As you probably read from my last post, I’m now living in London. So something that struck me lately was that I need to intergrate with people from all over the world to get a richer experience. This isn’t just for me, this should be done with all platforms also.

I would like to argue that it’s better to build in a site into social media, than building it the traditional way -an isolated campaign site. Who wants to travel to the Island, when you only need to turn to be there?

If your platform is built up by videos – create a brand channel and modify it.
Is it a landing page? Why not move everything to Facebook and point your old adress to the new Facebook page and applications.

In this way you can create a lot more functions that can use information pulled from the different social media platforms to create a richier brand experience for the users and you’ll co-exist with them instead of forcing them to come.

My name is David, I live in southern Hackney, London with my girlfriend in a collective of 7 people. Our room is 8 sq meters and my nr is 075 848 25983. I work at the digital agency AKQA. The story of my life, AND I LOVE IT ALREADY!

I was so taken away when I saw this new laser projector that is projecting moving images with full touch screen functionality. Imagine if you would mash this up with an internet connection, streaming media sites and social media networks. Booom… Television is reinvented.

Building your career is nothing different than building an IKEA shelf -it’s completing small steps in your life in order to reach your vision.

If you want to suceed into your dream job you have to know 2 things;

1. Where you can find it and

2. How to get there.

Create your own manual by writing down small steps that will get you closer the achievment over time. Whenever you’re facing decisions, have these small steps in mind.

Polish these when you have time. So whether it’s a book about a certain topic that you’d like to know more about or a portfolio that’ll conclude and showcase your best work.

How is this theory working in real life for a newly graduated adstudent? I’m having an interview in 2 weeks for an internship on the best agency in the world – One step on my vision’s checklist. It’s not hard, just believe in yourself and take aim.

Would you agree with me that the generic webshopping experience today is rather flat? I predict that it will be more of a social thing in the future as it is in real life. The brands have the possibility to embrace technology and build concept stores in different environments, thus promoting the brand experience and drive to sell.

I’ve collected some nice examples, here are my favorites. Think about this intruiging question; Why spend money on campaigns, when the right e-commerce will do all that and bring in money for you?

Pizza Hut Mobile App

Zugara’s Augmented Reality Shop

My bronze pencil entry at the One Show College Competition 2009

Creative and Technology took place this week end in London’s Saatchi Gallery. Panelist Yates Buckley, technical director at digital production company Unit 9, stated a quote that has being disputed over the advertising blogosphere.

- “If you are a creative and don’t know about technology, you’ll be out of a job soon”.

To be a tech-savvy creative doesn’t mean you can code. It’s knowing in which channels to play out the concept you’ve come up with. I’ve seen people throw around the term digital as it was one category (digital, outdoor, print e.g).

Well it’s not, it’s thousands of channels that behave differently and that has unique possibilities to get a conversation going between the client and the customer. The media climate has never been this diverse as it is today and that equals that there’s never been as much creative opportunities. My point is that if you’re not tech-savvy, you’re ideas will be limited.

To meet the campaign goals and exceed the client’s expectations you as an agency will need tech-savvy creatives that know the old and new landscape, so your client can benefit from “earn space” out there with spot on communication for their brand.

Social media is the same thing as word of mouth, the only thing that’s changed is that digital empowers the consumer to be heard to more people through different platforms.

A lot of brands are trying to figure out social media so I’ll start a series here on my blog called “social media tickers” with the customer’s mindset in focus. Let’s clear out what makes social media so powerful in our age.

Branded marketing services is on everybody’s lips here at the agency where I work. This is something that can be very powerful when it’s executed the right way. It about crafting a connection between the customer and the brand that empowers the user. Every brand and market has a unique bond to their customer with their products/services and with that comes a huge possibility to create an unique position.

Nike+ is the best example of this and they’ve seen substantial revenue since their launch 2006 with Apple to take music and sport to a new level. I’d like to see the service as the grandmother of branded marketing services and the services that are coming out now are her children.

Fiat Eco Drive

My own pitch for Virgin Money

Which brands will go ahead and jump into the yet unexplored waters after Nike, Fiat and possibly Virgin Money?

These are the biggest markets in September for Iphone and amount of users
14 500 000 USA
  5 400 000 Europe without UK & Russia
  1 500 000 UK
  1 300 000 Russia
     714 000 China
     373 000 Mexico

Augmented Reality is a 3D display that is used to overlay a synthesized world on top of the real world.  In smartphones it uses the GPS, Movement (lattitude, altitude and longitude axis), camera, 3D graphics accelator and the phone’s tracking devices.

There’s a war on who will launch the best Augmented Reality browser between companies like Acrossair and Layar. The browsers can feature services like Yelp, Wikipedia, Google search, Twitter and will be usable for anyone. Acrossair will launch theirs Nov 09.

There’s a handful of great apps right now: Wikitude’s direction pointer, Red Laser’s barcode scanner and Subway maps of NY and London. There’s also Social Augmented Reality, with tweetaround, a location based feed with tweets and status updates displayed all around you. Most of the API’s for AR today are closed for exclusive developers/clients. It’s now when they’re starting to become opened that the technology will take off and be used by everyone.

I see a trend that today’s new technology is adapting to become more user centered. My guess is that we’ll see Google and others following pushing for local advertising. Another interesting thought from a futuristic point of view on advertising is that all surfaces will become interactive in the future. We’ll not talk about digital vs. non traditional. This technology have the potential to bridge traditional media with new media thanks to the next big thing, pattern recognition.