Back in the good ol’ days…
Posted by Anna | Filed under Blog, Thinking
Scavenger and treasure hunts. Choose your own adventure books. Exploration.
Evoking memories of childhood?
Apparently, this turn of nostalgia is the way forward at the moment, and is proving to be key inspiration for a lot of marketing and promotional activity; creating campaigns that are very much based on users exploring and searching, just like when they were kids and the world was an exciting place to be.
Case in point:
In the US, the Levi’s Go Forth ARG hunt will award the ultimate winner with $100k, whilst Red Bull is hiding it’s new ‘energy shot’ drinks all over the country for people to find (access through Facebook, nice social media twist). Samsung is running a more traditional scavenger hunt, albeit with a photographic twist. Even Stephen King is getting in on the act, divvying up his new book into 5,196 pieces (must be relevant to the story somehow?) and scattering them all over the internet, giving UK players clues to find them and piece the story together. And what about Editors, promoting their new album by inviting users to explore a virtual London through Google Street View, searching for areas where they can listen to new songs? Not forgetting, of course, the plethora of brands, film and gaming companies and record labels who create interactive videos, either bespoke or via YouTube Annotations.
Why?
We have also noticed a distinct sense of nostalgia in traditional TV advertising, looking back at “the good old days”, reminding consumers of times gone by and childhood memories. Just look at last year’s uber-nostalgic, multi-award winning TV ad for Hovis, which had such a good PR backing that the first view of it (in the ad break of Corrie no less) became a must-watch event in itself.
Why?
It’s not just advertising. Film studios appear to be making a lot of kids books and TV shows (Where The Wild Things Are, The Fantastic Mr Fox and the Transformers franchise to name but three) into box office filling, family friendly movies that remind the adults in the audience of when they were young.
Why?
Is this a reaction to the recession? In hard times, do we tend to look back to times past with rose tinted glasses? Does this notion of nostalgia make us feel better about the situations we now find ourselves in? Does this method of tapping into nostalgia ACTUALLY sell more products? Is this all just a symptom of post-modernism? Ah, now THAT is another blog post in itself…
Tags: advertising, Editors, Hovis, Levis, nostalgia, nostalgic advertising, Red Bull, Stephen King
One Response to “Back in the good ol’ days…”
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Tom Stanley Says:
November 2nd, 2009 at 9:00 pmI was on Yahoo and found your blog. Read a few of your other posts. Good work. I am looking forward to reading more from you in the future.
Tom Stanley
We are a digital creative & social media agency.