The ATL march to the marketing middle ground
The huge above-the-line empires have ruled our lands for quite some time, their size and resource is considerable but their hold on the conscience of the everyman is waning – and fast. Just as many digital shops are struggling to add thought and insight to their impressive production values, the ATL agencies are finding it hard to do more than animate their press ads in banners.
We all know it, they know it – I’ve worked for a couple of them myself and they all know it’s modernise or die time (OK, overdramatic – downsize). The things they are doing are often predictable and largely un-exciting, a digital shop buy out here, an iPhone app to support a press campaign there. Nothing that warrants particular comment. So it was a genuine curve-ball when Fallon released a social networking application called Skimmer.
What makes this remarkable is not their thinking; this is no Cadbury Gorilla or Sony Bravia Rabbits – all from the same minds. Rather it’s just how much they’ve polarised their approach – from revolutionary TV work to utilitarian web work. It’s just an application, not for a client and not even an original piece of technology – Flock already do this, in an arguably more useful fashion.
No – they’ve just a built an admittedly well designed, social aggregation tool. Plain and simple, but from Fallon – not predictable. They’ve only gone and jumped out of their trench and into the digital one, but they’re still skirting around the edge of the battlefield, just from the other side – but for now maybe that’s enough?
