On Friday Creative Social’s Mark Chalmers introduced our talk at Eurobest which was then given by Ted Persson & Tony Hogqvist. Despite a poor turnout for many Eurobest seminars, Creative Social drew a pretty much full house with their provocative F**k Digital seminar which was brought to life beautifully with illustrations by Ola Persson AKA Kongotec. Check out the pictures here… And the slideshare here.
Ted kicked off the talk, positing that digital is all around us, that it’s no longer something new, it’s a given. Yet there is a gap between the perception in the heads of most people and clients’ perception that digital is a specific discipline.
The guys finished their introduction with a montage of recent digital advancements…
But then it was time to take another perspective on the topic. If Digital really was dead – then who…and what killed digital? Ted & Tony identified 3 suspects: Herd Mentality, (Mis-Use of )Technology and Silo’d Thinking.
Suspect 1: Herd Mentality
So you create a fantastic piece of work, it achieves great success and award fame. Next thing you know, all your clients want the same thing for their brand and it’s brothers and sisters pop up all over the internet. So much for original thought. Yes Herd Mentality is definitely a suspect in the killing of digital.
Exhibit A – WarioLand, Shake it: the YouTube video that shook the elements of the page it sat within causing the YouTube video page to fall apart as the video played, initiated many Warioware ripoffs.
Now the hot topic is iPhone Apps and Social Media. It seems that these ideas are becoming more important than the overall strategy or outcome of the initiative.
Suspect 2: (Mis-use of) Technology
With the limitless possibilities we’re afforded by technology, it’s tempting to do things – because you can. Because you’re getting a kick out of technology: “wouldn’t it be cool if…”. Sadly this can lead to heavy, over – complicated digital work. New technology does not always become relevant or great technology
Exhibit A: Car Websites
We’ve all visited these “orgies of the latest cutting edge 3D standards”. The sites that invite you to inspect, change the colours of and even drive the featured car…but you might waste a large chunk of your life in the process, IF you even get that far.
Exhibit B: Share Fanaticism
Social media gone mad. Connect everything to everything – your twitter to your youtube and download a code to redeem in Spotify and you then get a chance to participate in a sweepstakes. And then there are these share buttons – isn’t it easier to just grab a link yourself? Be social, but create a clumsy experience that turns people away – quite the opposite effect to sharing.
Suspect 3: Silo’d Thinking
This third and final suspect can be found lurking in both the clients process and also agencies. If we think about the length of time it takes to get from business idea to product launch, that’s quite a substantial time-line. So why is it that at 5 minutes to 12 o’clock an urgent call comes in to create an ass kicking film that is expected to go viral in 3 days?
If used right, digital media has the ability to impact the core of the business of a company. But all too often is’t seen as an afterthought, or marketing channel rather than an underpinning product or service extension.
Brands who have escaped this suspect are Nike+, Fiat Eco Drive and hopefully we’ll start to see more of them.
With three suspects with clear evidence against them and no alibis. Ted and Tony thew them all in jail. They’re hoping that we can all keep them there.
