A couple of months ago I was working on a brief for a financial company which seemed intrinsically and fundamentally boring. The client briefed us pretty tight; everything had to be about professionalism. Professionalism was the word of the day. But how on earth could I make professionalism cool? A planner told me: "Unpack that word. Think of it as being more than just one thing." And I realised professionalism also meant honesty, it meant integrity, trust, sincerity, it meant the difference between being an amateur and changing the world. Anything can be cool and interesting when viewed from the right perspective; from the perspective of those to whom it matters. No idea if we won the pitch or not, I left a couple of weeks later. The important thing is that I won something valuable, a great insight to improve my thinking. Yeah, that's the important thing.
In a similar vein of discussion, how do we make security cameras cool? Oncam is a manufacturer of sophisticated 360-degree camera technology, as featured in private homes, businesses, banks and casinos. Their latest campaign invites you to become a detective, reviewing security footage to catch a gang of Faustian criminals called 'The Magicians'. Most people go out of their way to avoid ads online. As an ad critic, I go out of my way to click on them, but only the ones which are genuinely interesting and feel fresh. The clever aspect of this campaign is it let's you take part in a forensic analysis, looking through different scenes via a 360-degree camera, but you're doing so for the story. Because which one of us hasn't wanted to step into a Hard Boiled detective novel and become the hero? Sure, it's a little rough around the edges, but this is a branded microsite, not Raymond Chandler. It's digital storytelling, well done.
We reached out to Oncam who told us they were really pleased with the results so far from the campaign and were happy to share some of their social media metrics with us (as of July 2015). As an ex-social media manager, these are great stats.
Stats:
Total number of interactions with the campaign, to date: 1.6M
% increase of Twitter followers since launch: 450%
Tweet engagements: 2.01K
Number of likes: 776
Completion rate: 62%
Users returning to site: 13.1%
Therese Hume, Digital & Social Media Marketing Manager at Oncam told Adland:
We are only a small company and we have been delighted with the level of interaction and awareness the campaign has generated. We have received a number of business opportunities as a direct result of this campaign, although due to the sensitive nature of our business I am unable to give you any names.
And you know what - I bet they have. Brave marketing can change perceptions. This is my favourite digital campaign of the year so far. Professionalism can be interesting. A CCTV camera can be interesting. And brave advertising needs to be self assured, and unlock that interest.
Good luck detective: http://www.heistoncam.com/
Client: Oncam
Chief Marketing Officer: Richard Morgans
Digital & Social Media Marketing Manager: Therese Hume
Agency: 41? 29!
Agency President: Alemsah Ozturk
Creative Director: Seren Koroglu
Creative Group: Alperen Altınoz, Deniz Makal, Ufuk Cetincan
Art Directors: Ufuk Cetincan, Deniz Dayıoglu, Fahri Guclu
Software Development: Gunay Sert, Emre Cakmakcı, Fatih Kocak
Graphical Animation: Enis Kılıc
Project Managers: Firat Sorgucu, Asli Nur Erguzel
Agency Producer: Berna Bulat
Digital Communication Group Head: Kayhan Dural
Digital Communication Manager: Ali Erkurt
Production Agency: Haciyatmaz Film
Director: Cagın Dizdar
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I used to teach a teams class at a portfolio school. I used to assign intrinsically boring products to prove there is no such thing as a boring product. Only boring people with no imagination. If you're a great creative and work with a great team who come up with great briefs, in theory, there will never be a product. In practice it's usually the opposite. But anything is possible.
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PermalinkClever idea that shows an actual USP, that's neat. I'm not the type that spends time in branded entertainment things but a detective game like story is more likely to lure me than anything else so points for that too. The best part is that I learned the products USP from the title and this clip alone. I might check out these cameras.
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PermalinkI was impressed with myself when I played through to the very end, and then started reading about security cameras. Spy Games are an often-used solution to make a product exciting, but here it really makes sense and the execution is well done. I could nit-pick and say 4 levels is maybe 1 too many, or that the puzzles seemed arbitrary rather than logical. It's easy to poke holes. But the reason I consider this a great digital campaign is simple. I played right through to the end, motivated by nothing else than interest in solving the mystery. Sure, it's not perfect. But it's still a very good example of what creatively-led digital can achieve.
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