If you're a woman and you've used dating apps such as Tinder, you'll know that dating in 2017 has gotten weird. Tinder is not for the faint-hearted. Most heterosexual women who've attempted it, have most likely experienced one of the following from a guy: - a horrific pick up line - an unrequested penis pic - a hostile response when rejected Luckily for me I've experienced all three. What a time to be alive. Tinder is now probably best known as the app if you want something quick and easy. According to a study last year, a third of men said they "casually like most profiles", treating it like a game; seeing who they match with for a quick ego boost with no intention of following it up. Whereas 93% of women said they only match with guys who they are actually attracted to and want to date. So in summary, dating apps were looking pretty bleak for women; leaving them with low confidence, feeling harassed or unfulfilled. In 2013...

Just a quick one from me tonight. Every year, The Grocer releases the Top 100 socially savvy brands , and I'm pleased to say that Lucozade Energy UK was ranked high at #16, pipping big global brands such as Doritos (#17), Cadburys (#46) and Coca-Cola (#67) to the post. Ranked by brands' content engagement rates across both Facebook & Twitter. Brands that may have smaller followings are outstripping the performance of their large global competitors because they’re keeping content localised and contextual. To quote Doyle from The Social Retail agency  “They’re connecting with their fans in a true and very honest way”. We don't have a massive following on social compared to some of our global competitors, however we are big on contextual messaging and targeting; understanding our audience, creating content bespoke for them, and being relevant to them at the right time, with a relatable message.  A unsurprising learning from the list; brands are now using...

Holy shit guys, I'm not even sure how it's been over a year since my last post. Luckily for you, I'm back with some porn - yaaaay (a cheap ploy to get you back but hey I know what works) sorry, this will be SFW Last week I met a guy and we were talking about advertising and marketing, which was so great because most people I meet don't care. (sad for me) I often forget that my friends don't absorb or remember ads like I do. I'm critiquing the tag line, the creative, the call to action; "is it clear?", "Is the brand coming through??", "Is this aligned with other aspects of their campaign????!!!!!!" I mean, it's exhausting. Most people who see this Oasis ad wouldn't think twice about it, whereas I am in some kind of emotional turmoil. It's just very uninspired. Where can this idea of shrugging off advertising as a waste of time really go beyond here? In 4 years time when this campaign has gotten tir...

I'm sure not many people knew what an algorithm was before Easter weekend, but thanks to everyone losing their shit on Instagram, the word is now pretty mainstream. In case you have no idea what I'm talking about, last week there were whispers in the wind that Instagram were changing the format of news feeds. So instead of seeing all posts of everyone you follow in the order they posted them, we will only see posts from people we view most/interact with most, or brands who have paid for the pleasure. Celebrities and influencers had a meltdown, frantically telling people to turn on notifications so they wouldn't miss out on their posts. In some ways, this is good. No longer will you see 12 consecutive photos of Susan's "night out with the gals" which prove that she cannot: a) work a camera, and b) grasp the concept of art direction.. (It's quality Susan, not quantity.) But in many ways, this is bad. I like waking up in the morning and scrolling do...

Up there with the likes of my favourite social brands such as Lego, Marmite and Adidas; Lucozade Energy  made it into The Drum's Best Brand Vines of 2015, as well as Twitter's Top Global Brand Vines of 2015. Having led the social content for Lucozade Energy's 'Find Your Flow' campaign, I am pleased our Vine formats have been accredited. We had great success with them on Twitter, achieving  over 22% engagement rate , compared to 2% FMCG benchmark. We noticed which Vines were performing best and optimised them, not just on Twitter, but created versions for Facebook, targeting our audience with the most engaging and shareable concepts. I only wish they had shown the best performing (and my personal favourite) Vine as the example in both articles! Which was this one: Looping videos work so well to bring out the  visual aspect  of 'Flow'. We are about to go live with our exciting new content as part of our Always-On Social Plan and...

It's not often I want to write up about an ad that I like. Mainly because there haven't been many recently. Of course I could bore you with my opinions on the highly anticipated Christmas ads from John Lewis (made me cry) or Sainsbury's (it's just a cat fucking up Christmas), but then I'm not sharing anything new or valuable with you. I saw this trailer for Channel 4's 'Meet The Superhumans' - spine-tingling stuff. (Click to watch) You may remember the original SuperHumans ad for the 2012 Paralympics. If you haven't, here it is - an extremely powerful video that I personally find emotionally overwhelming and highly gripping. (Click to watch) Channel 4 are bringing back the idea for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janerio, The original idea for 'Superhumans' came because the Paralympics never had as much worldwide coverage or air-time as the Olympic Games (the Para's opening ceremony had 11 million views, whereas the O...

There are many places I don't mind being advertised to, in fact there are many places I expect to be advertised to. Everywhere from my work, to my home, to my deathbed. However, I don't enjoy being advertised to on Instagram.  Instagram is a very personal app. Users are selective about who they follow, and weigh up whether they really want to commit to having certain content be part of their news-feed. Instagram is one of those rare social media sites where people are looking to discover; to search out their passions and be inspired. Users care about the content they are seeing; they will check their news-feed when they can dedicate the time to appreciate the content, and they will most likely scroll down until they reach the last photo they viewed, so as not to miss anything. Unlike Facebook, users won't put up an album of photos, they'll choose that one special one which sums up the whole night. Unlike Twitter, they won't post every time they ha...

Consumers create much more (and often better) content for your brand than you do. A bold statement maybe, but a quick sweep of social channels and consumers are there; using, sharing, living your brand. Take GoPro's consumers for example: Or perhaps Lego's Or Nutella's... Consumers are using brands in the most genuine, real way, every day. But I'll come back to this in a minute. Today I attended ISBA's 'Good Brief Week' event, which was about how brands should do real-time, reactive marketing. I feel this is one of those topics I know a lot about because I actually have some common sense, and I know that a beer brand shouldn't be tweeting about the birth of the royal baby because it's got fuck all to do with them. Jon Burkhart opened the presentation with the overrated, outdated, Oreo - Dunk In The Dark example... " Ugh, here we go ".  But no, before I was about to ram my pen into my jugular, he brought...

Just a little bit of light writing from me on this sunny evening, as I have come across several things recently which have brought me great comical pleasure. First off, Marks and Spencer's want to put their D in your bread. Yes, I know I'm late to the party with this one. I blame the fact I went on holiday at the time this came out, and hadn't heard/seen it until my return. I know a few people who've never heard the term 'The D', so perhaps M&S copywriter could be forgiven, but surely someone out of all the hands it passed through to go live had heard of the expression? Next, Marketoonist.  As someone who wasn't from a marketing background, I started my career very aware of how all marketers talked, acted and bullshitted in the exact same fantastic way. Despite now being fully integrated in the marketing world, I can still mentally step out and appreciate how ridiculous it can sometimes be. And how aware of life can you r...