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If you’ve been following this blog or if you’ve spent any time on our Web site, you know that Bizo has a deep commitment to transparency. We built this company around the idea that it was possible to target advertising without compromising anyone’s privacy. (Read more about that here and here.)

But lately we’ve been thinking about what it might look like if we were to take transparency even further in the online ad space. What would it be like if with every ad you saw online, you knew exactly how and why it found its way to your screen?

Title: Caroussel

Title: Gorilla

Title: Lamp

Title: Generic

Copy: "Ads of the World - Entrust your good stuff"

The campaign references the following ads:
Cadbury "Gorilla" film
Ikea "Lamp" film
Sony "bravia" film
Philips "Caroussel" film
Nova Radio "Le grand Mix" prints
Lego "Imagine" prints
Greenpeece "Boomerang" prints

Advertising Agency: 1789, Andorra
Creative Directors: Baptiste Clinet, Jo Dubruque, Nicolas Lautier
Photographer: Louis Vincent
Production: A Present Paris
Retoucher: Wiloneo

The rating is based on many factors including incoming links, user activity, traffic and other subjective and non-subjective measures.

This result couldn't have been achieved without you. A big thanks goes out to you and I hope I can rely on your help in 2010 as well!

Experiments with Mentos crowned online game changer of the decade

London, 21 December 2009: GoViral, Europe’s leading distributor of online branded content, announced today that ‘Mentos experiments with Diet Coke’ by Eepybird has topped a poll of 1,099 people to find the most significant online marketing campaign of the decade.

Closely following Eepybird’s experiments was Dove’s ‘Evolution’ campaign in second with ‘Will it Blend’ by Blendtec coming in third (top ten below).

40 campaigns were shortlisted by a panel of digital and online advertising experts including Ajaz Ahmed, founder AKQA, Martin Bailie, head of planning at Glue, Jason Goodman, founder of Albion, Hugo Drayton, CEO at Inskin Media, journalist Gareth Jones and GoViral Chairman Jimmy Maymann. The campaigns were then put to a vote through a global online panel.

Maymann said, “Mentos experiments with Diet Coke by Eepybird was incredibly popular. But what made it a game changer was that initially Mentos and Diet Coke didn’t know about it. It proved conclusively that in the internet age, when it’s so easy for people to create content and broadcast it, brands no longer have full control over their marketing. It also proved that brands who embrace what’s happening around them in social media can go on to achieve incredible results.”

TOP 10 CAMPAIGNS 2000 - 2009

1. 2006: Eepybird.com - Mentos + Diet Coke experiments
(Nominated by: Jimmy Maymann)
This campaign was never planned, neither by The Coca Cola Company nor Mentos. It started out as an experiment by Eepybird. A qualified guess would be that more than 60 million people have seen the clips that made Eepybird, Coke and Mentos internet stars.

1. Find the right place to gain as much experience as possible in the shortest amount of time. This may mean a hot-shop independent agency, a large multinational or hopping jobs every 2 years depending on the available options you may have.
2. Work somewhere that's worthy of your time and talent. Don't settle for any job.
3. Put more effort into your job than expected and do it cheerfully.
4. Become the most positive and enthusiastic adman in the agency.
5. Be forgiving of yourself and others. We're humans and we make mistakes even when we only have good intentions. Don't allow such mistakes make you lose sight of long term goals.
6. Be generous with your contributions to the team's work. Do not try to take credit for every idea you came up with.
7. Persistence, persistence, persistence. Great work never just falls into your lap. You need to work for it, refine it, perfect it.
8. If you clearly see you're going into the wrong direction with your strategy do not be afraid to stop and rethink everything even if it means you have to start everything from scratch.
9. Discipline yourself to save money on even a modest salary. This will give you the freedom to change jobs when things go bad and will allow you to take meaningful holidays that refresh your mind and body.
10. Commit yourself to constant improvement. Technology and the industry is developing really fast. You have to keep up.
11. Commit yourself to quality. Do not ever settle for something less than your outmost best. Perfect your work till time allows.
12. Your professional happiness isn't based on the number of awards or how much you make, but on the relationships you have with your colleagues and clients. Treat them with respect.
13. Be loyal to your clients and your agency. It will be appreciated even by the competition.
14. Be honest with your work. Never lie or mislead the consumer. If you do you will feel miserable about your profession.
15. Be a self-starter. If you identify an idea take charge and go for it.
16. Do not blame others. If you're unhappy about something take the initiative to change instead of whining about it.
17. Be decisive even if it means you'll sometimes be wrong. Timing is everything in advertising.
18. Be bold and courageous with your work. When you look back on your professional life, you will regret the the things you didn't do more than the one you did.
19. Do not overestimate the value of formal education. Most successful adman never had formal advertising eduction. Real work experience is more valuable than any education.
20. Eat healthy, do sports. Your mind and body are your only tools available to you. Do not abuse substances. Save them for those critical special times when you really need a boost.
21. Don't take all advice for granted. Pick what's useful for you. Make up your own rules and change them at your will.

You can watch AotW's YouTube Channel right here on AotW or on YouTube. Here are the top ads from 2009 ranked by number of views. These ads qualify as virals.

#1: NMCU (Norwegian Motorcycle Union): Bugs

09 December 2009, Amsterdam - Swedish software company BURT, co-founded by Gustav von Sydow and Gustav Martner, ECD of Crispin Porter + Bogusky Europe, releases a free version of its online campaign analytics product this week. This pioneering product development has a waiting list of 900 agencies, which essentially helps creatives to be the best they can be.

The product, Rich, is aimed at creative agencies and has been incubated at Daddy, the Swedish creative agency which was acquired by CP+B in June, becoming CP+B Europe. The main idea for Rich is to provide a more efficient feedback loop for copywriters, art directors and other creatives. so that they can learn from their previous work.

New York, NY - November 12, 2009: International Awards Group announced the Call for Entries for its new competition, the Hive Awards, on Thursday, November 12th. The recently launched Hive Awards, honoring the unsung heroes of the internet, was created by noted blogger and digital strategist Alan Wolk to reward the coders, programmers, content developers, strategists and planners for their innovation and creativity within their industry. As Executive Director of the newly unveiled competition, Wolk is the driving force behind this premier award show.

Political correctness—and the scrutiny of language it spawned—might not be the cultural neurosis it was in the early 90’s, but we’re still sensitive to it. Except when it comes to certain brand names. These names, like all brand names, are able to acquire their own meaning and associations over time. But taken out of their fuzzy, protective brand context, they have unintended—and often unfortunate—associations.

Without further ado, here is a short list of brand names whose questionable derivations many of us tend to forget or ignore.

Banana Republic

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary provides the following definition: “a small dependent country usually of the tropics; especially: one run despotically.” A pejorative expression, “banana republic” connotes human and environmental rights violations, foreign exploitation, and dictatorships. We think merino V-neck sweaters and sheath dresses.

Great stories from the people who lived them; tightly edited and well-paced; fascinating study of creative process.

New York, NY – November 9, 2009: The Global Awards, honoring creative and marketing excellence in healthcare communications worldwide, announced its 2009 award winners. This year’s Global Awards Grand Jury awarded two prestigious Grand Global Awards, forty Global Awards, and one hundred nineteen Finalist Certificates. The Global Awards and Bravo!, a group of Australia healthcare specialists, celebrated this year’s award recipients at the Global Awards presentation in Sydney, Australia.

On November 4th, the Advertising Agency Association of BC (AAABC) announced the winners of the 2009 Lotus Awards in Vancouver. The Lotus Awards are one of Canada’s most anticipated advertising and marketing awards shows because of the depth of creative talent in the Vancouver market.

For the third year in a row, top honours for "Best of Show" went to TBWA\Vancouver, for the Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF).

I've increased the size of images that you see when you click the thumbnails from 460px to 590px. I experimented a lot and found this to be the optimal size for most screens, which are growing in size significantly in the last few month. Hope you will get to like this change.

Thanks for being a reader of Ads of the World!

The name as we use it is a Scottish shortening of "allhallow-even" ("even" meaning "evening") and dates from 1745.

"Allhallow-even" was itself a variation of "All Hallows’ eve," which dates from the mid-16th century and marked the last night of the year in the old Celtic calendar. The Irish, being a superstitious people, claimed "Old Year's Night," as it was also known on the calendar, was a time for witches. In addition, the ancient Gaels of Ireland believed that on the night of October 31 (the end of the annual harvest), the boundary between the living and the dead was dissolved. The dead would rise from their graves to damage crops, spread illness, and wreak havoc.

Irish and Scottish immigrants brought versions of their Halloween traditions to the US in the nineteenth century. These included jack-o'-lanterns, which originated in Europe and were first carved not from pumpkins, but turnips and rutabagas. The Celts believed the head was the most powerful part of the body, and so created "heads" out of root vegetables to ward off evil. Pumpkins were used in the United States because they were larger and more plentiful.

Boo.

In this post you can read the second chapter free from the book The Next Evolution of Marketing: Connect with Your Customers by Marketing with Meaning, written by Bob Gilbreath, Chief Marketing Strategist at Bridge Worldwide.

The book introduces a new marketing model (Marketing with Meaning) that people choose to engage with and ultimately improves their lives. In a nut-shell, the book shows that the most effective way to earn the trust and attention of today’s cynical customer is to add meaning to their lives instead of bombarding them with meaningless messages. Please let me know if you’re interested and would consider writing a review on your blog.

What marketing with meaning can do for you

What if we started over? What if we threw out the textbooks and the flowcharts and rose above the snazzy jingle, the celebrity bribe, the empty sizzle, and the ad accost? What if we stopped trying (and failing) to be all things to all people and instead tried to create some- thing of meaning? What if we stopped interrupting people to tell them how great our products are and actually did something to prove our greatness?

I believe that in a world in which consumers can actively choose to avoid marketing, the only way to win is to create marketing that they actively choose to engage with. Akin to the industry-altering significance of direct marketing in the 1950s and permission marketing in the 1990s, marketing with meaning is the next logical step in an evolutionary process. If direct marketing was about approaching strangers individually, and permission marketing was about turning strangers into friends and friends into customers, marketing with meaning is about improving customers’ lives through the marketing itself.

London, 26 October 2009 – The organisers of the Eurobest Festival, honouring advertising creative excellence across Europe, are pleased to announce the introduction, from 2009, of the new Advertiser of the Year award.

The prestigious Eurobest Advertiser of the Year award will be presented to advertisers who have distinguished themselves for inspiring innovative marketing of their products and who embrace and encourage the creative work produced by their agencies. This award will be presented for the first time to Guinness, a brand which not only commemorates 250 years of existence, but also this year celebrates 80 years of iconic advertising campaigns which have played a significant role in its history.

New features give mobile marketers more flexibility and better customer behavior tracking within SMS marketing campaigns

Arlington, VA – October 20, 2009 – 2ergo, a leading global provider of mobile products and services, today announced the launch of its new Mobile Messaging Click-Through Tracking technology that allows marketers to more easily measure the success of their SMS-based mobile marketing campaigns. With 2ergo’s new technology, marketers can track exactly how and when consumers are interacting with the SMS messages they receive, including the number of total and unique click-throughs to a mobile website, mobile page views, user flow, and the time and date of each interaction.

While today the suit in ad agencies is reserved for the... well "suits" (aka account executives), yet this wasn't always the case. If you watched the show Mad Men, you would notice how elegant creatives were a few decades ago.

This is not to say there is anything wrong with being dressed in jeans and a colorful shirt, but in my opinion there are times when a good suit can do good. For example when you're presenting to a major bank executive or meeting your new pharma client. Some of the business people don't get that informal dressing doesn't meant informal work. And, we're all about perception, right?

In what could possibly be the largest offer for a single Internet banner advertisement, Twitter has just been offered a princely sum for just one day of advertising on the site.

Marketing company uSocial.net, who provide a service selling followers on Twitter, have just offered the social media site $500,000 U.S. dollars if Twitter will allow them to place a banner ad on the site for a time period of 24 hours.

“While half-a-million dollars may seem like a large amount to invest in one banner for one day, we believe that the investment will be more than worth it.” Said uSocial.net CEO Leon Hill.

Twitter as yet do not offer any kind of advertising on the site, so the move by uSocial may well end up leading to some of the first paid ads on the site. However, it is unsure as to whether Twitter will respond favourably as they may not agree with the content being advertised.

More information on the service uSocial is hoping to promote on Twitter can be found by going to http://usocial.net/twitter_marketing.

The world of online advertising is rapidly changing. The types of campaigns that affiliates have historically made money on are being driven out of existence, leaving affiliates with two choices: risk prosecution trying to milk a dying market, or join the new breed of companies elevating the industry and prospects by offering real brand name brands and real consumer value.

Guest post by: David Rogers is the Executive Director of the Center on Global Brand Leadership at Columbia Business School.

After 25 years, we still don't understand what the Internet is.

At least that is the more charitable view of the Federal Trade Commission's new regulations that will fine bloggers who endorse a product without disclosing any free samples or other compensation that they received.

To attempt to regulate speech (however sleazy and deceptive) on "blogs" is not at all equivalent to regulating speech on radio or television. What it is equivalent to is trying to regulate all speech printed on paper – newspapers, office memos, classroom handouts, post-its, and handwritten notes on your kitchen fridge.

Three students launches D&AD Creative Search as a tool for other students during the D&AD Students Award 2010.

The Internet has a huge role in the everyday life of creatives. We use services such as Google, Wikipedia, YouTube, Twitter, blogs and news sites are something that we use everyday. It’s very easy to become overwhelmed with information when we perform a simple search on a new subject. This demands more mental activity than necessary in order to sort the results. D&AD Creative Search sifts through results from the major services we all have daily contact with. You get a simple, flexible, and structured overview of your search. The results can provide new angles as you see the subject yield images, texts, films and music in the same place.

During the coming month Creative Search will launch more exciting features and services.

Creative Search is created by: Peter Prinz, Kaspar Prinz and Philip Cristofor Beckmans College of Design, Sweden

Visit: http://www.creativesear.ch

Instruction video:

In Advertising we always try to find the next big, hip cool way to advertise our products.

We are in a constant battle to get more people talking about our products & brands and to find new ways that haven’t been done before.

Recently I came across a young, hip company that offers a brand new technology that can do just that. CamSpace is a promising technology company from Israel. It has developed a unique platform, based on computer vision that turns any object or product (tub of yogurt, can, box, bottle, etc) into an interactive computer controller and that lets the controller operate games and experiences. The platform knows how to detect a particular brand of product and you can even use just your hands to navigate through a website! You can run this technology in POS, outside activities and the internet which give you an interesting cross media and platform solution.

Demonstration of the technology:

New York, NY - October 5, 2009: New York Festivals 2010 International Advertising Awards officially announced its Call for Entries on Monday, October 5th. For 53 years, NYF’s International Advertising Awards has honored the World’s Best Work™ in all media from 71 countries around the world: television, cinema, print, outdoor, interactive, design, mixed media, collateral, radio and student advertising.

New York Festivals online judging system ensures that each entry receives the proper amount of time and attention, in an environment that is free from outside distractions and unsolicited opinions. The online judging system is the first line of defense against “scam ads”. Judges are allowed to “flag” a suspected scam ad simply by checking a box when viewing an entry online. NYF Grand Jury members are encouraged to write confidential comments online to support their suspicions, once entries are flagged, an investigation into the allegations will commence.

Leo Burnett Forms Integrated Iberian Regional Leadership Team

CHICAGO – Oct. 9, 2009 – Following his dynamic success as the General Creative Director of Leo Burnett Lisbon, Leo Burnett Worldwide today announced that Chacho Puebla will now serve as the Executive Creative Director for the newly formed Leo Burnett Iberia.

Since taking the creative helm at Leo Burnett Lisbon, Puebla reached global acclaim by winning eleven Lions at this year’s Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, an honor he shared with Tura, his faithful companion and the most awarded creative dog in the world.
Due in large part to Puebla’s creative leadership, Leo Burnett Lisbon earned the title of the 7th Most Creative Agency in the world, according to the 2009 Creativity Report.

"Chacho is a world class creative and a new breed of integrated thinker,” said Mark Tutssel, Global Chief Creative Officer of Leo Burnett Worldwide. “His stellar, award-winning performance over the last few years is testimony to his outstanding creative talent. Under his leadership and Tura’s magnetic personality, I look forward to Leo Burnett Iberia reaching new heights of creativity in the future.”

Known for his creative spark and unrelenting passion, Puebla was a natural fit for the recently established Leo Burnett Iberia management team. He joins Isabel Ontoso, the new Regional President of Iberia, and Miguel Simoes, Director of New Business for the Iberian Region, who will also continue to serve as the Managing Director for Leo Burnett Lisbon.

Giorgio Brenna, President of Leo Burnett Europe, echoed Tutssel’s confidence: “I have tremendous faith in the talents of Isabel, Chacho, Miguel and their teams and know that they will successfully lead this ambitious Iberian project for Leo Burnett.”

New York, NY – October 7, 2009: The Global Awards, honoring creative and marketing excellence in healthcare communications, and Bravo!, a group of Australian healthcare specialists, have joined forces to celebrate the competition’s 2009 award winners at the World Premier Global Awards gala in Sydney Australia. The awards presentation will take place on Friday November 6, 2009 at bel mondo, located in Sydney’s historic Rocks area. The event opens with a cocktail and canapés reception followed by an awards ceremony. Michael Demetriades, Executive Director of The Global Awards, will present the trophies to the international award winners. The event will be sponsored by Medical Observer, Julie Dang & Associates, SMC People, Mail Marketing Works IDS, Momentum and the AFA.

Adapted from How To Write An Inspired Creative Brief (iUniverse.com)
By Howard Ibach
Dateline: October 5, 2009

It turns out that no two briefs look exactly alike. That’s good.

It speaks well for a document that it can be so important and still be adaptable. It’s organic, not static. (And it’s not rocket science!)

The creative briefs you’ll review here are, quite simply, well-written and inspired documents. And they’re different in one way or another from each other.

But pay close attention to what they have in common. And to the vocabulary used by the writers to answer each section. These examples are from UK agencies. The UK is the birthplace of the art and science of account planning. Many believe that our British cousins are the finest creative-brief writers on the planet. I agree.

It’s my job to help correct this imbalance. Beginning with you. Let’s examine each brief for its strengths and, if we can find them, weaknesses.

Read the full article on Graphics.com.

Amsterdam, 23 September 2009 – DAY Creative Business Partners in Amsterdam (www.day.nu) has designed the first Nike Sportswear pilot store in Europe. The store, opening in Paris this month, is the first of a series throughout Europe launched by Nike Sportswear, a new division of Nike.

New York, NY – September 28, 2009: New York Festivals hosted the 2009 International Advertising Awards World Tour Ceremony on Monday, September 21st at Madrid’s Museo Del Traje. The event, showcasing the “World’s Best Advertising™”, was one of five international awards ceremonies presented by NYF, and the first awards ceremony held by NYF in Spain. Telecinco’s sports anchor Sara Carbonero hosted the awards presentation, featuring a screening of the 2009 NYF Advertising Awards Gold Winners, awards ceremony and cocktail party. The spotlight was on the winning work of advertising agencies from Spain, Portugal, and Europe. Eight Gold World Medals, eight Silver and thirteen Bronze were awarded at the gala event.

Madrid photos with Sara Carbonero

Catalogue Autumn-Winter 2009/2010
Client: Meltin' Pot
Agency: Armando Testa Turin
Exec Creative Director: Michele Mariani
Creative Director: Luca Cortesini
Art director: Daniel Cambò
Photographer: Winkler+Noah

I’ll admit it upfront, so diehard fans of AMC’s Mad Men are forewarned: I’m one of the few people who’s not completely infatuated with the show. But as someone who does branding for a living, I’m intrigued by how it reconstructs the ethos of an era using brands and pop cultural references.

The launch of the new www.your-life.com website has created a platform accessible to users worldwide and brought the motto „Talk Contraception“ to life, through worldwide events both online and offline.

The event kicked off yesterday with a live worldwide interactive Online Press Conference involving journalists from all over the world, where the online youth survey „Talking Sex and Contraception“ was premiered.

Berlin, September 24th, 2009 – At the core of the concept, as conceived of by KREATIVEKONZEPTION*, is the formation of a Web 2.0 community where young people can interactively deal with issues and questions related to love, sexuality and contraception. This direct interaction makes the message „Let’s talk about it“ a hands-on reality, and keeps it alive even after World Contraception Day 2009 on September 26th.

I read the terms "virals", "viral ads", "viral videos" everywhere used incorrectly.

The so called viral ads are advertisements that are created with the intention to be distributed through social media channels, such as video sharing sites, blogs, traditional news channels and any other non-payed media. These ads usually feature content that is funny, unusually helpful, amazing, surprising or controversial in nature. The main advantage of such distribution is the low or non-existent media cost. Secondarily, these ads are usually introduced to the consumer by their friends, which makes the context more personal and thus the viewer will be more perceptive to the message.

However these ads most of the time should not be called virals. Going viral means the ad has been distributed by a significantly high number of people through various channels. What constitutes a high number is a subjective matter, but clearly something that got 1000 views on YouTube did not yet go viral. Viral starts at tens of thousands of views or impressions.

Instead of the incorrect term "viral ads" for ads created for the social space, I would like to coin the phrase "social ad", which is more descriptive in my opinion and doesn't depend on how much the ad was distributed.

In the event a social ad gets shared extensively the adjective viral can be added. Proper use would be "social ad that went viral", "viral social ad" or it can be simply shortened to "viral ad".

I would suggest put the minimum number of views or impressions for social ads created for an international audience at 100,000 uniques before it can be called a viral. On a national level depending on the size of the subculture even 10,000 uniques can be enough to qualify.

Let me know what you think!

Update: I removed the block until I can find a smarter way to do it. All is back to way it was before.

I am experimenting with blocking hotlinking of images from Ads of the World because of excessive bandwidth usage. I would like to get your opinion on this measure.

Hotlinking is when somebody posts an image on his site by copying the url of the image instead of copying the image itself. Therefore every time somebody looks at his site the images are served from Ads of the World servers instead of his own server. With the block in place they will see a placeholder image (see on the right), which is only 7K instead of several hundred Kilobytes.

Our bandwidth is going over 3 Terabytes a month and a big percentage of it is a result of hotlinking. We love the fact that people share our content, but sometimes our servers are strained and we get no links back in return. It's a measure I really don't want to take, but forced to.

Most blogs copy the images and upload them to their own servers and link back to AotW and this is the ethical and correct way to do.

If you have no means to upload your own images or you have a problem with this new policy because of historical reasons, please let me know and I will add your site to the list of sites who are excepted from this block.

We only want to block abusers, not our fellow advertising bloggers. So we're currently looking into other more efficient ways to do this in order to prevent abuse, but allow reasonable amount of hotlinking.

Thank you for your understanding!

There’s one indisputable truth about brand naming: your name is only as good as your company, product, or service. Consumers rarely invest in something based solely on the perceived quality of its name. They invest in a product’s or brand’s reputation. Names can influence purchase decisions, but they don’t unilaterally prevent or guarantee them.

Which leads us to the phenomenon of brand names that go bad.

In the 1950s, a top US automaker decided to elevate one of its existing brands to the level of luxury car, creating room for a new sub-luxury brand. The company did its due diligence and came up with a plan. The brand would represent a new business division. It would place the parent company in a parity position with other major US automakers.

The car launched with significant fanfare. But in just a few short years, the party was over. The company was Ford, and the brand was Edsel—a name that has become synonymous with colossal public failure. Speculation as to why the Edsel failed is endless. But one thing is fairly certain: it wasn’t because of the name alone. If that was the case, then brands like DeSoto, Chrysler, Buick, Cadillac—names that are no more or less odd-sounding than Edsel—would have failed just as quickly.

Consumer research done after the Edsel proved unpopular revealed, among other things, that the name was a problem. That’s a bit of a post-rationalization. What’s more likely is the car was a flop and took its name down with it. If the car had been a popular success, the brand name would be upheld as an example of how an unusual family name (Edsel Ford was the car’s namesake) can have breakthrough brand significance and stimulate record sales.