Brandopia

From Blogger to Spaves to Wordpress

2006-07-31T08:07:00.000+02:00

I started blogging at Blogger with Brandopia but since I joined Microsoft I didn’t find it appropriate to continue using Google products. The obvious choice was of course to start using Spaces which I did (My Space), but it doesn’t have the features I was used to for daily blogging (which is the purpose, of course). Therefor I now changed to Wordpress with my new blog: Brandopia.

Last post on Blogger!

2006-07-03T20:19:00.000+02:00

This is my last posting on this blog at Blogger. I have just joined Microsoft as Trade Marketing Manager for MSN in Belgium and I find it my duty to (at least) use the tools from the group. This does not mean that I won't be critical, of course ;-) or that I was not happy about the blogger tools. From now on you can find my musings on my Space

video blog on advertising

2006-06-06T08:16:00.000+02:00

5 on Friday is a nice video on all marketing topics. Some very interesting examples.

Google trends for SEO

2006-05-31T11:07:00.000+02:00

Very interesting artcile from Marketingfacts that can help anyone with chosing keywords.

Monitoring the blogosphere

2006-05-29T09:43:00.000+02:00

Here you can find 5 tools to monitor the blogosphere: Monitoring the blogosphere
Found thanks to Marketingfacts

Bravia mash up

2006-05-29T09:16:00.000+02:00

Found this really nice mash up for the Sony Bravia campaign: Bravia Mashup.

Found thanks to I-wisdom

Live Local and Leuven

2006-05-24T13:05:00.000+02:00

After reading the posting about Windows Live Local on TechCrunch, I had a look and was surprised to see that Leuven, the city where I live, was written in its French version (see the picture): Louvain. If Louis Tobback( the mayor) ever sees this he will not be happy ;-)

Viral experiment (6)

2006-05-15T14:01:00.000+02:00

After all the issues with video sharing sites (see previous postings) I've asked some feedback from another blogger: Coolz0r
You can see his analysis here: Viral Video Problems
and I must say, I agree with him. Thanks

Viral experiment (5)

2006-05-12T11:17:00.000+02:00

I don't get it. Everybody is talking about transparency when it comes to blogging. We, as an advertising agency, try to do so but get punished for it. In this experiment we tried to post the video to Revver but they didn't allow the video. This was there reaction:

"an admin has changed the status of your story for the following reason: We don\'t allow self links - so we\'re opting out of your viral experiment.- k? thanks.
The story is: http://www.videosift.com/story.php?id=2427"

What I don't get is that you have to prove on the one hand side that you own the copyright but on the other they accuse you of self linking??? Next time, I'll ask my little nephew to do the posting for me without any comments.

Viral experiment (4)

2006-05-12T11:02:00.000+02:00

My co-worker Stijn, just made a small blog to support this viral experiment. You can see it here. He will be posting on this experiment as well.

Viral experiment (3)

2006-05-12T10:57:00.000+02:00

Interesting, Dag wrote the following comment on our little experiment on Videosift:

Dag's first comment
Lame, this is a self-link viral experiment by a marketing company:
http://brandopia.blogspot.com/2006/05/viral-experiment-2.html

My reaction
HI Dag,
why is this lame? We made a nice little video for one of our clients and are posting it on video sharing websites. We are not paying anybody to blog about it, neither are we rating (or clicking like maniacs on the video) the video ourselves. We bring 30 seconds of entertainment (if you don't like the video that's something else) to anybody who wants it. We are not interrupting anybody, such as is the case with tv ads or pop-ups. Always happy to discuss this further with you. How is this different from you posting the Apple vs MS ads on this site, except that you don't work for either of them? The difference on our side is that our client doesn't have the budget to pay huge amounts of money to run it on tv or advertise it through banners. We had a small budget, made the video and wanted to share with the rest... in the hope that people will like it and (of course) think of TGV or visit tgv.com. We're really trying to be honest and transparent here (which is also the reason for my posting on my blog).

We'll see what happens next?

Viral experiment (2)

2006-05-11T15:42:00.000+02:00

Ok, postings have begun and the number of view on the videos are rising (slowly but surely), already some people are rating the video and it looks good. At the moment we have posted it on the following sites:Youtube, Putfile, Veoh, Vsocial, Ifilm, Zippyvideos, Flurl, Vimeo, Grouper, Stupidvideos and Videosift. On Videosift we also had the first person who voted for the clip, thanks a lot Krupo! Strange thing however at Revver , while trying to upload the video they replied to us to say that there were copyright issues. Incredible! We acquired all the rights for difusion of this video online on a global scale... so, I don't see the problem. To be continued...

Viral experiment

2006-05-11T11:48:00.000+02:00

For one of our clients, TGV , we are trying a little viral experiment. We have made a nice video (underneath) that we have put on their website, which we believe to have some viral potential. Now we started to post this video on all possible video sharing websites such as Youtube (we have already posted it on +/- 30 of them). The next step in the process is trying to get in contact with influential bloggers in the different target countries to have a look at the video and if they like it to blog about it.

Why did we propose this idea?

We had a very small budget and the client wanted to do a classic banner campaign since their objective was to create brand awareness for their site. With the limited budget we knew we would only be able to buy limited space and with ever-decreasing click-trough rates we didn't expect a lot of return for their money. That's why we are trying this. We split the budget in 3: shooting the video, building the webpages and having one of our webmasters ready to get in contact with bloggers during the following 20 days. We are convinced that we will have more view, downloads and visits to their site than if we would have done a simple banner campaign. I'll keep you posted on the progress of this campaign. Of course all remarks are welcome.

Advertising explodes

2006-05-10T17:12:00.000+02:00

Incredible evolution in the Ad industry, don't you think? Completely taken over from BuzzMachine

Advertising explodes: "Wal-Mart and other top advertisers are proposing an auction marketpace for TV advertising. This has big implications on many levels: It is another harbinger of the death of TV’s upfront, which was built on old business models of scarcity; now scarcity is dead as there is ever more content, more distribution, more competition. It is also another indication of the commodification of media; if you’re just broadcast, you’re just eyeballs… but (and here’s our opportunity) if you have real relationships with people you have more value. It is also an indication of competition with Google, which has been threatening to turn all ad purchasing into a Google auction; note that this project involves eBay. And it shows me this could create an infrastructure for negotiating advertising buys that could be used by the open ad marketplace for citizens media I proposed in Ad Age this week. On the Wal-Mart proposal, Ad Age reports: A group of marketers led by Wal-Mart’s Julie Roehm today put out the call for advertisers to contribute $50 million for a test of an online auction system to buy and sell TV advertising."

Some thoughts

2006-05-08T12:48:00.000+02:00

When looking at the program about Google on Uitzendinggemist I had to think about the postings I read on Unbundled advertising at MIT Advertising Lab and at Donata Communications. I only watch tv programs when I've read about it on some blog I have in my RSS Feeder, just as I did with the Google program. I have never come home, started my computer and watched or zapped randomly to watch tv on my pc as I would do with normal tv watching. Wouldn't it be an idea to use web 2.0 features on those tv programs where I would be able to go to one site where I have selected the watching list of a few people I trust so that I can find interesting or entertaining programs in only a few clicks? This will become even more interesting once you have site such as Uitzendinggemist for many more countries or channels. This reminds me of even another posting I found on Trendwatching about "Curated consumption". I believe this will become very important for content providers and tv companies. I would love to have some Amazon-like features that tell me what other people watched after you have seen something of interest. Just an idea!

Excellent program about Google

2006-05-08T10:05:00.000+02:00

Nice report on Google can be watched here. Nice site by the way: Uitzending gemist , it gives you the possibility to rewatch programs from the dutch television on the internet.

Perlorian brothers

2006-05-05T09:48:00.000+02:00

Some very funny ads here

MSN originals

2006-05-05T09:29:00.000+02:00

MSN is launching MSN originals where everybody can participate to tell stories. Nice project and I'm looking forward to see the first stories online. A interesting example of consumer generated advertising!

Soonr (2)

2006-05-04T08:03:00.000+02:00

Soonr is an incredible tool. You can connect it with Skype
and use your mobile phone to call with Skype. Cool, no?

Soonr

2006-05-04T07:36:00.000+02:00

Thanks to Techcrunch I found an amazing tool: Soonr
In a few minutes I had acces to my email and my documents trough my cell phone. Great Stuff.

P&G creates TV Show

2006-05-03T08:44:00.000+02:00

Interesting article from Big Picture Advertising taken over completely underneath:

P&G creates TV show: " We're big fans of email marketing - we have lots of case studies that show just how effective it can be. But even we're a bit surprised that P&G has turned an email newsletter into a TV show. P&G have had a very successful site and email newsletter called Home Made Simple - with lots of practical tips on home issues.

The transition to a TV show been talked about for a while, and the first episode goes out on June 4 on the Living Channel in the US. You can see a clip on the website - its style will be very familiar to anyone who watches the plethora of home makeover programmes on British TV.

Its a clear example of the new world of marketing - P&G get good profile for one of their key channels for selling lots of their brands that would never merit TV support. Living get a show with a ready made audience - and the marketing muscle of P&G to keep driving traffic. And the consumer gets good content.

And based on our knowledge of how Coke benefited from their product placement in American Idol we suspect that P&G ads in the show will work really hard too. A win win.

When we're briefing a project we increasingly try and think about how a concept would work as a TV show - given that the web is becoming a video medium rather than a text one. And in the world of IPTV there is no reason why any brand can't have its own TV show - the challenge is to make the content engaging. Just as it is with any form of advertising these days."

Great ads from Apple

2006-05-03T08:10:00.000+02:00

Some very nice ads from Apple can be found here.

First found on I-wisdom

2006-05-02T08:41:00.000+02:00

Channel 4 puts the complete first season of Lost online, for free. Problem is, I registered but I still can't watch the episodes. Pity!

Jumbo Shrimp Marketing

2006-04-26T08:13:00.000+02:00

Nice marketing presentation. Found on Brand Autopsy.

Ads of the World

2006-04-25T14:00:00.000+02:00

Just found this site: Ads of the World | Daily Creative Fix . Great collection and a true source or inspiration.