Here at Hoffman | Lewis, we pride ourselves not only on how creative our work is but also how effective it is. Novel, huh?
Well, as obvious as it may seem, not all agencies maintain both standards.
You’ll see work on their website that sure looks pretty, but if you ask how it was received, you’ll get a shrug and a reminder that, well, it sure looks pretty.
Or, perhaps worse, they’ll pepper their presentations with ironclad case studies leading to . . . wait for it . . . wait . . . build-up . . . steady climb, then sharp drop off to mediocre work, leaving one to wonder whether they thought more about the creative process or the process of defending the “creative.”
This is not such an occurrence.
A year after launching Touchstone Energy’s Together We Save campaign, agency and client are both extremely pleased. In fact, Hoffman | Lewis is currently developing a second wave of materials for the campaign. Stay tuned.
In the meantime, check out the spots for a refresher. And read up on some of the analytics below to see how the campaign is working thus far.
- The Together We Save campaign for Touchstone Energy Cooperatives is the only national energy efficiency advertising campaign
- The site has averaged over 10,000 unique visitors a month
- Users have calculated nearly $19,000,000 in potential home energy savings
- The site’s message resonates globally, with regular visitors from all over the world, including Canada, India, United Kingdom, China, Malaysia, Mexico, Germany and Australia
- The greatest number of referrals to the site (next to organic search results) come from emails forwarded from friends after visiting the site
One of my favorite quotes is “It’s difficult to think tactically and strategically at the same time”. Who said it? I don’t know, but I wish it weren’t true.
How often do you find yourself mired in a sea of numbers and ideas debating what to do tactically while pushing the long term strategic reason or “Big Picture” to the back burner and losing focus? It’s very easy to do. Hence the quote.
My son and I were making Duncan Hines brownies with the some sort of caramel swirl and nuts on top for a family function. We jumped right in and started prepping the bowls, spoons, oven, counter space, pans and everything we thought we needed. We had a deadline and were worried they wouldn’t be ready in time. We pulled the pouches of ingredients out of the box and placed them on the counters with everything else. Our stuff was everywhere.
Then, we stood there frozen with a vast array of brownie making materials everywhere. We were a bit overwhelmed. What were we doing again?
“We need the box Dad,” said my son.
The box. The picture on the box is why we bought the brownies in the first place. The back and sides of the box contained all the tactical information we needed to bring the image of the brownies on the front to life. Both Duncan Hines and my son and I started with the big picture of the brownies. That’s what they wanted to sell us and that’s what we wanted to buy…the big picture.
Every project should start with a big pretty picture for the front of your box in order to stay focused as you assemble the resources necessary to bring the picture to life. Please don’t discard or set your box aside while you are assembling the ingredients. You need to look at it frequently and show it to others.
By the way, the brownies did not look exactly like the picture. But they were very good and no one knew except my son and I.
Happy Thursday! Have you ever seen a bit of advertising that makes you want to scratch your head and ask “Why?” That’s what I did when I saw this banner ad for Burger King.
Original Creative Approach:
Agency personnel photographed folks in a restaurant after ordering a Whopper, then the photo was printed on a sticker and placed on the Whopper wrapper before giving it to the customer to reiterate it was made “just for them.” That’s great. Message served, right? Oh no…then some genius thought “let’s get their permission and use the the digital photo files for a banner.” You’ll see the results of the banner here.
Is it just me or does this seem really labor intensive and cumbersome for the restaurant staff? Not to mention, those photos are horrible! Who was the photographer? The Art Director’s blind cousin? I want to file this under epic fail.
Advertising needs to be smart. We kicked this around a bit and my team would have done it in reverse. Have web surfers upload their own photo to a rich media banner and the files then become part of the banner (upon approval). Been done already, right? Here is where it differentiates itself. The users who take part then are given a printable coupon for participating with their face appearing on said coupon. And yes. It could all take place in the banner in real time. The coupon is then downloaded or it is emailed to the user (I like the latter because the restaurant gains an email address for later communications) and the coupon is redeemed at the restaurant.
If you want to get really crazy the restaurant staff can cut out the image on the coupon and put it on the wrapper. Same result as the original creative concept without ad agency staff getting in the way of QSR employees during a lunch rush. I personally know what it’s like to get in the way, we really respect QSR staff. Which is why we created this and this.
But who knows, the agency probably was looking to burn hours at the end of the year…either way, I like our approach. It’s smart advertising.
Our interactive team loves a good challenge. Come to us with an idea and let’s kick it around. We’ll find a better way to wrap a burger.
Have a good week!
Jim Murphy, Director of Interactive Media
Hoffman | Lewis St. Louis
