Sacha Baron Cohen is not one to shy away from controversy. In fact, he has made a whole career out of it, pointing out the humour in all manner of taboo subjects and somehow not getting murdered by extremeists in the process. His last blockbuster ‘Bruno’ received a smattering of average reviews, so his new offering ‘The Dictator’ is going to have to blow everything else he’s done out of the water. Cohen and co hired the best advertising and PR teams in the film business to come up with a campaign which started running months and months before the 16th May release date, a campaign which has reached fever pitch in the last week or so.

The Dictator is a heroic story of a dictator who risked his life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly oppressed. This country is the fictional republic of Wadiya and Cohen plays the supreme leader Shabazz Aladeen You can get the general gist by watching the trailer here…

The advertising campaign began with a pre-advertising campaign a few months ago where colossal billboards omitting any title, date or text of any kind adorned buildings and giant advertising spaces. These images are in the same style as some political propaganda and only those who recognized the face of Ali G beneath the beard will have caught on.

Back in March, The Dictator launched a Republic of Wadiya website which is offered in English and Wadiyan. Aladeen has declared that the site is now bigger than Facebook. On the website there are links to Robert Mugabe’s website, North Korea, Cash4Gold, Victoria Secrets (for high-end hookers), a weather section for Wadiya and a calendar of events which includes a ‘Holocaust remembrance day’ mourning the day that prisoners escaped Auschwitz.

Ali G’s people have also organized a bus tour which is traveling around American Universities, raising the profile of the film.

An app has also been created – ‘The Dictator: Wadiyan Games’ in which you can take part in Aladeen’s favourite sports – running, swimming, fencing and boxing, all with the added advantage of having a gun. If you come first in all four games you can take a photo of yourself next to Aladeen and post it on your Facebook and Twitter.

Fast forward a few weeks to the Oscars and Sacha struts up the red carpet dressed as Aladeen (despite warnings that he might be banned from the ceremony by doing this) in his hands he holds a gold urn containing the fake ashes of Kim Jon-Un which he proceeds to throw all over a news reporter. He is then dragged away by security, if they are acting or not, remains a mystery.

Sacha also grabs a lot of attention by showing a Dictator ad at the Superbowl, while over here in the UK he takes over the front page of the Metro with a fake cover story entitled ‘Prime Minister Resigns’. Now if that’s not going to grab a nations attention then I don’t know what is.

Quite what strings Sacha has to pull to get away with so much and what kind of a budget he is working to makes you wonder. If the box office figures make it all worthwhile then that there is a hugely successful advertising campaign which knows no limits.

Jessica Hazel

Writer, blogger and director of Smoking Gun Vintage

http://creativepool.co.uk/jessicahazel

Launching this Thursday (17th May), The Exclusives is a seven-part series which inexplicably gives a troop of six young things the chance to bag a 12-month contract at Bauer Media, publishers of Heat, FHM, Closer, More and Empire. ITV cameras will monitor the contestants (despite claims we are watching internships, make no mistake, we are watching a game show) as they try their hands at interviewing, photo shoots and building articles.

Bauer and ITV describe the contestants as ‘aspiring journalists and writers’ and some are. Chris has written for local magazines, Ellie was unpaid editor at Bloggers Central. On the other hand, Felix only has a blog and a student radio show and Hayley paid her way through college working as, ahem, a glamour model – she has had nothing published. Now they’re all embarking on a process which is sure to be described as their ‘big break’, but is actually nothing more than a big pantomime. Career breaks are usually gained by hard work and merit. Here a drive on the fast track is granted to those with dashing looks and a ‘good telly’ back story.

Unsurprisingly, Bauer Media is cross promoting the show across their magazines, websites and radio stations. Read the pre-publicity and enjoy their claims that ‘The Exclusives showcases the fast-paced and competitive world of magazine publishing and the kind of talent needed to make it.’ Then watch the show and realise this is in fact,  ITV’s shot at stealing The Apprentice’s thunder, because rather than a searing insight into the publishing business, this is an entertainment which urges young people to race for a job for which they are wholly unqualified.

Bauer’s titles receive hundreds of speculative applications and portfolios from ambitious writers every week, so one would assume the candidate list for ‘The Exclusives’ was drawn from them. But no. Our new telly pals actually replied to ads which Bauer ran to populate the programme. You know, a bit like a boy band audition. If this daring half dozen were really so motivated, why have they not approached Bauer long before this format was announced? And if they have, why were they not picked for training or employment?

I don’t actually blame the six contestants for signing up. The jobs market is broken, so they’re taking an exciting leap of faith. But this project is a construct designed to produce sensational television. It has little or nothing to do with careers in journalism, creativity or writing. Now you may think this an obvious and futile point, but my concern is one of unfairness. It is unfair on the viewer, who is given a distorted and glib impression of the magazine business, unfair on the contestants who stand almost no chance of gaining the necessary skill and resilience  to do the job properly, and unfair on real, longer serving writers who have yet to make their mark through the more traditional, considered routes.

The magazine industry is tough and highly competitive. But competition brings quality, it insists writers’ talents are honed through long hours of training and years of practice. Bauer and ITV2 are now intent on bypassing all that precious stuff.

This then, is my objection. Journalism and professional writing aren’t like modelling, where one can be spotted at an airport and almost instantly propelled to stardom. The ability to write well and find a platform for one’s writing is hard won. Great columnists and correspondents spend many formative years as sub-editors, cub reporters or even (horror of horrors) advertising copywriters. It’s what gives them their instinct for a story, flair for an evocative turn of phrase, important experience and invaluable expertise. Charlie Brooker started out reviewing video games; Jon Snow taught in Uganda and David Hepworth was a record plugger in the East Midlands. Had any of them won a competition to go from rookie to professional in the blink of an eye, they would have achieved none of their many career highs.

Real journalism doesn’t work that way. And when the cameras stop rolling, I am sure that will be very apparent to the winner of ‘The Exclusives’.

Magnus Shaw – copywriter and blogger

www.magnusshaw.co.uk
www.creativepool.co.uk/magnusshaw

He was an art director. He was taller than the rest of us, looked strange, talked nonsense incessantly and when he wasn’t jabbering on about god knows what, he was making weird bird noises. Even at the youthful age of 19, he left people feeling rather bewildered and perplexed in his presence.

Needless to say, I became quite chummy with him.

We’d go out for a beer at lunchtime and once the drinks were on the table he’d get up and climb up on the pub roof. One time, in a moment of madness, I invited him to my 21st birthday party and he made his entrance wearing a small Horse Chestnut tree inside his shirt. Another occasion, driving in my car, he told me quite straight faced that his brother was named Eeyore. And when he wasn’t carrying the MD of the agency around the office over his shoulder, he painted his face with indelible magic markers. This guy was not drunk. He was not on drugs. No – he was just nuts – plain and simple. And if truth be told, people didn’t hold out too much hope for him forging a career in the ad business.

But surprise, surprise, he proved everyone wrong. Having got himself another job at an agency called CDP, 15 years later he’d won every top award going. In fact he was appointed the youngest ever President of D&AD and was listed in the D&AD Masterclass Series as one of 28 of the world’s best art directors.

His name – Graham Fink.

Mad as a box of frogs is Graham. But there’s no doubting the guy is also a genius. Sure his brain is wired slightly differently, but more than that he’s always open to new ideas. In Graham’s world anything is possible.

Of course he is not alone when it comes eccentric behaviour. In fact I’d be so bold as to say that some of the most imaginative creative people are often out to lunch.

Film Director Tim Burton is a nutcase in point. Whereas most people enjoy being awake he says he is at his happiest when he’s sleeping. “There are a few things that just calm me down: when I hear about somebody making mashed potatoes and when I hear about somebody sleeping and liking to sleep. I get this sense of calm, and it’s a wonderful feeling. And in Hollywood, nobody likes to sleep – they’re losing out, they’re not on top of it. I love to sleep.” Then we have artists Gilbert & George who, back in their student days, were prone to standing on tables, singing along to Flanagan and Allen’s song “Underneath the Arches” for a day at a time.

Dean Kamen, the guy who invented the Segway scooter, lives in a mansion with hallways resembling mine shafts, 1960s novelty furniture, a collection of vintage wheelchairs, spiral staircases and secret passages, an observation tower, a fully equipped machine shop, and a huge cast-iron steam engine which once belonged to Henry Ford built into the center atrium of the house. And who could forget Icelandic singer Björk dressed for the Oscars as a swan.

Many people outside of the creative industry would classify these examples as ranging from harmless eccentricity to borderline insanity. But if you’re an artist or professional creative you can probably relate to some of them. From my point of view, having spent many years working with creative people and observing their habits up close, they look perfectly normal – even essential – to me.

More power to your madness I say.

John Fountain is a freelance copywriter
Follow @fountainjohn

Anyway, today the tables have turned. I want YOUR opinion. Or advice or feedback or criticism. You see, I’m choosing a company and domain name. Oh, and I may want a designer’s help with a logo, too.

As a lot of you will already know, I’m a copywriter. Thus far, I haven’t needed to do much self-marketing because I’ve been networking hard and have managed to get quite a number of clients that way. But now I’m thinking of expanding and going beyond word-of-mouth recommendations and friends…and acquaintances of dads of friends.

But what do you think a good company name needs? It doesn’t necessarily follow that the name for a company which specialises in copywriting – or, indeed, anything in particular – needs to refer to that industry at all. Red Bull, Apple, Gillette… None of them actually refers to the products in any way. There’s the surname option, of course. Ford, obviously, was founded by Henry Ford – but I have a feeling that “Morrisons” might already be taken…

So coming up with a company name that’s good and memorable is proving a little tricky. I need something that trips off the tongue, for a start. Being a copywriter, of course, I should have an advantage inasmuch as I’m supposed to be good with words. And so I am, but the thing is that I’ve come up with SO many options that I’m having a hard time deciding on the best one. After many days of long, hard thinking, I’ve whittled it down to a Top Ten.

What’s the key message or the motivation? It’s not very complex and is pretty much what you’d expect: I want to market and promote my services as a top-quality copywriter. I want people to know that, when they meet me, visit my website and hopefully engage me, they will be getting an experienced, creative, versatile and communicative copywriter who can construct top-notch customer-winning content, whatever the brief may be.

So my question to you, Creativepool blog readers, is which one of these Top Ten company/domain names you would vote for. You’re welcome to just say “number 4” or whatever in the comments section if you want to leave it at that, but do feel free to explain why you think option X works best. So, here we go:

1. WeWriteCopy
2. WordSeed
3. ThoughtSeed
4. Writology
5. Writologist
6. OnCopy
7. TargetWords
8. WriteConsultant
9. CopyConsultant
10. WordArrow

And if you’re a designer and any of these options inspires you with ideas for a logo, do let me know. Maybe we can do a trade: my words for your picture!

By the way, if none of the above appeal, and you have a “brilliant idea”, I’m all ears. But do bear in mind that I may already have thought of it, but had to reject it because someone’s already nabbed it. It’s amazing how many copywriters there are out there, all of whom seem to have played the web domain game long ago. So maybe try typing it in as a URL before sharing your wisdom. Thank you, Creativepoolers!

by Ashley Morrison

Ashley is a blogger, copywriter and editor.

ashleymorrison72@gmail.com
www.creativepool.co.uk/ashleymorrison

For Sainsbury’s: “We say ‘hello’ to good buyers”.

A recruitment ad for security guards: “Who says you can’t have a successful career after the police? Look at Sting.”

These are some of my favourite headlines. But they never ran. It happens. An unappreciative client or account manager, a change of brief – not every great headline makes it to the target audience. Happily, many of them do. So below, allow me to present a few of the very best.

88.6FM

All these headlines have one thing in common, a solid proposition. They have a firm grasp on  the client’s message and find a wonderful way to express it. This is a perfect example. 88.6FM understand their audience and how to attract them. It’s a point of difference with a hint of rebelliousness and truculence. It’s also very refreshing to see edgy work for a broadcaster, usually a surprisingly conservative industry. Okay, maybe a bit rough on Phil, but I’m sure he didn’t lose too much sleep over the ad, what with him being played to death on almost every other station.

The Economist

Perhaps you saw this one coming. But for copywriters, the long running Economist work is something of a holy grail. An entire campaign built from nothing but headlines is a rarity. It’s possible this campaign has now become so successfully iconic, the approach will be rarer still. Nevertheless, almost everyone in advertising has a favourite Economist line. This is mine.

Volkswagen

It’s a vintage VW ad that always has creative directors feeling faint with admiration. It’s for The Beetle and has the headline ‘Lemon’. You know the one. However, I’m quite a fan of the work which relaunched the VW camper van. The headline is such a fantastically cheeky and amusing way to remind the audience of the classic nature of the vehicle and its importance in so many people’s lives. Superb.

Cancer Patients Aid

Charity advertising is often the most impactful. Sometimes, it needs to be – and it’s one of the reasons many agencies offer pro-bono work to the not-for-profit sector. Work in this field doesn’t have to be shocking, but in this case a three word headline almost knocks us off our feet. To encapsulate such a weighty proposition in four syllables, is copywriting talent of the highest order. Deservedly, this ad won an award at Cannes in 2003.

Peperami

Selling a skinny sausage alongside chocolate bars was always going to be tough and for many years, Peparami was a very niche snack. The line ‘It’s a bit of an animal’ went a long way to change that. I think it’s the double meaning that is so appealing – simultaneously describing the contents of the package with disarming bluntness and suggesting its wild and potent nature is smart, funny and thought provoking. The insane character accompanying the brand simply gave life to a headline which was already brave and provocative.

Ronseal

I have often said this is my favourite headline of all time and I have yet to change my mind. If the copywriter’s art is to capture the benefits of the product or service and present it in a way that persuades the audience to act, then ‘It does exactly what it says on the tin’, meets the brief with honours. Not only do the writers (Liz Whiston and Dave Shelton, if memory serves) identify the most compelling aspect of the product range, they have achieved a level of audience insight which is truly impressive. It’s a masterstroke of underselling, acknowledging that the consumer really doesn’t want a plethora of overblown claims, just the promise the substance will do exactly what it promises in its name. A simple notion, but far from simple to create. It’s a tribute to the line that we now use it in general conversation to denote something straightforwardly effective. For me, it’s a high watermark I’d be delighted to reach some day.

I hope you’ve enjoyed, or at least appreciated, the headlines in this post. I wrote one of them (but not one of the really, really good ones). And if you’re in any doubt whether any of this matters, let me leave you with the words of David Ogilvy:

“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.

Magnus Shaw - blogger, copywriter & broadcaster

www.magnusshaw.co.uk
www.creativepool.co.uk/magnusshaw

The most surprising thing about the spot was that the agency didn’t use any CGI to create the dancing eyebrows. Nor did the kids have ninja-style eyebrow manipulation skills. Instead they did it for real. With the faces animated by puppeteers rather than technological wizardry. So it’s just theatrical tape and string above and at the side of the eyebrows – and then all the mechanics were removed in post-production.

The ad is so convincing that many have tried to replicate it. And courtesy of YouTube, here today are some of the weirdest, silliest and best.

John Fountain is a freelance copywriter
Follow @fountainjohn

Bauhaus was a brief era of light sandwiched in between two horrific world wars. It existed for 14 years in three different locations The Barbican reveals the ideas, work and people whose commitment to creativity still remains relevant today.

The school was founded in 1919 in Weimar by the architect Walter Gropius, who believed that artistic ideas and technical skills should be developed simultaneously. The students first explored colour, materials and form before moving into a specialisation such as metal, wood, clay, weave, sculpture or print.

Expressionism was the first big influence on the Bauhaus students, this then moved onto De Stijl and Constructivism. Amongst the students were aspiring artists Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.

In 1925 the school relocated to Dessau, Gropius designed the school buildings, student apartments and faculty homes himself whilst his students designed the furniture and fittings. The Barbican explores these lesser-known products of Bauhaus as well as works made as gifts between the students and documentation of the exuberant parties which happened there. If you think you had fun at art school you can but imagine what being a Bauhaus student was like, Johannes Itten for example, began each of his classes with compulsory gymnastics.

The final Bauhaus school was situated in Berlin from 1932-1933, a short-lived affair as Adolf Hitler’s attack on Modernism forced the closure of the third and last Bauhaus which was by then being run by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. In 1933 the art school was found to be ‘degenerate’ by the Nazis. 61 of it’s teachers and students were arrested, textile students Otti Berger and Frederika Dicker died at Auschwitz.

It seemed that Bauhaus was born out of one dreadful war and died in another, but the Bauhaus style will always be sleek, cool and playful and will pay great homage to those who were lucky, or unlucky enough to attend.

Bauhaus: Art as life runs at the Barbican until the 12th of August

 Barbican Website

Jessica Hazel

Writer, blogger and director of Smoking Gun Vintage

http://creativepool.co.uk/jessicahazel

And so it was last night. At a loss for anything half decent to watch (the channels seem to have abandoned bank holidays to a holding position of sheer mediocrity), I defaulted to ’10 Things I Hate About 1999′ with Robert Webb. It was actually slightly more amusing than it sounds, but what really stood out was the second commercial break. Embedded in the standard mix of forgettable plugs for anti-ageing gloop and heavily discounted couches, were two pieces of work which managed to capture all that is imaginative, crafted and classy as well as everything that is crass, glib and trite in telly advertising.

So, first off, let’s go for the sublime. Twinings Tea has a patchy record in TV campaigns. They’ve never screened anything offensively terrible, but they’ve never managed much brand consistency either. I’ve always felt the premium beverage brand has struggled to find an adequate way to capture their proposition on screen. Obviously their market position is a few rungs above PG Tips. Twinings give the superior cuppa, not quite Fortnum & Mason but definitely looking down on the Tetley tea folk. Last year, there was a quaint campaign starring the ubiquitous Stephen Fry and his attempts to refine the coffee swilling Americans with his English tea shop. Sweetly comforting but not exactly a branding masterstroke. Sorry Stephen.

But now, at last, Twinings have nailed it. With the help of New York animation shop Psyop and a haunting Fleetwood Mac cover from Lissie, we can enjoy a beautifully simple execution which is a genuine pleasure to watch. The proposition, ‘Gets You Back To You’, is slightly woolly (most teas would claim similar), but that hardly matters.

Inevitably, TV advertising is now making heavy use of digital animation – but all too often we’re watching the technology rather than the art. This Twinings spot gives us the reverse. The paint strokes are beautifully natural, calming and attractive, while the movement ebbs and flows to open into a tide of colour. Pleasingly, this ad is less a sales pitch and more a little, relaxing oasis amongst the noise. Just as a good cup of tea should be. See for yourself:

Unfortunately, right alongside this gem, was the ridiculous new work for the Daily Express (the ‘World’s Greatest Newspaper’ if you’re happy to believe such an unsubstantiated claim). In a lifestyle montage, so frequently the last resort of a brand lacking ideas, we hear from a sweep of Brit stereotypes, telling us unconvincingly how they are making various changes. From there, an illogical link is made to the highly questionable notion that changing one’s daily paper is tantamount to a revolution in one’s life – or even the entire world. Much like their puffed up strapline, no proof or evidence is given in support. There is no genuine proposition, merely an empty claim. It’s a terrible execution of a barely formed concept and it largely wastes everybody’s time and money.

Interestingly, there is no sign of this clip on YouTube or even the Express website – suggesting the paper and its agency haven’t the faintest idea how to broadcast their message on line, or they are so aware of the ad’s shortcomings they’re happy to isolate it on Channel Five. Given it’s deathly nature, the latter would make sense.

If anybody has a link to this work, I’ll be pleased to post it here.

From style, care, simplicity and imagination to cliché, dirge, hubris and emptiness – that’s the great British ad break. Indeed, that’s great British advertising.

Magnus Shaw – blogger, writer and broadcaster

www.magnusshaw.co.uk
www.creativepool.co.uk/magnusshaw

First they ignored the temptation of using wizzy interactive media, instead they chose something decidedly old fashioned: a poster campaign. Next they created a co-branded campaign, where famous clothing, car and lifestyle brands would advertise their products to a fictional vampire audience.

The thinking was True Blood vampires are part of society, they’re part of culture and they’re just as deserving to be marketed to as any human would be. So why not ask some big brands to hand over their logos, branding, and, in some cases, actual ad campaigns to be reinterpreted for a more fanged audience?

The agency was surprised how many companies were keen to be involved. Soon they persuaded Harley-Davidson, Mini, Monster.com, Gillette, Geico, Marc Ecko, Comcast, and DirecTV to get involved in the mock campaign.

The whole campaign was completed in just eight weeks during which time the creatives delivered the equivalent of seven different ad campaigns. But it was the simplicity of the poster campaign that caused the most impact and demonstrated that, when used with flair and imagination, the billboard can still be a creative force.

As Todd Brandes, executive producer of the show said, “Everybody’s looking for a way to stand out in then glut of communication and this just happened to be an idea that everybody thought was new, different, fresh and cool.”

John Fountain is a freelance copywriter

Follow @fountainjohn

I remember one day going into the Gents lavatory in the college and seeing that somebody had recently sprayed the walls with more National Front messages. While standing there having a lash, I looked at the letters NF in front of me and came up with an idea to alter it, diffuse it and put a spin on it. I got a big fat black magic marker and between the N and the F wrote the words ‘No Fun’.

Why ‘No Fun’? Well in those days we art school types were well into the values of Punk Rock and had a particular admiration for the chaos, energy and alternative thinking that emanated from the Sex Pistols. The song ‘No Fun’ was one of the Pistols anthems. Them two words represented all that we felt about our society: the boredom, the politics, the lack of opportunities, racism… everything.

And of course, with my copywriting head on, ‘No Fun’ did indeed work a treat.

Over the weeks ahead, whenever I saw some NF graffiti about the college, I’d quickly scrawl my ‘No Fun’ message. It caught on. Soon other people started doing the same. I remember going to see The Jam at the Red Lion in Hammersmith 3 or 4 months later and someone had written ‘No Fun’ over some NF graffiti. Again at the Roundhouse, Chalk Farm. And then more sightings around the streets of Soho. Yes folks, my comment on the ideologies of the National Front had gone viral.

Since then I’ve always been interested in graffiti, street art and the like. Of course a lot of it is crap, mindless and does nothing more than defaces our environment. But on the occasions when I do see something that rises above all that and has an intelligent or funny point to make, frankly I’m all for it. So I’ve plucked out some examples and today, with thanks to a few websites including Shit London, here are a few choice cuts.

John Fountain is a freelance copywriter. Follow @fountainjohn

Bringing the idea to life

Illustrative style

Thought provoking

Alternative perspective

Silent but deadly

The double take