The end of the future of advertising agencies?
An apocalytic vision of the advertising future? A prevision of advertising mistakes? Or just a gag of a digital event-organizer that wants to wake up the advertising industry? Or does the event need more attendees? Maybe it is just a simple commercial clip? Or is it even meant to be spread the viral way (well done then, it seems to work, right…)? A video clip that allows so many questions, is worth being mentioned.
This video commercial could also be just a short film to demonstrate the creativity of the co-production companies FITC, Saatchi & Saatchi Canada, Lunch, and Tool. For their next flash event in Toronto the FITC has started a remarkable commercial ad that will make the advertising agency world think… hopefully.
The spot introduces an advertising agency that does not exist but might have been the last agency on earth “mps+c worldwide”. And the story is told just after the last employees have left the agency. A nice idea, right?
Allow some remarks…
If I had had the idea, I had tried to set up a community website for this fictional agency (the creators did not… at least for now) and created a charity story or some alike fiction around it for all people working in the ad agency industry.
It could have been a nice approach. Especially for advertising people to get ideas out of the cultural advertising change trap. Agencies could have collaborated and networked. Agencies could have… But, do agencies really want that? Collaboration, communication, creativity in an open world?
I had tried to integrate social comments function to enable, engage and enter the conversation directly on the website. If you understand how the customers are moving along the web, then why not living the idea with the viral… (is the reason a lack of resources and community management for such a sustainable idea?)
The increasing trend on the web is described quite well and companies should be thinking about this customer change in web use: “Internet Viewing, Facebook Updating and Obsessive Blogging”.
The production companies of this video clip could done much, much more with such a nice idea. Oh yes… But the message sounds great. Should we say that agencies should really, really, really wake up? Oh yes… And I am asking myself what comes after the last advertising agency has gone? Oh yes… Produce another film? Why? Success is never final! (Winston Churchil)
The change we see is a cultural one with high social impact on the world we live in. And companies should start seeing the web from a business-strategic point of view and understand, find and align their web-strategy with it. Companies should stop producing TV ads or banners without any call-to-action. And starting Twitter streams like “clowns” is definitely not the right way to approach the future of customer communication…