Amen to Seth Godin

As I have indicated before, I’m a loyal reader of Seth Godin’s blog (together with hundred thousands of people).  Today he wrote a post about PR which I cannot agree more with. Although Seth is a true marketeer, he gets PR and know how it should work (if only all marketeers could that would make my job easier :-))If you want to read the post, click here.

Join adidas’ party

As it’s been broadcasted quite frequently in the Netherlands the past week, I’m pretty sure some of you already have seen adidas’ new commercial. First thought that came to my mind is that they have put down a whole lot of money to create this star studded commercial. The following incredible list of celebrities are in the featured: Katy Perry, Estelle, Young Jeezy, the Ting Tings, DMC-Daryl McDaniels, Method Man, Redman, Afra, Ryukyudisko, Russell Simmons and Missy Elliott, athletes Kevin Garnett, David Beckham, Ilie Nastase and Mark Gonzales, and designers Kazuki and Jeremy Scott.

The commercial is part of the largest global brand campaign they have done – ever! 60 years after Adi Dassler registered the iconic 3-Stripes mark, adidas Originals is promoted under the banner of Celebrate Originality. “The campaign is set against the backdrop of a house party hosting an eclectic mix of people from the worlds of music, fashion and sport.” Hermann Deininger, CMO adidas Sport Style Division: “This is a campaign that celebrates all of them and offers an open invitation to consumers to come and join in.” For me they succeeded because the following video is a party I definitly would have wanted to be at!

The “house party” was directed by Nima Nourizadeh and features the track Beggin’ remixed by Pilooski.

Most ridiculous press release of 2009

As some readers know, I work in PR. Today, a colleague of mine send me a link to a just incredibly ridiculous press release, a perfect example of how not to do it. The release is pretty long so I won’t copy it into this post, but it links Rolex, suicide and Owen Wilson. Curious how that works, read it here. Melrose Jewelry, a LA based company send out this piece of bs. Whoever gave this one a go should be fired!

Owen Wilson without his live saving Rolex? © Splash News

Some people have already discussed this release that was sent out last week (such as Matthew Odam and Matt). Marina Hyde of The Guardian, my favourite UK news paper, had a very funny piece on the press release which is definitely worth reading. Actually, if you have some time to spare, go read some of her lifestyle/celebrity articles, her sarcasm is just great!

Nostalgic News

Contradictio in termino, or not really? The Dutch Broadcasting Foundation (NOS) started with a new initiative that I found quite interesting. As of this month, their online channel will broadcast the news of ten years ago. Meaning that today I can watch the news of 7th January 1999.

I watched it yesterday, and it was fun to see how the news was different, the anchors spoke more official and dressed very formal. Of course it is also interesting to see how some things haven’t changed over the course of years (trouble in Israel, the cannabis usage in NL is moderate, and sadly how rebels kill people in Congo). If you want to have a look yourself, you can go here, it is broadcasted every day at 12:30 and 21:30.

Irritating English Jargon

Although living in The Netherlands, speaking English is something that comes with my job as an account executive in an international pr agency. Therefore I had to laugh at NameWire’s post with two lists of the ten most irritating words or phrases in the English language (as I find some to be quite annoying as well). Here it goes:

Oxford

1. At the end of the day
2. Fairly unique
3. I personally
4. At this moment in time
5. With all due respect
6. Absolutely
7. It’s a nightmare
8. Shouldn’t of
9. 24/7
10. It’s not rocket science

Daily Telegraph

1. Literally
2. A  safe pair of hands
3. I’m gutted
4. Basically
5. Going forward
6. Upcoming
7. Shouldn’t of
8. Up until
9. Neither here nor there
10. On a daily basis

Other words that could have easily fitted the lift for me are e.g.  top of the game, up sell, leverage, empower, competency etc. What word are you most allergic to?

Why advertising doesn’t work

Since I work in PR, I find the next video very funny and spot on! (credits: Geert de Sager, Microsoft)

World Records and media attention, Pink Ribbon

This weekend I spent in Amsterdam, where there is always something going on. I walked by Museumplein, when a large group of people holding pink umbrellas caught my eye. It turned out to be an attempt to form the largest ribbon in the world for the Guiness Book of Records. They succeeded!

You could ask yourself why you would try to form a big ribbon? In this case there is a very good reason to, given the fact that the ribbon was pink. Pink Ribbon is an organisation which tries to increase the awareness around breast cancer. They do this successfully in many different ways. Estee Lauder is known for illuminating many famous buildings or sites in pink, such as the Niagara Falls and the Australian Harbour Bridge. In The Netherlands, a special glossy magazine is published once a year of which all turnover is donated to breast cancer research. Doing this year after year is not enough to get attention every time so therefore they came up with the World Record.

It is interesting to see how organisations attempt to get in the news. Trying to set a world record is nothing new. Just recently, Mentos set a world record making Mentos geysers (famous because of movies on YouTube). Last week, Cosmopolitan set a world record in photographing women in bikinis (over one thousand). Personally, I like the Mentos record since it uses the hype in a fun way. You can question whether making a big ribbon helps, but it at least makes you think about something serious as cancer. What Cosmopolitan tries to achieve with their world record or which message they want to send is still not clear to me. Using a world record just to get attention but with not much of a link to what you do or what you stand for is useless attention in my eyes.

Kanye West vs 50 Cent

9/11 is the day the war on terrorism basically started. This years 9/11 might have started a war of another kind, namely in hip hop. On this date, 50 Cent released his new album ‘Curtis‘ and simultaniously Kanye West released his ‘Graduation‘. Since 50 Cent is known for his fights with fellow artists (such as Nas, Jay-Z and The Game) he felt it was about time to start a new one. He might regret picking his new enemy though…

It all started with 50 Cent finding out that Kanye West moved up his release date to the 9/11. 50 Cent reacted by saying that Kanye only wanted to use the rivalry with 50 Cent to promote his own album. He might be right about that, but since musically he felt superior to Kanye he stated that if Kanye would outsell him, he would quit his solo carreer. There was an interview with both artists in the Rolling Stones, with a great cover! It resulted in a big media fuss and a lot of attention for both artists. Now, after a few days the first score is Kanye selling 700,000 albums to 50 Cent selling only 550,000. Bye bye 50 Cent!

The ones truly winning this whole ‘war’ though are the people of Universal, record company of both, who have had a big role in this great mixed marketing campaign. Quintessential of a laughing third…

PS. My personal favourite is Kanye West, I love his second single of his new album which could have been a warning to 50 Cent: Stronger

I’m back! / Four Day Marches in Nijmegen

Before I continue, I would like to apologise for my absence the last two weeks. First, I was very busy and right after that I’ve been quite sick. But I’m back and planning on keeping up my normal blogging pace :-)

What was I so busy with you might ask? Well, since the beginning of this year I was selected to set up a student department within the Red Cross in the city where I study and live – Nijmegen. One of our big activities we came up with was centered around the biggest event in Nijmegen: the Four Day Marches. For four days, over 40,000 international people and military will walk either 30, 40 or 50 km each day! This makes it the largest march in the world. And it’s not only about the march; during ten days there are numerous concerts and parties organised, which makes Nijmegen one of the most fun places to be in The Netherlands for those few days :-)

Back to my story… What will those people need after walking so many kilometers? We thought a free massage would be nice and that’s what we did. We offered the walkers free massages by working together with physiotherapy students who all did this voluntary. With a strategic location, sunny weather, friendly and motivated volunteers, lots of (media) attention and many tired walkers we could help it turned out to be a big success! This is the picture that made it to the ANP, the leading news agency in The Netherlands. More pictures can be found here, an interview with Omroep Gelderland (local news) here.

London baby!

Now that everything is taken care of and it is certain that I’m going to go, I can say that I’m going to work in London this summer! Last semester I did an internship at an international communication consultancy in Amsterdam, which worked out really well. In my last week I decided to approach the Dutch CEO to see if I could do another (short) internship at one of their offices abroad. A few weeks ago I got the news that I was accepted at their London office!

Since then, I had to take care of a few things. First, I found an apartment to stay, which is from a Dutch photoghrapher living in both Amsterdam and London. From there, it will be around half an hour to get to SoHo, where I’ll be working. Last week, I heard that I’m placed at the marketing communication division, which I’m really happy with. The contract is on the way, and yesterday I booked my ticket. I can’t wait, since it will be a great opportunity to learn more about pr/marketing and especially when working at such a great and big office. And I’m so excited about the city, I’ve never even been to London before and now I will be living there for a little while. I’m so happy!