Mark Forscher

This ad is pretty incredible. The download is a little slow but it’s definitely worth it. The soundtrack is great and it reminds me of Brazilan pop from the 60s. While many agencies are trying to build hype through ‘grassroots’ viral campaigns, well executed creative ads like this can be a lot more entertaining.

A few weeks ago I saw Jeff Benjamin from Crispin Porter + Bogusky in Miami, the agency responsible for Subservient Chicken (among other viral marketing hits), speak during the Eyebeam Contagious Media Workshops. He had a pretty realistic take on the challenge of advertising in 2005: everyone knows advertising is trying to sell something, so now people have the expectation that if you’re going to try to sell them something, you should entertain them while doing it.

Advertising as entertainment is not a new idea, but it is a lot more engaging (even as a tv ad) than a viral marketing campaign done for the sake of going ‘viral.’ Now if only I remembered what type of deodarant this Stunt City ad is trying to sell…

What happens when advertisers take their campaigns to the streets? Street artists fight back.

From Agenda Inc.:

Saatchi & Saatchi has eschewed traditional advertising techniques in favour of a more subversive, and possibly even illegal, method of getting its message across. As part of a £20 million campaign for a new Brazilian spirit it is spray-painting graffiti images on walls and buildings in the East End of London as a way to reach young consumers immune to conventional advertising.

But the campaign appears to have backfired. Real street graffiti artists have begun taking “direct action” against the interlopers. At the centre of the battle is a Christ-like figure dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, which has been sprayed in fashionable areas such as Brick Lane and Old Street.

The stencilled figure, based on the Christ the Redeemer statue that overlooks Rio de Janeiro, is part of global advertising for Sagatiba, a brand of cachaca. However, street artists have identified the figure on websites and resolved to deface it wherever it appears. Posters have been torn down, stencils papered over and one image has had paint thrown over it.

Read the original article from The Times, UK which has an interesting definiton of viral marketing: marketing which “allows consumers to think that they have discovered a product.” Huh?

What do slick sports cars and scantily clad Asian women pretending to play traditional drums have in common? Ill-conceived advertising and cultural exploitation!!

The ad is part of Mitsubishi Motors North America’s new national advertising campaign, created by BBDO, for Mitsubishi’s 2005 Eclipse sport coupe. Here’s the concept:

Mitsubishi Motors’ brand image will be distinguished by the contemporary, edgy look put forward in the new campaign, which incorporates subtle elements of Asian influence in U.S. pop culture, often referred to as “Japanese cool,” or “J.Cool.” As real as the British invasion of the 1960s, the J.Cool cultural phenomena is popping up everywhere — from Gwen Stefani’s smash hit “Harajuku Girls,” to Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” film series, to Japanese anime cartoons and “Hello Kitty,” to the Academy Award-winning film “Lost in Translation.” A modern mix of Japanese influences with a distinctly current spin, J.Cool provides a wonderfully distinct flavor and complimentary backdrop to Mitsubishi’s “Driven to Thrill” brand message. [link]

Lumping the Harajuku Girl subculture with Hello Kitty and Hollywood movies to represent a national Japanese ‘cool’ is a little like saying hiphop, George Lucas and Marilyn Manson define American cool. They have nothing in common. And Gwen Stefani’s bizarre appropriation of Harajuku Girls is not exactly the best model of a Japanese cultural invasion either. MiHi Ahn destroys Stefani in this Salon.com article (Gwenihana – Gwen Stefani neuters Japanese street fashion to create spring’s must-have accessory: Giggling geisha!) in which she dissects how Stefani has “taken Tokyo hipsters, sucked them dry of all their street cred, and turned them into China dolls.” Sexualizing and exotifying women and ritualistic traditions for commercial purposes is just tired tired tired. It’s 2005. Time for Mitsubishi to wake up.