The Pomegranate Phone: When Internet Marketing goes wrong

Good grief, people. Get over it! In the big picture, does it really affect you all THAT much? It's a cute, creative idea. Period. I, personally, was proud to see something that quality come out of Canada. We would never learn anything if people didn't try new things. Now, perhaps you could turn some of that critical energy into something more positive?

Thanks!

I'm a little late to the discussion, but maybe by this time there are actually results from the campaign that could prove if it was flop or a resounding success?

My gut told me this would not be a successful campaign -- I loved the idea and brilliant execution of the site but felt it was a total disconnect to the 'brand' and would have a big let-down p/o factor for viewers.

But who cares what I think or anyone else? Let's get the stats.

What was the click-through rate to the Nova Scotia site? What kind of time was spent on the tourism site, how many pages were viewed? And how many provided an email and requested more information from Nova Scotia tourism.

That should provide some answers to whether $300,000 was well-spent or not.

Actually, it was funny to me how well it worked. I'm studying industrial design, a knowledge/creative economy kind of job and was directed to the sight from the forums of a design website. I thought the site was hilarious, moreso because of the bizarrely good production values put into it.

Originally from Edmonton, it got me to thinking. If I can bring my own job with me, why not. After all, how many places in the world can a student afford ocean front property?

I love hearing about how angry people get over this. Gimme a break. It's totally cool and probably hits the target market they want to hit. How dare someone do something completely different!! How dare they think outside the box and drum up all this attention!! We need more and more of this type of marketing. Well done.

i totally disagree with this article. the fact that you're even talking about it, proves it works.
i'm from nova scotia, and i'm proud to have such an innovative way to attract attention to it's AWSOMENESS.
there is no such thing as bad publicity right? it is what it is. new, fresh and fabulous! now everyone what knows what anyone who's ever lived in n.s. allready knew....the east coast is indeed, a cool place, with cool people, & not everyone there FISHES for a living.

I actually found the link for the Pphone website on MSN (strange though - MSN seemed to think it's a new mobile device as well, as it was listed in the 'Tech & Gadgets' field under 'Most Recent Posts'). The site is an amazing showcase from the marketing perspective (IF there was such a phone). Hats off to the designers and creators! I also agree that the original message was lost in the medium this time. Perhaps the Pphone itself could have had a separate link, or menu ( for entertainment purposes). I also think the true message should have more obvious - viewers shouldn't have had to go through the issues mentioned by other posters, just to find out in the end that it was a Tourism message after all. I estimated the entire navigation of all the site's options took about 5 - 7 minutes(on a cable connection). Why not have brought home the message of Nova Scotia's benefits within a minute of two instead of being the proverbial punchline at the end of all of that navigating? In my thoughts, I had this niggling question: What if our website visitors actually believed in such a device...could there actually be a demand for such a thing? I envisioned all of those that were caught by the tourism tag and then, with a selfish secondary thought..started thinking more getting this Pphone rather than visiting Nova Scotia. Could you imagine the consequences if the phone became more in demand than the province's benefits? Sad to say, but I think it is possible..on the web, just about anything can happen!

To any of you who thought the Pomegranate was a bad finantial choice - check out http://jonzed.com. A Revolve/Egg colaboration funded by the general public (NSLC).

Is it just me or should the general public really be funding such foul mouthed content (regardless for whom it is targeting)?

I totally bought into this campaign and got all dreamy about the final "aha". Thought it was very cool, slick and really cool! Now it was also a risk as any viral campaign is going to be. You cannot guarantee it's effectiveness as it needs real word-of-mouth (ala internet age) pass-aroundness. Us in the media creation biz have both a tolerance for exploring things like this and a sharp critique but we are the extreme minority for the Pphone's intended audience. That's where I think it it falls down. I think that the right audience will"noodle" around and find it and start that WOM but that audience is the techie/phone-phreaks versus would be travelers and returning ex-pats.

Although, if the B-story campaign was to stir up a but of controversy over budget, execution and overall effectiveness in the blogosphere/twitershpere and social media landscape then they may have hit it right on the "phone". Even riskier and cunning, would be brilliant (would be unlikely too).

Sometime you have to take the risk. We always crap on government for not taking chances so they may have not hit it out of the park with this one, but at least they stepped up to bat.

Craig

Here's what you do: After the "hook," the first video about how awesome the phone is, before you start exploring, the NS Come to Life logo sits at the bottom corner of the screen.

If the Pom Phone videos are entertaining enough, the fact that it's revealed to be a gag so soon doesn't matter. By keeping the real message an easter egg, it shows a lack of confidence that the Pom Phone videos are themselves a standalone, entertainment product.

If your microsite is good enough, fun enough, interesting enough, people will still spread it around to their friends even if it's almost immediately shown to be an advertisement for a product.

The means (watching and sharing a fun, cool site) justifies the end (helping advertise Come to Life).

I was anonymous, now I'm not. ** Full disclosure: I did come clean to Jeff over a beer that I was the anonymous poster, we discussed the issue person-to-person and had a much better understanding of each others view ** As for the Pphone (as I shall call it) I can't really comment, as I couldn't wait for it to load. Sheesh! But I think the feedback illustrates why those god-awful Glo-Signs work - they get the message across quickly & clearly (sic). Being clever is a nice addition, but ...

Interesting, I had no idea what this "pomegranite phone" thing was about, I clicked through to the page, waited for it to load, saw it was some sort of demo for a new phone thingie, and went "meh, some new phone" and closed the page.

I had no idea it was some sort of marketing ploy to promote Nova Scotia. I can see it losing a lot of the target audience just through indifference.

Just my $0.02

I completely disagree. The whole concept of viral marketing is to draw the readers in through "buzz", and this is completely what this site did. I heard about it through word of mouth, and when I did indeed experience the site, i was thoroughly impressed with the fact that a conservative and "heritage-driven" province such as Nova Scotia was actually utilizing with this form of marketing.

Kudos for Nova Scotia on promoting itself in such a way. I am sure the demographics of the younger generations will appreciate their attempts.

yeah, there is a definite negative vibe against this catchy and original website from the usual set of naysayers who think they know all there is to know about marketing and success.

I can see why you would point to twitter, since the clique fired up a twemes.com tag (#pombomb) just so they could collect their hostility against it.

people will continue to pass the website around and keep the campaign going, and the cost was $300,000 - a bargain. much better for the government to engage LOCAL businesses to do this kind/style of fun and interesting site, instead of making limited use print media ads which can run near $60,000 (for a 1 day, 1 page ad in the boston paper, for example).

Any idea how they could have got the message across better? I had a brief look at the site and found it entertaining, but wouldn't have even known about the 'Come to Nova Scotia' connection if I hadn't seen the news article about it in the local paper the next day. It's nice that they're trying something other than playing damn fiddle music while showing people step-dancing to attract people to NS, but I'm not sure how many people will ever find the Easter egg in the first place.

Agreed! The meat and the ask are lost: "Share" and interior stuff were forgotten for the shiny bauble flash.