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Jeff Hodgson

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April 12th, 2012
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

Advertising is all about big ideas. Unfortunately, not every big idea is a good idea. I give you Exhibit A:

Well, I didn’t see everyone skipping to work this morning, so I’m guessing this guy’s message didn’t make it too far outside his hometown. But he thought big. He wanted to change the way the world got from point A to point B. He even used science to prove that skipping is better for you than running. Oh, well. Here are a few other ideas that didn’t pan out the way they were intended.

When the Adult Swim show “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” was made into a movie, LED displays mysteriously went up in major U.S. cities to promote it. It was supposed to be “guerilla advertising.” Problem is, people in Boston thought the homemade-looking displays were bombs and freaked out. The city pretty much shut down to deal with the possible terrorist threat. Oops.

How do you prove your identity theft prevention company is the best in the business? If you’re LifeLock CEO Todd Davis, you share your real social security number with the world. Sadly, the company’s fraud detection didn’t work as well as he thought. His social security number was used to take out a $500 loan and open an AT&T Wireless account. Worst of all, Davis didn’t find out until collection agencies called about the money he owed.

You may remember this commercial from the 2011 Super Bowl:

Groupon, an almost universally beloved e-commerce company, made a pretty poor judgment call with this ad. Trivializing human rights issues in Tibet gets you just about one thing: backlash from your consumers. The ad was pulled soon after it aired.

It’s impossible to know how people are going to react to ideas, but a little more common sense in each of these attempts to make a big splash could have helped keep them from sinking.

November 28th, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

If there’s one toy that truly captures imaginations and encourages creativity, it’s LEGO®. Sure, the simple building blocks have become more complex over the years, adding lots of new pieces, characters and even electric motors, but the fundamentals remain the same. Give two people the same bricks and tell them to make something, and you’ll most likely end up with two vastly different creations. You’ll probably also have two very entertained people.

Today, LEGOs have found a new way to amuse. Go ahead and search “LEGO” on YouTube. Then sift through the almost 500,000 videos. A few of the videos are commercials and video game trailers, but the majority of them are made by people who just love LEGOs or see them as a powerful storytelling tool. I’ve compiled a few of my favorites.

First, let’s watch the first level of Super Mario Bros. created with LEGOs. Full disclosure, LEGOs and Super Mario Bros. are two of my favorite things. Ever. So combining them automatically gets them the first spot.

Next up, we’ve got a video of a felt-tip printer created with LEGOs. This might be one of the nerdiest LEGO videos I’ve seen, which is saying a lot. But it’s also one of the coolest.

There are so many more awesome LEGO videos I’d like to share, but time and space won’t allow it. Other favorites you can look up on your own include The White Stripes music video for “Fell in Love With a Girl” and a kid telling the entirety of the original Star Wars trilogy in a little over two minutes.

Finally, I’d like to share the video that inspired this post in the first place.

This new LEGO product, called the Life of George, brilliantly brings LEGO further into the Internet age. It’s the first interactive game combining building things with real LEGO bricks and an app for iPhone or iPad. As far as I know, no other “old” toy has melded the physical and digital so well. In my opinion, the genius of it is that LEGO didn’t mess with the original in an attempt to make a cool app. They stood by the fact that building things in real life is way more fun than faking it on a screen, yet added the best of digital to make it social and engaging in a totally different way. Other brands would be smart to take note of LEGO’s success and build apps that integrate their real-world product in a new and interesting way.

As a side note, I still have two VERY large tubs of LEGOs at home. I have no intention of ever getting rid of them, because at this rate, LEGOs will never become obsolete.

September 27th, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

Babies dancing. Cats acting adorably mischievous. Teenagers ranting about Britney Spears. These one-off Internet videos rake in the views, but there’s not a lot of quality or thought behind them. It’s “America’s Funniest Home Videos” for the Internet age. But now, as the Internet is growing up, so is its content.

Some video creators are out to make something worth more than 15 seconds of fame. They start with an idea and create something, rather than capturing and exploiting a single moment. Hopefully, I’m about to share some of these with you for the first time.

One of my personal favorite Internet video creators is a man named Freddy Wong. His passion for video games is often reflected in his visual-effect-driven short films. He’s spoofed everything from Mario Kart to first-person shooters to action movies with his own brand of humor. See for yourself in this psychedelic little flick. (Warning: Film contains violence and lots of flowers.)

Another of my favorites is a sound designer and composer named Diego Stocco, who creates instruments, sometimes out of what most people would consider non-musical objects. While his videos don’t get the millions of views that Freddy’s do, he’s making something incredibly creative and worth watching. See for yourself.

Last, but definitely not least, I’d like to mention the high-calorie cuisine of Epic Meal Time. Lots of you have probably already seen these bacon-obsessed dudes build enormous meat creations in the kitchen. But in case you haven’t, check out their take on a gingerbread house. Hint: Less gingerbread, more meat. (Warning: There’s a bit of NSFW language.)

These new kinds of video creators have intensely loyal fans that watch and share each new video. For brands looking to make a quick viral video, partnering with someone like Freddy Wong could mean an overnight success. For example, a video collaboration between Epic Meal Time, our client GameStop and “Gears of War 3” garnered over 3 million views. The brands fit together nicely and created an entertaining video that their respective audiences genuinely enjoyed watching. As they say on Epic Meal Time, that’s “#%*ing SMART.

August 2nd, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

I first laid eyes on an iPod in eighth grade. Looking back now, it was a heavy brick of a device with only five gigs of memory, but at the time it dropped my jaw. Multiple albums of music fit neatly into this well-designed piece of hardware. I could haul my Green Day, Everclear (the band, not the booze) and Foo Fighter CDs everywhere I went without the need for a CD case. It was amazing. For many fans, Apple provides this kind of experience on a yearly basis when they announce their newest products.

On top of creating somewhat revolutionary, well-designed products, Apple has produced some of the best advertising around. Their “1984” commercial is widely regarded as one of the all-time greats, and the Mac vs. PC campaign was endlessly entertaining. Surprisingly, Lee Clow, the creative director responsible for much of Apple’s great advertising has said, “The Apple Store was probably the best ad we ever did.” It’s true. The store itself is an icon. The clean design is instantly recognizable as you walk down the street, through the mall and…watch YouTube?

Yep. The Apple Store has become a viral phenomenon. Why? Because the devices in the stores have cameras and they’re connected to the Internet. Videos of people dancing in the stores have garnered millions of views on YouTube and It’s pretty clear that Apple Store employees have been told to let them continue. After all, no one’s getting hurt and it’s great publicity. But how far is too far when pulling stunts in the Apple Store? Check out this video of comedian Mark Markoff as he attempts to find out.

I thought for sure he had them with the goat. Nope. As Apple’s fan base continues to grow and create these videos, someone may eventually cross a line, but for now, it seems like anything goes at the Apple Store. And that’s just one more reason for consumers to love a brand that has done so many things right.

June 8th, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

Selling things is easy when you’ve got an awesome product. And this real estate agent knows she’s selling one of the world’s coolest products.

Favorite line: “Leave your cares behind. Not your family members.”

“Home Alone,” at least in my mind, is a timeless movie. It’s every kid’s dream come true. The parents go out, and all of a sudden, you’re king of the castle. That’s probably why I watched that movie about a zillion times as a kid. Well, that and it was one of two VHS tapes I owned. The other being “Teenage Ninja Mutant Turtles II: Secret of the Ooze.”

What I loved about the video for the house is that the real estate agent makes no bones about why you should buy it. Sure, it’s got a large sunroom, an elegant sitting room and a spacious master bath. Truth be told, it’s a beautiful house. But that doesn’t connect on an emotional level. She knows it reminds people from all over of something that only movie magic can produce.

The owners, on the other hand, seem to play it down. They’re just a family that wants to sell their home. However, from the asking price, I’m fairly certain they know the value of owning the house where Macaulay Culkin single-handedly took down the Wet Bandits. Surely that became apparent when the Japanese ambassador showed up to check out their digs.

Can you tell I would love to live in this house? I don’t care what they say in the video, I would definitely try sliding down those stairs on a sled. I would watch old gangster movies and eat massive bowls of ice cream. And I would definitely make friends with the guy who salts the sidewalk, because I know he would have my back in a pinch.

I apologize if you haven’t seen the movie, but do yourself a favor and watch it soon. Here’s a fun musical trailer for it:

KEVIN!

April 12th, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

As a copywriter, I try to expose myself to ads from all over the world. Brilliant ads. Ads that sell products in new and inventive ways. Ads that make me jealous. Ads that make me wish that I had come up with the idea first. The Internet makes it possible to easily share these advertising gems and see what the advertising landscape looks like beyond our borders.

I’ve found that lots of countries make wonderful ads these days, but as a whole, no country has a style quite as unique as Japan. By unique, I mean completely mind-bendingly insane. And I love it. The ads below illustrate my point.

Here’s a Japanese commercial for Dole bananas:

Hey, science, guess what? Bananas don’t grow on trees. They fly out of this banana-man’s nose and make sad people in parks smile. Awesome. And if that banana-man has a Facebook page, I’ll send him a friend request.

Even international celebrities have gotten in on Japan’s ad craziness:

Yep. That’s the governator’s (Arnold Schwarzenegger) head exploding out of that woman’s hat to sell a Japanese drink. And once again, there’s maniacal laughter. Then the man who has seemingly never delivered a line with more than five words in his entire career busts out the drink’s tagline in Japanese. I think. Or maybe he’s yelling, “Get DOWN!”

So what can we learn from these Japanese ads? Well, I’ve seen similar ads featured on TBS’s “Funniest Commercials of the Year,” meaning that the humor does translate to our culture. Heck, Skittles recognized the power of crazy a few years back and has had the U.S. market cornered ever since. They’ve even taken their special brand of crazy and used it to create quite a social media conversation with more than 15 million of their closest Facebook friends.

Here’s an example of a recent interactive video they created:

It just goes to show that in our industry, inspiration can come from anywhere and when interpreted correctly can create a major impact for the brands on which we work. We just have to keep our eyes open and recognize brilliance when we see it. Arnold knows what I mean.

February 10th, 2011
Posted by Jeff Hodgson

Check out this clip from the “Today” show in 1994 and watch the baffled hosts try to explain the Internet.

Sure, it’s hilarious today. Most of us can’t go more than 30 minutes without using the Internet in one way or another. But back in 1994, did you know what the Internet was or the potential it held for coming years? I sure didn’t, but I do remember my introduction to it.

It was somewhere around 1998. I was at a friend’s house playing “Twisted Metal 2” on the original PlayStation. We wanted a cheat code, so we went downstairs to his mom’s computer and signed on to AOL. Five minutes and lots of annoying dialing sounds later, we were online and printing out our codes. My mind was blown.

Since then, the Internet has directly influenced a frightening number of pivotal moments in my life. When I first got into music, my friend told me I could download songs for free in chat rooms and later through Napster. In high school, I chatted with friends and got to know my soon-to-be wife through the magic of instant messaging. My first semester of college, Facebook expanded to my university. It helped me meet a few new friends and keep in touch with old ones. Today, with an Xbox 360 and Netflix, I watch all my shows and movies exclusively through the Internet. It’s no wonder that my job is to communicate messages online.

So what’s my point? My generation was just the beginning. I had to ask what the Internet was. Kids now know what the Internet is almost as soon as they can crawl. And they’re not just connected at home or at work; they take the Internet with them everywhere they go. So when marketing minds say that the Internet is an important place to communicate with consumers, it strikes me as a massive understatement. The Internet is not only, in nearly every way, the latest generation’s connection to popular culture, but also their tool for shaping it.

The question now is this: How long before brands realize they need to do more than get their message in front of consumers online? How long before they see that consumers online are shaping the culture without them? And most importantly, how long can brands afford to wait to engage consumers in interesting ways online before they’re left behind and forgotten? With each new generation, we’re racing toward the answers to these questions at warp speed.

And to answer your question, Bryant Gumbel from 1994, this is the Internet: