AdHack

Adhack.com, people-powered DIY advertising, just announced the winners from the Oly Awards: Best Brand and Best Ad Photographer for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics. From a field of 800+ nominated ads, Coca-Cola was awarded The Oly Award for Best Brand of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics for its advertising campaign and sponsoring of the Olympic Torch Relay.

Please find full post on winners here: http://bit.ly/baszF0

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I have been working hard from the last few weeks with James from Adhack and Dan from 67video.com to produce the first video ad for eMarketing 101. After all is said and done, this is what we came up with. Please do provide some feedback as we would like to make another one soon.

eMarketing 101 Ad

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In light of recent misunderstanding about What the f*** is Adhack and what it does, James decided to make a little adhack introduction video which you will find below. Now, since eMarketing 101 has hired Adhack to make an ad (a great video ad) for eMarketing 101, you could too! For your business, your project, anything. And guess what, it is going to be a much better (and cheaper) ad than if you contact your advertising agency on record. Why? Because an ad made by Adhack will be authentic. It will be made by real people, not actors and it is going to be your story, not some kind of a manufactured story that sounds fake which you know will get caught in everyone’s BS detector. Now, take a minute, watch this ad for adhack and contact James at james@adhack to make an ad for your business.

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It is a go. eMarketing 101 has finally decided to move one step ahead in its advertising and is pleased to announce that we will be working with Adhack, the DIY (Do it Yourself) Advertising community to create video ads for eMarketing 101. If you want to be part of this great journey or want to contribute in some way, please find the eMarketing 101 commission summary on Adhack.com. This is going to be a lot of fun. I will post the ads here as we progress and you will be able to comment.

Now, if you want to do the same thing I do to market your company more efficiently online and elsewhere (they do all kinds of ads) at a fraction of the cost of any major advertising agency, please feel free to visit Adhack.com for more information or communicate directly with James Sherrett, Director of Adhack: . His talented team will help you develop the powerful advertising ideas that will bring you and your business on a positive viral spin.

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Adhack.com is getting together with the official launch of its beta version, tonight, August 8 at 7h00PM at the Anza Club in Vancouver. It is the official launch party and James has put all the good stuff together for a great evening. 

Why you should come? Because Adhack is revolutionary & fun. (hacking has always been a lot of fun. Ask any hacker or James)

Here are more information:
They still have a few tickets remaining for last-minute shoppers—friends you might like to invite, folks you know are coming but haven’t signed up. So get on those:

Register here: http://adhack.eventbrite.com

Here are those details party party again, in case you need them:

7 pm to midnight
At the Anza Club
3 W. 8th Avenue
(W. 8th at Ontario)
Vancouver (BC)

More details and a map to the Anza Club on the AdHack Blog:
http://blog.adhack.com
(potentially requiring some scrolling)

Bonuses!

1 - bring your favorite ad to the door and we’ll trade you for a drink ticket.
2 - bring your iPod and you can play DJ. Intro your songs, spin the tunes.
3 - invitations from ad creators:
http://blog.adhack.com/2008/08/07/fresh-new-diy-adhack-party-ads/
4 - tags for the event: ‘adhacklaunch’ and ‘ahlp08’

Questions?
Let us know:

Oh, my. See you tonight!

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2 weeks ago, I stumble upon the most amazing dish rack I have ever seen, made by a company called Simple Human. I did not expect to see this in a Costco for some reason, which basically added to my surprise. Sonia was exasperated to see how crazy I was becoming over this dish rack, but not so much my friend James, Chief Punk of AdHack, a DIY (Do It Yourslef) Avertising Community who immediately suggested that I should do an AdHack about it. Just in case you were wondering, an AdHack, like the name suggests, is basically an ad that I would do myself and that could potentially be commissioned to the company who popularized the product or service. Like most of you would think, what could be so special about a dish rack. More than you think. Stay put, you’ll see, it gets even better when I unfold the story.

So last week, considering I did not know exactly where to start creating an AdHack for my brand new dish rack, which only cost $45 by the way, I sat down with James to go over the creative brief. The creative brief contains the thought process by which you must go through in order to come with the killer idea that will make the ad to stand out. Here are some of my notes:

Goals:
The ad must raise awareness towards the existence of a better dish rack out there that destroys the one you currently have. The initial hypothesis is that you endure your old dish rack because you have never thought that there could be a better option. Dish racks are usually not something we shop for or think about. (I found it by accident and I have never shop around for a dish rack before)

Audience:
People who already have a dish rack: most likely old (the dish rack!), ugly with faded colors and too small. The audience is urban and they live close to where they work.

Context:
We thought that the best context to come across this ad would be in a urban-type setting, like in public transit for instance. The setting must be somewhat relaxed in order for the audience to open up the idea that they should replace their old dish rack.

Promises:
Ad promise (story): The ad is a personal testimonial based on my discovery of a new product & the delight in finding that product. More than just a dish rack, the experience of doing dishes is becoming augmented because you now think about where you are going to put the dishes. As in any intellectual games, doing dishes is becoming like a puzzle game, which transforms the experience completely.

Potential tag lines:
Now, I look forward to do the dishes
Makes a Mundane Task Extraordinary

Product promise: It is more than just a dish rack, it looks good. It is also very functional, versatile, flexible and customizable. You can also consider it like a game where you need to construct a puzzle with all the dishes you have. There are multiple options on where to put the dishes, which makes the experience fascinating.

Proof:
I am the proof. The ad is a personal testimony which gets its authenticity by the person who does it (me).

Tone:
Fun, Playful, Brisk

Requirements:
Not applicable

Directions:
Not applicable (yet) - experimentation

Executions:
Not applicable (yet) - experimentation

So after a few minutes of playing around with these ideas and picnik, a free photo editing online provider, I actually came up with something quite different than what I envisioned initially. This is the first test:

I do think that the polaroid treatment puts the product in the right category and convey the idea that it is so much more than a dish rack. Who would photograph a dish rack, unless it is really good quality? This still needs some work done, which is why I post it. If you have comments or would like to help me make it better, please let me know.

If you want to know more about the company, please go to simplehuman.com

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