Over the last 12-18 months blur Group has been quietly sowing the seeds of a Creative Services revolution. We’ve explained how Crowdsourcing is a technique that corporates can embrace and that creatives don’t need to fear as a loss of revenues, but rather the way to find high-value work that they’d otherwise never encounter. We’ve [...]

At blur Group we’ve learnt a lot from marketing professionals about agency relationships.  We know that they’re as intrinsic to most marketers as their quarterly plan, their budgets and their brand’s reputation. As a consequence, when companies are looking for marketing innovation,  the agency is deemed central to any success. Whereas other outsourcing efforts are [...]

When Financial Directors, a breed that can normally produce a spreadsheet from a dinner party conversation, talk about tangible but unmeasurable ROI where social media is concerned you know that showing hard numbers is, well, hard.  But as we mentioned in our introduction to ROI measurement, financial return is part of the mix. We described [...]

Measurement, or its absence, is frequently held up as a reason to hold back on Social Media Marketing. CXOs will wave their hands in the air reluctant to embrace a dark art, an unmeasurable activity that will take up resources but, as many articles cite, is more about being there than actually delivering measurable results. [...]

One of a marketer’s rites of passage is writing their first agency brief. It might be to kick off a campaign or to test out a new agency as part of a beauty parade. Briefs take a lot of thought. The right brief leads to the right campaign leads to the right results. But have [...]

Here’s the best of the week from blur Group – put your feet up, draw the laptop closer and enjoy our read: The end of online? Wiped out by social media? This post looks at how marketing has become a bit obsessed with creating more disciplines rather than creating, well, more creativity. And if you [...]

2010 has seen blur Group’s Creative Crowdsourcing approach gain sizable momentum with large corporate clients, new startups and Crowds of Crowdies. Stirring up the world of advertising, it’s time to consider what’s going to happen in 2011 and what will win out. 1) Marketing will return to its first love: creativity. This year, new platforms [...]

The recent publication of a FastCompany piece “The Future of Advertising” has seen the online platforms abuzz with ideas. The #adfuture hashtag generates tweets aplenty and theories abound covering everything from new payment and reward models, to technology-driven, totally-automated agencies, like a manufacturing conveyor belt with campaigns rolling off on to the palettes. In trying [...]

Where were we? Ah, yes, autumn. It’s been a busy few weeks folks. Two London Underground tube strikes, a couple of working briefs with our friends at Paddy Power, a visit from the Pope and we gained a number seven placing in the Campaigns 2010 Agency rankings!

Campaigns Top 10 Creative Agency Ranking has just been released and blur Group debuts at No 7. We’re flattered. To quote: “… most of the creative agencies in our 2010 Top 10 are smaller than they were two years ago. Only one breaks the mould. And they were not even around two years ago.

We’ve been given a sneak look at the latest agency rankings due out next week from a well known marketing magazine. It lists the worlds largest ad agencies. And it will have the industry reeling. blur Group comes in 7th. This is a bit cheeky but we think it’s OK to spill a few beans [...]

Well that’s it then. The summer is over. The kids are going back to school, work outfits are in transition and we’re all bracing ourselves for colder, windier, rainier and generally darker days. So not a lot has changed then really- in Britain at least.

It’s Friday- and hopefully you know the drill by now. Our blur Group writers post blogs on Crowdsourcing, marketing, art, creatives, innovation and such forth. You read and hopefully enjoy them. Here are some of the week’s highlights.

Today marks the launch of blur Group’s next generation website- the latest step in our bid to challenge the world’s largest agencies. We believe Crowdsourcing will redefine the concept of creative agency and marketing services- which is just as well-  we’re the leading Crowdsourced creative group.

The concept of ‘agency’ or the role of ‘agent’ has not changed much in 100 years. Particularly when it comes to the creative agency. But there’s something a brewing in agency land.

blur Marketing took the FT Digital Media conference social. blur’s Crowds and clouds jazzed things up at the eventful conference and ricocheted speakers perspectives across the Twittersphere and social networks. Read all about it here.

The marketing services industry is changing. Big agencies are getting it from all sides. Google has eroded their media buying divisions. Social media is challenging their PR departments, while YouTube is confusing the hell out of TV advertising production. And mobile marketing – well that’s a whole new game of tennis.

We redisigned blur Marketing’s Facebook fan page. Here’s how you can improve yours. Use this great article on creating the perfect Facebook Fan page. We followed the step by step guide so check how it looks on our beloved blur Marketing fan page. Using ‘image real estate optimization’ we developed a custom badge for the [...]

We’re pretty confident that we’ve convinced you that blogging is key to your brand, so now let’s talk marketing. Photo by Bashed via Flickr You’re set for success, you picked your blogging platform and got it professionally designed. So what happens now? It’s highly likely that you’ll only be talking to yourself unless you get [...]

If you take social networking seriously you’ll end up with a personal brand. Here are some tips on how (not) to mange yours. Photo by bonked via Flickr If you’re reading this blog we’ll assume you’re experienced with social networks. Personal branding is the result of intensive use of social networking. A field we’ve been [...]

Hey singers, actors, artists and performers – are you getting your Facebook promotion right? Photo by carbonated via Flickr We recently launched Human Brands which we’re kinda excited about. It combines the vibrant visual effects of our design agency, blur Designs with the strategic influence of our digital agency, blur Marketing. Expanding a bit on [...]

P Diddy speaks out about artists need to develop and control their personal brands on and offline – inc social media. “Before, it was just at live shows, now you have to be able to do a great live show, you have to be able to do a great online interview, you need to have [...]