Who says that is not possible to buy friends?

Have you ever received requests of friendships in Facebook from people that doesn’t know you and from countries where you never were ? If so, your name can be in one of the lists of the Australian company uSocial, whose specialty is to sell friends and fans in social networks.

The uSocial already offers similar service in Twitter and it suffers heavy critics for promoting spam, according to Reuters. In its defense, the company affirms that drives their services to the social networks due to the great potential advertising that they offer.

Facebook is a tool of extremely effective marketing, according to Léon Hill, uSocial CEO, in an official report. The reality is that, if you get many friends in Facebook, automatically an instantaneous and addressed group of individuals will exist and they can be used to promote whatever that you want. The only difficulty is that can be very complicated to get so many followers. That the objective of the uSocial.

The company sells packages between thousand and 10 thousand friends in Facebook, the largest social network of the world, at prices that vary between US$ 177 and US $ 1.167. The great problem is the form as those “friends” are “offered.”

“Everything that we do is to send a message of welcomes or inclusion request in the customer’s friends’ list. In case the people decide to go ahead and to accept the new friend or fan” they can yes or no, said Hill to Australian media.

Due to the methodology used by uSocial to offer the packages, huge controversy arose. According to some Australian sites, Twitter tried to close the uSocial, accusing it of practicing spam, while the newspaper Los Angeles Times reported that Digg.com, site in which the people vote for their favorite sites or news, had also tried to close the uSocial because it sells votes.

Facebook is the more popular social network and the fourth most visited site of the world, with more than 250 million registered users. The company has among its investors Peter Thiel, Accel Partners, Microsoft and the Russian investment group Digital Sky Technologies.

Via: uSocial.

Vision Foundation of India has come up with interesting campaign to appeal to people to pledge their eyes for donation before their death. These prints of eye-balls in different near-death situations will surely draw attention but they look very graphic and repulsive.

All the near death situations suggest suicides. Train, Rope, Ledge are symbolisms used for death. Tagline goes:
“Don’t kill your eyes. Donate them instead.
If you don’t donate your eyes at the time of death, you are literally letting them ‘die’ with you. So you are killing your eyes as you don’t let them live on”

Yes, it is an emotional appeal to let eyes live on even after death. The important point that eyes can make someone else see for rest of their lives is left unsaid. Also the true message of need of vision by millions remains understated. Such social campaigns look good from positive angle. In this series death is more visible than the life. Person committing suicide is usually under much distress and not all would be in a state of mind to donate eyes before taking the plunge or tying the noose.

Via Advertolog

Many NGOs come up with innovative campaigns to sell their products to generate funds for their social programs. So this message of Unicef Croatia, which urges people to buy their cards and save lives is not new but the way this campaign is done was very novel indeed!

This is a picture of original wall graffiti on a school wall in Croatia. Their target is very clear. It is indeed school kids who are most enthusiastic about buying and posting Merry Christmas and Happy New Year cards. And also it is important to create awareness in the young lot about the state of poor people and how little help can save many lives. Thus good work being done by Unicef gets publicity too.

Amazingly the ad campaigns are going local in the globalised world! World Wild Life Fund did some installation campaigns recently in Paris and elsewhere. Motivating local communities does make sense. And creating a buzz over internet makes it global anyways. Hope this trend of using creative art directly in ad campaigns stays for long. Artists and creative people are after all back bones of advertising!

Via: Osocio

Former and in-service Presidents of United States have appeared in various public interest campaigns in the past. But President elect Barack Obama is all set to appear in a national print ad before taking office on Jan 20. This is one campaign that cannot wait that long.

January is observed as a National Month of Mentoring in United States. Future President Obama will send an important message on the occasion along with his popular promise of change. The print ad with Obama’s message on the need of mentoring a child is being produced on behalf of Servicenation.org.

Is this another move to cash on his present popularity and an attempt to ride on Obamamania that is sweeping the nation? Well, the cause and message both are important. To bring in any change it is important to become agent of that change. What better way than becoming a mentor of a child and building bridges between haves and have-nots? The timing of the campaign and choice of Future President with his promise of better future seems to be perfect. This seems to be continuity of Barack Obama’s campaign. A subtle difference is that is a social campaign and not an election campaign!

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Via International Herald Tribune

Here is a new multi-million dollar campaign launched by Reality Coalition about ‘Clean Coal’. The simple truth being put across in this TV, Print and Online campaign is that ‘Clean Coal’ simply doesn’t exist in reality!

The campaign points out that burning any kind of coal will add to global warming. This campaign will bust certain myths about reducing carbon emissions and cleaning up the environment by using clean coal. Coal Industry and politicians often campaign about making coal a better greener energy option! In reality industries need to focus on renewable greener options like solar and wind.

The Alliance for Climate Protection, League of Conservation Voters, Natural Resources Defense Council, National Wildlife Federation and the Sierra Club have come together in this joint project called the Reality Coalition. Only experts can reveal such hard reality in a simple truthful manner.

Global warming and climate change should become primary concern of each leading players in industry, environmental research, politics and also every citizen. Creating social awareness through such campaigns is the first important step. We all need to act or else the very survival of life on this planet will be at stake.

Via Adweek

This is another nice social awareness campaign. ‘The Gift of Reading’ has been an ongoing campaign of Literacy Foundation for last 10 years. On the eve of 10th anniversary they released new ads depicting fairy-tale heroes with a small message “When a child doesn’t read, imagination disappears”. How true!

None of us can imagine childhood without daily dose of fairy tale stories. Early reading begins with tales of these fairies, prince and princesses. But yet reading is taking a back seat. Though illiteracy is one of the main reasons but there is another bigger cause and that is onslaught of audio-visual media on young minds. This ad campaign maybe focusing on the need of literacy but it can be extended to encourage children to read more books. There is a need to bring back books and words weaving imaginary world in everyday life.

Creative directors and people of ad world can fulfill social responsibility in good creative ways. This is one such effort. They can play with words, images and mass psychology better than others. If not for others they have done this one for themselves. Higher the literacy, more people will be able to read their ad messages!

Via Advertolog

If you are in New Zealand and on your way to pick up developed prints from developing stores, then you might be surprised to see some blank prints in your envelope. This is a rare person-to-person campaign undertaken by Alzheimer’s New Zealand. The last photo says – “the first thing you lose are your memories. For more information & support visit alzheimers.org.nz”.

Dementia is beginning of Alzheimer’s and what better way than playing a memory trick to promote the cause. Blank photos can signify many things. Nice symbolism. Photo prints are frozen precious moments of life and what if memory starts getting erased? Early detection and intervention can help in preventing and curing dementia. It is a good campaign for a good cause.

Social advertising must have wide out-reach as well individual reach. One has to innovate constantly to be different to catch elusive attention of people. Guerrilla marketing has to be very effective. This campaign will surely help in creating awareness but will it help generate funds?

Via Invisible Red/Direct Daily

Here is a compelling reason for parents to finally kick the butt. Quit Victoria, part of Cancer Council Victoria, Australia, has launched ‘Separation’ campaign to urge elders to quit smoking and live longer for the sake of their children. The message is put across very nicely through this short commercial.

Statistics of early deaths of people with history of smoking or standard statutory warnings on cigarette packs tend to be ignored. For addicts there is never really a convincing reason to quit. Quit smoking campaigns with repelling pictures of tobacco related mouth cancer too seem ineffective. Smoking can kill. This is a simple truth. Another truth is death will be final separation from your own child. The ad here depicts an abandoned or separated /lost child on a busy station. This campaign depicting separation anxiety of young child hits home the message really hard.

Public interest, non-profit social campaigns play an important and difficult role in modern society. They have to be subtly persuasive, play more on emotions to seek attention of busy population. They have nothing to sell, but a commitment to put across the much ignored truths of daily life.

Via The Inspiration Room/Quit Victoria

Amnesty International Finland has put up this campaign poster with a freedom message that truly touches the heart. Sometimes simple black and white sketches do convey a lot more than most of the colourful campaigns with big slogans.

This picture of a young girl (and her hands tied with threads of her livelihood) with ‘Set her free’ slogan does put across the message about the organization and its mission of safeguarding human rights.

Many children and teenagers get sucked into a life of oppression and bonded labour. They often need only a helping hand to pull them out of it all. They have a right to childhood, education and normal life like all other children and teenagers.

Amnesty International has a strong presence in all trouble-zones and poor countries of the world. Their main source of income is from donations. Hence ad campaigns are important to get support for the good work.

The reality is stark and poignant. This picture truly depicts it. Hope they’ll able to bring back smile and colour in young lives.

Via Ads of the world

The message here in the picture is simple and straight. Bullets which ruthlessly kill bears, elephants, sharks and other animals for exotic food and fashion are indeed are coming from you. The symbolics of coin being bullet makes the sin all more clear.

Many NGOs, organizations often put up these social, non-profit ad campaigns to create awareness about vital issues which are often ignored. Over-consumption, consumerism, fashion and food trends often lead to mindless abuse of wildlife. These reminders are important and effective as well.

We see conservation efforts in our daily life too. People are going for organic products, its trendy to say no to fur or other wildlife products, recycling is in, plastic use is on the way out. But yet efforts are not enough because much is getting lost due to global warming and climate change if not for direct human consumption. Global warming and climate change again is due to human activities. The gun is indeed in our hand!
Via: commercial-archive