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MAS Assignment: Alphabet Soup
Our recent “mini” assignment this past week was to take photos and look for 15 letters in those photos. In other words, you might take a picture of an arch that looks like an “M” or a crack in a sidewalk that looks like a “Y.” It’s a great exercise to help you look at things differently, which is an important skill as a Planner.
I decided to take pictures of shadows around my neighborhood. I used a sidewalk, a bicycle’s spokes and a gate at my apartment. Then I cropped the photos so you can see the letter a little crisper.
Miami Ad School: Week One Planning Review
We had a lot of information thrown at us in Week One: guest lecture, brainstorming techniques, two assignments and our class schedules for the quarter.
I also met my fellow group of Planners, who are a diverse group from all over the globe, including Russia, Lithuania, Romania, Venezuela. It’s very exciting and I love the cultural mix.
Friday through Sunday (yes, we have classes on the weekends too) was Planning Overview with Chris Owens from The Richards Group. This was also when we received our 2nd assignment.
Chris Owens was absolutely terrific, and we all felt very fortunate to have him as our first instructor. It’s obvious he’s very passionate about Planning and he offered a wealth of information.
A brief summary of what we covered:
- What is Account Planning?
- Tools Every Planner Should Use
- Brand Model
- Developing The Creative Brief
One of the highlights for me was the clarification of what it means to be a Planner. Planners are not:
- the “voice of the consumer” (suggests we are a passive conduit)
- just researchers
Planners are:
- Brand & creative strategists
- Storytellers
- Trend trackers
- Idea champions
- Guides
This really only scratches the surface – I just summarized about 11 hours of in and out of class discussions. Up until MAS, most of my knowledge of Planning was through books and the web. MAS tries to create an environment that is very close to what you would experience in a real agency, and overall I think it succeeds. The opportunity to work in a team, bounce ideas off of one another and actually work on a campaign from idea to execution are invaluable.
Aquarium Phone Booth
Really clever combination of something left practically unused because of advances in technology and telecommunications and, well….fish in a big tank of water:
More pics at thepirata.com .
New Pepsi Ads
Some pics of the recent ads around Miami from the Refresh Everything campaign:
Banner on Miami Herald building
From a design perspective, I like the ads and the website. They’re simple and eye-catching, although I don’t think they’re very original (placing the round logo in place of the “O”).
Let’s dig a little deeper: The website is great, and takes a simple idea (people can post videos on the Pepsi YouTube Channel and address them to the President — best ones will be shown on the Pepsi website) to get people involved and create buzz. The reaction seems to be mixed, however, and Pepsi is treading a thin line by giving the site and the ads a political feel. There’s some positive feedback from “The New Advertising” blog that touches on Pepsi’s desire to target the Optimistic Millennials, where it says,
“They’re the generation that, whenever we do research with them, expresses an enormous longing for the optimism of the sixties.They envy the generation’s protest, music, dress, sexual mores and so much more. They believe they missed a critical period in relatively recent history.”
In the meantime, 24ahead.com points out that the numbers don’t look good (the number of videos being viewed is really low), while other right-wing blogs are calling for an outright boycott of all Pepsi products.
Here’s the recent Pepsi New Year’s Eve video that launched the campaign.
What do you think?
UPDATE – FEB. 1st
Here’s “Refresh Anthem” which aired during the Super Bowl:
Under Construction
Image Courtesy of Jasoon
This blog is under heavy duty construction at this time. Be back real soon.
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