My 6-month contract at M&C Saatchi Sydney comes to an end with February 2014. After a challenging stint as Social Media Strategy Director, heading up the social thinking at Australia’s biggest agency, and with a number of pitch wins under my belt, I’ve decided to reboot, and try something new. Starting in March, I’ll be […]
digital strategy
Qantas Travel Insider on building a social community
At the Social Media Club Sydney June event panel discussion Do you need an agency to run effective social media campaigns? Karla Courtney – Online Editor Qantas Travel Insider, and @qftravelinsider – represented the client perspective. Karla works client-side and has built a community around the @qftravelinsider Twitter account by engaging in conversations around travel. Watch the video excerpt from the evening.
Death of the microsite a casestudy: Bonds Art Attack
The microsite is dying, only most clients and (traditional above-the-line) agencies have not woken up to this yet. Adam Ostrow asks Is Social Media making corporate websites irrelevant? I agree with him and with We Are Social and say microsites are being killed off by social media (and search). Even David Armano just killed his website. Microsites are usually part of the silo’d channel marketing that clients (and some agencies) seem to love. So to have a brand campaign, you put out a TVC, some print ads, outdoor and then online is just the tacked on afterthought – and its usually the “matching baggage” banner advertising, and the microsite. Microsites exist because of a need for a campaign extension: a place to enter a competition, a place to go to when you’ve clicked on a banner to “find out more”, sometimes it’s a story that continues on from a television commercial. Except in most cases there’s not enough story to keep people hanging around to engage at all.
Too many agencies spoil the brand
I find the most successful campaigns or brand strategies has the idea owners (usually the strategic, brand or above the line agency) run the idea through the relevant channels. That’s not to say that they need to do everything, more that they need to be hands on where the the rubber hits the road, the point at which the creative concept (the big idea) becomes a tactical execution. It’s in the clients interest to give this responsibility to the lead agency, and hold them accountable for the execution. So many times, the way the “big idea” is executed becomes about cutting corners because of “saving money”, or its “death by a thousand cuts” the slow, slicing and removing of functionality because of a lack of understanding how it is an essential part of the bigger, strategic picture.