Everyone wants to make it to the finals.

So we were thrilled to find out last week that we made it. The ECHOs that is (though we probably could have turned out a better team than the French had we gone to the World Cup).

To quote the ECHO awards themselves:

“The DMA International ECHO Awards Competition honors the world’s best direct marketing campaigns — campaigns that have raised the bar in terms of strategy, creativity and results. Campaigns recognized by ECHO not only do everything right in terms of marketing and creative execution, they demonstrate insight into audience behavior and earn the involvement of their target markets.”

Of course, we’re by no means guaranteed of picking up a trophy, but it’s an exciting time for CUBED for two reasons. Firstly, this is the first time we have entered work into the ECHOs, and secondly, BOTH pieces of work we entered are finalists.

Bottom line is, we’re damn proud of the work we do for our clients so naturally we’re chuffed to see it recognised on an international stage.

And while we know awards aren’t everything, in shows like the ECHOs the work only gets a gong if it got results.

Our fingers (and Ned’s paws) are crossed. Now it’s just a matter of waiting for October when the winners are announced.

Ahh Guerilla marketing, it’s all good fun ‘til someone loses a passport, gets arrested, fined and faces legal action.

As you’re probably already aware, the FIFA world Cup is in full swing in South Africa. But what you might not be aware of is the 36 women thrown out of the Holland game, questioned, arrested, fined and threatened with jail time. For wearing orange dresses.

Personally, I don’t think many people can get away with wearing tangerine, but surely this is a case for the fashion police as opposed to the actual police?

Not if you’re FIFA.

You see while a lot of us in adland regard big sporting events as a chance to do some tactical advertising, the organisers of these events are getting increasingly tired of advertising smart arsery muscling in on the official action.

A good bit of eye-catching tactical mischief can not only get a client on a tighter budget in front of an audience of millions, but also gives the impression of a brand with a sense of humour.

FIFA, however, doesn’t appear to have a sense of humour. What they do have is lawyers.

They’ve already released the hounds on Bavaria, the Dutch brewer who distributed the offending dresses. And to be fair, Bavaria already have previous form – four years ago in Germany at the 2006 World Cup, a bunch of Dutch supporters ended up watching a game in their underwear after they were told to surrender their Bavaria branded lederhosen.

In April FIFA stopped local low cost airline Kulula airline from advertising itself as “The Unofficial National Carrier of the You-Know-What.” Clearly this time they mean business.

One could argue Bavaria should have known better.

And the world is watching, in 1997 at the International Rugby League World Cup in France, during the Ireland v France game, underwear brand DIM deployed the DIM DIM Girls as ‘cheerleaders’ in the crowd. Dressed in their undies they obviously got quite a lot of attention. And got on the wrong side of the IRL.

The next IRL World Cup is in 2011. Dare the Dim DIM girls run the risk of having to hand over their outfits at the gate?

Question is, will this be the event that’s going to turn a bit of tactical advertising into something of, well, a home goal? It certainly ups the ante. I doubt it’s going to stop agency creatives from coming up with the ideas – after all, creatives do get a perverse sense of glee at messing with anything they know they shouldn’t. But are the previously brave clients going to be quite so cavalier? The appeal of a cheeky bit of guerilla advertising will lose a lot of its shine if the resulting law suit sends your company broke.

However it plays out – one thing’s for sure, this story, not unlike the World Cup itself, is gonna be worth watching.

d

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The first anniversary’s always the best isn’t it? Both of you planning a little something special. A bit of a surprise.

Second one’s pretty good too.

Of course, by years three and four, the shine has come off things a bit.

And by year five most of us get brownie points just for remembering the date.

What a wonderful world it would be if every year was as exciting and full of promise as the first. Sadly, that doesn’t seem to happen unless you’re married to Heidi Klum.

But we all still like the idea, right?

So that’s the angle we took when we created a new piece for TRUenergy celebrating the TRUenergy Value Bundle. It’s  a neat little package that bundles your gas and electricity together and gives you an 11% rebate year after year after year. It’s TRUenergy’s way of saying ‘Happy Anniversary’.

Go get yourself some TRU love. Click here and sign up today!

I have a confession to make.

I’m obsessed with crumple zones – you know, the weak points at the front and back of your car.

See, before crumple zones were first introduced in the 50s, car safety was all about designing cars to be stronger.

Tougher.

Able to take a crash like John Wayne could take a punch.

Problem was – doing this may have helped the car to better withstand a crash, but it meant the occupants took the full force of the impact.

So we should all thank our lucky stars that Mercedes engineer Béla Barényi started thinking passengers would be safer in a car that could absorb the kinetic energy of a crash. Instead of following the thinking of the time and developing a tougher, stronger, more John Wayne-like car, Barényi designed one to be weaker.

Brilliant!

The weak points at the front and back of the vehicle would crumple in a crash, absorbing energy to protect the passengers.

Now you may argue that this thinking wasn’t a big deal – after all, it’s based on high-school physics. But high-school physics had been around much longer than the automobile and nobody else seemed to make the link.

Barényi’s thinking was revolutionary.

And here’s what keeps me up at night:

What else are we looking at from the wrong angle?

What else are we trying to make stronger, when we’d be better off making it weaker?

What conventional thinking should we be putting to rest? Or at last challenging?

60 years ago, conventional thinking said that to make a car safer, you had to make it stronger.

20 years ago, conventional thinking said that nobody in their right mind would trust someone they’d never met on the other side of the world to honour a sale made over the internet. eBay turned that thinking on its head and paved the way for other micro-commerce sites like Etsy and Amazon’s marketplace.

Today, conventional thinking still tells us that you must never bastardise a logo, yet Google’s very successfully done the complete opposite. Not only has it not damaged their brand, it’s built them a fan base!

And just last week, thought-leader Seth Godin made a post about working fewer hours, not more, to compete more effectively.

So what other conventional thinking should we be challenging?

Love to hear your thoughts.

xk

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Hard work pays off in the end. Everyone knows that.

But guess what?

Easy pays off too.

As part of our work for AMP last year launching their simple superannuation offering, we had to get two rather cynical audiences onside – which wasn’t so easy.

One audience was financial planners. The other was the general public, whose interest in superannuation is even lower than Stef’s interest in Justin Beiber.

So what’s the best way to talk to these audiences?

Straight up.

Instead of beating around the bush, we asked the financial planners if they wanted new clients and demonstrated how easy it is to get them:

And Joe Public?

A different sort of demonstration. One that shows what the product means to you.

Easy.

Like the man says, it’s not rocket surgery – sometimes the most obvious answer is the right answer.

Winter’s well and truly with us now.

We can tell because the heater under Ellie’s desk is getting a solid workout, Dave’s grumbling about drafts like an old woman and that ad on telly last night for a designer “Snuggie” doesn’t seem so stupid any more.

As the evening draws in earlier and earlier down at CUBED HQ, we decided to invest in a bit of extra lighting, and that included our lush new chandelier.

Some lights are there to light the way, some let you see what you’re reading and some simply set the mood.

Well mood, consider yourself set.

Next time you’re planning to visit CUBED, pop in a bit later in the day, put the hard word on Mel for a coffee and see how much warmer our winter reception is.

Pfffftt. Mortgages. Seriously who’s got the time to figure out if it’s worth swapping banks? Not gonna happen. We all have better things to do with our lunch breaks than hang about in a queue. You know, things like eating our lunch.

That said, ANZ have a solution for those of us who are time-poor. Or just plain lazy.

Mobile lenders.

A hardy bunch of mortgage experts willing to go anywhere, any time. And to illustrate the point we recently created a full page ad for ANZ Mobile Lenders to appear in the Qantas in-flight magazine.

What an ace medium to use! Not only did we have a buckled-in, captive audience, we were also able to make the creative message perfectly relevant. It’s not often you know what your readers are doing, but if they’re strapped into a 747 you know exactly where they’re going next.

So it seemed apt to point out that if ANZ mobile lenders can meet you wherever, whenever, then they could even greet you at the airport gates as you step off the plane.

Which sounds great to us. Because it would be a nice change to be greeted by someone who’s not expecting a present.