MOBILE...ITY

I didn’t know the meaning of a flash mob till two weeks when I saw it live. A flash mob is a group of people who agree to meet in the city center with the sole purpose of performing a dance in synchrony. And usually, these people do not know each other. So technically, it was a semi flash mob, organized by Nokia.

It’s 2 p.m. in Nairobi at Kencom. I see a group of  about 25 men and women dancing as I approach. A mob has already surrounded them and are watching the spectacle.  The girls are in tight blue track suits printed Nokia and heels. Of course.

They were promoting the new Nokia Asha phone. Now that’s marketing! I mean, Nokia blocked Kencom! They had a caravan with a speaker, the works. Their exit from the event was a scene from the movie Fast and Furious. The heelclad vixens jumped on the Harley Davidsons. It looked awesome! The torque was a symphony in itself, and they knew it; they revved for about 10 minutes before they finally left.

The whole affair lasted about 20 minutes; short and to the point. Speaking of points, they get them for originality (people in Kenya have just gotten the hang of flash mobs, so it’s original here) and these guys BLOCKED KENCOM! No buses were moving. Very cool! Points for execution.

This comes up head to head against Huawei’s new Huawei Device Ascend P1 advertisement. 

An old man dressed in pure white from head to sandal wearing a flowing white toga and holding an ancient compass. He looks like something out of Greek mythology, or how you think Galileo would look. He looks into the distance, across a vast plain, where a white horse stands. He drops the compass. The horse begins to run. They meet in a titanic, brilliant clash of light and a phone emerges: a Huawei. The screen flashes ‘Beauty meets brains’. End. Genius. Simply genius!

LICENCE TO DRINK

There are 4 types of chemical bonds:

• Ionic bond
• Covalent bond
• Polar bond
• James Bond 

Let’s concentrate on James bond. The latest movie Skyfall which is 23^rd of its series, is coming out this November. What you didn’t know is you will not hear his signature line anymore; the ‘shaken not stirred’ one. Now, he will say Heineken. Yes, Heineken the green-bottled Dutch beer. I was as surprised as you; the legendarily suave ladies’ man will actually drink beer. Alas! Could it be that James Bond is an ordinary bond – err, man, just like you and me?

Before you get angry that this Bond is now drinking beer, there are marketing/advertising and production reasons behind this partnership. In previous movies, the Bonds were so smooth that even when 5 goons are after him and a building is exploding behind him, he still has time to open the car door for a lady. This generation’s Bond, Daniel Craig, is a man’s man, not a ladies’ man. Compared to Pierce Brosnan, he is not as easy on the eye. He’s rough and tough. When he drink’s a man’s man drink, a beer, it’s believable.

I feel that with this partnership, Heineken has upgraded itself from being just a beer to being the  smoothest, badassest beer (drunk by the smoothest, badassest man). Its competition, Guinness, whose current slogan is ‘Come drink at the table of men’ will be in trouble after Skyfall premieres, simply because Bond is drinking Heineken; all men on the planet want to be James Bond (and all the ladies just drool and drop at his feet), so they are going to drink whatever he is drinking.

For a long time Heineken has sponsored sports; first Liverpool Football Club , then the UEFA Champions League which is a huge success. We are talking about the guys who brought Usain Bolt on as a hype man in last season’s final match between Chelsea and Bayern Munich. They should bring Daniel Craig this time. They have gone a step further, a step larger still, by choosing a universally popular far-reaching platform: the world’s longest-running movie franchise (James Bond just turned 50 on Bond Day, October 5^th). Heineken is branching out from traditional sporting sponsorship to entertainment industry, with one swift, well-calculated move. It is, quite simply, brilliant. I love it.

Just because Heineken positioned itself strategically with James Bond, today I give Heineken a ten over ten. The basic moral of this post is, positioning in a new market must be strategic and properly thought out.

As soon as I learned this information on a Friday afternoon, I promptly walked into a classy bar and did my best James Bond impersonation for the female waiter who quickly approached. In a charming, Bond-like manner, I lifted one eye brow and asked for a Heineken. She didn’t even notice that we were in my own movie, License to drink.

CITIUS, ALTIUS, FORTIUS

The above is Greek for ‘Faster, Higher, Stronger.’

 

This is the Olympic motto. Every four years for 1 month the world comes to a stop to witness the greatest sporting spectacle this world has ever been privileged to know, passed down to us through a rich Greek heritage, separating the demigods from common man: the Olympics. ‘Tis the season.

The Olympic Games are here and with them comes advertising on a large scale. A case in point is ARIEL detergent. Their ad campaign is a series of commercial portrayed with their slogan as the ‘proud keeper of Kenyan colours’. It starts with an Olympic gymnast and goes on to showcase of various athletes in their different disciplines. The highlight is when they show the Kenyan heroine Catherine Ndereba, 4 time winner of the Boston Marathon, finishing the race and gets to her knees dressed in the Kenyan Olympic uniform, bright colours blazing. The voice over then says “…In the Olympic games, it’s not the colours you go out with. It’s the colours you came in that matter.” This ad is 31 seconds long but in that short period of time the magnitude of inspiration is well displayed. It is for this reason the advert gets a Naeto C: 10/10.

Then we come to the culprit of the day, Coca Cola. Let me tell you, one of the reasons I fell in love with advertising is Coca Cola. I was 9 years old and there it was: the ‘holidays are coming’ Christmas ad. I’m sure you all remember: the ad started with a young boy sitting on his grandpa’s lap by the fire. It’s Christmas, the house if full of decorations and he is reading a book to the little boy. Suddenly a huge shiny red Coca Cola truck magically appears and powers through the living room fireplace, with lights everywhere and a rotund Santa giving out gifts to little children on the way. The little boy becomes Santa’s little helper in the first truck in a line of what looks like thousands of red Coca Cola trucks as far as the eye can see. That ad was spectacular. Every time I watched that ad I was in awe, and I would rush to my room to kneel down and earnestly pray that just once, this red Coca Cola truck would pass by my house so I could see it, if only once…

This year is an Olympic year and Coca Cola is the official partner of the Olympic Games. This means it gets the most advertising rights during the entire period of the games. There is only one problem. Their global campaign is ‘Move to the beat.’ It is about fusing music with sport. I am sure this campaign was decided on as they rode on the cusses of the excellent World Cup 2010 campaign with K’Naan’s Waving Flag (also a great ad with a great song choice, obviously, and the 3D robot with the boy was good as well). But to do it again in 2012 is NOT OKAY. In 2010 one month to the World Cup the whole world especially Africa had the World Cup spirit. The Coca Cola ads played everywhere, all the time; on the radios, on our TVs and flooding the internet. Fast forward to 2012. Barely a week to the Olympics and the Olympic spirit is lacking! Their current campaign for a billion Africans sharing a Coke is good; emotive, happy, powerful, all the things a good Coke ad is known for. However, for the Olympics ‘Move to the beat’ is a poor campaign. I feel it has scarcely any life or colour, in comparison to Coca Cola’s past record, and bears no unforgettable traits to adequately represent true Olympian ideals. We all grew up on Coke. They set a benchmark in advertising that they are apparently they are finding hard to keep up with. I mean you can’t compare ‘the Brrrr! Side of life’ or simply ‘Always Coca Cola’ to ati ‘Open Happiness’. Coca Cola is, unfortunately, steadily losing its touch. They have managed to do injustice to the Olympic campaign that is why today I give Coca Cola a 2/10.

Straight to the bank

Today I’m touching on advertising in the banking industry, dividing a few of the worthy opponents into 3 categories:  the good, the bad and the ugly.

THE GOOD

The good has to be COMMERCIAL BANK OF AFRICA, for a successful rebranding from the blue logo to the current black and green logo. The bank even had trailers like a movie for their rebrand on major roundabouts in the city, and the rebrand is beautiful. The added boost was the television commercial to promote the rebranding. This tv commercial is about a middle-aged man who owns a small business and has a young family, his journey through time to his creating an empire, and finally as he picks up his son from school. The slogan they aptly used is ‘Time for more.’

8.5 out of 10.

THE BAD

This one goes to Barclays Bank, ‘…na tia/na bongo…’ In case you are wondering, this language is lingala, used in the 1995 tv commercial where Barclays animated an ATM (who doesn’t remember that ad?) which had serious dance moves that could rival a Koffi Olomide dance. I was in primary school then and it used to come during prime time, just before the news. It was very entertaining for its time.

For Barclays to use the same concept 17 YEARS LATER, but this time humans are dancing the same lingala is boring and tired. Barclays, a bank of such resources, who wants you to bank with said resources, has no resources to revamp its ads? Really? They NEED to really pull up their socks as far as advertising is concerned.

2 out of 10.

THE UGLY

The bad goes to Family Bank. Currently, Family Bank is running two t.v commercials. The first is about a girl in a shop calling her father repeatedly. Her father explains to her what the ideal, perfect family is. The worst thing about this advert is the voices. It is like they used voice overs which weren’t in sync with the character.

The second advert is about a young boy who is walking in the tea plantation and his grandfather explains to him how to pick the tea tree, then it ends with the boy saying kabisa. Some convoluted unrealistic story like that. I mean, why are they happy over tea? If this boy actually grew up around tea, wouldn’t he have known that by now? Why are people arbitrarily smiling? I get that adverts are supposed to make you want the product, but can they at least act like the audience is intelligent? The acting in this commercial is awful. The talent is of the basest level, the delivery poor and the general aestheticity is lacking. I mean, we can excuse it because Family Bank is relatively young, but…still.

3 out of 10.

In second place comes National Bank with their current advert of mobile banking. This is an UGLY ADVERT, hands down. The acting, of the father of the house is horrible. Ati his wife asks him for money and he answers, “Honey I’m not a bank,” in a voice that sounds like he has eaten a full bar of soap and bubbles are his new voice (pre-recorded yaani) all the while looking soap-opera cheesy (again with realism in ads).  The 1995 National Bank commercial was a brilliant advert which looked like the Safaricom ‘Niko na Safaricom’ one and had a majestic soundtrack: White Forest’s Sweet Lullaby. That ad could move you emotionally and make you want to walk to the nearest national Bank branch and open an account pap. The current commercial makes you want to cry and tell your Mama Mboga akuwekee pesa zako.

2 out of 10.

These banks should really consult Dr. Advice.

In general, what is it with ads and unrealistic parallel universe happiness and shallow plots, inappropriately lumped together with smiles for no reason? Maybe if they showed a few real stories (for instance, how children ACTUALLY talk, not like in a Spanish dubbed soap) or worked on, say, story development, then people would relate to them more, and they would hence be more effective…

Tell A Vision

In this world there are four things if told to a person at the right time will change their life forever for the better: One, Truth. Two, Flattery. Three, Honest Criticism and Four, Advice. So I’m here for three and four: my mission is to critique Kenyan adverts as well as offer advice to how to make them better. Hence this blog. ADvice.

Today we criticize the Kenyan government. Wow. This topic is a constant source of controversy and debate. Kenyans will blame everything on the government – “Maze hii gava inabo, imejaa corruption, cheki maroad gava hakuna kitu wanado, hakuna majob zozote, huyo dame alikataa kuingia box , na najua ni gava ndo ilimshow…” If you let Kenyans criticize the government, let’s just say forever is not long enough.

However, on this one occasion, the government has outdone itself, yaani Abbas na Chantel – IMETOKELEZEA! The Kenyan government, through the parastatal CCK, has just won the GOLD. I am woooooowed. In my opinion, their ad has given a bit more focus into what a proper, well-done ad should 

look like.

Where do you start and where do you finish? The message is clear: migrate from analog to digital yaani from aerial to cable. What better way to do this than with the analogy of a wildebeest migration? DID THEY JUST ANIMATE TELEVISION SETS AND MAKE THEM DO THE WHOLE SERENGETI MARA THING? Do you see how the tvs jump into the river and make it to the other side only to find tvs with better picture quality (so the saying really is true, the grass – or at least, its picture quality - is greener on the other side…). The music is something from an opera or an epic movie like Troy, then the effects when they are walking in the dust…for a minute I thought I was in an IMAX cinema…

Now that I want to rate this advert (and all after it) I will judge on the following points:

Creativity, /10

Talent, /10

Delivery/Execution, /10

General Aesthetic, /10

So after compiling these, the score will be divided by 4 to give an aggregate score out of 10.

This ad, gets a Naeto C from me yaani 10 over 10 (everything was a 10, so the aggregate score is a 10). ESPECIALLY because ni ya gava. They did something right.