Orange launched another advertising campaign: the world's first internet balloon race.
The game is a little bit different than most other internet games in that the game does not occur on one site, but instead occurs among multiple sponsor sites. Anyone can be a sponsor--all you need to do is submit a URL to the game.
Anyone can join the game and get a balloon. The only way to move ahead though, it appears, is when you visit a site, or when anyone decides to give you a boost or when you landed on a site that would give you extras.
The whole experience feels a little bit like web-ring meets 1010wins. If you are determined to win the race, you ended up visiting a ton of sites that you normally won't get to. The 'sponsors' in turn get some brand exposure. In this sense Orange is providing a free advertising platform in the name of an internet game, and through doing so create brand awareness for itself... power to the users?
via CrackUnit
©2008 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Orange: First internet balloon race
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Keep Life Sexy / Personal lubricant rebrand through UGC
www.keeplifesexy.com is KY-Jelly (a personal lubricant)'s venture into UGC-powered advertising.
The concept is really simple and straight-forward, to the point where I actually question its creativity. That said, I also felt that many interactive seen these days are so 'innovative' that the target audience might just not get it.
Bottom line: it's an innovative approach to any pharmaceutical marketing site and it succeeds in updating my brand perception for this old-school standard. That makes for a successful campaign.
via Tom Ajello's tweets
©2008 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Personal Branding
Back in the spring of 2007, I started the exercise of personal branding.
I love doing branding and identity projects, but there aren't many opportunities at the moment. I have learned over time that the best way to keep myself fresh is to do it constantly and persistently. So I follow the paths of Oprah and Martha Stewart and started the exercise of personal branding.
My extensive exploration of self is my research on understanding my brand, and it is from these analysis that I came up with the logo that you see today, from which I have developed my color system and branding guidelines.
The Logo
The logo is composed of three circles: small, medium and large. The three colors are the origin of colors, and represents design (magenta), technology (yellow) and marketing strategy (cyan) respectively. The execution is simple because I had a Bauhaus education.
The logo is placed everywhere where I exist, and extend beyond the seeminglee.com domain and into all the collaborative communities. I use the logo to 'stamp' holiday greetings. I also use it as my avatar on all my social networks. Because the logo scales well, it is also used as the favicon on my main hub.
Fun today
I was doing some experiments with video projection the past couple of days and I thought that it might be fun to brand myself directly on my body.
So here's my current advertising campaign running on Flickr: this is the closest I've been able to get my logo on the product—myself.
©2008 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Saturday, January 5, 2008
AdAge 2008 Annual: LBi International = top 25 marketing organizations
The print edition of my Advertising Age arrived in the mail today and I noticed that I have missed out an important fact to report: LBi International (parent company of IconNicholson) is ranked #19 in the top 25 marketing organizations globally according to net revenue.
The rest of the figures are:
- Omnicom Group
- WPP Group
- Interpublic Group of Cos.
- Publicis Groupe
- Dentsu
- Havas
- Aegis Group
- Hakuhodo DY Holdings
- aQuantive (bought by Microsoft in Aug. '07)
- Asatsu-DK
- MDC Partners
- Sapient Corp.
- Carlson Marketing
- Epsilon
- Aspen Marketing services
- Cheil Communications
- George P.Johnson Co.
- HealthStar COmmunications
- LBi International
- Media Square
- inVentiv Communciations
- Cossette Communication Group
- Harte-Hanks Direct
- Clemenger Communications
- Doner
©2008 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
LinkedIn store now open
How do you make money off of social networking sites? Besides selling AdSense ads, here's another way to do it: open up a store and sell branded materials. Professional social networking site LinkedIn is doing just that. As I hook up with my 380th connection today on this popular site, I noticed this banner ad on the page:
which links you to the LinkedIn store. Right now the items are not very imaginative: but one can just imagine the magic of it all if they would allow customization. Something like See-ming Lee, proud LinkedIn user. Connect with me at http://www.linkedin.com/in/seeminglee would attract customers like never before.
Truth be told, you don't even need a high-tech solution to do the job: You can do as as simple as giving people the option to write their URL or their name on a designated area with a water-proof marker (which can come with the shipped package) and people can create customize content by drawing directly on the t-shirt. That'd be fun!
©2008 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
Wikipedia: more audience than New York Times
AdAge published top sites by parent companies in their 2008 annual and I find it interesting to note that Wikipedia has more audience than the New York Times:
Top sites by unique audience: Top 10 parent companies
|||||||||||| 121.3 million - Microsoft
|||||||||||| 120.3 million - Google
||||||||||| 111.9 million - Yahoo
|||||||||| 103.8 million - Time Warner
||||||| 73.1 million - News Corp.
||||||| 68.6 million - eBay
|||||| 64.6 million - IAC / InterActiveCorp
|||||| 60.3 million - Amazon
||||| 49.9 million - Wikimedia Foundation
||||| 49.6 million - New York Times Co.
Copyright 2007 Advertising Age. All rights reserved.
If the content by Wikimedia Foundation gets so much audience, there is a definite advertising market for wiki. Wiki is open-source but I am not sure if you are allowed to use its content for commercial purposes (I must check).
Meanwhile, it makes me wonder how the Answers.com business model work, as they clearly sell ads and clearly uses wikipedia content.
Copyright 2007 Advertising Age. All rights reserved.
Also interesting to me is the amount of time users spend on these sites. I'd assume that the data plotted above are the average amount of time per users on these sites. If people are spending 4 hours on AOL and 2 hours on MySpace everyday, it suggests that there is much money to be made via subliminal advertising on the site. The key for advertisers is to find fun and unintrusive way to promote their products in these spaces.
I'd happily throw hp-branded electronic boards at my friends on Facebook if the graphics are cool. The latest hp-flickr promotion is interesting also. User-centered services and promotion are key for corporation to extend their brand reach into the Web 2.0 space. Most ideas are out there, it just takes a good matchmaker to tie them together to create value to both the consumer and the business. (See: SML Pro Blog: Innovation = Synergy of Existing Ideas)
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Don't Give Up / 2007 / SML
Don't Give Up: Rev 1. Created in response to http://www.pokenewyork.com.
Related SML Universe
+ SML Fine Art
+ SML Notebook
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Ideas / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
Uniqlo Grid = Branding through interaction design
http://www.uniqlo.com/grid/
YouTube: Uniqlo Grid / Inspirations Are Everywhere
SML Thank You
I would like to thank Tom Ajello (Blog / Facebook / Flickr / LinkedIn / SML Wiki / Twitter) for alerting me to this on his recent tweet.
Related SML Universe
+ Inspirations are Everywhere
+ SML Collection
+ SML Ideas
+ SML Interaction Design
+ SML UI
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Analysis of the Intel Sound Identity
An amazing video analysis of the Intel aural identity (aka sound identity), or how music is used to drive consumers marketing / advertising messages. Created by P. Tagg from Université de Montréal in 2005.
SML Thank You
I would like to thank Ken Kraemer for sending this over.
Related SML Universe
+ SML Advertising
+ SML Music
+ SML Identity Design
+ Symphonic Electronica
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Microsoft Beats Google for Facebook Deal / WSJ
Wall Street Journal reports moments ago that Microsoft just agreed to invest $240 million for a minority stake at Facebook (Google). The companies have discussed a valuation for Facebook as high as $15 billion.
Google Vice President Tim Armstrong declined to comment on any Google discussions with Facebook.
User distribution for social networking sites by the end of 2007 - Research Data
Source: DataMonitor (Google)
- 35% = Asian
- 28% = Europe + Middle East +e Africa
- 25% = North America
- 12% = Caribbean
Related
- Microsoft to Pay $240 Million for Stake in Facebook / 2007-10-25 / New York Times
- Microsoft Pays $240 Million for Stake in Facebook / 2007-10-24 / Bloomberg
- Google News Launches Facebook Application / 2007-10-20 / Slashdot
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Facebook SocialAds = Advertising + Social Network Data / AdAge
Advertisers and agencies in New York are invited to an event held on 2007-11-06 with Mark Zuckerberg and the Facebook executive team as they unveil a "new way of advertising online."
The exact details are not disclosed, but Advertising Age speculates that it may have something to do with "SocialAds", a term which Facebook traemarked on 2007-09-24, which is described as "advertising and information distribution services, namely, providing advertising space via the global computer network [and] promoting the goods and services of others over the internet."
Read the full article here:
Facebook Set to Introduce Major Ad Play: Social Network Could Unveil 'SocialAds' at NYC Event Next Month by Abbey Klaassen / 2007-10-23 / Advertising Age
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Adsense as Blog Analytics Tool / 2007 / SML Ideas
Aside from generating petty change every month, Google Adsense can also serve as an ambient device for you to figure out how well your blog posts are without jumping into Google Analytics.
I use the 728x90 Adsense units on my professional blog, and I noted that:
- When I first installed it, it had four random text ads on it.
- Then I wrote a good blog post, and the four ad units turned into three text units
- Then the spot hosts two ads
- Until finally it turns into one giant ad.
When it turns into a single ad, I noted that:
- The first time it turned into a single 728x90 banner, it's usually an Ameriprise ad
- Then I'd start getting Circuit City ads
- And then I'd get Yahoo ads (as seen above)
- Until finally I get Google ads!
And when my blog posts aren't that great, it will start to dwindle back to 2-4 ads... when eventually it might even get to public service ads, which, thankfully never happens anymore. :)
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Ideas / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Gender Behavior Differences on Social Networks / Advertising Age
Advertising Age recently did its annual survey on college students and found that there is a significant split in social-networking activities between sexes.
Gender behavior split on social networks
Stylistic edits are mine
- Facebook ranked as the most popular website among the 18-to-24 set
- Social networking was twice as popular with young women as young men
- MySpace, which was No. 1 last year, ranked No. 2 with females but dropped out of the top five for young men
- That means marketers using social-networking sites to target young people are reaching far more females than males
- Men are far more likely to use social-networking sites for business purposes such as LinkedIn
- While their tech savvy showed, particualrly among men who ranked Digg and Engadget among their top 10 websites, they didn't make the leap to consumer-generated media.
- Only 8% said they had uploaded videos to YouTube
- 64% don't make videos at all
- 14% don't share them with anyone
- 75% surf social-networking sites
- 71% read news online
- Only 14% write blogs
Popularity Contest
College students' favorite brands
Advertising Age: 2007-10-04: Apple, Target, Facebook Tops for College Students
Read full article online
SML Copyright Notice
©2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Creative Strategic Technology / 2007 / SML
SML Synergy = Creative Strategic Technology
Related SML
SML Domains: CCSTO = CCO + CSO + CTO
SML Domains: CreativeStrategicTechnology.com
SML Flickr Tags: Synergy
SML Ideas
SML Search: Synergy
SML Synergy
Synergy of Business = Design + Technology + Marketing Strategy
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Ideas / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Friday, September 21, 2007
SML Flickr Adsense = SML + Flickr + Google Adsense
SML Random Idea: If your Flickr stream is popular, you might as well put some advertising on it to make some money.
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Google SML / 2007 / SML
Google SML = See-ming Lee 李思明 SML + Google
Inspirations Are Everywhere
Cyclone Ranger (Chris Keane / Ernie Hacks)
Cyclone Ranger: How to get people to advertise your stuff, for free
LinkedIn: Chris Keane
Related SML
SML Del.icio.us: Google
SML Flickr: Google SML / 2007 / SML
SML Flickr Tags: Google
SML Pro Blog: Google
SML Pro Blog: Google SML / 2007 / SML
SML Pro Blog: Search Results for Google
SML Search: Google
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee 李思明 SML / SML Pro Blog / SML Universe. All rights reserved.
Friday, September 7, 2007
Morgan Stanley: Van Kampen Investments: 2005 Concept: Folders
Client = Morgan Stanley / Van Kampen Investments
Project = Banner Ads 2005 Concept
Concept = Folders
IconNicholson Team (IconNicholson.com)
Robert Fisher / Sean E. Duffy / See-ming Lee
Copy (provided by Morgan Stanley)
Dig... Deeper... That's our investment philosophy.
Over 400 portfolio managers, research analysts and traders.
Each one commited to leaving no stone unturned.
Van Kampen Investments.
Shine.
See what Van Kampen can do for you.
SML Flickr Tags
MSVK.2005.Folders
SML Flickr Sets
Morgan Stanley Van Kampen Investments / 2005 / SML Projects (Set)
SML Universe
SML Advertising (Set)
SML Collection (Collection)
SML Projects (Collection)
Copyright Notice
Copyright 2005 Morgan Stanley / Van Kampen Investments. All rights reserved.
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Flickr Analytics / SML Analytics
Objective.
- Analyze the Flickr Intersestingness algorithm.
Methodology
- Tagging and grouping top 20 images from the Popular-Views, Popular-Favorites and Popular-Comments pages on Flickr.
- Compare results with images from the various sets via AND / OR operators.
Preliminary Analysis
Related tags: top-v111 / top-v333 / top-v555 / top-v777 / top-v999 / top-v1111 / top-v2222 / top-v3333 / top-v4444 / top-v5555 / views-top20
Related tags: favorites / favorites-5 / favorites-10 / favorites-15 / favorites-20 / favorites-25 / favorites-30 / favorites-35 / favorites-40 / favorites-45 / favorites-50 / favorites-55 / favorites-top20
Related tags: comments-top20
All three galleries combined give you the winning ingredients for market success for any advertising campaigns. These sets, as such, double-duty as quick-visual reference for your next photoshoot.
If analyzing my own photographs give me this conclusion, I can only imagine the entire collection of images hosted on Flickr can provide.
Hypothesis: Top Interesting = Algorithm (Views, Favorites, Comments)
AND(Views, Favorites, Comments) / Flickr Analytics / SML (Set)
Thumbnails / Detail / Slideshow
I hypothesize that Yahoo is using these data to train an AI (artifical intelligence) algorithm to predict images that will be influential. (Related: see my blog post on Theorizing aesthetics). And if they aren't, I think that they should. Google literally dominates the text-ad market by indexing every single bit of text available to them, it would be smart for Yahoo to pick a different market segment and become the expert in it.
200 Most Interesting Images / Flickr Analytics / SML (Set)
Thumbnails / Detail / Slideshow
200 Most Interesting People / Flickr Analytics / SML (Set)
Thumbnails / Detail / Slideshow
200 Most Interesting Designs / Flickr Analytics / SML (Set)
Thumbnails / Detail / Slideshow
Notes
(1) Top 20 ranking fluctuates. As a result, it is possible for the Top-20 sets to have more than 20 photographs.
SML
SML = See-ming Lee = Design + Technology + Marketing Strategy;
SML Copyright Notice
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee. All rights reserved.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Synergy of Business = Design + Technology + Marketing Strategy
You have seen many PowerPoint presentations that speak of the power of the successful business treo: design, technology and strategy. It usually goes like this:
- A circle appears, representing design.
- Another circle appears, representing technology.
- Yet another circle appears, representing strategy.
- These circle overlaps one another, looking like an RGB mixing diagram.
- Drum rolls... and the presenter talks about the importance of being at the center where all three circles overlap.
This presentation bores so many to tears that it doesn't see the light of day very often these days. It also neglects the reality that being at the dead center is not really what matters (the result), rather, it is the constant balance among the three groups that matters most (the process by which to achieve equilibrium):
- design + technology / strategy
- technology + strategy / design
- strategy + design / technology
It is an important business idea, however, and I propose that the wordings be changed from the What to the Why. When you show the ROI first, people generally listen more intently:
- Usability = Design
- Longevity = Technology
- Commercial Value = Strategy
When you wish to back it up with examples, instead of picking a single product to demonstrate the effect, pick all of them. Show your audience how the same formula applies to all products and services that wish to be successful in the market place. It is especially true if you wish to reap the benefits from the power of cult branding: from Apple to Linux, from Harley-Davidson to Volkswagen, from the World Wrestling Entertainment to Oprah Winfrey.