A free iPhone App offers a map of all the spots across town and an augmented view to help people find spots near them. The campaign brings London’s rich history to life through a simple experiential event.

So far so good… I obviously had to check out the website www.youarehere.com. First impressions where really disappointing and the online element just didn’t achieve the same level of engagement as the rest of the campaign. From a design perspective the ‘page’ is cluttered and content hierarchy is unclear. I was expecting a whole microsite around the campaign with more photos and content – maybe real stories from people associated with each photo. In fact it’s just a poor landing page – they may as well had not pushed the URL on all the posters as heavily. It’s a shame because there is a really big opportunity to add a further level of engagement online through user interaction and social media. I’d have liked to have seen an online platform for discussion and information exchange – helping to paint an even richer background to each of the spots and events, from local peoples knowledge.

I just wish the online element was stronger, or even just more clearly sign-posted. Don’t get me wrong the iPhone App is simple and fun, but trying to find it in the App store was difficult. Maybe I was having a stupid moment! I tried searching for ‘Museum of London’ first – nothing. Then ‘You are here’ – nothing again! Finally I realised the small print on the landing page which read “Just search for Streetmuseum on iTunes”. OK I downloaded it but this third campaign title was a little hidden and why they couldn’t highlight the App name more if it was so different (especially on the posters), or even hyperlink to the iTunes store (like I have).

Overall it’s a real shame because the thinking behind the idea is beautiful, the offline execution is done brilliantly, and the iPhone itself is good fun. In summary ‘must try harder next time’.

The Topman trouser shoot did not go to plan.

We’ve been working with Topman on their social media and developed their profiles from a standing start to thriving communities providing rich consumer insight and sales. One of our recent projects for London Fashion Week was identified by Yahoo! as the most viewed and searched show during the period. This is a great example of how involving the community demonstrates real value, providing more impact and exposure than competitors. Independent pat on the backs from brands like Yahoo! are always welcome but we also have our own way of tracking results – just ask about our social rating tool.

The press release is below but we think it is a powerful testament to our social work when our male only campaign trumped unisex campaigns by other brands.

***TOPMAN REIGNS SUPREME ON LONDON FASHION WEEK’S CATWALK***
Men’s Growing Passion for Fashion Revealed By Yahoo! Search

Friday 26th February 2010.  As the curtain falls on London Fashion Week, Yahoo! Search has been looking at who reigned fashion supreme as King or Queen of this season’s catwalk.

The Yahoo! Search data over the last week revealed the Topman Design collection made the greatest impact and buzz.  Proving that consumers still have a passion for high street fashion the show generated the highest search reaction and greatest keyword spike of the entire London Fashion Week.

Usually incorporated into the successful MAN event, this year’s AW2010 showcase is the first time Topman Design stepped out on its own.

Following on the smartly polished heels of Topman’s premium collection, the ever popular Vivienne Westwood and Burberry collections ranked in runner-up positions.

Top 5 London Fashion Week Collections by Popularity

1 Topman Design
2 Vivienne Westwood
3 Burberry
4 Jaeger
5 Jasper Conran

topman ad in lights

Topman store launch for London Fashion Week went really well last night – well done to all involved. Some of the Neoco team went down and quaffed quite a lot of Moet by all accounts  They also hooked up with other agency peeps from Evoke and In Mobile before trying out the digital keycard booth to get some great freebies and Topman discount. A big thanks to all at Topman for working with us on this so far (and everything to come)

You can keep up to date with the store re-launch and beyond using these channels:

Twitter
http://twitter.com/topmanUK

YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/user/TopmanBlog

Facebook
http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Topman/99634526926?ref=ts

Flickr
http://www.flickr.com/photos/topmanuk/

Twitpic

http://twitpic.com/photos/TopmanUK

Check out some more photos and video from the night:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7YzBOMu-Sc]

topman stairwell

hot like fire baby! it's scorch london

Everybody say HALLO to the new Scorch website! We’ve involved Scorch in some projects for our clients before and we think they are pretty darn fab – so we were rightly pleased when they asked us to look at their website. Our understanding is they are rightly pleased with the website and have already had positive feedback. So go check it out, check them out, and share some digital lurve.

blazing hot website for scorch

Meltdown headliner

Tickets now on sale for the AWESOME Meltdown event.

This has been an absolute stormer over recent years with previous guest directors including Massive Attack, David Bowie, Morrissey and more. this year, free jazz legend and icon of the avant-garde Ornette Coleman will take over Southbank Centre’s riverside venues and spaces as the 16th director of Meltdown. Reflecting the restless, unfettered spirit of this year’s director, Meltdown in 2009 will provide a platform for avantrockers, jazz and world music artists alike – giving free reign to reinvention, improvisation and the collaborative concerts Meltdown is renowned for.

As the Southbank Centre digital agency it was our task to put together all the comms for this year’s event including the dynamic website that draws on several social feeds, including Twitter, Blog and a Spotify playlist.

Meltdown homepage

There has been a great response from the community – the Twitter feed already has nearly 700 followers and newsletter subscriptions are high. So don’t sit here reading any more – go and check it out and why not treat yourself to some tickets too!

We often get clients asking us about all these different channels and the best way to communicate across them. Good news is that we are going to start running workshops and training days to help expand the knowledge and ability of our clients and their internal teams. This is open to people on either side of the fence (client or agency side).

Are you interested in any of the following? If so, go to http://ping.fm/rSWYc and register your interest.

* Mobile Marketing – Harnessing the power and potential of media targeting
* Online Marketing – Getting to grips with the power of online marketing
* PR – Getting to grips with how online fits into the PR mix
* Audience Building – Unlocking the keys to boosting your traffic and retaining customers
* Blogging – Authoring blogs that get readers and ratings
* Community & Web 2.0 – Building effective online communities
* How the Internet works – Understanding the key components that make up the Internet
* Podcasting – Getting to grips with designing and building podcasting strategies
* Media Targeting – Harnessing the power and potential of media targeting
* Search for Advertisers – Getting more profitable customers through search
* Search for Agencies – Getting more profitable customers for your clients through search
* Email Marketing – Getting to grips with email marketing
* Viral Marketing – Creating effective viral marketing messages
* Research for Online Audience Behaviour – Understanding your customers
* Word of Mouth & Advocacy – Engaging and motivating your audience to promote your brand
* Widgets – The way to create widgets that get results and exposure
* Trends – Understanding the strategic trends driving the digital economy
* Web 2.0 – Harnessing Web 2.0 practices and technologies in your business
* Web Project Management – Running web projects to deliver on time and within budget
Go to http://ping.fm/IqnOz and register your interest.

As reported in January’s New Media Age, Virgin Atlantic are preparing for the soft launch of their new travel portal “Vtravelled”. According to the article, the community site will aim to recruit 2 million founding members between the soft launch date (end of Feb) and the rollout in June – an ambitious target.

The site moves Virgin into territory already covered by their main long-haul airline rival – BA. “Metrotwin” is based around the idea of “use[ing] what you know about one city to explore the other one.” So Borough Market in London is twinned with Union Square Greenmarket in New York. It’s an interesting idea, complimented by the excellent look and feel of the site and interesting content – a point well observed by Alex Bainbridge in his blog.

Virgin’s community site takes a different approach. According to the NMA article, the site will focus on:
• providing an “inspirational” site that will help “spark ideas for new trips”
• image and map content
• hosting “personal travel content” in the form of “trip pods” that allow users to share their travel plans, photos, notes and chat

Ultimately, Virgin want customers to “think of the site when making a travel decision”.

As Alex points out in his blog, with this approach, much of the content appears to be focussed on an individual’s travel plans. This differs from sites such as TripAdvisor and Metrotwin where much of the content is focussed on a place and therefore often of interest to other users.

There is also a crossover of functionality with the large social-network players (Facebook, MySpace etc.). Can Vtravelled persuade users to leave Facebook and other social networks to post photos and chat to their friends?

I believe that the success of the site will come down to the implementation. If the look and feel and feature-set are attractive enough to the target audience (users who wish to share travel plans or plan trips), then users may embrace these tools and make the jump.

Arguably Virgin have the clout to make this happen. Other recent Virgin advertising activities (agreeably not in “digital) seem to have been a success. I joined Virgin Active after the “lose the bits you hate” tube poster campaign and the more recent Virgin Atlantic TV ads are extremely impressive.

Whether Virgin can meet their ambitious targets remains to be seen. I for one am looking forward to following the success of the site, not least because of what it will say about consumers appetite for niche social-network communities. From my experience implementing social networks for our clients I do believe that niche networks are the future. I think users are willing to sign up to sites that they identify with, me included. Recently I’ve signed up for the BA website and a Cravendale branded ‘make the tea‘ site! But at Neoco we know that, however grand the scope of a new social network, it’s expert implementation that will keep members engaged over time.

facebook developer garage london logo

Another event we will be attending, the FDG. A monthly staple of ours to chat to like minded folk about developing on Facebook. Again, we will feedback to clients anything interesting that comes out of this. This month doors open at 6 – which gives us more time for Pizza, Beer and that essential banter!

Join us this month as:

* Andy from Huddle talking about their experience on the LinkedIn platform, and how this compares to Facebook

*Victoria McEvedy – lets us know the legal stuff with ‘The law and social networking: third party applications’

*Cat Burton from Moshi Monsters join us to talk about their experience with Facebook applications

*We hear the latest on the MySpace platform from Chris Thorpe

*Mark Baker fro Sun / MySQL tells us about meeting Facebook’s scalability challenges, and scaling MySQL apps.

*Dan Lester, CTO of The iPlatform enlightens us on the framework for launching applications on multiple social networks

*Santosh from TwitBlogs talking about their experience building an Open Social container

Plus the regulars – Iskandar’s back with the Latest from the Platform and all the top advice, networking and free beer at Sun Microsystems.

IAB banner

Another event that you can catch the Neoco team at – or ask us for a report from is the IAB B2B forum: B2B marketing can be hugely different to consumer facing campaigns, particularly when using online advertising, but it can also be incredibly powerful when used correctly.

This essential IAB afternoon forum will give you everything you need to use internet advertising correctly to attract, convert and retain customers in the B2B sector. Whether you are entirely new to internet advertising, or are simply looking to refine your skills, this event will equip you with actions to take back to your teams, improve your business systems and ultimately increase your return on investment in 2009 and beyond.

The IAB has been providing educational material and thought leadership in the B2B sector for many years through its B2B Council. Consisting of the industry’s leading experts, the Council has put together an agenda that is packed with case studies, helpful tips and facts. It will cover most forms of internet advertising from a strategic perspective, including search, email, display and video marketing.

At the event, the B2B Council will also be launching their latest publication with every delegate receiving a free hard copy.

AGENDA

12.45 – 1.15pm
Arrival and lunch

1.15pm – 1.30pm
Chairman’s welcome and B2B Market Overview
Joel Harrison Editor for B2B Marketing

1.30 – 2.00pm
ATTRACT – Innovative online thought leadership
Hanne Tuomisto-Inch – Banner Corporation
Andrew Sibley – Head of Brand & Advertising – Cisco Systems
Cisco’s European head of brand and advertising, Andrew Sibley, will shed light into Cisco’s worldwide experiences and strategies in branding and marketing to business and IT decision-makers in the digital space. Cisco, one of the IT industry’s leading innovators, is a good example of a company that is at the forefront of innovation in digital marketing. Online is key to all Cisco’s communications from enhancing brand experience to launching new products.

BREAK

2.20 – 2.50pm
CONVERT – Delivering business intelligence through digital acquisition 2 x breakaway sessions: long and short closing cycles
Edward Weatherall – Concep

Matt Cooksley – Global eMarketing Manager – Cushman & Wakefield LLP
Long closing cycles: Cushman & Wakefield is the world’s largest privately held real estate services firm with 221 offices in 58 countries and more than 15,000 employees. The firm offers a complete range of services to various clients, from small businesses to Fortune 500 companies. Based around the long cycle, if you choose to attend this session you will learn how to convert clients for larger purchases that require a longer period of consideration.

Alastair Douglas – Simply Business
Short closing cycles: If you run campaigns within quick closing cycle sectors, this session will be perfect for tips to improve upon your campaigns from an expert in this field. Simply Business is the UK’s most popular business insurance and finance portal, using many internet advertising tools including search to deliver undeniably good results.

2.50 – 3.20pm
RETAIN – The role of Internet marketing in Retention
Richard Bush – MD – BaseOneGroup
Retention is key, we all know that, but what role can the internet play in developing and retaining our most valuable customers. In this interactive session we’ll be investigating the retention potential of a whole range of web based techniques from search to virtual seminars.

3.20 – 3.40pm
FUTURE – 2009: an IAB insight
Guy Phillipson – CEO – IAB UK

3.40 – 4.00pm
Q & A

Neoco Sketch

I recently stumbed upon a site that does one simple job – it takes an image and then produces a representation of this image by simply writing words on a page. My explanation is clearly rubbish, so here’s what it does, straight from the horses mouth:

Textorizer takes a raster image in a format such as png, jpeg or gif, detects edges using a Sobel convolution filter and replaces them with supplied lines of text.

You can click here to see my “textorized” version of one of LB’s Neoco sketches.

The output of this process is an SVG XML file – where SVG stands for Scalable Vector Graphics (click here for more details from Wikipedia). In terms of the usefulness of this process, I will say what I said to eveyone in the office – usefulness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. I think it’s useful. Kind of!

http://textorizer.whatfettle.com/