Ad Blog

Saint’s work for the V&A Museum has been nominated for a D&AD pencil

This is a fantastic achievement, whether we win it or not. Simply being nominated is a recognition of the quality of the work, and it’s thoroughly deserved. The team who worked on it all cared passionately about the project and went that extra mile at every stage to make it the best it could be. I’m tremendously proud of them all.

This accomplishment is made even more great by the fact that we had a tiny budget and managed to achieve a great deal with the pennies we had to spend. The work itself is well polished with great production values. We managed to use some new technologies such as Augmented Reality invites, which displayed an interactive 3d shape when held up to a webcam, and the results are absolutely outstanding. It was one of the most successful launches the V&A have ever done, surpassing visitor targets by 100%. The campaign reached 1.6 million people online and was featured on 1,122 social media channels.

You can view a video which summarises the campaign and its results here

Essentially, we were asked to promote the up coming Decode exhibition. It was a the largest installation of digital art in Britain and the theme was ‘open source’. These two concepts are an absolute dream to be working with as they provided a fertile ground for our creative concepts to explore.

The V&A had commissioned Karsten Schmidt to design a digital identity for the Decode exhibition. We asked if we could allow the users to get under the hood of this work and recode it themselves. To our surprise, the V&A and Karsten were fine with this. Happy days, this was all of a sudden a potentially very cool project indeed. So, we created a website with an interface that allowed users to control variables and affect the artwork in real time. We also made the code itself available and provided links to all the tools they would need get right down to the details and tinker away as much as they wanted. People could then submit their work to be displayed in the gallery. The best examples were then built into the digital outdoor display, such as the cross track projectors and LCD screens. The very best work was then put into the exhibition itself. This was a great example of UGC or Co-Creation actually providing something that was valuable and not just a gimmick. It was fundamentally in line with the theme of the exhibition and helped increase amplification because the sort of people who would enjoy the installation were also the sort of people who would enjoy tinkering with the code and embraced the open source philosophy.

All in all a really super piece of work and very much in line with the beliefs and values that we at Saint embrace.

View the summary video here

1 Comment | In: advertising, animation, design, digital, saint, technology | tags: awards, D&AD, david gamble, decode, digital art, exhibition, Karsten Schmidt, open source, pencil, recode, recode decode, saint, V&A. | #

Just came across this great little video about the last agency on earth. Really well done and quite amusing.

I think they might be right. If agencies don’t evolve, they will eventually die out. The majority are still woefully behind the times in terms of understanding the modern consumer and how to reach them. So far, they are not experiencing any problems because of this, so they think everything is fine. However, if all the clients were to suddenly realise that they need a change, the agencies would not be able to respond quick enough and would have a crisis on their hands, as it would be too late. In order to bring about institutional education and a fundamental shift in perception, you need a bit of time. You can’t just hire a few geeks and say “job done”. You need the whole agency to ‘get it’. The trouble is, often, the people in the top few layers are blissfully ignorant and may well have someone beneath them who is 1 page ahead of them in the manual, so can pull the wool over their eyes, but is no better themselves.

The Last Advertising Agency On Earth from FITC on Vimeo.

I don’t agree with the video that broadcast media will die out completely. I think it will continue to play a role, but that role will be a very different one indeed.

When I set up my next agency, it will be just as capable of doing great TV, print, experiences and more as it will obviously be in doing digital. It will also foster a spirit of constantly looking forward and making sure we are on top of any innovations or advancements in new channels. This is something that people from a digital background are used to doing anyway, because that is the nature of technology. It’s what keeps us interested. It’s always changing and you need to constantly keep learning or you are left behind.

The agency of the future will recognise this and embrace change. It will also stop thinking about things in such a silo’d and traditional way.

The trouble is, changing an existing agency is like turning a super tanker. Indeed, in many ways it’s harder. A super tanker will eventually turn. However, some parts of an agency may never truly adapt.

The only real solution is to start again with a blank sheet of paper. Cast aside all preconceptions and look at things with fresh eyes. Forget how things used to be done. How ’should’ things be done? Any existing agency coming from either side of the divide will always be either “an above the line agency, doing digital” or “a digital agency, doing advertising” and they will always be doing things in a way that is similar to how things used to be done.

People’s habits have changed beyond recognition in the last twenty years. Have agency models? No, not really. They haven’t fundamentally changed for a lot longer than that. Sure you’ve had the odd gimmick or social experiment like St Lukes. But nothing that has really addressed how to go about creating work that is in tune with the modern consumer.

There’s a massive opportunity for a new type of agency to start as they mean to go on and launch right in the sweet spot that everyone else is clamoring towards!

Watch this space…

No Comments | In: advertising, agency, digital, future, technology | tags: agency, atl, digital, future, new model, supertanker. | #

This guy looks hardcore!  Nicely done bit of video too

YouTube – Mission to the edge of Space – Red Bull Stratos – Trailer.

No Comments | In: advertising, fun | | #

In April 07 I joined Simon Labbett & David gamble to set up Saint. It was their baby.  They had already designed the logo and put together a business plan of sorts; indeed, they had resigned from RKCR to go set it up. However, Mark Roalfe persuaded them to stay and do it within his agency.   The CEO at the time, James Murphy, had the vision to see that this was a good thing and was very supportive of us. We set up at the front of the agency, a clear sign of the importance they placed on this venture. In the early days there was us 3 and a planner called Joe. We all mucked in and worked hard. David & Simon were the Creative Directors as well as the only creative team in these early days. And I have to say the quality of the work was superb.

Virgin Atlantic was our founding client – we took the digital away from Glue. Despite the wealth of clients at RKCR, we had to pitch for and win every bit of business in our own right. But that was fine, we had a really good team and no interfearence from the agency, so we could make the right descisions without having to consider a miriad of opinions, clouding the way. In the first 9 months of existance, we had a formidable pitch record of 8 wins on the trot.

Throughout this period the work started pouring in. We needed to ramp up, fast. So, I drew on my network of contacts and started to assemble a team of digital rock stars. Experts in their field, hard working and trustworthy. We had a solid unit now with specialist digital strategy, creatives, design, motion grapics and project management. By this time we could do pretty much everything in house and that helps turn around quick projects but more importantly it means you get a melting pot effect. Proper synergy where everyone’s skills and knowledge combine to help one another. Creatives can pick the brains of a flash Scripter to see if something is possible and in doing so, they can get further inspiration and push the concept further. This is something I feel passionately about and I know it works when you get it right. It’s one of the reasons Saint is a success. There are many others but I can’t give away all my trade secrets!

By the end of our first year, we had converted some agency clients and got some good work away but we were still setting up the machine. Our internal processes had to change as we grew and we still had a job to do in terms of integrating and educating the wider agency, Rainey Kelly.

Our second year was the year we came of age. We won some non RKCR clients of our own and got some great work away. We were a Cannes Cyber Lion finalist for our BBC White Season – spectrum project and I think if we had polished our award entry submisiion more, we may have got some silverware. Over the course of this time, we continued to grow and take on new clients. We made a modest but significant profit in year two and the last six months of that year were very strong, so we knew we would hit the ground running in year three and were set for great things. There was a real team spirit and a sense of positivity. We would all pull together and acheive the impossible – often working hard and playing hard. Many people have said to me that Saint is “a very special place” or “the best job I’ve had”.  It’s certainly not because anyone has an easy ride.  I think it’s a shared passion that we all want to do the best work of our careers. This is backed up by unprecidented staff retention. In the first 18 months only three people left us. Two emigrated to other countries and one has subsequently begged for their job back!

We did indeed hit the ground running in year three, 2009, and we kept on running. As of writing, we are 45 digital experts at the top of their game, we have had nine strong months, where income has grown steadily and profit is on target to be 20% for the year. When you place that in the context of the economic climate, I think it’s a significant acheivement. We have won more pitches, increased our retained clients and continued to pick up our own clients, such as a cool project for Getty Images called The Flickr Collection and we are currently working on the V&A’s latest exhibition – Decode.

The other week we received campaign of the month in NMA for our anti-knives work – It Doesn’t Have to Happen – ‘freestyle king‘ (A project close to my heart, as I spotted the opportunity in the agency, stayed late that night writing a digital strategy deck to present the next day, and managed to wrestle it into Saint.  We have been working on it for almost a year now and have over 12,000 friends on Beb0).

Last week we were included in the NMA top 100.  Saint came 67th in the top 100 and no 37 in the top 50  marketing agencies – the biggest for our age.

I’m very pleased with what we have acheived. Not only do we have a proper digital agency which can function independently but it is part of a top 10 above the line agency and functions as a fully integrated offering. I don’t know of any other ATL agencies who have managed to pull this off as sucessfully. Some have partners they work with but it’s a dysfunctional relationship. Some say they ‘do digital’ but they don’t actually know what they are doing and are losing money hand over fist. Some are getting there but aren’t as far along the line as we are. So, I’m extremely proud and I think that all my colleagues in Saint should be too.

“…one of the only advertising agency digital arms to stack up against the independents.”
- Campaign, 11th Dec 09

2010 promises to be the year when we take things to the next level. We have built it and they have come. We are now a well oiled machine ready to produce to outstanding work. Last month we boulstered our planning department with two digital heavyweights: Paul O’Neil, from AKQA, who just won a grand prix for his work on Fiat Eco Drive; and Jerome Courtial, ex Weidens, BBH and Glue. He was the planner on the original Linx effect website and mobile application. You can read Jerome’s own blog here.  They join Mark Sng (Mark’s blog is here) and Lee Briggs.  Mark is one of the original ‘rockstars’ i mentioned earlier and has been a pivotal member of the management team throughout our journey.

So, that’s a very quick summary of the Saint journey so far.  I may well edit this post and I will certainly be adding further instalments as the story unfolds.

No Comments | In: advertising, saint | tags: above the line, adam graham, atl, david gamble, digital agency, integrated, rainey kelly, saint, saint@rkcr, simon labbett. | #

The first post on my new blog. Happy days.

If you are reading this, well, there’s plenty more interesting stuff in this blog – get involved. This was just the first post.

However, as is customary on these things, I should probably say a few words by way of an introduction. I’m Adam and I’ve been doing digital stuff since ‘96. I wont bore you with my life history but briefly…

Whilst at University reading Management & Law, I found Management common sense and Law unbelievably boring – so I availed myself of the free internet connection in my room and the little known search engine called “Google” and taught myself all about computers and websites etc.

I started doing a few websites on the side as a way to make a few quid and managed to make a few connections in business.

By the end of my degree course, I had enough clients to leave Uni, set up a little office and start my own business. Pretty soon I had enough work to hire some people to do the actual design and build side of things and I focused on running the company – although I could still muck in if required.

In ‘98 I launched the world’s first “full service, music-on-demand, internet radio station. This went through a few different brand names, starting as online-radio.net, then whoneedsradio.com and ending up as ichooseradio.com. It was called this because we pioneered the concept of users choosing the sort of music they wanted to listen to, when they wanted to listen to it – many years before Last.fm or Spotify etc. (unfortunately, this was a bit too early in the life of the internet as broadband adoption was low and people’s consumption of content via the computer was not the same as it is now).

In 2002 we were the first people to stream live from Glastonbury. Another thing that people take for granted now but at the time it was groundbreaking. We did it over an ISDN line from a caravan in a field. That same year, we set up Radio Avalon with user participation via SMS and email. Michael Eavis said that we had advanced the technology and interactive elements by a quantum leap.

The digital agency that I set up grew to a reasonable size. We had offices in London’s trendy Brick Lane and our main clients were music industry and youth marketing. We got some great work away and won some awards. It was a really enjoyable time where I learned a lot but all good things come to an end and in 2005, I got a proper job.

After a three month stint at SEO and e-commerce agency, Tamar, I went to work for Wunderman Interactive and ended up as Global Account Director, running the Windows Mobile account for EMEA. It was a great company in those days and I was lucky to work with some really talented people on the top of their game. After three years it was time to move on. I had accepted an offer to go work at AKQA but at the last minute, decided to join David and Simon to set up Saint.

The Saint story continues in the next post…

No Comments | In: advertising, history | tags: 3wmedia, brunel university, entrepeneur, htw, ichooseradio, websites, wunderman. | #