Digigen & The TinMan

Film directors are a funny, yet evolving breed. Many still protect their art form in the most parental way, others open it up for pimping. The ones that get it right are collaborating, knowing that brands can help fund movies, help promote movies, and create additional conversations beyond the plot & characters.

Collaborative marketing was at the centre of Transformers. Michael Bay seems to get the value of creating branded opportunities and it was this area which saw the partnership with Lenovo. In the film Autobot Wheelie’s sidekick, Brains, masks as a quiet ThinkPad Edge Plus laptop that turns into a transformer with its own character traits, voice, temperament and life. As Brains helps protagonist Sam Witwicky fulfill his destiny the audience gets a sense of the laptop’s imaginative nature and function.

“We’re seeing an increasing number of Chinese brands looking to product placement as a way to amplify their brand awareness and influence. However, seamlessly integrating products into films in ways that will really connect with consumers requires creativity and skill. It requires professional expertise to successfully integrate branded content into not only the movie itself but also into everything from trailers to bloopers, posters and billboards to branded merchandise. Ogilvy Entertainment has a solid presence and network in Hollywood and can connect our clients to the world’s entertainment capital,” added Ogilvy Entertainment’s Zhang.

I don’t think product placement can work without collaboration. This relieves the forced nature of many product placements giving it a more natural feel, fitting in with the Director’s vision for the film. I quite like this but sadly couldn’t find any visual of it anywhere.

More here at the WPP press release

Damn current industry trends. They make a mockery of important steps in marketing and important partnerships. Every brand and “person” partnership is now being tagged as a “collaboration”. Every interaction that a brand has with a “celebrity” is a “collaborative and creative partnership”. So how do you cut through the difference between collaboration and simply a sponsorship or partnership?

For me, and I’m always happy to be shot down if someone has a better idea, collaboration isn’t necessarily about who you partner with, but what you can get that partner to do. What output are they going to create on your behalf? If a collaborator is simply a face in a photo, or a name on a golf club, or a name on a sneaker/trainer/tennis shoe, then it isn’t a collaboration.

A collaboration should be defined by two parties working cohesively together to create something new, something fresh and exciting. From Intel’s Creators Project partnership with United Visual Artists to Threadless’s ongoing commitment to produce the greatest crowdsourced tshirts, these types of collaboration are all about a visual creative output.

And as we have discussed previously in the post on The Visual Economy, this creative output is going to become more important in the eyes of the consumer in establishing how you value a brand.

Some great collaborations:
- Intel and United Visual Artists (Link here)
- Gap and CoolHunting (Link here)
- Range Rover Evoque and City Shapers (Link here) (See OKGO Collaboration with Range Rover’s GPS tool below)

Some non-collaborations:
- Eminem, Dr.Dre and Chrysler (great ads, but not what I would define as collaborations)
- Anything Tiger Woods and Nike or EA (great endorsements, but now what I see to be collaborations)

Would love to hear your experiences