Scott Seaborn (above), Ogilvy Group UK’s head of mobile technologies, has been elected to the Mobile Marketing Association’s (MMA) 2009 European Board of Directors.
The Mobile Marketing Association is an “action-oriented” association designed to clear obstacles to market development, to establish guidelines and best practices for sustainable growth, and to evangelize the mobile channel for use by brands and third party content providers.
“We are pleased to have added Scott to the Board of Directors for 2009,” said Mike Wehrs, president and CEO of the MMA. “The goal of the MMA is to advance the mobile marketing industry worldwide, and Ogilvy – Scott particularly - has been key to driving the success of the MMA in Europe. I would like to personally thank Scott for his commitment to driving mobile marketing initiatives, and welcome him to the Board of Directors.”
The MMA Board is comprised of individuals from the world’s most prominent agencies, advertisers, handheld device manufacturers, wireless operators, retailers, software and service providers, as well as any company focused on the potential of marketing via the mobile channel.
Meet Dave Birss (above), our new digital creative head. Dave brings a wealth of experience with him, having created acclaimed work for brands such as Orange, Hewlett-Packard, Lexus and Fosters over the last 15 years.
A founding partner of the popular online independent UK shop guide unchainedguide.com, Dave has also been creative director at both MRM Worldwide and Poke, before his most recent spell as a successful freelance consultant, helping agencies integrate their on and offline offers.
Executive creative director at OgilvyOne London, Colin Nimick, says of the announcement: “Dave is a key appointment for us, someone who’s going to play a big role in our push to become London’s top digital agency. He’s one of those rare truly integrated creatives who can turn his hand to most things, who’s won plenty of awards and who understands the technical stuff that lies behind the best digital work.”
Dave’s talents don’t stop there – session musician, university lecturer, breakfast show DJ and former nude model are just a few of his alternative guises. We look forward to seeing nearly all of them!
Ogilvy Group UK this week set up a brand new unit for the digital century. Redworks Broadcast is a stand alone unit within Ogilvy that allows us to offer clients a competitively priced, faster turnaround implementation service for any of their communications needs and materials. Hand in hand with the new name and branding are a new set of services from this unique Soho standard post production facility and digital hub.
A new Final Cut Server and edit network allows the Redworks Broadcast team to extend their expertise to the worldwide network, ensuring offices around the world benefit from their high quality post production and digital service.
Ogilvy Interactive’s strength as the largest interactive agency in the world was recognised by the results of a study conducted by the Recma Institute and published by Le Figaro this week.
The Mobile Marketing Association’s co-chair and Ogilvy Group UK’s head of mobile technologies, Scott Seaborn, organised his first MMA event at BAFTA in London last night. Designed to show off the potential of mobile advertising as a marketing tool, the evening was hailed as a huge success by all who attended.
Rory Sutherland, Ogilvy Group UK’s vice-chairman (pictured aboove), was one of three keynote speakers and predictably brought the evening to an entertaining end.
Congratulations are also due to Scott who was unable to attend the evening due to the birth of his second child.
Over 100 people (plus another two or three hundred from the Ogilvy office) attended Ogilvy London’s Mobile Day last week, held in and around the Ogilvy Digital Lab space. The short (six minutes) film above will give you a flavour of what the day was like.
The accompanying exhibition space featured a veritable who’s who of the mobilerati, including 2ergo, Admob, Bango, Blyk, Filter, Incentivated, Inside Mobile, Mobile Acuity, Mobile Adnews, Navteq, Snap Now
Spinvox, The Light Agency, Velti, Wapple, WinPLC and Yahoo Mobile.
Among the speakers were Ogilvy Group UK’s vice-chairman, Rory Sutherland, and Jess Greenwood from Contagious magazine (www.contagiousmagazine.com). Chris Bennett from mobile operator Blyk, Alex Meisl from Sponge and Mark Lewis also spoke.
Gigafone, a leading mobile marketing solutions group, is to showcase its patented mobile marketing system, RingMate, in Ogilvy’s London Digital Lab (a sepecially-designed area within Ogilvy’s Canary Wharf HQ which aims to explore new ways brands can communicate and engage with their customers, and where creatives, account teams and clients explore next generation brand engagement).
RingMate enables brands to deliver engaging, personalised content to mobile user segments/communities on an opt-in basis. Subscribers can personalise their mobiles with full-screen interactive content, allowing brands to enter into dialogue with consumers through RingMate’s unique “non-interrupt” user case. Only activated by incoming calls and messages, content is available for subscribers to view at the beginning and end of a call or message. Following a call, consumers can either use the one-touch click-through to the mobile web and enter competitions or call operators directly, if something catches their eye.
Andrew Grill, Head of Business Development for Gigafone says: “We are very proud not only to have gained entry into this forward thinking mobile technology showcase, but also to have backing from Ogilvy’s teams which contain some of the world’s brightest thinkers on digital marketing. This is a great opportunity for us to demonstrate the capability of our platform to some of the world’s biggest brands in a collaborative environment.”
Scott Seaborn, Head of Mobile Technologies for Ogilvy Group UK, adds: “At Ogilvy, we strive to stay ahead of the latest trends in brand engagement, and the Gigafone full-screen, user profiled solution gives us the opportunity to put this new type of marketing under the spotlight”.
Ogilvy Group UK’s viral campaign for its client Cancer Research UK (created to tie in with Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October) has won a prestigious People’s Choice Award from online magazine UTalk Marketing (www.utalkmarketing.com).
The campaign – entitled “Breast Awareness Guy” – romped home with over 50% of the vote for “Best Digital Campaign of the Year”, beating off competition from the likes of the BBC’s iPlayer “Penguins” viral and AKQA’s “Pot Noodle Boy” film.
The viral aimed to encourage donations of at least £2 per month to Cancer Research UK and help women become more breat aware. Supported by email and banner display advertising, it directed women to a microsite (www.breastawrenessguy.org) where they could learn about breast awareness, the work of Cancer Research UK and how to make a donation. In order to secure the attention of women at a time when they would have been bombarded with messages on breast cancer, the campaign features an eye-catching male model called Tommy who demonstrated the principles of breast awareness.
The judges said: “Breast cancer is a serious subject so it takes some skill to make a viral not only informative but amusing too. The job was done brilliantly in Ogilvy’s Breast Awareness Gyu viral that used muscly hunk Tommy’s prominent biceps to cheekily show women how to check their breasts. The digital campaign won an impressive 53.58% of the industry vote.”
To watch the viral, click on the YouTube link below:
Ogilvy Group UK has opened a Digital Lab at its Canary Wharf HQ to nurture creative thinking, innovation and new projects. The Lab has been equipped with a range of futuristic, high-tech goodies, including 3D holograms, 360-degree TVs, motion sensor equipment and six-sheet interactive screens. The Lab is also kitted out with the latest interactive gaming equipment, top-end Apple Macs and a 63-inch plasma TV.
Ogilvy already has a number of Digital Labs in other parts of the world - the first was opened in Singapore, with New York and Brazil following - but London’s Lab is the largest and best-equipped. Creatives and other agency staff are encouraged to visit the Lab to develop ideas outside of specific briefs, which can then be presented to clients or prospects for consideration.
Ogilvy’s Nicole Yershon says: “The Lab is helping clients to understand new ideas more clearly, and to get them to innovate.”
A number of clients have already visited the London Lab, including BP, Ford, Unilever and Fanta. Two projects are about to emerge from the Lab’s ambit - check ogilvy.co.uk regularly for details…
Click on the images to see the Lab in all its glory.
OgilvyInteractive is part of the world’s largest digital agency network, offering consultancy, creative development, design, technical build and maintenance across web, email, interactive TV and mobile channels across all Ogilvy Group UK companies.
Our clients include: American Express; BP; British Airways APAC; British Gas Business; British Gas Energy; Cancer Research UK Interactive; Castrol; Cisco; City & Guilds; Comfort; Dove; Flora; Hellmann's; IBM; Kodak; Lenovo; Omo; Persil; Sunsilk; Vaseline
