Agency Spy

Another Anomaly, the spawn of Anomaly, has released its first piece of work. “The-little-shop-that-maybe-can” was charged with developing and implementing a non-traditional marketing plan to ensure New Yorkers hear about a fight taking place on January 17th for Jones v Trinidad.

So, a non-traditional marketing plan coming from a small and radical new shop? One would expect that it would be creative and at least somewhat compelling. Not so much. Here are some of the elements:

- Projection text media in partnership with Visual Goodness and the technology of Paul Notzold. We love this part. We love this tech every time we see it.

- The online viral campaign is a boxing postcard. Why the URL has “game” in it (http://www.msgboxinggame.com ) we’ll never know, as there is nothing “gamey” about it.

– They got Beanie Sigel to give a track from his new album. As Another Anomaly hypes him inconjuction with the fight, Siegel mentions them on radio. Standard PR fare.

There’s also some traditional stuff (print, broadcast, radio, etc.). They sent some ring girls around town and got one of the fighters to get snaps with the Knicks. Did some wall paintings, too. Yawn. Oh and they reached out to the Hispanic community. We’re no sure how, but it’s bound to be just as interesting as the rest of this stuff.

When Another Anomaly was announced, there was all this talk of providing services dealing in IP, marketing communications and “whatever the new partners feel passionate about.” To the partners, do you guys feel passionately about the fight or the work you’ve created to promote it? Where’s the IP anyway?

You know, the best marketing we ever saw for a fight dealt with the recent Hatton/Mayweather match on HBO. The cable station produced a traditional marketing reality show called 24/7, which followed the fighters for three weeks before the big night. No one in my brownstone (3 boys and 1 gal) watches boxing. We’re more soccer, football and video game enthusiasts. Quite accidentally, we all fell into watching the third episode, as it followed behind a re-run of The Wire. From that moment on, we were hooked on two people and an event that we had been oblivious of only moments before. People took sides. Hatton’s tagline of “A pint and a fight” became the mantra of the house. We called friends and made them watch the show. On fight night, we got some beer, food and 25 of our nearest and dearest over to watch the boys slug it out. It was awesome. We were yelling. We were invested, became advocates. Maybe, just maybe… simplicity can be more effective, better - a pint and fight and some emotion. That’s all you need. Just a thought.

The agency SS+K has been working with new company Credo Mobile . Credo aims to make the best out of cell phone service by taking 1% of your charges and putting them towards “progressive” causes such as Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. Finally! A cell phone service for liberals.

No seriously… Okay, so while we just poked some fun, we’re also going to give SS+K a big thumbs up for using interactive artist Paul Notzold to create a dynamic street campaign. Paul agreed to the project because he believes in the mission of Working Assets, which Credo is a subsidiary of.

And we’re going to give AdWeek, who covered the campaign, a big thumbs down for not mentioning him. Advertising journals often fail to mention the artist (unless they’re a big name) who provides the actual creative force. Hey AdAge? The agencies won’t look bad if you reference whom they tapped. Notzold’s made quite a name for himself lately and is a respected member of the street artist community. We all know that brands are especially worried these days about whether or not agencies have a clue about what’s going both online and off. SS+K look like they’ve got their ear to the street on this one. Nice.

SS+K employed Paul’s genius technology that provides passersby to interact with the campaign using their cell phones. Projected cartoons, drawn by political satirist Tom Tomorrow, (featuring images of people such as George W. Bush and Dick Cheney) were shown next to blank dialogue boxes leaving onlookers to fill in the blanks. The application of Paul’s technology is so great because it allows contextualizing of text messaging to tell a story in public space. 

Alice Ann Wilson, design director, SS+K, said “This is voice that contributes to larger issues. The text projection creates a sense of community where everyone can use their phone to actively engage in the brand.”

Right on.

We’ve been seeing these ads around town lately. Okay… can someone please tell us what the deal is? They’re awful. Clipart? And um hello, what’s with the weird copy? Both of these ads were clearly made by the same folks as they go to the same URL - www.chainfactor.com. We want to know who the agency or creative behind these monstrosities is like right now. They’re an assault to our senses during that oh-so painful morning commute.

Email us at : agencyspy at mediabistro dot com

The billboards and print ads for Italian fashion brand Nolita featuring an anorexic woman have been banned. The IAP said that the picture campaign violated their code that “advertising to be honest, truthful and correct and article 10 which states it must not offend moral, civil and religious beliefs and respect human dignity in all its forms and expressions.” The photographer, Italian Oliviero Toscani, called the move censorship. The legendary Toscani is no stranger to controversy. One of his most well-known ads was for Benetton and featured David Kirby, a dying AIDS activist, surrounded by members of his grieving family (see below). The campaign had received backing from the Ministry of Health. Minister Livia Turco said that the ad could “promote responsibility towards the problem of anorexia.”

Nolita, Italian fashion brand, selected anorexic Isabelle Caro for their new ads debuting at Milan Fashion Week. The ads were shot by famed photographer Oliviero Toscani. The Daily Mail is reporting that Ms. Caro weighs a mere 64lbs. The 27-year old French woman has her own blog (we couldn’t locate it) and has suffered from anorexia since she was 13.

Isabelle said that, “I’ve hidden myself and covered myself for too long. Now I want to show myself fearlessly, even though I know my body arouses repugnance. I want to recover because I love life and the riches of the universe. I want to show young people how dangerous this illness is.”

Nolita had this comment “‘to use the naked body to show everyone the reality of this illness, caused in most cases by the stereotypes imposed by the world of fashion.”

Giorgio Armani responded with, “Anorexia has reasons which are not linked to fashion. Even people who take no notice of fashion get anorexic.”

Read More: Dita Von Teese Looks Hot While Pimping Birth Control

A new billboard planted uh… built in the UK believed to be a world’s first green billboard, which reduces noise pollution and boosts tree coverage. Made from a living, growing hedge of native willow trees, the Green Billboard offers advertisers a low-carbon option that enhances the local landscape, can be an attractive medium to screen development works and makes use of the trees’ sound absorbing qualities to confine noise levels.

Seems quite static though. It’s good. Don’t get us wrong. Go Mother Earth.

Westin Hotels, Deutsch New York and small marketing agency Electric Artists just launched an outdoor campaign that emphasizes the chain’s year old tagline: “This Is How It Should Feel.” The $30MM experiential campaign is turning busy, hectic areas into “places of renewal.” There no shots of the rooms, people checking in or any other hotel amenities. We love that the campaign attempts to pull an emotional response out of the consumer rather than shoving advertising copy down their throats through a pairing of unusual technologies and more traditional expierences. The campaign consists of innovative grab bag including Read the rest of this entry »

Amnesty International in Switzerland launched an award-winning human rights awareness campaign called “Not Here But Now” that we couldn’t let you miss (see larger photos after the jump).You may have noticed that it rightfully took home a Gold Lion this year, but we’re not taking any chances. Placed in Swiss cities in June 2006 the campaign was designed to Read the rest of this entry »

Check out this billboard for the World Wildlife Fund campaign that uses the sun to fight global warming. It’s great work. Some agency or in-house marketer must be very please. The video above shows the ad across the time span of a day.

Take note - All creatives working in Europe need to mind their ps and qs as the ASA is on the hunt. The Advertising Standards Authority just banned a billboard showing a crash-test dummy with a baseball bat standing over another on the ground, alongside the pay-off line: “Hard like Mother Russia”. Why crash dummies? We dunno considering that the billboard was for the brand Soviet Jeans. The ASA said:

- the billboard made violence seem acceptable and attractive for impressionable youths who wore or aspired to wear Soviet clothing.

A few days ago, the ASA took out a W+K spot. Keep in mind it’s not just this governing body slamming advertising. It’s consumers too. Complaints are what really force the ASA into action. This might be a cultural trend that is picking up some serious steam.

More: Xbox gets their new broadcast spot censored, but we love it anyway.
W+K print ad gets banned in Europe.