An insight is fresh thinking about the audience, product, service, or in our case, a series of events or a festival. Insights guide the concept and unify the work and communication.
CASE STUDIES
Product: NBC Universal's G4 network
Problem: Since its inception, NBC Universal's G4 network struggled to grow interest from advertisers, and their fan base was inconsistent at best. Their solution: transform their flailing network originally created for geeks and gamers into a channel for “The Modern Man.”
OMFGco's strategy and design work for Canvas Lands End
Product: Milk
Problem: The California Milk Processor Board needed to reverse plunging industry sales fast, or its members could literally have lost the farm.
Analysis:
“It is perhaps the most boring product imaginable. We have all tried it. Most of us already own some. There is very little to say about it. Milk is not new. It is not improved. It is white. And so it was that when the California Milk Processor Board first asked us to pitch their business in 1993, we were shockingly ambivalent. A number of us simply thought the product was inherently too boring.”
—Jeff Goodby of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Insight: “The only time I even think about milk is when I run out of it.”
The story behind the big idea:
Jon Steel and Carole Rankin were at a focus group when the clouds parted and a woman said, “The only time I even think about milk is when I run out of it.” Goodby scrawled “got milk?” on a poster board for a meeting and decided it might be a tagline. And Silverstein set it in that typeface that has by now been appropriated (“got ____?”) by lots of junk, donuts, wine and Jesus folks.”
—Jeff Goodby of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Result: “Got Milk?” marketing campaign not only helped turn around milk sales but also changed the face of consumer marketing forever. — Jeff Manning
Got Milk Ad
Product: Nike women’s running shoe
‘Insight’: women (always) think they are too busy, no time in their day, and therefore too busy to run / exercise.
‘Creative Concept / Theme’: Gone Running
Execution / media examples: Signs for your computer / door; videos; print advertising, etc.
Banner video ads.
Problem / Creative Assignment: How can a shoe company stand for more than shoes?
Insight: Nike makes shoes for athletes created by fellow athletes… not just for looks but performance.
The “Big Idea” is to talk to consumers athlete to athlete. (Big ideas are embodied or expressed by the tagline, for instance Nike’s “Just Do It”.)
Tagline: Just Do It.
Client: Girl Effect, Nike Foundation — writer Jess Vacek
Media: video
Insight: People were no longer affected by images of starving children, they had seem too many images portraying children in crisis and needed a new way to both effect change and to reach the people who can help.
Product: A fancy Chrysler minivan
Audience: Moms; Writer: Ginger Robinson, Designer: Brad Simon
Insight: Why shouldn’t a minivan be the fanciest car on the road? Why can’t a minivan be a a luxury car? Why give up luxury just because you are now a mom (or dad)?
Client: Dodge Ram
Big Idea / Tagline: “So God Made a Farmer”
Media: Superbowl spot, 2013
Benefit? Ad raised $100,000 for Future Farmers of America.
Background: “So God Made a Farmer” was the name given to a speech given by the radio broadcaster Paul Harvey at a 1978 Future Farmers of America (FFA) convention. The speech was a derivative of a 1975 article written by Harvey in the Gadsden Times, which was itself similar to a 1940 definition of a dirt farmer published in The Farmer-Stockman. The speech was given as an extension of the Genesis creation narrative referring to God's actions on the 8th day of creation. Harvey described the characteristics of a farmer in each phrase, ending them with the recurring “So God Made a Farmer”.
The speech was used in a commercial by Dodge Ram during the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLVII. The ad featured photographs of rural America set to a narration of a portion of Harvey’s speech. In a collaboration with the FFA, Dodge agreed to donate $100,000 for every 1,000,000 views that the YouTube video of the ad received up to $1,000,000. This goal was reached in less than five days. — Wikipedia
Client: Target Baby
Big Idea / Concept / Tagline: People are excited about the first baby born on New Year’s Eve. Let’s celebrate them all… “Happy New Year, Baby”
Execution / Media: Share “the big news” via Facebook. Target advertising used social media. Take the info from social media and use giant refrigeration magnetic type… on a very large analog board. Out of home videos on billboards in Times Square.
Art Director: Max Erdenberger, Photographer: Katherine Ledner, Director(s): Everynone.
Giant Babies in Times Square: