Brand Noise

scenarioDNA grows context planning with mDive suite of research tools

I wanted to share our announcement about our upgraded suite of mDive mobile research tools.  We are very excited about the ways we are integrating these into our planning work.  Drop us a line if you have any questions.  You can learn more about the tools on our site at http://www.scenariodna.com.

New York, NY (July 7, 2008). No time like now has demonstrated a need for change in the research tools that we rely upon. Successful brands thrive on the nuances leveraged by pockets of influence, rather than the momentum formerly only gained by mass market appeal. Instead, today’s newly influential groups of consumers follow their passions in unique ways rather than what’s expected of them.

To understand them means to find the drivers that underlay their passions, and to be wherever they are. “To that end, when we looked for a technology partner it was critical to find one that was ready to ebb and flow with consumers as readily as we were,” says Tim Stock, managing director, scenarioDNA. “We found that expertise and flexibility in Neighborhood America.”

To define the ideal consumer narrative and see where a brand can authentically cast itself (or not) requires new immersive research techniques that underscore consumer mobility. The fact is, the mobile phone has become the most immediate and personal way to connect with consumers, no matter where they roam. Mobile communication, used alone or in conjunction with an online social network, can stimulate a deep connection to a consumer’s world.

The mDive suite of tools conceived by scenarioDNA and powered by Neighborhood America allows for that immersion, helping clients zero in on social networking and communication issues. “Without question looking at behavioral patterns now establishes a strategic foundation for the future,” adds Stock. The mDive suite of services includes:

1. mDive™ Mobile Panel -   custom panels engaged weekly or semi-weekly via mobile surveying
2. mDive™ Bluetooth  -  invites panel participation via strategic Bluetooth locations
3. mDive Trends™ -  custom or omnibus panels covering Green, Luxury and Entertainment
4. mDive Generations™  -  custom or omnibus panels covering Boomers, Gen X and Gen Y
5. mDive PushToPoll™  - an add-on cellphone widget for panel members of ongoing studies

The Scoop on Facebook's Lifechanging Box Sponsor

Facebook has a pretty "sharp" (!) new game circulating...The Lifechanging Box. It's like hot potato in reverse. If the box opens while it's in your possession, you win its prize. But I'm one of those curmudgeons who walks past raffle tickets even when they go to a good cause--because I NEVER win at games of chance. "Maybe this time" runs through my head...but I'm pretty quick to squelch the notion. And so I did the same when I saw the application for Lifechanging Box (sans its sponsor name) fly through my Facebook site. Now that the sponsor has been revealed to me and I see colleagues have already won some pretty cool stuff, I'm rethinking that decision. Is there a vacation in that box? I'm so ready for one.

Red Bull's DNA of Sport

(from Adweek) MEN7, a multiplatform lifestyle and entertainment network that debuts July 3, has partnered with Red Bull to create a branded entertainment Web series, DNA of Sport. The series take a soft-sell approach, and the integrations don't showcase specific Red Bull products or overtly push the brand. Instead, interactive contextual overlays give viewers the chance to explore the world of actions sports and -- hopefully -- forge deeper bonds with Red Bull, said Darren Chuckry, COO at MEN7.  read more

Profile of a Music Pirate

It makes for some interesting dinner conversation when when one of your friends is an intellectual property lawyer (he used to represent Apple Records while going through the DJ Dangermouse fiasco).  The topic certainly gets people's blood going.  It represents the shift into a whole new way in which companies and consumers relate to the value of goods and services.  And like other industries before them like cars and tobacco, reveals an attempt to dictate control over how the market functions. We must go through them.  The consumer sees things differently. The struggle to change gets ugly - and often results in singling out folks for litigation. In this week's BusinessWeek an article focuses on a 45-year-old single mother who, after being sued by the record industry, is now taking the record industry to court. Tanya Andersen is going after the recording industry under conspiracy laws. She argues the Recording Industry Association of America, the industry's trade group, and its affiliates worked together on a broad campaign to intimidate people into making financial payoffs.  Read more

Good Placement Fat Boy

I managed to catch the new film by David Schwimmer called Run Fat Boy Run this last week.  Pretty harmless and amusing with some cameos from top Brit comedy folks like David Williams and Stephen Merchant.  Another cameo I didn't expect though was Nike.  The film focuses around the Nike River Run and places the brand rather well in the story.  There is even a scene in which the main character is given a pair of top Nike trainers to motivate him to run.  A small story - but a very simple human story that places the brand in a less "pumped up" context.  This is good - and it left me liking the brand in a different kind of way. 

The Method Behind Pep Band Music Choices

Who knew to ask? It can seem that the pep bands are forever behind the times, playing from song lists borrowed from classic-rock radio stations and wedding-reception D.J.s.

But there is a method to their madness — “We try to play songs that not only appeal to the blue-hairs in the crowd, but also to our students,” said Jim Hudson, director of athletic bands at Arizona State.

Updating the songbook is an annual tug-of-war. Most bands hold year-end votes for band members. At U.C.L.A., the bottom five songs are dropped. Five new ones are added.

Most pep-band arrangements, designed for timeouts, range from 100 seconds to 2 minutes. Raps, with their repetitive hooks, are increasingly used for 30-second timeouts.

Choosing the right mix has legal complexities, too. Music is copyrighted, so bands typically cannot simply choose a song and start playing it — although many do.

Read the whole story.

Funneling is Not Sustainable Branding

Mekanism recently announced the launch of the Rockband.com social network. We first heard about the plans for the network back in October. We were hoping for a bit of evolution in that time. Rock Band is a great game. Rock Band as a social network is not. Not to say there is anything wrong in its execution, but the premise of a destination channeling people is not the direction to head in. Conde Nast came to that realization with Flip.com, which is now available as a widget on Facebook. And American Greetings approached its Kiwee brand from the get-go as one to work in tandem with existing, fabulous properties. Even Second Life only becomes something interesting when it becomes part of things outside of itself. Hmmm...maybe Guitar Hero is getting a handle on that now that it has launched Guitar Hero 3. Sustainable branding means working with resources that exist and function well among their users.

(Photo: 'Rock Band' set-up with 110" screen from a Panasonic PT-AX100 Projector. Onkyo 605 feeds the sound from the Xbox 360.)

Reality TV Moves Beyond Trash

Hardisty is a Canadian Pacific Railway town about 200 kilometres southeast of Edmonton with a population, according to the entry sign, of 743.

Last June, 117 women - about 85 per cent of Hardisty's female population - were whisked away on buses sans cellphones to set the stage for a 10-part Canadian reality series. Their destination? A luxurious week last June at a Canmore resort in the Rocky Mountains. They left their husbands, fiancés and boyfriends behind to fend for themselves and care for their children.

Hardisty accepted its role in hopes of gaining a bit of marketing exposure. Replete with farmland, essential services, a recreational lake and nine-hole golf course, Hardisty has lots for sale at $1 per square foot (prices negotiable by town council) and is keen for new residential, industrial and commercial development, officials say.

CBC said The Week the Women Went attracted an encouraging 770,000 viewers, comparable to Royal Canadian Air Farce, but not quite in the same league as Hockey Night in Canada, which gets more than one million viewers on average.

"All of a sudden we're not a small little community nobody knows about," Mr. Kulbisky said. "Everybody in Canada and beyond knows about us."

As reality tv matures and participants get more savvy as to what they can get out of it, the nature will change, bringing it closer to the participatory experience audiences are requiring from all avenues of entertainment.

Read more.

Kid Robot, Secret to “Yo Gabba Gabba!” Success?

“Yo Gabba Gabba!” began appearing on Nickelodeon in August, and with remarkable speed it has acquired fans who are preschoolers and fans who are old enough to be their parents...Charles Rivkin, the president and chief executive of Wildbrain, which produces the show, says, “I challenge you to find another preschool show that four months after going on the air is actually selling adult apparel at Barneys.”

While plenty of shows for children have also appealed to adults — “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” “H. R. Pufnstuf,” even “Sesame Street” — “Yo Gabba Gabba!” updates this idea for a generation that, it has been argued, is ambivalent about letting go of its own youth.

The real deal came when the original creators hooked up with Wildbrain. Back in 2006, Wildbrain acquired a majority interest in Kidrobot, which makes and sells high-end “designer toys” and apparel that appeal to fashionable young adults (who may or may not be parents). Thus “Gabba”-related products arrived in exclusive retail settings much faster than usual, demonstrating consumer demand to other merchandise partners.

You couldn’t ask for more perfect serendipity in partners, which goes to prove that authenticity starts at the drawing board. Had “Yo Gabba Gabba!” been conceived under other premises, it wouldn’t have been strong enough to bring into the Kid Robot world. On the other hand, if “Yo Gabba Gabba!” merchandise went straight to big box retailers you would’ve had a watered down product. The Kid Robot connection offers the brand longevity, with more staying power than it would have had on its own.

(Image: T-shirt recrafted into dress by JinJur.)
Read the article.

Scrabble Pirates Back Its Game

Scrabulous, clearly a knockoff of the board game Scrabble, was developed by two brothers in India. Its popularity is a major driver of traffic to Facebook, where a reported 500,000 members log on to Scrabulous each day.

Dozens of Facebook groups have been created to “save Scrabulous.” The biggest had more than 23,000 members late this week, days after the letter from Hasbro and Mattel was made public. Most group members seem to understand that the companies are merely protecting their rights, and many think that the game makers will reach some sort of understanding with the developers of Scrabulous, allowing the game to stay. A Hasbro spokesman said as much in a statement, asserting that the companies are seeking an “amicable solution.”

Josh Quittner of Fortune magazine’s Techland blog thinks that is just what should happen. “If I were an evil genius running a board games company,” he wrote, “I might do this: Wait until someone comes up with an excellent implementation of my games and does the hard work of coding and debugging the thing and signing up the masses. Then, once it got to scale, I’d sweep in and take it over. Let the best pirate site win!”

There's defending your intellectual property, and then there's admitting that you dropped the ball. What we have here are two companies focusing on the negative, annoying their consumers, and ignoring an opportunity.

Read more.