Oh, I see.

Turns out these legends of the ad game are not looking to be my friend. Fine, I had nothing in common with them anyway. Apparently, you need to win some awards to get on their radar. That's why the Andy's did such a great job of selling their premise: Win an Andy, win them all. The campaign basically says that this particular award show is so prestigious, you'll get the other awards easy, and perhaps, friendship with the best of the best. So I'm off to register for the Andy's, since they used compelling content to get me into the season of awards shows.

Good day for me, friend wise

Looks like I did the impossible. I became officially, publicly friends with some of the greatest creative directors in advertising today. Now, I'm a nice guy, but this still surprised me. I'm so glad that all that ass kissing the last three years has payed off.

Click the pic to see the proof.

Award Shows are relevant, Dammit! Vol 6.

McCann was the big winner last night at the International Andy Awards for their work with Halo 3 . We've seen the ads, with the diarama on an enormous, detailed scale. It flipped the video-game-tv-spot norm of pure action and explosions and made it eerily quiet. But what took it further was the interviews of "veterans." It put a human face, a whole story to these video game characters.

But back to the title of the article: awarding work like this is good for advertising. It was a multimedia, highly interactive, thoughtful campaign. It wasn’t a goofy commercial. Nor did users didn’t have to buy anything to get involved, but it was oh so engaging. So, if we award work like this, then creatives will strive to do more of it, more of it will get presented, and more of it will get made. It's the natural selection of compelling content.

Oh, and results. The release of Halo 3 rocked Spiderman and Harry Potter.

Award Shows are relevant, dammit! vol.5

More to come. I'm just getting the excitement started. I forsee another smart move by the Andy Awards to be more modern, making modern advertising the star. Can't say more.

Award shows are relevant, dammit! Volume 2

Last night, R/GA took home the top prize, "The Grandy" (and a championship ring) at the International Andy Awards. The winning piece--in the pool with the Skittles TV campaign (TBWA\NY) and the Safe Happens Integrated campaign (CP+B)-- was NikePlus.

This is HUGE people.

The Andy's Jury recognized that this is the next step in advertising--collaboration. I've been preaching it since I started reading Wikinomics--but collaboration and community are where it's at.
R/GA and Nike developed this product together. From the beginning. It's not like Nike delivered some shoes with iPods and said "hey sell this." No, they sat down--agency and client--and built a product around an idea, from the ground up, together. And the results were amazing. As for community, the premise of the whole product was built around community. You upload your runs, and view other runners stats, share routes, have time races, and support of all kinds. From the shoes, to the iPod that tells you how you're doing, to the website and widgets that you use to keep track, to the other users who become your friends supporters, you live with this product. Its compelling content at its finest.