Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/49492
OUTLOOK ONLINE AND There are so many ways to reach consumers these days and brands are taking advantage of them all, from digital billboards and social media to in-store kiosks to Websites to viral videos, mobile phones and apps. This part of the business is growing, with no sign of slowing down, and creatives and post professionals are finding even more ways to engage consumers. DEREK RICHMOND Director of Integrated Production 180LA www.180la.com Santa Monica 180LA is an international advertising agency. Derek Richmond manages all media areas: print, broadcast, television, video con- tent and interactive digital. Prior to 180LA, he worked at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners as director of digital production. A recent project was Sony's "Everything Looks Better in 3D" homepage takeover. STRENGTHS: "The digital world now provides more engage- ment with the consumer. It allows brands to connect with consumers where they spend most of their time — on their favorite Websites and in social media. We can now place the digital, place the advertising, place the interaction, place the experience where consumers normally are. "With mobile devices becoming more powerful in terms of graphics and processing speeds, digital can now fully extend what was once only possible online into the mobile market. What you can do in terms of creative design and interaction is improving tremen- dously over what could be developed on smart phones just a few years ago. "With digital and Internet-enabled televisions, brands have a deeper engagement with consumers in their homes as well. We can do more than static billboards now. We can meet consumers on the streets, with inter- active storefronts, kiosks, installations, and you can use your mobile phone to interact. For example, a brand or a business can text something to your phone as you leave a store. It engages you everywhere you are and allows that two-way communication rather than just viewing or reading something in a magazine. Print is changing as well. We are now seeing Quick Reader (QR) codes that allow you to get deeper into the content seen in print, and the brand is able to communicate with you past that particular engagement. 34 Post • December 2011 www.postmagazine.com MOBILE "We can also use analytics to see what people are doing, when they are doing it, how they are doing it, so we can improve the creative in subsequent campaigns. We can fine tune the way we are engaging with people and find more effective ways to put content out there." WEAKNESSES: "Sometimes digital communications can be less thought through than what goes into a TV spot or creating a traditional media print ad. Often, people think because it is digital it can be pro- duced more quickly. The problem is the world then gets inundated with marginal creative executions. Digital could be better served by adopting some sensibilities from traditional media. That is why a TV spot goes through all those motions, because it needs to be perfect." OPPORTUNITIES: "Brands, companies and agencies can build their own intellectual property, their own proprietary software applica- tions; everyone can become a software creator. Ideas don't have to live as a one-off anymore, they can live as an application, which can be used, optimized and perfected over time. This gives everyone a chance to be a software developer, and the best ones will rise to the top with breakthrough applications and become part of the lexicon — like 'Googling' something, or "Liking" on Facebook. People say that Google can do all these things, well so can you, because everything that Agency 180LA worked on this homepage takeover campaign for Sony on Cnet. Google does is built on an open platform that anyone can build upon." THREATS: "Putting software development/application develop- ment in the hands of everyone in the world is cool, but it also waters down the application category with too many options. The more that NEW MEDIA BY RANDI ALTMAN