Holiday shoppers can be pretty fickle, according to Google's retail-based study being released today. Fickle to the point that 76 percent of shoppers change their mind about which brand to purchase thanks to a Google mobile search. 

Picture the average consumer, walking into one shop in a mall before staring down at his or her phone for three minutes and walking out and into another store. Well, maybe that is not fickle at all—just smart. Either way, retailers have to be ready to convert prospects into customers in real time. 

"It's anyone's game today, especially online," said Julie Krueger, retail managing director at Google."Because shoppers are choosing the brands that are there and useful in the moment, established brands can't take for granted that their loyal shoppers will automatically default to shopping with them this year."

Indeed, Krueger and her team last year found that only 50 percent of holiday shoppers were willing to change their minds. 

She added, "With more and more stores choosing to close on Thanksgiving, I think we'll see greater growth online not only on Thanksgiving Day but also throughout all of Black Friday weekend and through Cyber Monday. Although Cyber Monday has traditionally been one of the heaviest desktop shopping days of the year, we're seeing that mobile usage continues to grow. I imagine that this year, Cyber Monday will be more mobile than ever."

Here are a few other data points from Google's report, which entails a series of summertime surveys that ranged from 800 to 1,500 participants:

• About 25 percent of U.S. mobile video viewers utilized YouTube before purchasing while they were at a store or visiting a store's website.
• In July, mobile searches related to "unique gifts" increased more than 65 percent while mobile searches related to "cool gifts" jumped 80 percent.
• Seventy-six percent of mobile consumers who searched for something nearby visited a related business within a day, and 28 percent of those searches result in them buying an item.

In September, Hillary Clinton released a devastating attack ad on Donald Trump, in which young girls are seen looking at themselves in the mirror while Trump's offensive remarks about women—in particular, their looks—are heard in the background.

The ad, titled "Mirrors," has gotten more than 5 million views on YouTube, and has been hailed by many as one of Clinton's strongest ads of the year.

Barack Obama's 2008 campaign manager, David Plouffe, told Slate last month: "I do think that Clinton will look back, particularly in suburban areas where they will be able to really drive good margins with women, that the ads helped. That ad where they show Trump's words and children listening? That stuff works!"

Now, Kathy Griffin has springboarded off the famous spot with a great parody of it. It's not subtle, but it is hilarious. Check it out below. Note: It features lots of NSFW language.



While many of Trump's foes are tiptoeing around his more appalling statements, Griffin comes out and says what a lot of people are thinking but can't say publicly. In an election season that's been so brutal, this kind of comic relief is always welcome. 

Check out the original "Mirrors" ad below. 

A boy suffering from kidney failure isn't weak. He's a gladiator about to step into the ring for battle. 

So says a gorgeous, jaw-dropping new campaign from SickKids Hospital—or as it's more formally known, The Hospital for Sick Children—in Toronto.

In the centerpiece anthem, titled "SickKids VS: Undeniable," ailing children, alongside their families, doctors, nurses and other hospital staff, all gird for battle—as medieval soldiers, pro wrestlers taking baseball bats to dialysis machines, and comic book superheroes.

It's a gripping two-minute argument from agency Cossette—more than anything, for the power of imagination as a vehicle for hope, and metaphor as a medical tool. Anyone who has struggled through a serious illness, or watched someone else do it, knows that defiance isn't to be undervalued. This takes that basic insight to new heights, with enough of a playful tone to match and address its core subjects. 

More than 50 SickKids patient families agreed to participate in the film, and 100 staff members from the hospital also lent a hand, on or off camera.



To be clear, the fight imagery—interspersed with medical animations, neon motion graphics naming diagnoses, and dramatic footage of life-or-death moments during care for context—is impressive in its own right. But it's the soundtrack, "Undeniable" by Donnie Daydream featuring Richie Sosa, that pushes the spot into extraordinary territory.

A bone-crushing rap, driven by a steadily pounding kick drum, perpetually crescendoing synth bass, militaristic snare patterns, and haunting, echoing crashes and yelps, it's no surprise that the song (or versions of it) have already found a home in other high-profile ads from Finlandia Vodka and Adidas.

None used it as effectively, though, as Cossette does here. That's thanks partly to the intrinsically sympathetic subject matter. But it's also because the war-themed concept, the Olympic-style execution and the blood-raising music combine to create an experience far greater than the sum of their parts. Even during moments that might risk seeming cheesy, the spot will take an emotionally engaged viewer on a rapid-fire trip—through uplifting highs, and endearing quips, and gut-wrenching lows, then back again—ending, appropriately, with a kid channeling a tiger's roar.

The only problem may be, in fact, that the message comes across too clearly, and could be mistaken for overpromising in a field—medicine—that can, at its best, only delay the inevitable, and in some cases not by nearly enough. It's worth emphasizing, for that reason, that the campaign's ultimate purpose is to fundraise for the hospital, including research into new treatments. In other words, it's not just speaking to specific kids' battles, but the broader goal—to win them all.

To that end, three more TV spots under the "SickKids Vs." umbrella will roll out through the end of December, with support across print, digital, out-of-home, and cinema. OMD handled media planning and buying. More print work and full credits are below.

CREDITS
Client: The Hospital for Sick Children
Agency: Cossette
Chief Creative Officer(s): Carlos Moreno, Peter Ignazi
Creative Director/CW: Craig McIntosh
Creative Director/AD: Jaimes Zentil
Agency Producer: Dena Thompson
Account Supervisor(s): Olivia Figliomeni, Daniel Dolan
Account Director: Hanh Vo
VP, Brand Director(s): Michelle Perez, Steve Groh
Chief Strategy Officer: Jason Chaney

Production House: Skin & Bones
Director: Mark Zibert
DOP: Jackson Parrell
Executive Producer: Dan Ford
Line Producer: Joan Bell 

Editing House: Skin & Bones
Editor: Marka Rankovic
Transfer/Online Facility: The Vanity
Flame Artist: Sean Cochrane
Colorist: Andrew Exworth
Animation: The Mill NYC
Animation: a52
Audio House: SNDWRX
Music Creative Director: Didier Tovel
Song: Undeniable - by Donnie Daydream Feat: Richie Sosa

​Clients​
VP, Brand Strategy and Communications: Lori Davison
Director, Integrated Brand Marketing: Kate Torrance
Director, Digital Projects: Mark Jordan
Manager, Patient Ambassador Program: Lisa Charendoff
​M​arketing Manager: Tina Tieu
Marketing Manager: Harleen Bhogal
Coordinator, Public Relations: Madeline Salerno

Uber is doing huge business in Mexico City, to the point where they feel comfortable using drones to taunt people who aren't using their service yet.

A recent ad stunt for UberPOOL saw the company fly drones over gridlocked traffic. The drones carried signs saying things like "Driving by yourself?" and "This is why you can never see the volcanoes." That last one only makes sense if you know how polluted Mexico City is.

The point is to guilt the reader into carpooling with the UberPOOL. (That won't get you anywhere faster, of course. In fact, you might wait just a little longer for your ride.) 

I'd hesitate to call Uber's global expansion strategy "world domination," but it's not too far from that. After all, their valuation is based on the promise that they will be the premiere ridesharing app on Earth, and they just gave up on China for now, so they're courting Latin America—where they've already had some success in Mexico and Brazil—with gusto.

None of that really justifies heckling people with drones, but it's irksome in the same way that an unlicensed cab company hailing itself as some kind of revolutionary act is irksome, so it's totally on-brand for Uber. 

If you've ever wanted to try to climb inside the head of a drug addict willing to shoot up a flesh-rotting, mind-melting opioid, now may be your chance.

A surreal six-minute video from Europe is aiming to battle the use of krokodil—a cheap, easy-to-make heroin alternative infamous for turning the skin of its users into scaly reptilian patches, and their brains into puddles—by imagining the darkest, most self-destructive thoughts of one of the drug's users.

The film, titled "Krokodil Requiem," is a haunting mix of animation and live action, created by directors Romain Demongeot and Sonia Presne and a team of collaborators. Set in a Siberian graveyard, much of its imagery is Russian, drawing on Demongeot's own ancestry, and the country's status as an epicenter for the drug. Mostly, though, the piece is a horrific visual cornucopia, at varying moments engrossing and eyebrow-raising.

The protagonist, a young man high on the drug, goes on an insane trip through a snowy, hellish landscape, battling ghosts and wandering headless into an iron maiden matryoshka doll before bending over to pick up his teeth while he sprouts ridges along his spine. The voiceover, meanwhile, delivers an apocalyptic, suicidal dose of self-loathing, in tortured poetic form, as the protagonist willfully spirals towards his own death.



That macabre inner voice is key to the core concept. Demongeot says that, unlike most anti-drug ads, he wanted the film to approach the problem from an addict's point of view, citing his own history of drug use, in his younger days, as inspiration for the perspective.

Now an experiential art director at Unit9 in London, he started the passion project years ago after seeing a Vice documentary (NSFW) on krokodil, or as it's officially designated, desomorphine. He partnered with Presne, an art director and post-production specialist, as well as composer and sound designer Balthazar Benadon (who shaped an unusual 3-D mix—headphones recommended) and casting director Sébastien Novac.

Together, concurrent with the release of the video, they say they are launching a nonprofit organization called Prévention-Krokodil to raise awareness of the drug.

While the full extent of krokodil use is unknown, 2011 estimates put the number of people injecting the drug in Russia, during its peak there, at between 100,000 and 1 million. Reports of its use in the U.S. have been scattershot, and some doctors have contested them as unconfirmed by lab tests.

Regardless, the consequences of injecting it are severe. Produced by cooking codeine with toxic substances like paint thinner and red phosphorous from the tips of matches, the drug often leads to amputation, and sometimes death. A 2011 story from Time put the life expectancy of addicts at two to three years. The Russian government has since cracked down on the sale of codeine, reducing the drug's hold there.

Questions of timing aside, Demongeot and Presne's film is, in terms of craft, impressive. And it succeeds in being increasingly disturbing as it progresses. Whether it's an effective argument against krokodil is a different question. A bit self-indulgent in its length, and as gorgeous in its wallowing as it is, it does risk romanticizing the same self-destructive impulse it purports to combat.

Even at its worst, it remains fantastical—almost cartoonish—in its style, never quite achieving the realistic, gut-wrenching impact of what's arguably the zenith of moribund anti-drug film messaging, the classic "Don't shoot up" moment in Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream, when the camera zooms out to find Jared Leto's character lying in a hospital bed, arm amputated nearly to the shoulder due to an infection caused by heroin abuse—a brutal image that shatters any glamorizing effect that story might've possibly had on the drug.

In other words, "Krokodil Requiem" might be a better ad for the skills of Demongeot and his co-creators than a PSA against desomorphine. But it's still an experiment worth watching.



FULL TRANSCRIPT OF VO:

Under this white winter sky, I'll go to find God
My soul is weary, worn out
I'll fly away, abandoning this place
A final farewell to this cruel world
The instrument stings my vein, I bleed
My heart rate slows
Obscene, the krokodil strikes me
With an aphrodisiac death

Be patient
Let the poison seep in
We will ascend to the sky
Covered in scars

As the scent of opium fills me
And my breathing slows down
I see ghosts
My mother and father

My drifting soul wanders
Following the wind
My wandering thoughts
Flutter in infinity

Finally, the stars have begun their gruesome dance
In a moment, I'll ascend to the canopy of heaven

This liberating desomorphine
Eating away at my thin bones
Liberating a man from torture
Sucking on his flesh and on his skin

This soft attack, destroying
My organs and my senses
I bid farewell to existence

Cuts, grazes
Thousands of blades plunging into my body
A gruesome omen
Foreshadowing the end of the world

My skin burns, a heatwave
Sets my lungs on fire
Hands pull at my guts
In the flames, my heart melts

My senses are on fire
My reeking breath, floating back to my nostrils
And as death dances close
I see the abyss

Lunacy takes hold
Of my limbs and my body
Dreadful contortions
My young corpse is twisting

My dislocated limbs are listening to no one but themselves
My skeleton is falling to pieces

My neck shatters, my lips throw up
In agonizing dizziness, my head unscrews itself

My rotten teeth fall to the ground
My rancid skin retracts

The pain disappears
In this final moment

Screams, spasms
Jolts
These shivers
Break my bones

My skull cracks open
From the blows of Death
At last my soul escapes
And the Reaper, delighted, devours me

The ad industry is losing more talent than it's gaining, according to a LinkedIn study—"The Truth About Strategy Talent"—done in partnership with the 4A's. In 2015, the ad industry experienced a 25 percent net loss of global talent to competing industries, but one area where agencies need to focus a bit more time is the strategy department. According to LinkedIn's data, strategic planners are 30 percent less likely to be satisfied with their current positions.

Of those polled for the study, 28 percent said they don't see themselves working in their current positions within the next year and 40 percent are more likely than global talent to leave their positin in the next six months. Additionally, 92 percent said they would be interested in learning about a new job opportunity, while 43 percent are more likely to respond to messages from recruiters about new opportunities, compared to the average agency person.

"I think first and foremost that because planners tend to be very curious individuals, the fact that they are so much more likely to respond to a recruiter is not surprising but interesting because I think because they are curious by nature they are more likely to be open to talking to anybody about anything," Nancy Hill, president of the 4A's, said.

In comparison to agency talent, strategy people are more likely to look for new job opportunities when they are overlooked for a promotion or when they feel they aren't challenged enough at their current job.

"We have to stop looking at strategy people like all they are there to do is inform the brief. They can have so much more of an impact on the clients' business," argued 4A's president Nancy Hill.

Added Jann Schwarz, global director of agency and channel development, LinkedIn Marketing Solutions: "The research suggests that, in addition to salary, lack of challenging work and overlooked promotions are key blockers to retaining strategy professionals. Agencies must better align with the underlying factors that motivate employees to stay and make adjustments accordingly." Schwarz noted that these factors are easily addressable, agencies simply need to take the time to address them.

The good news is that, according to the data, strategy people don't necessarily want to leave the industry altogether. Compared to other agency talent, strategy talent is 35 percent more likely to look for promotions within the current company. Rather than switching industries, strategy people tend to look at competitive agencies for promotions.

LinkedIn collected data for the study through a number of global professional studies including its "Job Switchers" survey and "Talent Trends" survey, as well as LinkedIn data on member behavior as of February 2016. This particular survey marks the first time LinkedIn has done a deep dive into strategy professionals in the advertising industry, and compares those individuals against the rest of the ad business and other industries.

For advertisers, consumers have become a moving target. Literally. Our society is more mobile, active and urban than ever before. Higher skilled workers are moving to urban areas, as are many corporations like GE, McDonald's, Google and Facebook.

Consumers now spend 70 percent of their time out of their homes, according to Kinetic USA. Millennials are dining out more often than their parents ever did, and the Internet of Things lets us stay connected to home and media from anywhere.

Barry Frey

So, it comes as no surprise that the impact of video advertising in the home is on the decline. The audience for ad-supported television is both shrinking and fragmenting—not a great recipe for marketers. According to Nielsen, traditional television viewing has been decreasing steadily year-by-year across the majority of demographics. Even NFL football, the mainstay of television ratings, is down a whopping 10 percent this year.

Similarly, time spent on desktops is down 12 percent since 2013 as ad blocking, fraud, viewability and clutter have become issues of great concern.

Notwithstanding these trends, one thing that hasn't changed: Video remains the most powerful form of messaging for brands. Therefore, media planners are seeking how best to recapture the in-home video impressions that have been lost. According to Nielsen, consumers are spending almost four hours a day viewing screens that aren't TVs.

In the digital place-based (DPB) and digital out-of-home (DOOH) media world, we have a key element of the video impression solution in the eyes of media planners. In the Digital Place Based Advertising Association's 2016 survey of media planners, 61 percent of respondents said they included DPB/DOOH in their media plans, exceeding the 50 percent mark for the first time in the eight-year history of the survey. At the same time, the outlook for future DPB/DOOH spending growth is bright, with 94 percent of planners indicating spend will be the same or greater over the next three years. 

One big reason for such success and prospects for continued growth lies in DPB/DOOH's powerful relationship with mobile. It's the only segment not threatened by mobile. In fact, both media activate and enhance each other. Together, they offer data maximization, customer impression targeting, multiscreen retargeting, consumers on the path to purchase, geofencing and attribution.

Enhancing this DPB-mobile connection are companies like Intel, Bulzi, SITO Mobile, Ayuda, Vistar Media, xAd, Broadsign (combining automation and data) and others that are identifying consumers in anonymous and aggregated fashion through mobile IDs and leveraging the data to serve addressable advertising.

In DPAA's survey, 44 percent of planners said they recommended media plans that combined DPB/DOOH and mobile over the prior 12 months, and that they're more likely to recommend DPB/DOOH in the future if mobile is used as follows:

• For retargeting ads that have been delivered on DPB/DOOH (78 percent)
• To measure DPB/DOOH audiences through tracking devices (75 percent)
• And as a means of enabling interaction with DPB/DOOH creative (69 percent)

Brands are showing ads to consumers on screens in movie theaters (Screenvision), office buildings (Captivate), shopping malls (Adspace), gyms (Zoom), transit and other consumer hubs (Clear Channel, Outfront), restaurants (AMI), taxis (Verifone), city venues (Intersection) and gas stations, and are the retargeting those same consumers via smartphones.

Dan Levi, evp and CMO of Clear Channel Outdoor, indicates said the company is deploying mobile in a big way as its Radar product fuses mobile location data enabling advertisers to effectively plan and buy targeted audience impressions.

Writing in The Huffington Post recently, Andy Sriubas, evp of Outfront Media, opined that location data is "the new gold rush, driving depth of information." Or as John Costello, CMO of Dunkin' Donuts, noted at xAd's On Location event, "We've always known that location was powerful. Now it is actionable!"

Or, Andreas Soupliotis, CEO of Ayuda Media Systems, has put it: "Location has become the new cookie."

At a recent Advertising Week session, Mike Gamaroff, svp, SITO Mobile, echoed and elaborated: "It's best not to underestimate what location data means and its value. Location is a new audience insight. It's granular and a major disrupter."

The mobile-DOOH connection is among many on the agenda at the DPAA's ninth annual Video Everywhere Summit in New York on Oct. 27. The Summit is the largest one-day event dedicated to multiscreen engagement, attended by brands, agencies, media, ad-tech companies, mobile companies, location data groups, and, of course, the digital out-of-home industry.

There is no single solution to the video impression dilemma, but it's very clear that digital out of home, in tandem with mobile is a significant part of the answer and will increase in importance over the next several years.

Barry Frey is president & CEO of the Digital Place Based Advertising Association. He can be reached at barry.frey@dp-aa.org and followed on Twitter: @barryfrey.

It's one of the biggest weeks of the year for marketers, with ANA's Masters of Marketing conference getting underway. So our podcast panel is ready to talk about the biggest issues facing many of today's top brands.

Join our opinionated band of Adweek editors and writers for this week's installment of Yeah, That's Probably an Ad. On the new podcast episode, we talk about retail, the rise of Jet.com and how brands are navigating the increasingly blurred lines of gender.

But that's not all! We also share this week's ads worth watching and cover presidential candidate Donald Trump's late arrival to the TV ad scene—a decision his campaign may come to regret—along with Wieden + Kennedy's global leadership restructure.

This week's podcast panel is:

• David Griner, digital managing editor of Adweek.com
• Tim Nudd, creative editor of Adweek
• Christine Birkner, brand marketing writer at Adweek
• Kristina Monllos, brand marketing writer and podcast producer at Adweek

You can subscribe to Yeah, That's Probably an Ad on iTunes, Google Play Music or Stitcher, or stream the newest episode right here:

Viewers tuning in for coverage of the third and final presidential debate on Wednesday night will see both sides working together for the greater good, blazing new trails toward a brighter tomorrow.

Alas, we're not talking about the candidates for our nation's highest office. They'll surely snipe and grouse—and in the case of the GOP's nominee, loom and leer—as usual. Fiat Chrysler's Jeep brand, however, will seek to bridge the gap by launching new election-themed ads on CNN's pre-debate show and MSNBC's pre- and post-debate coverage. (The debate itself is commercial free. How un-American!)

Developed by mcgarrybowen, a quartet of 15-second spots continue the distinctive split-screen visual style Jeep used in the first patriotic installment of this campaign. That ad ran during coverage of the previous two presidential debates, and will encore tonight in a spiffy 30-second edit.

As for the new content, Jeep's soft-sell message of social harmony and unification works hard to cut across party lines. Owners of the off-road Grand Cherokee Trailhawk and luxury Grand Cherokee Summit models consistently find common ground in various vehicle features, such as the Parallel Park Assist system, which is the focus of the ad below:



"We wanted to bring to life the two 'souls' of the brand—the freedom upon which the brand has been rooted since 1941, and the adventurous American spirit that propels the brand forward today," says Fiat Chrysler CMO Olivier Francois, who was recently named Adweek's 2016 automotive Brand Genius for his efforts on Jeep. "The split-screen concept as a means to underscore that duality was one that intrigued us from the start, but we couldn't do split screen without purpose. The launch of the two new Jeep Grand Cherokee models was the perfect opportunity."

As for the political bent, he adds, "the presidential campaign allowed us to add one more dimension, or another layer."

In the next ad, we learn about Quadra-Lift Air Suspension, a progressive feature that even conservative drivers can love:



According to Francois, the debates give Jeep "one of the biggest stages after the Super Bowl this year, but with a very different level of cost." Ads running during debate coverage are selling at a fraction of the Big Game's nearly $5 million price tag for a 30-second spot. (Jeep created two notable commercials for Super Bowl 50 last February, "4x4ever" and "Portraits." The latter won the Super Clio for best ad in the game, and was Adweek's pick too.) And while the Super Bowl delivered an audience of about 112 million, the three debates combined will handily beat that figure. (In fact, the first two Clinton-Trump meetings already lured 145 million viewers combined.)

Next, let's check out Lane-Departure Warning and Blind-Spot Monitoring, which sound like they'd come in handy during debate prep:



And finally, it's plain to see that Selec-Terrain technology helps candidates of all stripes navigate those inevitable bumps in the road:



Given the consternation in some circles over Cat Stevens' conversion to Islam, the hippie-dippy song choice for the campaign has raised some eyebrows, but Francois prefers to focus on the message rather than the messenger.

" 'When You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out' was intended as anthem to respect and peace when it was written in 1971," he says. "The song's message still holds true today."

Remember, regardless of our differences, we're all Americans, so it really doesn't matter if you're on the left or right. (Unless, of course, you're actually driving at the time.)

For some, the political thrust may seem like a stretch, but it's timely, and makes sense given Jeep's heritage as a can-do American brand. (Yes, it's manufactured by an Italian automaker nowadays, but you can't have everything, capisce?)

And by the way, Jeep should feel free to bring back "presidents" Martin Sheen and Bill Pullman in its ads any time. Grazie!

CREDITS
Client: FCA U.S. – Jeep brand
CEO: Sergio Marchionne
Chief Marketing Officer, FCA - Global: Olivier Francois
Director of FCA U.S. Brand Advertising: Marissa Hunter
Head of Jeep Advertising: Kim House
Jeep Advertising Manager: Nicole Pesale

Agency: mcgarrybowen New York
Chief Creative Officer: Matthew Bull
Executive Creative Director: James Cheung
Executive Creative Director: Cliff Skeetie
Copywriters: Annie Egan, Kent Koren, Peter Min, Jesse Custodio
Art Directors: Luke Partridge, Chris Park
Executive Producer: Dan Fried
Managing Director, Integrated Production & Design: Dante Piacenza
Managing Director of Music Production: Jerry Krenach
Music Producer: Stephen Stallings
Music Licensing Supervisor: Jonathan Hecht
Director of Talent Services: Sue Ayson
Business Manager: Barbara Silverstein
Group Managing Director: Lindsey Schmidt
Account Director: Lauren Bronchtein
Account Supervisor: Brittney McDonald
Account Executive: Christina Harman

Production Company: Superprime Films
Managing Director: Rebecca Skinner
Managing Director: Michelle Ross
Executive Producer: Colleen O'Donnell
Director: Sam Bayer
Editorial Company: Whitehouse Editorial
Editor: Josh Bodnar
Assistant Editor: Alejandro Villagran
Producer: Nick Crane

VFX Company: Framestore
Executive Producer: Dez (Derek) Macleod Veilleux
Senior Producer: Maura Hurley
VFX Supervisor: Kathy Siegel
VFX Supervisor/Lead Compositor: Raul Ortega
Matte Painting: Quimet Delgado
Compositing Team: Jamie Scott, Greg Cutler, Chihcheng Peng, Jose Arauz, Elaina Brillantes

The Sierra Club purchased a geofilter that people attending tonight's presidential debate at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas will see. The ad takes aim at Donald Trump's climate change stance. (Trump doesn't believe human-made pollution is causing global warming.)

The geofilter reads, "Climate change is not a hoax but Trump is."

Revolution Messaging, the marketing agency working with the Sierra Club, sent Adweek a mock-up.

Climate change has hardly come up during the first two debates. The environmental organization hopes its Snapchat effort will have an impact on the debate tonight. 

Perhaps the ad will provoke moderator Chris Wallace of Fox News to ask the candidates about climate change. Though the 69-year-old doesn't exactly fall into Snapchat's key demographic of Gen Zers and millennials.

Ken Bone, America's favorite mustached-man-turned-meme of the 2016 presidential campaign, has teamed up with the very brand that made him famous in the first place—Izod.

The Belleville, Ill., resident became an internet celebrity this month after he asked a question of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump at their debate in St. Louis while wearing a bright red half-zip Izod sweater.

The sweater, his mild manner and the sight of him snapping pics with a disposable camera at the debate quickly made him the man of the night. 

A new video begins at Bone's house where he puts on his glasses, grabs one of about a dozen identical red Izod sweaters off its hanger and pins on a button that simply reads, "Vote." Soon, he's posing for selfies outside the U.S. Capitol, using another disposable camera to take photos of the Lincoln Memorial and talking to dozens of fans while spreading the good news of democracy.

"I don't think I'm going to continue to be internet famous forever," Bone says. "That's not my expectation." 



The two-minute spot says nothing about Izod until the very end, but instead puts its focus on Bone, his unexpected celebrity status and the responsibility he feels to get people out to vote. (The video was released early Thursday on YouTube, soon after the third and final presidential debate ended.)

Izod throwing Bone a bone might come as a surprise. Days after earning the nation's affection, Bone lost some of his mojo while hosting an "Ask Me Anything" session on Reddit when another user discovered disturbing comments he'd posted on Reddit in the past related to pornography and the killing of Trayvon Martin.

Izod isn't the first brand to partner with Bone. Last week, he became Uber's pitchman for UberSELECT in St. Louis. In the Izod video, Bone—whose fame is still less than two weeks old—is self-aware enough to realize his 15 minutes of fame won't last forever.

"When it's over, it's over," he says. "And I'm happy to have played my role."

Have you seen The Big Short? Gary Vaynerchuk has and he believes what it depicts within in the financial sector—that the numbers, measurements and predictions were flat wrong and no one cared—is infiltrating the ad world.

"This is what's happening in the advertising industry, and I'm the guy with the weird fucking eye," said Vaynerchuk, referring to the character Christian Bale portrayed while speaking at the National Advertisers Masters of Marketing Annual Conference in Orlando. "Everybody knows!" 

The problem, Vaynerchuk posited, is marketers are in the midst of an attention war—they are spending their dollars in the wrong places and they know it. When consumers aren't watching appointment television, or if they are, they're looking at their phones during commercial breaks. It doesn't make sense to spend the bulk of your marketing budget executing a beautiful 30-second spot.

Vaynerchuk argued that the smartphone is the new television and marketers need to be where consumers are actually paying attention. What's happening with television is exactly what happened to the radio with the invention of the television, according to Vaynerchuk.

"Attention is in different places now," said Vaynerchuk. "I could care less if Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat exist tomorrow. I care about where your attention is. ... If you're a brand that makes a TV commercial for your audience that's 22 and under, you're a fuck-face." 

Revamping where your brand is can make a big difference. While working for Sour Patch Kids, Vaynerchuk found the brand grew 60 percent when it began running ads and filters on Snapchat instead of 30-second spots on SpikeTV. 

That doesn't mean marketers need to go all-in on Snapchat; instead, they have to consider when and where people are actually paying attention to ads. With that in mind, Vaynerchuk believes "the No. 1 under-priced ad is the Super Bowl because everyone watches it."

What needs to change when it comes to Super Bowl ads is "the creative has so much vested interest in being a showcase for agencies," said Vaynerchuk. Instead, the creative focus should be about figuring out a way to get all those eyeballs to do something and turn it into a major data collection event for brands.

David Patton has been named global president of Y&R, effective January 2017. Patton will be based in the London office and will report to the agency's global chief executive David Sable.

Prior to joining the Y&R team, Patton spent six years at Grey Group as president and CEO of Grey EMEA. He also spent two years as CEO of Grey U.K. With Patton's upcoming departure, Grey announced that Alain Groenendaal, president and CEO of Grey Latin America, will take over as president and CEO of Grey Europe.

Sable noted that while Y&R looked both outside and inside WPP to fill the global role, and found great candidates outside of the network, Patton was the best fit.

"As our momentum kept getting bigger and stronger I needed that extra help, particularly getting into the details as we get into the markets. It was really important that I be able to provide better service going down into the markets and to all my regional guys. It was just the right thing to do," Sable said. 

Outside of naming a new global president, Sable also announced a few other key hires.

Y&R, under Sable's lead, has established a global healthcare practice, which will be led by Howard Courtemanche. Courtemanche joined Y&R a few months back and has previously served as president of JWT's Health division. Since his arrival at Y&R, the agency has won three pharma and over-the-counter accounts. He will continue to help the agency build on this success in the health business in the coming months.

"Of all the businesses one can have, healthcare is the one that probably requires the most specific expertise," Sable said. "When you have somebody who has lived it and knows the language in a different way, because it's not just marketing language. You need to understand compliance, regulatory environment, what the approval process is like, you need to understand the FDA. There's so many different things."  

Additionally, Y&R also announced a new global chief marketing officer. Former director of business develop in North America, JJ Schmuckler, will take on the global CMO title. 

The hires came as Y&R's North America division continues to see success and growth over the past three months. Driven by the agency's New York office, Y&R has won six new accounts, including the three new health clients. Other new clients include JPMorgan Chase's corporate business (won in partnership with VML), lead creative agency for Cirque du Soleil and work for The U.S. Census bureau's first digital census in 2020.

With the announcement of the three new positions Sable hopes to show Y&R's momentum, "the importance of our position in WPP's horizontality," and the "growing opportunities we have to bring our businesses together and bring better solutions to clients."

It all started with what seemed like another forgettable promoted trend ad on Twitter on Wednesday morning. Excedrin, the pain reliever, was trying to poke a little fun at how agonized and obsessed the American public has become with the presidential race between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, as the GOP and Democratic nominees were set to do some verbal jousting once more in their third and final debate later on in the day. 

The possibility of a #DebateHeadache is high. Be prepared with Excedrin®. pic.twitter.com/J1c1Mg6Wsk

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 19, 2016

But, with potential voters seemingly hungover from the first two debates, the ad worked better than a hair-of-the-dog Bloody Mary on a Sunday morning. Marketers for the GlaxoSmithKline-owned product went on to share six #DebateHeadache tweets.

The first #DebateHeadache tweet appeared at 3 a.m., when the promoted trend went live, and the momentum grew throughout the day. In addition to the promoted trend, which reportedly costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, Excedrin amplified the effort with a scattering of promoted tweets. 

Excedrin benefited from 46,000 Twitter mentions on Wednesday, according to Talkwalker, representing a 3,100 percent increase compared to the prior day. The mentions also constituted a 360 percent jump when comparing the first three days of this week and Monday through Wednesay last week, per the social media analytics player.

Another social data company, 4C Insights, said #DebateHeadache mentions spiked 602 percent during the debate compared to the prior hour. 

The copywriting appeared to improve throughout the day. Here are Excedrin's other #DebateHeadache tweets:

Based on our research, a #DebateHeadache is almost unavoidable. Get ready for it with Excedrin®. pic.twitter.com/Rar0I9qMXQ

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 19, 2016

Frustration only makes the #DebateHeadache worse. Relieve your headache fast with Excedrin®. pic.twitter.com/WwIH2Qrh6c

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 20, 2016

Relieve your #DebateHeadache fast with Excedrin® so you can keep a cool head. pic.twitter.com/6kJxvLuSVu

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 20, 2016

Changing channels won't help your #DebateHeadache, which is why Excedrin® is here to bring fast headache relief. pic.twitter.com/g01RoHDGd8

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 19, 2016

When it comes to headache relief, there's no debate — Excedrin® is the clear winner. pic.twitter.com/DQAT37Cez1

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) October 20, 2016

Lastly, most of the reactions to the brand's newsjacking seemed to be positive. Here are a few notable Twitter users who tipped their hat to Excedrin:

Well done, @Excedrin. #DebateHeadache#DebateNightpic.twitter.com/8bNmenV8VO

— deray mckesson (@deray) October 20, 2016

Hahaha great advertisement by pain medicine @Excedrin.#debatenightpic.twitter.com/cLacdnngCu

— Negar نگار (@NegarMortazavi) October 20, 2016

That @Excedrin is running Twitter ads now warning of the impending #debateheadache is brilliant marketing

— Kimberly Atkins (@KimberlyEAtkins) October 19, 2016

UPDATE: This story originally suggested that Excedrin did not buy the promoted trend. 

Chief marketing officers for the world's top brands are challenging each other to find and support the industry's next generation of talent. The initiative is one of a number of issues the Association of National Advertisers' newly formed Masters Circle aims to tackle.

"Without quality talent, this industry's future is questionable," said ANA president and CEO Bob Liodice, addressing 2,700 attendees at the ANA's Masters of Marketing Annual Conference in Orlando, Fla.

ANA board members Jeff Jones (former Target CMO, now president of ride-hailing app Uber), Linda Boff (General Electric's CMO), Kristin Lemkau (JP Morgan Chase's CMO) and Jon Iwata (IBM's CMO) are leading the charge on the ANA's CMO Talent Challenge.

CMOs who accept the challenge are committing to mentor younger generations, spending at least five hours with students to chat about marketing careers and participating in an industrywide ANA/AEF talent study.

To kick off the challenge, CMOs are prodding one another to join in via Twitter using the hashtag #TalentFWD.

Today we launched #TalentFWD at the #ANAMasters. Join @jjones, @coastw@KLemkau and me: https://t.co/k1C2VjhpVu. Pay it Forward!

— Linda Boff (@lindaboff) October 19, 2016

I just accepted the CMO Talent Challenge! I nominate @sethfarbman@eileenlynch to join me within 24 hrs https://t.co/MEYEcNlgfB#TalentFWD

— Jon Iwata (@coastw) October 19, 2016

I just accepted the CMO Talent Challenge! I also nominate @KellyB to join me within 24 hrs https://t.co/5iJTTxk557#TalentFWD

— Seth William Farbman (@sethfarbman) October 20, 2016

Other objectives for the ANA Masters to tackle include arguing for transparency in media and fighting against fraud; advocating for gender equality, multicultural marketing and diversity, and all aspects of social responsibility in marketing; and working with the Digital Advertising Alliance and the Advertising Self-Regulatory Council as well as other organizations that keep the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Trade Commission at bay.

"As an industry, we need to get out of our own way and overcome issues that hamper growth potential," said Liodice. "We are on the right track, but we need CMOs to turn up the leadership dial. We cannot leave this to others to do. We must get involved and take the action we need to build our brands and drive our business results. When CMOs do that, everyone wins."

In his delightful and insightful documentary "Remember Those Great Volkswagen Ads?" British filmmaker Joe Marcantonio explores the transcendent power of advertising to help brands overcome their limitations and—in the case of DDB's groundbreaking 1960s work for the German automaker—establish an enduring, vibrant image in the hearts and minds of consumers.

"The piece wasn't commissioned by DDB or VW," Marcantonio tells AdFreak, "I just made it for the love."

His father Alfredo served as VW's advertising manager in the 1970s, and in 1982, the elder Marcantonio co-authored an acclaimed book about the history of the brand's marketing (from which his son's project lifts its title).

Clocking in at just under 20 minutes, the film mixes archival footage with interviews to present a brisk, bouncy stream of fun and incisive commentary from Alfredo Marcantonio and numerous Mad Men-era luminaries who either contributed to DDB's VW work or were influenced by its style.



"I thought that maybe they'd be polite and spare me a few minutes," Joe Marcantonio says of the filmed chats he conducted with John Hegarty, David Trott and Alan Parker (as well as his father). "But each of them was so passionate about the influence it had on their careers, they spoke for much longer than I thought. I thought initially that the film could be five minutes long, but my first cut was 48 minutes. It was really tricky to get it down to 18 minutes." (Conversations with other ad legends, including Helmut Krone and George Lois, were culled from clips dating back to the 1980s.)

VW's ride into the American zeitgeist got off to a bumpy start, given the nameplate's genesis in the 1930s as a form of affordable, reliable transportation for working-class Germans living under the Third Reich.

"To be completely honest, I was wondering what was going on in [former DDB chief Bill] Bernbach's head, because it really had Nazi connotations to it," Krone—the art director behind the campaign's sleek, trendsetting style—explains in the film. "I didn't think it was something that we should do."

Apart from VW's Nazi ties, some members of DDB's creative team initially believed the compact, oddly shaped, sparely appointed Beetles of the era were simply too alien to succeed in the U.S. market of the early 1960s, where fancy, finned, fully loaded vehicles were all the rage.

"I felt the car was so utterly preposterous," says Krone. "We had to Americanize it as quickly as possible, and maybe get somebody like Dinah Shore to do a singing commercial like she was doing at the time: 'See the USA in Your Chevrolet.' " Such schlocky notions were dismissed in favor of a more "intelligent, don't-underestimate-the-public type of advertising" that became DDB's trademark, Krone says.

Simplicity was key. The car itself offered basic, no-frills functionality. Likewise, its advertising was in most respects bare bones. This was especially true of print efforts, defined for a decade by monochrome executions in newspapers and magazines. These often used self-deprecating headlines—"Lemon" and "Think small" rank among the most renowned—and a shot of a single Beetle (either unadorned or, in some cases, satirically in sync with the surrounding copy).

After putting together the first few ads along these lines, Krone left New York for a brief vacation, "rather depressed" about VW's domestic prospects. But when he returned, "people were talking about it—at parties, everywhere, they were talking about these Volkswagen ads!"

Parker, a former copywriter who later became a Hollywood director, distills the campaign's appeal: "I don't think people realized quite how vulgar advertising had become at that time … and therefore, how amazing a Doyle Dane ad, particularly a Volkswagen ad, looked in a magazine filled with rubbish."

The film traces the campaign's successful transition into television. In one vintage spot, a snow-plow operator drives his trusty Beetle through brutal weather … to get to his plow. Another presents next-door neighbors, each with $3,000 to spend. One buys a brand-new $3,000 car (it looks like a big American model). For the same price, the other purchases a refrigerator, a range, a washer, a record player, two TVs … and a brand-new Volkswagen.

"It is miles better than anything out there at the moment," filmmaker Joe Marcantonio says of these classic campaigns. "Pretty much every car ad you see these days looks the same. The cars are shot at the same angle, same height, all are clean, usually in a nondescript cityscape. The ads are made to be safe, to not offend, to appeal to the masses—but that means that they have no honesty to them."

For honest work to emerge, clients must be willing to take a few risks, the filmmaker says. "The bravery of VW can't be underestimated," he says. "They were daring enough to put their complete faith in Bernbach, and were richly rewarded."

Likewise, Bernbach's DDB reaped its own rewards, riding the success of VW (among other clients) to the pinnacle of the '60s Madison Avenue scene. In a broader sense, the campaign elevated the industry as a whole, demonstrating that agencies could indelibly imprint brands across our shared cultural psyche and build long-lasting trust, goodwill and a sense of coolness and fun.

For VW, the positive vibes resonated for five decades. Though at times diminished, they always seemed to rev back up to speed—until September 2015, that is, when VW's emissions scandal began making headlines. Now, more than a full year later, bad feelings from that episode linger.

Given the fragmented media landscape and jaded nature of today's consumers, it's unclear if advertising, no matter how quirky or inspired, can help put the brand's image on the road to recovery.

The new Ford Edge is so enchanting, it will turn the vicious assassin that an arms dealer hired to kill you into a smitten guardian angel—though the killer with the heart of gold might still steal your ride as payment for his protection.

So says a new eight-minute short film for the automaker from agency GTB, starring actor Mads Mikkelsen as the hitman, and directed by Jake Scott.

Tracking the story of a couple turned state's witness against a weapons smuggler, it follows them into hiding as Mikkelsen's character stalks them, and their bright orange SUV, which apparently they've decided to bring with them to their new Mediterranean village home. (Presumably it was just too good to give up, even if they didn't mind changing their faces with a little casual plastic surgery.)



Mikkelsen, playing the titular "Le Fantôme" or "The Ghost," is ultimately so charmed by the car that he refuses the bounty, and even protects the couple from the second murderer sent to replace them—swapping their Edge for an old two-seat motorcycle and a couple of plane tickets to Peru.

In other words, the film straddles the line between the somber and the absurd—though how intentionally isn't, at first, entirely clear. The stakes are high—life and death. The hero is blocky. His motivation is goofy—a point that seems most deliberate when he pauses his hunt to nuzzle the car. The Ford seems woefully out of place, a point the story halfway strives to acknowledge but doesn't quite defuse. Its modern profile sticks out like a sore thumb against the lush, classic, dilapidated backdrop that the production so beautifully shapes.

Ultimately, it doesn't feel believable. This isn't a luxury automobile, and it's not obvious whether Ford is asking people to laugh at the car without quite giving reason to do so, or to applaud the car as a down-to-earth antidote to the hackneyed, dazzling underworld tropes the film goes to great lengths to polish.

Ultimately, it's most likely the latter. A fair reading would find the whole film a delightfully arch send-up of gangster narratives, and a celebration of modesty and morality. Regardless, the visuals are wonderful, and Mikkelsen's performance is eminently watchable—enough in its own right to keep the audience hooked, and guessing.

In fact, the only real crime may be the color of the car.

CREDITS

Agency: GTB
Chief Creative Officer: Julian Watt
Executive Creative Director: Bryn Attewell
Creative Director: Peter Hvid
Producer: Romila Sanassy
Group Business Director: Sarah Rosser
Account Director: Sian Patrick
Senior Account Manager: Luke Johnson
Account Executive: Mathilde Pors
Planning Partner: Stephen Wallace
President: Paul Confrey
Client Services Director: Fabio Ruffet
Director, Integrated Planning: Melanie Elliot

Prod Company: RSA Films
Director: Jake Scott
Exec Producer: Cindy Burnay
Editor: Joe Guest at Final Cut
Director of Photography: Mark Patten
Production Designer: Joseph Bennett
Photographer: Nigel Harniman
Cast

Le Fantôme: Mads Mikkelsen
The Widow: Barbara Steele
Hero Couple: Karin Perathoner and James Brown
The Kingpin: Jon Campling
Interpol Agent: Zarko Radic

Ford
Vice President, Marketing, Ford of Europe: Matthew Van Dyke
Marketing Communications Director, Ford of Europe: Anthony Ireson
Brand Content Manager, Ford of Europe: Lyn West
SUV Brand Content Manager, Ford of Europe: Chris Rushton

For its latest marketing investment, Goldman Sachs is spending on Spotify.

The financial-services firm started running ads Wednesday on the music-streaming service in the U.S. and U.K. in hopes of recruiting younger candidates. The campaign includes a 30-second spot hinting at a few of the roles potential employees might be interested in.

"What advice would you give a tech firm breaking into a new market?" the ad says. "How would you help grow a university's endowment? Discover this and more at Goldman Sachs, because a career here could take you anywhere."

The ad then redirects listeners to a 14-question career quiz on Goldman's website that helps visitors determine the part of the company that might be the best fit for their skills and interests.

It isn't the first time Goldman has turned to a millennial-focused medium. A year ago, it ran ads on Snapchat in hopes of recruiting college students via the app's Campus Story channel. Earlier this year, the company again used Snapchat, buying ads in support of International Women's Day.

It's not the first time Goldman has worked with Spotify, either. It advised the Swedish company earlier this year as it raised $1 billion in debt financing. As The Wall Street Journal reported in March, raising debt instead of equity could help Spotify maintain a higher stock price if it decides to pursue an initial public offering.

If you picked up a copy of Welcome to My Neighborhood with the illustration of a joyful mouse, bunny and kitten holding hands and dancing on the cover, you might think you'd found the perfect picture book for your little one. But upon closer inspection, you'd see a broken whiskey bottle in one corner, an empty tin can in another and a worn-looking mattress in the background. It's a picture book all right, but it's definitely not intended for kids.

VML created the book, described as a bedtime story to wake people up, pro bono for Youth Ambassadors, an organization that works with young people in troubled communities facing anything from domestic violence to hunger. Making something that looks like your average picture book but that isn't for children was intentional on the part of VML, and a key to making the campaign work.

"It's a children's book not for children," said Tiffany Lynch, co-founder of Young Ambassadors. "Why would we allow these stories to happen to children in our city when we can't even allow our own children to look at what's inside? It's the juxtaposition of those two ideas that VML so brilliantly came up with that really shocks you."

One of YA's biggest youth empowerment programs designed to help struggling kids overcome some of the terrible things they face every day is journal writing.

"By getting the urban, poor teens to open up and write down on paper what their reality is, it really does help them to talk about it and start the healing process," Lynch said. After looking over a thousand or so entries from Youth Ambassadors, the team decided to pick three stories and feature versions of them in the book.

The three central issues are violence in the home ("The Good Man"), hunger ("Dinner Time"), and gun violence and murder outside the home ("My Big Brothers"). In "My Big Brothers," the author, Angie, tells the story of how her three older brothers ended up in jail. Here's the full text from that story:

"I have three big brothers. I love them very much, but they don't always do the right thing. The first one is in prison because he tried to rob a bank. My second brother is in prison because he shot a man eleven times in broad daylight. The man owed my brother money, but didn't pay it back. And then there's my third brother. Some man tried to rape him in a bathroom so he choked the man to death. I love my big brothers, but they don't always do the right thing."

The illustrations for each story by artist Davey Gant are done in classic storybook style, but the work perfectly depicts much darker and harsher realities.

"The struggle that these kids go through on a daily basis is almost incomprehensible by the rest of us that don't live in these neighborhoods," said Aaron Evanson, executive creative director at VML. "It's so hard to relate to anything they go through. You think you may have a bad day. It's not even close to what some of these kids are going through." 

VML and Youth Ambassadors hope to distribute the books to all kinds of community leaders including foundations, government agencies, policy makers and educators.

"We see this on the news all the time but we are numb to it," Lynch said. "When you open up this book, because of the medium, it shocks you. The idea is that people pay attention in a different way, and it strikes a chord in a different way."

Outside of handing physical copies to decision-makers in communities like Kansas City, VML is also working with RW2 Productions to created an animated version of the book narrated by children reading the three stories.

The team is also creating a stuffed bunny like the one in the book to send to community leaders.

"We have an almost Build-A-Bear bunny that looks like the little girl bunny in 'My Big Brothers,' and we have one of those voice chips in it," Evanson said. When pressed, the bunny starts reading the story to its owner. 

"Just to hear these stories come out of a cute little bunny or even a childlike thing really gets the point across more than anything," Evanson added.

To get a full sense of what it feels like to read the book, take a look at some of the excerpts below: 

 

 

 

When Norman de Greve joined CVS Health, the company's plans to phase out tobacco, effectively losing $2 billion in annual revenue to become a major player in the health care field, were already rolling. That, of course, was part of the reason he wanted to join. For de Greve, tobacco hits home: He lost his father to lung cancer when he was just 7 years old. 

Now, two-and-a-half years later, CVS Health has helped drop tobacco sales by one percent across all retailers and proved its purpose of "helping people on their path to better health," de Greve told attendees, while speaking at the Masters of Marketing Conference in Orlando today.

Plus, 500,000 consumers visited the section of the company's site devoted to quitting smoking and 260,000 people sought help from counselors at CVS.

The move also scored 100 million media impressions for CVS Health and revamped the way people see the brand. In 2015, 40 percent more influencers saw the brand as impactful in improving health, versus 2014. 

"Selling cigarettes and antibiotics in the same store is just wrong," said de Greve. "Two-and-a-half-years later and we're still the only pharmacy not selling tobacco. Rite Aid, it's your move."

But even with its successful tobacco exit (when asked if there was blowback from the tobacco lobby de Greve couldn't recall any) that doesn't mean CVS is taking aim at alcohol or sugar.

"Tobacco is unique, it is universally bad," said de Greve. "For us, there likely will not be another tobacco-like thing. It's just not going to happen." 

Still, the company is "looking to [shelve] healthier options," from brands like Chobani, Annie's, Amy's, as well as some almond milk, noted de Greve.