A new look for Santa and the Credit Union Christmas pageant!

Filed under: Fun, Our Workposted on January 30th, 2012

Working with the events team at the South Australian Tourism Commission, MassMedia were commissioned to put a new digital spin on promoting the largest Christmas pageant of its kind in the world, by redesigning the Credit Union Christmas pageant website. The new site was designed to reflect a more playful and contemporary look with lots of new features including a new history section and plenty of cool areas for the kids (and adults) to explore and engage. The new site was a radical departure as the events team were looking for MassMedia to produce a site that would help showcase a brand new focus on this incredibly popular South Australian event.

With the 2011 Credit Union Christmas Pageant thousands of people lined the streets of Adelaide, sharing in the magic and fun of the Pageant. About 335,000 people – the young and young at heart – packed the 3.3km route along various vantage points across the city, while 150,000 tuned into Channel Nine’s live broadcast, to enjoy this iconic event which has been the traditional herald to the Christmas season since 1933.

This year’s theme was ‘celebrate the clown within’, with more than 250 clowns entertaining crowds along the pageant route, with thousands in the crowd wearing red noses. The pageant featured 63 floats and 15 bands plus nine walking sets, 10 dance groups, one DJ and three choirs, totalling over 2,700 participants. The Credit Union Christmas Pageant, Creative Director /Event Manager, Brian Gilbertson said: “It was fantastic to see so many people of all ages, from all walks of life, shoulder to shoulder, enjoying the day. He continued “The Credit Union Christmas Pageant is about giving to the community and we hope that everyone who attended or watched the live telecast on Channel Nine enjoyed the magic of the day as much as we did.”

Preparations are already under way for the 80th celebration of the Credit Union Christmas Pageant, next November that is only less than 330 more sleeps!

We are proud to announce some great new MassMedia folk!

Filed under: Announcementsposted on January 30th, 2012

Through the end of 2011 and into the start of 2012 we added some awesome new staff members who are gearing up for a bumper year ahead.

Joining us in our Sydney office we have new additions to the tech team with Technical Lead – Brendon Ghumman, and cracking developers Philip Beresford and Saber Ahmad. Brendon has close to 10 years’ experience in the software industry and an accomplished Information Services professional with strong problem solving, analytical, design and technical skills.

Also in our Client Services and Production teams we have new Account manager Alec Goins, Producers, Sylvia Luk in Sydney and in Melbourne – Senior Producer Alexander Levashov.

We welcome aboard such a great set of new faces and enjoy having such skilled people on our team looking after our clients.

MassMedia help put South Australia’s Best Backyard campaign on the map

Filed under: Announcements, Our Workposted on January 30th, 2012

In late 2011 MassMedia  Studios were asked by the South Australian Tourism Commission to help showcase (from a digital perspective)  the proposition of taking a holiday within South Australia to a purely South Australian audience. The Best Backyard online campaign was born.  MassMedia produced a multi-faceted creative and strategic digital concept to showcase the above the line advertising campaign.

Our challenge was to change the perception for real South Australian’s to avoid going on holiday interstate, but to take rewarding holidays in their own backyard. We wanted the campaign to spark Best Backyard conversation, and to change Facebook ‘water cooler conversations’, being about TV shows and footy matches to great South Australian holidays. The South Australian Tourism Commission wanted these conversations to be around real life South Australian experiences of travel, exploration, relaxation and adventures within the state. With a bank of previously created user generated content the challenge was to showcase this in a unique and instantly believable effective way, appealing to a broad audience of potential travellers.

The campaign has been a great success for the South Australian Tourism Commission, and featured expandable digital banners, Facebook campaign integration and a Best Backyard microsite housed within the main South Australia website. Make sure you check it out and book your next holiday in South Australia!

Nokia starts it’s long climb back to the top

Filed under: General Chatter, Industry Trendsposted on January 25th, 2012

There is a lot of buzz about the new Nokia range of phones that are built in partnership with Microsoft. I was fortunate enough to be given one of the new Nokia phones to play with recently, and I have to say the user experience is beautiful. Despite being the biggest Apple Fanboy, I would happily switch to the new Nokia phone if I needed to.

It would appear the love is not singular . 22 Analysts globally have predicted that so far Nokia have sold 1.3 million units of their new Lumia. Now whilst this isn’t huge compared to the iPhone, it’s a great start for a brand new breed of phone.

Many have written off the Espoo-based company (or considered that Nokia going Windows Phone was a fatal decision) but the market responded pretty well to the Lumia 710 and the Lumia 800. We still don’t have official numbers from Nokia but, according to analysts, anything beyond 1 million for the two phones in merely two months (the Lumia phones were launched on October 26) is a strong figure. It would not only place Nokia back on track but would also make investors a bit less skeptical.

Apple are doing quite well

Filed under: Industry Trendsposted on January 24th, 2012

The company posted a profit of $13.06 billion on revenue of $46 billion. Earnings per share were $13.87, far more than the $10.08 per share analysts had been expecting.

Analysts had expected Apple to report first-quarter earnings of $10.08 a share on revenue of about $38.8 billion. And on average, they’d called for iPhone shipments of nearly 30 million, iPad shipments of about 14 million and Mac shipments of around five million. “We’re thrilled with our outstanding results and record-breaking sales of iPhones, iPads and Macs,” Apple’s CEO Tim Cook said in a statement. “Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline.” Apple’s guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2012 as per usual is comically low: expected revenue of $32.5 billion and earnings per diluted share of $8.50. Apple shares, which had slipped more than 1.6 percent to $420.31 in advance of the company’s earnings announcement are now headed back upwards in after-hours trading.

Air China: Facebook Check Ins

Filed under: General Chatter, Industry Trendsposted on January 24th, 2012

Check in with Air China – Case Movie from Rodolfo on Vimeo.

Here is a nice social integration campaign from Air China. In order to increase consumer awareness about the airline’s flight services to Sweden and throughout the extended Asian region, Air China launched a campaign around Facebook check-ins. The airline created partnerships with a number of popular Asian restaurants in Sweden, to act as ambassadors for Air China. At each restaurant guests were encouraged to check-in with Air China on Facebook as they sat down to eat. The check-ins were aggregated on the Air China Facebook page, complete with a leader board so and users could view the most popular restaurants. Each week the most those with the highest number of check-ins were awarded two complimentary tickets to Asia. This campaign is a good example of how best to use social media in simple way to get fans on board. (Forgive the pun). It achieved excellent results, reaching over a million people. Created by Swedish advertising agency Rodolfo.