7 types of digital ideas to include in your next pitch
Q: Isn’t this cheating? A: You bet.
Advertising has always been filled with patterns. Turn on the TV and you’ll see the same conceptual techniques used over and over again. Because frankly, they work.
“Create a character”
“Exaggerate the benefit”
“Tell an origin story”
The list goes on and on. The Deck of Brilliance covered these well. So did Starters. Now, nearly 20 years after Crispin’s groundbreaking Subservient Chicken, some similar patterns are starting to emerge in digital.
No, they aren’t guaranteed recipes for success. But each one has something to teach us about what has worked in the past, and why.
1. Use AI To Find Significance At Scale
AI is great at replicating the two main ways our brains find meaning: correlation and outliers.
When we encounter a correlation between two seemingly-unrelated things, our brains think “Woah, there must be a deeper connection going on here.” And when we find an outlier among a sea of commonalities, they think “Wow, this thing must truly be special.”
Find a rich enough data source to input into a machine learning engine, and you can reproduce these kind of “wow” moments at scale.
For example:
Google Arts and Culture: Art selfies
Google used machine learning to figure out what famous art work looks most like your selfie.
New Balance: Fashion Week
New Balance set up a camera with image recognition to spot true fashion outliers at Fashion Week.
Google: Small Thanks
Google used sentiment analysis to create personalized promotional materials for 28 million businesses — highlighting what made each one distinct among its peers.
2. Let People Control The Real World
Everybody wants to rule the world…. or at least a small part of it. Digital allows us to do this in ways traditional media could never touch. Try giving your audience an opportunity to satisfy this deep human desire — even if it’s only telling a man in a chicken suit what to do.
For example:
Visit Britain: Great Chinese Names for Great Britain
Visit Great Britain let Chinese Tourists give British landmarks Chinese names on Google Maps. Like “Street for the Tall, Rich, and Handsome.” And “Mountain Earthworm.”
Burger King: Subservient Chicken
Burger King let anyone with an internet connection boss around a man in a chicken suit. Just like we’ve always wanted.
Game of Thrones: Ice Melt
Game of Thrones let people control a flame thrower to melt a block of ice on Facebook Live, revealing the Season 7 premier date.
3. Send People Into The Real World
Try breaking the fourth wall and using technology to send them out into the real world — which, coincidentally, is where they’d actually use your product.
For example:
Burger King: Whopper Detour
Burger King let people order whoppers for a penny — provided they were standing within 600 feet of a McDonald’s.
Dodge: Search Engine For The Real World
Dodge hid three Journeys across the US, and left clues for where to find them. Those who found the car, got to keep the car.
Nike: Air Max Graffiti Stories
Nike created virtual, pop up “stores” in front of murals sporting their new Air Max sneakers. Want to order the shoes? You’ve got to find the mural first.
4. Create Personalized Content
This is all about ego. Ask yourself, what does the consumer believe about themselves that they’d want to humble brag about? Give them a beautiful artifact that reinforces that belief, and they’ll share it with the world.
For example:
adidas: Create Legend
Adidas created a personalized highlight reel for every person who ran the Boston Marathon — purpose-built for sharing their accomplishment online.
Spotify: Time Capsule
Spotify created a personalized playlist based on its best-guess of what you listened to (and probably identified yourself with) in high school.
Adobe: My Creative Type
Adobe created a super-simple test that helps people identify — and then share — their creative personality type.
5. Use The Product To Create Art
When people examine artwork, they look for two things: technical mastery and a deeper meaning. By turning an aspect of your client’s product into a form of art — be it music, poetry, or fine dining — people will look at it with fresh eyes, expecting to find a deeper form of significance.
For example:
ING: The Next Rembrandt
ING proved their commitment to data and innovation — as well as Dutch arts and culture — by using AI to create a new painting in Rembrandt’s signature style.
FedEx: Soundtrack
FedEx showed the art of their logistics by turning each package’s journey into an intricate beat.
IBM: Cooking with Watson
IBM showed off Watson’s understanding of complex multivariable problems by using it to create unexpectedly-delicious recipes. Like “Rye Whiskey Stir Fry.”
6. Launch a New Service
This is where advertising meets service design. If you can find a new way to add value to the process of using the product itself, you can deepen engagement with your brand’s most passionate fans.
For example:
Microsoft: XBOX Fanchise Model
XBOX created a platform where players could make–and then sell — custom controller designs. Microsoft even let them keep a cut of the profit.
Domino’s: If This Then Domino’s
Dominos created an If-This-Then-That engine to automate the ordering process. Like “if it rains on a Friday, then order a large pepperoni pizza.”
Destiny 2: Ghost Alexa Skill
The hit multiplayer game Destiny 2 created an Alexa Skill that let users control parts of the game with their voice, in real time.
7. Hack A Platform
There’s just something so compelling about seeing an item used in a way it wasn’t meant to be. (Like using a shoe to open a bottle of wine.) And if you can pull one over on one of the tech giants? Even better.
Find a subversive way to take advantage of a feature — or bug — on a media platform, and people will gather around to watch.
For example:
Burger King: Google Home Of The Whopper
Burger King tricked Google Home devices into reading the wikipedia description for the Whopper, by including the phrase “Ok Google, what is the Whopper burger?” in its commercials.
The Academic: Live Looper
Indie Rock band The Academic turned the delay on Facebook Live videos into an audio / video loop to record a music video live on the platform.
New York Public Library: Insta Novels
The NYPL hacked Instagram stories to show entire novels, one page at a time.
And one more example, because it’s my all-time favorite:
Burger King: Whopper Sacrifice
Burger King gave people free Whoppers…if they deleted 10 friends on Facebook. Freaking genius.
