Think Tank 3 thinks they are brilliant. They bought ads on Google (the ones that show up on the right of a search) for key phrases for searches for other hot shops. Here is their site: think tank 3 | a modern day think-shop
Note- no RSS feeds, pop-up windows- all the things that Google and blind people really don’t like.
If you look at how Google sees them by typing in site:thinktank3.com you will find they only have 51 results- many with the same headline. The OneShow thinks this idea of buying keywords was an innovative use of media- we say, it’s embarrasing. We can get to the top of search for free. The following is from their site- I can’t link to the exact page- because it’s a pop-up):
THINK TANK 3
This online campaign for and by Think Tank 3 is the first ever idea based campaign to run on Google, using Google’s ad-words program. Search marketing accounts for gazillions of dollars in online advertising and it had never been used to host an idea based campaign. That’s why our series of ads, which appear on Google when you type in searches like “Crispin Porter”, “Alex Bogusky”, “DDB”, “Modernista”, or “Kaplan Thaler,” stand out so much. It’s also the reason they were worthy of a One Show Merit Award for exceptional innovation in media.
We’ve gone from not showing up in search for Crispin Porter Bogusky to number 11 because we understand that content brings real results. Google AdWords is an expensive way to get people to your site. And once people get to your site- wouldn’t it be great if they could comment on it- or point to an exact part of it- so they can send it on to their friends. Sort of like what this site accomplishes? What do you think?
Business Week gives CP+B the title “The craziest ad guys in America”- when in fact, it’s the other agencies that are crazy. Corporate conglomerates have zero to do with creative solutions to business problems- they cause business problems.
When The Next Wave came into this world, we avoided the words “advertising” and “agency” for a reason- the solution isn’t always advertising (in fact, most of the time- it’s not advertising at all) and we’re not a temp agency to come in and solve your problems so that we can go on our way when the client thinks they have everything under control. We chose the words “marketing • innovation” because according to Peter Drucker- that’s all there is to business. Even our tagline sounds different than most agencies- “Create lust • Evoke trust”- that’s what it’s all about- but, maybe we should also add- “make buzz” - because as Alex Bogusky says “I like that they are talking about the work. If they aren’t talking, then your brand is dead.”
In the media multiverse, it’s impossible to stand out if you do work that doesn’t create an emotional response. CB+P is willing to risk alienating some customers in order to stimulate the core buyers. This is the absolute opposite of what the big corporate agencies are willing to do. They prefer to buy buzz- because they can mark it up- the problem is buzz can’t be bought anymore.
If there is one thing to be learned from Crispin’s work, it’s that every opportunity to open a discussion with the market is exploited- from bags and window decals, to rewriting employee manuals. Read the article from Business Week- and come back and share your observations about how they approach their clients’ challenges.
The idea of the 500 channel world should be long purged from anyone’s vocabulary at this point- there will be content to watch until the world goes into self-cleaning oven mode- or freezes over like a hockey rink- but, there may not be many humans in the actual show. Take a look at Animusic videos of music making machines- or go rent the movie “Final fantasy” or start looking into virtual worlds like “Second life” and you realize- we can do much cooler things in a virtual world. By taking scenes from video games to illustrate stories, Machinima, anyone with a creative bone in their body will be able to create stories with a look equivalent to a Hollywood movie.
The big question will remain- what to watch? This is where the power of crowds and agents of influence will come into play. The best advertising agencies will be the ones who can guide the masses into unwittingly being their agents of mass propaganda. Strike the right nerve- and the reaction is exponential compared to the force of the first strike.
The key to the future will be how will these provocateurs be paid- in the free wheeling virtual world? Agencies have relied on the idiotic media commission system for too long. Will it come down to some kind of pay-per-click (or the 2.0 version- commission on sale)- or some other formula?
Crispin Porter + Bogusky in Miami has started to take equity positions in companies they work with- which should make people in corporate marketing positions start wondering how long they will be able to hang on to their cushy “C” level jobs where they just play General to the mercenary agencies that are hired to do the job or be the scapegoats.
Big changes are coming- all thanks to the shift in power from the ones with the most money- to those with the best ideas- and tools that put the power in everyone’s hands.
Would you purposefully put something on your label or packaging to get people talking about your product? If you wouldn’t, you aren’t interested in getting the most buck for your marketing buck.
Tom Bihn Inc. decided to have a little fun with their care labels by putting something in the French part of the label that isn’t in the English- you can read their reply on the Urban References Page above- but the translation is something like: “we’re sorry our president is an idiot, we didn’t vote for him.”
I’m not going to make a guess if this is about President George W. Bush, or the company president “Tom Bihn” as the company claims- but, it has made it onto the Urban Legends Reference page (snopes.com) where people go to check out if an e-mail is a hoax or not.
Now, I’m writing about this in 2006, and the answer about this tag was answered in 2004- so you can see, a good stunt can keep working long after the initial buzz is over. There are people who probably would never buy a Tom Bihn bag because of the label, and there are others that absolutely would- but, here is the zinger- this little stunt probably made more people go look up Tom Bihn than could have possibly be accomplished any other way for a lot less money than a conventional ad campaign. That, my friend, is the premise of both a guerrilla campaign and a viral campaign- and that’s the kind of advertising we at The Next Wave like (make that love).
The Blogospher seminar was profiled today in the Dayton Daily News. The seminar teaches businesses how to use blog software (or content management system software) to manage content on their site and optimize it for search. One of the reasons this site has seen it’s average monthly unique visitor-ship rise over 800% is the use of WordPress to manage this part of the site.
It’s coming- and if you are a middleman in the content delivery system, watch out. To define middlemen: record labels, movie studios, television networks (cable, broadcast, pay-per-view)- the people who come between the content producers - and their audience. The only people who will still be able to profit from this are the quality aggregator distributors like the Apple iTunes store, Amazon and probably Google (who may or may not - own the online world in the near distant future).
Read the link above- to find out how an unknown, small time singer, gave a concert to 70,000 people from her basement. Even if this was a set-up by a label, there are enough nerdy music geeks out there that can figure out how to do this on their own.
Sandi Thom now has a number one UK single- just recently the hip-hop band Gnarls Brakley have a UK number 1 hit purely from downloads.
Music is driven by word-of-mouth and the preferences of the “early adopters/ innovators”- more so than other product or service categories. If you are trying to build a brand quickly- using good webstrategy can get you to the top quicker than conventional media. If you don’t believe it, go ask Sandi Thom.
