Tom Morton's Blog

The great interactive creative debate

Apparently it's still raging, this time on BBH Labs' Blog.  Here's my theory - interactivity is most powerful when it harnesses people's passions, so most of the truly great interactive creative work still comes from brands that people are passionate about.  

Much of the greatest interactive work has been around people’s passions: causes such as Barack Obama’s election campaign and The Great Schlep, entertainment properties such as Halo and cult brands such as Apple. Here interactivity harnesses those passions, giving people something to congregate around and to engage with.

It’s much harder to do this with everyday brands. (After my own agency TBWA pioneered the Media Arts Lab agency concept for Apple, one wit in the organisation asked ‘now how would this work for a hot dog?’) We can create related passions - dog adoptions for a petfood brand. Or we can create content that whips up interest - computer games for milk and Burger King. It’s doable, but it’s a creation, rather than a harnessing.

Broadcast advertising has to engage people in a much simpler medium. Let the spot generate thirty seconds of laughter or excitement or empathy for beer or soap. With a bit of leeway from a client, it’s possible to do this for most brands. That’s why you see so many great ads for everyday products in advertising awards ceremonies.

So there’s the difference. Broadcast advertising can elevate any product. Interactivity can certainly make an ordinary brand more useful or more relevant, but truly great interactive ideas still tend to come from brands that people care about already.

Doctor Johnson, Celebrity Twit

The first thing you read about Twitter is how celebs like Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand are avid tweeters.  Personally I'm more interested in the intrepid souls who tweet as fictional and historical celebrities.  Dr Samuel Johnson tweets all the time, more often about Jade Goody and his Virgin Media set top box than about compiling a dictionary.  Charmingly, many of Johnson's followers are from his home town of Lichfield.

Mistaken Identity

Radio Scotland's Tom Morton is overwhelmed by a surfeit of other blogging Tom Mortons.  He lives in a peat hut somewhere in the Shetland Islands and champions Scottish folk music.  Lots of people read his blog.  We're definitely not the same person.  

Selling The Recession

Interviewed for last night's Channel Four News.  In the programme I discuss the types of advertsing that tend to work in economic downturns.

Big Ideas, part two

Here is the second part of my article on big ideas.  Talking about five principles for how big idea marketing needs to adapt for the multimedia age.

Big Ideas and MAD Men

My agency is now publishing Mad Blog, a collection of our best thinking and articles.  My article about whether big brands still need big ideas appears here.  Spoiler alert, they still do.

Maybe It's Because I'm A Media Twit, That I Love London Town

I should have posted this ages back.  A Guardian article from March about why creative industries choose to locate in London.  I said that creative industries tend to locate where creative people like to locate.  I was rather pleased with this observation until I read how Richard Florida had come to exactly the same conclusion in The Rise Of The Creative Class five years earlier.

Talking TV

I made a very small appearance in The Guardian's Future Of Television supplement. Asked about the state of the medium, I paraphrased Steven Johnson's argument that this is a golden age of TV. Programme makers have to appeal to tighter audiences with shows that bear repeating, downloading or buying on DVD, which makes for more complex, edgy viewing. Johnson cites 24 and The West Wing as examples. I'd add Life On Mars and Mad Men to the list. It might make life harder for the ad industry as we can't buy big automatic audiences any more, by it makes life more rewarding for viewers.

Read the article here

An Inevitable Post About Facebook

Like most posters, I have spent a lot more time on Facebook than on blogs in recent weeks.  And I've been thinking about how advertisers could make use of the service.  I'm no fan of most advertising activity on social network sites (big businesses hate protestors, so why do they behave like a mob of activists at a G8 summit with site takeovers?)  And this fine article has got me thinking.  Facebook Platform has made it easy to develop tools and applications for people to use on their sites.  There are some 900 tools doing the rounds, from the Chuck Norris Fact Generator to a bookshelf where you can display your favourite reads.  What a great opportunity for brands to develop useful tools for people.  Where's the Carling Pub Recommender or the Sky TV Im Watching XYZ recommender or even the FHM Facebook Stalker?  It's the perfect opportunity for brands to dip a toe into Branded Utility.

Talking Cats And Market Leaders

Barclaycard's new advertising campaign appeared in the papers this weekend.  In theory I should be a sucker for it.  I like debt.  I like cats.  I even worked on the Barclaycard account in my early days in the industry.  Bring all that together and I should be theirs for the taking.  But Barclaycard are playing a dangerous game with their advertising voice and with the standing of their brand.  Barclaycard hasn't had a consistent brand for a decade.  Initially it was understandable as new card launches and the advent of balance switching made their old Rowan Atkinson-fronted 'gets you out of trouble' positioning feel dated.  Brands, especially service brands, sometimes need to find their feet and reposition for a changed market. It appears that ten years later Barclaycard has yet to find its feet.  I'm concerned that Barclaycard is enjoying its lack of a positioning.  How tempting to lead with the offer and just make the public laugh.  But what happens when Barclaycard realises that constant new campaigns dilute its media spend? Or when Barclaycard needs to do something important?  Or when the offers run out?  Brand owners might enjoy the temporary expediency of working without a market position.  But their brands will never achieve any kind of brand leadership without one.