Baby Carrots’ junk food-esque marketing campaign
September 23, 2010 § Leave a Comment
Bolthouse Farms and Crispin Porter + Bogusky have assembled a great satirical marketing campaign for baby carrots in the style of junk food ads. Entertaining and fun. And if that’s not enough, the campaign comes with its very own microsite, and iPhone app that boasts of being “the world’s first ever carrot-crunch-powered video game. Ever.”
Future:
Indulge:
Extreme:
So you want to create an iPad app. Some guiding principles to consider.
June 2, 2010 § 1 Comment
On Wednesday, January 27, 2010, the tech world was abuzz. Apple had just announced their latest shiny new toy: the iPad.
At the time and for the weeks and months following, the announcement has been met with mixed reviews. In one camp, people have labeled it as being just an oversized iPhone that was not quite phone, not quite computer. In another, it has been heralded as something that can be expected to revolutionize the gadget industry and way we interact with technology in ways we’ve seen Apple products do in the past. Within Critical Mass, we also had many discussions about the potential impact of Apple’s new iPad. However, regardless of our discussions and each person’s opinion around the iPad, one thing was sure. There was a lot of excitement – especially at the prospect of designing some of the first iPad apps for our clients.
Rather than talk about the impact of the iPad on our industry and market (if you want a great read on the subject, see Neil Clemmon’s post on Experience Matters), this post discusses some of the things we’ve learned about iPad app design and development through our own experience with some of our savvy clients. Through the course of our work with iPad apps, six main guiding principles have surfaced.
Social responsibility meets social technology.
March 21, 2010 § Leave a Comment
What happens when you combine volunteerism, opportunity and technology? A brand new iPhone app created by VolunteerMatch and imc². Not only does the app present a convenient, easy way to find volunteer opportunities from a network of over 70,000 participating nonprofit organizations, it’s being offered free.
Having just downloaded the app, I have to admit, I had some doubts initially. I had a hard time imagining how an app of this nature could function in a way that would engage me and hold my attention, and even add useful assistance in my everyday life.
Yes, I’m committed to volunteerism, but will you, dear app, really be different than websites and volunteer forums? The answer is a resounding yes. The app is intuitive and easy to navigate. Search results are abundant and can be filtered according to location, skill-base, keyword, or area of interest. It was a great call to allow search without forcing the user to register for an account or login first. It also links up fairly seamlessly with Facebook and Twitter if someone wants to share an opportunity with a friend or acquaintance – although you need to pre-sign-in through the “Options” section, which isn’t always apparant at first glance.
I think the only thing that is yet to be seen is how useful this app will be outside of the United States. I have to admit to being a little skeptical about whether I would actually surface any results in Toronto. So, when three location-based results appeared, in a way, I was pleasantly suprised. That said, it’s still only three for the whole of the Greater Toronto Area. Of course, there is always the option to include all virtual opportunities (I received two hundred postings), which admittedly suprised me. However, the user still needs to carefully filter through them. I seemed to get a lot of “virtual” opportunities that obviously needed me to be on location.
However, the potential is tremendous and this is only the tip of the iceberg. A really interesting app – one I’ll definitely be keeping on my phone.
Find out more or download the VolunteerMatch iPhone app.
