Jury Debates Whether ‘Back to the Start’ Film Is Ad, Or Content, Or Both

Chipotle’s “Back to the Start” film combined with the brand’s Cultivate Foundation, a Chicago festival and a new loyalty program captivated the judges at the Cannes Lions festival’s first branded content and entertainment contest. The Grand Prix went to the campaign that comprised all those elements, “Cultivate,” by CAA Marketing, Los Angeles.

WHAT IT IS: Chipotle has re-defined fast food, starting a Chipotle Cultivate Foundation; re-invented its loyalty program as the Farm Team, which rewards members for learning more rather than for eating more; and is holding a Cultivate Chicago food festival. What has defined the campaign more than anything is the two-minute film “Back to the Start” that ran online, in movie theaters, and as Chipotle’s first national TV ad, featuring Willie Nelson covering Coldplay’s song “The Scientist.” The spot also ran during the broadcast of the Grammy awards, right after Coldplay’s own live performance. The ad takes viewers through one farmer’s journey, from a huge industrialized farming compound to one with more-sustainable and humane practices. Chipotle encouraged viewers to download the song at iTunes, with proceeds going to the Chipotle Cultivate Foundation. The TV component of “Back to the Start” also won the film Grand Prix and a Gold and Silver Lion in film craft.

WHY IT WON: “It wasn’t the most talked-about 99-cent burrito,” said Jury President Avi Savar, founder and chief creative officer of Big Fuel. “It was about an emotional connection with an audience.”

Mr. Savar said the campaign was relevant to both the audience and the brand, had a meaningful business outcome, and proved to be original and inspiring content, as well as showed a brand can have a number one hit song and build games.

“One of the debates was ‘is the film in that piece an ad or content?’ The fact that it’s both is the best thing in the world,” he said.

THE JURY: The 16 people on this inaugural jury included four U.S. judges, and a few of the pioneers in branded entertainment around the world, like Argentina’s Rodrigo Figueroa Reyes, who started one of Latin America’s first branded entertainment companies, Buenos Aires-based Fire Advertainment.

CONTROVERSY OR CLEAR WINNER? Three other Gold-winning entries were cited as contenders. Montblanc International’s “The Beauty of a Second” by Leo Burnett Milan “captured user-generated content,” Mr. Savar said. Carling Black Label’s “Be the Coach” by Ogilvy in South Africa created a new sports event and let fans call the shots. And the “Great Crusade” for Australian airline Qantas by Sydney agency Wonder was a great example of storytelling, he said. For the “Great Crusade,” Qantas partnered with Tourism New Zealand to do an online series about a tour of New Zealand by a rugby fan group called the Qantas Wallabies during the Rugby World Cup.

“We would have been happy with any one of them,” he said.

What tipped the balance in favor of Chipotle was the way content lived across multiple “touch points,” and built one voice across all those touch points, he said.

“The story is core,” Mr. Savar said repeatedly.

TOTAL NUMBER OF LIONS AWARDED: A Grand Prix, a very generous 18 Gold Lions, plus 13 Silver and 24 Bronze Lions, for a total of 56 prizes, of which the U.S. won 26.

The gold winners illustrated the potential breadth of this category. Among them were 72andSunny‘s Kenny Powers MFCEO campaign, and McCann-Erickson’s Nature Valley Trail View, which both earned two Golds. Single Golds went to Intel’s Museum of Me, out of Projector, Inc. in Tokyo, which transforms your Facebook content into an exhibition of your own life; TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles’s GT Academy USA, which turned Gran Turismo 5 video game players into real life racers; and Pereira & O’Dell’s “Smokable Book” for Snoop Dogg’s new King Size Slim Rolling Papers, the sheets of which you can actually tear off and use to smoke.

WHO ELSE DID WELL: This is another category, like titanium and integrated Lions, that the U.S. dominates, winning a Grand Prix, 10 of 18 Gold Lions, and six of 13 Silver Lions.

LOOKING TO NEXT YEAR: As the first jury for a new awards contest, Mr. Savar said much of the debate revolved around which categories and subcategories should exist, and how best to guide future submissions. In the second year, the jury will either have an easier time, with ground rules to follow, or will do some tinkering of its own as the branded content awards evolve at Cannes.

CHIPOTLE: BACK TO THE START:

I was recently quoted in this AdAge article discussing the value, or lack thereof, of Google+ as it relates to a brands social channel eco-system.  The full article written by Cotton Delo does a great job covering the topic.

Avi Savar, founding partner at the social-media agency Big Fuel, said there’s a widely held notion that Google+ users skew male and technology-savvy, which means having a presence on the platform is useful for consumer-electronics brands such as Samsung and T-Mobile. Such companies could potentially research which aspects of a device resonate with their niche audiences before bringing it to market, for example.

“It’s a good place to do some community outreach and focus grouping, and to get insights from a specific type of demo,” Mr. Savar said. “Outside of that, I don’t find too much value for a brand to spend time, energy and resources there.”

Read the article on CommPRO.biz

As you know, Web 1.0 was characterized by prolific content creation: organizations raced to claim their static presences on the Internet and produce commerce-driven media. Web 2.0 – and social media – brought with it an era of connectivity and reciprocity.

And today, branded content now tells stories, and provides value to the consumer. So what will the next iteration of the World Wide Web’s impact on brands look like?

In order to understand this, we must evaluate the current situation of online content. Mobile access to the Internet has resulted in hyper-productivity—namely, more people creating more content more often, and in more places. Instead of owning one online property, such as a blog or a dot-com, virtually everyone on the Web manages several pieces of real estate through which they publish content and interact with their social networks.

But with new opportunities arise new challenges. The demand is high for a reduction in noise; several applications have appeared allowing users to vet relevant content, prioritize the content, and discover more content that aligns more closely with their interests. So what will Web 3.0 be about?

The answer: Personalization.

Navigating the Web has become stressful, and users are seeking a more pleasant experience. Relevancy is now the name of the game: Brands must now compete for the attention of their audiences by providing personal value to the users. This means that we can no longer identify target audiences in terms of demographic; but rather, along passion points. Passion points are the things that users are passionate about, the types of content that they actively seek out online.

Personalization will occur in three specific areas:

1. Data Collection

The future will bring more niche networks that connect people and things in similar ways that humans connect in the offline world. This is called the interest graph. The interest graph is the data collected from a user’s online actions that give insight into that user’s passions, interests, and activates. The interest graph is especially useful to marketers looking to amplify their brand’s message within niche markets.

2. Technology Development

Technology will not only be built with function in mind, but with social components built in to the device, resulting in a new breed of “smart appliances.” Think of all the social actions that people take around food, from sharing recipes to uploading photos of their favorite dishes. A refrigerator with Internet access can not only recommend recipes based on your existing inventory, but suggest recipes that your friends have tried (and even gave a positive rating to).

3. Personalized Engagement

With a staggering rate of new users joining more and more social networks, billions upon billions of data points are being produced every day. The brands that will succeed in meeting their business objectives are the ones that can scale for personalized engagement across multiple platforms. Each platform requires a different approach, different technology, and yields different results. It’s no longer about maintaining a presence on social – it’s about tailoring what you publish and how you interact to unique audiences within each channel.

The future of social is about the online world meeting the offline world in ways that are as diverse and as personal as the individuals using them. To learn more about the future of social from influential new media experts like Joseph Jaffe, check out the video below:

The Cannes committee has rolled out its final jury lists and there are some notable names, as expected, in the bunch. Namely, Big Fuel’s founder/CCO Avi Savar will topline the Branded Content & Entertainment jury as president, Saatchi & Saatchi global digital creative director Tom Eslinger will oversee the Mobile Lions and Ivan Zacharias, director on the Stink roster, will take on the jury president role for the Cannes Film Craft Lions. Phew, thus ends our Cannes coverage, we think, until the actual fest gets underway. Check out the full jury lists after the jump.

Branded Content & Entertainment Lions Jury
Avi Savar, Founder and Chief Creative Officer, Big Fuel, USA – Jury President
Rodrigo Figueroa Reyes, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, FiRe Advertainment, Argentina
Michael Hilliard, Executive Producer, FINCH, Australia
Silvia Goh, Managing Director, LiquidThread/Starcom MediaVest Group, China
Jan Godsk, Creative Consultant/Branded Content Specialist, Ideatakeaway, Denmark
Cyrus Oshidar, Creative Director, Bawa Broadcasting, India
Marc Ros, Partner & General Director, AFTERSHARE.TV, Spain
Dean Baker, Managing Director, JWT Entertainment, United Kingdom
Mary Lisio, Senior Vice-President, Non-Fiction & Branded Entertainment, Scott Free Productions, USA
Doug Scott, President, OgilvyEntertainment, USA
Bill Davenport, President, Wieden + Kennedy Entertainment, USA
Scott Donaton, Chief Executive Officer & President, Ensemble, USA

Film Craft Lions Jury
Ivan Zacharias, Director, Stink, United Kingdom – Jury President
Dulcidio Caldeira, Director, ParanoidBR, Brazil
Ralf Schmerberg, Artist/Director, Atelier Ralf Schmerberg, Germany
Sneha Iype Varma, Executive Producer/Partner, Nirvana Films, India
Seiichi Hishikawa, Executive Creative Director, Drawing and Manuel, Japan
Espen Horn, Executive Producer, Motion Blur, Norway
Alex Roman, Director, The Third & The Seventh, Spain
Peter Raeburn, Creative Director, Soundtree Music, United Kingdom
Michael Sagol, Executive Producer & Managing Partner, Caviar, USA
Diane Jackson, Executive Vice-President/Director of Integrated Production, DDB Chicago, USA

Mobile Lions Jury
Tom Eslinger, Digital Creative Director, Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide, Global – Jury President
Barney Loehnis, Digital Lead Asia Pacific, OgilvyOne Worldwide, Asia Pacific
Leo Xavier, Founder, Grupo.Mobi, Brazil
Paul Gunning, Chief Executive Officer, Tribal DDB Worldwide, Global
Daisuke Yanasawa, Chief Executive Officer, KAYAC, Japan
Hoon-Joo Shin, Vice-President of Corporate Image, KT, Korea
Per Holmkvist, Founder & Board Director, Mobiento, Sweden
Salvador Carillo Bardo, Chief Executive Officer, Mobile Dreams Factory, Spain
Peter Sells, Head of Mobile, BBH, United Kingdom
Laura Marriott, Chief Executive Officer, NeoMedia Technologies, USA

I was quoted in Saya Weissman’s article in Digiday today talking about the insane adoption of Zynga’s new game DrawSomething.

Draw Something is the latest digital phenomenon. It took the game just 50 days to get over 50 million downloads in just 50 days.

The Zynga-owned game is simple and fun. It’s like playing an easier version of Pictionary on your iPhone with your friends or with strangers. With the tap of your finger you can try to clumsily draw your best waffle or surfboard, or you can watch someone else draw and then guess what it is. Big Fuel chief creative officer Avi Savar calls it “Pictionary for the Facebook generation.”

It’s safe to say that Zynga is probably feeling pretty good about its recent purchase of OMGPOP for $180 million The question is how, if at all, Zygna will further incorporate brands into its ad strategy. Like all new bright, shiny digital objects, it’s unclear if Draw Something will be a viable outlet for brands beyond being yet another place for banner ads.

“I think there’s a deep opportunity to integrate,” said Brandon Berger, chief digital officer at Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide. “I’m a firm believer in games being an important place for brands.”

So far on the free version it’s just the usual banner ads. With such a huge and growing audience at its disposal, Draw Something seems like the perfect place for brands to jump on board and associate themselves with a fun social game.

It would be a prime candidate for a new type of activity-based ad format like those offered by Appssavvy and Kiip, which reward users for achievements with product samples and coupons. You could imagine someone getting a brand reward for successfully drawing five words. Or Zynga could do sponsored challenges in which a brand challenges users to draw something related to the brand. For example, Nike could have running-themed sponsored words.

One thing’s for sure, there are many opportunities far beyond standard ads.

Branded color palette options or having special branded drawing topic words that relate to a brand’s message would fit in with the game and with the user experience.

“Gaming is a fun environment, but I caution any brand that participates to understand the game environment first,” warned Berger.

But Draw Something isn’t exactly the next Facebook or Twitter. It is after all just a supremely popular mobile game.

“I think brands can learn a lot from the adoption of the game,” said Savar. “I don’t look at this as anything more than a game right now.”

I had a nice quote in this article by Stuart Elliot in today’s New York Times print and online editions

Social media enable brands to amplify advertising centered on authenticity because the details of their history and heritage give them a story to tell to an audience that prizes “status and reputation,” said Avi Savar, chief creative officer at Big Fuel, a social media agency that is majority-owned by the Publicis Groupe.

“The big idea is what’s the existing social behavior a brand can tap into,” Mr. Savar said. “If I align with a brand, it needs to align with my values.”

Oscar Rolls out Its Red Carpet for Social Media

By Avi Savar

Two years ago, Slumdog Millionaire took home 8 golden statues. Hugh Jackman sang and danced his way into America’s hearts. And Ben Stiller did a hilarious Joaquin Phoenix impression. Yet the 81^st Annual Academy Awards ranked as the 3^rd least-watched ceremony from the last 20 years. It looked as though the general public was suddenly disenchanted with Hollywood’s biggest night. But something happened the following year that caused viewership to jump by 14%. What led to this sudden interest in what seemed like an aging Hollywood tradition? The answer is social media.

From The Academy’s official Facebook and Twitter accounts to its interactive website Oscar.com, the star-studded event has opened its doors and rolled out its famous red carpet to viewers worldwide, experiencing the glitz and glamour online and through second screens. There’s even an official Oscar mobile app, loaded with nominee lists, trailers, videos, fashion specials, and more, so that movie fans can get their fix no matter where they are.

This year’s theme is “celebrating the movies in all of us,” with a campaign focused on the role that movies play in our personal lives. The Academy Awards YouTube channel is holding an open call for fans to submit videos that tell unique stories of how a movie or movie moment has changed their lives, to be featured on their channel leading up to the show. The Academy has also teamed up with humor website FunnyOrDie.com to produce original content that pokes fun at the historical awards show, starring Mike Myers and Academy Award Winner Kevin Kline all about Oscar etiquette. Supporting the ramp up to this Sunday is What’s Trending host Shira Lazar, hosting a series of daily interviews with various entertainment personalities, covering topics such as online chatter, fashion, and the nominations.

But nothing is more important than the engagement that takes place on Sunday night. The “Oscar Buzz” page of Oscar.com is a great resource for fans to learn how to connect with the red carpet and with each other. Fans can connect with Facebook to fill out a digital ballot, and then challenge their friends to see whose predictions were the most accurate. The hashtag #RedCarpetQA will be used for fans who want to ask the stars a question by tweeting directly to the pre-show hosts. The site also tracks trending topics (by tweets per minute) and streams tweets tagged with the #Oscars hashtag. Viewers also get a peek behind the curtain through various cameras that are set to stream all the action on the red carpet and backstage at the awards.

What I find interesting about this year’s Oscar campaign is its attempt to bring together past and present, a theme that is echoed throughout its social channels and on the official Oscar blog. An interactive timeline on the Oscars site lets users explore past nominees and memorable moments, along with corresponding historical events that help put Hollywood in context with the rest of the world.

While the Oscars are off to a great start in terms of engaging at-home viewers through social media, there’s certainly room to make the viewers a bigger part of the show. I’d also like to see integration with new platforms, like Google+ (a hangout with the stars?), and Pinterest (since the red carpet experience is a highly visual one). As they tell the less-fortunate nominees: there’s always next year!

Avi Savar is the Founder of Big Fuel. You can find him on Twitter @AviSavar.

In this new clip, Big Fuel Founder and Chief Creative Officer Avi Savar takes the time to explain more about what Branded Content & Entertainment is and why he thinks its inclusion into Cannes Lions really recognises a new and important medium in marketing. Avi Savar is this year’s Jury President for the first-ever Branded Content & Entertainment Lions.

Avi Savar is the Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Big Fuel, and this year’s President of the first-ever Cannes Lions Branded Content & Entertainment Lions. In this new video, he shares some insights into what those entering need to do to make sure their work does well when it comes to judging.