HOP OUT THE FYRE AND IN TO THE WATER

January 23, 2020 Team Soho Advertising, Creative  

As the New Year resolutions begin to fade out, and the motivation to make this year ‘the best year ever’ personally and professionally for most, we in the office got to talking about if when people say all of this, they really mean for themselves, or the company they work for?

Well one man that was willing to do anything to ‘succeed’ for the company he once worked for is Andy King. Remember him? The guy that was literally willing to ‘suck the seed’ out of a customs official in order to get drinking water for the failed Fyre Fest? Well, Andy didn’t have to in the end, they released the water but the Festival had bigger problems as we’ve come to now know.

Well it’s all water under the bridge, but for Andy, water continues to be part of his life as Evian have partnered up with him. As it is the one year anniversary of the Netflix Fyre Fest doc that Andy featured in, the water company has released a special water bottle in honour of the ‘team player’ which is superbly branded with the slogan, “So good you’d do anything for it.” Absolute liberty, but funny at the same time.

Could the idea behind this collaboration set the precedence for 2020 and this decade  where we’ll see other big brands using viral moments or the personalities in them as content or marketing angles to get their products and services out there? Should we expect those who had 15 minutes of fame to be back for 15 days more? 

Soho Pixels is going to go out on a limb here and predict that this decade is going to be the most creative to date for advertising, content and marketing, and we are so looking forward to it!

Read More

TOP BOY TO TOP BRANDS

September 30, 2019 Team Soho Advertising, Creative  

 It has been a little over 3 weeks since season 3 of ‘Top Boy’ has been released, and what an impact it has made culturally and socially. Ask most people if they know who Dushane and Sully are, and we’re confident they’ll  say they’re characters from ‘Top Boy,’ as everyone and their aunt seemingly has watched it. The gritty urban drama has certainly ventured out further than just to a predominantly black audience this time around, and for good reason.

More than just gangs, guns and drugs, the well thought out script and narrative focuses on the human element of impoverished London, touching on the socioeconomics and family, or lack of, as to why kids get drawn in to this murky world. Being released 6 years after season 2, season 3 has fully been embraced by social media with memes and captions of clips and dialogue regularly being seen in tweets and posts on the time line; with “Daily offender, crazy Eastender,” being one of the prominent ones, as said by Modie (played by newly crowned Mercury Award winner Dave) during his jail break scene.

Having waited 6 years, it seems like everyone is already craving Season 4, so did Netflix miss a trick here by releasing all 10 episodes in one go? Yes we realise this is their business model, but had they released an episode every week, it would have been a brilliant 10 weeks of ratings for Netflix as each episode left you on a cliff hanger. This leads to our train of thought at Soho Pixels on brand partnerships with this drama franchise, or at least the huge potential of it.

So with the anticipation of Season 4 already on everyone’s lips, will it equate to big brand synergies for this urban drama, or will the violence and reference to drugs and gangs scare them off? My question is, what’s the difference in the violence to say a ‘Game of Thrones’ episode? What is the difference to gang and drug reference that a number of the ‘James Bond’ movies had? Oh wait, let me guess, they’re fictitious characters right? Well, one show centered around true life events featuring gangs, drugs and violence was the BBC’s critically acclaimed series ‘Peaky Blinders,’ yet this hasn’t stopped brand endorsements and even a festival put on just recently in the shows honour.

All it takes is for one big brand to be brave and attach themselves to what is shaping up to being an iconic TV show. Cool adverts or clever content pieces for product placements could be very lucrative for both the show and any brand. Maybe the real problem is the brand execs are scared about ROI and paying Sugar his money if the show flops. Tell them don’t worry, it won’t, and he’s dead!

Read More