Xavier Adam Blog

Brand Psyche

19 June 2009 – 11:05 am

Having lunch yesterday with a lawyer friend. We touched on the legality of a brand not profiting from the goodwill of another brand.

At the weekend I saw a press advert for cakes, using a clock, cartoon style lettering and garish pastel cake colours. This is very similar to another company’s advertising, also making associations with tea time, but advertising much more heavily, and I think having started their campaign earlier.

Immediately I thought the advertiser was the heavy ubiquitous advertiser we are used to seeing. The campaign has been around for three months or so now. When looking more closely it wasn’t, it was the rival brand, looking very similar.

They were tapping in to my psyche. Definitely. I had a two second confusion window, thinking it was the ubiquitous advertiser. But how can this be proved in court?

Most non-media people would not realise they were being manipulated in this way. Partly because I saw LOCOG lawyer Alex Kelham’s excellent talk at the IPA, I was extra aware to what degree a brand can pursue an infringing advertiser.

These two tea time examples may be a co-incidence, but I am not so sure.

Both could be interpreted as legitimate images and messages. They are associating with tea time, being tea time products. The two adverts do look far too similar to be a co-incidence.

What do you think? Is measuring brand physche an impossibility? Are we taking image and rights too far? Should we relax a little and be less uptight? Do the public care? Do they notice this sub conscious mind-manipulation?

Images will appear shortly.

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b.TWEEN Beano

16 June 2009 – 4:01 pm

Fresh in from the annual northern interactive meets media beano, b.TWEEN, I have spent 24 hours looking at all the new apps and technologies covered during the two day event.

b.TWEEN is always a great event. Katz Kiely and her team, really think through the content, running order, venues and attendees’ interests. These industry types have a fantastic handle on what people like me need to hear about.

Usually at conferences you have heard most of it before. b.TWEEN routes out the weird, and takes little time to make me understand why this is relevant to what I am doing everyday.

This was my third b.TWEEN having taken a break in 2007.

There is something about the event which makes it quite different to the usual run of the mill conferences that bombard my inbox. The desire of b.TWEEN people to learn and share is strong.

There is no organising plc of the ‘bums-on-seats’ school, which are so impersonal, ramming down my throat why I should go and see some worthies, or, usually not even going that far. Just sending a long boring list of organisations involved, and insinuating I am missing out by not handing over my £ 1000 pronto.

Alongside the big names at b.TWEEN are people from the largest global agencies, broadcasters and technology firms, mixing with the smallest niche providers. Script writers of reality games share salad and fruit with hard nosed commercial types.

b.TWEEN is different. There really is something for everyone, from the every day tangible to pure conceptual. To demonstrate their innovation, b.TWEEN Twittered, before Twitter was in common use. They created their own version of the messaging service, live text from b.TWEEN participants scrolling over the screens at the Cubby Broccoli Cinema in Bradford. That was in 2006.

This year, helping Katz compile a book on b.TWEEN helpfully forced me to go to the more obscure, but often still well attended sessions. Canadian academics, people from the arts sector and university technology transfer programmes are just some examples of those doing interesting work with digital technology. All were at b.TWEEN09.

Details for 2010 are yet to be announced, in the meantime check out the website at b.TWEEN

btween09#

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Future of Television

10 June 2009 – 10:56 am

Last night I was invited to an excellent event hosted by Richard Lindley, formerly of BBC’s Panorama programme. The investigative show had a massive following under Richard’s stewardship in the 1980’s and 90’s.

The audience at his event was a mixed media crowd. Who seemed like big TV fans. This may sound odd to people outside the business, but media types can be snobbish about TV, insinuating it is some form of lower entertainment and not really a cultural activity.

Odd, when for example there are so many good history shows, natural world documentaries, in-depth current affairs programmes and top notch comedy and drama. Hardly low brow stuff.

Following heated exchanges and much applause, I was not entirely sure what the main point of Richard’s debate was, (but this did give it a nice freeflow style). There was a lot of talk about whether the BBC licence fee should be split between the BBC and commercial broadcasters, to create a more level playing field and encourage wider quality programming. The discussion oscillated around this point in several forms.

To me it seems the TV types are only thinking in one formula. When there are various shades of approach that can be taken, to narrow the gap between the BBC with its currently guaranteed licence fee and commercial broadcasters experiencing falling advertising revenue.

In my view, there needs to be an overhaul of the licence fee. It is a poll tax and for people who do not like broadcast, seems an imposition on them. We should in no way dumb down the BBC to save a bit of money, but there do need to be some changes. Time has moved on, and we are no longer in the advent of the TV decade, where the licence fee was the clear solution.

After the event I was speaking with some attendees about a tiered fee structure for BBC services, where different people pay different rates for different packages. If Sky and the like can do this, why not the BBC? It seems fair and will stop many of the stories in the tabloids about the BBC wasting licence payers’ money. The viewer, listen and surfer pay for what they use.

What do you think? Does the licence fee have a future? Is there potentially a better and fairer system? How can the BBC compete going forward? Should product placement and other commercial activity be encouraged?

Finally, thanks to the debaters, who really did make this a fun and interesting event. Peter Bazalgette, Nick Ross, Laurence Marks and of course, Richard Lindley.

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Twittle Twattle

1 June 2009 – 11:38 am

We signed up to Twitter around 18 months ago. I would say it reached a tipping point within my group of friends in mid-2008 and the general public in late winter 2009.

Becoming useful as a tool for seeing what was going on. The more people on there you know, the more value it has. Simple.

Just a very quick surf today throws up two new Twitter stories on the major UK media websites. Why has Twitter become so popular? I would say it is the immediacy, and like Google, the simplicity of use. It does no more or less than it says on the virtual tin.

The rules of Twitter are still quite random. For example, many people think getting a huge Twitter following is a good thing. I would say, as an individual, what is the value of being followed by random people in far flung corners of the planet? Also, there is a security issue, broadcasting movements may not be wise amongst an unknown group. The Twitter rules will be self-refined over time.

Lastly, companies and their agencies are making much of their prowess in the digital sphere and now include Twitter in their digital bag. I have signed up with such experts and really am getting some rubbish through on my Twitter feed.

Major brands look confused, are they trying to be my friend, or, sell me their wares. I am unsure, and it seems they are too. One newspaper Twitter feed spams me the headlines, a complete waste of time. When I can just surf on down to their website and read them there myself. Brands are being badly advised.

As a Twitter user, my key pointers for brands are below.

Do, be sure what you are trying to say, a corporate brand trying to get cool, just because of a Twitter account, looks odd. Get the pitch straight and be consistent.

Don’t, overload your followers, be timely but not annoying. Wholefoods is a corporate whose Tweets, while not amazingly interesting, do the job of keeping the brand omnipresent.

What do you think of Twitter? Here for the long term, or, no more than temporary Twittle and Twattle?

Why is the service so popular? Media hype. Or, a serious business and social tool?

For you readers and Twitterers, Twitter ID, @xavieradam

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Public Relations Value

29 May 2009 – 2:01 pm

We had this fantastic email through today from Andrew in Leeds; who we have done some work with.

“AMC Network has really helped RandomStorm get the message out to people who our usual advertising would not reach. It has really helped our brand promotion and the mentions in the Sunday Times and on the BBC Website, saw the RandomStorm website traffic vastly increase. As well as the traffic, the search engine value from getting a great inbound link from authoritative sites such as the BBC and Sunday Times, have really helped with our search rankings for organic search. PR really is imperative if you are trying to launch a brand!”

What can I say. Old and new working in harmony.

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It´s the real bling

10 May 2009 – 9:44 am

A friend at Coutts bank mentioned an independent gaming company called CyberSports a few times over the last few months. Knowing my interest and experience in the sector he was keen to get me to their product demonstration.

Venturing down to the meet CyberSports at London´s Hospital Club proved an evening well spent.

I really got the Football Superstars concept, even if the controls were looking a little clunky and some of the investors in the room were less understanding of the technological challenge. Linking up several players worldwide on a real time basis, while explaining to a largely non-gaming crowd what was happening.

Football Superstars is played live over the Internet, and replicates the whole of a professional footballer´s life.

Playing well earns money which can then be spent on bling, Range Rovers, gym membership, night clubs and bars. Just like in Manchester, Liverpool, or, Milan. Except this euro-pastiche City, takes a bit of Barcelona, Warsaw and maybe Paris in its generic 3D graphics. The end result is rather like downtown New York, not a location known for its football affiliations.

A while back I worked on some of the big football titles. The blockbusters.

But what I really like about Football Superstars is, unlike my previous projects, the online game takes the whole football experience as a full package.

The marketing looks good, and I particularly liked the life size imagery used on the day. Contrasting La Liga and The Red Lion Sundays. The caption being, a game of two lives. It works very well.

Revenue currently comes from advertising, sponsorship and player micro payments. Although a player subscription model is always an option too. The two current sponsors are Puma and Reebok, their football boots being available for purchase in the game and boasting their own real world characteristics.

One very avant garde development we spoke about over drinks, was the ability to do real world exercise and upload this to a game avatar. The iPhone seems the obvious device right now to act as the data collector and intermediary.

Overall, I think the concept and delivery are really good. The openness of the game to fans is good in this day and age, where brands micro manage their users. CyberSports allows unpoliced fan sites, and in places such as Russia these have boomed.

CyberSports is aware it needs to iron out some of the problems, such as the initial software download. Which are not surprising, given the scale of the game and the complex 3D environment.

Football Superstars fills a gap, and in time should prove to be a winner.

CyberSports, thank you for my invitation.

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Skycar, returns, but will it fly?

24 April 2009 – 3:31 pm

An accidental dinner with some explorers a few weeks back, lead to a fun invitation from Kim, an expedition organiser and PR.

The setting, Charlie Boorman’s garage in West London. Yes, the one where they always start from, as I have been asked a few times now.

Being a lover of innovation, I had not actually heard of the Skycar until conducting some online research earlier in the week. Prepping before the launch.

The Skycar concept is truly great and has been the talk of the week amongst those the project has been mentioned to.

The Skycar does just that, leaving the earth’s surface (!) it can hit a flight speed of around 80 mph, and has a range in excess of 100 km.

In minutes it is a plane, then a car, then a plane… the Yamaha engine driving the wheels, or, a rear fixed rotor blade/propeller. The driver/flyer decides if it is going to be an earth or skybound trip and flicks the lever accordingly.

This is not Bond fantasy. The Skycar works.

A team just took the 500 kilo prototype from the UK, over the Channel, through France, over the Pyrenees, down through Spain to the Straits of Gibraltar and on to Timbuktu. Amazing.

A documentary is coming out covering the adventure, so we are presuming they made it! They certainly made it back, as I saw them.

Such a great and simple (well maybe not to execute) idea now seems so obvious, and practical. Think expeditions, rescue, farming, and traffic jams, or, lack of with the Skycar!

Keenly priced at around £ 45 - 50 000. It seems a much more interesting play thing than a one dimensional earth bound Supercar.

Anyone fancy a Skycar?

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Regional Press, is not so dead

22 April 2009 – 3:13 pm

Last night I enjoyed the company of other BIMA members at the refurbished Kettner’s in Soho.

James Bromley from the Daily Mail Group, kindly came to speak to us about the future of publishing in a digital world.

While I know this is very un-voguey, I do not think the future of regional media is completely dead, just changing. There are some major regionals in the UK and abroad. For example, the Yorkshire Post manages to maintain both a City and Westminster office, and is the voice of some 5 million people in this important economic region. The county covers nearly 10% of the UK population, so by geography and fact alone, in no way is it an insignificant title in terms of numbers, or, potential financial clout.

Similarly on my regular travels around Europe, I read Le Matin in Switzerland, and La Vanguardia in Spain. Again two major regionals. I like the localness of what they tell me. In Yorkshire I want to hear about Yorkshire business and in Catalunya, about what is happening in Barcelona and the other north eastern cities. This is value. Value to me.

Once I have read my newspaper on the plane, train, in the bar, or, at the office, I can discard it, (re-cycling of course!). It would take some fool, or, very rich person to do that with an electronic device at many times the cost.

So while it may be in fashion to say news print (and TV, while we are at it) are dead. In my opinion, the reality is they are part of a changing media landscape.

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Branding the mountain…

18 March 2009 – 10:12 am

Formigal write up coming soon…

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NMK February 2009

26 February 2009 – 8:12 am

Chris Lee over at NMK, kindly covered some of my comments at the recent MWC show in Barcelona.

Please see the extract below.

Un-Crowded House

Registered delegates at the show fell below 50,000 at Mobile World Congress this year, compared to more than 55,000 last year. This should not detract from the quality of innovation and developments taking place, according to show visitor Xavier Adam, managing director of marketing firm AMC Network.

“I’ve come to MWC in previous years and seen technology demonstrated that either nobody wants or concepts that aren’t available yet. This year those innovations are here and they’re working, which is really exciting for the industry,” he said.

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