Tag Archives: youtube

Let’s get engaged

I saw this video last week.   I actually watched it twice.  Closet massive romantic at heart, always ready to be enchanted by a good love story.

Then I showed it to my flatmate.  We cooed over it together.  But that time I realised the shots of the car were rather professionally art directed…

I, like many of the people in the comments stream suspect it is a piece of branded content for Ford.   The branded YouTube channel and website that have popped up in the last few days would suggest there is certainly more happiness to share in the coming tales of Matt & Ginny and their shiny red Ford.

Another happy moment witnessed at the weekend was when  two teenage girls standing next to me at a tram stop in Melbourne spontaneously started rein-acting this Tiffany ad on the panel opposite them.

Putting their arms around each other and walking up the lane,  one mockingly stares into the other’s eyes asks the other if one day she’ll buy her some Tiffany, as they erupt into a fit of giggles.  I was gutted I didn’t quite manage to get their picture in time.

It’s so easy to get addicted to all  the oxytocin and thrill of ‘likes’ and interactions, (an ever popular discussion point in the Sydney Community Manager group) but both Matt & Ginny, if they are a piece of marketing and the Tiffany ad reminded me about the importance and the magic of being able to truly engage with people and make them smile by telling stories with our brands.

Because just liking someone will never make a long lasting love story.

Life in A Day

I saw this campaign for the first time today.  It made me get a little excited and remember why I love working in marketing and advertising.

Life in A Day – A historic, global experiment to create a user generated feature film, shot in a single day, by you.

The film will undoubtedly be beautiful and capture some great insights and moments of real life from all over the world.  But what got me most excited today, were the comments on the YouTube channel.  (Except the obligatory ones about the idea being ripped off)

I do get a bit gushy about community, as some of my close colleagues and friends will know – but I am not embarassed to say I personally love this idea because already, a day or so after launch there were comments and questions from people all over the world.  From the very beginning this project has started to bring together a worldwide community.  A community with a shared purpose.  An experience they can all share, that they can connect through and an end product they will all have had a part in creating.  Something that wouldn’t have been able to happen 5 years ago before we lived in these shared social web times.  (Gush, gush!)

I also love the fact that someone at LG has decided to invest their marketing dollars in this kind of project.  Being brave enough to demonstrate their technology in an idea that does something, rather than just say something about the product.  It also looks like it has been done jointly between Youtube & LG, with no mention of an ad agency – unless I can’t find it?  If this is true, I find that very interesting too.

I eagerly await to see what happens on July 24th and the resulting piece of film that Ridley Scott and Kevin Macdonald will create to premiere at the 2011 Sundance film festival.  Until then, I will enjoy watching the conversation and buzz in the community as it all happens.  I’m in.  So I’ll certainly be out with my camera on the 24th to capture a little bit of my life for them.  I hope you do too.  Nice work LG.