It was at a recent Dave Chappelle concert when it dawned on me the importance of disconnecting from the world. In between the profanities and lewd, vulgar, yet funny content, I found myself socializing and engaging with those around me more than usual. Was it because we shared a common emotion of laughter? Or the increased consumption of alcohol? NOPE! It was mostly due to the privacy and security precautions the venue took as part of the concert experience. (Really?!)
Before entering, each patron was asked to “lock” their phones in a sack, making them inaccessible until after the show. Part of this was to avoid anyone sharing the contents of the event. The other, which was not as overt, was to bring us back to a simpler time — a time when engaging and socializing with a human being was all we knew. A time when our eyes and ears were glued to a live event or conversation, rather than a screen in the palm of our hands. (Ahhh, the good old days!)
While some may think “down time” should be time spent being productive — I beg to differ. It should be time used to reconnect and recharge. I personally love when I am taking a flight somewhere and have to go into airplane mode. I am disconnected, and able to put my mind at ease for those few hours. I look at it as a reboot — an escape from the flood of information and content that invades my headspace almost every waking moment of the day.
Our brains already consume way too much information (11million bits per second to be accurate), and are more than likely overwhelmed and exhausted. Imagine a hamster on a wheel, at some point it’s little legs get tired and has to get off. Now imagine that hamster never getting off… that’s our brains. So it’s important to find ways to disconnect. If that means taking a walk outside, while leaving your phone at your desk, or just going into silent mode for a bit, I highly recommend it. You’ll find yourself and mind refreshed, making you a more productive and sharper you.
So let’s see if you can integrate this into your everyday. Try allotting 15min to your schedule for that walk, or going into silent mode (label it “Unavailable” on your shared calendars). See if you can make it a routine, and let us know how it’s working for you. I know from our side, it helps everyone here think clearer, which results in bigger ideas, better creative, and happier clients.
]]>
If you live in a major metro market, then you know what it’s like to walk down the street and see 90% of the people with their heads down buried in their phone. I was one of those people, until I found myself standing in the middle of the street in Manhattan writing a text and nearly getting hit by a taxi. From that point on, I made sure that I was always looking up. But I am definitely in the minority. And this post is not about the safety, or lack thereof, when it comes to texting. It’s about how marketers can capitalize on this Head Down Revolution.
According to Statista, the U.S. mobile phone penetration has reached 81%, representing 223 million consumers. And those consumers spend an average of 4.7 hours per day glued to their smartphones. More importantly, is the role that texting now plays in our everyday lives, especially when it comes to marketing. For an eye-opening example, texts have a 99% open rate compared to 20% for email*. Pretty amazing, huh? Now I imagine that smartphones are currently in the midst of fine tuning their hardware to introduce features that can block such correspondence. But who knows when that will come?
So until that day, marketers have a humongous opportunity to take advantage and focus their outbound efforts on the behaviors of the smartphone user. A behavior that is now second nature, and while receiving a text from a brand may seem like a nuisance at first, it is certainly less of one than an email. Also, if you’re sending info or content that isn’t selling, but more serving them something of value, then you’re more likely to be able to maintain that dialogue.
And isn’t a dialogue what we want? It opens the door, and leads to traffic. And when you have enough traffic, ultimately it will lead to transactions. It’s this approach to marketing, partnered with the aforementioned tactics, that can build the awareness and engagement you’re looking for.
Now how about a little “social experiment”: The next time you’re walking down the street, take note of how many people’s’ heads are down. It truly is a sight to see. Just think, those eyes could be engaged in your brands message. And if the message is “timed” to when your customer is in the market for a new product, it becomes relevant and timely — a very powerful combination.
*Credits: Jack Loechner — Editor of The Center for Media Research; SinglePoint; Statista
]]>
This week marked the 12th annual Advertising Week New York conference– a week-long celebration and exploration of topics relevant to the advertising, branding, and marketing industries. After attending events throughout the week, we asked our President, Marc Sampogna, what his best experience was at this year’s AdWeek NY.
As Halloween approaches, discussing something “scary” is never more appropriate. At this years AdWeek NY, I experienced some interesting topics and conversations. All of which uncovered insights that I’m sure I’ll use at some point in my day-to-day. But one in particular really resonated with me, and that was with Seth Godin (sethgodin.com). Now, I’ve seen him speak a number of times, and have read some of his books, e.g., Purple Cow, All Marketers Tell (Lies) Stories, etc., but something about this talk hit me in a different way… a good way — in a way that gets lost in the world of marketing and creativity these days. He spoke about “fear”, and that if you, the agency/creative/strategist/
Why is it that we filter down our ideas, and dilute the creativity out of them just so they’ll do something average? Well, it’s, as Seth stated, because “average is what reaches 100 million people”. Average is mainstream. Average is a sure thing. Look, from a business perspective, I get it, we gotta sell tickets, put asses in the seats, move shit off shelves, etc. But for f#@ks sake who the hell wants to be “average”??!! I sure as hell don’t. I want to be scared. I want to be afraid. I want to take risks. I want to hold nothing back. Put myself out there and do things that make me uncomfortable. Because if it means that the ideas I put forth are genuine, and inspired from within, then whether it fails or not, I can move ahead knowing that I stayed true to what matters to me — not being average.
Minimum wage in the United States is recognized as a sign of financial instability, but it is rarely understood exactly how incredibly draining minimum wage labor actually is.
Blake Fall-Conroy, an artist who strives to create “socially-conscious” pieces, has conceptualized an ingenious way to demonstrate the frustrating, monotonous, and often demeaning plight of minimum-wage worker.
Fall-Conroy invented the “minimum wage machine,” a device with a hand-crank that the user turns continuously, and dispenses a penny every 4.5 seconds. An hour will earn you $8 in pennies, which until eight months ago was the minimum wage in the state of New York.
The artist hopes that the machine will help people understand the amount of work that goes into making just $8/hour, and perhaps inspire sympathy for those who work minimum-wage jobs or provoke change in legislation that will raise the minimum wage (the minimum wage in New York is now $8.75).
What Sparks Our Fire: Art that serves a purpose and sparks social awareness.
]]>
The commercial for the Amazon Kindle Paperwhite was commended for its normalization of gay couples and absence of gay male stereotypes.
This week, as an early Festivus present, thousands of people will cross one more thing off of their Dream-things-to-do-in-New-York bucket list, by stopping by their old pal Jerry Seinfeld’s place. His fictional apartment, that is. A re-creation of the famous Upper West Side apartment will pop-up thanks to Hulu on 14th street near Chelsea Market on Wednesday, and will be open through Sunday. This fan-driven activation will celebrate the introduction of ‘Seinfeld’ to the Hulu catalog.
Similar activations have been created to celebrate ‘Arrested Development’ and ‘Friends’. The ‘Central Perk’ pop-up cafe was co-sponsored by Eight O’Clock Coffee and Warner Brothers, and gave both brands a valuable way to connect fans with one of the most popular shows in television history. Both of these activations were incredibly popular and generated long lines just to get close to the action.
Activations like these allow fans to engage with their favorite shows in an exciting way– they can actually place themselves into the show they normally see through a television or laptop screen. The promise of a great selfie on Jerry’s couch might just be enough to make the long line worth it.
If you’d like to see if Jerry has a copy of Kramer’s coffee table book about coffee tables on his coffee table, the apartment will be open June 24th through June 28th from 10 AM to 7 PM at 451 West 14th Street.
What Sparks Our Fire: Seinfeld… enough said.
]]>
What can you do with an abandoned underground trolley terminal? In Manhattan, where space is at a premium, there are a billion creative uses for this subterranean expanse. In 2011, James Ramsey, Dan Barasch, and R. Boykin Curry IV proposed a radical idea for the space that sat unused for over 60 years– turn it into an underground park. The idea immediately resonated with New Yorkers, drew massive media attention, and got a wildly successful Kickstarter get off the ground. And this month, Ramsey, Barasch, and Curry have returned with a new Kickstarter to fund a test lab, bringing them once step closer to the reality of their Lowline park.
The test lab for the Lowline mostly aims to test the special technology that engineers have built to bring sunlight underground. Solar panels at street level will act as sunlight receptacles. Sunlight will then be funneled underground where it can be disseminated to the plants living below. Where UV lamps might have been used in the past, the Lowline is revolutionary because it aims for sustainability. Additionally, visitors will be able to go to the test lab this Fall to see the results in action.
Calling their park the Lowline as a nod to Chelsea’s High Line, the creators have acknowledged the huge impact that green public spaces can have on the surrounding community. The High Line was similarly built on abandoned elevated train tracks on the west side of Manhattan, with the first phase opening to visitors in 2009. With almost 5 million annual visitors, the High Line’s presence has revitalized the surrounding community in a way that the Lowline hopes to emulate on the Lower East Side.
Learn more on the Lowline’s website and Kickstarter.
What Sparks Our Fire: Sustainable public spaces spurring cutting edge technological and economic benefits
]]>
Every year marketers and brands flock to Televisions’ Upfronts, to hear the new network line ups and get a preview of the coming years television strategy. A month before the Upfronts kick off, TV networks are already sharing the spotlight–and potential media dollars–with this month’s NewFronts. Thanks to a long list of buzzworthy announcements, celebrity appearances, and corporate interest this year’s NewFronts signify the continued growth in importance of digital media and advertising. Started in 2008 by Digitas as a way to “bring together content creators, distributors, talent and brands to harness creative media opportunities made possible in the age of digital marketing,” the NewFronts conference has managed to become one of the most important conferences in the digital content realm. Brands like Hulu, AOL, Yahoo, and Google’s YouTube give presentations on their upcoming year’s content in order to attract advertising dollars. In 2008, these presentations were intended to convince marketers and agencies to shift more of their budgets into digital advertising, but as more marketers have already been convinced, the conference no longer helps marketers decide if they’ll invest their advertising dollars digitally, but tells them where. With almost 13% growth in the past year alone, digital advertising now comprises almost 30% of U.S. ad spend. 
This year’s NewFronts have already brought news that Hulu will pick up all 9 seasons of Seinfeld, a huge announcement that will surely draw in many advertising dollars. As the conference grows in size and importance– alongside the digital advertising sector as a whole– we will come to expect more and more of these big announcements every year.
What Sparks Our Fire: Knowing that we’ll be spending a good chunk of the month of June binge watching Seinfeld
]]>
With the rise in DSLR camera ownership, light photography has emerged as an increasingly popular form of photography. While it has traditionally been a difficult style of photography to master, New York-based designers Duncan Frazier and Steve McGuigan have entirely revolutionized it with just one product: the Pixelstick. The Pixelstick is a LED-lit stick that can display the “pixels” of images, as it is pulled in front of a DSLR camera with a long exposure. With the Pixelstick, photographers can create still images, or capture several images to put together into an animated video.This gives photographers the freedom to “paint” images and even video clips and gifs onto whatever real-life (dark) background they can imagine. It also gives brands an opportunity to put their logo in some creative locations. Take a look at this video and see some of the incredible possibilities.
Light painting with pixelstick from Bitbanger on Vimeo.
What Sparks Our Fire: A revolutionary new product that can expand creative possibility
]]>
New York City at it’s core, is known as a center of the arts. You can get your art fill all over the city, making stops along museum mile, gallery hopping in Chelsea, taking in the street art in Dumbo, or making the trek out to PS1 in Queens, and now even in one of the most iconic spots in all of the city… Times Square.
Now, as New Yorkers, we tend to avoid Times Square at all costs, but artist Peggy Ahwesh’s City Thermogram, has made it a destination spot for art lovers as well as tourists.
City Thermogram unveils both NYC’s electrical grid and the heat signatures of the human bodies that crowd its streets onto many of the largest billboards in the area. It’s a portrait of the urban everyday through the lens of a heat-sensitive camera. Using innovative technology, the piece recasts our ‘photographic’ world into one of unexpected revelations about our bodies, energy sources and personal devices. While this technology is usually used for scientific purposes, in Ahwesh’s hands the camera reveals the dynamism of the human body and offers a heat-based visualization of the electrical power grid that we all operate within.
This is part of the Midnight Moment series, the largest coordinated effort in history by the sign operators in Times Square to display synchronized, cutting-edge creative content on electronic billboards and newspaper kiosks throughout Times Square every night.
What Sparks Our Fire: Innovative Art in Unexpected Places
]]>