Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Activate: Brand relationships!

From live to life and viral to traditional. All experiences...


In the broad scope of marketing one of the keys to success is brand activation. Now, when submerged in ad clutter, visual noise and a lot of competitors, brand activation plays a pivotal role in the success of branding programs, while intertwined with the WWW, viral and social network platforms. Though at times it is misinterpreted by just throwing parties or solely paying a sponsorship fee; activation is the MOST important part when putting the brand in front of your target audience.


Most brands don’t go mainstream in main-street through Madison Avenue but there are others that choose not to, considering their strategic approach to their target audience. Also, most of the brands rather be big within their niche than small in the Walmart shelves.


Adidas takes a tribal sport to the masses with great hype and an inside story. The documentary: All Blacks,serves as the platform to generate genuine brand activation through viral and 30 second TV spots. The narrative is media neutral, while the story flows in any medium. 




Oakley edits video of it’s sponsored athletes to create incredible promotional tools that spread around the web within their niche. While capturing video footage of most of it’s live activation programs, it breathes action sports throughout it’s massive brand engagement cycle. 




In the best of it’s stunt/guerrilla/mob style campaigns, T Mobile hits the street with a smart and unique activation. Since the message is the same, any public happening that involves people sharing, makes it worthwhile for audiences across the board and the brand. In the same vertical it successfully uses the live execution for viral threads and TV spots, while keeping the axis of it’s campaign.




Just 3 SMART executions in different markets and intended for different audiences. Only to enlighten the minds of so called marketers who spill money in traditional advertising for share of _____'s sake.


You can lead by being good but champions go further, they stand aside from the pack doing OUTSTANDING stuff!