As in the previous year, we analyze the most creative brand campaigns of 2012 focusing on the best performers in unconventional non-business categories, including ‘Magnets’, ‘Record-breakers’, ‘Kids pleasers’ and some more.
The Provocateur of the year — Lynx (AXE)
The most effective way to win the attention of a broader audience is to shock it, shake the grounds with extremely inappropriate things you have never seen before, disgusting in some ways, but captivating. Or just to be smart and tap into the loud buzz. This year, Lynx (AXE) capitalized on virtually every event with a great mass media resonance—it apologised to Prince Harry after tabloids revealed his nude photos and suggested help to men from all around the globe, who accepted the challenge of turning a lesbian daughter of a billionaire into a straight girl. Quite a daunting task, but with AXE it’s as easy as abc.
Photo: A Lynx “contest” poster, www.facebook.com/lynxHK
The Magnet of the year — Pinterest
That’s how we call media products, which attracted millions of users on the Internet. They work like real magnets—you are just gravitating towards them for some reason. In 2012, the most powerful magnet was Pinterest, which grew dramatically within just one year and managed to become the biggest influencer for other media resources, who almost simultaneously changed their outlays to Pinterest-like design.
The Motivator of the year — Diesel
Diesel offered its fans to remember how great life was twenty years ago, with no Internet and artificial brains everywhere, and encouraged them to disconnect from the social media channels (primarily Facebook) for three days. Set yourself free from the online buzz right now, you still have time.
Pic.: Diesel Pre-Internet shoe page, www.diesel.com/yuk
The Record breaker of the year — Red Bull
The most long-awaited record of the year was the Red Bull’s Stratos mission, a 4:20 minute long freefall from an altitude of 39,045 meters. The record planned for about five years was finally set by Felix Baumgartner on October 14.
Photo: Baumgartner’s jump
The Kids pleaser of the year — Toyota
Leaving out LEGO, Mattel and many other brands, which mission is to make children’s’ life yet brighter, we focus on companies from the world of adults. Toyota performed best in this category. The brand unveiled its hilarious concept car at the Tokyo Toy Show 2012 in mid-June, to actually educate kids how to drive a vehicle, when they grow up.
Photo: Toyota Camatte, from blog.toyota.co.uk
The Bullyboy of the year — Samsung
When it comes to product wars, brands use all their creativity to poke fun at their rivals. Samsung was a champion this year—it let down Apple, which released its iPhone 5 in early fall with its new mockery video and print.
The Magician of the year — Google
We all need magic in our life, and some brands are ready to share it with us. Google teamed up with Cirque du Soleil to launch an absolutely gorgeous online experience “Movi.Kanti.Revo,” which takes a person into an intriguing world, full of miracles.
The Classics ‘reimaginer’ of the year — MINI
Ahead of the Olympic Games, MINI shot the “Britalian Job” video, heavily inspired by the classics, The Italian Job (1969), with well-recognized scenes and cars.
The Collaborator of the year — H&M
Lots of brands, especially global ones team up to merge their expertise and artistic approaches to create something hot and steaming, and it’s not that easy to shortlist the most avid collaborators of the year. With dozens of new products unveiled as part of two (or even three)-parties work this year (Swatch, adidas, Nike and many many more), H&M tops the list of brands, which makes creative partnership with luxury brands and celebrities one of its priorities. In 2012, the retailer teamed up with Maison Martin Margiela, Anna Dello Russo and David Beckham, which created new collections for the chain—in 2013, the brand is not going to spend much time on collaborations, since H&M creative adviser Margareta Van Den Bosch commented to fashion.telegraph.co.uk that the brand “will not have any [collaborations] for spring [2013]. We decided to skip it, as we have had so many this year. So it’ll be something for next November.”
Photo: David Beckham in the top from his H&M collection, www.hm.com
We wish brands to be creative and influential in 2013, bringing positive change around the globe with their unconventional initiatives and collaborated work.