These racists need a lesson in Copywriting

I'd probably be really upset at this billboard if I could figure out what it's trying to say. I get the "diversity means" setup, but the jump from that to "Chasing down the last white person" leaves me scratching my head.

I'll take a wild guess that the advertiser, League of the South, is trying to tell people that the real objective of a diverse society is to eliminate its majority population. But that doesn't seem to make much sense, does it? That's like saying the purpose of putting sugar in your coffee is to remove all traces of java in your cup.

Anyway, I suppose putting two sentences together to communicate a coherent thought is too much to ask of people who don't know how hashtags work.

Image via Gawker

Can this kind of teaser campaign still be effective? #smallenfreuden

It's like a combination of the fictional Gabbo! campaign from The Simpsons and early meme site Zombo.com.

As Marketing reports:

Several ominous orange billboards appeared in Toronto last week, posing a strange question: “Do you #smallenfreuden?” 

They feature no tagline, no brand logo and no call to action. Just a question with the term smallenfreuden (an English/German portmanteau meaning “the joy of small”) styled as a hashtag.

Doing some research, the Canadian ad blog found an obscure Twitter account and this video:



So what is it for? I'm not that curious, really. I'm more interested in seeing if such an old-school teaser campaign can still work, without either being prematurely outed or simply forgotten about before it reaches critical mass.

What do you think? Is this approach stuck in the 20th century, or will people pay attention long enough to be a captive audience?

UPDATE: It's Visa

#agencylife is way more fun than agency life

Yesterday, my friends at Adland started a fun hashtag thing on Twitter. Called #agencylife, it was inspired by one Adlander's complaint about a typical agency problem. Soon, everyone was doing it.

It became a thing. So much so that AdAge reported on it, asking "are folks just having a laugh or sharing some harsh truths about the industry?"

the answer is, "both". The hashtag brought together creatives and suits, large and small agencies, from countries all over the world. There are no secrets being shared here, just the kind of in-jokes that any industry breeds due to the day-to-day demands of trying to please everybody and manage a stable full of clashing egos.

I was really happy to see one of my contributions make the AdAge post:

Creative Director uses the non-words "virality" "sharability" and "memification" in the same sentence. With a straight face. #agencylife
— Tom Megginson (@CreativeTweets) April 11, 2013

Even better was the response I got from Noise Digital:

Challenge accepted RT @creativetweets: Creative Director uses the non-words "virality" "sharability" and "memification" in the same sentence
— Noise Digital (@NoiseDigital) April 12, 2013

To which I responded:

@noisedigital #Vine it or it didn't happen. :)
— Tom Megginson (@CreativeTweets) April 12, 2013

And then this happened:

@creativetweets BOOM! Proof that virality, sharability and memification are real. vine.co/v/btYri5F69hD #agencylife
— Noise Digital (@NoiseDigital) April 12, 2013

There's nothing like a Twitter support group to make another week in advertising worthwhile.