Business in Your Face
What better way to grab attention than to send a giant business card to potential clients – a simple and straightforward but seldom used method to inconvenience your target audience. Sent by courier straight to the front desk of various corporations. To some, this effort may appear to be almost silly but is makes a lot of difference between being overly creative for creative sake and being creative for effective sake.
As opposed to tacky direct mailers or conventional ones that tend to get ignored, some solutions to tricky problems are often glaringly simple that we ignore them. This is one of those that adopted a simple solution for a simple problem, fuss-free and effective.
Escaping sounds that cry for help
As always, Amnesty International’s awareness ads give this refreshingly smart appeal that is ever so simple and thought provoking.
Simple strips of black paper, printed with screams for help in the form of text, were stuck onto openings of various places where sound could seep out from. It puts across the point that escaping sounds are often cries for help and it is so easy to ignore yet it can be so easy to save.
What a refreshing change from emotional hardsell ads!
Small helps for Big spills
What better way to demonstrate the superb absorbancy of paper towels than to create a big spill. On the main streets of New York, busy commuters were greeted by large installations of spilled liquids, complete with steam and aroma (in the case of coffee). These spills were accompanied by sampling and outdoor ads delivering the message saying “Makes small work of Big spills”.
It took awhile (and a few times) to get the tag, nevertheless, is an exciting sight to behold. Installations that make full use of sight, sound and scent are almost a sure hit and we reckon this one was too.
Sliced like a page
As advertisers and creatives, experience can get in the way of good ideas when we forget to dig the fundamentals of expounding on keywords while brainstorming.
This effort however, clearly showed otherwise.
The selling point of precision knives are the ability to slice to milimetres of precision while maintaining consistency and accuracy. What better way to demonstrate that than a simple print of an apple on the fore-edge (yes, that area is known as ‘fore-edge’) of a book. When fanned, shows the apple thinly sliced, letting the user interact with the ad itself.
The idea is pretty unique but we just hoped the branding could have worked a little more for that.
Take Care of Yourself
As part of a stint to promote an exhibition in the French Bienale, several actresses and singers were asked to put up a tearful act after reading a letter while in the train. Plainly playing on human curiousity in general, for something that had nothing to do with them at all, most of these concerned public either feigned ignorance, stared in helplessness or went way out to offer consolation. In all ways, the letter that was intentionally left in the train (whether crumpled or not), was picked up and read by these inquisitive people, only to read a heartwrenching break up letter which was the starting point of the exhibition.
Sophie Calle, an artist and provocateur, had arranged for this stint to be performed stemming from the topic of her exhibition – ‘Take care of yourself’, the last words written on her break up mail.
Read more about the concept and details here.
What a way to play on human curiousity, it had pretty good potential if not for the relatively small reach. But oh well, art exhibitions aren’t intended for the masses are they?
It Fits Everywhere
How do you grab the attention of drivers with a mailer without typically leaving them on the windscreen?
Toyota iQ, the little concept city car that prides itself in its size, goes with the tagline “It fits in everywhere”. To go with that, little car shaped mailers were slotted into car wing mirrors, cleverly leaving a leaf to stick out. Which driver would let a leaf remain in his mirror? In a possible attempt to sweep it off only finding that it refuses to budge, you’d be surprised that a little car appears instead.
It is a simple piece of mailer, which is well-thought in designed to be in sync with its product message, placement and medium.
Who said all flyers had to be boring?
The Wonder(button)bra
The Wonderbra brand has a new integrated campaign to grow awareness around it. Toying with the idea that with Wonderbra, the button on the lady’s blouse can potentially pop and hit someone, the visual for its poster is simply hilarious.
From this concept, they realised a viral ad, a special promocard, a mini website, and a fan page on facebook. All these operations work in synergy to spread the concept on all the media involved.
Everything is pretty much in Italian on the site so we daren’t comment for our lack of multi-linguistic ability. The idea on the other hand, consists of the facebook profile page and a picketing contest that has so far garnered fan response of about 800 people.
There’s even a National Cleavage Day, affectionately known as NCD, which seems to be a real hit with their target audience of penny-wise, confident and feminist-inclined women.
This perhaps is one fine example of hitting the bullseye from a thorough understanding of the target audience.
From A House to A Home
It has been some time since we came across a simple piece of maildrop with full illustrations.
Thanks to Standard Bank, we get to see one now. With a limited budget, the standard DL sized envelope was given a complete facelift and covered with delightful illustrations of a house. Aiming to convey the message to existing home loan customers that the new Access Bond can quickly and easily provide for extended needs of household expenses.
Upon opening the flap, a roof is instantly added to the visual of the house, turning it from a ‘house’ to a ‘home’. As the copy puts it, ‘It’s this easy to turn your house to a home’.
Lovely!
Take a Peek
How sweet it would be to be greeted by a friendly zebra when you start your car, bright early in the morning. As compared to a leaflet for carwash, this is a pretty sight that is unlikely to go away unnoticed.
To communicate that Zoo Safari is not a common zoo, because the animals run free just like in a safari, they created electrostatic stickers containing animal pictures. These stickers make the visitor imagine what it would feel like to be so close to a wild animal, “up-close, no cages, more fun”.
A Tee A Month
It has come to the point in the year where design studios begin the annual task of designing calendars for the next year. In a bid to do something different, the variety of forms and functions are increasingly toyed around with, resulting in some rather interesting outcomes.
Leader – a clothing store, produced a hanger of 12 shirts, each representing a month with the dates printed on it. This not only generated much buzz after the calendars were given out but in turn generated sales as the designs were being sold in the store.
Put your egg on someone else’s plate
The idea of having a paper egg on your plate seems quite a novelty and at first glance, it is either an ad for an egg product or a hunger awareness programme. This one being the latter, trying to convey the message that you might have had your egg today but someone else out there is starving. The copy is pretty weak and quite a kill to the idea we must say. It reads “Did you have egg for breakfast today?” followed by some really loose sentences.
Furthermore, the actual call isn’t for donation but for support towards this effort by attending a walk. For a good thing, we now witness the importance of good copy and visual collaboration for a good idea to be great.
Stronger Dogs
To promote brand awareness for Iams Dog Food, plastic frisbees that looked like a metal 10kg discs were given out for free at parks and frequent pet strolling areas. The message of course was to convince owners that dogs would be stronger with their feed.
Simple idea that is high on practicality, functionality and still low on cost.
A house in a bag
Instead of a catalogue, Index Livingmall, the furniture store, designed a set of 3 shopping bags in small, medium and large sizes to represent room spaces. Pretty much understandable when you look at it, consumers can see the furniture and decorative items from the outside, punch them and watch their spatial placement in a mock 3D format, ingeniusly. Atypical of condo spaces, a small box that has to look stylish yet functional for living can be a challenge to decorate and design. Given such a cool giveaway item, we’re pretty sure the sales figures would do prety cool too.
Strength in a string
As advertisers, we often need to find new ways to work around the same old problems, with the same old set of mediums (and budget). Boring as it sounds, it really isn’t the case at all. Targeting corporate individuals in corporate settings is often a challenge, especially for direct mailers which tend to get lost in the mail even before reaching the intended recipent.
Faced with such a problem, a smart solution to fix that would (possibly) be to catch their attention with the envelopes instead. Of course although that was not exactly Pantene’s primary intention, it still is a good idea to exploit. Whether it be sponsoring envelopes which contain totally irrelevant content that HAD to arrive in the recipent’s hands, or designing a direct mailer, the devil is indeed in the details.
For Pantene, the brief was simply to emphasise its branding about strong hair and at the same time deliver their latest product range and related information to clienteles. By designing the back of the envelope to exaggerate hair strength from pulling at a string, it definitely caught the attention of consumers and by far – is one marketing idea that hasn’t been used much.
Spreading Unity, Not Swine
When the pandemic of Swine Flu caught the world by surprise, the public needed to be educated against kissing (think European greeting) and to put on masks in public places. Definitely, convincing reluctant public to wear masks were no easy idea and thats where emotional messages of goodwill would work best.
Giving out masks with simple messages of unity, showing how you play a part in the entire picture, worked in this case. On each mask it said simply – “We do not need to kiss each other to feel our support”. As a result – all masks were given out and well received, sucessfully achieving its purpose.
A day of Jail
To promote a shock documentary series on a day in America’s worse prisons, a picture of a prison meal tray was printed and distributed as tray mats in eateries and restaurants in Paris. As a result, this ambient campaign generated great attention, far more than the press and poster campaign that it launched concurrently.
Tooth busters
Playing on the ironic fact that candy busts your teeth in the long run, a chocolate shop gave out a loyalty card in the form of the oral cavity, punching holes on teeth on every visit.
We think its a smart little idea that doesn’t burst budgets yet is unconventional it is own way and definitely works.
Weekend Murders
How do you spread the word to watch TV when everyone is out there in the Summer?
Going out to get them is exactly what the idea was, for a TV show that needed publicity. “Weekend Murders” was the name and a pool of blood was its game. By giving away red towels in the shape of blood, beachgoers who lay down on them appeared to be lying dead on a pool of blood.
A clever imagery and practical advertising!
Hold a hand with a bag
Transforming a paperbag design into a message is a task that is simple but not necessarily easy. In this instance, a meaningful message to bring child autism into greater awareness showed the user holding hands with a child whenever he or she picked up the bag.
As simple as it is in reality – that is all it takes to reach out to a child with autism.
Meat you there!
One of the things that always intrigue me during a creative thought process, is how far and disconnected the brand/product involved, can be from the execution location, method or brand, if any. In the case of a Safari Park wanting to promote itself, it found a butchery and picked butcher paper to be its advertising medium.
Yes ok the connection here is evidently, meat and animals but who would have thought of using butcher paper in a butchery, with the message being – Dangerously Close (to the animals in the safari).
Interestingly fresh I must say.
Tough clothes on sale
Although this collateral isn’t particularly witty or unconventional, we just wanted to draw the attention to the use of bag handles as the key feature of the medium. Resembling knuckle rings, without having to show any image, it is already known that the brand is tough, edgy and streetwise. Just with the handles!
Perhaps some brands can think about unconventional ways to boost corporate identity with their paperbag handles too.
The unconscious now contactable
A very simple idea that would potentially keep unconscious party goers safe where they are. Just a rubber stamp with rotatable numbers saying – If Found Unconscious Please Contact [number]. Although not a permanent solution to educating the public on keeping safe, it is an immediate solution to address current issues without high costs or fancy material.
We think its a guerrilla in its own right, stamping people with other people’s telephone numbers and all.
Dress the Diner for Dinner
A cute and innovative way to be instantly dressed for the occasion, napkins with various tie designs were printed for use. Nothing in particular to promote here but we’re just demonstrating how napkins could potentially be creatively used instead of just printing a brand on them.
Free your mind and start small for big ideas!
Censored for the Press
All over the world, governments exert too much control over the press. When being asked to bring to attention, the violations of right to free speech, the International Society for Human Rights distributed highlighters to journalists attending a press conference held on the subject of “Freedom of the press at 2008 Olympic Games”. Instead of highlights of bright yellow, the ink inside was replaced with black dense ink that left a censor bar on the paper when used.
(think, black marker)
Printed on the ‘highlighter’ was the website link and a phrase which said – In many countries, the press is censored every day. You can make a difference.
This move was resonant with their target audience and saw increased site hits and 50% more requests than usual from journalists seking informative literature about censorship.