New Year

Well, as you all may have noticed, I haven't updated this blog very often lately. I feel a bit sad about not having the time to do it, due to my daytime work, and also due to my weekly commuting between Stockholm and Göteborg.

I will not make any new year's resolutions about posting more often though. LoveEvent will live on, but more quietly and not so actively, waiting for better times. Times more suitable for me to pick this up again...

I'd like to end this year by writing a short post about two companies who I have written a lot about this past year: ICA and A Non Smoking Generation, who now have a campaign together.

Read more on A Non Smoking Generation's blog, or at ICA's facebook page.

(My older posts about A Non Smoking Generation and ICA.)

Until next time; Happy New Year and I wish you alla 2011 full of energy and new opportunities!

And again....

I just have to blog about this ICA commercial. In my opinion, ICA keep making hit after hit after hit. This time they "copy" the commercial for Gina Tricot, a clothes retailer. The TV commercial was released in the same day as the news that Gina Tricot's model for the last 7 years, Pernielle Holmboe, is being replaced with Brasilian model Emanuela de Paula.

There are different voices to be heard about the commercial. Many think that the agency behind ICA's commercials, King, is making it easy for themselves, parodising everything. I on the other hand, find the commercials funny. So what if they are "just" parodies? They get attention and people adore the ICA "family". Why not credit the agency for that?

Judit & Judit are late?

Today I saw a very funny TV commercial from ComHem. It featured Judit & Judit in various movies and TV shows, advertising TV "On demand". I liked the commercial, and decided to blog about it (check out my previous post about ComHem's Judit & Judit here.)

Though, I was a bit surprised to find that the commercial can't be found anywhere on the internet. I googled, and checked ComHem's YouTube channel, but didn't find anything. I was a bit annoyed. In my mind, if you release a TV commercial, why not release it in social media at the same time as well? I decided to call Judit & Judit (since they are the spokespersons for ComHem's customer service ;). I talked to a nice boy who didn't know much, just that the TV commercials were released today, and if I didn't find it on YouTube, ComHem probably hadn't had time to upload it there. He suggested me to take a look on ComHem's web site (which I already had of course) but he said he wasn't sure the commercial could be found there. Quite disappointing actually.

The picture in this post is from comhem.se, so apparently there was a launch event held in Stockholm, but then, even more so, why not follow up with a YouTube upload?

So, instead of a blog post about a funny (possibly viral) commercial, it resulted in a blog post about Judit & Judit being late with their uploads. Or am I wrong? Is there maybe a strategy behind this? Please enlighten me! :)

ICA does it again :)

ICA have come up with a new TV commercial, making a parody out of a Swedish video blogger (Amanda) who is quite "popular" on YouTube. Some like her blog, and some find her posts being quite meaningless. Anyway, many have heard of her, and many will certainly find ICA's commercial hilarious (as I did). Unfortunately, both clips are only in Swedish, but I am pretty sure the ICA one will become a viral video soon...

Check out one of the "original" clips from Amanda's Youtube channel.

And here is ICA's commercial:

My previous blog posts about ICA.

Glacéau Vitaminwater "Guerrilla" Campaign

On Monday, Glacéau Vitaminwater was launched in Stockholm. The hydrating, great-tasting vitamin enhanced beverage comes in 6 different flavors and functions, and is only promoted through sampling and PR activities. No commercials on TV or in magazines. Interesting. Read more about it in Dagens Media.

Picture from glaceau.se.

Of course, I might be a bit biased reporting about Glacéau Vitaminwater, since I'll be working for UMG with the PR activites... but, hey, I wouldn't be human if I had always been objective. ;)

The only downsize is that the glaceau.se web page is not finished yet, apparently due to the IT guys playing too much online poker. ;)

ICA and Jamie Oliver

ICA is a grocery chain in Sweden, and they have made theirselves a name out of making short TV commercials building up a story about their employees. Many of the commercials are very popular, and the most recent one features Jamie Oliver. I like it!



Follow ICA on Twitter.

True Blood Guerrilla

I ran across this inventive guerrilla campaign for True Blood season 2 (in Sweden the series apparently airs on Canal+).

This lightboard is at a bus stop, and the picture of this guy is advertising some shopping mall. Oddly enough I didn't even check what mall, I was just so amused by the True Blood campaign... Anyway, someone attached a transparent sticker to the guys neck, making it look like he's been bitten by a vampire. There is also text saying "True Blood, season 2, Wednesdays at 20.00, Canal+". I liked it and it made me smile! :)

The show has been aired since September though, and I wonder if I'm just slow on noticing the campaign, or if Canal+ needs more wievers?

An older blog post about True Blood can be found here.

Be a hero!

In Sweden, if you own a TV, it is mandatory to pay a fee for public TV and radio. There are two commercial-free public service TV channels that are bascially run by the government. The money is used to produce and purchase TV shows, and the news are (supposedly) objective.

The problem is that many people don't pay. It is kind of hard for Radiotjänst, as the name of the company that handles payments is, to check every home for a TV. So, they make commercials in order to get people to pay. They have previously run a few fun campaigns, including the popular "En snigel på ögat" (A snail on the eye) and Hembesök (House Call), and now they have a new one out.

Picture/logo from radiotjanst.se.

I saw a link on Facebook, from one of my friends. I clicked it and was redirected to a (Swedish) movie, where a woman, in an international press conference, asks how we can be sure that what we see on TV is real, and how we can be sure that even the little voices get heard. She explained it was due to one person, a hero, and she opens en envelope with a photo of my friends dog. You then see people all over the world cheering for the Swedish hero, and more photos of the dog, in different crowds, beeing hailed as a hero. I was amused, and curious, until the end of the movie, because it wasn't until then that it was revealed that why this dog was a hero was because it paid it's TV fee! So, the whole site, where you an upload a photo of yourself (or of your dog) and become a hero, is a campaign for the Swedish TV fee.

Ok, so the idea is maybe not new, but I like it nontheless, and here is my Hero movie (and yes, we do pay pour fee... ;) and here you can be a hero!

Footnote: Hembesök (House Call) actually won the Guldägget award for best film. Guldägget (The Golden Egg) is a competition hosted by The Swedish Association of Communication Agencies, an organisation for independent companies active in the business area of advertising. Here is a previous post about Guldägget.

Commercials

The blog has had lot's of posts about weddings lately, and not so much about advertising and viral videos, so I thought I'd share one of my favorite commercials/viral videos. This commercial for Volkswagen was never aired in Sweden, but it is hilarious! Enjoy!

Wedding cake advertising

Click here for a very nice collection of wedding cake themed ads. I like the Axe one best, which one do you like?

In-game advertising

At the airport the other week I picked up the magazine Gate, and I read a very interesting article about in-game advertising (IGA). It's quite amazing all the stuff I find interesting in airport magazines...

Anyway, the article discusses IGA as the new (and possibly only) way to reach the target group of men, 18-34 years old. They play computer games more than they watch TV, and apparently the target group find that IGA make the games more realistic. According to the article, one of the more famous usages of IGA was the start-up of Barack Obama's presidential campaign, where his picture and the slogan "Vote for change" was seen on billboards in 18 different computer games. This was the first time IGA was used in a presidential campaign, and apparently it was quite successful, right?! ;)

Ed Bartlett from the company IGA Worldwide thinks that IGA is very successful due to two different aspects: 1) when you play a game, it is multi-tasking-secure. You must be 100 % focused on the game and focus on what's going on on the screen. 2) IGA Worldwide has a way of measuring the size and screen time for each advertiser, and so the client is only invoiced for actual exposure. These two aspects combined with the high concentration of wealthy 18-34 year olds and the strong growth within gaming segment gives a very potent mix in advertising. But Ed might be a bit biased ;)

Even so, it might be that IGA is something we will see more of in the future, or what do YOU think?

Kreafon on Twitter

So, it turns out it really does take up a lot of your time trying to keep up to date with everything that happens on the internet and in all social networks and blogs...

Only a mere five days after my blog post about communication agency Kreafon, where I kind of dissed them for being, according to themselves, "in the front" when it comes to social media, though they did not even have presence neither on Facebook nor on twitter, they actually started a twitter account and are now official twitters! Well done, Kreafon! :) Follow them on twitter here, I know I will.

McDonald's brand

I saw this strip (originally here) and, wether you want it or not, McDonald's is the 8th most powerful brand in the world, according to this report.

And even though McDonald's must be pouring tons of money into advertising and PR, they also seem to spend money on their employees.

I heard that a manager, starting up a fast food pizza chain in Stockholm, wanted to get experienced fast food employees, and thus tried to recruit personell from the three big hamburger chains in Sweden: McDonald's, Burger King and Max. He offered them a better salary, hoping to attract competent people. The employees at Burger King and Max didn't have any problem at all switching work places, but the manager could not get a single employee to leave McDonald's. The McDonald's emloyees all stated that the personal and work related development opportunities at McDonald's were so good, that they didn't want to leave the company. So maybe we should learn from McDonald's: money isn't all that counts...

No smoke publicity

Since I am personally a big fan of people NOT starting to smoke, I am very pleased to see that Fredrik Söderhielm, Secretary General for A Non Smoking Generation, has written a debate article in Aftonbladet (Swedish daily paper) asking the government to take harder action against tobacco companies and tobacco advertising, such as hardening the rules on exposing tobacco products in food stores. (The article can be read here, and here is an earlier press release about it.)

I have earlier posted about A Non Smoking Generation's anti-tobacco campaign and also a post about them winning an advertising award for that campaign.

I like that the organisation keeps getting publicity, because I do really belive that smoking is bad for you, and every kid that can be prevented from starting to smoke is so worth all the work I imagine the organisation is putting into their PR campaigns. The article was almost a full spread, and is probably read by a lot of people. Go Fredrik and A Non Smoking Generation!!!

Kreafon

A few days ago, when browsing the internet, I came across a nice blog. The blog is hosted by Swedish PR and communication agency Kreafon. I checked out their website and found it very interesting. They claim to be a full service agency, but I feel some things are missing. And by some things, I mean events. Events are a great way to enhance brand experiences, and combined with traditional marketing, a strong graphical profile and social media, a brand can gain great success with the target group consumers. So I think I will send them an email, offering my services! :)

So, this morning I did a normal Google search (normal for me anyway). I entered the words "advertising pr marketing" (but in Swedish; "reklam pr marknadsföring"). And I was a bit impressed to see that Kreafon, this relatively small agency (with only three full time employees) came up as the number one hit (after the sponsored hits)! It must be a sign! ;)

Though, I can't stop wondering why an agency who claims that they are good with social media and can help their customers build a stronger (online) profile, doesn't seem to have neither a Facebook Group nor a twitter account?!?