Dec 4 2012

Any Belgian knows the 1207 and 1307 iconic numbers for Belgacom’s information hotline. The numbers also represent a rich online data service, 1207.be and 1307.be, offering a wealth of contact data, free and easily accessible within just a few clicks.This efficient search tool digs up in no time the catering service number you lost, or the shop address you urgently need.

Emakina developed an original online activation campaign to celebrate the information service: ‘Apartment 1207′. By using the search engine, you help the resident of apartment 1207 to find a caterer, to save his dinner date after he burns the turkey. Or when he accidentally shuts down his electricity system, you can find him the electrician to get the lights back on. The online game is a real competition that runs until December 10th. You can play several times each day, to win one of the many great prices. Your search can land you a tablet, a Wii, film tickets, gift certificates, etc.

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Sep 26 2012

Quelle Genève?

With this provocative question, Emakina.CH is at the heart of a new debate on the future of the city of Geneva and the region. Both have resisted to the international crisis. Now the time has come to open up to the world, fight populism and protectionism and invent a new international and positive story.

Michel Balestra,spokesperson for “Quelle Genève?” and Didier Zanone, partner of Emakina.CH present the campaign (Image: Steeve Iuncker Gomez, Tribune de Genève)

So the Business Federation of the Romandie Region, the Chamber of Commerce, Geneva Financial Center and Economie Suisse asked Emakina.CH to create a campaign to start a true interactive debate on the future of the city. Read the rest of this entry »

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Aug 6 2012

You knew you could rely on him for toy certification, but did you also know he can also sing?

Back in February, Emakina/ Motion produced a viral clip on toy safety for the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry (DG ENTR). The clip was a huge success, among other reasons, due the original 3D characters, led by the newly-created star: the CE-E robot. The little hero spends his nights in a toy shop, checking out his fellow toys (especially Barbie…) to make sure they are safe for use. In fact, CE-E was created to raise awareness of the EU toy certification (CE marking), ensuring they are safe and well-explained to potential buyers.

Since we all fell in love with little CE-E, we were delighted when the Commission asked us to produce a new clip, in which the robot reveals his singing skills…!

The challenge in both these clips was to target both young children and their parents, across Europe. In order to do this, we invested in fine 3D animations, witty song lyrics, and an original catchy tune (warning: very catchy tune!). The song has already been produced in English, French, and Spanish, and we are currently working on the next language adaptations, including: Italian, Polish, and German.

When seeking CE-E’s response to this post we received the following statement from his agent: “I would like to thank my fans across Europe for their love and support, and to reassure parents that even now that I sing and dance during the day, I am still dedicated to testing toys every night. Despite my newly-acclaimed fame, other than upgrading to a fancier shelf in the toy store, and buying Barbie the doll house she’s always wanted, I am still the same simple robot”.

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Jul 17 2012

Life Capsule is a start-up company which offers individuals the possibility to save their precious and confidential information online. In the event of death, this information and personal memories can be made available to (certain) relatives through a secure website. The Emakina Group was involved in this initiative since its early conceptualisation, through assisting the founders and developing its strategic plan. Emakina is currently launching the company’s stylish website, built in OpenCMS (Java).

Even a sensitive issue as one’s plans for after death has now gained its place on the web; a development which was well-noticed by the two Life Capsule founders. Having dealt with a personal loss of a family member, the two founders searched for a practical way to commemorate their loved one over the Internet. Once they realised that such solution did not yet exist, they decided to create Life Capsule and to materialise their idea.

Life Capsule offers a web platform on which subscribers can preserve personal data which they would like to leave to their chosen ones once they pass away. Each subscriber thus designates those who will have access to their digital material. Such “life capsule” may contain various documents such as: photos, videos, PDF files, but also texts or even musical playlists. This approach also allows transferring confidential information such as access codes for social networks, last wishes, or address lists.

A central part of Life Capsule’s homepage is dedicated to subscribers’ commemoration sites which are made public after they pass away. The company offers various subscription packages, and donates a part of its revenues to the King Baudouin Foundation. Each year, the sums which were donated to this charity organisation will be published on the Life Capsule website.

Complete discretion and high security are among Life Capsule’s top priorities. In order to guarantee that the data are safely secured for many years, the company has sought the help of Emakina’s experts. Being the first digital agency in Belgium, Emakina has proved its broad expertise through its numerous large-scale clients from the financial sector (banks and insurance companies). Furthermore, thanks to the security audit, conducted by Zion Security, Life Capsule can guarantee that its site is immune to online piracy.

The site equally offers its visitors a full range of interesting information on dealing with death, including: writing a testament, last wishes before death, and even delicate issues like euthanasia. Last but not least, the company is establishing a fund, with sufficient funds to maintain its servers and software for the next 50 years, regardless of the financial future of Life Capsule.

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Jun 25 2012

You’ve all seen the signs, hung all across the city of Brussels, inviting participants to the EU Sustainable Energy Week. But have you watched the viral clip, produced by Emakina, which accompanies this cross-national campaign?

The EU Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW) is the key annual event of the Sustainable Energy Europe Campaign. It showcases activities and over 600 events, dedicated to energy efficiency and renewable energy solutions in almost 40 countries. These events are organised by the Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI) on behalf of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy. From 18 to 22 June, more than 30,000 participants discussed energy efficiency and renewable energy in all their forms during the 2012 edition of EU Sustainable Energy Week.

The new video trailer, produced by Emakina.eu, shows how small changes can make a big difference in the future of our energy consumption. The video was being used to promote this large-scale annual event. Its target audience was fairly wide, with a spectrum of industries, schools, local authorities and municipalities, transport companies and academia. In addition, Emakina produced a series of interviews with winners of the EUSEW Awards, using the same visual identity and setting as that used in the clip in order to give the campaign a coherent branding. Among the interviewees are representatives of initiatives from the UK, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands; and even a Belgian minister.

For more information on the events, please visit the Sustainable Energy Week website.

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May 18 2012

The answer is actually quite simple. According to the “Le jeu sérieux en Belgique francophone” annual conference (French for “the serious game in French-speaking Belgium”), the development of games has become more and more common in “serious” contexts, such as public-awareness campaigns, marketing a new product or service, or even for educational purposes. Every year, during the “Serious Game” event (which took place last week), prizes and awards are granted for outstanding so-called “serious” games.

The new game developed by Emakina for Electrabel has just been recognised as such, winning the Bell.Now award for the best “adver-game”. Participants of the “Serious Game” conference were asked to rank the best examples of the past year.   The Electrabel “Switch Off/ Smart Energy Game” was thus voted as the best case for marketing purposes. As suggested by the category name, the purpose of the game, developed entirely in-house by Emakina, was to promote the new Electrabel application which is part of the company’s wide-scale campaign.

The organisers might think it’s very “serious”. We still think it’s fun…!

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May 7 2012

How do you take an abstract and complex topic, such as the contribution of the eco-industries to the European economy, and turn it into a viral clip? This was the challenge, posed by the European Commission to Emakina.EU, member of the Emakina Group, specialising in communicating the European institutions. The goal was to promote “Eco-innovation”, a programme run by the Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI), supporting private initiatives which have a positive impact on both the environment and the European economy.

The great level of trust we gained from the client allowed our creative directors to explore new concepts, off the beaten-track of the typical “institutional” clips. Their idea was to “personify” the themes of environmentalism and economic activity in the form of two dancers.  The artistic interplay between the dancers metaphorically expresses the synergic potential of the two fields.  It was meant to rebut the misconception that environmentalism stands in the way of economic growth and show that the two can in fact enrich one another.

The clip was produced entirely in-house by Emakina.EU, including its original soundtrack music. In order to develop the concept and properly illustrate the relationship between the dancers, it was decided to produce a clip which lasts over two minutes, long in today’s standards of viral clips. The video will now be disseminated on the most popular social media,  targeting potential entrepreneurs who may be eligible for an EU grant.

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May 4 2012

Football fans in Belgium and around the world can now enjoy the new website of the Royal Belgian Football Association (RBFA). BelgianFootball.be was created by The Reference, a Ghent-based full-service digital agency, and part of the Emakina Group.

A site to experience today’s football

The Royal Belgian Football Association exists since 1895 and represents all football clubs in Belgium. Each football season, the Association organises no less than 300,000 football matches for 2000 teams. Its ambassadors, the Red Devils, represent it internationally, attracting a lot of web attention. The Belgian Football Association has been active on the web for many years with the site footbel.com (included in the CIM Metriweb reports). Players, from the highest to the lowest leagues, and their supporters, use this site extensively. But they’re not alone. The site is also commonly used by referees, trainers, clubs, board members, stewards and volunteers, sponsors etc. A match is a lot more than 22 players on a field running behind a ball… As a full-service digital agency, The Reference convinced the Association of their web approach in synchronicity with the further professional development of the sport in Belgium.

Caught the football bug? Build your own website!

The project posed some interesting challenges. The new RBFA website had to accommodate large traffic volumes, while delivering massive amounts of information to the entire football community.  Thanks to the smooth integration with the RBFA’s databases and its existing backend, you are a click away from all information on teams, upcoming matches, and more!

To make the web experience fun and user friendly, the site features a dashboard, where visitors can create their own pages. Each of them can pick her or his favourite team, be alerted of cancelled matches, view filtered news items, and enjoy many other personalisation features.

The new site was built using Drupal 6, with an extensive system of dynamic blocks. Content editors can thus create and adapt information efficiently and with high flexibility, significantly reducing the time laps needed for information to be published.

Anja Cappelle, managing director van The Reference concludes: ‘We are very proud to have created this very lively information channel for the Belgian football fans and their Association’.

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Apr 17 2012

Emakina.NL has won the pitch for the development and creation of the brand platform websites for Blue Bland (Netherlands) and Planta (Belgium). The digital agency was chosen over two other agencies in the competition. The decisive elements in the decision were Emakina’s clear consumer insights, combined with their strong and creative strategy for a content-driven platform. Next to this, the translation of the concept to a strong content calendar seamlessly fitted with the always-on communication approach of the Unilever brand. The agency will manage the technical, creative and editorial side of the projects.

Blue Band is a household name in the Netherlands since 1923. The brand is known in the market as a trusted margarine for young families. DraftFBC developed and executed the current above-the-line campaign. Quelle Belle Journée (Paris) is responsible for the creation of the new TV commercial for Planta.

Emakina.NL is part of the Emakina Group, an international online agency network with over 350 employees, active in the Netherlands, Belgium, France and the United Kingdom. Besides Blue Band, the customer portfolio of Emakina includes Bonduelle, Foundation ‘Weet Wat je Besteedt’, Dove, Magnum and Unox .

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Apr 16 2012

A new print campaign, produced by Emakina for Partenamut, the Belgian health services and insurance provider, introduces a striking new visual identity for the brand. After creating an original all-blue environment two years ago, Emakina decided to build on the same logic with an aesthetic approach that is unique in the field of health services. Together with the client, the team steered away from the traditional use of lifestyle photos of ‘shiny happy people’, in need of medical treatment. Instead, the campaign introduces handmade clay statues, designed and created by artist Ghislain Honoré.

Using photo-stop motion, each of the characters is presented in a typical every-day-life situation, where Partenamut plays a positive and dynamic behind-the-scenes role. Both the background and the characters were left in white while the key items, associated with the Partenamut’s positive intervention, were digitally coloured in the brand’s identifiable blue. Some 68 kilos of Italian clay in ‘broken white’ were used to create 50 statuettes, each about 20 cm tall, as well as some glasses, crutches, hospital beds, and other accessories.

Partenamut makes every effort is made to make clients’ lives easier, with less concerns, and with the least possible amount of paperwork.  This campaign thus symbolised Partenamut’s approach of keeping its services as simple as possible for its clients. The original visuals were combined with to-the-point and service-oriented copywriting. All the displayed messages were direct and positive; illustrating the advantages of Partenamut’s various services.

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Mar 28 2012

Commercial Information – In a business move that advances Emakina’s positioning, the company announced today its purchase of Wanabe’s goodwill. Wanabe is a Belgian-based agency which has enjoyed a strong reputation for its competences in brand activation, use of CRM tools, and building brand loyalty. It has been active in various sectors, such as: automotive, tourism, consumer goods, and retail.

Immediately following this acquisition, the Emakina Group, will offer Wanabe’s clients services from its four core fields of activity, namely: strategic brand management, brand activation, web building and digital applications. Emakina’s nine “Competence Centres” will also be put forward to Wanabe’s existing clients, allowing for the two companies to develop new business synergies.

Brice Le Blévennec, Chief Visionary Officer of Emakina: “This acquisition will reinforce our experience in brand activation and in CRM systems. The current trends towards consumer-focused marketing and the use of social media – become more strategic for our clients. Our newly-enriched service offer is thus now even more unique in our market”. Following the acquisition, Wanabe will be managed by Elsa Nejman and Jonathan Cerneels; who will serve as Managing Director and Managing Partner, respectively.

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Mar 26 2012

Clinique, the American cosmetics brand, famous for its allergy-tested products, has decided to engage with its clients differently. Its recent campaign, titled “3 Step coach”, uses a specially designated online platform for this purpose.  Clinique invites users to register as “coaches” on a Facebook Connect application, designed and developed by Emakina. Once registered, the challenge is on. Their goal is to invite as many friends as possible, and then share information on Clinique products as well as their personal experiences with them. Coaches are awarded with “badges” for each successful invitation or item they advertise. They become official “ambassadors”, after having collected a total of seven badges.

During the course of one year, all ambassadors receive Clinique products, corresponding with the experiences they write about. They are also treated with a personal coaching session, offered by an official Clinique expert. This experience will guide them on how to best match their skin types and needs with the most appropriate Clinique products. Friends of the ambassadors, who follow the activity online, get a VIP treatment as well! They each receive a three months products supply and the opportunity to join their ambassador during the one-on-one coaching session.

The “3 Step coach” application is unique in communication on beauty and cosmetics. Clients interact intensely with the brand, and deepen their knowledge of its various products. Furthermore, this campaign, covering 8 different European countries, was adapted to in the various languages of each local market.

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Feb 16 2012

The combined positive energy of Electrabel, Group GDF SUEZ and Emakina truly starts to create communication sparks. Electrabel launched its new consumer website, introduced a new version of the Electrabel Energy Manager and produced a practical new mobile application for this Energy Manager service.  All ‘signed’ Emakina.

Electrabel, the first energy provider in Belgium, is a long-standing client of Emakina. About one year ago, a new pitch was launched and Emakina came out of this contest as the winner: the agency was named preferred supplier of Electrabel. New in this relationship was that the mission would include social and mobile media, besides web activities.

• Energy Manager

Electrabel helps its customers to reduce their energy consumption and environmental impact. So it wanted to offer its customers a new service that could make them true partners in this valuable effort. The Energy Manager allows them to fine-tune their energy actions and reduce gas and electricity consumption.

In the application, customers fill in their gas and electricity consumption. They then receive a clear analysis, with state-of-the-art bar charts and graphs indicating their energy history. They can also opt for data in a list format, of course. This information is the starting point for improved energy management, with a coaching support, offering practical tips and insights.

The Electrabel Energy Manager is also available on iPhone and Android. It targets both residential and small office/home office clients. For users on the move, the Energy Manager app is the perfect addition to the Energy Manager website.

• Spreading the word

Emakina is also the partner for Electrabel’s web activation campaigns, including promotion and bannering actions. The campaign now starting will highlight the launch of the new online application for residential customers. It will also introduce the other mobile applications, Electrabel Mobile and Electrabel Energy Manager for Professionals. Banners in different formats are placed on key Belgian portals and news websites. Objective is to generate traffic to the different Electrabel websites and apps. The tools are really handy and valuable, so this promotion really is worth the energy!

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Feb 10 2012

Clinique, the leading American brand of dermatologist-developed cosmetics and its digital agency Emakina once more offer a nice surprise to beauty lovers. Clinique introduces its new tool for women, that helps them select the best suited foundation for their skin type. Each beautifully crafted Clinique skin care and makeup product is allergy tested and 100% fragrance free.

The website allows users to connect via their Facebook account. Once the visitors provide access to their pictures, the Clinique ‘advisor’ asks two quick questions about their skin type and possible makeup problem. The answers help to define the perfect foundation, matching the different characteristics of each beauty. The tool now proposes the ideal foundation solution, together with a beautifully adapted picture, adjusting contrast and light, and nicely framing the result in a real star lodge setting. The ‘star photo’ offers a glimpse of the beauty effect the correct foundation will create.

This original campaign already proves to be a great success, with over 3000 registered participants. Clinique’s pages on Facebook for the Netherlands and Belgium have already attracted more than 18.000 members, making it a real beauty forum. Clinique believes that every skin can be great skin. The new tool is once more a new step towards that goal!

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Dec 19 2011

We have kept it quiet for a while, but now it can be unveiled: Bonduelle has chosen Emakina for developing their complete online brand strategy! After a pitch which involved several contestants, Emakina was ultimately preferred over its competitors for its strong strategy and extensive experience in fast-moving consumer goods.

Emakina will implement Bonduelle’s online presence for both the Netherlands and Belgium in the same way as for the international brand. Emakina will develop an entirely new brand platform, different online activation campaigns and will especially focus on improving the company’s social presence. Our copywriters’ unit has already written dozens of recipes with a fresh tone-of-voice, and the other texts on the website are now in line with Bonduelle’s new guidelines. The completely revamped website (for Belgium and for Netherlands) is online and new functionalities will be rolled out in steps.

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