Lateral

We moved!

2009-12-07T08:49:00.000-08:00

Hi there, we have moved our wonderful wonderful blog to http://www.wearelateral.com/

Hope to see you there!

Science Inspired Design

2009-11-29T08:30:00.000-08:00

Turning Dunes Into Buildings

2009-11-29T08:22:00.000-08:00

Tutorial Tattoos

2009-11-20T09:21:00.000-08:00

Who discovered DNA?

Who sang 'Living La Vida Loca'?

The man who discovered DNA is Frederick Miescher.

We don't have to tell you who did the vida loca song.

Years ago some of us at Lateral were pitching on Intel's advertising. (We were working at DDB Chicago at the time).

We had acces to Intel's intranet and found profiles of their employees.

All the people we saw had at least registered 5 patents and some of them were even nominated for the Nobel prize.

These people were brilliant and we had never heard of them before.

We felt these people were not getting enough recognition for their work.

And we felt that other people - rock stars, movie stars, professional athletes- might be getting a little bit too much recognition for their talent and efforts.

We came up with a campaign which starred these Intel employees 'Living La Vida Loca' together with celebrities. (showing their 'cribs' visiting the Oscars etc)

The campaign was meant to give them the recognition they diserve, in a funny way.

Intel did not buy it and maybe they were right.

But we are pleased to see Philips understands that pop culture reaches more people than science.

And they have found a cool way to solve this attention problem.

Their LED implants are meant to help discover diseases and monitor the effectiveness of drugs.

Few people are really interested in diseases (unless it is THEIR disease of course).

A lot of people are interested in tattoos.

Which is why Philips is telling a story about moving tattoos instead of a story about diseases.

Science will probably never become part of pop culture.

But Philips' scientists have invented a way to deal that.

What You Will Be Doing Next Year: Foursquare.com

2009-11-20T01:47:00.000-08:00

At Lateral, we think we know what will be the next big thing after Twitter: Foursquare.com

Why?

Because the people who were on Twitter first are now on Foursquare.

Because the people who invested in Twitter first have now invested in Foursquare.

Because the founders of Twitter have now invested in Foursquare.

But most of all because it's simple, relevant and fun.

Find out for yourself on http://www.foursquare.com/

94wines.com Is On To Something But Gets It Only 94% Right

2009-11-19T08:46:00.000-08:00

Sure there are people who like to know that a certain wine was made from a certain grape growing on a certain soil which gives the wine certain tones added by the barrel which was made of…

Others just want to know: “Will I like it?”

The ‘others’ have now got their very own brand, and we are a little proud it’s Dutch like us.

94wines.com doesn’t fool around with unpronounceable French names, maisons, barrels and other complicated stuff, they just ask you a few questions and send you a wine that will suit your personal taste.

The only thing we find a little bit disappointing is that when you click on a wine number (a wine number, we love it: so true to the essence of their story!) you still get descriptions using terms like “full body” and “a combination of Chardonnay and Viognier”

But hey, maybe we are just being brand purists.

If you like wines that you will like, visit 94wines.com

(Update: we were contact by the ppeople at 94wines.com Turns out they only mention names like Chardonnay because they are required to by law)

And You Think You've Got Problems?

2009-11-18T06:50:00.000-08:00

People working in the idea business know coming up with ideas is not the hardest part of the job.

There are two things much more difficult than coming up with new ideas.

The first is recognizing a great idea.

The second is realizing it.

At Lateral we put a lot of energy in realizing new ideas.

But we know we have never worked as hard at making an idea come true as William Kamkwamba.

William was born in Africa. And after seeing a windmill which generated electric power one day, he wanted to build one.

He did not know anyone who could teach him.

He had no Internet to look for tips & instructions .

In fact, when he first saw a computer and the internet years after he built his wind turbine, he went nuts because it could have saved him years of trying.

Not only did he not have any help, people in his African village made fun of him.

But William did not give up. He built his wind turbine and taught others in Africa to build one as well.

He also taught people to teach other people so the knowledge would spread faster.

Next time you have a great idea and find it hard to realize it because of your busy schedule, a skeptic boss or a tight budget, compare the obstacles in your way to those of William Kamkwamba.

He didn’t give up, and neither should you.

(If you want to read William Kamkwamba's fulll story order his book at http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Harnessed-Wind-Electricity/dp/0061730327 )

Esquire Magazine AR

2009-11-18T02:07:00.000-08:00

Esquire Magazine takes it's first augmented reality steps.

Meeting New People? Get A New Business Card

2009-11-16T07:18:00.000-08:00

Most people design a single business card (or have one designed) and take it everywhere they go.

When you think about it, this is not a very smart thing to do.

Because using the same business card all the time, means you are using the same thing to make a good impression on lots of very different people.

Designer Maurizio Russo realized this and created a special business card for a special audience.

For his trip to Japan he designed a series of Maurusso vs Godzilla toy businesscards.

We like his toy business card idea a lot.

But we like the fact that he first thought about the function of a business card even more.

Possibly The Best Brief Ever

2009-11-15T12:13:00.000-08:00

In his excellent book "Buyology" Martin Lindstrom describes one of the greatest briefs ever.

It was for the design of the 3rd coke bottle from the left.

The brief was simple (which is always good) but very demanding (which is even better, but you can't do that without making it simple first).

The brief said: "We want our Coca-Cola bottle to be recognizable even when it is dropped and gone to pieces".

It is a very weird demand.

We can't imagine Coca Cola actually worrying what their bottle would look like broken.

But it is also a brilliant demand.

It challenged the designer to come up with something incomparable.

And it forced Coca Cola to approve only of something incomparable as well.

The brief forced both designer and client to be brave.

The world could do with more briefs like that.

Live Social Media Count

2009-11-15T02:17:00.000-08:00

Is this a great tool to show clients how big social media have become?

Or a great example how the web is becoming more and more about 'real time'?

Anyway, it's great and we thank dutchcowgirls.nl for pointing it out to us and Gary Hayes for creating it.

These Are Sausages.

2009-11-14T12:56:00.000-08:00

We have to admit, we were a bit shocked when we saw them at first.

And we consider ourselves creative open minded people.

This has to be strangest sausage packaging in the world.

It's wild, modern, balloony, festive...

It's definetly not something you would immediately associate with sausages.

The Russian designer and client have to be nuts.

Or are they both geniuses?

They might be if you look at the alternative.

Which is to go for a design that is all about sausages.

Which would make it look like all the other sausages in the supermarket.

Let's say this sausage brand is totally new.

So it would have to start getting some market share at the cost of other sausage brands.

Looking exactly like all the other brands would mean that consumers would probably not notice the new brand.

Looking like a wild party sausage from disco space will definitely get people's attention.

The way we see it, this new design could fail quite easily.

But so could a "safe" design, and the rewards for this weird design could be much higher, because it is almost a new category by itself.

Go strange sausage go!

Not Your Average Car Commercial (Thank God)

2009-11-13T06:21:00.000-08:00

Why do all car commercials look the same?

(You know, shiny car drives on empty road in desert/mountains/forrest).

Because that's what most car manafacturers want from their ad agencies.

They think it's safe, because nobody can hate it or not understand it.

We think it is very dangerous.

Not only are these commercials boring the crap out of consumers, but they also don't tell anything special about the brand.

Fortunately, there are a few car marketers out there who do get it and have the guts to produce some great stuff, which makes people fall in love with their brand.

Mini is certainly one of them.

Microsoft's Future Looks Good

2009-11-13T03:53:00.000-08:00

This is our fourth post on Microsoft already.

And we do tend to critize the brand's communication.

Not this time tough, we like this video.

It's not desperately trying to sell it something, it's just showing us a possible future.

A future that looks rather good.

No It's Not A Nike Commercial

2009-11-13T03:36:00.000-08:00

Atelic from duckeyejey on Vimeo.

In fact it is not a commercial at all.

But we like it, and it made us wonder why commercials are rarely as interesting as this video?

Nerds To The Rescue

2009-11-12T08:20:00.000-08:00

A couple a days ago we wrote a post about Microsoft's advertising and it's image.

To put it mildly: Microsoft's image could be better.

And that's because of bad communications and bad communications alone.

Sure, they have made some mistakes like Vista (ok, big one there) and their business methods in dealing with competitors are sometimes bullying.

But Google made some screw ups as well and made a very questionable deal with the Chinese government.

And why is Microsoft not getting kudos for Bill Gates charity work?

At Lateral, we believe nerds will save the planet.

Because they do not have some (political or religious) ideology that guides them, but because they see a problem or need and aim to fix it or answer it.

Watch this video and you will know what we mean.

We love Bill Gates for his foundation and we kinda like Microsoft as well.

We could even grow to love Microsoft if it would fix it's advertising and other communications.

On Transparency: The See Through CEO

2009-11-12T03:13:00.000-08:00

At Lateral we talk about transparency a lot with clients.

One reason is that it could threaten their business.

By that we mean that consumers can now easliy compare everything they do and offer to their competitors, so if their offer and behavior isn't the best of the best they will lose customers.

The other reason is that it is a big opportunity.

By being transparant as a company you gain consumer trust and likeability.

Wired Magazine wrote a great article about transparancy called "The See Through CEO".

You can read the first part here:

Pretend for a second that you're a CEO. Would you reveal your deepest, darkest secrets online? Would you confess that you're an indecisive weakling, that your colleagues are inept, that you're not really sure if you can meet payroll? Sounds crazy, right? After all, Coke doesn't tell Pepsi what's in the formula. Nobody sane strips down naked in front of their peers. But that's exactly what Glenn Kelman did. And he thinks it saved his business.

Last year, Kelman was the newly hired CEO of Redfin, an online brokerage firm that was, as he puts it, "the ugly red-haired child" in the real estate world. Redfin was trying to turn the industry upside down by refunding people two-thirds of the commission that real estate agents normally charge. Customers loved the idea - why the heck did you need to hand over 6 percent of the price of your house, anyway? But agents hated it for destroying their fat margins, so they began blacklisting Redfin, refusing to sell houses to anyone who used the service. Kelman was struggling to close deals for his clients.

His first reaction was to keep the situation quiet and pretend everything was OK. "We were really ashamed that our customers were getting pushed around, so we tried to keep it this dirty little secret," he says. But when months went by without any improvement, he decided to take a different tack.

Kelman set up a Redfin blog and began posting witty screeds about the nasty underbelly of the real estate business. He denounced traditional brokers, accusing them of screwing customers with clubby, closed-door practices. ("If we don't reform ourselves, and take out all the sales baloney, too, people will come to hate real estate agents the way they hate tobacco companies or Big Oil," he wrote.) He publicized Redfin's internal debates, even arguments about the design of its Web site. He mocked himself: One post described how he had sat at a college job fair for hours, waiting in vain for a single student to approach him. ("This was particularly sobering because it meant we had outlosered our neighbor to the right, Ford Motor Company," he wrote.) Meanwhile, in the blog's comments, old-school agents were unleashing hissing attacks on Redfin. Kelman left the critiques ine and lashed right back, in full view of his customers.

His enemies got nervous. All this intestinal spew seemed maso chistic. Worse, it was probably bad for business. Everyone's business.

But customers loved it. More and more signed on to use Redfin, and by the beginning of this year, Kelman and his crew were closing several deals a day. "Instead of discouraging customers, being open about our problems radicalized them," Kelman says. "They rallied and started pulling for us."

Like some crazed convert, he trumpeted his epiphany: "I honestly believe that if Redfin were stripped absolutely bare for all the world to see, naked and humiliated in the sunlight, more people would do business with us." Follow me, he urged.

And many have. Radical forms of transparency are now the norm at startups - and even some Fortune 500 companies......

Read the rest of the article here: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.04/wired40_ceo.html

Inflatable Safety Belts

2009-11-09T03:54:00.000-08:00

After airbags, we can't help thinking "what took them so long?".

Still, Ford has a winnner here.

Add A Sixth Sense To Your Mobile Phone

2009-11-07T04:31:00.000-08:00

3 things are important to us in this video.

The first is, that this "device" was made from mainstream consumer available technology which only costs $350.

The second is that is was made by just one guy.

And the last thing is, that the presentor is NOT talking about something that is to come in 10 years.

(the presentor did mention something about 10 years, but she was refering to the whole thing being implemented into brains!)

This technology will be mainstraim in about 3 years.

Every mobile phone will have this.

Repeat: every mobile phone will have this.

Which means that consumers will be able to compare your brand and product more easily than ever.

Which means that you, marketer, have to do two things, and you better do 'm fast.

First make sure that you have covered your basics: make sure you are planet (environment, labourors, animals ) friendly and that your price and quality and service are highly competitive.

The second thing you have to do is a bit harder but the rewards are much higher.

Make sure that you are incomparable.

Have incomparable functions, incomparable design, incomparable distibution, incomparable service and a very clear and incomparable brand story.

Things are becoming more comparable very fast.

Make sure people don't view your brand or product as just a comparable thing.

The Boom Of Social Media Visualized

2009-11-06T11:28:00.000-08:00

(Click on picture to enlarge)

Microsoft Sucked At Advertising, Then Got It Right, Then Started Sucking Again

2009-11-06T11:02:00.000-08:00

Nobody likes Microsoft.

But everybody uses it.

Why? Because Microsoft may not be the hippest, not the easiest to use, not even the brand that offers people the latest technology.

What Microsoft does do well, is offer great value for money.

This video shows Microsoft ad's from 1990's till 2009.

In 2008 Microsoft for once had a message that was perfect for them.

But they just had to screw it up again, trying to be really cool in 2009.

Microsoft: you are functional and great value for money.

You are not cool and you don't have to be.

People love functional.

People hate brands that try to be cool when they are obviously not.

Stop trying to be Apple and start being Microsoft.

In the end people will you for it.

One More Must Visit Website : Listorious.com

2009-11-06T10:32:00.000-08:00

Only a week after the introduction of the list function on Twitter, Listorious.com already collected over 5,000 list you can follow with just one click.

Marketing, comedians, mimes.....marketingmimes, they have a list for all your interests.

Websites We Highly Recommend (5 of 5): Mashable.com

2009-11-06T06:53:00.000-08:00

Social media is all about real time.

And news about social media does not get more real time than Mashable.com

Twitter before it's tweeted, Google before you can Google it.

Websites We Highly Recommend (4 of 5): wonder-wall.com

2009-11-06T06:37:00.000-08:00

If you have anything to do with interior design, you have to visit Japanese wonder-wall.com

And if you don't have anything to do with interior design, you should as well.

Their website is just too beautiful to miss.

Websites We Highly Recommend (3 of 5): PSFK.com

2009-11-06T06:29:00.000-08:00

PSFK.com is a great source of inspiration.

You should visit it every day.

Or at least once to download their free "Good Brands 2009" report.

Websites We Highly Recommend (2 of 5): Trendwatching.com

2009-11-06T06:21:00.000-08:00

Want to know what a "Twinsumer" is?

What "Generation G" is all about?

Trendwatching.com's newsletters will keep you up to date on all mayor consumers trends.

Some of them are really enlightening, some just tell you stuff you already now.

But hey, all of them are free, so sign up!

Websites We Highly Recommend (1 of 5): Twittratr.com

2009-11-06T04:24:00.001-08:00

Twittratr.com was created during the US elections by Obama supporters, who wanted to know how their candidate was being talked about by Twitter folk.

Now Twittratr is a non-perfect, but very quick tool to check the way people feel about your brand.

Twitter Working On Integrated RT Function

2009-11-06T04:08:00.000-08:00

This week Twitter introduced lists, now they have announced to introduce an RT function soon.

RTs (reposting something someone else wrote and mentioning their name) was invented by users, and will now be integrated so users can RT by just a single mouseclick.

That's one of the things that fascinates us about Twitter: it's users really shape the social platform.

Users lead, Twitter follows.

Lego Augmented Product Demo

2009-11-06T03:57:00.000-08:00

Lego Augmented Reality from Sjaak Alvarez on Vimeo.

Not the latest, but still one of the most relevant augmented reality applications out there.

The Posting Economy

2009-11-05T07:17:00.000-08:00

The Urban Cursor

2009-11-04T02:19:00.001-08:00

Danish designer Sebastien Campion created the urban project Urban Cursor "in order to explore the bond between the physical world and the numerical world".

We don't know about the last part, and really don't care.

It's original and people are obviously having fun with it.

Sometimes that is just enough.

Can Advertising Create A Need?

2009-11-02T07:37:00.000-08:00

Below you will find a recent blogpost written by UK advertising legend Dave Trott.

It is so good, we just had to publish it on our own blog.

Here it goes:

Akio Morita was the founder of Sony. Apparently how he got started was that, after the war, he bought several dozen wire-recorders from the US army.

These were an early form of tape recorder. When he bought them he didn’t know what he was going to do with them.

He knew the possibilities of this new technology excited him. The trouble was, there was no demand for it.

Being unable to record sound and instantly play it back was not a problem that needed solving. At least not for the average person.

Before Akio Morita could satisfy a demand, he needed to create one. So he wrote a small pamphlet about the uses and possibilities of a wire recorder. And he distributed it to schools in the Tokyo area.

Pretty soon the schools were clamoring to buy his wire recorders. He sold out, and that was the start of Sony.

Years later he saw the possibilities in transistors. Until that point, radios and TVs had used big old-fashioned ‘valves’.

These looked like light bulbs. They were about the same size and just as fragile.

Akio Morita realized that by using transistors instead, he could make technology smaller and tougher. In fact, truly portable for the first time.

One of his first uses of this was a tiny radio. At least it was tiny by the standards of the day.

It was about six inches long, four inches wide, and an inch deep. The problem was the demand for a portable radio didn’t exist.

So, before he could satisfy a demand, Morita knew he needed to create one.

He told his salesman they should demonstrate how amazing the radio was by popping it into their shirt pocket. The problem was it didn’t fit.

So Morita had hundreds of shirts made with slightly oversize pockets. He issued these for each of his salesmen to use when demonstrating the radio.

Sony created the market for tiny portable radios.

Years later his research and development people came up with a tiny tape cassette player that gave great sound. But it had no speakers. And it couldn’t record.

The Sony marketing department said the product wouldn’t sell. No one was asking for a cassette player that didn’t record and only worked with headphones.

Akio Morita knew, before he could satisfy a demand, he had to create one. So before he launched the product, he gave it away to opinion formers.

Professional musicians, recording studios, music journalists, composers. They all talked, and wrote, about the fantastic quality of the sound. Pretty soon the public were clamoring to buy it.

That was the Sony Walkman.

But before Akio Morita created the supply, the demand didn’t exist.

Adam Morgan wrote the book “Eating The Big Fish” which launched the concept of ‘challenger brands’.

Adam was telling me about an experiment in Canada. A company wasn’t sure about the value of its advertising. So, to see what would happen, they only advertised in half the country.

Sales didn’t seem to go up, so they stopped advertising.

Instead they did a coupon drop over the entire country. But only half the country used the coupons. Guess which half.

If the demand doesn’t exist, you can’t satisfy it.

Henry Ford said, “Before the automobile existed, if I’d asked people what they wanted, they’d have said faster horses.”

People aren’t visionaries. They can’t know they want something that doesn’t exist.

Sometimes you have to create the demand before you can satisfy it.

That’s called advertising. Creating a demand.

Akio Morita said, “The greatest assistance I had in growing my company was the total failure of nerve on the part of western businessmen to make a move without research.”

Marshall McLuhan put it differently. He said, “Running a business based only on research, is like driving a car by looking in the rear-view mirror.”

(you can find more off Dave Trott's wisdom over at www.cstadvertising.com/blog)

Tokio Fashion Week: Hand Models

2009-11-02T04:48:00.000-08:00

Why pay big money to super models, when you can use hands to show your collection?

This cute little video which was shown during the Japan Fashion Week in Tokio is sure to put a smile on everyone's face.

Burger King Augments Dollar Bills

2009-10-30T03:37:00.001-07:00

We write about Burger King a lot on this blog, because they seem to share our attitude.

Which is: try everything, build on what seems to work.

We think this is a smart way of operating in the real off line world and we KNOW it is the only way to succeed online.

Not everything Burger King does online is succesful but that does not matter.

They create, try, learn and create again.

They stop doing what doesn't work and improve and develope what does seem to work.

And now they have taken their next little step in augmented reality.

No need to print anything out first, consumers can just hold up a dollar bill in forn of their webcam to see what that dollar will buy them.

Try everything, build on what seems to work.

It's really not that difficult.

The Google Story In 2:13 min

2009-10-28T13:27:00.000-07:00

(via dutchcowboys.nl)

Can Kids Teach Themselves?

2009-10-26T11:42:00.000-07:00

What happens if you go to some poor area in India where kids don’t speak any English and stick a computer in a wall and leave it there for months?

Dr. Sugata Mitra did exactly that and found a bunch of kids who had taught themselves 250 English words (mostly mispronounced).

Also they were asking him for a faster processor and a better mouse.

Arthur C. Clark once said: “A teacher that can be replaced by a machine should be.”

Dr. Mitra’s experiment shows that at the very least a machine is better than no teacher at all.

(actual experiment starts after 7 minutes in the video)

This Proves It: Bloggers Are The New Celebrities

2009-10-23T02:29:00.000-07:00

Let's say, you are organzing your fashion show.

Who do you put on first row?

The guy who orders millions of dollars of your designs for his retail chain?

Or a blogging kid who calls himself "Bryan Boy" ?

At the D&G show in Milan, the new order of things was clear for all to see.

Retail buyers and fashion directors had to give up their seats for four bloggers who in internet fashion circles are called "the Fab Four".

These very influential fashion bloggers were not only given front row seats, but also provided with tables and laptops as well.

Need even more proof of the celebrity status some bloggers now enjoy?

Designer Marc Jacobs recently introduced a "Bryan Boy Handbag" for men.

Samsung Gets It

2009-10-23T02:16:00.000-07:00

Quick! Think of a mobile phone brand that is totally internet savvy when it comes to advertising...

Apple? Sure, maybe.

But we think Samsung totally gets it.

Not only was Samsung very quick to follow the Youtube Unboxing trend (search for yourself just type unboxing on youtube) and are they succesfully using bloggers to help build their brand, this new youtube video is further proof of their viral awesomeness.

Using Youtube's options to link other videos in a video, this viral Samsung commercial allows viewers to choose their own storylines.

It's relevant, original, cool.

And no it's not Apple.

Pepsi Raw People: Take A Look At Skittles

2009-10-14T03:14:00.000-07:00

Pepsi Raw people, we at Lateral Amsterdam love the way you are building the Pepsi Raw brand.

You are doing lots of things totally right.

You are mostly building your brand through sampling and social media instead of traditional advertising.

You even printed your Twitter adress on 1.4 million cans, asking people to tell you what they think of Pepsi Raw.

You are almost doing everything right.

And still you have only 900 followers on Twitter and only about 2000 fans on Facebook.

We feel this is because you are giving no social rewards for people using social media.

Which is a shame because it is so easy.

What people get out of social media isn't just communicating with others.

A large part of it is about getting attention.

Skittles knows this and puts everything (unfiltered by the way) people say about Skittles on Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr on their own website, skittles.com.

You should do this and more.

Print Twitter comments (positive and negative) on your cans.

Show real time web communication about Pepsi Raw on electronic billboards.

Print "@estherwaller23 doesn't really like it, but @jeffpulver LOOOOVES it" on London busses.

Show yesterday's most interesting Twitter and Facebook comments on Pepsi Raw in newspaper print ads.

Get more people talking about Pepsi Raw by making sure they get something out of it.

Also, showing people other people are talking about Pepsi Raw makes them curious and makes them want to join the conversation.

Succesfully using social media isn't just about talking and listening.

It is very much about taking and giving as well.

XBox 360 You Have To See It To Believe It

2009-10-14T01:57:00.000-07:00

The first minute of this XBox 360 announcement is pretty amazing.

No controls are neccesary to play games because the XBox 360 scans your body.

But the second part of the video is what we find the most interesting.

The XBox 360 allows you to try on different clothes and show them to your friends in real time, so they can advice you on buying it or not.

Now it doesn't take a genius to figure out this can also be applied to home interiors, car test drives, new hair styles etc.

It does take a marketer who is willing to devote a serious piece of his or her time to find out how this new technology works best for his or her particular brand.

Would we be willing to help? O yeah, we love the XBox360 !

Lateral Thinking: Make It Fun

2009-10-09T02:17:00.000-07:00

At Lateral one of our all time favorite ad slogans is from light soft drink Diet Tango:

"Diet Tango. You need it because you are weak."

And let's face it, most of us are weak.

We are temped by fatty snacks and sugar filled drinks all day.

And all too often we can't resist temptation and give in.

This wouldn't be such a problem if we got enough exercise, but we don't.

Because we are also tempted by things that allow us to avoid exercise like remote controls, cars and escalators.

So if we want people to get more exercise, how do we do it?

Do we launch a campaign telling people exercising can prevent heart attacks?

Most people already know so that can't be the answer.

Ban cars, remote controls and escalators?

Nice idea, but there would probably be riots.

Some people in Sweden came up with a real nice solution.

They turned regular stairs into piano keyboards which produce a sound when stepped on.

Suddenly climbing stairs becomes very temptative.

Fighting one temptation with another.

There is always a great solution as long as you keep thinking.

Giving up is for the weak.

Lateral Thinking: Change Your Name

2009-10-06T04:52:00.000-07:00

With so many talented creative people working in advertising and marketing, it always amazes us how little case of true lateral thinking we see.

There are very few reasons for this, and very many excuses.

One of the most used excuses is that something is said to be a given and can not be changed.

Like media (30"TV), air date, production budget, target audience, distribution, packaging etc.

A lot of times better solutions are not discovered or even ignored because something is not allowed to be changed.

The case of Carribean Airlines proves what a waiste such a way of working can be.

Carribean Airlines is Trinidad & Tobago's national airline and was named BWIA.

Now who is pleased to hear a travelling agent say a name like BWIA?

You have never heard of it so it sounds small.

And because it sounds like a small airline, you start thinking of incompetent pilots and small old rotten planes.

When BWIA hired UK ad legend Dave Trott to do their advertising he didn't say: "Hey, let's do a great TV commercial and make some kick ass posters."

Instead he said: "I have thought long and hard about this and you have to change your name." (and your logo as well)

Fortunately no one told Dave Trott that he could not change the name of the airline.

Carribean Airlines is so much easier to do advertising for than BWIA.

When you hear the name Carribean Airlines you think "Big" and "Reliable" (and probably "nice"and "sunny" as well).

By changing the name Carribean Airlines turned a $60 million loss into a profit in only 4 months.

When you really start thinking lateral things can take of pretty fast.

1 RT, 900K People Reached. We LOOOOOVE Twitter!

2009-10-06T00:53:00.000-07:00

Loyal readers of this wonderful, wonderful blog know we (together with our Chicago sister agency The Escape Pod) are helping comedian Rich Fulcher to promote his new book Tiny Acts Of Rebellion.

We are doing this by organising a flash mob and tweeting about it.

We have asked people to change their avatars and hundreds did.

We have asked those hundreds to spread our message and they did.

And when you have hundreds of people doing your tweeting for you, 1 of them might just spread the message to exactly the right person.

Our message reached actor&comedian Steve Agee who tweeted about it.

Mr Agee has 900,000 followers who love to read every tweet from him.

On Twitter it is true that you are only a few people away from every person in the world.

Impossible To Make? All The More Reason To Design It

2009-10-05T01:35:00.000-07:00

We saw this concept of a Coca Cola can on a design blog called TheDieline.com

It was made by a young designer by the name of Dzmitry Samal.

The design is certainly remarkable, but so were the comments on the blog from other designers.

You would think designers would argue about wether it fits the Coca Cola brand, or maybe just explain why they thought it was beautiful or ugly.

Think again. All comments from other designers were explaining why such a can can't possibly be manufactured on a mass scale.

Too expensive when it comes to materials, it would take too long compared to a normal can..

We were surprised. We expected most designers to think bigger than that.

Which brings us to the reason why we posted a picture of the Sydney Opera House above the Coca Cola can.

When Danish architect Jorn Utzon presented his design for the opera house, it was impossible to build.

He designed it first and dealt with construction problems later.

Impossible didn't stop him and it shouldn't stop you.

Like the famous sport brand says: Impossible is nothing.

You Do Not Own Your Brand

2009-10-04T11:59:00.000-07:00

Your brand is not yours. It is THEIRS.

And who are THEY?

Well anybody who cares enough to buy it, sell it, blog it, tweet it, flickr it, make a video about it or even do a whole website about it.

THEY for instance, are www.peopleofwalmart.com

A website that posts pictures of funny looking people in line at Walmart. (and by the number of tweets we read about it, is getting very popular fast).

Now put yourself in the position of a Walmart marketer.

Would you laugh? Be afraid of brand damage? Call your lawyers? Or think of it as an opportunity?

Remember the Mentos&Coke videos on Youtube?

Coca-cola called their lawyers.

Mentos worked with Youtube and did a great sales promotion.

When THEY play with your brand let THEM play. (and call your advertising agency to see if you have some fun with it as well).

Never call your lawyers. It's not your brand anymore, those days are gone.

The New Million Dollar Home Page (well sort off)

2009-10-04T07:56:00.000-07:00

Remember the Million Dollar Homepage?

Some kid divided his website in tiny little squares and sold the squares to companies, who put their logo in it?

Now, when you saw that you went "why didn't i think of that" didn't you.

So did Jason.

And he actually came up with a great idea: iwearyourshirt.com

Anyone can hire Jason to wear a shirt with their message on it for a day.

Jason will take a picture on it and put it on his blog, make a youtubevideo, put it on facebook and tweet about it on Twitter.

Jason's pricing system is pretty ingenious as well.

January 1st is 1$, January 2nd 2$ ...December 31st is $365.

Jason has sold out 2009 and wore 206 T shirts.

Making him a rough 50.000 dollars. Not a million dollar homepage, but still pretty nice.

Order your Tshirt ad space at www.iwearyourshirt.com

Credit Crunch Couture

2009-10-04T03:33:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we love Viktor&Rolf.

Not because they are Dutch (although there may be some chauvinistic pride involved) but because we love great ideas.

And Viktor&Rolf do ideas as much as they do fashion.

We love the idea of creating a beautiful dress with big holes because haute couture is suffering greatly from the credit crunch.

Below are some pictures of their older work.

To us it never goes out of fashion, but maybe that's just because we focus on the idea behind it too much.

Zork Not Cork

2009-10-03T10:18:00.001-07:00

Even though winemakers keep telling us that screw tops are better for the taste of wine than corks, we are conditioned to associate good wines with having a cork.

But cork is getting rare so more and more wine makers are looking for alternatives.

We would advice them to switch to Zork.

It looks like a cork, after popping you can preserve the wine with it and it looks really really good.

Cheers.

Who Cares About Asian Elephants?

2009-10-03T06:46:00.000-07:00

Sure, you won't find a lot of people saying: "Asian elephants threatend with extinction? Good, always hated the big grey buggers."

But you won't find a lot of people reaching deep in to their pockets to help either.

So what to do? Start going door to door? Like 20 other charities people have actually heard of before?

Make a TV commercial and hope TV stations will air it for free? Considering the budget it would cost to produce a commercial you would probably be lucky if you can break even.

Fortunately for the Asian elephant, someone came up with a great idea.

112 man sized were made and painted on by various Dutch artists (Corneille being 1 of them).

The Elephants are placed all over Amsterdam for a month to raise awareness and after that they will be auctioned for the cause.

We don't know who came up with the idea, but he/she is definetly no dumbo.

And...We're Live!

2009-10-01T00:50:00.000-07:00

It's no longer a secret.

We (Lateral Amsterdam and our friends at The Escape Pod in Chicago) are helping Rich Fulcher to promote his new book Tiny Acts Of Rebellion.

Wanna see what it's all about? Get in onthe action?

Visit http://fuckoffbigben.com

What The Tweet Is Going On?

2009-09-30T13:06:00.000-07:00

Hundreds of people on Twitter are changing their profile pictures into a somewhat provoking Big Ben Hand Gesture.

Why? Because we asked them to.

Well, us and Rich Fulcher.

We can't tell you more yet, but we will soon. Stay tuned!

Brilliant PR. 37signals Now Worth $100 billion

2009-09-28T12:59:00.000-07:00

37Signals.com sells software.

They sell software to small businesses.

This makes their global number of potential customers...eh...millions.

Their software is chepa, easy to install and use, but all that means nothing if people don't know your name and don't know where to find you.

They solved a great part of this problem with a (we estimate) 20 cents picture and a 20 cents email press release.

Their gimmick: they sold 0,000000001% of the company for $1.

Which, acoording to Silycon Vally Hysteria Standards, makes 37Signals.con worth $100 billion.

Wired magazine wrote about, thousands of blogs posted it, even more people tweeted it.

37signals.com is now a better known name and anyone searching for software on Google is much more likely to run in to them.

20 cents and a good idea.

Less budget, more effort. Just the way we like it at Lateral.

The Most Inspiring Video Ever

2009-09-26T03:37:00.000-07:00

Yes it really is 1 hour, 16 minutes and 27 seconds long.

Watch the first 5 minutes and see if you can get yourself to stop.

Brave Brands Are Better At Social Media

2009-09-25T10:46:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we are huge Skittle fans.

We have watched every Skittles commercial that was made for the last 3 years at least a hundred times.

We even did a post on it.

Watching the commercials, we immediately knew this is a brand (client)who is unafraid.

Turns out, Skittles is even braver than we thought.

They are showing everything that is posted about the brand (videos, pictures, comments) on Facebook, Flickr, Twitter and Youtube on their own website skittles.com

And when we say that they are showing everything, we mean everything.

Last time we looked at their website one of the comments on a skittles youtube videos was "I like M&M's better".

A lot of marketers in the USA are critizing the way Skittles sort of puts their brand in the hands of consumers.

We say Skittles is very smart and we are not alone in this.

Only 2 other brands have more fans on Facebook than Skittles.

We Made This But We Can't Tell You Why (yet)

2009-09-25T09:33:00.000-07:00

In colaboration with our Chicago sister agency The Escape Pod, we made this.

We can't say what it is for yet, but if everything goes well, you will see this image a lot pretty soon.

We Have Got To Work With These Guys

2009-09-25T05:06:00.000-07:00

In a world where the average commercial is a boring product demonstration lacking all credibility, an almost funny joke or a bunch of famous athletes wearing shoe X or Y to make you buy the same, it is always nice to see something that is totally fresh.

This video for Universiteit Twente by Buro Knapzak makes all other commercials look like they were made 20 years ago.

When the right project comes up, we will give make sure to give these guys a call.

Universiteit Twente from Buro Knapzak on Vimeo.

Playing With Sand. Always A good Idea.

2009-09-25T04:34:00.000-07:00

We love what Theo Watson, Thijs Bierstekers and Karian Weijers are doing (the video below is a test which took place at september 4) for the new Dutch Film Museum.

They could have played it boring and safe by doing a (media wise expensive) poster or print ad announcing the coming of the new Film Museum, but they chose to make themselves and their clients budget work harder.

On the site where the new museum will be built they use the only material there (sand) to show the world what the new Film Museum will look like.

As fellow Dutch men, we are proud. And a little bit jealous.

Before Advertising Consider Your Other Options. (And Check Your Basics)

2009-09-24T01:21:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we have many many many many theories on advertising.

(yes theories, because advertising never was and never will become an exact science. Not only because there is creativity involved, but also because the damn world just keeps changing too fast)

One of our little theories is that advertising is often not the best way to spend a communication budget.

If possible one should try to get word of mouth, which is much more powerful because it comes from people who have their friends best interest in mind.

Zappos.com does a great job at this. Instead of spending money on advertising, they spend money on extreme service, which causes people to recommend zappos.com to their friends.

PR is also preferable to advertising because it comes from an impartial if not critical source.

Virgin does a great job at this. Not only does Virgin save millions in media spendings, we are convinced Virgin's messages are received more positive because consumers do not turn on their "Beware It's Advertising Alert".

Another thing we hold to be much more powerful than advertising is realy realy great product design.

With a design like this study from Tai Chiem, Playstation 4 sales will benefit from advertising, but definitely not depend on it.

Evian Saves Money on Paul Smith

2009-09-24T00:42:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we have many many many wonderful books about advertising.

We only look into 3 of those books regularly.

The first 2 books are decades old: George Lois' book and Bill Bernbach's book.

We look into Bernbach's book to remind us of basic ad wisdom like "if your ad goes unnoticed everything else is academic".

We look into Lois'book to remind us to be brave and ambitious.

The third book however, was published recently.

It's called Advertising Next.

There is not a single TV or print ad in it, because the book is all about advertisers and agencies who have managed to reach a lot of consumers without a huge media budget.

Every campaign in the book is different (some are products, services, virals, events etc) but there is one common denominator:
they use a part of the huge budget they do not have to spend on media, to make sure everything looks and feels great.

In other words: less money, more effort.

One of the great examples in the book is Evian, which collaborates with a new designer every year to create a new special Evian bottle.

These bottles become collector's items instantly, turning the lucky few who own one into Evian fans forever, and the rest of us in to Evian admirers.

Evian's latest collaboration is with designer Paul Smith.

Who surely doesn't come cheap, but surely costs less than the production and media budget of the average TV commercial of the average big brand.

The moral of this story? Drink enough water, read Advertising Next and start thinking differently.

The Most Beautiful Tea Bag EVER

2009-09-21T11:17:00.000-07:00

Big companies like Lipton never seem to come up with exciting stuff like this...

Why not? Why can't a company with tons of R&D people do what Russian designer Nathalia Ponomareva did?

Anyway, it is the most beautiful tea bag we have ever seen. (via Fubiz)

Ridding The World Of Bad Pants

2009-09-21T05:21:00.001-07:00

We love Pants To Poverty.

Not only because they are trying to make the world a better place by making and selling totally chemical free underwear while paying cotton farmers and factory workers a fair price, but because they are so 2010 in doing it.

Their advertising is totally social using Youtube, Flickr, Wikepedia, blogs and Twitter.

And their sales channel doesn't include a single store.

Instead they succesfully promote and sell their underwear at concerts and events.

They are a sort of charity, but the coolest charity we ever came across.

Using everything that works well for them, like pretty girls in their undies at concerts and a mysterious creature called The Panteater.

Watch the Panteater Documentary here, buy some underwear at www.pantstopoverty.com

Online World Changes The Offline World

2009-09-18T02:55:00.000-07:00

We all know the internet is changing everything.

But when we think about it we usually think of things dissapearing, like offline travel agencies, or new inventions, like a fridge that automatically orders fresh milk.

When we think about how the online world is changing the offline world, it seems we tend to think big.

At Lateral we see thinking big as a good thing, but when it comes to trends it is usually a smart thing to look at a lot of small changes to predict big ones.

Which is why we love to spot little ways the online world is changing the offline world, like this Twitter-like offline calender made by Burak Kaynak and Cem Has.

Reinventing The Wheel

2009-09-17T03:03:00.000-07:00

We started Lateral becuase we did not want to do just advertising anymore.

We want to solve problems for clients (or create new opportunities, but that's a dfifferent blog post).

And the harder the problem, the better we like it.

How the make a folding bike as small as possible isn't exactly our field of expertise, but we like designer Victor Aleman's appraoch. His attitude: "who says you can not fold a wheel?"

Home Printed Meals, Get Your Home Printed Meals!

2009-09-14T01:24:00.001-07:00

At Lateral we are doing some exciting 3D printing projects with our friends at Freedom Of Creation.

The stuff we come up with together with them is amazing, because 3D printing technology not only makes new things possible, but also because it changes the way we think.

And in the future it will even change the way we cook. Check out these mindblowing Philips videos and get ready for some delicious home printed meals.

Also mind blowing: The Biosphere Homefarm

The Beatles + Xbox 360 = magnificent

2009-09-14T01:18:00.000-07:00

What are you doing reading this? Press play!

Why We Did Giveusbacknewyork.com

2009-09-07T12:35:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago (we were ECD’s at JWT Amsterdam at the time) we had a little free time and created a website called giveusbacknewyork.com.

The basic idea was that New York was New Amsterdam once and there for Dutch property and we created a website and fake action group claiming it back.

We made a very simple action-group like website and put one single video on YouTube.

We also wrote some emails to bloggers, and then waited what would happen.

A lot happened.

In only 2 weeks we had over 1 million unique visitors who spent between 5-10 minutes on giveusbacknewyork.com

When the number of visitors decreased we made new YouTube videos, wrote more emails to more blogs and thought of new initiatives.

Like sending T-shirts to people in New York, who we didn’t know but who did have a Dutch surname, and getting some friends of ours in New York to plant tulips in Central Park.

Each time we initiated some new thing the number of visitors rose.

And when we tried something that didn’t work, we quickly created something else.

Eventually things got so big that the off line media started to take notice.

We were interviewed by New York newspaper and made the 8 o clock Dutch national TV news (the item lasted 8 minutes, with one million people watching).

That’s when the questions came. And the questions weren’t even directed at us, it was people asking other people questions.

Well, when we say people, we have to be more precise.

It was advertising people asking other advertising people questions.

And when people who work in advertising ask questions, they usually think they already know the answer.

The question was: “Why did they (two advertising guys) create giveusbacknewyork.com?”

And the only answer they could come up with was: they want PR for the agency and themselves.

Even Dutch advertising magazines thought this was our reason.

It wasn’t.

Our reason was that we wanted to find out what it takes to create a successful on line campaign.

And because clients were not asking us to do it, we decided to create something our selves.

We wanted to learn how to do exciting things on the internet and the only way to learn that (sorry gurus) is to actually start doing things yourself.

We wanted to learn and we did.

We learned how to promote a website using YouTube.

We learned how to promote our YouTube videos using the website.

We learned how to sell stuff by opening a web shop.

We learned how printing 200 T shirts and stickers and sending them to people can get you on national TV and can get complete strangers to put stickers all over New York .

We learned how to approach bloggers.

And how not to approach bloggers.

We learned all these things and had a lot of fun, but most of our colleagues in the advertising business thought we did it only to make a name for ourselves.

They just couldn’t think of another reason.

Which to us seems pretty weird since we are all in the thinking business.

Nike History Of Flight

2009-09-07T02:14:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we always love to find out things about companies' and brands' history.

It's always fascinating to read how a company got started, how it struggled and succeeded.

We think we are not the only ones interested in it, and we find it amazing to see how few brands actually use their history to delight current customers and attract new ones.

Fortunately some brands do understand the power of their history, like Nike.

Visit and enjoy Jordan History Of Flight: http://www.nike.com/jumpman23/historyofflight/

A Marketing Problem Every Global Brand Has To Deal With

2009-09-06T12:57:00.000-07:00

We all know everything you put on the web has the potential to reach billions.

So when an agency in, let’s say Belgium, does an online assignment for, let’s say Heineken, they could be reaching not only the population of Belgium (11 million) but people all over the world.

There are 2 problems with this: the first is that the message Heineken is sending to the people of Belgium may not be the message they wish to send the people in the UK or the US.

The second is that if the communication becomes popular all over the world the local agency and local marketers are not really rewarded for it.

Now we understand the importance of “one clear message”, but we do not really think the first is a big problem.

People on the internet do not receive communication in the same way as they do with, for instance, TV. It’s is not forced upon them.

They either receive it from friends or they have actively looked for it themselves.

And though the Belgium message may not be 100% in line with the US message (for instance the Belgium message might be “Brussels no 1 choice!” where the US message might be “Look cool while refreshing”) chances are small they would actually contradict each other.

The second problem, local agencies and local marketers not being rewarded for global success, is much more serious.

The best way of illustrating this, is by looking at a local web initiative that has become a global success.

One of our creative teams (at the time when we were the ECD’s at JWT Amsterdam) did a thing called “KitKat Jesus”.

Basically there had been a couple of Jesus shaped things in the news (like Jesus’ face in a tosti that was sold on ebay) which inspired the team to photo shop a Jesus shaped face in a broken KitKat bar.

They just emailed the picture to some blogs (not mentioning that it was from an ad agency of course) and things exploded from there.

Today it has over 90.000 Google results and it was printed in newspaper articles all over the world.

It was also spot on the brand’s “Have a break..theme. In fact, almost all bloggers and journalists mentioned the brand’s theme unprovoked.

But like we said, there are problems with this.

A problem could of course be that KitKat headquarters does not consider this good PR (because of religious feelings), but like we said, we consider this a minor problem.

The big problem is that things like this don’t happen often enough and that brands are wasting massive opportunities to reach millions of people at extremely low costs (the KitKat Jesus thing did not cost more than 2 hours pay for the creative team).

And the reason that they don’t happen enough is that it is just not appreciated enough.

Most ad agency account people don’t care because they don’t get paid for any success exceeding their home market and local marketers don’t think they will get a raise or a promotion for going the few extra thousands of miles (get it?).

In fact most of the times the only reason that things like these happen is because there are some creative teams and agencies wanting to make a name for themselves.

So what should global brands do?

In the first place they should create a system which encourages and rewards local marketers and agencies to create local online campaigns (or just fun stuff) that also benefit the brand on a global scale.

Then they should allocate budgets to make campaigns that become popular globally even more successful (for instance budget to create a follow up).

They should do this, and work hard at this until it comes natural to everyone working on their brand everywhere.

When they have achieved that, it may become time to look strictly at brand guidelines again.

Update: decided to give some more supporting evidence: this Dutch Heineken commercial was also meant as a local campaign. would be nice to see this kind of work more often.

The 95-5 %, 5-95% Rule

2009-09-06T08:07:00.001-07:00

Why are some brands so successful online (for instance Burger King) while other similar brands (McDonald’s) perform so poorly?

At Lateral Amsterdam we immodestly think we have found the answer, and we decided to call it “The 95-5%, 5-95% Rule”. (reasons being that it is pretty accurate and it sounds very Seth Godin like)

The first part of the rule, 95-5%, refers to the budget.

Successful online marketers spend at least 5% of their budget on online campaigns.

By this 5% we don’t mean online direct marketing efforts, but pure online branding budget.

We make this distinction because the first is often very predictable and always very measurable, where online branding is never predictable and hard to measure precisely.

The successful online marketer knows this, but does not shy away.

He (or she) knows the 5% of the budget might not do anything for the brand at all, but he also knows it will never be completely wasted.

Because the successful online marketer knows that his brand has to learn how to act online and that the only way of learning that is by doing stuff online.

But spending 5% of the budget without even remotely knowing the final result still isn’t enough.

The 5-95% part of the rule refers to the amount of their time successful marketers spend tracking and improving their campaigns.

Only 5% of a marketer’s time should be spent on (for instance) TV campaigns.

Marketers can spend less of their time on TV-campaigns because we already know a lot about how they work and they are therefore pretty easy to predict, measure and manage.

95% of a marketers time should be spent on online campaigns because we do not know much about how they work yet (and even the little knowledge we do have is rapidly becoming old fashioned) and they are certainly not easy to manage.

Not only does a marketer need to monitor an online campaign constantly in order to take measures in case of a slow start (find out why, make improvements, perhaps raise the budget) , he or she also has to expect the unexpected.

Consumers will do as they please with an online campaigns, which could mean they may love it, ridicule it, spread it, alter it (yes they can!) or totally ignore it.

The marketer needs to be ready to act in all of these cases and when he has acted, he has to be ready to act again, since his new actions will generate new, often unexpected responses.

The 95-5 %, 5-95% Rule means successful online marketers will have to put up with a lot of hard work and even more uncertainty .

Fortunately their chance of success is increased by the 95% of marketers that are just not willing to go there.

A Metro, Definitly Not A Subway

2009-09-06T06:22:00.000-07:00

The city of Caracas (Venezuela) is in a valley surrounded by hills and mountains. many people live in the hills and work in the valley. Infrastructure is a major part of the problem in the barrios. A new and revolutionary approach to urban planning was developed by the founders of the urban-think tank in Caracas. A metro cable system connects the barrios in the outskirts of the city with the center's commercial area. The cable meant that a normal 2 1/2hour commute is
now only 20 minutes.

Transformer USBs

2009-09-06T06:15:00.000-07:00

transformers are no longer just toys, they're usb's too. japanese company takara
have designed 'ravage' and 'tigatron' usb's that transform into wilcats. also included in the range are usb hubs and computer mouses.

(via designboom)

Is Posterous The Next Big Thing?

2009-09-06T05:55:00.000-07:00

Át Lateral we think blogging isn't just a good way to get in touch with interesting people, we also think it's fun.

But it's also a bit of work. And by work we don't mean finding a topic and wrtiting about it (that's the fun part) but the uploading of videos pictures etc.

Enter Posterous.com this website does everything for you. You just send them an email with copy you have written, attach a video or photo (or powerpoint or etc etc) and they take care of everything, including linking everything to your twitter, facebook etc accounts.

Posterous might just be the next big thing.

The Power Of Free

2009-09-05T04:39:00.000-07:00

When Amazon introduced free shipping when you spent more than 25$, sales increased immediately.

Many customers would by an extra book to avoid shippping costs. This happened in the US, the UK everywhere. Except for France.

What happened? Were the French just not so big on reading? No. It turns out that only in France, the shipping wasn't communicated as totally free but at the price of 1 cent. That's right ONE cent.

When Amazon removed the 1 cent from it's French website, sales increased in France as well.

So marketers, which would be the better proposition: "3 for 10 euros!" or "Buy 2, get 1 free!"....

Good Thinking For A Good Cause

2009-09-05T04:19:00.000-07:00

Chilean artist Sebastian Errazuriz planted the tree in the center of Chile’s National Stadium where dictator Pinochet tortured political prisoners 30 years ago. For a week, the stadium was open to the public as a park, and the finale of the piece was a real soccer match played in front of 15,000 people.

Web&Design: How They Looked When They Were Launched

2009-09-05T04:09:00.000-07:00

Fun article in The Telegraph showing how 20 popular websites looked when they were launched. We will show Google and Twitter here, the rest you can find at:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/6125914/How-20-popular-websites-looked-when-they-launched.html

via @Dailyinspired on Twitter (Follow them!)

Georges Rousse- Bending Space With Paint

2009-09-05T03:56:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we are always looking for new ways to sell stuff to people. George Rousse just likes to make you look at a space in a new way. We love it (and can't help thinking- how can we use it?)

Samplelab: A Store Where Everything Is Free!

2009-09-05T03:36:00.000-07:00

We read about this in Chris Anderson's book "Free".(You may know the author from is other book, "The Long Tail")

Sample Lab, is a members-only space in Tokio, Japan, that invites consumers to sample and test new products. Samplelab makes it's money by renting out shelf space to advertisers and charges members a small annual fee. It also gathers customer feedback and sells the results.

Sample Lab offers everything from BBQ sauce and exercise equipment to pantyhose and moisturiser. Besides trying everything out in the shop, members can take home up to 5 items per visit. To harvest their precious feedback, Sample Lab asks visitors to fill out surveys about the products they've tested.

Only in Japan? We think not. In fact Sample Lab is looking fro franchisers all over the world at www.samplelab-international.com

Even Harder: Rubiks 360

2009-09-01T07:26:00.000-07:00

erno rubik, the inventor of the famous rubik’s cube game is about to release his next puzzle game, the rubik’s 360. the new puzzle is spherical as opposed to cube-shaped and also transparent instead of solid. and if you thought the cube was hard to solve, the 360 is even harder. the puzzle has three spheres, with six coloured balls that have to each nest inside there corresponding slots. the puzzle was also designed so you literally can’t put it down, otherwise your progress will be lost.
http://www.rubiks.com

Packaging: He Said, She Said Wine

2009-09-01T07:04:00.000-07:00

‘He Said She Said’ is a fun and quirky entry level wine range for The Lake House Denmark in Western Australia. The naming and label is designed to inspire conversation and spark a healthy debate at the dinner table.

Neurosonics Audi..Something Complicated (but fun)

2009-09-01T06:16:00.000-07:00

DJs in lab coats, robots consting only of human heads...it's weird but we like it

Neurosonics Audiomedical Labs Inc. from Chris Cairns on Vimeo.

Some Wisdom From Our Escape Pod Friends

2009-08-20T07:11:00.000-07:00

This was written by Vinny Warren at our Chicago "Sister Agency" The Escape Pod.
It's a piece about online and why Burger King is and will be kicking McDonald's ass.

Burger King gives McDonald's a digital Whoppin'

For several years now Burger King, once one of the worst accounts in advertising, has been exemplary in its use and exploitation of new media. Or as we call it: media.

In partnership with agency Crispin Porter Bogusky, Burger King has dived deep, doing everything from branded content to (truly) viral efforts as well as some brilliant advertising for the Whopper. If you’ve eaten their fries lately you’ll have noticed that they, quite rightly, even treat the fry box as a medium. Giving the diner information and matey chat. Everyone could learn a lot from what these guys have done.

We were talking about this recently with someone whose opinion we value highly who happens to work at Google. And he made the point that BK’s experience in the digital area qualifies as a legitimate asset at this point. It’s worth money and is a competitive edge. And conversely McDonalds’ much more tentative steps in the digital arena will someday bite it on the rear end.

Similarly, agencies that have been hesitant about embracing the possibilities of digital/online will, and are, having a rude awakening. Because actual experience is golden here. You can read all the blogs and Malcolm Gladwell and Seth Godin books in the world and go to all the conferences but nothing subsitutes for doing something. And the great thing is that, unlike traditional advertising, it doesn’t necessarily cost a fortune to try something in digital land.

If you look at the BK work, a traditional TV mass marketer might criticize it as being “all over the place”. And it is. CPB is constantly launching new initiatives and ideas whose commonality is often merely tone. They are having fun. And they know from experience that the best way to approach the online world is to try a lot of things and see what sticks. Because nobody, not even CPB, can be sure of that. It’s a bit like the record industry model. Throw out a bunch of stuff and something will hit.

It’s a much more free-form approach. And one that understandably would make some marketers nervous. Not BK. What’s the biblical quotation? As ye sow so shall ye reap. Yup.

You can find more wisdom like this at:
http://theescapepod.wordpress.com/

Meanwhile In Japan...

2009-08-20T02:00:00.000-07:00

Japanese men working for big corporations are called "salarymen". These salarymen work hard all week and hand their paycheques over to their wives, who then give them an allowance.

Japanes agency UltraSuperNew used this custom for a campaign to promote Philips raizors.

It's fun, effective and a bit weird. Just what we would expect from Japan.

You could got to the campaigns website www.kokekokke.jp but you probably can't understand a thing of what's going on.

Will Burger Kings Angry Whopper Come To Europe?

2009-08-19T06:23:00.000-07:00

Too bad Burger Kings is so focused on it's American/Candian/UK operation that they often forget about us folks on "the old continent".

Or do they think we are a boring bunch "who just wouldn't get it"?

Come on BK, wake up and bring us the angry Whopper and it's fun campaign. We want to watch angry people and we crave to send some Angry Grams!

(send your angry gram via http://www.bk.com/en/us/campaigns/angry-gram.html)

It's Art, But It Should Have Been Advertising. Done By Us. (Damn!)

2009-08-19T05:33:00.000-07:00

One of those "Why the F#$R$##$$% didn't we think of this ??!!" moments.

2 artists claim to want to send a letter to everybody on the planet and have decided to start with the small Irish village of Cushendall.

Goal was to create a buzz, but all the letters together make a masterpiece even without the buzz.

Damn why didn't we think of this!?!

Got Carbon Footprint?

2009-08-19T03:13:00.000-07:00

Supermarket giant Tesco has become the first UK retailer to display the full carbon footprint of milk — one of the top-selling products in its stores.

From today, all Tesco own-label full-fat, semi-skimmed and skimmed milk ranges will display the carbon footprint label as part of an on-going drive to help shoppers make "green" purchasing decisions. It has pledged to "footprint" 500 products by the end of the year.

read the rest at http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/17/tesco-milk-carbon-footprint

We Are Getting Kind Of Tired Of Stuff Like This...

2009-08-19T02:43:00.000-07:00

Yes we do think it's creative. We may even call it clever.

But we have 2 big problems with stuff like this.

The first is: advertising is using everything these days, and it is becoming more and more intrusive. If we as an industry keep going at this rate by the year 2040 the only place that is free of ads will be the bodom of the ocean (and we even have seen a billboard down there for a diving school)

The second is much more important tough. This kind of advertising is Thinking Small. Instead of having fun with a bridge, wouldn't it be better if a brand actually built a bridge? Sounds ridiculous? There you go thinking small again...

If You Are Going To Do TV, Do It As Good As This (2)

2009-08-18T05:26:00.000-07:00

Watch and learn European marketers, because this American absurdity would certainly work just as well over here. First brand to do it over here would grow like a baby elephant in a hay stack.

If You Are Going To Do TV, Do It As Good As This

2009-08-18T04:37:00.000-07:00

We think TV is often the lazy marketer's choice. There is often a much more effective way to spend the budget.
But sometimes TV is the wisest choice. And when you do TV, make sure you do it all the way. Like Skittles and Starbust. Very smart agency + incredibly brave client equals pure genius, indeed.

Polaroid Isn't Dead It's Just Sleeping

2009-08-18T04:20:00.000-07:00

You can't revive Polaroid these men have been told. But they come from the land that is actually lower than sea level, and it has been said you can't live on the bodom of the sea as well. (in case you didn't get it yet, they are from Holland where Lateral is based)

They intend to relaunch Polaroid in 2010. Suppport these brave men on: http://www.the-impossible-project.com/

Women Won't Buy From Prettier Women

2009-08-17T08:11:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we are interested in everything that has to do with women. And we have a great excuse: we want to know about them, because we want to sell them stuff.

Here is a piece of new research on women's shopping behaviour we enjoyed today:

Sexy shop assistants discourage women from making purchases, new research claims.Employing sexy shop assistants can be intimidating to women and put them off making a purchase , a new study claims

Researchers found that women were less likely to buy a product if they believed that the female staff member was more attractive than them as they were considered a direct "social threat".

Unlike celebrity endorsements, which were seen as positive role models, beautiful female shop assistants appear to be a little "too close to home" and direct competition to the purchaser. Potential purchasers may be even put off entering the shop altogether.

read the rest at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/6027746/Sexy-shop-assistants-discourage-women-from-making-purchases-new-research-claims..html

Do All Your Twittering On Monday So You Can Actually Be Productive For The Rest Of The Week

2009-08-10T03:29:00.000-07:00

Why wait for stuff actually to happen to you and Twitter about it, when you already know what you will be doing the whole week?

Just do all your Twittering on a Monday morning and get it over with. People will never notice and continue to see you as Mr. Sociable (or Mrs).

And if they ever do notice, they will think you are really smart, efficient and internet savy.

How? Visit www.tweetlater.com

Albert Einstein Robot

2009-08-10T01:36:00.000-07:00

Exciting? Scary? Watch the video and decide for yourself.
via dutchcowboys.nl

CCTV's Architect's Latest Trick

2009-08-04T03:05:00.000-07:00

This fall construction will begin in Bangkok on "Maha Nakhon", a 77 story building designed by Ole Scheeren, the architect who gave the world the CCTV building.

From a distance it looks a little like an unfinished building, but we like it.

(via interiordesign.net)

The GM Skateboard. We Want One!

2009-08-04T01:56:00.000-07:00

On Consistency

2009-08-04T01:36:00.000-07:00

via swissmiss

Architecture Meets Fun

2009-07-31T08:31:00.000-07:00

If you are working in a boring office, tell your boss to hire Clive Wilkinson. He did some amazing work for the offices of Disney and Google, but we still prefer his container stuff which he did for a charity organization which send stuff to Africa in containers. Here is some of his amazing work

Is It Advertising? No. But It Is Beautiful!

2009-07-31T07:53:00.000-07:00

Check out this amazing short film by young director Christian Simmons. Amazing, the guy is only 26!

High End Gasmasks

2009-07-31T07:03:00.000-07:00

At Lateral we colaborate with many many many wonderful friends who make many many many wonderful things.

Check out these fashionable gasmasks designed by our pal Diddo Velema.

The Next 5000 Days Of The Web

2009-07-31T06:48:00.000-07:00

The Internet is going to materialize...

Using Bloggers To Advertise Your Brand?

2009-07-31T06:23:00.000-07:00

A lot of brands have tried to advertise using bloggers. Only a few have been succesful, because only a few have gotten it right.

It's hard and tricky because as a marketer you have to realize (and keep realizing) that the blogger and his/her audience come first and your brand comes second.

If you get it wrong, it's even less effective than traditional advertising.

Watch this video from a blogger who participated in The Ford Fiesta Movement and learn a few things about what you can and cannot do as a brand in the blogosphere.