According to some of the photos that can be found on flickr (which I can’t show you, as they’re not under Creative Commons but we’ll come back to this later), Homebase shot the ad above on February 10th. A mere two days after our post recommending they do so.
Just call us 1000-psychic-heads…
Joking aside, it’s good to see this kind of friendly disruption. Interruptive yes, but not combative. It looks like it was all rather enjoyable and fun and it would also seem that Homebase aren’t just stopping there either.
According to their latest promotion ‘Transforming the Nation‘ Carlisle Station won’t be the only place in the UK to get such a makeover. You too can get your community involved and nominate a public space near you to get ‘the Homebase makeover’.
While we applaud the over-arching theme and campaign mechanic (disrupting schemas and getting local community involvement; breadth and depth), we still can’t help but think that there are a few missed opportunities here.
Scott Gould recently spoke at the WOM Espresso about SPREADABILITY vs REACH and in doing so touched upon the key point of GUIDANCE vs GOVERNANCE.
This sign, posted by the Homebase film crew at Carlisle station reminded me of just that:
I’ve worked in television, I know that the above ‘waiver’ is a legality box that must be ticked. However, there are ways and means, surely? Why not have two signs? One with all the legal spiel on it and another…
Oh I don’t know, maybe one like this one:
So I’d like to give a gentle nudge in the direction of the content creators out there – and I don’t just mean those Flickr fanatics or YouTube aficionados, I mean content creators in their purest form: those that create conversation, those that will get to work and actively seek out their friends and peers to amaze and share with them what they have seen.
Yes, this may have happened already. Of course it did. But there really is no harm in lending a guiding hand along the way.
Homebase shot a TV commercial that happened to take place in a train station.
What else could they have done?
Off the top of our ‘Heads:
Where’s the digital component?
Have we invited any bloggers along? (Trainspotters? Home Decorators?)
Should we invite the local staff along to meet and greet?
Is there a twitter feed or a hashtag for this?
Could we blog the progress of the build?
Should we set up a Facebook page: ‘My town was Homebase’d’
What about Easter Eggs? Can we make it more than just a sofa?
Is this driven by insights? i.e.: are the products on show there for their popularity?
Here at 1000heads we call this (and a whole lot more) ‘WOM Optimisation’, as in – what are the word of mouth triggers that we can put in place to make this event/activity/content as shareable as possible?
Next time you’re attempting anything like this, take a moment and think:
Every brand wants their very own new, shiny app, right?
Well, maybe they should consider exploiting existing apps – and the audiences and conversations already built around them – before they fork out.
In a recent interviewChris Cunningham, co-founder and CEO of Appsavvy, had a great piece of advice for companies looking to incorporate applications into their word of mouth strategy:
“Apps are not about building your own — leave that to the vast amount of really smart developers — but rather partnering with an existing, established app and audience, where you can join relevantly and add value. It is also important to view these channels as connected and not as silos.”
The two examples he gives of successful partnerships – the DVD release of Public Enemies joining with Mafia Wars, and H&M integrating into iPhone’s MyTown – show that if you are highly relevant to the app audience, you can seamlessly connect with the passionate WOM they are already stimulating.
It’s a great approach that emphasises how brands must connect rather than create, and amplify rather than broadcast.
Can you think of any app communities that would seem a natural fit for certain brands?
A new member of the ‘Heads team speaks! We’d like to introduce you to Tom, recently appointed Community Exec and all round good (easter) egg, who has a provocative post to share…
Hi all – I’m Tom and the newest member of the 1000heads team. I join from 6Consulting where I worked to provide the Radian6 social media monitoring solution to Marketing, PR and Customer Service teams at corporate clients across the UK.
In the process of finding my new role I met with a number of agencies from across the spectrum of social media, marketing and PR.
To be honest, in that time I’ve encountered some problems with the way a lot of agencies (from across all disciplines) approach social media campaigns for clients. Most of these problems are born from the way agencies pitch for business and from not putting insight and understanding at the heart of their business. Without wanting to go on a rant, I think it’s really important to show some of the common approaches out there that are giving WOM a bad name.
This seems to be a pretty typical scenario for brands wanting to ‘get social’:
Brand has some money left in the 1/4 budget (maybe £10k)
Brand marketing team decides “well, social media is something I hear about a lot at the moment, so let’s do something with that”
Agency called in to give some ideas of “what social media we can do for £10k”
Agency account team is not that clued up and their soc med guy is overstretched, however they have some pretty creds and a basic idea of what is possible from some conference they went to 9 months ago. They also talk a lot about how Dell made all that money on Twitter!
Agency account guys all want the fee, so they take down client requirements, tell the client they have done this stuff before and it’s all very possible, and then get the project signed off ASAP (so they get their fee)
Account team celebrates, then they get back to the office and realise “uh-oh, we actually have to deliver this stuff”
Agency hurriedly starts looking at how they are going to deliver the work, they suddenly realise that the tools cost more than they thought and the resource required is a lot higher and a lot more expensive.
Because the team doesn’t really understand the space they cannot find all these promised “advocates” and “communities” they have told the client they are going to map and engage with, they just keep finding Splogs and spammy tweets – maybe they should have done some research before closing the sale!?
They don’t know how to measure success even if they have it!
The client is underwhelmed by the delivery and so decides to abandon the social media initiative as it seems like a waste of money.
The above is a ten-step recipe for failure and for waste; it is also unsustainable for both the agency and the client.
I chose to join 1000heads because it is so obvious how differently they do things here. 1000heads place insight at the heart of everything they do. They don’t just listen to the conversation before engaging, they truly understand how word of mouth works, what commitments are required (both online and offline) and what media and tools are best used to engage different audiences.
That comes from experience but also from robust research which leads to real, actionable insight that feeds into everything else and that ultimately feeds into successful campaigns, happy clients, and happy employees.
I’m proud to be one of them and looking forward to working on our account with Nokia. Come and say hi if you’re ever near Great Windmill Street.
Yesterday, I was more than a little impressed by the deep blue shirt that James (our Engagement Strategy Director) had on. A good hue, and a nice collar. I’m a simple man to please.
“Why the snazzy shirt James?” I enquired.
“Because I’m going to launch of this year’s PR Week Power Book”
Yesterday, I was more than a little impressed by the deep blue shirt that James (our Engagement Strategy Director) had on. A good hue, and a nice collar. I’m a simple man to please.
“Why the snazzy shirt James?” I enquired.
“Because I’m going to launch of this year’s PR Week Power Book”
Following on from our first forays into Twestival love from just over a year ago. This year we’re helping out again by supplying the cakes for all and sundry that are attending and helping raise money for this year’s cause, Concern.
Thanks to the lovely guys and girls at Crumbs and Doilies we’re bringing along 42 dozen (yes, that’s 504 for the quick-minded of you) vanilla flavoured frosted cupcakes to share with you all.
“We like people, we like talking to people, we like eating cakes with people. Nuff said.”
Alas I don’t have any photos of the three lovely gentlemen who we’re sending along to assist in the giving out of said sumptuous delights so instead you’ll have to settle with this picture of the cakes themselves…
Last weekend 1000heads despatched a number of its team out to a certain convention in the good ol’ US of A.
Admittedly, while we were there supporting a particular client, I also made sure we had time to get into the Austin Convention Center itself and take in some of the more interesting panels and talks that SXSW has to offer.
Yes, but what did you learn?
First and foremost, while a fair chunk of the predicted chatter was indeed about location-based services such as Gowalla and Foursquare, what we found was a very low rumbling about 2010 being the year when companies and brands alike truly harness the power of crowd-sourcing. This piece from Fjord about the iPad cements some of the feelings I already have about it, but also talks about content curation and the knowledge of where as opposed to what.
Hat tip to the guys over at Genius Rocket by the way, good to hear some sense throughout all the noise…
We also learned that SXSW really isn’t as bad as some people say it is. Similarly to other conferences we’ve been to before, the real value lies within the many different opportunities to connect, learn and share… and, with a smattering of smarts, maybe do a small amount of business along the way. Those things themselves are worth the air fare alone.
Africa is a much misunderstood market, but potentially as large as China or India. Computer and internet penetration is extremely low, but cellphones are everywhere. How to tackle communication and social services on a continent where electricity – including charging cellphones in rural areas – is the greatest challenge.
Sadly, the panel was cancelled at the last minute as the key contributor was called away to a personal emergency however, I did get the opportunity to meet the lovely Gaby Rosario who gave me the rundown about how while there are only 65k iPhones in South Africa, there are in fact nearly 45million mobile subscribers. Unsurprisingly, in South Africa at least, the iPhone is not the be all and end all.
But we knew this already, right?
It’s funny, even though the US-based event had such an international turnout, a lot of the content had a very US-centric point of view. The point about the iPhone for example, articulated so well by Gaby just hours before I first started writing this down, was a breath of fresh air against the constant stale wind of how mobile iPhone applications are going to change the world.
This is not to say it was a wasted journey, not by any stretch. Seeing people I haven’t seen since September ’08 – made it even more worthwhile. Being introduced to new faces through old friends and connections – given that 1000heads now has French, Canadian and US offices – again, also made it extremely beneficial.
Of course, working out there, meeting clients and competition winners… the list of how awesome it was just goes on.
Would I go back? Yes. Every day I was up at the crack of dawn to catch an early morning panel, be it on community building, crowd-sourcing, social media, blogging, mobile, neuro-science marketing… (no, really).
If the SXSW selection panel had picked someone to speak, it was (mostly) worth a visit.
Improvements?
Well, I’d still want to see a more clearer grading system for each session (like Vero mentioned the year before), and I think I could/should definitely speak about something at the next one.
Maybe my lucozade travels; staying mobile and connected ’round the world. Tips and tricks for the global traveller…
Last Friday I got to combine my lit-geek and WOM-geek selves at Digital Storytelling 2010, “an afternoon of inspirational speakers and events for journalists, academics, entrepreneurs, digital experts and students” created by not on the wires and the BBC College of Journalism.
1000heads were very proud to be Headline Sponsors of such an eclectic and intelligent event. Sadly I couldn’t stay for long, but I did catch Ben Chesterton‘s moving presentation of the work he’s doing with Duckrabbit, mashing up audio and photography in the Condition Critical slideshows for Médecins Sans Frontières, which tell some pretty important and powerful tales.
For my braindump I chose to look at how – and if – social media is changing the way we tell our own stories, brands tell their stories, and how the two collide. I hooked my thoughts on four key themes; here’s a quick précis.
1. Comics
I’m a comic geek, and I’ve written before at the Guardian about how I think social media encourages a architectural, multi-media way of storytelling similar to graphic novelists. I find this most powerful when fewer words are used (we’re all fighting for space and attention in the online world, after all), but they are deepened and complexified by their link-rich context. The next level of this 3D storytelling will be mobile-driven augmented reality – the real world glossed with information, irony, images and opinion.
2. Heroes
In social media, we’re all the heroes of our own stories, and we’re uploading fragments of our stories all the time. That’s why gaming is such a natural fit for the space,; the newly released Heavy Rain is the first in a new generation of games where our own decisions and characters determine the plot. Brands are recognising this shift from consumers to creators, from personalising their offerings to put our preferences at the core (from Nike to Mountain Dew) to, in the words of Chris Brogan, ‘making your audience feel like a superhero.’
3. Symbols
Time was, it felt naff to see specific brand names used in a story; a sell-out of the grander symbolism, somehow, But truly the evil queen’s red apple has become the Apple; the purity of the lily has become use of Crème de la Mer; Penelope’s tapestry has become a Moleskine. We constantly and shamelessly use brands to express our identity online – the general has become the specific.
4. Myths
When we don’t have face to face instincts to rely on when building trust, only digital words and images, what do we rely on to capture our attention or empathy? Stories. Brands are realising the importance of building and sharing their own creation and evolution myths, and making sure they feel authentic to consumers. Moreover, they are starting to appropriate our myths – to include our stories in their own, by listening to us and engaging us to join their journey.
A nice example which ties these themes together is that of Isobella Jade, a New York model who tweeted me a couple of weeks ago.
Isobella had read a couple of my online articles, felt a connection, and offered to share her own story, a memoir she wrote on the free computers in the Apple store, and which became a cult success after they invited her to give a public reading in the store and the press picked up on it. We had a digital conversation, and last Tuesday she sent me a copy, alongside clippings and a card – which I duly talked about on Friday.
This little encounter exemplifies ‘the social media tale’. Isobella is the hero of her own grassroots story. The book is written in graphic, scenic chunks. She connected with me through my stories. She uses brands like Apple and Walmart and Vogue throughout the book to define what she is and isn’t; and Apple in turn uses her to reinforce its myth as an inclusive, empowering company. And that story, inherently conversational and emotive, spreads.
There’s so much here to dig into and discuss – there were some great questions on the day we barely got a chance to get into – but I just wanted to throw some conversation starters out there. These kinds of insights are central to 1000heads’ tactics in helping brands to share stories and become part of the stories their consumers share.
