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Slapometer is having the effect we had hoped for and far more. At 11am this morning (Tuesday 6^th April) the total slaps given were 4,319,306 with Gordon Brown having 56.2%, David Cameron 27.8% and Nick Clegg 16%.  The media is bustling as more people ‘vote with the back of their hand’. On Monday Albion couldn’t have been prouder when the Daily Star featured an article on Slapometer in both the paper and online. As well as this Rory Cellan Jones has spoken about it twice already today live on the BBC news, (with a picture of Slapometer up on his computer screen in the background we might add). We’re hoping for a lot more press to come in the next few weeks on the lead up to the elections so watch this space for more updates and if you haven’t had a go yet we thoroughly recommend it www.slapometer.com

Last October, while the BNP leader Nick Griffin was sweating on BBC Question Time, one of our creatives built slapnickgriffin. It was a simple site where people could express their dislike of the man, by ‘voting with the back of your hand’. It really struck a nerve, and quickly went viral, getting 20 million slaps in just 5 days. We had to take it down when we received nasty threats from far right groups. (For that same reason, we’re not crediting the creative who dreamt up and made it, in their own time – but they’re awesome.)

With an election about to be called any day, we wanted to do something new that took the slapping idea into mainstream politics. And here it is. The Slapometer.

The Slapometer is ‘watch along’ website that lets you ‘vote with the back of your hand’ by slapping along to the live televised election debates. It’s a way for people to express their opinion on the leaders’ performances during the debate, by virtually ‘slapping’ them when they say something particularly wrong. Live graphs show what everybody is feeling, in real time.

We think the slapping idea reflects the sentiment surrounding this election: The dislike of all politicians, and the feeling that there’s no one to vote for – only against. Of course we’re not advocating violence, it’s a ‘Carry On’ slap, in the grand tradition of ridiculous political protest e.g. egging, flanning, Spitting Image.

As well as being fun, we think it’s actually useful. It’s a version of the dial tests popular in US political polling. And we think it’s a much more nuanced tool than, for example, Channel 4’s simple poll after Ask The Chancellors.

If you like it, please pass it on. We want to get as many people as possible slapping along during the debates (which we think are likely to be on 15^th, 22^nd and 29^th of April).

Thanks to the team at Albion who have worked in their own time to pull this off. You know who you are.

http://www.slapometer.com

Steve Henry, our non exec advisor picked up the Chairman’s award at the BTAA awards the other week. He calls it “one of those lifetime achievement awards which make you feel like your career is all over”. You can read all about his experience of the night on his blog.

Steve showed us some of his favorite HHCL work in a company meeting recently. It was interesting to look at the diversity of work from the subversive Tango stuff, to the category-breaking First Direct launch and then the more serious Fourth Emergency service work for AA. Nearly all of the work still stood up today. Sure it didn’t have an associated augmented reality, social-networked embeddable widget, but the rules of cut through in advertising haven’t changed. Engaging, relevant brand thoughts expressed in a way that is surprising and entertaining still get momentum. And you know that if any of these campaigns were executed today they would have the legs to span digital media.

When people hear that we have Steve Henry in at the agency their first question is usually “What does he do?”. So let’s paint the picture. Steve is in 3 days a month, which works out as once a week for 3/4 of the month! He usually begins the day by spending time with the agency partners talking about the briefs with the most potential for creative greatness. These briefs could be big or small or they could be pitches. He then helps us interrogate the briefs before they go into creative development. For the rest of the day he is looking at live stuff going through the agency with a fresh pair of eyes. He can be heard to be saying constantly “Great work always has a something about it that feels like it can’t be done.” And occasionally someone gets a serve in a way that only Steve can pull off – where they are held accountable for screwing up, yet feel motivated to fight another day.

Steve is basically a ball of energy who questions what we are doing. Steve still has more to give than most people who are just starting out. His enthusiasm for the business is infectious and we feel lucky to have him. For him every day is just another day with opportunity to change the world.

Finally, here are a few pieces of HHCL work that we admire (and could find on Youtube).

Albion rebranded Virgin Radio to  Absolute Radio over 18 months ago. We’ve been really proud to see them continue to innovate and challenge the future of radio with a bunch of new things like dabbl the user controlled web station, Compare My Radio and Absolute 80s (the last of which Albion also branded).

Our latest assignment for Absolute Radio has been to promote their breakfast offering. You will now find Christian O’Connell, Frank Skinner and Dave Gorman spear-heading a 7 day line up. So we thought it only fair to make a virtue of their best assets – their faces. On a chilly Winter’s day in a warehouse studio in nearby Shoreditch we had the privilege of seeing Christian, Frank and Dave in their PJ’s… or in Frank’s case, his nightie. You can hear what the guys made of the shoot in some clips from their shows below.

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The campaign is running on posters and digital across London. And you can upload your own morning face on the Christian O’Connell Facebook Group.

It’s a DirectTV ad, but more than that, it’s a start. We present the first Albion in-house TV production, a brand new 30sec ad for a brand new product from the Betfair stables. The casino end, actually.

And we’re very proud of the final result. As far as Casino DirectTV ads go, I can confidently say it’s one of the best I’ve ever seen! (I guess I’d always be saying that). And it was all done in-house, from concept, to storyboards, to animation, etc. (except for sound, done by the lovely guys at 750mph). It was a great learning process and a great overall process, both internally and with Betfair. So congratulations to everyone involved, namely Tom, Liz, Stevo, Petrina, Matt, Sam and Neil.

Now, we’re not going to become a TV production company, but it’s a real plus knowing that we have these kind of capabilities, it opens up very interesting opportunities and will definitely help us help our clients better. And we got to say ‘Action’ a couple of times, even if it was just to a monitor.’

See it on Sky from Monday after 11pm.

After much anticipation, our latest Betfair Front Room TV advert, featuring the one and only Andy Gray, went on air during the Manchester United V AC Milan game on Wednesday 10^th March, causing quite a stir.

As you’ll see from the advert (below), Gray was quick to give Scouse a ribbing for Liverpool’s early Champions League exit, followed by some great banter with Arsenal fan, Robbie.

Keep your eyes peeled for some more exclusive online content featuring Andy Gray coming soon on Betfairfootball.com

If you haven’t heard of The Betfair Front Room by now, you can’t call yourself a real football fan. Our highly acclaimed integrated campaign which puts Betfair, the world’s biggest betting community, at the heart of football fandom, is now in full swing with a whole host of tantalizing TV adverts and online content under our belts. (check it out here)

But we’re not stopping there.  With our 5 über-passionate (bordering on obsessive) football fans feeling very comfortable on their inflatable Chesterfields, we thought it was about time we mixed things up, and so last night’s shoot was just a little bit special.

Enter Andy Gray, former international footballer, seasoned commentator and world-renowned Sky Sports pundit.

Yes, you heard it here first – this is an exclusive. So be sure to check out the first airing of Andy Gray taking on the Front Room lads in style during the coverage of the Champions League second-leg game between Manchester United and AC Milan at Old Trafford on 10^th March.

Massive big-up to all involved, especially to our clients at Betfair, and of course to our director Theo Delaney and the crew at Hotspur & Argyle. Finally, here’s one for the scrap book – our own Neil Potter and Matt Roskill rubbing shoulders quite literally with the big man. Although Matt’s jumper has either shrunk in the wash, or he’s choking on Neil’s excessive use of perfumed hair spray. In the words of Andy Gray: ‘Right on the money’.

Yesterday we enjoyed our best Albion Society yet. We were filled to the rafters, with people having to stand at the back to fit everyone in. Those who couldn’t make it were following on Twitter, like @debkhan who tweeted “@albionsociety stellar panel -fed up to miss it-following up via Twitter love-in”. So massive thanks to all those in the audience who set the twittersphere alight with your quotes during the session. It’s not surprising that this was our most talked about Albion Society with a high calibre panel second to none.

Alan Rusbridger, Editor in Chief of the Guardian Media Group talked about a series of interesting binaries facing both journalism and politics now: Us Vs. Them; Open Vs Closed; and with direct  reference to Murdoch’s Paywalls, Pay Vs. Free.  ”If you are open that means you want to be part of the way the web works rather than simply on the web,” whereas, being authoritarian, top down and proprietorial, whether in politics and journalism, is ” just completely antithetical to the way everything is going”.

Justine Roberts, founder of the influential online community Mumsnet, hailed this as “ the first social media election. We have a  have a power in agenda setting, because all the journalists and therefore the politicians are all watching social media”. However she dismissed suggestions that this made communities such as Mumsnet the new block vote saying that if anyone tried to tell her members that they all had to do the same thing, they’d be more “like an octopus with PMT” all going their own direction.

Tess Alps, Thinkbox Chief Executive, praised the space for criticism provided by the  mediation of professional journalists: “I don’t want politicians and the public to always have a direct unmediated relationship because next time it will be Nick Griffin. I think Goebbels would have loved the internet for that reason!” She made an impassioned plea for us all to continue supporting professional journalism saying “Politicians without online communities would be worse, but online communities without journalism would be utterly meaningless.”

Dan Thain, Senior strategist at Bluestate talked about how digital campaigning doesn’t replace real world campaigning, rather it is a way of stimulating “real activism in the real world. The fundamentals haven’t changed. Peer to peer contact is still much more important and high value.” Digital campaigning however, enabled the two important elements to any successful political campaign “Money and Mobilisation” a strategy they’ve developed by “looking at participation, what matters, what gets results – seeing what works and focussing relentlessly on that”.

Read what the Telegraph and Brand Republic had to say.

Next time Albion Society gets together at Patisserie Valerie will be in June. Make sure we have your details if you want to be invited to come along.

Sometimes advertising delivers one of those Really Proud Moments.

Really Proud Moments usually include:
- Your mum seeing some of your work.
- Your mum seeing some of your work and understanding it.
- Your mum seeing some of your work, understanding it and actually liking it.

Well, we were really chuffed to make it onto Wired Magazine’s updated London silicon roundabout. Another Really Proud Moment. The original 2008 list compiled by Dopplr’s CTO included 15 tech start ups all based around Old Street. In the updated map we one of only a few creative agencies to be noted alongside some of our favorite tech brands: Tweetdeck, Moo and Last.fm. Oh, and we are at number 69 (cue childish chuckles – double proudness).

A few months ago it was realized that the walls here at Albion were a tad bare, so the management saw fit to get the team to design and paint a mural on the kitchen wall… It’s a bloody mess!