This it is: two Aussie brand entertainment campaigns that snuck in before 2010

This is it!

Having worked in the world of brand entertainment for a few years now, I've had too many "Is this it? Is this really it?" moments to count.

I'm sure those folks who work in the world of brands and mobile can relate.

"This is it! The year that [insert mobile or brand entertainment here] is going to take off."

Last year there were several clues that a shift was occurring in the Australian market: TV networks burdened by bad balance sheets; brands becoming more demanding of media owners and looking to make their dollars count in a tough climate; a few highly visible and successful brand entertainment campaigns like Rexona's Greatest Athlete; and of course, the many articles that spewed forth weekly from our press.

Sadly this didn't turn out to be the case, and developing large scale brand entertainment projects in the small Australian market is still as challenging as ever.

There were however, two campaigns that snuck in before the end of the year to give me a good feeling about 2010.

Over summer, Tourism Australia premiered their TV series No Leave, No Life. Based on their campaign of the same name, the series drew on the insight that Australian's are not as laid back and relaxed as we might think - we don't take enough holidays and need to restore our work life balance. Apparently we've accumulated 123 million days of leave between us!

This Network 7 series plucked little Aussie battlers in need of a break from their workplace, and whisked them away for a dream holiday experience.

The focus was on driving a connection with the audience through the integration of stories about the Australian experience, and the No Leave, No Life message rather than leveraging it across a bunch of mediums.

You can view the series here - it rated through the roof for a non ratings season prime time offering, proving (yet again) that programmers and brands can work together to attract and entertain audiences.

Coles also launched The Great Aussie Cook Off, a national competition and TV series to find Australia’s best family of home cooks (disclaimer, this is a Brand New Media property). In this instance, the TV series on Network Nine was the centrepiece, but by no means the primary connection point for audiences.

Research BNM did in early 2008, showed that despite the plethora of cooking shows, people wanted to see real families from a diverse range of backgrounds cooking their own recipes.

In each episode, families competed head to head to see who could cook the best three course meal, using the same mandatory ingredients – as voted by the audience.

You could watch the show, purchase the cookbook or download that week's recipes online, buy the recipe ingredients on special, cook the recipe and vote for your favourite. In contrast to the Tourism Australia campaign, the emphasis was on leveraging the family home cooking proposition across a range of channels, particularly in-store.

Obviously, one of these campaigns belongs to a major tourism body and the other a major retailer, so we can assume they had very different objectives.

2010 may not be 'the year', but with the introduction of additional FTA digital channels, we might be getting closer.

A blanket ban on brand entertainment

For decades, brands have appeared in, funded, produced, marketed and sponsored entertainment. Proctor & Gamble set up their own production company to create radio serials back in the 30s. Soap operas had an obvious beginning. Recently in a meeting with Reg Grundy, our most famous television pioneer explained how brand funding gave him a start in television. Graham Kennedy's paid for 'in program advertisements' where he pilloried products for minutes on end were legendary.



No one called this brand entertainment.

In recent years, we've witnessed a product placement juggernaut and a move towards more sophisticated attempts to weave brands into storytelling. Taking their cue from the sports sponsorship model, brands have also become smarter about leveraging the value of their involvement with entertainment.

Everyone (including me) has called this brand entertainment, or something similar.

But it seems to me, this is where the whole damn trouble began - the emergence of this now ubiquitous phrase, and the invention of this 'new discipline' has a lot to answer for.

Frankly the language seems outdated, and it's holding us back.

Because as more than one observer has noted, the term 'brand entertainment' still has a bit of a stink about it.

Not in the minds of audience or marketers necessarily. But certainly in the worlds of media owners, TV networks, major production companies etc, there is still an unwarranted stigma attached to the notion of brand entertainment.

There is absolutely no guarantee that because a production company, online platform or network develops a show, finds the brands and then dictates their involvement that a) the brand integration will be any more sophisticated or better executed than if a brand were to do it all themselves (with the right partners and expertise) and b) the entertainment values will be superior.

Look at Network Nine's homemade, I'd suggest it's fairly heavyhanded on the brand integration front. Only it's not badged as brand entertainment, as it's a network commissioned show. And given it's ratings performance, it's hard to say that it's delivering for audiences.

Brands invested 50 million pounds in Quantum of Solace but no one says 'oh yeah, Quantum of Solace is a brand funded movie'.

As I've written about previously, brand funded entertainment is not entirely blameless for the position it finds itself in. However, given it's burdened by a legacy of language, I've got a simple solution.

I vote we kill off these phrases - brand funded TV, branded content, advertiser funded programming, brand entertainment, branded entertainment.

What entertainment is not brand funded one way or another?

Let's return to one simple word.

Entertainment.

Which is after all what we're all working hard to create.

I reckon that solves everything.

It's time for networks to change their attitude towards brand entertainment

One of the frustrations of working in brand entertainment space is that TV network programmers remain unconvinced of brand funded television's merits. It's something we're constantly banging our heads against.

While prime time shows like Australian Idol and Australia's Next Top Model are network commissioned, they are at the very least part brand funded when you consider the role that sponsors, contra and licensing play in generating revenue and saving dollars on the bottom line.

As programming budgets shrink, and audiences fragment, we'll see an increasing move towards the part commissioned, part brand funded TV model which is a great thing for this market. (Nine's Homemade is a classic example of this, although the response from audiences suggests they're not finding it overly entertaining).

Currently, in the minds of network programmers, '100% brand funded television' still equates to a fundamental trade off between entertainment quality and advertiser needs. It means off-peak scheduling and free programming for a slot they'd rather not worry about.

They're inherently suspicious, their policies around brand entertainment tend to change fairly regularly, and despite the obvious benefits (delivering value to audiences and brands, higher yields, lower programming costs), there is, as someone said to me recently, "still a bit of a stink" around it.

The most frustrating thing is the artificial dichotomy between the potential entertainment value in a commissioned show, versus a brand funded show. Small screen history is littered with discarded network shows that failed to rate and cost big money.

Who says a brand funded show can't be entertaining? Or can't deliver a big audience?

There's no doubt that brand funded TV producers are partially to blame for the 'down and dirty' reputation. In the past this kind of programming has been characterised by lower production values, a plethora of logos, and a crappy offpeak timeslot.

This was because producers were forced to monetise poor timeslots by over capitalising on the number of brands involved. They were often bending over backwards to squeeze dollars from skeptical marketers, who then approached the content as they would an ad - more logos please!

This paradigm is now old and outdated.

The reality is that there are many more places for producers to distribute brand funded content - in a sense, the TV element is becoming a launch-pad or marketing tool for a bigger content play online.

In addition, marketers are a hell of a lot more sophisticated. They recognise the danger of compromising the entertainment integrity, and the audiences' interests. If brands are not providing value for an audience, they might as well spend their money on something else.

Overall, if the dynamics of brand funded TV are to change, network attitudes have to change.

Network support = bigger budgets = better production values = better timeslot = better marketing support = better value for brands = less brands required to fund the proposition.

V Raw: embracing your inner casserole

In these early wintry months I've been dusting off my big pot and making some tasty soups and casseroles (try this lovely Italian vegetable soup with celeriac and borlotti beans).

Without a doubt, these hearty dishes always taste better the next day, when the flavours have had a chance to infuse.

I think a few more marketers need to embrace their inner casserole and give their campaigns a bit more time on the stove (see this previous post on taking the long view of brand entertainment).

So it's great to see Frucor and OMD have brought back the highly successful V Raw campaign.

The strength of this campaign was always its insight around young people and their lack of access to creative industry jobs - something that is even more pertinent in this climate.

Once again, V has teamed up with folks at places like Diesel and The Glue Society to offer internships to aspiring young creatives.

Start knocking at that door.

Social Psycho: a fascinating experiment

I was giving a presentation a couple of weeks back talkin' bout entertainment, when a lad at the back made the comment 'apart from Tourism Queensland, which was largely international in terms of entrants, Australian's don't seem to have much of an appetite for getting involved in user generated content campaigns'.

There's plenty of evidence to the contrary. In other words, Australians are watching stuff, making their own, and talking about it. This can only mean that clients and agencies are failing to ignite interest from audiences.

I've said this before, I think there is a genuine interest in experimentation, but a lack of creativity, bravery and importantly an effort to understand the relationship between people and the environment. This has got us stuck in a rut where Doritos, Subway, Toshiba, Samboy and Nissan are the norm, and Six Beers of Separation is the exception (it's early days so we haven't yet seen them really take off but it's a much more interesting concept).

But here's one I'm really excited about. I'm completely intrigued, involved and plotting my part in this new creative commons project. It's called Social Psycho and in truth, there is not a brand in sight.

It's the brainchild of one Marcus Brown from Munich - storyteller, stirrer and tweet reader.

As the video above suggests, Marcus has unearthed a cracking premise:

What would happen when someone who had access to the personal data of hundreds or thousands of people completely lost it and became unhinged? What would happen if that said person was extremely web savvy, had accounts of facebook, twitter, friendfeed, blogs and knew their way around Google maps etc.?

Social Psycho is a work of fiction that intends to build on this terrifying idea and I'm inviting you to get involved. It's my new project. Although I will be mainly writing and developing the main character of the story, you are invited to develop sub-plots and characters in order to build stories of your own."

Marcus has set up a Google group and is inviting us to take on a character or help develop the story in whatever way we like - via blogs, videos, twitter etc. There are already some curious discussions and sinister ideas bubbling away on his murderous stove.

It's a project created by Marcus, with our help, and all for the princely sum of time and occupied minds.

Get involved. Experiment. At your peril.

And brands, take note.

Six Beers of Separation launches on Youtube

I wrote about this a while back, but the Tooheys Six Beers of Separation series is now up and running on Youtube.

Full episodes are coming soon, but check out the trailer below - if it doesn't make you thirsty, the top notch production values and a strong premise suggest it will be an interesting watch.

Content: what role should a brand play?

On Wednesday, I was part of a That's Advertainment panel discussion at AIMIA's V21 conference in Melbourne. I have to admit to really enjoying the experience of tossing around thoughts with three smart folks in Christy Dena (cross media storyteller and University of Sydney PHD student), Matt Houltham (Publicis Digital) and Frankie Ralston-Good (Naked's Melbourne MD). I thought it was a pretty vibrant discussion that happily bounced us around the brand entertainment space.

One thing that really resonated with me was an analogy Frankie used to illustrate the different ways that brands can utilise content to engage audiences. She argued that we're still applying old world thinking to new ways of doing things without necessarily "understanding that eco system and the role a brand should (versus could) play in that scenario".

Here is an excerpt from thoughts Frankie shared at the conference (inspired by a previous conversation she had with Brett Rolfe)

What we actually need to do is to think in different ways about brands and our interactions with people. As an example, imagine our consumers as a group of mates sitting around a camp fire sharing ghost stories. As a brand, how do you get involved? Are you a newcomer that sits down and joins the conversation? The fire that keeps everyone warm? Perhaps even the space in which everyone sits? Are you actually the story that is being shared? Or could you be the memory of the night's events that gets passed around and repeated in the days that follow?

If we don't develop new ways of looking at content, its creation, its consumption and distribution we will continue with a hit or miss approach. We know how badly things can go when brands and their advisors pick the wrong place to be. And if I may return to my camp fire, we should always consider the understandings and beliefs consumers currently have about us before we do anything. If a stranger turns up in the middle of a wood, and starts talking randomly about ghosts we are more likely to reach for a weapon than invite them into our tent.

p.s Thanks to Debra, Karla and Kylie from Ish Media for putting together an entertaining panel and awesome video presentation

brand entertainment: a bit of a stink?

I was in a meeting last week and someone mentioned they think brand entertainment in this market still has 'a bit of a stink around it'. 

We were talking in the context of television and in a way I think he's right.

What do you think?

User generated campaigns are only as good as the ideas behind them

Recent campaign launches from Samboy, Doritos, and Subway have stimulated quite a bit of chatter about the merits and downfalls of this style of campaign. Accusations of boring, lazy creatives, and scoring bigger agency resourcing budgets have been some of the criticisms levelled here.

I think these examples show a willingness to experiment, and to try something different.

But at the end of the day, this style of campaign is only as interesting as:

1. the idea itself - how compelling is it? what value does it offer?

and

2. the people you engage

and

3. the way you enable their involvement

and

4. the way they respond

Using social media isn't interesting. But ideas and people are.

Remember the whole world is your creative department. But give 'em something interesting to play with.

8 big brand entertainment initiatives in 2009. And it's only February.

Despite the doom and gloom, it’s going to be a defining year for brand entertainment.

Here’s a quick look at some of the initiatives that have already emerged in 2009.

1.The Tmobile Dance
In January, over 350 dancers converged on Liverpool Street station to performed an inspiring routine for surprised morning commuters. The 3 minute piece from their Life's for Sharing campaign, was filmed using hidden cameras so as to capture spontaneous reaction of commuters.

Not only did the ad go to air on TV within 48 hours of filming, it went around the globe. Commentators were divided on whether flashmobbing still has legs, but did the ad seemed to strike a chord with punters? The video has attracted 4.6million+ Youtube views and stirred up

lots of chat and PR. On February 7 police had to close the station when flashmob of 13,000 turned up to recreate the Dance after responding to a T-mobile callout via Facebook. As to sales or any other measures, looking forward to hearing more.

2.Rexona's Greatest Athlete

Greatest Athlete pits eight of Australia’s highest profile athletes against each other in a “gruelling test of their physical prowess and mental toughness.” The platform revolves around an eight part television series on Network Nine, that leverages both Rexona’s performance credentials and its sporting ambassadors.

Some brands have previously made the mistake of throwing everything into production at the expense of a broader content marketing effort. There is a kind of 'holy grail' attributed to the creation of a television show. In this case, Rexona have focused on building an entertainment platform, which evolves across a number of channels. It's a lot more than a TV show. You can watch all the episodes here online.

3.Cadbury Eyebrows
The latest effort from A Glass and a Half Productions has received largely positive reviews from some unlikely sources and more than 4 million views. Cadbury Eyebrows starts with two ten year olds waiting to be shot for the family portrait. When backs are turned, the children cut a range of eyebrow dance moves to the sound of 'Don't Stop the Rock' by electro-funk superstar, Freestyle. On the back of its success, Orange and Cadbury have teamed up to launch the ringtone (downloaded 125,000 times in the first 11 days).

Is it an ad? Is it brand entertainment? I reckon it's both, but most importantly, it’s about the surprise and childlike joy that defines the Cadbury chocolate experience.

4.Gatorade and the Quest for G
This one is a little more puzzling – it’s the latest TBWA campaign for Gatorade and it can only be described as 'a take off of a take off'. Its starting point is Monty Python and the Holy Grail and it’s layered with references designed to appeal to the die hard fan. Produced to coincide with the NBA All Stars Game, it launched with short spot during the Superbowl - the full series can be viewed Youtube. When you work this one out, can you let me know?

5. Nintendo and the Wiinoma

In January, Nintendo announced the launch of Wiinoma, a dedicated Japanese broadcast TV channel. An internet connection is all Japanese Wii owners need to access original Nintendo produced content - from cartoons to cookery (hmmm not sure about that last one). There are plans for world expansion, potentially opening up 18+ million living rooms around the world. While Nintendo says the channel will "see it make the critical shift towards content-based revenues", it's really based on a traditional advertising model (Dentsu will produce the programs and sell the ads). Still, it's an exciting development - a heady mix of old and new that should make TV networks sit up.

6. King Gee Jack of all Trades
I wrote about Jack of all Trades in January this year, when the third series debuted on Network Nine with over 1 million viewers (thanks to its scheduling in the cricket). It's an entertainment platform model (similar to Rexona's Greatest Athlete) that aims to uncover Australia's greatest tradie. The fact it's in its third series is testament to its appeal to brands and audiences. Not bad.


7. Audi's Truth in 24
In March, ESPN will air a documentary called Truth in 24. The production follows an Audi team's pursuit of victory at the infamous Le Mans race. The brand reportedly took a hands off approach to it's involvement in the film and there was no guarantee Audi would come out triumphant (still with 8 victories in 9 years, it probably had a pretty good chance).

Marketing Managers take note:

“There was an element of uncertainty with this film from the outset,” said Scott Keogh, Audi of America’s chief marketing officer. “But we wanted to honestly depict the drama, the triumphs and the setbacks of Le Mans racing and spirit of motorsports that is woven into Audi’s DNA. To accomplish that it was essential to let the outstanding storytellers at NFL Films do their jobs without interference and with unprecedented behind-the-scenes access before, during and after the races they filmed.” (Yep, especially of that last sentence)

8. Cheetos and Boing Boing
This is a good example of why a) partnerships make sense and b) it doesn't have to be complicated. Boing Boing have a big audience. And they have lots of sway due to their ridiculous level of credibility. Cheetos pays Boing Boing to create a video series they know will appeal to their hard-to-please-marketing-savvy-fickle-as-all-hell audience. And they take over advertising for the month. Boing Boing make some cool Cheetos content, tell people about it (and that Cheetos slipped them some cash) and Boing Boing, or should I say ker-ching ker-ching.



Got a campaign you think is worthy of inclusion? Let me know

When is an ad just an ad?

Yesterday a creative director said to me "an ad is really branded content, in this case it just happens to be 3 minutes long".

Um no.

It's not.

Well at least not always.

No doubt I'll be accused of getting caught up in semantics here, but client discussions often hover around the role of content in a marketing strategy, and a brand's place within the content (checkout my previous post on 'planning your brand entertainment experiment'). 

And we often find ourselves having to defend the entertainment or interest value of something from a well meaning client wearing an advertising straitjacket.

I'm the first to admit there are no rules.

Is Cadbury Eyebrows an ad? Yes. Is it branded content? Yes.

Is Rexona's Greatest Athlete an ad? No. Is it branded content? Yes. Is it an advertising platform? Yes. 

But is retailer Harvey Norman's latest TV effort flogging flat screens an ad? Yes. Is it branded content? No.

As Rohit Bhargava writes in his post on how to create a content marketing strategy, it has to be about more than you.

"This is not a sales pitch. It needs to be useful and offer more context beyond just how great your product/service is."

Cadbury Eyebrows is about the childlike delight inherent in the brand experience. 

Greatest Athlete is an entertainment platform that leverages Rexona's performance credentials and sporting ambassadors.

What about you, what are you offering?

Scoring big on sponsorship ROI models

Unfortunately I haven’t been able to watch the Australian Open Tennis these past few days because my set top box is playing up and 7 is the only channel not working.

Still I’ve been following the highs, the lows, and of course, the outfits.

Sponsors like Garnier and Kia pour big money into the tennis. And indeed, when done well, sports and entertainment sponsorships can be a really effective way to connect with consumers, borrow interest, reposition a brand, provoke consideration and all the rest.

Today the Australian Open released Roy Morgan Research which Adnews ran under the headline ‘Major sponsors scored big with the Australian Open this year’.

The research indicates:

Major tournament sponsors Kia and Garnier are heavily associated with the Australian Open by those who watch the tennis on TV (41% and 34%) and those who have attended professional tennis in the last 12 months (53% and 48%).

But what does this actually mean? Who cares if people have associated your brand with the tournament unless it translates into something meaningful? Given that these brands are all over the Open, surely this is a 'hygiene factor'? While I’m sure the brands involved have their own activation strategies and specific measurement methodologies, this highlights the underlying tension between industry standard metrics and tailored measurement.

On the one hand, standardised ROI models mean that there is a shared language around results and comparative success. On the other hand, these results don’t always mean a great deal.

For the last few years, agencies have scrambled to develop standardized ROI models for brand entertainment.

I’ve seen (and probably created) my share of doozies based on dubious spreadsheet calculations and logo sizes.

But standard schmandard I say. Entertainment means a lot of things to a lot of different people. In addition, the way people engage with entertainment (with or without the help of brands) varies wildly.

We might be able to standardize the types of questions asked, but rarely the challenges we face and outcome we're striving for. And never the behavior we want to elicit.

I think I feel another post coming on.

Australian first: brand funded show in top ten

"Brand entertainment just doesn't rate"

Heard that before?

On Sunday, the 100% brand funded TV program King Gee Jack of all Trades broke into the top ten programs.

Sunday All People Top 20
1 Nine News Nine 1,397,000
2 Seven News Seven 1,339,000
3 One Day Cricket Aust V SA Game 2 Session 2 Nine 1,285,000
4 20 To 1 (R) Nine 1,216,000
5 Two And A Half Men (R) Nine 1,116,000
6 Flashpoint Nine 1,112,000
7 Hot Property Seven 1,068,000
8 Jack Of All Trades Nine 1,043,000
9 The Mentalist (R) Nine 960,000
10 The Rich List Seven 951,000
11 Eye For An Elephant ABC1 943,000
12 The Big Bang Theory Nine 929,000
13 Outback Wildlife Rescue Seven 901,000
14 One Day Cricket Aust V SA Game 2 Session 1 Nine 851,000
15 ABC News ABC1 782,000
16 Cold Case (R) Nine 762,000
17 M: Nine Months Seven 756,000
18 ABC News Up-Date ABC1 747,000
19 About A Boy (R) Ten 562,000
20 Bad News Bears Ten 529,000

Source: OzTAM. Rankings are for metro average audiences.

This is the highest ratings result achieved by a brand funded program in this market.

A kind of Australian Idol meets Backyard Blitz, the program pits four Aussie tradies against each other in a contest to find the greatest tradie in the land.

King Gee Jack of all Trades is produced by Brand New Media and is now in its third series on Network Nine.

So who says brand entertainment doesn't rate?

*Brand New Media is part owner of Stickywood

Taking the long view on brand entertainment

Recently, there’s been a lot of interesting discussion around the dichotomy between the short and long; between one off campaigns and an ongoing conversation.

I don’t agree that there isn’t room for social media marketing initiatives like the Whopper Sacrifice (233,000 odd people defriended at last count), but I’m definitely an advocate of longer term thinking espoused by people like Peter Kim, Mack Collier and Gavin Heaton. The kind that puts people, communication and social enterprise at the heart of business and builds value over time. Rather than the sort that relies on making a bit of noise every time a new flavour is released.

When it comes to brands creating entertainment, there are similar advantages in taking the longer term view.

The highlight of any marketer’s calendar is without a doubt, shooting the new TVC. There’s only one thing that’s sexier these days - making your own content.

This (along with staff turnover) is why marketing managers often want to launch a new campaign platform every year. It’s not because of ‘wear out’, or negative feedback from the trade, but because it’s the best damn part of the job. Compared to doing a sales roadshow, it’s a heap of fun and if it’s good, you can look smug at barbeques for weeks.

Obviously that’s not reason enough.

Marketers need to take the long view and build content platforms and entertainment assets that can evolve and grow over time.

This allows for innovation, experimentation and evolution; for fusion of content and product. It speaks to the reality that few get it right first time; that problems are rarely solved overnight; that learning is a constant and that big, bold ideas need time to sprout wings. For the beancounters, it can mean serious cost efficiencies.

Critically, it helps locate the asset at the core of business rather than quarantining it as a marketing plan output. And if done well, it can excite, engage and unite people across a business in a common goal.

Importantly, it enables the involvement of other people in story creation. This might be the contribution of the customer service team to the sales story, or the audience's involvement in the journey of a character.

Everyone wants to be known for something. So what do you want your brand to be known for? What asset might support that vision, lend it interest, connect people or maybe even do something nice for the world?

Do audiences expect their theatre to be brand free?

On the weekend I went to see famed Canadian director Robert Le Page’s production of Lip Synch as part of the Sydney Festival.

The production was 9 hours, punctuated by 5 intervals.

Despite this herculean duration, time seemed to float by. The production had a filmic like quality and a rich visual language. It was incredibly moving, inspired and at times very funny.

Lip Synch got me thinking about two things.

First, Le Page’s company Ex Machina receives a significant amount of government funding which means he can spend up to two years developing a work like this. This incubation period is a rare luxury in the world of theatre and one unimaginable in Australia’s climate.

It also flys in the face of the notion of beta testing which characterises a lot of creative development in the world of digital. New dramatic texts may have their own beta phase through creative workshops, dramaturg involvement and readings, but rarely do they incorporate the views, feedback and experiences of the audience.

Second, theatre is one arena where brand involvement still amounts to traditional sponsorship and rarely leaps the integration fence. Is it taboo or something that has gone largely unexplored?

One exception is Pot Noodle, a musical comedy that premiered at the 2008 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Created by the smart folks at UK ad outfit Mother especially for their client Unilever, it was set in a Pot Noodle factory, and based on creative concepts that had underpinned years of advertising.

So the big question is, do audiences expect the theatre environment to remain ‘clean’?

Content marketing: what should we call it?

If you haven't stumbled upon it, Joe Pulizzi writes a very informative blog on the subject of marketing and content.

Right now there's an interesting discussion going on about finding a universal definition for what Joe calls 'content marketing'.

I avoid the term 'branded content' because it sounds like the brand bit has been pasted onto some random content. I like the word 'entertainment' because it suggests a connection with the audience.

That's why I use 'brand entertainment' (and because Stickywood is a brand entertainment consultancy business).

But this is too narrow to encompass everything you might stick under the umbrella of content marketing.

Sometimes we industry folks get hung up on semantics and buzz words (in protest Julian is putting a ban on 'social media' and Mark Earle and crew are having a B free January). But I think Joe's thought about client comprehension and education makes this cause a worthy one.

So what do you think? Join the discussion and have your say here.

An audience led model for entertainment

This is one of my favourite Stickywood tools. It's ridiculously simple and really useful.

Clients usually go 'aha' when they see this.

So I thought I'd share it.


The layers in the circle represent the different ways that audiences can engage with content and entertainment (in the broadest sense). The closer your brand is to the centre of the circle, the smaller the distance between you and your audience.

Eat
Broadcast entertainment consumed in a passive way. Stuff people watch or 'eat up' (e.g traditional TV).

Play
This denotes a level of interaction. Audiences can play with the entertainment (e.g music festival, mobile game)

Shape
The audience can influence the content (e.g ARG, user generated content)

Share
People are enabled to share the content with others (e.g video sharing sites like Youtube)

Eat. Play. Shape. Share.

It's a handy matrix when exploring ways that audiences can engage with entertainment.

Use it wisely.

What if brand entertainment took over?

As I was walking to work this morning, I had a thought.

What if every single brand in Australia that currently talks (or even shouts) at its audience with television advertising, turned to entertainment and conversation instead.

Does anyone know just how many advertisers that would be?

We'd be swamped with witty brand repartee and genuine responses to our gripes. We'd have games coming out of our ears and reality TV burning holes in our eyes. User generated content would be waking us up in the morning, and provenance documentaries would be sending us to sleep at night.

As brand entertainment further encroaches on marketing, ideas like Spreadable Media (thanks Faris) and the Natural Selection of Interesting (thanks Laith) will become increasingly important.

Ensuring you're delivering against a consumer need will be just as paramount.

And enabling your audience as curators, consumers, creators and conversationalists should be a no brainer.

Planning your brand entertainment experiment

Over the last week I've been checking in on the Corolla Ninja Kittens post on Campaign Brief. It's the comments that got my attention with no less than 94 opinions shared - it's essentially a tirade of negative sentiment punctuated by some congratulatory chatter and inside info on a creative honcho's penchant for dwarfs and strange animals. Tough audience.

Expect more of the same from this audience because traditional marketers are becoming more willing to experiment with brand entertainment. They're sticking their heads above the trenches.

This is in part driven by digital media taking some of the guesswork and much of the expense out of this kind of experiment. What's more, digital transparency means even the crudest measurement efforts can generate useful learnings. And quickly.

As we move into an era of experimentation, we can look forward to a few Eureka moments and plenty of false prophets. And no doubt we'll be hearing about it on Campaign Brief.

So here's a few questions to ask yourself when doing your laboratory testing. I'm not sure if this will help you avoid an industry caning but it might improve the results of your experiment.

1. Understand your audience' entertainment needs

It's not enough to produce something entertaining and spruik it in places where they spend time. Think about your audience' needs and behaviours around entertainment. How do these play out in the context of different channels?

2. Know your place

Identify a clear role for the brand in the entertainment, and the place for entertainment in your communications. If you don't have a reason to be there, audiences won't have a reason to stick around.

3. Define your entertainment challenge

We talk about this one a lot. Entertainment can do and be lots of things. What's the central problem your entertainment strategy is going to help you address?

4. Build your strategy

Apply the same rigour here as you would to your communications strategy. What's the solution to your entertainment challenge? What contact points should you be exploring? How might the brand behave in these environments? What kind of social object are you creating? How will you engage the audience? As curators, consumers, creators and conversationalists?

5. Pick your partners

What creative partners will help you realise your ambition? Do you need help to create an idea from scratch? Or the right producer to turn your idea into a viable entertainment concept? Think about specialist skills you require. A television comedy series is a long way from a narrative driven game.

6. Don't build it if they're not going to come

The content cesspool means there's no room for a 'build it and they will come' mentality. What does your distribution matrix look like? What distribution partners do you need? How does your commercial model stack up? How might other brand partners help you deliver against your entertainment challenge, offset financial risk or help extend your distribution?

7. For good measure

How will you know if you're successful? This should clearly link back to your original challenge and strategy. Do you need to undertake an assessment 'pre, during and post'? What tracking tools might be required?

Brand entertainment on the rise

Is it just me or...

Last week, creative outfit Three Drunk Monkeys emerged as the brains behind 30 seconds. Carat has just poached Tim Flattery (ex Mitchells, Becker) for its branded content post. Tooheys is launching a reality TV show with Radical Media. TCO is flying (as always) with a Sam Smith announcement. And Samedi is teasing us with a few videos uploads on said youtube channel (more on that later).

Is brand entertainment in Australia about to grow up? I think yes.

Anyone know of any other exciting new announcements which support my humble theory?