Hospital Marketing Journal

Anatomy of a Photoshoot (Part Deux)

As we gear up to launch our new campaign for Riverside Medical Group next month, we thought we’d offer another behind-the-scenes peek at a Ten Adams photoshoot…and, of course, lessons learned along the way.     LESSON #1 — Doctors are different from you and I. (In this case, MUCH better dancers.) WHICH LEADS TO LESSON #2 — Music makes every job better. LESSON #3 — An unused wheelchair makes for a perfect camera dolly. LESSON #4 — It’s okay if your photographer looks like Andre Agassi. (As long as he doesn’t act like John McEnroe). LESSON #5 — Hospitals are home to many Instagram-able distractions. Oooh, shiny… LESSON #6 — Messages from home can make the long trips more bearable. LESSON #7 — Professional lighting brings out the poser in all of us. LESSON #8 — Healthcare marketing requires more heavy lifting than you might imagine. LESSON #9 — Anything can be fixed with duct tape. LESSON #10 — Sometimes doctors need a little TLC, too. LESSON #11 — A weeklong shoot means you should plan to leave with more than you arrived with. LESSON #12 — And, if you didn’t plan for that, see lesson #9 — duct tape. LESSON #13 — A good team moves in synchronicity at all times. LESSON #14 — And a good client knows how to make the job fun. LESSON #15 — Dinner on a photoshoot is not always fancy. LESSON #16 — You should always have several wardrobe options ready to go during a shoot. LESSON #17 — If you try to take pictures of your shoes on set, you’re probably gonna get busted. LESSON #18 — Sometimes everyone really is kung foo fighting. LESSON #19 — Life on the road is better with good folks by your side.

Ring in the New Year — Ten Adams Style

While most New Year’s resolutions revolve around diets and exercise, Ten Adams has kept its goals for the upcoming year on the less conventional side. And to shake things up even more, the creative team here at Ten Adams has been hustling and bustling to put together a fun video showcasing these goals.     Ten Adams has also made a resolution to help those in need. So, this holiday season, Ten Adams is taking a moment to recognize our blessings and support an initiative that has been near and dear to the hearts of the Ten Adams family — Lifesong for Orphans' — Both Hands initiative. This initiative helps families adopting orphans internationally with the incredible expense of the adoption process — while, simultaneously, serving widows through home improvement projects. With over 163 million orphans in the world today, we encourage everyone to donate to this cause, helping to put children back into families and on the road to success and recovery. To contribute to Both Hands Foundation, please visit www.bothhandsfoundation.org. We wish everyone a wonderful holiday season and all the best in 2013!

Anatomy of a TV Shoot

How does an idea go from this: To this: Well, come along for a never-before-seen, mind-blowing look behind the scenes at a Ten Adams TV shoot, as we share a few lessons we learned along the way. Lesson #1: Film crews are notoriously awesome at making a scene (wink, wink) + disrupting traffic. Especially when 40 feet of banners are involved. Lesson #2: Helicopters are just as cool now as they were when we were seven. (Helicopters with remote cameras? Even cooler.) Lesson #3: Creative directors + associate creative directors evidently are not insured to climb suspension bridges with the rest of the crew. (Lesson #3 ½ — this makes them cranky.) Lesson #4: Shooting a movie theater scene? Foggers are a great little trick used to achieve that awesome projector beam. Lesson #5: But, foggers can malfunction. (And when they do, the only other way to get a little ‘atmosphere’ is to set a piece of toast on fire. A very smelly solution that has the added benefit of shooting to the soothing shriek of the smoke alarm). Lesson #6: This is Ray. Ray is from Germany. Ray worked on the set of the original Willa Wonka and The Chocolate Factory. Ray invented a theatrical light that melted a street lamp on the set of one of the Batman movies. Ray owns a 400-acre tree farm in Costa Rica. Ray makes his own shampoo. Ray is the Most Interesting Man in the World. Lesson #7: How do you achieve that pretty flicker of light on the faces of talent in a movie theater shot? Like this (Sorry, I was too dang excited to remember to turn the phone horizontally. Also, note the lovely shrieking alarm we referenced earlier from the smoking toast): Lesson #8: Everything looks sexier through a lens. (Well, at least banners do.) Lesson #9: Another handy trick of the trade — if you’re shooting a street scene, ask your friendly local firemen to do a wetdown of the pavement. It makes for a way prettier shot. (Plus we like fire trucks almost as much as we like helicopters). Lesson #10: We learned from our fearless director, Norry, that each member of a film crew has a ‘uniform’. Just like us agency folks are always cloaked in black, this is the typical uniform of a member of the art department. (And there’s no better AD than Amy, trust us.) Lesson #11: It’s intensely gratifying to cross that red marker through a shot in the storyboard. Fin! Lesson #12: A green screen can (and will) appear just about anywhere Lesson #13: If someone asks if they can use your car in a commercial or movie, think it through — because this is probably what they intend to do with it: < Lesson #14: Art directing is way better from the backseat of a truck. Your own chauffer. Police escort. A monitor-on-a-stick. Oh. And walkie-talkies. 10-4, good buddy. Lesson #15: Yes, we require constant supervision. Lesson #16: For some reason, talent gets nervous sitting on a bicycle, rigged to a trailer, being pulled through rush-hour downtown traffic by a dude she’s never met. We don’t get it Lesson #17: Apparently, we’ve been riding bikes the wrong way most of our lives. Lesson #18: It is not a good idea to drive like this. Lesson #19: In case you haven’t learned this yet, cameramen love to rig things whenever possible. Lesson #20: No, this outfit is not available in stores. (So, the shroud is to help her see with special lenses she wears to control the helicopter’s camera. It takes two people to shoot with a helicam — one person to operate the copter, the other to operate the camera. But only one gets to wear the outfit.) Lesson #21: It’s way more fun to shoot before a live studio audience. And it feels good to be inside the yellow tape for a change (as long as it’s not crime scene tape.) Lesson #22: It hardly feels like work when you get to hang out with people who are as nice as they are talented. (But that’s a lesson us Ten Adams folks learned long ago).

First Annual Brain Games

Due to our work schedule, we couldn’t make it to London for the Olympic Games, so the Ten Adams office was converted for a few hours last Thursday into an Olympic ground. You might say that office Olympics are much more carefree and considerably less competitive than the real Olympics, but the competition at the Brain Games was stiff this year. (Trash talk was accepted and even encouraged!) However, even with all of the excitement and competitiveness going on, pre-games training was not required—just a good attitude and a good sense of humor. At the opening ceremony for Ten Adams’ first ever office Olympics, representatives of the two sides of the brain proceeded  through the event grounds (a parking lot/our backyard) in colorful uniforms (t-shirts) to boost excitement for the contests that followed. Two teams, the Right Brains (Orange) and the Left Brains (Blue) participated in the following games: Bat Spin Relay Race – The Right Brains and Left Brains spun around in circles with their foreheads (and festive brain caps) touching the end of a bat before taking off on a dizzying and potentially dangerous run down to the other end of the yard. Even though the Orange Team got points for style (Debbie, the team captain, took one for the team and nose-dived into the ground), the Blue Team was the first to cross the finish line, leaving them victorious.  The Brain Race– Lauren from the Orange Team and Kathy from the Blue Team wound up their walking toy brains fast and furiously for a mad dash from one end of the conference table to another, but the brains themselves were not so fast (much slower than our Ten Adams healthcare masterminds!). Again, the Blue Team was triumphant, even though there was some questionable activity from the Blue Team’s participants (Nancy!). The Brain Toss – Our last, and perhaps most grueling event was the Brain Toss. Members of the two teams dueled against one another to throw our Ten Adams splatter brains hoping to hit the bullseye.  Unfortunately, due to the stickiness of the brains most didn’t even hit the wall, much less the target. A few made it down to the second floor, and a couple more stuck to the ceiling (something that has become an increasingly regular occurrence around here). Kris’ catlike reflexes allowed her to actually catch a brain, winning style points for the Orange Team, who came out on top for this event. The MVPs were Nancy from the Blue Team and Chris from the Orange Team. Although the Blue Team was awarded with the most medals, the Orange Team held the MOST valuable player, Naiyana, who did all of the artwork for this event. Thank you, Naiyana! When all was said and done, the first annual Brain Games was a success! Ten Adams was energized by the unity and laughter it brought to the team and plans on continuing the Brain Games in the coming years.  How does your company reenergize and build stronger staff relationships? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

Experiencing the Brand

I am emotional. So are you. And this is okay. Because humans are emotional creatures. Sure, the rational side takes over every now + then (good thing, otherwise we’d all be driving Ferraris we can’t afford). But the 2012 Olympics have been proof of the power our emotional brain has. We didn’t see many TV spots promoting a product or service. (Those that have, tanked…hello, McDonalds.). What we have seen are brands doing their best to tug at the heartstrings of their consumers — connecting their brand experience to this 17-day experience we share together with the rest of the world. Nike has inspired. Visa has celebrated. P&G has connected deeply with their critical mom audience. (Confession — those ‘Thank You Mom’ spots made me tear up nearly every single time. Like I said…emotional.) Appealing to emotions is a smart move. Because we will always remember how we are made to feel. And hearing about a brand is nothing like experiencing a brand firsthand. Brands that hold no personal connection to us are easily replaced. I am not personally connected to my brand of toothpaste. But P&G has worked very hard during these Olympics to make me feel connected to their brand (which includes toothpaste) in a different way. As the proud supporter of Moms, P&G has hit a home run with their TV spots. But P&G has made an even smarter move, letting consumers experience their brand in a tangible + meaningful way. Their 65,000 square foot Family Home caters to parents of Olympians — they take care of the laundry, the meals, there’s even a salon for mom makeovers. This is a rare + valuable opportunity for parents of Olympians to experience the P&G brand, not just read about it, think about it or talk about it. And P&G has embraced this opportunity. It's no longer enough to have a transactional relationship with consumers, not enough to provide basic and rational value in a product. Those types of relationships are one-dimensional, forgettable (and easily replaced). Not easily replaced are the emotions generated through brand experiences like what P&G is building. This is where brand loyalty starts. Ten Adams recently launched The Christ Hospital Health Network brand, (which you'll see more of in this + future newsletters). A component to this launch was giving consumers (which includes both patients + employees) the opportunity to interact with + experience the brand on a personal level. For a brand launch like this, the internal audience is just as important as our external audience. We hand delivered sneak preview kits to inform employees about the rebranding efforts + to display the new brand with pride — making them feel like a valuable + critical component to the rebrand (which they are). We also developed an interactive video kiosk that allows patients + employees to speak about their experiences with the brand (and giving us terrific content for social media propagation). Experiential marketing like this is gaining momentum — and with good reason. Because experiences are what make us truly fall in love with brands. (And cry during the Olympics, from what I’ve been told.)