Saatchi & Saatchi drives client success with AI innovation
Combining experimentation, strategic insights and AI-powered tools, the agency has set new standards for marketing success in an evolving digital world.
Sponsored
MacLaren moves
Mike Rumble has joined MacLaren McCann Vancouver as an associate media director, M2Universal. Rumble previously ran the Western Canadian McDonald’s business at OMD.
Meanwhile Victoria Gray and Hagan Ainsworth will share management of the shop as GMs, while Ainsworth continues as VP/CD and Gray continues as VP/director of strategy. In addition, Al Szajman joined MacLaren McCann Vancouver yesterday, as group account director on the General Motors business in Western Canada. He comes from Wasserman and Partners.
Davies named VP of programming for satellite radio
Ross Davies has been named the VP of programming for Canadian Satellite Radio (CSR.) In this role, Davies is responsible for all originally produced and acquired programming. He will also oversee the programming and production studios CSR plans to build across the country.
Prior to this appointment, Davies ran his own consulting company called The Davies Company, naming the Canadian Association of Broadcasters and Standard Radio as clients. Before starting his consultancy business, Davies had also spent more than 20 years at CHUM, with his last position as VP programming. He will report to CSR president and COO Stephen Tapp.
*** NEWS FLASH *** NADbank releases readership numbers for Toronto and Montreal
The Newspaper Audience Databank (NADbank) announced results today from the first half of the 2005 study, analyzing daily newspaper readership in the Toronto and Montreal markets. In Toronto, The Toronto Star leads with 50% of adults 18+ on average reading the paper over the course of a week, down from 54% from the same time last year. The Toronto Sun follows at 30% (spring 2004 figures were at 33%), while The Globe & Mail trails at 21%, down 1% from spring 2004. Average weekly readership of The National Post at the half-point of the year stayed steady at 12%.
Interestingly, average five-day readership of the freebies Metro and 24 hours grew in both markets. Metro grabbed 20% in both Toronto and Montreal, up from 19% and 18% respectively from last year. 24 hours came in at 17% in Toronto and 11% in Montreal, increases of 4% and 2% from spring 2004.
Vespa creates buzz in the streets
Picture this: You’re sitting on a patio and see a delivery guy pull up on a Vespa scooter. He leaves the Vespa to do his thing and 10 minutes later, a pretty girl comes by and asks, ‘Is that your Vespa?’ You shake your head no and she says, ‘That’s too bad. I’d really like a ride on it.’ The girl asks everyone on the patio about the scooter in question. Finally, the delivery guy comes back and the girl asks him for a ride. He agrees and the pair rides off into the sunset.
Kinda makes you want one, huh? If so, you’ve just been sold.
That’s the thinking behind Vespa street theatre. Masterminded by Dentsu’s creative catalyst Glen Hunt, the street theatre generates buzz and takes advertising to the streets – literally. Hunt says 80% of the time, the actors ride off to the patio crowd’s applause. Talk about buzz.
BBM Commercial Tracking
Please open the attached link to view BBM’s Commercial Television Tracking Service GRPS by week and month for Montreal Franco covering the broadcast months of October 2004 to July 2005 inclusive and for Toronto & Vancouver for August 04 to August 05 inclusive.
Please note that the higher GRPS shown for Toronto and Vancouver in August 04 versus August 05 are attributed to the Summer Olympics on CBC.
GRPS are based on commercial minute ratings for Adults 25-54.
Max Trax Galaxie goes Sonic
Commercial-free digital music service Max Trax Galaxie is taking its brand even further through a new consumer mag called Sonic. Sonic, developed by Corus’ Max Trax and CBC’s Galaxie along with Toronto ad agency Zig, is a free bilingual pub for music lovers. The 20-page launch issue is being distributed this week to approximately 220,000 digital cable subscribers across the country. The next issue is slated for January 2006 with ad rates yet to be determined. According to a spokesperson, the pub is open to suggestions in terms of unique marketing opps. Sonic targets 25-54s.
Maxximum maxes out O-O-H ad faces
In the spirit of go big or go home, Toronto-based Maxximum Outdoor has announced new ad face acquisitions at the Yonge and Dundas intersection in Toronto. Most notable are three exterior backlits with a Yonge Street exposure, two large interior banners with main floor exposure of the Eaton Centre and yet another at the Eaton Centre entrance corner of Yonge and Dundas. Rates range from $8,000 to $31,500 net – for an ad that measures 84 feet high by 312 feet wide – for four weeks. Production costs are extra. The O-O-H agency took over the management of the ad faces from retailer Sears. Maxximum Outdoor’s clients include Travelocity and Adidas.
http://www.maxximumoutdoor.com
New comedy series begins production
Alice, I Think, a new comedy series for CTV and The Comedy Network has headed into production which will continue through Nov. 10. The production companies are Toronto-based Slanted Wheel Entertainment and Vancouver-based Omni Film Productions and Slanted Wheel president Jon Slan says they are interested in negotiating advertiser involvement.
The 13-part, half-hour series follows the trials and tribulations of a 15-year-old girl with an oddball family living in smalltown B.C. It is based on the successful book series by Nanaimo, B.C. writer Susan Juby and will air in the 2005/06 season.
Amberwood and YTV to roll out Rollbots
Ottawa-based Amberwood Entertainment and YTV have struck a development deal for Rollbots, a half-hour 3D animated action series for kids aged 6-11. Jonathan Wiseman, director of sales and marketing at Amberwood says that plans are in place to position Rollbots as a top new brand in the kids’ market through merchandising deals such as toys and video games among others. The production date for the series has not been announced.
OMNI to air Canadian-made South Asian drama
A new dramatic series from Rogers OMNI Television and producer North American Media, Canadian Desi, will be coming to TV screens Saturday, Oct. 1 at 8 p.m. It will be appearing on OMNI.2. The 13-part series will run two back-to-back episodes each week, wrapping up in mid-November. The series runs in Urdu/Hindi (people who speak these languages can understand each other) with an English version coming next year. Canadian Desi follows the lives of three South Asian families of varied descent living in suburban Canada as they try to cope with clashes between the old world and the new and other issues.
Fraternity events draw corporate sponsors
Having trouble getting your brand in front of university students? Fraternity Alpha Epsilon Pi has the answer. The fraternity has been organizing parties, but with a difference. These parties are a professional venture with corporate sponsorship, and raise money for charity.
University of Toronto student and VP of AEPi Kobi Gulersen says they had four parties last year, each drawing between 1,000 to 1,500 attendees. For one of them, Mac Cosmetics was a sponsor and gave away $40,000 worth of cosmetics (everyone got a take-home bag.)
Dose goes live, seeks sponsors and bloggers
The daily youth rag, Dose is hosting a series of live music events across the country. The first one, sponsored by Virgin Mobile and Molson Canadian, featured the Dandy Warhols at Toronto’s Mod Club last Sunday. In October, the Offishall Music Tour presented by Solo Mobile featuring rapper Kardinal Offishall hits university campuses in the daily’s publishing markets of Ottawa, Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver. Gold-level and local sponsorship opps are still available.
‘Any [brand] that’s interested in talking to the college and university crowd is welcome,’ says Dose‘s director of marketing Mark Shedletsky. ‘So it makes sense for beer brands and local or national retail chains.’ The events will be supported via Dose magazine, Dose.ca and through local street teams in each city. The teams are hitting colleges and universities handing out swag including 10,000 sampler CDs.
Key marketers sign up for etc.tv trial
Etc.tv begins a 10-week trial of its advertising-on-demand network in November with a veritable Who’s Who of Canada’s major marketers taking part as charter advertisers. Molson Canada, which was the first to sign on back in March, is joined on the roster by the Big Three automakers Daimer-Chrysler Canada, Ford Motors of Canada, General Motors of Canada, as well as The National Bank of Canada, and packaged goods giants Procter & Gamble and Unilever among others. Ian MacLean, VP/GM of Montreal-based etc.tv, says the trial participants recognize the importance of understanding how consumers behave in a digital media world where they are now in control. Described as a Telescopic Television Advertising model, etc.tv allows advertisers to have extended conversations with self-selected consumers who opt in and choose to find out more about a brand, product, or service by using their TV’s remote control to access long-form ads.
Clicking an on-screen etc.tv icon in a 30-second spot brings up a menu of available content, which could be a long-form commercial, infomercial, or a branded half-hour show. Viewers can then choose to return to the live program, watch the content right away, or bookmark the content to view later. Because it is an interactive system, they can stop, pause, rewind or fast-forward the content as they would a program they’d downloaded to their PVR. During the 10-week test, the etc.tv application will be available on TVA and LCN news and information network to Videotron digital cable customers subscribing to its illico digital interactive TV service. Videotron has about 1.5 million cable customers in Quebec and more than 350,000 of them currently subscribe to the illico interactive service.
A full commercial launch of etc.tv will follow the pilot. MacLean is currently in talks with Canada’s other leading cable providers with his ultimate goal being the creation of a national ad-on-demand network.
New newsletter targets moms
There’s a new online publishing company in Toronto targeting the ‘mom market.’ The first edition of SavvyMom Media’s permission-based e-mail newsletter, SavvyMom Today, launched last Thursday. The publication counsels busy moms on everything ‘from diapers to dinner parties.’ SavvyMom Media cofounders and directors are Minnow Hamilton and Sarah Morgenstern. Hamilton says they have no paid advertisers as yet but have allied pro bono with the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation and are in talks with agencies, media buyers and clients. Sponsored e-mails are available. She adds: ‘With women making 80% of the purchase decisions, the newsletter is attractive to most categories so we’re trying not to limit ourselves and are looking at things that mums would buy for themselves and their families – everything from toys to cars.’
The newsletter is issued Tuesdays and Thursdays. As to readership, Hamilton says: ‘We put together a small database of own personal contacts and depended on word-of-mouth. Readers have to opt in because it’s permission-based.’ Hamilton says after three business days of operation, SavvyMom had 700 subscribers, including clusters in Alberta and B.C., despite the company’s plans to focus initially on the Toronto market. She hopes to achieve 5,000 readers by the end of the year and roll out to other major cities in 2006.
http://www.savvymom.ca
