Don't cover it up

Having three daughters myself this put a shiver down my spine.

YouTube makeup star Lauren Luke, a UK personality with almost half a million subscribers and more than 125 million video views, took a break from her regular tips on covering up in her latest video. The self-taught makeup artist encourages teen girls and women not to hide evidence of domestic abuse in her latest post, “How to look your best the morning after.”

This is such a powerful piece of communication, love how they use a make up tutorial via YT as a way to get their message out there, perfect in every way. Beautifully simple and yet so powerful.
 

Show your support by sharing this video. For help in the UK: Refuge UK and for help in Australia

Poster with bite

Love this little number,  simple, graphic and very eye catching, all the ingredients of a great idea.

I also like ideas that use the media too, well done, nice work.

Why brands should care?

Do you remember when you were a kid there was always one kid, who was a spiteful git and by his very nature greedy, always took and gave nothing back. Their response if someone pulled them up, with vented spleen they would reply; ‘I don’t care. We all disliked those kids and over time they would lose friends, and they became the outcasts in the playground.

These kids never had any empathy towards others. As human beings we warm to people who show empathy and these principles are the same for all brands, more so now were a brands actions are for all to see via online.  So why do so many brands totally ignore this human trait?

But they’re companies that genuinely do care beyond selling products take the company Seeds Of Change: http://www.seedsofchange.com here’s a company that 3:1% of net sales go towards promoting the use of sustainable agricultural practices. In 2010 the company used this to support three apprentices for a UK charity; Garden Organic.

They also set up a school programs around ‘Sowing millions, growing millions’ where they helped teach children where food comes from, the best foods to eat, they also went one step further by helping kids to sow and grow organic school gardens. Many of these gardens are in urban areas which have a very poor social demographic, where most kids would be lucky to get one meal a day. Now there’s a company that stands for something, they want to help others.

According to research from Havas Media, which tapped into 14 countries and looked into 300 brands, from a sample of 50,000 people, improving people’s collective wellbeing is imperative for brands. From the research 57% feel that they can make a company behave more responsibly, they feel as a collective they have a say on how a company should conduct itself.

And there’s a connection with the growth of so many social conscious organisations sites like Brand Karma and Kiva.

Brand Karma is giving the power to the people, they now have a collective voice on how companies should act and if they don’t act in a responsible manner they tell others and they all then boycott the brand.

The site http://brandkarma.com/ looks at brands in how good their products, are, how well they treat people and how well they look after the planet, good or bad it’s all there for people to see. There’s no hiding place.

Kiva http://www.kiva.org/ is another organisation that has grown out of caring, but takes a slightly different approach, quite simply they leverage the web and worldwide network of microfinance institutions to help other small businesses, especially women. Since Kiva was founded in 2005, they have 771,590 Kiva lenders with a staggering $317 million in loans given out with an equally impressive 98.94% repayment rate.  Dermalogica the skin care brand in the US is heavily active in Kiva http://www.dermalogica.com/au/fite/index.html and all new employees become part of the Kiva program. Question why wasn’t this started by a bank?

Interesting and much more worrying for many brands is the view that 70% of people surveyed would not care two hoots if brands disappeared completely, according to

Havas Media brands are becoming increasingly irrelevant to people;  ‘We need a new way to measure and build brand value’

So what can brands do? Quite simply, brands who haven’t in place a ‘caring policy’ should get one and get one quickly, believe in something, something that is genuinely going to help people, this needs planning and put into action from key staff. This has to come from the top down where everyone in the company believes and knows that the company they work for is doing something for the better.

This doesn’t mean getting people to ‘like’ your brand or a cheap giveaway, this has to be something much more tangible and it needs to be an ongoing outlook it goes beyond marketing, it’s about a belief.  It’s about a shared value, for instance take Pedigree Dog Food's shared value in the belief that every dog deserves a loving home, they don’t just flog dog food, yes that’s the long term goal by association but they know to get people to respond in a positive manner towards them first a brand needs to clearly communicate a brands philosophy or higher purpose.

Shared values are the new currency and brands with a social conscious are the ones that will be of value to people’s lives, the others will slowly disappear from people’s life’s as people couldn’t care less what they have to offer or eventually have to say.

You can follow me @kevinferry

Imagine another great ad by Lego

Creativity and the Lego brand go together well just like LEGO itself and here's another example of their creativity Using the medium to full effect by using their surrounding environment as part of the composition.  The bus shelter ads titled 'Whale', 'Caterpillar', and 'Monster' was created by Ogilvy Malaysia, lovely creative work, create and play.

Genius

View the ad here 

When I saw this and when the super appeared I laughed my head off. This is so beautiful and well shot, the cast and music, everything I love it. Hat tip to the director Jonathan Gurvit (Mercurio Cinematografica) and the creative's @ Italian agency Armando Testa.

Ideas- it makes you think

Read brief, read brief again - Go for a run, swim, walk, play monsters with the kids, read brief again, read books and blogs, watch films, watch everyday people going about their everyday lives, sit with the cat, read brief, eat cake and drink coffee. Then I begin to doodle, if I'm relaxed, ideas then flow- I usually start by word mappiing - then doodles - then ideas, then scamps.Read brief, read brief again - Go for a run, swim, walk, play monsters with the kids, read brief again, read books and blogs, watch films, watch everyday people going about their everyday lives, sit with the cat, read brief, eat cake and drink coffee. Then I begin to doodle, if I'm relaxed, ideas then flow- I usually start by word mappiing - then doodles - then ideas, then scamps.

Us and US - XL and XXXL

We all know the US have the highest food consumption in the world and Australia is wobbling close behind. Just looking at the stats below it's scary to think we are all eating ourselves to death, we need to start putting a 'fat attack' plan in place, what would you start doing now?
Created by: MedicalCodingCareerGuide.com

Kraft very much Likey

Now here's a nice simple idea that me likey very much, I like when brands reward people for their interaction it's much warmer and you like the brand even more. Kraft asked fans to “LIKE this post” and told them that they “never know what may happen”. Almost 5,000 took a punt and liked the post and in return Kraft said thank you with the aid of The YellowJackets a capella group. They called it “Likeappella – Mac & cheese likes you back”. The brand posted the video in a follow-up post: “We LOVE it when you LIKE our posts. So we’re showing you some love back with a song personalized for you, our fans.” Nice work Crispin Porter + Bogusky. Like it alot, enough of the like gags.

Cool Tool for Social Media Monitoring

Whether you want to do research on a current topic or track a future event, Hash Tracking is your tool to do it. Let’s say you are going to Blog World. Simply enter the hash tag and Hash Tracking will start tracking as the conversation with that hash tag starts. But you can also run custom reports on hash tags, like “networking”:

With the data reports you can see who is using that tag, total tweet impressions and reach, total tweets and a complete transcript of all tweets. Who should use Hash Tracking and why: This is another great tool for the marketing professional who wants to gather information in tweets and links from the social web on a particular topic, who the influencers in that topic are and seeing the reach for that topic. Insights might lead you to plan where you will focus your social campaigns.

Creative Data teams

Last night I was over at LBi shiny new offices for our monthly IAB Creative Social #cs, it was very inspiring and thought provoking, with our key speaker Chris Clarke the ECD from their London office, sharing his thoughts over pizza and beer with much of the talk around how digital is shaping up. One topic that we touched upon was around the subject of 'emotional storytelling' and how as clients and agencies the old model of rational responses really doesn't stack up anymore in the digital arena. (I personally never really bought into that approach from the start). Instead people will be more than likely react to something purely on an emotional level.
but what was interesting was the fact that as agencies we must as creatives embrace and harness data. For us to truly get the big slices of the pie when it comes to the marketing dollars, we need to work our ideas and thinking around the data that others collect, it will be our job to dovetail that into our thoughts, the double edge sword for all agencies is that this can be expensive, and very time consuming, just trawling through the amount of data out there is such a massive task for agencies and client, many feel they are been swapped with the data, the trick for us; is how can we decode that data, and attach our thinking around the data. It’s that moment when people are at their most receptive and have that emotional pull towards a brand. That for me is the next big challenge for many agencies. And no I don’t just mean producing infographics and doing straw polls they don’t count, but mass data analyst does.
Other points that I took out:
• People aren’t in control, platforms are the ones in control - the likes of Facebook and co dictate how you see things.
• According to Paul Adam at Facebook 70% of our conversations is talking about other people (negative and positive)
• People haven't the mass group of friends that they can influence, in fact the opposite is true, for example the average Joe, you and I have only really 5 friends that we share and can influence.

Makes you think

I will leave you with a truly inspiring read that was read out at the IAB Creative Social last night. This is for all you creative's who sometimes need reminding why we do what we do- if you feel the urge to read out aloud at a client meeting then feel free.

We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams.
World-losers and world-forsakers,
Upon whom the pale moon gleams;
Yet we are the movers and shakers,
Of the world forever, it seems.

With wonderful deathless ditties
We build up the world's great cities,
And out of a fabulous story
We fashion an empire's glory:
One man with a dream, at pleasure,
Shall go forth and conquer a crown;
And three with a new song's measure
Can trample an empire down.

We, in the ages lying
In the buried past of the earth,
Built Nineveh with our sighing,
And Babel itself with our mirth;
And o'erthrew them with prophesying
To the old of the new world's worth;
For each age is a dream that is dying,
Or one that is coming to birth. T

William Edgar O'Shaughnessy

What happened to the Super heros?

Even superheros need to keep fit- kids keep active

I love stats and not take life to seriously

Not a single one of your ancestors has ever failed in getting laid (Most people on tumblr will probably break the chain)

I love this stat as it makes me laugh and here's some more:

If you are 80 years old, you have lived through over 1/3 of America’s history

At one point, you were the youngest person in the world.

If a woman who is an only child has all boys (or no children at all), they are ending a chain of women that has been going since we were single-celled organisms.

The average human is a 28 year old Chinese man.

Dinosaurs were alive for longer than they have been extinct.

You breathe using just one nostril, then switch to the other 30 minutes later. Repeats for life. (After reading this pay attention)

In 30 or 40 years, people will be having 2000s parties. Just like now people throw “dress like the 70s” parties.

John Lennon is part of a group that has sold more CD’s than anyone else in the history of human life, and he never knew what a CD even was.

Grossness and morals define each other. For example, you won’t spit in the mouth of your girlfriend, yet you will kiss her.

You spend years seeing the same people often and you’ll never exchange words with them.

People hundreds of years from now will stumble upon your image without thought or emotion.

Everyone dies within six months of their birthday.

50% of all doctors graduated in the lower half of their class.

Mammals are just containers water uses to move itself from one place to another.

Many peoples most cherished beliefs come from 1st century writers and religious fanatics whose understanding of the natural world was below the level of a modern 5 year old.

The “food pyramid” that most of us grew up with was published by the US dept of agriculture. Their job is to promote agriculture, not to promote healthy eating.

80% of the images on the internet are of naked women.

If we ever meet superior aliens they will simply classify us under “violent, irrational apes” and will not be amazed by our art or philosophies, the same way we boringly classify newly discovered animals every year.

When the sun goes out, our descendants that watch it go out won’t be human.

When you’re about to die, you’ll regret all the days you took for granted.

The youngest mother in medical history was 5 years old. It makes you wonder about the generation gap for the people around you. Your best friend could be a thousand generations ahead of you. Your boss could be a hundred generations behind you. Makes sense considering he’s an asshole.

We magnify the differences between us, instead of the things that make us similar. You are not really any different than anyone else on earth that is your age, yet you feel like you are just because they speak a different language, eat different food, worship a different imaginary creature, or live somewhere else. In reality, we are all the same species living on the same planet. To bears, we probably look exactly the same.

(Source: iampitchforkmedia http://iampitchforkmedia.tumblr.com/post/4680491655/things-youve-probably-never-thought-about