Already, over 4000 creative events are being planned in over 170 countries - from the slopes of Mt. Everest to the underwater reefs of the Maldive Islands, to the parks and streets of our own communities. In fact, check out the events in your area here and plan to join in.
Participants will be uploading images of their events in real-time to both the 350.org website and on the giant screens of Times Square. By day's end, there will be an unprecedented global gallery of images and stories, enough to make both old media and new ring out with this crucial number.
As a participating Blogger in the Blog Action Day, I received this email from Robin Beck, the Lead Organiser for Blog Action Day 2009.
It reads:
You did it!
Yesterday you and bloggers in 155 countries across six continents wrote about a single issue that impacts us all, and turned Blog Action Day 2009 into one of the largest social change events ever held on the web.
Your participation helped change the conversation and showed the power of the web to connect people across the world who despite their varied backgrounds have one shared desire: to make a difference. According to blogpulse, we increased the number of posts about climate change on a given day by 500%, and CNN wrote a great article covering the excitement and diversity of today's event across the web and around the world.
A full recap is up on our blog, and here are some highlights:
We hit 31,000 total trackable blog posts, and our current estimate is that together we reached at least 17.9 million people yesterday. We just exceeded 13,000 registered bloggers on the site and are working to get all of you who posted but haven't yet registered into the final count.
We had at least three major world governments as active participants in this year's event. United Kingdom Prime Minister Gordon Brown posted the first Blog Action Day entry in Britain at the stroke of midnight on the 15th, which was followed by Foreign Minister David Milliband and many others from the UK stationed around the world. The PSOE governing party of Spain hosted a bloggers event focused on climate change and transformed their website for the day to promote Blog Action Day. And late in the day, President Barack Obama's White House blog joined in become part of the global movement of bloggers shaking the web.
Of course, well-known bloggers were a big presence yesterday as well:
The Official Google Blog gave a green tour of the company's campus; Mashable asked what you're doing to reverse climate change; The Unofficial Apple Weblog suggested "Five apps to help save the world"; Treehugger gave us two simple things that could, by themselves, stop climate change; Global Voices posted a roundup of bloggers from around the world writing in many languages; Gadling spent the whole day posting about green travel; BlogHer covered the road to the next international climate negotations in Copehagen.
There are many more, and we encourage you to check out the Featured Posts on the blogactionday.org homepage for a longer list of some of the world's largest blogs.
On December 7 2009, world leaders from 192 countries will gather at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen to determine the fate of our planet. You can take part in this important event and here are ways you can have your say and make a difference to Climate Change.
Turn Copenhagen into Hopenhagen
In response to the planned UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen on Dec 7, the campaign 'Turn Copenhagen into Hopenhagen' has been launched.
Here you can sign the UN petition in support of a world wide response to the problem of climate change. The mission is to connect every person, every city, and every nation to Copenhagen. To give everyone hope, and a platform from which to act. To create a grassroots movement that's powerful enough to influence change.
The site gives you lots of things you can do including linking to the Facebook site for Hopenhagen and spreading the word by Twitter.
Show the world you support change. Turn Copenhagen into Hopenhagen.
'Turn Copenhagen into Hopenhagen' was developed by Ogilvy NY.
Join the TckTckTck Campaign
The Tck Tck Tck campaign also supports the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. And October 1 saw the launch of the global campaign song, a re-mix of 'Beds are Burning', recorded by over 60 artists and celebrities, and re-written by Midnight Oil themselves to reflect the greatest humanitarian crisis facing humankind today - climate change.
This campaign allows you to download free the re-recorded song 'Beds are Burning' either at the site or at the Apple iTunes store and in doing so you add your name to the petition. Check out the video on YouTube.
The re-release of 'Beds are Burning' was driven by one of the co-founders of the TckTckTck campaign, former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's new organization, the Global Humanitarian Forum, and their partners Havas Worldwide and film production arm, The:Hours.
Posted by Darren Woolley on October 15, 2009 7:54 AM
NEW YORK: The final day of the Adforum CEO Summit (9 October New York time) saw the clash of the marketing communication Network big guns stress digital integration.
David Jones, global CEO of Havas, provided an inspirational presentation on the power of agency networks to make a difference in the world through the support of the TCK, TCK, TCK campaign and the One Young World campaign.
This was followed by an address by WPP's global head Sir Martin Sorrell who gave a very honest and pragmatic assessment of the economic issues facing the industry. A clearer contrast and comparison could not be found anywhere.
But as the delegates - 28 pitch consultants from all over the world - sat to reflect on the five days of meetings, there was a clear theme emerging: the world has shifted through technology and that the industry is rapidly developing to address that change.
There are still many different responses and a multitude of solution in the market, possibly as many solutions as there are marketers looking for answers.
But the one clear trend is that the idea of digital as a separate speciality is dead.
Digital technology is everything and if an organisation still has a separate digital strategy to their comms/advertising strategy then they will be left behind.
Just as agencies that do not have digital as the platform of their offering will be left behind.
NEW YORK: Even here in New York City, the home of advertising, at the Adforum CEO Summit, agencies are talking about results and accountability but the reality is sadly lacking.
Today we met with two of the biggest direct marketing agencies in the world. And while they may talk heavily about their focus on ROI and results and while they demonstrate a heavy investment in metrics and data dashboards, when it comes to presenting case studies the results are lightweight.
Not because of the results, but the way they are presented. A 4% increase in sales, and a 20% lift in revenue may sound impressive; the question is on what base and against what spend?
Where is the base or objective or where is the ROI? While agencies bleat about their compensation and bemoan the value they create that they do not share in, the fact is that in most case studies this value is never proven.
Instead they appear to rely on hyperbole and rhetorical, supported by flimsy and flaky numbers. The excuse that the client is protecting their confidential information is fallacious at best. There are plenty of rigorous ways to present results in a meaningful context without providing actual spend figures. One way is profit or revenue ROI as a percentage of spend. But perhaps it is simply easier to rely on hyperbole than face the real numbers?
Story by: Darren Woolley
08 October 2009
Posted by Darren Woolley on October 14, 2009 4:00 PM
NEW YORK: Five brave procurement professionals faced up to 28 pitch consultants on day three (7 October New York time) of the AdForum CEO Summit in New York City, but who came out on top?
Interestingly, every single one was a marketing procurement specialist with almost all having a marketing background or marketing experience.
Most had changed their titles from procurement to marketing services in recognition of the general negative perception of procurement in the marketing category.
The procurement people kept using the term "enlightened procurement" and in many ways they were.
The big issues discussed were:
1. How to move compensation from resource to value based - too hard.
2. How to provide incentive based remuneration - great idea, but setting the metrics and payment level difficult.
3. How to manage agency / client relationships for greater effectiveness -complex and not enough time or resources.
While the consultants had many solutions and suggestions for this, the enlightened procurement people seemed to believe they knew better.
And more interestingly they had no suggestion on how to make more procurement people more enlightened.
As the consultants walked out on to Park Avenue this afternoon (7 October, NYC time), one was heard to mutter "and to think these people are increasingly our clients".
The fact is that while the industry change is being driven by technology it is not the bigger agencies that are being left behind. Investment and focus on technology and people seems even the bigger agencies expanding their game beyond television.
Of course, it is easy to cherry pick the case studies to support the rhetoric about their response to client demands. But that would be the cynical response to seeing 11 credential presentations in two days.
Having said that, some things stay the same. Creativity is central, the focus, all pervasive. The work, the executions, the ideas and the concept is king, no matter where it originates. Accountability, ROI and performance drives everything.
We may be global but we act seemlessly as one team. Totally integrated to what you need or we will collaborate with others.
It is good to see that the more things change the more they sometimes stay the same.
NEW YORK: The big talk among pitch consultants that have gathered in New York for the Adforum CEO Summit is that digital no longer exists as a speciality.
Apparently digital is dead as a speciality, because everything is digital, therefore everyone has digital capabilities, including or perhaps especially the PR agencies.
That was the opening day (5 October New York time) consensus among the 28 assembled pitch consultants from around the world.
So here is the new land grab for the lion share of the marketing budget:
Agencies are positioning themselves as the "lead" agency for the communications strategy. But it appears leadership means that they know best and so everyone else is to follow.
However, PR agencies are marking their territory around social networking, after all, they have had many years of influencing the influencers, so who better to understand and implement?
Basically the whole industry continues to be in transformation, and who ends up with what is still being battled out.
Also, the GFC has had an impact on everyone. Most consultants are reporting that the year was slow to start with but has picked up - unless you were in auditing in which case the GFC was a boon with many clients using the audit to add to the bottom line with refunds from the agencies, especially media.
There is a type of procurement professional I meet that can best be described as ‘hit and run’. They target marketing, aim for the ‘low hanging fruit’ or the ‘quick wins’ then hit the agency remuneration making massive cuts and then quickly move on to the next category leaving the devastation in their wake for the marketers and agencies to deal with.
This is not the majority of procurement professionals, according to CIPSA (Chartered institute of Purchasing and Supply Australia) who optimistically themed their 2007 annual conference “It’s not just about the cost”. Yet for these ‘hit and run’ procurement professionals the only meaningful measure of success is cost reduction.
So why is it that when they apply their tried and true cost reduction strategies to the marketing category do they often create poorer outcomes?
This video captures the frustration many production and design people feel on a daily basis. Which probably explains the language. NB: Do not watch this video if profanity offends you.
Posted by Darren Woolley on October 1, 2009 1:47 PM
