Pixels from the Edge » Digital Advertising

Measuring Social Media Efforts

Richie — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:50:03 +0000

Measuring the success of social media efforts can be automated to a certain extent, but also needs human analysis to really be able to assess the tone and brand positioning across the various targeted social media platforms. There is no industry standard for measurement and ROI but the introduction of standardized measurement by UKOM in the UK may lead to better benchmarks.

Before a campaign starts its goals need to be properly understood:

If the goal is qualitative then we consider the campaign a success if we have been successful in building better relationships with our key audiences, have been able to participate in conversations where we previously lacked a voice, and if we were able to engage in a meaningful dialogue with our customers.

If the goals are quantitative then assessing the results can be more automated as we can use analytics to measure traffic, Feedburner to measure the reach of our feeds and podcasts, YouTube to determine how successful our videos have been, Facebook to determine the popularity of our apps, Delicious and other bookmarking sites to measure the popularity of our content, and work with the various search engines to see how much we are mentioned and linked to, and to see if our rankings have improved.

It is important to measure sentiment before, during, and after campaigns, this can be somewhat automated with a tool such as BuzzMetrics. Measuring constantly during the campaign allows us to react quickly to counter a negative reaction or enhance a positive one, maximizing opportunities and driving strategy.

De-Branding Myself

Richie — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 12:58:00 +0000

So here I am, I’m 32 years old and I’ve been on the web forever, shit before the web even really existed I was gophering German university FTP servers for pictures of Claudia Schiffer. And what do I have to show for myself now, for all my years of online service? Who the hell am I online? londonstreetlife? Really??? Now that I can finally see it for what it is, it really is all kinds of lame. A buddy of mine got an iPhone last year and my phone broke so he lent me his old phone, he was all about keeping that sweet sony walkman phone in good condition incase he ever needed it again, which included leaving it in some orange case to keep it safe, I thought it was ugly but I was like whatever, I needed a phone. Then one day at the bar he sees me with the phone in the case and all he can say is ‘I never realized how much of a fool I looked going around with that phone!’ And that’s just about where I’m at right now, I’ve seen myself in the mirror carrying that lame ass phone in that ugly ass case, except it’s not a phone it’s my online brand, and it’s way lamer than that phone in that case ever was.

Lame-ass phone in ugly-ass case

I am a Techie

In fairness to myself there is a history behind “londonstreetlife”. See originally I was just a kid screwing around online, flaming and win-nuking in the chat rooms, and I fancied myself as a bit of a hacker dabbling in some buffer overloading and shit. And at the time I was just “streetlife”, and as a nick back then it worked, everyone had handles like that. And to be honest I think I could still work with that name if I’d managed to hang onto it, shit streetlife alone would be way dope. But back then it was like $70 to buy a domain name and I didn’t even have money to get myself a snack, and that $70 was a reoccurring annual fee, and besides no one back then was thinking to buy their own friggin TLD. And as the years went by streetlife.com was snapped up, but I didn’t care I just threw a “london” on the front, that was cool I was living in Spain and that was a throwback to the streets where I was from. And it seemed to work and I just went with it, and I didn’t think about it again…

I am a Creative

But over the last year or so I’ve taken a journey to embracing my creative side. Really I always had my foot in the creative door but my mind was firmly stuck in the techie room. It took a lot of self reflection on my part to get here, and it wasn’t easy, but thanks to the respect and support of some great creative leadership at my agency, believing in my creative talents, I’ve finally landed. For a while there I was extremely confused, I didn’t know where I was at. I was promoted to ACTD (Associate Creative Technology Director) at work, and suddenly I felt somewhat ostracized from the Technology department but yet I didn’t feel like I was part of the Creative department either. It didn’t help that I now reported to both departments, and I ended up feeling like I didn’t belong to either, marooned somewhere in between. I saw the movie Tropic Thunder and there’s a line where Robert Downey Jr’s character says “I’m the dude playing the dude disguised as another dude”, and at first I laughed cos it’s funny but then I realized that was sort of how I would describe myself and it was kind of depressing. But I ended up understanding that I am creative, and I am also technology, and the fact that I found myself so lost in identity was more the fault of the agency and the industry. See the future of web development is the merging of both those departments, and the agency has taken a great step towards reaching that goal by creating the first cross-over role, and it is now up to me to prove it works and let the rest of the agency catch up.

A dude playing a dude disguised as another dude

I am a Brand

So now that I finally embraced myself as a creative it was apparent that my brand wasn’t working, or even that I barely had one. See a techie is in the background, it doesn’t matter what your brand is, you don’t really get to have one. When you’re interviewing for a tech job none of it matters, they care about your expertise, coding skills, your work ethic and your ability to hit deadlines. None of that can be captured in a brand or a portfolio, therefore you have to produce code samples and references to look good and get hired. But when you’re a creative it’s entirely the opposite. A creative is in the spotlight, a creative represents the agency and the clients brand, a creative’s name goes on the awards and is talked about in the press releases. So if you aren’t able to brand yourself well then how can an agency trust you with a clients brand? If you don’t even know yourself well enough to define your own creative brief then how can you be be capable of capturing the essence of your clients? And if you don’t have the skill set or the drive to effectively execute and produce results when it comes to your own brand then how can you expect an agency to put their clients image in your hands?

But what brand am I?

So I’ve tasked myself with the challenge, and the project “my brand” is well under way, I’m energized and more excited about this than I have been about any project in a long time. Shit finally I get to find out who I am. Coming soon to a browser near you. Summer 2009. Watch this space!

iPhone App Interactive Ad Banner

Richie — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 10:52:00 +0000

I was sitting on the sofa the other night watching the Tigers suck and I came across an interesting ad served up within TwitterFon on the iPhone. Leaving aside the fact that I still use TwitterFon over the much lauded Tweetdeck (it scrolls down to your oldest new tweet which is a truly priceless feature), I noticed the following ad banner:

Apart from it being an automotive ad which is the industry I have been involved in now for a number of years, the peel-behind icon in the top right corner really stuck out. It represents ads by VideoEgg who coincidentally we’d just had in the office a month or so ago giving us a presentation. I was impressed with the company’s ad model and portfolio, and found Mark Spates, their Director of Social Media Strategy, quite an exceptional guy. But this post isn’t about VideoEgg even though I realize now thinking back that I have a lot to say about them, so maybe I’ll do that another time. Anyways, I knew from their ad model that they don’t charge per impression or click-through, but for the time spent actually interacting with the ad, which leads them to produce some really interesting and engaging content, so whilst I am not in the market for a Prius I clicked through to see what it was all about.

And I was really wowed. Twitterfon peeled back to reveal behind it what I came to realize was a full-blown microsite, shit this thing was as good as some of the lower budget reveal sites we’d put out on the web two or three years ago. But this was in an ad, in an app, in my cellphone, in my hand, while I sat on the sofa watching the Tigers suck. Of course it wasn’t really as good as any microsite we’d put out two years ago, but for the reasons I just mentioned it felt like it was. And also up until now all the iPhone App banner ads I’d seen have been tasteless unsightly garbage, offering me something along the lines of a free Katie Perry song if I download some dodgy app, reminding me of the exact same problem we had on the web when ad banners first came about, the horrible junk that they were, and the iPhone is meant to be a mobile platform that isn’t a throwback to the nineties.

Okay so you click the VideoEgg symbol to launch the interactive experience:

And revealed behind the App is the microsite:

This homepage loads instantly, and as you see it’s pretty simple stuff, which is what I like. In fact it’s what most of us like, as this article which is a little dated but still stands true points out – web users are getting more ruthless – if you’ve got a gallery to show me, some videos, or any other interesting piece of content then sweet, I dig it, bring it on. But don’t dick me around and waste my time with your bloated over-designed over-engineered Flash (or whatever technology) app that takes forever to load, and then every time I interact with it starts with its bullshit animations and transitions, which appear to only exist to cover up the fact that it provides absolutely nothing of worth or value to me, only to discover that you need a PhD in rocket science, be a level 60 sorcerer in world of warcraft, and quite possibly even be slightly retarded to boot, just to figure out how to interact with it.

Well that’s not this, this is simple. And my time is precious, and me is ruthless, and me like it lots.

There’s a gallery with about a dozen interesting shots:

There’s a vehicle colorizer:

And finally you can watch some of their tv spots:

As this ad was served up with TwitterFon it would be an obvious move to improve upon it by having some kind of Twitter tie-in, but only if it improves upon the experience and not just so it can claim to incorporate the latest fad of the week, and lets not forget that this ad is likely served up into a wide assortment of apps belonging to the VideoEgg network so the experience needs to be generic to all of them.

Look I’m not saying this ad was some truly amazing experience, really my only point is that it reminded me that this is how all iPhone ads should already be, and I’m pleasantly surprised to see that some of them already are.

I Am Creative

Richie — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 11:09:00 +0000

I’ve only really come to terms with this fact over the past year. For the longest time I was confused about the issue and during my teen years had built up a stigma around the whole idea of me not being creative. See I went to school with some really awesome creative talent, guys that went on to graduate with honors from schools like the Royal College of Arts, and are now illustrators for respected newspapers and magazines, top architects in their field, and producers of music videos for some of the worlds top recording artists. And back then in high school I just couldn’t compete with that, so I didn’t. And then these guys went to their fancy art schools and I went off to tech college, and when we met back up in the summers they’d become real anal artsy types (not so much my old school boys but the friends they’d made), the kind that know everything about everything and try and belittle those who aren’t as privileged with their education. They’d ask me who my favorite artist was and I’d say “Picasso” and they’d snicker and call him main stream and mouth-off like 100 more artists I’d never heard of. Well guess what douche bags, I’ve now been to art galleries all over the world and I’ve seen the artwork of all your fancy artists first hand, and I still think Picasso fuckin rocks. If I could be there right now I’d tell them something like 83% of this planets population has never even seen a snowflake, and 43% of the world has never tasted butter. I don’t know whether that has any relevancy here but it just seems damn appropriate. In fact I’d just tell them to go with their sheep, even though remembering myself back then I probably threatened to bop them on the nose which I’m sure didn’t help the situation much. Anyways what I’ve eventually come to realize, and it’s taken me a long-ass time, is that Gustav Eifel architect of the Eifel Tower and the Statue of Liberty probably couldn’t paint for shit, and Michaelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel but he probably couldn’t sculpture a damn. Or maybe they could. But my point is that I’ve accepted that while I can’t design I can definitely creatively direct.

I’m a cool CAT
Okay maybe I’m letting it get to my head a little but I’m not letting it make me big headed. Allow me to self indulge for a moment as I step out of the creative closet. I’m Creative And Technology, and whilst I myself have only recently come to terms with this, others have known for much longer. I was hired into the agency as an engineer to bridge the gap between the Technology and Creative departments (that should have been a big clue right there). And when I first got here designers would thank me for making the build-out match the comp exactly, which I always thought was weird, like isn’t that my job? Sure it was my job but no one told the other engineers that. See there was a perception in the Engineering department that an engineers primary job was to build out the functionality, and then secondary was the design, and getting it vaguely similar to the comp was more than acceptable. Shit back then the designers weren’t even allowed to talk directly to the engineers, my managers would be pissed that I’d have designers in my office. It wasn’t part of the process, it wasn’t in the project plan, the process was more important than the product. Well shit I’d say, it’s part of my process and my project plan and I’ll be here till midnight getting it right if I have to, and if the product isn’t the most important thing then what the hell are we all doing here? And if Creative ever came at us with something new, something we’d never done before, well the MO of the Engineering department was to say we didn’t do that and reject it, but I was like hell yes bring it on and I’d figure it out – research it, learn it, create it. And if I ended up realizing it was impossible I wouldn’t go back to them with “No”, see I lived by a mantra I’d picked up at a former employer – “Offer alternatives not obstacles”, and I’d go back to the Creative Director with other options, alternatives I’d come across or dreamed up while researching. And more often than not they’d go with it, and you know what? Sometimes we’d look at it after and think it was better than the original direction. That’s right, ideas I was having were making their way into the design and I didn’t even realize what was happening, see I was like the ugly duckling on the Engineering team, I was a maverick and a trouble maker and I didn’t fit in, but when I went downstairs to the Creative floor I was popular and I thought it was just because they liked me, I didn’t realize it was because they saw me as one of their own. And all along I was a fuckin white swan with the rest of them, just that they could see it but I couldn’t.

There’s a million more examples and stories I could talk about during my journey to get here. And maybe I haven’t even picked the best examples to tell you but I’ve made my point. Earlier this year I was promoted to ACTD – Associate Creative Technology Director, the first one the company has ever had. Shit they created a position for me and I still didn’t get it. I saw it as an honorary position, like a lifetime career achievement award at the Oscars, acknowledgment that the actor had given a lot but had never been great enough in a single moment to win the big prize. And when it was announced I had Creative Directors telling me it should have happened a long time ago and yet I still saw it as more of a pat on the back, a thanks for all your help and hard work. See I was still screwed up in the head, those damn college art students still messing with my mind, the Engineering department making me feel less than worth for caring too much about the quality of my product, me still not understanding what it means to be creative, my own insecurities of my abilities.

So how did I snap out of it? In the end it’s really quite simple. I started working on putting together a portfolio site. And that entailed getting together all the work I’d produced over the long years all in the one place for the first time. And it then involved thinking about that work I’d done and doing write-ups on it, and those write-ups involved looking at that work and actually taking credit for what was rightfully mine. And that’s how I realized it, by going back, all the way back to the beginning, I was and had always been responsible for creating some kick-ass shit. Sometimes it was kick-ass technology, and sometimes it was kick-ass creative, and more often than not it was both, shit I develop websites for a living so is there really a difference? I realized everything I’d done, just about everything I’d touched was for the better because of it, because of me. I realized there’s no shame in being creative without being able to design, all those ideas that I’d thrown out there that had made their way into the wire frames, into the comps, into the products. Yes if I hadn’t had that idea the design would have still rocked because the designer was a rock star, but the product wouldn’t have been as good. And there’s nothing wrong with giving a designer direction even though you don’t have the skills to design yourself. No I can’t start with a blank canvas, I don’t know how to use Photoshop effectively and I don’t understand all the theory behind the hue and saturation and such, but give me a starting point and I can take it from there, show me a design and I’ll give good advice and critique, I’ve proven this to myself and my peers many times over, and they respect me for it and finally I respect myself. I now know there are kick-ass designers that can’t creatively direct, just as there are copy writers that can’t design for shit but can creatively direct. And I now know there are techies that can creatively direct too.

Automatically Rotating Homepage Takeovers

Richie — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 19:56:00 +0000

Something going on at Pandora that I came across today really struck me. They’re automatically rotating homepage takeovers as you interact with the site. It makes sense really, it’s a radio station so you load it up, minimize the browser and forget about and the songs play on and on, and therefore there’s no point in showing ads. So when they know you’re looking at the page, on interaction, is when they start showing ads (and try and get some revenue for the amazing service they offer for free).

Just in case you are not familiar with the term ‘homepage takeover’, it’s advertising talk for when a homepage is taken over by an advertisement. I think historically it was more of a roadblock, which is when there’s an obnoxious overlay and you have to click ‘close’ to continue browsing the site, but these days it can also be when the entire page is branded (or rather co-branded) with a product. A good example is this ask.com homepage from a few weeks back that was branded with a movie which quite possibly has the longest title of all time:

So back to the Pandora website. I was initially fascinated to see this going on, that when I interacted with the site these big colorful and sometimes animated backgrounds were changing. This is something I’m used to seeing change on a page load, as I navigate from page to page, or at least refresh the page I’m on. But really what’s happening with Pandora is it’s a self contained web application, so the page itself doesn’t change but the content within tabbed navigation areas gets updated. The core of Pandora is actually a Flash app, though it’s contained within HTML, the footer is in HTML for example, and so are the ads I’m talking about here. I’m sure this is a model that will be adopted by self contained web apps that bring content to the user instead of the other way around, if it hasn’t been already.

So here’s a few examples I came across:

The Black Eyed Peas example above is probably the most visually stunning I saw.

Vitamin Water looks good.

Some Microsoft ad, not really appealing to me. This also shows an example of an inline ad badge within the playlist (Alltel).

Canon Power Shot above, it’s alright, and has an interactive movie area (which pauses the radio station). This also shows how the Alltel ad badge moves along as an item in the playlist.

Brine Join the Tribe Campaign

Richie — Thu, 21 May 2009 11:57:00 +0000

This week was quite exciting for me and my newly formed team here at the agency. We re-launched our client’s website (an incredible feat we pulled off in only 4 weeks from design to launch, but something I’ll talk about in another post) and we launched the digital arm of the new campaign “Join the Tribe”, which in essence is built around the idea of featuring tribal warrior masks built from new 2009 Brine lacrosse products.

Now I must admit that I personally wasn’t involved in conceptualizing the campaign, this was spearheaded by our traditional diversified team back before its digital counterpart (my team – digital diversified) was even officially formalized. And when the campaign arrived on our doorstep and our team had to come up with a way to complement the campaign digitally I still wasn’t involved much as I was committed to other duties (like a project for Ford and um yeah becoming a new dad!). It was pretty obvious that we needed to create an online experience that generated these tribal masks, of course the budget wasn’t quite there to carry out the grandiose idea we originally had, which was pretty damn impressive and involved face recognition to automatically build the tribal masks. So we went back to the drawing board (at which point I was now fully involved) and came up with a more slimmed down version of the application which allows the user to create the mask themselves from a palette of Brine equipment. Now I may be biased at this point, but aside from the initial wow factor that the face recognition technology would have provided, and yes it would be cool if the mask generated really represented the characteristics of your face, but the finished product we’ve come up with where you actually build the mask yourself is pretty damn fun to interact with, and perhaps even, considering the 8-18 year old age range the campaign targets, is a better suited end product. You can check it out here.

So it’s pretty fun to play around with, and I’m proud to be a part of it. You can generate a mask in 3 ways – remix (which gives you a base mask to work from), template (which gives you a stenciled background to work on top of, or just go ahead and start from a blank canvas, and this is after you’ve selected whether you’ll be created a male or female mask (which uses male or female equipment respectively). And once you’re in design mode you can pick the equipment by category (mirror mode can be handy for this), or pick by facial feature (which offers you a mesh of equipment pre created to look like eyes, mouth, nose, etc…).

And when you’re done you can download your mask in a whole bunch of standard sizes (iPhone, chat icon, game icon, screen saver, etc…) and save it to the gallery for all to see.

And of course no digital campaign would be complete without the ad banners to drive traffic to it.

The Tribal Masks app was developed by Honest who did an amazing job with an extremely tight deadline and I am looking forward to working with them again.