Two Premieres In One Week...Did I Mention They Were Media Firsts!

This week has made me feel extremely proud to work in the Paramount Theatrical team at MEC as we planned and implemented two UK media firsts for the releases of two big films.

Big Brother Paranormal Activity 3 premiere event

The first being the unique and exciting campaign which launched Paramount’s Paranormal Activity 3 in the Big Brother House.
MEC negotiated a partnership with Channel 5 and Endemol to host the premiere of the film. The partnership with Big Brother started with contestants competing in a selection of intriguing Paranormal Activity tasks within the house. The winning housemates were rewarded with the opportunity to attend the premiere, which was hosted in the main Big Brother arena.
In addition Big Brother fans were given the opportunity to win tickets to join the contestants in the VIP area at the premiere. MEC developed a social media campaign using promoted tweets and Facebook to increase word-of-mouth and drive traffic to the competition page. This was a great demonstration of social media's role in generating mass awareness and huge buzz around film releases.


The winning contestants and fans joined a host of celebrities on the red carpet and watched Paranormal Activity 3 on a giant screen installed especially for the event.
Supporting this unique idea, we built a 360 media campaign to promote the Paranormal Activity 3 launch, which ran across TV, print, radio and online, as well product placement spots within Big Brother. Following the premiere, footage from the event is going to be used across all media to continue promoting the new movie over the Halloween period.
Big Brother is an iconic show and offered the perfect platform for us to launch Paranormal Activity 3, especially as the film's theme and content is centred around activities which happen inside a house documented through video cameras.


Sean Cannon, Communications Director for Paramount at MEC said, “We are always looking to push the boundaries with our campaigns for Paramount. Hosting the premiere of Paranormal Activity 3 in the Big Brother house is the perfect fit for this launch and we are very excited to see the campaign kick-off.”


The second Premiere was for Steven Speilberg and Peter Jackson's The Adventures of Tintin. On Sunday 23rd October from 5.30pm Tweeters were able to click on our promoted Twitter trend #TintinPremiereLive and view the live stream direct from the right hand panel of their Twitter account. Click on this link to see the live streamed content including exclusive interviews with the cast http://www.livestream.com/tintinpremierelive .


London Premiere of Tintin at Odeon West End 23.10.11


The live streaming enabled Tweeters and fans to gain direct access to the red carpet where Alex Zane and Robyn Bright hosted the event for us! Guests sitting in the cinema were also able to see the action on the red carpet as the live streaming was also shown on the cinema screen. The film’s stars including Simon Pegg, Jamie Bell and Nick Frost are big Tweeters so they created initial buzz on the micro blogging platform before the day of the premiere. As part of our media communication strategy we created a Twitter campaign to ensure there was a build up of anticipation and excitement in the run up to the big event. Normally film premieres are a magnet for celebrities and this one was no exception. I managed to walk past the lovely Jamie Bell (who played Tintin) on the red carpet and spotted the gorgeous Daniel Craig! Other than the film's cast who were obviously going to be at their own premiere, I also bumped into a couple of cast members of my favourite Sunday night drama Downton Abbey!
The film itself was an action-packed and fun filled adventure which the whole family would enjoy and although I may be biased as I worked on the release, I would recommend watching Tintin on the big screen as the cinematography and 3D animation is outstanding!

Overall this has been an exciting and rewarding film-filled week and I look forward to blogging about our next big film release Puss In Boots!

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#FrostSorrell - It's Frost-Sorrell the TV show!

Every quarter at MEC the whole UK office gathers for a company meeting usually in a venue near the Southbank or London Bridge area. These quarterly meetings or MEC In Motion as they are better known are a way for the management board to keep MEC employees up to date with the company's development and progression. Each MEC In Motion tries to offer something different usually with the help of a guest speaker. However the latest company meeting saw the bar being raised to Olympic standards as we found out what our latest MEC In Motion would entail:

Jonathon Ross' ITV Studio set

On Friday 16th September the whole of MEC London made their way to the new set of the Jonathan Ross show at ITV studios. MEC Access made media history when they arranged and co-ordinated a live stream event featuring Sir David Frost, the ultimate TV presenting legend and the media industry's most successful business mogul Sir Martin Sorrell. To give the event an even bigger profile, ITV went on to film the whole interview whilst simultaneously live streaming it to MEC's global offices in 84 different countries. MEC employees all over the world were able to submit questions for Sir Martin through MEC's global twitter profile @MECideas while MEC London sat in the studio. This was an impressive example of active engagement - successfully demonstrating how a global audience can participate in live events through the possibilities of live-stream technology and social media.


I knew this event would probably be a once in a lifetime opportunity so I thought it would be great to obtain some exclusive content for my blog. After speaking to MEC Head of Branded Content Chantal Rickards I managed to get myself backstage and into the green room where I met Sir David and Sir Martin. After a congratulatory toast to celebrate the success of the afternoon I put on my journalist hat and asked the WPP Chief a quick-fire question:

Me interviewing Sir Martin Sorrell in the ITV green room

Me: "Google and Facebook are constantly in the news as they try to compete against each other. If you had to put a bet on who would win the race for media domination who would it be?
Sir Martin: "Interestingly in relation to your question, it was stated in the news earlier that Facebook missed its first half nationals...and Google + maybe starting to get some traction or relative traction... I wouldn't bet on either or against one another but it's just interesting that we're seeing maybe, Facebook coming under much more intense competition with Google +....but Facebook is obviously very powerful, it's the second or third biggest nation on the planet... so it's not to be underestimated but there's more competition for Facebook and vice versa there's more competition for Google..."


Although my time speaking to Sir Martin fell short of what I had anticipated, it was interesting to hear his thoughts about the two rivalling media giants. During his interview with Frost, he went on to say that the medium has become more important than the message - although I beg to differ especially in light of the economic downturn where we have seen more and more brands focus on customer value in their messaging - (e.g. M&S £10 dine in for two).

Other key notes from his overall interview with Sir David Frost revealed how his best piece of advice was not to have one piece of advice and to have someone they can talk to who doesn't have an agenda. Sir Martin went on to state that to excel in this industry you need persistence, quoting Saatchi & Saatchi's mantra "nothing's is impossible" which he said should be applied to every aspect of life.

To conclude, the day was a great success and a huge thank you goes out to everyone who contributed to the afternoon including Sir David Frost, Sir Martin Sorrell, the MEC Access and MEC Social Media team, and a special thank you to Chantal Rickards who was the brains and coordinator behind the whole event!

See below for a few of my favourite tweets from the day with the help of James Caig's Storify post http://storify.com/jamescaig/frostsorrell-with-mec

"MEC company meeting at ITV studios! David Frost is interviewing our very own WPP's Sir Martin Sorrell, live & aired to 82 offices across the world. No pressure.. @MECideas #FrostSorrell"

"We’re live, Sir David Frost is warming up the audience with some anecdotes before his guest arrives! #FrostSorrell"

"Sir David Frost, Jonathan Ross' telly show set and a company meeting? Yes please"
"Sorrell: 'I do have an iPod, but my iPad and my Kindle are my favorite tools that keep me in touch with the world#FrostSorrell"

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Do it, Be it, MEC:it

MEC:it 2011

360 people +
36 charities/community projects +
Over 2500 hours worth of work +
Gala dinner, awards ceremony and one massive rave @ The Roundhouse
= 1 amazing MEC company awayday aka MEC:it 2011


After months of preparation and planning, the MEC away day (16th June) out-weighed all my expectations. Being on the planning team along with 19 others meant I knew all the ins and outs and organised a lot of what we were going to be doing on the day.

MEC:it Dream Team

The whole UK company including the London and Manchester office were split in to 36 teams of 10 and were allocated a charity or community project from decorating to digging. At the start of the day teams were sent to their project location dressed in a bespoke MEC:it tshirt and armed with gardening gloves and a packed lunch bag. Part of being on the MEC:it planning team meant we had to come up with an engaging and entertaining element for the course of the day. So in order to continue our expertise in digital acceleration as a company we decided to incorporate a social mobile challenge including the use of Facebook, Twitter and a fantastic mobile gaming app called SCVNGR. Each team had to complete a series of mini tasks throughout the day such as uploading tweets to twitter, capturing and uploading photos and flash-mob videos to Facebook and using SCVNGR to complete location-based challenges. The idea was to encourage competitiveness through the open platform of social media, allowing teams to see what their competitors were uploading and how well they had done in completing the social and mobile tasks. Everyone became actively engaged and made a great deal of effort to complete the challenges. The sheer volume and standard of content created made all the hard work and planning worthwhile. From creating our very own Loveshack remake to holding a yoga session in the London underground, the flash-mob videos were by far the most comical with teams using whatever they had at their disposal to make them funny and entertaining. Click on the below to watch the oscar nominated performances:

Despite the typical British downpour everyone's spirits were high and everyone thoroughly enjoyed their projects- although I'm sure it was the thought of an alcohol-fueled evening event which helped keep them going!

After everyone had 'MEC'd it' at their charity/community project the men got suited and booted (or kilted in some instances) and the women got all glammed up for the evening gala event. Although at MEC our preferred choice of transport is an Addisson Lee-mosine, coaches chauffeured us to the Roundhouse in Camden where we strutted our stuff on the red carpet and posed for what felt like the paparazzi. Technically we did have a pap snapping shots for OK! magazine so look out in next week's issue and you may see the photo below stealing a half page in the back!

The champagne reception, the three course gala dinner, the awards ceremony and the party made the whole event a smash hit. The drinks were flowing (or being flown over my dress), the music was pumping and there were some rather creative shapes being cut on the dancefloor. Everyone was pretty merry to say the least and the ghostly faces the next morning summarised just how much we all took advantage of the free bar! Thank god we were given a late 11am start! However despite the raging hangover, I always enjoy the morning after work events because that's when all the stories begin to blossom and the gossip spreads like wildfire around the office. Although I don't intend on turning this into a gossip column I will say this: MEC:it's gossip certainly didn't disappoint. A week later and I'm still hearing people nattering about the evening's scandalous rumours!

I have no experienced my first MEC Awayday and if I had to sum it up in one word it would be EPIC!

Bring on the next one...

Best quotes the next day:

• "finally feeling human- think this was officially a two day hangover... Mec Awaydaywas well worth it though!"
• "what a fantastic Mec Awayday , definitely know it was a hardcore one after having 16 hours sleep to recover and still feeling tired! Right lets start planning the next one..."
• "Me and Dan turner walking around London bridge at 4am with a stolen rubber arm was quite funny!...Oh and i missed the train back to Manchester this morning which wasn't funny at all! I blame Danny"

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The longest jagerbomb line up in grad history...

As you will see I haven't written a post in a couple of weeks. I also haven't slept, eaten or exercised in a couple of weeks either! Why I hear you ask, well I have had my life taken over by what is known  as the MEC Grad Pitch. A final project to mark the end of the graduate rotation programme at MEC. After being given a brief for teen road safety two weeks ago, I have experienced a rollercoaster of feelings and emotions from over excitement to over-tiredness, rushes of adrenaline and mental exhaustion.

All the rotational grads were split up and led a pitch team of 5 other new starters or graduate level colleagues. Reflecting a real pitch situation we had two weeks to brainstorm and plan a communications campaign detailing our insight and idea for tackling teen road safety in London. Because of the tricky target audience and stigma attached to government advertising, this made the pitch one of the most stressful tasks I have done in my career so far. However it was by far one of the most beneficial and rewarding. The early starts, late nights and working over the weekend was all worth it, and I know that everyone involved felt a great sense of achievement and satisfaction. The highlight and I guess most daunting apsect of the pitch was presenting infront of senior management including Steve Hatch the CEO of MEC. Although it was daunting it was also an amazing opportunity. Arguably however another amazing opportunity was witnessing all the MEC grads let loose in our local bar, setting up the longest Jagerbomb line in bar history and racking up over £1000 worth of bar tab in our celebratory drinks session after the pitch! Animals!

It only seems like yesterday since I started at MEC fresh out of Newcastle University but I have now officially finished the MEC graduate rotation programme. It feels like I have graduated for the second time and that the last 9 months have been an extension of Uni. All I can say is I have had the best experience. After reading back over all my blog posts since starting at MEC I can't quite believe all the great things I have done as a result of the grad scheme. I really couldn't have asked for a better start in my career and it's all thanks to the fantastic culture and great people who work at MEC. On behalf of the other rotational grads Rosie Duncan, Rachel Deed, Jono Rayner and Lizzie Harris, a special mention must go to our grad rotation dads Ben Gordon, Simon Keep and Carl Nawagamuwa.

One final point, although it is the end of my grad rotation, fear not, my blog posts will live on! After having my blog mentioned a few times by candidates interviewing for the next grad scheme intake I feel proud of it's success and recognition. Long live the blog!


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Broadcast Banter - TV Is Alive & Kicking!

Having recently moved into the MEC Broadcast department I am familiarising myself with the art of TV planning and buying, turning on my charm and becoming pally with the channel saleshouse reps and getting to grips with all the TV jargon.

It's no secret that I have been eagerly anticipating my time in Broadcast as the other grads have given it rave reviews (the broadcast team players being a key element behind the positive feedback). The broadcast team at MEC have a reputation for being the loudest, most welcoming, most entertaining and most sociable department with the best banter going. So far I haven't been disappointed. Everyday starts with a hand tingling high five from one of my managers follwed by an early round of tea. In my first week I competed in a strength challenge. Each member of the broadcast team (men and women) had to lift at arms length a case of boules (metal balls) and see how long they could hold them up for. No real reason other than a bit of fun and healthy competition between the team! I am proud to say that I lasted 59 seconds beating all the girls and even some of the men! This surely calls for some kind of award?

All fun and games aside the TV department work extremely hard to make sure all our campaigns are due to deliver what air time has been bought on each channel.  Buying and managing TV ad spots is not as simple as maybe an online campaign because TV ratings or viewing figures fluctuate daily which means you have to keep track of how the campaign is progressing.

Because television is a high impact medium it delivers immediacy, mass coverage, flexibility, movement, colour and crucially, spot-by-spot accountability. The fragmentation of audiences is met by a multitude of digital channels from E4 to Eden ensuring that an advertiser's message reaches a chosen target audience in an effective but cost-efficient way. I'm not denying the fact that the advertising industry has seen dramatic change (increases in social media and online spend), but global cross-media studies (by Milward Brown) have confirmed the following key facts:

• Multimedia campaigns deliver more than any single media channel can on their own, but TV often delivers the bulk of impressions and brand response.
• TV advertising is still an extraordinarily important channel for changing awareness, attitudes and sales.
• It still delivers vital mass audience reach and can prime other media to make them more effective.
• TV also surpasses other media in terms of communication power.

The fact is no matter what area of advertising I end up working in, my knowledge in Broadcast will always be useful as so much of  a client's budget is spent on TV. It is a medium suited to every target audience and I personally can't imagine an advertising industry without the presence of TV.
Long live TV!

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How Entrepreneurial is your agency?

Ad agencies are rethinking what it means to be entrepreneurial and according to an article in the Evening Standard,  are considering two interesting ideas for increasing revenue and winning new business:1. Taking share options in a client's business in lieu of fees
2. Retaining some of the intellectual property (IP) rights of an ad campaign, rather than letting the client take everything.
Although these two ideas are not extreme, they are unconventional for an industry which typically generates revenue from a client remuneration system. This system is reliant upon fixed fees or man hours and very little on campaign results.
The two new trending ideas show great new business potential and are inextricably linked. An advertising campaign (based on IP) ultimately contributes to the success of your client's business (sales and profit) which naturally suggests that agencies should retain IP rights and pocket some of the business share.

However the article didn't really reference the value based model pioneered by Coca Cola which is founded upon performance related pay. Such models would incentivise agencies meaning the best agencies will earn the most.  The flaw with performance-related pay is the complex nature of determining the actual value of a campaign so I think there is room for a model which is based on both performance and fixed fees.

Another factor which has encouraged this wave of new business models is increased competition from smaller specialised digital agencies. Consequently the Evening Standard reported that traditional agencies will need to develop more commercial models which point towards new service offerings or venturing down a non-advertising route such as brand start-ups. Part of me thinks agencies should be stepping outside of the traditional service offerings as it encourages entrepreneurial spirit, but conversely I don't think they should try to offer and claim to be experts in everything. Demonstrating expertise in one or a few services is far superior than being mediocre at everything.

All-rounder vs one expert talent - What do you think?

New Business: Charmingly Persuasive Bulldog

If I was asked 2 days ago to outline the role of new business within a media or advertising agency I probably would have blagged my way through a very brief description which would have said “it's just about trying to win new clients for the agency”.

However having spent the last two days on an IPA New Business course I am confident and more knowledgeable about what hides under the umbrella that is ‘New Business’.

One thing that has been embedded in my mind is the attention to detail and its significance. Whether this be in the initial prospect email, the chemistry meeting or the actual pitch; if you miss something or make the smallest of mistakes it will be the first thing the client notices and the one thing that will deter them from considering your agency!

The line-up of speakers on the course represented a breadth of notable talent and represented key new business figures including: 4 Marketing Directors of various advertising agencies, the Director of Client Account Team at the COI, CEO of the AAR (Client-Agency Relationship Consultancy) and our very own Business Development Director, Cormac Loughran from MEC.

When thinking about trying to win New Business we were asked to consider the process we would follow if we were spending £56 million on building our dream house. Where would we begin our research? What do we want to know? How do we want to be treated? What factors are going to sway your decision? etc.
A pitch could be won within the first two minutes but equally it could be lost. First impressions are crucial as the ultimate deciding factor for a client is the people and team they are going to be working with. The success of New Business is reliant upon relationships whether with the trade press who write about your agency, the intermediaries between you and the client, the chemistry between members of the client account team, and finally the relationship between your client team and the client themselves.
The pitch process is like dating, no date is ever the same so you can't apply the same formula, however before giving the client any piece of work or information be sure that it is relevant and ask yourself is it useful, interesting and entertaining?

Our learning on the course was assessed by a chemistry meeting with the actual MD of Heineken so it was challenging and daunting to say the least. In teams we worked into the night to generate the content and strategy for our meeting and put together a 15 minute presentation only being allowed to use the medium of voice and a flip chart! The following morning we held our chemistry meeting in front of all the course attendees and presented our initial view of the prospective business and how we were going to create initial standout in a cluttered market. Our idea was to completely defy the trend of the market and create standout by creating silence and we proposed a strategy based around long-term gain vs short-term presence. To top off the last two days I was over the moon when our team got crowned as the winner!


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Daybreak Dreaming

One of my dreams when I was younger was to be a TV presenter and thanks to ITV I came a step closer to living the dream during an ITV studio tour.

Although an early start (7.30am) this easily topped the list for being one of the best experiences on the MEC grad scheme. Having watched Daybreak (or GMTV as it was previously known) from a young age, it felt so surreal to physically walk around the studio and sit in the green room where all the celebrity guests usually wait before going on air.

I have always been a fan of the lovely Lorraine Kelly (as she is one of the original GMTV presenters) and I was chuffed when we got the chance to watch her whilst she was being filmed live. At the end of her show we got to meet Lorraine and posed for a cheeky photo to remember the occasion. The photo opportunities didn't end there and we got slightly camera-happy when we went into the Daybreak studio (which by the way is so much smaller than it appears on TV.)

We parked ourselves on the Daybreak sofas, stood in front of the weather screen to present the weather and posed on the very stage that all the bands and artists perform on when they come onto the show! 

However no studio tour would be complete without actually meeting the most important people of the show – the presenters themselves. My Daybreak dream reached its peak when we brushed shoulders with Christine Bleakley and Dan Lobb from Daybreak! We stood in the green room chatting to them and they were both really welcoming and genuinely nice people. Christine was even more stunning in person and she had a killer pair of Kurt Geiger heels on!

The morning couldn't have been any better and it ended with a champagne breakfast with all the indulgent food imaginable. I think I speak on behalf of all the grads when I say that it was one of the best mornings we have had, and who knows, maybe one day I will pursue my old dream and become the next big TV presenter!

Any tips Lorraine/Christine?


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Typical Is Relative

Did you know that the World's most typical person is a 28 year old Chinese male and that there are 9,000,000 of them! This fascinating fact was posted in an infographic video produced by the National Geographic who investigated the typical statistics that characterize our human population.

The video triggored my thoughts about the most typical UK media agency as I have recently moved into the New Business team at MEC. Part of my role whilst rotating in this department is to look at our agency both internally and externally, including how MEC is publicised through PR, our social media presence and what people are saying about us, how our website is performing and what our company credentials say to potential clients.
When sending out prospective letters or pitching for new client business, credentials are used as an introduction to the agency so the client can distinguish between all the competitors. Credentials are pretty standard but because there is so much competition I am trying to re-invigorate MEC's credentials in the hope that we stand a better chance of impressing and remaining at the forefront of the client's mind. The pace of change and digital advancement in the media industry has forced agencies to change their business model to reflect full integration. Consequently this has enforced an industry standard where agencies have become typical. They increasingly integrate all communication and creative services, have all the best research resources, own all the tools in the box, and have the best people in the industry. I started to think about how typical MEC is and whether there is such thing as a USP anymore?

I think the key to creating standout is not to prescribe standard credentials as I'm sure most clients would prefer to look through company info in their own time. Instead we should facilitate the 'New Rules of Marketing' -  nudging clients to actively seek and engage in our conversation via our blogs, social media, to create and post our own video thought-pieces in order to enhance our profile. All these elements together will naturally communicate the agency's credentials without the need for stating them in a typical list and thus creating standout and demonstrating our USP.

Just a thought:
Typical is stating your USP. Atypical is encouraging your USP to be found and witnessed by the client.


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The Best Way To Predict The Future Is To Invent It!

After spending the best part of 5 hours at the Microsoft London offices I am now officially a guru for all things digital in the world of Windows Live, Bing, MSN and Xbox Live. 
I think by now we are all conscious that our digital habits are changing and evolving at a faster rate than ever before:

• 78% of the UK population now go online after work and in the evening
• 28% of internet users own a smartphone, which is 43% of the UK population
• By 2012 it is predicted that mobile devices will outsell PC's and laptops and there will be more internet used through mobile than on computers.

Ok. So enough facts. The question on everyone's mind is what the future will see!

Many people within the media industry have stated that 2011 is the year of the mobile but what can we expect from this platform? For Microsoft, mobile will be the 'Swiss Army Knife of media' which their range of Windows 7 phones are already resembling. The Windows mobile system embodies all of Microsoft's consumer platforms, offering complete content and technology integration.

In relation to media, if planners haven't already started they will soon be moving into real-time campaign planning as a direct response to consumers' real-time interaction with brand touch-points such as Twitter and Facebook.

Video on Demand (VOD) will continue to grow and Microsoft are trying to push MSN video into the broadcast-led market. Although YouTube dominates this space, this is partly fuelled by the increasing number of videos posted and watched via Facebook, ultimately highlighting YouTube's power of being where the conversation is.
In the last week Warner Brothers signed up to become the first film distributor to enable Facebook fans to rent and buy films via their brand page using virtual Facebook credits. Maybe the future will see us watching live TV, our favourite programmes, and live streamed events such as festivals through Facebook brand pages?

In relation to technology, Microsoft stated that every physical surface has the potential to become a digital interface and content platform through touch technology. In addition with Xbox Kinect technology, all content on TV can potentially be gesture controlled. Ultimately the digital will transcend the physical and the mobile will transcend the device.

The success of these ideas are reliant on a number of things. The technology we need to implement them already exists however we need to work out how we can use it and more importantly how open is it.

Inventing the future rather than predicting it will make the impossible inevitable! 



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The Face Of The Voice Over

Have you ever sat in front of your TV watching an advert and wondered who the voice over belonged to, imagining what he or she looked like in person, and that your voice could have done a better job?
This morning I met the voice over artist for one of our TV sponsorship campaigns and sat in the recording studio while she perfected her one simple line repeatedly until the client was satisfied.

The woman who had been hired to be the voice over sat in the room opposite us behind a glass window while we observed and listened in the editing suite. As she began to read her line she was given prompts and directions for altering the pitch and tone and pronunciation of her voice in order to sound a particular way. I must have listened to the same line being read about 30 times with different voice styles and emphasis on certain words. It's intriguing how one person can produce so many varieties to their voice, but the strangest thing was speaking to her in person as her actual voice sounded completely different to the voice over she produced and actually her voice sounded younger than she looked.

I think the best way to example this is when you speak to someone on the phone and then later meet them in person and they look nothing like how you imagined.

On the way back to the office I found myself thinking about different TV voice overs and one always catches my attention. It belongs to Peter Dickson the voice of E4, because it is so distinct and entertaining.


What's your favourite TV voice over?


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I'm Impressed

Press - A medium which has received a lot of well Press in the last few years as the media industry coos over the birth of digital and possibly the retirement of Press.
In the short time I have spent in the Press department at MEC my opinion has changed. My initial view was that Press was on its last legs but in all honesty I believe it still has a lot of credibility. More importantly I believe the way we think about press needs to change and be promoted in a way which glorifies it rather than dismisses it.
In thinking of how to change people’s perceptions of Press I questioned the status and authenticity of news which circulates around the web. Content and stories posted online can spread virally within minutes but unless these make headlines in the national press, how important and newsworthy are they?

Take this example of a Tweet which was re-tweeted by Stephen Fry: "Pls join me in supporting Rebecca (a long-time pal of Stella's dad, John) and school friends walking 50 miles to give this little girl a fighting chance."

As a result, Stella received over £2000 through Twitter, but more significantly her story made national headlines and featured in The Sun!

Ask yourself this: If the story didn’t appear in the pages of the press, how important would you have considered it and what is the likelihood of you even knowing about it?

During my morning commute I religiously read the Metro newspaper and as a result came across a number of crucial articles relating to our competitor brands. Interestingly both articles commented on the brands' online ad campaigns; demonstrating press' role in enhancing the story's significance. More importantly, without reading these in the Metro first it is unlikely that I would have come across them or even deemed them as important or relevant.

I think people should see Press as giving the ultimate stamp of approval and authority rather than as a dying medium. Press isn't dead, because without it how can we distinguish what is newsworthy?

This Industry Is Big Enough For The Both Of Them

As I come to the end of my placement in MEC's digital department I feel the time spent has been extremely beneficial and I have got to grips with one of the newest and most unpredictable media platforms. Although the knowledge I have gained has barely reached the tip of the iceberg, I have left feeling excited about my future work in media agencies.

One thing I am certain and have been consistently reminded during my time in digital is that it is the future and it is an exciting department to work in. However I can't help but question the strength of digital as a sole media platform. I don't doubt online's extensive potential however a new advert for retailer Tesco came to my attention.
This was a TV ad for Tesco's grocery shopping app (please watch the below):

Tesco is the first high street supermarket with a full digital strategy however it is interesting how much it relies on traditional media such as TV to advertise and promote it. There have been countless predictions and statements that the digital space is soon to overtake traditional media.

Although more and more consumers are buying into digital technology and spending increasingly more of their time online, one thing remains constant - TV is still trusted in penetrating a mass audience especially since it is at a time when people are relaxed in their home environment. In comparison consumers face digital advertising every time they carry out daily tasks such as online banking, email, online shopping, gambling sites, social networking, gaming, researching and much more. Thus my point is that most people are online for a certain reason other than to relax and so are maybe less likely to take notice of ads. It is all very well for a brand to have digital services but in order for these services to be used and appreciated, traditional means of creating awareness play a key role in their success. This is why I believe digital advertising will never be superior to TV, maybe not for another 10 years at least.


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Taking Over the Home of Online

I am now half-way through my rotation in the digital department and I can now talk the language of cyberspace.

A lot of my time has been filled doing reports and PCA's (post campaign analyses). Although reporting is not the most thrilling of tasks, it has taught me a great deal about how to measure the success of a digital campaign and especially what works well for particular clients. The higher the CTR (click through rate) the more efficient the campaign has been and the cheaper the CPC (cost per click) the more cost effective the campaign has performed. Put this together and you can work out the overall best site placement. This could be an expandable MPU on MSN's homepage or a leaderboard on the guardian.co.uk. However it's not just choosing the format of the display because the placement of the display ad is actually most important. Targeting consumers at the right time in a contextual environment is key. This brings up an age old debate about creative agencies and media agencies and who has the most important role.
Personally collaboration is what constitutes great advertising and working together to maximise the ad creative so that the right consumers are exposed to it is where an idea turns into results and ROI.

In relation to online advertising I had to put together a powerpoint deck for all the different Home Page Take Overs (HPTO's) available on the digital marketplace. Who would have thought there was so much scope to be creative with display advertising on websites. From my research and speaking to different media owners I found a HPTO for the film Avatar which is to be particularly engaging.
Click on link to see:
http://ads1.msn.com/ads/demos/Avatar/12.18.09_Fox_AVATAR_Homepage.htm

Once on the page the user is instantly greeted by a rich media MPU (multi-purpose unit) which when clicked on, glides the whole homepage down to reveal an interactive trailer page.
(Note: on the MPU there is a text button to enable the Avatar skin on/off)

Before being exposed to the variety of display possibilities I was unsure about the future of display advertising. However I do believe that as an industry we have only scratched the surface of display ads and it won't be long before we see video display ads that change their copy (message) to speak to the user directly as soon as they land on the webpage.

Watch the online space!

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"I want to play a game"

The title of this post relates to two separate work instances. The first reflects a series of chilling, gruesome and downright disturbing films. First clue is there have been 6 released so far and the 7th is about to be released in 3D? Any guesses?
I'm talking about SAW!

Saw 3D is due to be screening in our cinemas in a couple of weeks before Halloween and I have been (un)lucky enough to be working on Lionsgate Films which is one of our film distributor clients. Part of the perks of working on a film client is that you get to go to previews and premieres of the film releases you are planning and buying the media for for the advertising campaign, although in this case I was having nightmares of the film before I had even seen it. I went to a special preview screening of Saw 3D and I have to say it wasn't as gruesome as I had built it up to be, although I did spend most of the time watching the film through squinted vision.

The second instance that my post title reflects is that I actually did play a game...a cinema/film quiz game as part of our cinema immersion day at MEC. Two cinema media owners DCM and Pearl & Dean came to our offices to give our agency a series of presentations on how to best target audiences through the cinema medium including families and 15-34's and to introduce a range of new cinema innovations for engaging with audiences pre and post screening. The day finished with a film related quiz night. I had high hopes for my team coming first until we had one too many glasses of vino however the night was a great bonding session and I got to know people in my office who I hadn't previously met or been introduced to and not forgetting the added bonus of free wine and nibbles!

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ABSOLUTEly Fabulous

"Good morning, this is DJ Robbo and you're listening to Absolute Radio"... If you're wondering what all this is about then read on!

As part of our training on the grad rotation scheme we embarked on a radio tour of Absolute Radio (formerly under the virgin radio name) where I discovered my talent for radio presenting.
Upon arrival I sat in reception with my fellow grads staring at the wall mounted electric guitars signed by various artists. We were then greeted by our Absolute Radio rep who took us on a tour around the building and showed us the studios where the DJ's and presenters record their live shows. It felt quite surreal to be walking the same hallways that famous music artists had walked. After playing a mini game of table football in their live lounge we were given a presentation overview of Absolute Radio and where it sits within the radio industry. If I'm honest I had never really listened to Absolute radio before but since finding out that they have two different stations dedicated to pure 80's and 90's music I was won over and immediately downloaded their iphone app.

The best part of the tour was getting the chance to record our own radio show in one of Absolute's recording studios. I took the role as lead DJ presenter and the other grads took on newsreader, co-host and weather reader. We had some real radio banter introducing each other with comical names such as DJ Robbo (myself) and Rozzy D (newsreader) and had such a laugh just making up random chat. The mini show was recorded and will be sent to our office for us to listen to. Major cringe as I hate the sound of my own voice especially when we used ultimate cheesey lines such as 'In da house' and 'a big shoutout to..'

However the whole experience was priceless and I think if all else fails I will try my luck at being the next big radio presenter, so watch this space!
You have just been reading the blog of DJ Robbo, hope you enjoyed the script.

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Immerse Yourself

The only way to learn is to become immersed in the subject you are studying and this doesn't just apply to the educational environment. As part of my training programme at MEC a number of events and training days have been organised. I'm now half way through my time in the communications planning department and everyday I have learnt something new. On Wednesday CBS Outdoor advertising took myself and the other rotational grads out for a tour around some of their key outdoor advertising sites.

Standing opposite Waterloo Roundabout we were given all we needed to know about outdoor poster/billboard sizes and bus panel advertising. I never knew there were so many different ways to advertise on buses whether its a t-side a superside or a rear panel or an all over bus wrap. Whatever or wherever you want to advertise, more often than not there is always a possibility however bespoke or crazy the idea may be. The idea of outdoor advertising is to completely immerse the consumer with the brand campaign and one of the most visually impressive methods is to do an underground station takeover.

After looking at 48 Sheets, digital escalator panels and cross track projections (those projector screens you see while you're waiting for a train) we were taken to Westfield shopping centre. We were given a guided tour around the whole centre and briefed on all the possible advertising opportunities and platforms available. As our tour came to an end, we finished the day with a free lunch! Amazing!

The following day was another full days training but this time it was conducted by all of the departments within MEC who each had a an hour to talk us through their roles and the kind of work we could expect to be doing if we joined their team permanently at the end of  the rotation. This was a really insightful day, one which may have been better placed during the first week of our rotation in order to fully understand the company set-up. However listening to talks and viewing presentations on each of the departments really helped me to identify the areas I was most interested in pursuing at the end of my rotation and a number of my preconceptions about certain departments were in fact challenged.

To end a great day we were able to get our hands on invitations for a private party hosted by Spotify (free online music) and partied the night away at one of Camden's great clubs Koko.

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Scene 4 Take 8: On Shoot with Olly Murs

What better way to spend a working day's afternoon than on a film shoot for our new ad campaign. Yes that's right, I managed to bag myself a place on a shoot for Nintendo and if you think that's exciting, imagine how I felt when I was told that Alexandra Burke and Olly Murs (from the X Factor) were going to be featured! I couldn't believe my luck. Celebrity sightings asside, it wasn't all fun and games and I did sit on a really hard wooden chair for 3 hours watching take after take after take of the same scene. During the break I was able to mingle with the stars and actually spoke to Olly who is a genuinely nice guy. I was dying to get a photo with him but considering I was in a professional environment and representing MEC, I thought it would be best not to. Damn that would have been a great photo!  

On a more serious note I felt privileged to be at the shoot and I also learnt so much about the production side of advertising and how ideas on a piece of paper translate to an actual filmed TV ad. There were so many people at the studio all looking more important than the next, not to mention the 5 people who were there just to cater for Miss Burke's needs, making sure her hair and make-up was styled and applied to perfection. I now appreciate the sheer amount of hard work that goes on behind the scenes of a 30 second ad shoot. After every scene take the shoot director would speak to the client to ask whether the brief had been covered and all mandatory points about the product had been raised. This was an ongoing communication to ensure that the brief was being met and the tone of voice and actions were appropriate for representing the product.

Overall attending a shoot for my Client's advert was an overwhelming experience and one which I really enjoyed. Fingers crossed it will not be my last!

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Everyday is a New Experience

As my second week draws to an end I feel like I have been at MEC for at least a month, I feel really settled and everyone on my team have spent time talking me through what client campaigns they are working on and how to use a number of analytical and comparable media report programs.

I have also been lucky enough to start working on a brand new campaign which means I will gain a real insight into the communications planning role from start to finish, from being given the initial brief to signing off the media plan. I sat in on my first briefing session which outlined the product details, target audience, creative stapline, business objectives and the communications objectives. In short the communications objective is to generate as much awareness as possible within the target audience because the product being advertised is a completely new product.

Being a creative thinker I remember lying in bed and suddenly a rush of flashbulb ideas filled my head so I got up and wrote them down in a notepad. The next day I took it upon myself to put together a short power point of my ideas (which went down a treat with the account manager).

The grads who were on rotation in the year before me are currently working on a final project. In teams they have been given a live client brief to work on and produce a complete media plan which they must pitch to a panel of judges. I was asked to sit it on a brainstorming session for the campaign which I found extremely insightful. I felt energised by people's creativity and enthusiasm and it was interesting to see how other people think. However I also learnt a lot about the roles and appropriateness of using certain media platforms for best communicating a brand message and engaging an audience. For example, creating brand collaborations and partnerships to enhance trends and facilitate behaviours and celebrity ambassadors to drive awareness and create buzz around a product or campaign. It is experiences like these which make working in a media agency so diverse and enjoyable. Everyday I have been exposed to something new and I am continuously learning.

To conclude, I now feel more integrated within MEC rather than a new starter because I have been immersed into my team's current projects and have been able to get my teeth stuck into some live campaigns.

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Summer Fridays - Gives you that Friday Feeling

Towards the end of the week I presented back the work I had carried out which was a great way to demonstrate my understanding of it. I was then lucky to get a one-on-one demonstration of how to use a program called Ad dynamix (a great online tool allowing users to find out everything there is to know about advertisers, brands and their media advertising spend). I was given a project looking at the pastt 4 years of cinema box office sales which I had to then compare with the media advertising spend for the top 10 film distributors (Paramount, Lionsgate, Universal etc). Through this I was able to identify trends and engage with the media used to advertise film releases and explore how advertisers have changed their communications strategy in the last 4 years (the main trend witnessing the introduction of online advertising). However I will be interested to see how the next 4 years differ and I predict that the industry may see a growth of online advertising but displayed via outdoor platforms.

To conclude, my first week at MEC has been great and to top it off I was taken out by my team for lunch - bonus! I used the opportunity to get to know the people I will be working with and also to gain more insight into the current projects the team are working on (not to mention the ins and outs of office gossip)

Finally, not that I want to brag but my first week ended in the best possible way with a little benefit called Summer Fridays. The whole company is invited to leave work early at 3.15pm instead of the usual 5.15pm! And a little bird told me that Summer Fridays was extended into the end of October last year. A good idea really because it gets darker much earlier in the autumn months, so finishing earlier will mean we get to leave work in daylight!