As 2014 comes to an end, I thought I'd write a post about some of the things I am proud of this year. Being British, if someone pays me a compliment or congratulates me, I awkwardly mutter thanks and sprint away from them, convinced that they are merely being kind out of pity. One of my (many) New Years Resolutions is to take a moment to soak in my achievements and celebrate them. So, before I decide to not write this (because I am cringing already), here we go.... Pimp My Summer Ball Earlier this year, Lucozade partnered with MTV so we could be more relevant to our target audience of 16-24 year olds. We created 'Pimp My Summer Ball', whereby selected Uni's could compete to get their summer ball pimped out by us. To vote, they just had to tweet #YESPimpMySummerBall plus their Uni name. This competition went above and beyond our expectations and KPI's. It organically trended not only in the UK, but globally within the first 24 hours We ended up with

Here's a true story. Last week I read that a 14 year old boy had made £14,000 by selling crisps, snacks and energy drinks to fellow students at school. As part of his black market stock, he was also selling Lucozade, the brand that I work for. Obviously at this point the feelers were out. I heard murmurings in the office... ' should we do something ?', ' keep an eye on it '. don't hate tha player, hate the game Then as of yesterday this boy decides to sell a signed (by himself) bottle of Lucozade Energy on eBay. It's all over the news. Oh, and now the bidding has gone up to £2.5million. Suddenly, I'm having people come up to me left, right and centre. ' Are you jumping on this ?', 'So  what are you going to do on social ?', ' There's budget if we need to create a really cool response .' Me:  One of the main reasons we are not getting involved with this story is because we are a company that only markets

HALLOWEEN, aka the best time of the year, is right around the corner. I am squealing like a butchered pig at the thought of watching terrifying films, eating spider shaped sweets and carving spooktacular pumpkins - all whilst in fancy dress! Is there anything better? I think not. Me, my future hubby and the kids on Halloween I have a love of All Hallow's Eve and advertising, so you can imagine my excitement when brands start to incorporate the holiday into their marketing campaigns. Last year, Tide and Oreo both did these creative Vines which were fun 7 second videos recreating scenes from The Shining (click on the hyperlinks to view). This film seems to be the cult horror classic of choice, even this year with Ikea in Singapore. Take a look - I bloody love it I love how relevant the advert is, not only to Halloween, but that they've chosen a scene from a film that works so well in their own environment - The Shining really wouldn't have loo

hi ME AGAIN, So we have yet another charity awareness social campaign designed for female narcissists. This time it's taking a selfie the moment you wake up and then posting it online with the hastag   # WakeUpCall. So far it's mainly celebrities taking part, however I'm sure this will spread quicker than ebola and you'll soon see suspiciously flawlesss pics of that Facebook friend you know full well is a right munter. Jemima Kahn started the trend that asks people to post a selfie and then donate $8 to child right's charity, UNICEF. The selfies aim to serve as a "wake up call" that alerts people of the child refugees in Syria. Nice idea, ruined by vanity. Wish I woke up with a naturally filtered face like Paris',..... Generally, I believe you can never do a non-self-gratifying wake up selfie for two reasons: 1. Either your photo will be contrived and designed to show everyone how "amazing" you look when you wake up,

So I pretty much just got back from my holiday in US which was incredible. I hopped in a people carrier with random strangers and we road tripped it from Newark to Miami, via DC, Tennessee and the Deep South. the gang One day in Panama City Beach it was raining so we went to see a movie, and one of the pre-show ads really caught my attention. It was for Spotify and the tagline was ' You have the story, we have the song '. The ad shows Jason telling us about when he got fired from his job and handled it like a rockstar thanks to Whitesnake's 'Here I Go Again'. Check it out:  You'll see at the end of the ad is the hashtag #ThatSongWhen . This is just the beginning of Spotify's new campaign which encourages viewers to share their memories where music played a pivotal role.  The aim is that this will drive conversation, evoke emotion, and thus result in people signing up to Spotify over other more popular US music streaming platforms such

So, the Ice Bucket challenge. I'm sure we all have our own feelings about it. exactly. In my opinion, this year has been a bit of a charity showcase what with the "no make up" and "cock in a sock" selfies. Social media is a great way of raising awareness, however you have to admit that along with the do-gooding, there is an egotistical, attention-seeking element to it - just like everything else that gets posted on a social media site This kind of self-promotion charity works so well and is fantastic for raising awareness, but a reported half of Brits who did the Ice Bucket Challenge did not donate to the ALS charity.... this is my surprised face And now with news coming out that out of $10million raised, only an apparent 14% goes towards the fundraising, everyone is acting shocked like this is BRAND NEW INFORMATION! Come on, every charity has staff, overheads, admin bills - if you have a problem with it (those who actually donate), then why don&

Last week our PR company gave us some tickets to attend the very mysterious Desperados Twisted Mission; an exclusive event to celebrate their new lime and mint flavour, which involved an Instagram challenge followed by a private Sub Focus gig. It was hard finding out anything about this apart from the fact we had to turn up at 7pm in London's XOYO. On entering the luminous green bar area which was urbanly decorated with gritty metal cages of Desperado beer, we were handed a wristband, two tokens for a couple of Verdes, and a lanyard with instructions for the mission. The challenge was simple; to visit 5 bars around the area, take a selfie, and tag it with the hashtag #DVTM. Make it back to the bar in time and you'll get to see Sub Focus. It was a fun, simple challenge which didn't require too much effort and wasn't too cringe so people would back out. Missions and challenges to win is something I've always wanted to do on social for the brand I work on, how

At the risk of sounding like I use my blog to just rant about ads that annoy me... I need to get this off my chest. Has anyone else noticed the increase in ads which use old hip hop classics? First, Money Supermarket and their bizarre Snoop Dogg partnership. This ad never bothered me much until I was about to get down to 'What's My Name?' in the car, when my sister immediately changed the song and said that she couldn't enjoy it now because it reminded her of ' You're So Money Supermarket '! Such a thoughtless ad, ruining a great song for my sister and most likely the nation. Twat A one off? Well no. Because suddenly comes along a mankini-wearing gnome , exposing himself to one of my all-time faves, 'Mr Boombastic'. They have called this paedophilic gnome Gavin, in hope of making him some kind of fun spokesperson for the brand. Fine, I don't even have time to go into the pointlessness of this disturbing ad: I'll never be able

I'm so sick of non-sexual foods doing overly sexual ads. Main reason for this outburst is Muller's new Deluxe Fruit Corner ad featuring Nicole Scherzinger. Her 'muller-licious' line was cringe enough without her now orgasming in the back of a cab. Not only does she scream 'yes baby.. YES!' after taking a bite of a yogurt (A YOGURT), but then when the cab throws her forward, she sits up with the creamy substance on her nose... basically like the yogurt just jizzed on her face. She then giggles it off like this is normal behaviour whilst the cab driver is most likely thinking she is clinically insane. Take a look: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vY4lH4q9DUY Nicole really shows off her wide range of acting skills as she's also the current spokesperson for Herbal Essences, another ad in which she climaxes whilst washing her hair. No wonder guys think they don't have to work hard. She really loves chocolate sprinkles Another one that rea