After the thrills and spills of a highly entertaining production, we’ve just seen the launch of our new ‘Middleman’ campaign for Betfair. The idea’s a simple one: on Betfair, you cut out the middleman which means you bet direct against 3 million other people. And that of course means better odds and much bigger wins (than all those traditional high street bookmakers). I worked on the digital arm of the campaign. Developing concepts that push the middleman idea. The titles and bets are all dynamic – being updated live directly from Betfair.

It’s Betfair’s biggest ever marketing campaign to date (see this article on Brand Republic)

As you’d expect for a brand like Betfair, it’s a fully integrated campaign with a massive online push that kicks off with the first ever YouTube takeover by a betting brand (coming here soon) with a nice little cameo from Andy Gray, so watch out for that from midnight on Saturday…

My digital campaign ran alongside a series of TV ads made by Andre at Albion.

They were part of a bigger integrated campaign, but it’ll be unfair to show the press work as I just looked over Nick Darken’s shoulder in awe as he drew it.

Waves can be uploaded via webcam or mobile phone.

Waves can be uploaded via webcam, mobile phone or the Facebook Battle of the Fans application. We also made this how-to film. The waves can be searched under different categories like “Bizarre”, “Teens”, “South England”, “Male”, “Wolverhampton Wanderers”.

To give the wave some team rivalry we created this Battle of the Fans Facebook application whereby you can load yourself and your friends into the wave. There is a league table for each team.

The following scene may be disturbing to some viewers.

The Cookie Factory Blog

Natalie and I came up with the simple idea of making custom cookies for Christmas. You’d go to a site, create a cookie we’d bake them and send them. This proved a bit of a logistcal nightmare. However we did decide to bake cookies and capture the experience, along with stories, films & facts.

As part of our preparations we read, made-up, tried and tested many different cookie recipes (causing bellies to expand somewhat). Yes, the Albion Cookie Factory truly immersed itself in cookie and biscuit folklore. So to whet ones appetite we had a little website for friends of Albion to see the full Albion Cookie Processification.

We teased the idea with emails and the idea of secret special edition cookies. Then when baking day came we baked a truck load of cookies. Then wrapped them up nicely and sent them out.

I really love the way the online and real world can come together in such scrumptiousness.

We even broadcast one kitchen live over Skype.

We created idents to make the branding feel much more filmic and special while reataining a sense of magic. Of course we still had to explain what Joost was so…

One of the most interesting things is when the What is Joost? film got leaked onto You Tube. People were actually using the comments area to ask each other for invites. This made the film a great word of mouth tool.

No Turning Back…

Joost is…
The hairs on the back of your neck standing up. You watch. Smile. Watch some more. Then tell your friends. It’s like the first time you liked someone.

Joost is…
You telling TV what you like.

………………………………………………………………………………

The Venice Project

Joost began life as The Venice Project – an invitation only closed beta. I helped develop the ideals behind the brand then created Behind The Scenes documentaries about these stars of internet to get the techie community gossiping.

This is part of the strategy to build the buzz around the project among tech enthusiasts. This isn’t about hype or stunts, but by getting their people talking directly to the community, just telling the truth. So I thought about what we wanted to reveal at this stage, planned some scenarios, and took a documentary film maker to Leiden and London to shoot them. The briefest bit of editing, and then we posted them on their website.

Here they are for your viewing pleasure. Look out for a few odd touches! My favourites are the blank phone conversation and trying to explain how Joost will work with figurines.

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I then designed and wrote copy for the Fruitstock website and filled it full of great things happening on the day. This enabled me take the Pass It On concept to another level. Any attraction or band featured on the site could be passed onto a friend, who you think may be excited by that particular thing – making it more personal.

This was the email invitation for Fruitstock. When it was forwarded, it automatically created a daisy chain of recipient names. As the email got passed around all your friend’s names got added to the daisy chain on the right, making the email more viral.

Oh no, flashback to hand-cramp from drawing loads with colouring pencils, arrgh.

My Creative Director Matt Gibbins had an idea to film squirrels for a Fruitstock viral. So we all banded together filmed and edited a Fruitstock viral and a load of short stings. You’ll have to take my word for it but it got in the Lycos top 5 viral chart. Very prestigious.

Fruitstock Squirrels from Aaron Hinchion on Vimeo.

View BMC website

For Blaupunkt an attitude was developed to appeal to a younger audience. That way we could have a conversation with our audience without sounding like their parents. The Blaupunkt Motoring Club (BMC) gave Blaupunkt ideals about music and driving. The BMC site featured upcoming events, reviews, music to listen to that was related to articles, car custom tips and music nights into an energetic experience.

I art directed, designed and wrote content for the website. My good friend Tim McNaughton developed and coded the 3D style navigation and the unique database behind the flash site.

Tideford Organic foods are made in Tideford, Devon. They’re about Tideford Time, their own slowly more relaxed lifestyle. Charged with coming up with a online concept I thought what could be a really slow, relaxed way of doing a website. Ah ha – How about a book. A book you read while laying down in the grass. Genius.

P.S. Notice the church clock is always at the right time. Details.