Our Logbook » Slacking, Thinking, Work Archive

After the thrills and spills of a highly entertaining production, tomorrow sees the launch of our fantastic new ‘Middleman’ campaign for Betfair.

It’s Betfair’s biggest ever marketing campaign to date (see this article on Brand Republic)  and we’ve been really lucky to work with a cracking international client team in Hammersmith and Malta in our bid to position the brand as ‘The World’s Biggest Betting Community’ (yes, we’ve even got that claim through those lovely people at Clearcast).

The idea’s a simple one: on Betfair, you cut out the middleman which means you bet direct against 3 million other people. And that of course means better odds and much bigger wins (than all those traditional high street bookmakers).

As you’d expect for a brand like Betfair, it’s a fully integrated campaign with a massive online push that kicks off this weekend with the first ever YouTube takeover by a betting brand. A massive coup for all of us involved and a nice little cameo from Andy Gray of Sky Sports, so watch out for that from midnight on Saturday…

We’re also going to be on TV throughout the season’s live sport coverage (football, horse racing, golf, cricket, you name it…) with a couple of hilarious ads showing how middlemen (yes, it’s those traditional bookies again) get in the way of people trying to betting and add no value.

A big well done and a massive thank you to everyone involved at Betfair, all our partners and of course here at Albion (too many to mention in this post, but you know who you are).

Look out for it over the weekend.

Here’s a sneak preview for you:

Since its launch two months ago Draw and Fold Over is still going strong and yesterday we were contacted by Mark Sinclair at Creative Review who had just stumbled across it. In his words ‘I love it, lots of fun‘ – read more on his blog post here and if you still haven’t had a go yourself, you really should. www.drawandfoldover.com

Earlier in the week you might have heard that we won the Jose Cuervo account, one of the oldest most recognised and awarded Tequila brands – worldwide.

To celebrate we thought what better place than a Mexican bar along the road where (guided by a knowledgeable barman) we tested out a number of Cuervo cocktails. The girls had some rather large pink ones (very SATC) and the boys went more macho with shorts followed by an odd looking green chaser (which the barman claimed to be good for you).

We think our night out has put us in good stead to work on the Cuervo portfolio of products and has given us an insight into the product to help us deliver an international brand positioning and creative platform.

One thing we learnt during the night is that Tequila definitely makes you happy!

Work will roll out later this year.

…a question pondered by many and only answered by a few brave souls. It could be anything – a piece of film or animation, an image or photograph, even a story or piece of juicy gossip.  But how do you recognise when something has the potential to be shared by hundreds, even thousands of people?

In true Blue Peter style, here’s one we made earlier. Yesterday in fact – and it’s a great case study on how things explode at the speed of light with the power of online word-of-mouth.

Before we start – it’s worth noting that we (Albion) did not create this image. It was sent to us. All we did was help it on its way to thousands of people via the interwebs. If YOU created this image, then give us a call and come in for a cup of tea and a chocolate digestive. You deserve it.

So, our ‘go viral’ mantra (case study of the ‘England Muppets’ image):

• Launch at exactly the right time. For the tiny percentage of the country that didn’t know, the England football team were playing yesterday and every man and his dog were acting like true football pundits on the social networks. We posted the image just at the right time when people were truly engaged in all things England and all things football.

• Make people want to share it. We laughed out loud at the irony in this work of art. To many, the England football team are a bunch of Muppets – so sticking their heads on to a team photo was perfect comedy value. It got our attention, made us smile and made us want to send this on.

• Make it simple to share it. Twitter is great for blasting out 140 characters quickly and easily, so we posted it via TwitPic with a shortend URL and tagged on the appropriate football hash tags that were trending at that time.

And finally…

• Hit the influencers – this is often easier said than done, especially if it’s branded content, but in this case, our picture was picked up organically by some heavy hitters on the key social networks. You need to know who you’re targeting; or just know that where you’re promoting the viral content, people will be interested in it.

In our minds, the ‘England Muppets’ image ticked all of the above criteria, so when it achieved over 300 views in 9 minutes, we knew this was viral gold. And it’s still going strong, achieving way over 2000+ views in less than 24 hours – and you can check out the original link here.

Last night a team of Albion’s Account Handlers were lucky enough to attend the last IPA 44 Club ‘Big Achievers’ event with Johnny Hornby. Johnny is a true Account Man to the bone, a founding partner of CHI and widely known as one of the most respected Ad Men around. We were in for a lesson in 20 years of Account Handling experience, and he didn’t disappoint.

Johnny talked through some vital aspects of what, in his opinion, makes a really great account handler. He explained how the ‘old school’ measures of traditional account handling still firmly had their place – or sharp pencils and clean note pads, as he put it. When commenting on his days on the Ogilvy graduate programme, he spoke fondly of ‘The University of Advertising’, and how he originally had wild dreams of becoming a creative.

Interestingly, Johnny divides the Account Handler stereotype into 2 halves – those who are on-the-button organisers with great project management skills, and those who are born relationship builders who thrive on inspiring creative people and giving confidence to their clients. He admitted he himself was the epitome of the latter  – even going as far as to say a previous boss had once stated ‘We need to get you a number 2 fast….or fire you’.

As Claire Beale, Editor of Campaign, probed Johnny with questions on his ‘playboy image’ in the Ad world, he was quick to dismiss this as the way to go for young account types, adding that ‘working hard and playing hard’ is the measure of his success to date. Even stating categorically that although he loves mixing business with pleasure, this doesn’t always work out the way it’s intended.

To sum up a great 30 minutes with one of the industry’s top men – Johnny hit the nail on the head by saying that to be really successful in the often self-indulgent Ad world, you must really love what you’re doing. ‘Our industry is going at 120mph’ he added, and pointed out how we must be constantly listening to our clients; knowing what’s going on in the industry in every media channel; and never forgetting that the over-supply of agencies wanting to take your breakfast is even more apparent now than ever before.

One of Johnny’s best quotes of the evening is still ringing in my ears – ‘I’ve always wondered where average Account Directors end up…probably not in a good place.’ Inspiration and motivation were the order of the evening, and we certainly got served a plate full. Thanks Johnny.

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).

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).

This Tuesday at the Marketing Society, Howard Schultz shared some of the marketing story behind the Starbucks brand, and as it’s a business we’re fascinated by, I went along to find out more, accompanied by Anne MacCaig, CEO of Cafedirect. Midway through a media tour publicising the company’s involvement in the Red project, and fresh from an encounter with the Today programme, Howard gave a polished performance, with a big emphasis on the company’s CSR efforts including a whopping $300 million investment in staff healthcare in the US. Coming from relatively humble origins in the Projects, he was keen to explain his personal motivation:”I wanted to create the kind of company my father never got the chance to work for.”

With this as his start-point, his focus has been on building the company, not building a brand. This year the Starbucks marketing drive during the economic downturn has been single-mindedly on reconnecting with the core customer and the brand is now number one on both Facebook and Twitter. And this energy and engagement has been sustained by social initiatives like giving away a free coffee on the day of the US presidential election to anyone who came into any branch of Starbucks and proved they’d voted.

Howard was keen to point out that CSR is not marketing for him; it’s part of the Starbucks ethos As you might expect, Anne asked a searching question about Starbucks’ relationship with the growers – one of Cafedirect’s greatest passions in life. It was an interesting discussion to open up – whilst Starbucks is one of the biggest buyers of Fairtrade coffee in the world, it’s still a tiny proportion of their whole product, but Howard’s justification was that the Starbucks product strategy is to put quality first above all else. Howard also pointed to a micro-lending scheme and a water programme. Anne’s view was that in reality a corporation of that size could be doing a great deal more to help growers achieve the right product quality with fairer trade, and that with their scale they could have a massive, immediate impact. Howard’s philosophy in business is about rising to the challenge; as he described it “you have to take the hill everyday” Now leading a business that has grown from 3 stores when he first joined to 16 000 worldwide with 180 000 employees, that’s one hell of a lot of hills he already has under his belt. Given Starbucks’ commitment to being a responsible employer, embracing the people who supply their product, as much as the people who serve it, seems the logical next step for the business. Maybe that’s Howard’s next hill…

Watch ‘An Audience with Howard Schultz’

I went along to the IPA’s 44 Club talk at the London College of Fashion on Tuesday night. It was a talk from three of the marketing industry’s top clients: Peter Buchanan (COI), Alex Lloyd Davies (P&G), and Ian Armstrong (Honda).

They were brought together to explain to a room full of account handlers exactly what it is that clients want. Having worked for a period of time in both camps (ie. client and agency side), I was particularly interested to see whether my impressions of what makes a happy client, based on my personal experience, aligned with the opinions of these industry experts.

The presentations that ensued were varied and extremely insightful. Peter (COI) launched the event with a detailed look at how public sector advertising differs from the commercial sector. This was followed by Alex’s (P&G) top tips on how to create the perfect client-agency partnership, based on her experience of having worked with a host of different creative agencies. To complete the session Ian (Honda) approached the question from a more personal perspective, outlining the Honda company ethos, and illustrating how all his colleagues (both agency and internally) belive in the same fundamental set of values.

I’ve pasted by notes of the main points from each speaker below to share my newfound knowledge. In resonse to my personal quest – to discover whether there were similarities between what I felt clients were looking for, and what the clients who worked in vastly different industries had articulated – I found that the overwhelming desire was to be treated as partners – regardless of the industry.

Peter Buchanan (COI) – important factors to consider when working on a public sector account:

• You will often be dealing with unconventional audiences
• Insight into the attitudes and behaviour of the target audience is very important (and often difficult to get hold of)
• Bear in mind the different factors that might influence the message reception (ie. try and look at the ad through the eyes of a journalist, as the political context may mean that the ad has a political message that can be spun out of it…)
• UK offline can be as valuable as online marketing in the public sector (people still expect traditional response mechanisms) as well as a large proportion of the population still don’t have access to a computer

Alex Lloyd Davies (P&G) – top 11 tips

• Show how the creative/strategy work will make the client’s business grow
• Show why the work is clever – what is it that makes it quicker/cheaper
• Work with the client like they are a partner – use inclusive vocabulary when addressing them – talk about ‘our brand’ etc
• In a large business, ask up front who you should talk to if you have a particular idea or some interesting data you have received
• Ahead of a meeting, call the client up and give them a brief heads up on the idea and running order of the meeting
• Try and weave the idea in to an initiative/strategy that is already planned (as marketing budgets are so tight at the moment the only work that will run is one that is aligned with the core objective of the brand)
• Show how the work is measurable (and be honest if it isn’t) – do not be afraid that work will be rejected on this basis alone
• Proposals should be short and sweet
• Show the client what the consumer will actually see (ie. show the work in situ – whether banners on a website or POS material)
• Think whether you would spend the money if it were your own? Do you think you are giving your client good value?
• Value the small jobs as much as the large ones (as small jobs done well can instil confidence in your agencies competency which can lead to larger jobs)

Ian Armstrong (Honda) – top 10 tips

• Clients want good, creative work
• Show an understanding of the client’s strategy
• Demonstrate that you have the emotional intelligence to work with others (you need to be able to work well with people from all over the world from a diverse range of backgrounds)
• Honda works with people whose attitudes and values are aligned with theirs – their colleagues have strong behaviours (the visible manifestation of attitudes and values) that get the job done
• Their agency must be passionate and embrace challenge
• Agencies must be consistent in their delivery
• People must be open minded and receptive to new ideas
• Operate in a state of ‘mild agitation’ – have a sense of urgency to the work to get the job done
• “We can all be doers” encapsulates the attitude of Honda

The last Albion Society of 2009 took place yesterday at Patisserie Valerie, Spitalfields. George Magnus a Senior Economic adviser at UBS and someone who is widely credited with being one of the first economists to foresee this year’s credit crunch hosted the event talking about the ageing population; an The Age of Ageing.

For the first time in history life expectancy is currently rising and at the same time fertility is falling. This is increasing the number of dependents (people too old or too young to work) relative to the size of the workforce which is having major implications for economic growth and public finances.

George covered 3 potential solutions: increase the retirement age, (thus making people work longer), increase immigration (substitute workers from overseas for UK workers); improve Total Factor Productivity so that we can increase economic output even though the labour force will be smaller (get more from fewer people working).

In a room predominately filled with people below 60, it stirred up much debate as they conjured up thoughts of  their own futures. David Wethey from Agency Assessments raised the question of how far we will be able to solve the problem if we manage to address the prejudice of ageism?

The morning was wrapped up by one of our very own Senior Planners, Sam Ashken who highlighted the possibilities and opportunities an aging population can have for businesses and entrepreneurs – there are tremendous opportunities to target this ‘growing’ market  - answers on a postcard.