This is the archive.php file

Happy 15th Birthday YouTube – Here are your highlights…

This month, YouTube is fifteen years old. As a member of the Generation Z clan, I find that hard to process.

As we know, YouTube has provided a cemented platform for cute cats and wannabe Evel Knievels hysterically falling from small walls, but it had a more-than-profound effect on the marketing and public relations world.

TV adverts were something we used to skip to go make a cup of tea, or a window of time in which to relieve your bladder. But, since its launch in 2005, YouTube has provided the platform for some incredible advertising communications that exceed what was we thought was virally possible.

Here are some of the best viral YouTube-based marketing campaigns we have seen:

1. Dollar Shave Club

Razor subscription service Dollar Shave Club is a very interesting brand. It was almost solely built up through influencer marketing through brand deals with YouTubers and has gone on to secure almost 3.2 million subscribers to its service worldwide.

In 2012, they launched one of their first promotional videos on YouTube, racking up a total of nearly 27 million views so far. The video is incredibly satirical, clever and downright hilarious!

2. Always’ #LikeAGirl

http://youtube.com/watch?v=XjJQBjWYDTs

An incredibly powerful and eye-opening campaign, Always’ 2014 ‘#LikeAGirl’ campaign was an early adopter of including a hashtag in a title to help spread a communication. With nearly 69 million views, the campaign is supportive and uplifting and is perfectly summarised by the first line in its description:

“Join Always in our epic battle to keep girls’ confidence high during puberty and beyond. Using #LikeAGirl as an insult is a hard knock against any adolescent girl.”

Brilliant.

3. Gillette’s ‘The Best a Man Can Be’

http://youtube.com/watch?v=koPmuEyP3a0

Another campaign that questioned gender expectations and stereotypes was Gillette’s 2019 campaign, swapping their iconic tagline ‘The Best a Man Can Get’ for ‘The Best a Man Can Be’ to promote the end of toxic masculinity.

It was an incredibly powerful piece and despite the quite strong backlash it received (shown by the hugely disproportionate amount of dislikes on the video), Gillette’s campaign fulfilled its sole purpose – to make the world stop and think.

4. GoPro’s ‘Fireman Saves a Kitten’

A great example of let ‘the product do the talking.’ Video camera market leaders GoPro, uploaded footage of an unconscious kitten being rescued from a burning house by a firefighter. All shot on a Hero camera, the harrowing and intense clip was shared worldwide and viewed 43 million times.

All GoPro had to do was stick their brand logo at the start of the footage and the advertisement was complete. Buzzwords like durable, reliable, sturdy and dependable all spring to mind without ever being said.

5. John Lewis Christmas Adverts

http://youtube.com/watch?v=r9D-uvKih_k

One of the most famous Christmas adverts is actually one of the best viral video examples of last year. When someone says ‘have you seen the John Lewis Christmas advert’, you don’t immediately sit in front of the TV and wait attentively until it comes around, you grab YouTube and it’s there on the homepage. The most viewed article across most of the big newspaper sites last Christmas was the John Lewis advert.

Spanning both traditional and new advertising platforms with a successful campaign? John Lewis completed it mate.

 

 

What will the food trends of 2020 look like?

Veganuary really is just the beginning. In 2004, The Guardian published an article that claimed that the ‘developed world’s over reliance on meat would be of the most pressing issues for the survival of our species’.

To some extent, they were right. 350,000 people have signed up for Veganuary so far this month, but Veganuary is just the beginning of a whole new global diet. Whilst a plant-based diet was a radical and revolutionary trend, new threats such as climate change and food shortages mean that it is highly likely that it will become a nutritional norm.

What will the diet of the next 30 years look like? We have compiled some of the latest, greatest and futurist eating trends and rating them based on what we think will be on the table for 2050.

Insects

Wow, that is a strong one to kick off with.

I know, but it is not as strange as you might think. Plenty of South-East Asian countries eat insects such as crickets waterbugs and even wasps, which can provide the protein and nutrients that ‘regular’ meat does.

The BBC reported back in 2012 that ‘The Dutch government is putting serious money into getting insects into mainstream diets. It recently invested one million euros (£783,000) into research and to prepare legislation governing insect farms.’ The overall cost to farm insects is substantially less than traditional farm animals and cattle, so it could be an interesting opportunity.

A big problem with using insects is the westernised stigma around not eating a creepy crawly, which is understandable, but insects can be crushed and used, without consumers knowing, as a traditional meat substitute such as in burgers and sausages. Eating a cricket burger would be much more digestible than a whole fried cricket on a plate.

‘Ooo I’d try that’ rating: 3/10

Lab-grown Meat

Also known as ‘in vitro’ meat. Meat grown from stem cells could also be the perfect solution to those who can’t give up the authenticity of a good burger. Plus, the production process emits 96 percent lower emissions than conventional meat and it also uses a drastic amount less water and land space.

A win win then?

Well not quite.

Per pound, in vitro ground beef costs nearly fifty times it’s conventional counterpart – so it is currently no where near the commercial stage and that is before you consider the cost of producing stem cell grown meat at a large scale. However, production and research have only been properly successful in the last decade, so by 2050 who knows what could be possible?

‘Ooo I’d try that’ rating: 9/10

Algae

Okay, is this getting a bit ridiculous now?

Bear with us on this. Algae has been used by Sheffield Hallam University as a substitute for salt in processed food. It has been said to give a very flavoursome taste like salt, but of course it contains very little natural salt. Using algae would also aid with global health concerns surrounding high sodium intake, such as strokes and high blood pressure.

The Japanese have been using it for years in salads and other dishes, so we could adopt this interesting ingredient quite quickly. They already have massive ‘algae farms’ that use sea water to aid farming, which is also great for the planet and preserving water, as it just goes straight back to the sea.

Ultimately, to really combat the problems surrounding current food production, we need to change our nutritional norms – it will save us in the long run.

‘Ooo I’d try that’ rating: 7/10