Number 6

 Mad Men Ad Facebook App   (PER, RWA)

If you love great tv, you probably love MadMen and can't get enough of their incisive wit and '60's styling. Greenberry, an agency in the Netherlands, came up with a brilliant Facebook app that allows users to create a Mad Men-themed ad that incorporates their personal data after completing a creative brief and choosing one of the cool templated designs. And what's even better, the best ads appeared in the Dutch print magazine, BLVD Men, and on billboards in Amsterdam. It's perfectly on brand, yet still allows users to personalize the content. How cool is that? 

<p>MAD MEN AD 

No 5

El Norte Beer: The Best Excuse Ever  (RWA, LBS)

There's just so many reasons to love this campaign because it solves one of the age old issues between Men and Women with first world problems. Men like to go out and drink with the guys, especially after they're married or settled down, women ..not so much.  So Norte Beer takes the guilt out of going out drinking..not that I condone it, but it's perfect for a beer company.  Every time they had a beer, the guys would put the bottle cap into the collection jar, and it would count towards a minute of good deeds sponsored by El Norte. In all 50,000 minutes were donated to restore schools, improve parks, clean up lakes and plant trees. What girl would complain about their guy contributing to those lofty goals? The perfect excuse. 

Click here to see Part 1 and Part 2 of My Top Ten Digital Campaigns for 2011

Number 8

Kraft’s Jello iphone/ipad app  (PER)

It’s certainly not easy to make a 100 year old food product made from animals’ bones, sugar water and artificial coloring relevant to a new audience, but that’s exactly what Kraft did for their gelatin dessert known as Jello.  Rather than highlight its healthful qualities in these days of promoting water as calorie free—Jello has no fat--the campaign focused on its fun factor by creating a free mobile app that’s pure joy. Users select their favorite flavor and then choose any song from your iTunes library, and then watch your favorite Jello dance in time to the music. They even suggest choosing different genres, from Punk to BlueGrass, to watch the Jello groove out. Try it, you'll like it. 

KLM Surprise  (PER, RWA, LBS)

I love KLM even though I've never flown the airline.  And I'm not alone. They have over 600K fans on Facebook, Virgin America under 200K. Here's one great reason why. They not only understand their customers, they appreciate them. Everyone knows that waiting in airports before boarding your plane is unbelievably boring, but KLM thought of a way to change that. Using Foursquare and Twitter to locate KLM  passengers who had checked in at the airport, they surprised them with a personalized gift as a thank you for flying their airline.  

A little surprise goes a long way and the smiles on the faces of the recipients tells one part of the  story, and 1MM impressions on Twitter tells the other side too. Decidedly a brilliant use of all three themes. 

http://iboy.posterous.com/london-adland-according-to-4chan

1) the benefits are not immediately apparent
2) inertia is a powerful force that must be overcome
3) it requires consistent discipline and focus
4) if you're not careful you can get hurt
5) it's more fun when you're doing it with other folks

Did I forget something?
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This is Part 2 of my series of The New Language.  Part 1, called The Consumer is Dead, can be found here (http://bit.ly/amimIO) . Part 3 is coming soon.

I think I’m going to change my profile on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Posterous. Currently it states I am “exploring the time and space between things”, but I think there’s a much shorter and more descriptive way of saying the same thing, “I’m futuring”.

I saw a blog post recently from @Faris, where he said “I spend a lot of time thinking about the future”. And I realized he could have just said “I future a lot” or I spend a lot of time futuring.”

It has a nice ring to it.

It reminds me of a book I read to my daughter when she was 4, called “Mirandy and Brother Wind”. The story centers around a big dance called a Cakewalk and a 6 year old girl named Mirandy.  Mirandy needs a partner for the dance and decides the best partner she could possibly have would be the Wind.  She then tries numerous ways to catch him and her wise grandmother tells her that nobody can catch Brother Wind, because “he be special, he be free.”

Doesn’t that sound like the future? The future is free. It roams around stirring things up, confusing people, breathing life into still things, but if you catch it—just for an instant, it’s the best partner for the dance.   And Mirandy was right.

Cheers.

Photo by Peyekcaster.

This is Part 1 of The New Language Series, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is coming soon.

To clarify, I don’t mean the actual human person is dead.  I mean the term “consumer”—it should be deposited on the trash heap and banished to a brand’s Siberia. 

It’s out of date and out of touch. 

It implies a nameless, faceless statistic that watches ads, then buys, uses, eats, cleans, wears and throws away your product.  Those days are over.

I don’t like being thought of as a consumer; I’m sure no one does, but that’s how companies look at the people who generate their revenue and drive their ROI.

The whole notion of consumption has a pejorative connotation these days.  I take special care to reduce my consumer footprint. My mantra, especially in these recessionary times, is Reuse, Recycle and Repair. In fact, Rachel Botsman, author of “What’s Mine is Yours” predicts Collaborative Consumption as the next groundswell, and I agree.   In other words, consuming is not a growth business.

Instead, brands need to understand I’m an individual and that’s how I want to be spoken to. And if there are a lot of people like me, you can consider us your colleagues, but not consumers. We don’t consume all day and we are not building your consumer profiles.   

We interact, we relate, we communicate, we share. And we do those things with our friends, our relatives, and our families. And just lately, we’ve been doing that with brands. 

Instead of a consumer, if a brand treats me as a colleague, I feel we are participating in a relationship that grows, expands, gets richer, and if I am treated well, continues for a long time.  If I like your page on Facebook, or follow you on Twitter, we have entered into a new dynamic, that of “friends”.  You are in my stream, I have the ability to talk to you directly and you have the same in reverse.  We have entered into a social contract to listen to each other.  We have both become more human, more accessible, more connected.

In recognizing this new relationship, let’s treat each other with more respect.  You will have access to my data, my preferences, my habits and that can help you make better products. I will have access to communicate what I like, and especially what I dislike, to you directly and in joining other audience members who feel the way I do, I may have the power to change what you do. 

I believe we will both benefit from this new relationship as colleagues, and when we recognize that, we’ll be able to work together for a better experience.