What are we doing lately?
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(This is post is constantly being updated.)
October 11, 2017
We’ve recently been re-engaged by Microsoft (yay) to create #people stories so it has been a chance for me to reflect on and share some previous work. Microsoft have an impeccable pedigree in brand storytelling with their Microsoft Stories. One of the most popular blogs we’ve ever written featured my interview a couple of years ago with Steve Clayton whose job title is now simply Chief Storyteller at Microsoft. Steve’s editorial code is ’no bullsh*t, no corporate speak, no rockstars, (and) no platitudes’ which we quite like. So, from the vault I thought I’d pull out and share a film we made two years ago about a Microsoft-sponsored app that helped people in wheelchairs navigate their way around Bangkok’s notoriously disability unfriendly streets – and featuring members of the Thai Paralympic wheelchair basketball team in the lead up to Rio 2016.
You can see the film here (duration 2:30)
You can read the blog with Steve’s interview here (five minute read)
We covered two fashion weeks this week, both with a focus on Epson’s fabric-printing technology. We look at Melinda Looi’s new range in Kuala Lumpur which can be found here (three minute read). And in London we focus on John Herrara’s ‘Armada’ collection here (also a three minute read).
Also this week, Guillaume Sachet talks about Mediacorp’s investment in Singapore-based Mentorica a retail analytics and street advertising firm which uses AI and facial recognition to tell what people are looking at. You can read it here. (Five minute read.) And our latest advice for Singapore’s SMEs from Singtel’s techblog focuses on making your website mobile friend. You can read it here. (Three minute read)
Also keep an eye out on our Instagram account as content director Fraser Morton’s portfolio of behind the scenes photos from our shoots over the last few years will be playing for the next fortnight from today.
October 4, 2017
LinkedIn infeed video has been going for a few weeks and we’re already seeing amazing take up. We’ve been working on a few formats for LinkedIn, as well as Facebook and Instagram and the first one is #people stories. This started with the Instagram videos we did for Mediacorp that I’ve already shared. The 60-second unscripted interview format has allowed us to cut production times and produce highly authentic, snackable content for infeed. Here’s the latest film we did for one of Singapore’s best-known inner-city restaurants and bars, Club Street Social where we spoke to owner Min about her vision to bring a little bit of New York City to Singapore. The film has had a great response and several thousand views across various platforms since its release a week ago.
You can see the film here. (60 seconds.) Read more about what we’re doing on #people stories here. (Two minute read)
September 27, 2017
This week we’ve released our first podcast and the response has been very positive. A few months ago we built a podcast studio in Click2View complete with soundproof velvet curtains and high-backed chairs and it’s great to finally put it to use. Podcast listening increased by 23 per cent between 2015 and 2016 and is continuing to grow. Incidentally the number one podcast on iTunes in 2015 was, The Message, and it was made by a brand, GE. The Message is a factual mystery about an alien radio transmission from the 1940s. According to Hubspot one in 10 marketers are adding podcasts to their content repertoires this year.
I was a late convert to podcasts and it wasn’t till I understood how much I’d missed listening to a good old conversation that I came around. The Click2View Content Hour is a long-form conversation with leaders in the content industry. We kick off with Mediacorp’s Miguel Bernas on whether brands should become publishers and how Hollywood character types and story structures should be part of the content marketer’s skill set.
Podcasts are perhaps best for explaining concepts that are new or complicated. This was really brought home to me this morning in a WhatsApp message from my father. My dad has for years struggled to understand what I did for a living after leaving journalism. This morning he wrote after listening to our podcast: “I am fascinated by it. How far this has all come. The implications for other organisations who still dwell in the realm of press releases and print and TV and social media is major. The way the content should be part of what the product is!??!? Anyway I’m just starting to get my head around it. I really enjoyed it.” A very pleasing endorsement.
You can listen to the podcast here. It’s 30 minutes long and best enjoyed with headphones in a comfy chair.
This week also saw the release of a video explaining the work of the Visa School of Public Policy in Singapore. The school has been in existence since 2011 and aims to be a trusted partner and thought leader to government regulators and policy makers around the world through programs to improve awareness of the benefits of good policy and regulation around electronic payments and innovation.
You can watch the video here. It’s 4 minutes long.
September 20, 2017
Our latest TVC has just been released for Bank of China’s new Sheng Siong Visa card. The concept was to show scenarios where you might earn cash back using the new card, such as catching a Grab taxi, and then shower the actors with cash. Easy right?
Silly us. Getting a load of notes to burst uniformly in the air and flutter down gently had the team flummoxed and the conference room at C2V became an inventors lab while the photocopier printed out sheets of dummy Singaporean currency to test various options. We looked at everything from a homemade potato gun to a vacuum cleaner to get the notes to explode evenly over the actor. Eventually we burst balloons full of notes, from above, to get the effect right. (The scene took four takes.) My favourite touch was the origami money in the restaurant.
You can see the commercial on Bank of China’s Facebook page here.
Working with journalists to find stories on behalf of, or about, our clients, is one of the most exciting things we do. Often though, digital stories are taken from other sources and there’s little original reporting. We try and avoid this as much as possible which is why I always look forward to seeing what one of our star contributors, Annabelle Liang, The Associated Press correspondent in Singapore, comes up with when she’s on the SME beat for Singtel’s myBusiness. Annabelle’s latest piece is a profile of exciting Singaporean start up igloohome who have been named an AirBnB global partner.
You can see the story (10 minute read) on Singtel’s myBusiness site here.
September 13, 2017
This week I want to share a pilot film we did for Visa a couple of months back. Titled A Chef, a Filmmaker and Tuk Tuk Named Monika it was filmed in Jaipur and features this unlikely trio (if we can count a machine in the cast) on their quest to drive around India and film people’s stories in return for cooking them a meal. I was presenting at All That Matters yesterday and used this film as an example of how innovative brands are becoming with content. With projects like this and episodic content like Solo Traveller featuring multiple distribution channels, Visa is essentially acting like a traditional broadcaster and certainly living up to a content-first business model.
Following on from our big “reveal” last week on the work we’ve been doing for Mediacorp we’ve got oodles to share. Here’s our video profile of Channel News Asia journalist Olivia Siong who said it was nerve wracking being the object of questioning for a change. Instagram picture and story on actor Romeo Tan which unsurprisingly, as an artiste, scored lots of likes. His name really is Romeo by the way. And the latest LinkedIn CXO blog from Guillaume Sachet, head of social on why Mediacorp is partnering with start ups.
On the blogging front, I end up feeling the work we do for Singtel’s myBusiness is always speaking to me. Such as this one on how to find a work life balance as an SME owner. (Still struggling with that.) Hopefully we’re better on this topic, on how to make your Facebook or Instagram videos standout. And there’s this on how to design a great digital experience for your customers.
Finally, the latest in our content best practice series on the Click2View blog is on how to win the respect and trust of your customers with content. That’s it for this week folks. Enjoy the rest of your Wednesday.
September 6, 2017
This week, after six months of hard work we can reveal a remarkable employer branding content campaign we were privileged to work on for Mediacorp.
Over six months, working with exceptionally talented Singaporean photographer Juliana Tan, we went behind the scenes to tell the daily life stories about the people who make up Mediacorp. From Benny Chew, who runs the company coffee shop, to camera operator Ahmad Fakhry Bin Zainodin talking about how his son is following in his footsteps. Actor Tay Ping Hui spoke about how he planned to become an economist before he discovered acting, and receptionist K Letchimi revealed her stories about fans and fandom, experienced over many years staffing the front desk at Singapore’s national broadcaster.
The inspiration was varied but came from the Humans of New York Instagram account and some of the behind the scenes photography of Barack Obama when he was U.S. President. We didn’t stop at photo stories. There were video stories, like this one with DJ Joakim Gomez and LinkedIn blogs like this from Chief Customer Officer Debra Soon to connect with business leaders and provide informative commentary from the top. To share our thoughts on content creation we hosted five “lunch-and-learn” sessions for staff at Mediacorp each attended by 70-80 people.
We took over the Mediacorp Instagram account (where you can see all this and more) and grew the followers by 63 per cent within six months. This was a below-the-radar campaign with no promotion or paid media – the idea being to generate interest slowly and organically and then lift over time, which is why we can only begin talking about it now. Mediacorp social media lead Marco Sparmberg explains here in a LinkedIn post this week how the company is trying to create a business culture for digital creators and storytellers. Big thanks to Karen Yew, Nadeem Ashraf, Miguel Bernas, Yeong Lai Lai, Marco, Debbie Khoo, Pauline Tan and everyone else who contributed, not least the great team at Click2View, including co-founder Neal Moore, digital content director Erik Magelssen, content advisor Artur Akhmetzyanov, and a very special mention for BBC journalist and part-time Click2Viewer Tim McDonald, who stepped in as editorial lead for much of the project. Great job everyone.
August 30, 2017
This week Citibank has released its latest wealth insights video where Citi’s Florence Tan talks to Professor Paulin Straughan, Dean of Students at the Singapore Management University and Ayesha Khanna, CEO and Co-founder of ADDO AI about skills that will be needed in the future and how educators respond.
In blogging for Singtel’s myBusiness we describe how SME’s can protect their data using the cloud, and for Singtel’s Adtiq blog, teaching SMEs about digital marketing, we offer a guide to what UTM tracking is and why it’s useful, plus a how-to on setting up and optimising a Facebook page for a small business.
On Click2View’s blog and company LinkedIn page, we’ve added the second instalment in our best practice series. This time, we riff off US content everywhere man Gary Vaynerchuk’s mantra of just getting started on content to give you a guide to the three basic things you need to get right as you kick off your content journey.
August 23, 2017
This week the first episodes of our Winter Traveler content for Visa have been released on VisaAPNews. These three episodes (one, two and three) all made for the Japanese market are focused on promoting travel to, and things to do around, the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeong Chang, South Korea. There’s more to come later this year.
After last week’s release of our story for Google Play on the Singapore-based streaming service Viki I’ve created a playlist of all our Android Developer Stories for Google Play. The view count for our episodes in this global series is at 1.25m and counting.
In blogging this week, we went out into the heartlands of Singapore and found an SME owner for Singtel’s MyBusiness who fully automated his traditional provision store, completely DIY. As part of our series on artists and Epson’s SureColor printing technology we covered artist Nini Marini’s journey applying her designs to all manner of objects and surfaces. And we look at the digital media metrics SMEs need to know about for Singtel’s Adtiq blog.
On Click2View’s blog we dive into the perennial debate about outsourcing content creation to an agency (like us) or doing it in-house and we try and answer the question straight, with as little self interest as possible.
August 16, 2017
Our latest Android Developer Story on the Singapore video streaming startup success story Viki has been published. Here is the accompanying blog. Our Android Developer Stories are collectively on more than a million views and this one is approaching 10,000 after a few days. Not bad for B2B. Thanks Google Play. This is one of the best yet.
In blogging this week, we published this lovely profile of the founder of Awfully Chocolate for Singtel’s myBusiness. We covered Cisco’s 2017 mid-year Cybersecurity Report for them and this piece is on the story of the moment, ransomware. Our blog for Epson on their excellent printing technology is live, here’s a piece on what artists think of the Epson SureColor P607. Finally some of our new work for Singtel’s incredibly useful Adtiq blog helping SMEs become familiar with digital marketing.
Finally, we’re jazzed that Click2View and Visa have been honoured again for the Solo Traveller series at the prestigious Content Marketing Awards, run by the Content Marketing Institute (CMI) in the United States. We were a finalist in two categories Best Motivational Video or Video Series and Best Content Marketing Program in Financial Services. Here’s our post and here’s the full list of winners. We’re very happy to be counted amongst the best in the world.
August 2, 2017
This week we announce the arrival of our new editorial content director Jackie Shorey which got a bit of coverage in the local marketing press. Jackie was a journalist and editor at the Financial Times for 18 years, managing editor of Wallpaper magazine and most recently the New York-based editor-in-chief of the Brunswick Review, the communications journal of the Brunswick Group. Jackie will oversee all our blogging and written work and her experience producing magazines adds a custom print publishing capability to Click2View.
Also, we’ve published our latest case study on a scripted comedy cartoon series we did for Cisco featuring a pack of prairie dogs, using them as an example of Cisco’s attack continuum cybersecurity architecture can defend your pack – so to speak. The cartoon teaser led into a series of cartoons and gated e-books to drive leads and was picked up by various cybersecurity-focused media outlets and social channels.
July 26, 2017
This week our latest Visa Merchant Stories from Myanmar have been released. These were filmed and edited on location with a three-day turnaround and are all in the Burmese language. Local banks were given the go ahead to issue Visa cards for domestic use in January. In traditionally cash focused Myanmar, these videos are to show merchants how electronic payments can benefit their businesses. #cashlesssociety.
I’ve mentioned Philippines social media star Bianca Gonzalez before. She of the 1.8m Instagram followers. She has even more on Facebook, 2.8m, and our video with her, for her Visa cashless challenge has now been viewed 195,000 times. We’re trying to figure out how we can work with Bianca again.
We’ve released our latest case study video. This one is on our Tasty videos for Panasonic late last year. Tasty videos were popularised by Buzzfeed, you’ll know them by their heavy use of overhead cameras and the fact that you only see the chef’s hands. Ours uses the same technique plus some beauty shots to show off Panasonic’s excellent kitchen appliances in a series of food “hacks”.
We’ve been re-contracted to continue producing editorial content of Singtel’s myBusiness blog – which is one of our favourite gigs, thanks Singtel. And we finished out the old retainer with a lovely story about what’s in store for small Singapore traders – known as the rag and bone men – after the closure of the Sungei Road Thieves Market.
July 19, 2017
This week the videos and pictures from Manchester City legend Paul Dickov’s visit to Singapore for Mundipharma’s Betadine are up on Facebook and Twitter. Including this one on the Man City Facebook page. Happy client by all reports.
We have had a long relationship with Citibank producing content for a number of departments including their mid-year outlook films for wealth management. The data is showing the latest one is the best yet – we think so too. Thanks Citi.
We’re seeing more and more co-branded marketing films being made. This one for Visa and Taiwan Taxi is playing out in the back of taxis across Taiwan for instance. We’ve recently completed another consumer marketing film that is going to be shown as inflight entertainment – I will reveal all when it’s out publicly. Who knew brands would end up becoming TV distributors.
It’s great to be part of something that is changing the world (apart from the content revolution) and working with Visa to cover the relentless shift to electronic payments is incredibly inspiring. Their focus is very much on looking at how electronic payments are changing things for the better, for all sorts of organisations and people. Here we spoke to business leaders and card holders in Vietnam about the way electronic payments are changing their lives. #cashlesssociety
July 12, 2017
This week: Our latest work for Ben & Jerry’s newest flavours is performing well. This Truffle Kerfuffle #flavourfilm is my favourite because it just makes me want to sing along. But the Urban Bourbon one I’m most proud of because the liquor labels – all our own creative – are very funny.
We’ve long been known as the video guys but we do a lot of editorial work. Notably for Singtel’s myBusiness Techblog. This one charts the digital transformation of a traditional SME, Royal Insignia. We’re totally bought into the Singtel team’s social mission to help SME’s as the engine room of the Singaporean economy.
Editorial expands the contact network significantly. This piece released for Kaplan last week leverages on our contacts in the supply chain world to explain logistics to potential business students.
Very-Fast Turnaround production is becoming better established. Last week we shot a scripted 2-minute product film on Wednesday for Visa. Four locations, three talents, and a rickshaw — the edit began on location (Wednesday) and first cut was completed end-of-day Friday. Not only does it crunch the time taken, it focuses everyone’s attention on the film over a very short period leading to better and more timely decision making. The idea is simple, the same or better quality, much faster. #VFTbyC2V
July 5, 2017.
This week we released Bianca Gonzalez Intal’s (better known as @iamsuperbianca) cashless challenge made in Manila for Visa. The social media superstar Instagrammed her 1.8m followers a cut-down version that has been viewed 45 thousand times in two days. What was special about this (apart from Bianca who is one of the best talents we’ve worked with) was that we did the edit real time and delivered the first and second cuts within 24 hours of wrapping the shoot.
Our Porsche 2.4 hours of Le Mans (the Singapore event) video was released this week. Our Bali-based content director Fraser Morton released a beautiful independent project with his creative coop Far Features on an incredibly talented young Singaporean photographer Lee Yik Keat. And I got papped (the slang term for being photographed by paparazzi) by the new Southeast Asia editor for Campaign Magazine, Babar Khan Javed.
One of our favourite gigs is working for the guys at Google Play who we do the Android Developers series for in Southeast and South Asia. This week they released our latest video for #IDGAMESCONTEST a competition for Android developers in Indonesia. Congratulations to all those in the winners circle.
Occasionally our clients let me loose on their copy. Here, for Singtel’s myBusiness tech blog, I wax lyrical on the business benefits of taking your clients to lunch regularly. Anyone for lunch?
June 1, 2017
Just need to do a big shout out to our client Visa, who never fail when it comes to having the guts to go out and tell a story.
This is a pilot for a show about a chef, a filmmaker, and a tuk tuk called Monika. A terrific trio who are three-wheeling there way across India cooking for people and hearing their life stories in return
I really hope this isn’t the last we see of these guys.
May 16, 2017
This is our documentary about Singapore’s first team to compete in one of motor racing’s most prestigious competitions, the 24 hours of Le Mans, in June last year. It’s just been released in time for this year’s race. As a piece of work it is one of our all-time favourites. More importantly, it’s getting some great engagement stats.
Thanks Motul and Clearwater Racing for being such champs, on and off the track.
March 12, 2017
In February we were in South Korea shooting for the wonderful folks at Visa for some upcoming Olympic content. All will be revealed soon.
But here’s a little taste from our Instagram feed The Cutting Room Floor, where we put all those great shots that don’t make the final cut for one reason or another.
A post shared by The Cutting Room Floor by C2V (@cuttingroomflor) on May 20, 2017 at 3:49am PDT
The South Korean winter shoot is another instalment in our multi-award winning Solo Traveller series for Visa.
The series recently picked up a bronze in the Southeast Asia Markies in the female audience category, a strong follow up from it’s gold in the marketing excellence awards last year in the same category.
This is one of our favourite episodes featuring some long-board skating in Seoul.
July 25, 2016
We make Google Play’s Android Developer series of case study videos in Southeast Asia. We were very proud that this one, shot in Jaipur in India, about an app developer who is teaching languages to people who didn’t have access to such an app before, was played out at Google’s IO event in Mountain View. Very proud.
We do quite a bit of work for Google locally in Singapore as well. This film featured Hai Sia Seafood, the multi-generational Singapore SME that was mentioned PM Lee’s National Day Speech in 2016 for its brave move into digital technology.
In this film we enjoyed working with Singapore street artists on a campaign to encourage millennials to print stickers for Canon Pixma.
