Small screen, big creative opportunity

Earlier this year, mobile took the stage as a category at Cannes for the very first time.  Earlier this week, we launched the Creative Sandbox Gallery, a crowdsourced collection of global campaigns that push the boundaries of creativity and technology across digital platforms.  It’s becoming clear that mobile has truly arrived as a creative platform, and we can feel a new awakening brewing within the creative agency community around the possibilities of mobile.  

When creatives embrace and believe in the power of mobile, beautiful, impactful work is produced.  We wanted to share a few of our favorite examples here, in our first ever video tour of mobile creativity.  Below we share a sampling of some creative mobile branded experiences as well as some of our favorite rich media mobile and tablet ad executions.  Be sure to check the Creative Sandbox Gallery regularly for more cutting edge mobile examples as more are submitted.

Branded Mobile Experiences
We’ve seen brands from all verticals investing in creative mobile experiences.  We recommend focusing on creative executions with broad reach, but we wanted to share a few noteworthy Augmented Reality and QR code executions as well.  Here are a few of the most creative branded mobile experiences we’ve seen:

• Heineken: With the insight that many people watch UEFA Champions League matches at home alone from their couches while using their smartphones instead of in a social setting, Heineken introduced the mobile game StarPlayer. To score points, players predict what will happen in the next few seconds of the game.

• Band-Aid (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): What better way to take a hurt kid’s mind off their boo-boo than this augmented reality Magic Vision app featuring the Muppets?  After applying the bandage, children can use the app to interact with Muppets.

• eMart (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): This major retailer in Korea faced a challenge: sales slowed during lunchtime.  To drive in store traffic during this time of day, they installed a shadow QR code in a heavily foot trafficked area that would only be scanable when the sun was directly overhead at lunchtime.

• Toyota (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): Toyota created an extremely entertaining app that takes advantage of the fact that mobile devices are location aware.  Consumers can be a backseat driver as their real world route is pulled into this engaging mobile game:

• Red Tomato Pizza (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): In Dubai, where hundreds of languages are spoken, ordering pizza can be challenging.  With the invention of the VIP Fridge magnet (aka Pizza Emergency button) that communicates via bluetooth with your smartphone, a simple push of a button transmits your exact order for delivery.

• Airwalk: To promote their limited edition shoes, Airwalk created an “invisible pop up store”.  For one day, if people downloaded the app and came to a specific location, they could visit an invisible virtual store made possible through augmented reality and purchase the shoes.

• Chevy (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): With the insight that consumers are increasingly engaging with their smartphones and tablets while watching TV, Chevy introduced their Game Time app, effectively hijacking the Super Bowl by adding a second screen. This app gave viewers a reason to engage with Chevy for the entire game and watch their ads closely for the chance to win prizes including a free car.

Rich Media Mobile Ads

Often, when we talk to creative agencies about mobile creativity, they immediately think about apps and augmented reality.  However, an often overlooked and under-planned area in mobile creativity is mobile ads.  Many creatives (and media buyers and brands, for that matter) are unaware of the creative possibilities of mobile ads.  Using HTML5, app-like rich media executions can be created to run at scale to an engaged mobile audience as they browse apps.  Take a look at the examples below to understand the cutting edge of mobile ad creativity, uniting the digital and physical worlds:

• Coke (Cannes Lions Mobile Grand Prix Winner 2012): The classic “Hilltop” campaign was reimagined for the digital era through Project Re:Brief.  Through this rich media HTML5 ad execution in mobile, consumers can literally buy the world a coke via specially configured vending machines set up in cities around the globe, delivering on a brand promise Coke made to consumers more than 40 years ago.  

• Bradesco Seguros (Cannes Lions Mobile Gold Winner 2012): Bradesco found a creative way to leverage rich media ads on tablets to promote car insurance plans to tablet users in Brazil.  A simple swiping gesture between pages of content led the car in the ad to crash, driving home the message that “Unexpected events happen without warning.  Make a Bradesco car insurance plan.”

The results?  While many of these example have not publicly released their data or simply mentioned that they had strong engagement with their audience, some of these companies included sales results in their videos above.  eMart indicated that their Shadow QR code drove sales during the lunch rush as intended and Red Tomato Pizza reported becoming so inundated with orders that they are considering expanding their operations.  Research has also demonstrated the critical role plays in brand building.  The bottom line is that mobile is a highly creative medium that works for building brands and driving sales.

We are inspired by the brands and agencies behind these industry-leading campaigns and we hope you enjoyed this quick video tour of mobile creativity.  Please visit the Creative Sandbox Gallery to view new best-in-class mobile campaigns as more are added.  If you’re a creative agency, we hope you’ll submit your work to be featured in the gallery.  We can’t wait to see what you create.

Posted by Johanna Werther, Sr. PMM Mobile Ads

Small screen, big creative opportunity
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