FOX International Channels (FIC) Asia has partnered with New Classics Media (NCM), a China-based film and television company, which grants FIC the exclusive broadcast and distribution rights in all markets outside of mainland China for NCM’s new modern-family comedy/drama series, Tiger Mom.

This is FIC Asia’s first collaboration on a television series produced in mainland China and a breakthrough in its roadmap to taking Chinese content global.  Whilst both production quality and demand for the content around the world are high, cases of made-in-China television series successfully crossing over to territories outside of the domestic market have been rare, said FIC in a press statement.  As an international media company with extensive operations and experience in Asia, FIC aims to push forward this wave of Chinese content around the world.

The series will launch on STAR Chinese Channel (SCC), FIC’s Chinese entertainment channel, in various territories around the world at the same time as in mainland China.  Through this partnership, the show Tiger Mom will gain access to markets worldwide through FIC’s global presence. It will also be leveraging the network’s extensive international broadcasting, packaging and marketing experience, allowing it to reach more audiences in markets including Hong Kong, Taiwan, Southeast Asia, Japan, Korea, Australasia, Europe, North and South America, Middle East and Africa.

Cora Yim, senior vice president of the Chinese Channels Group at FOX International Channels Asia, said, “Not only has the quantity of drama series made in mainland China increased significantly over the last several years, but so has the quality, yet very few have successfully been exported to overseas markets, except for maybe a few period dramas.  It is our goal at FIC to bridge the gap between great Chinese content and the clear demand for it around the world.  We have been steadily investing in Asian and Chinese channels and content for over two decades so we are in a great position to lead the charge in catering to this demand.”

Wang Qiao, international new media director of NCM, added: "This collaboration with FOX International Channels will enable us to have a more comprehensive access to the international mass media. Through larger distribution networks, as well as more professional programme packaging and broadcasting methods, this will allow more audiences overseas to enjoy authentic Chinese TV programmes, with values that shape mainstream Chinese culture.”

Tiger Mom explores love, relationships and the challenges of raising a child in modern day China.

In celebration of National Day,Electrolux is giving Singaporeans the chance to find out what popular local dish truly represents their personality.After the Electrolux Asia Pacific Food Survey found that 93% of Singaporeans are passionate about food, the “What local food are you?" quiz aims to ignite this passion and celebrate Singapore’s exciting array of local dishes.

The interactive Facebook game quizzes users on a series of multiple-choice questions around personal preferences including their favourite Singapore neighbourhood and local movie.

One of six food personalities is revealed based on the answers given: Hainanese Chicken Rice, Nasi Lemak, Laksa, Char Kway Teow, Chili Crab and Ice Kachang.

Socialbakers CEO Jan Rezab takes a seat on the couch with Marketing for the very first installment of our weekly video segment.

Rezab was fresh off the plane from Beijing where the social media analytics company has been in talks with platforms in China about bringing its tools to the world's biggest internet market.

He talks to Jennifer Chan about social engagement and what's next for brands on social media.

http://youtu.be/bKN7jhZaoAU

Ed Sunico, customer development director at Unilever Philippines, is the new chairman of the 2014 Araw Values Advertising (AVA) Awards of the Advertising Foundation of the Philippines.

Now on its ninth year, the biennial AVA Awards is unique as the only industry event that recognizes campaigns than not only sell great ideas and entertain, but also promote positive values.

“This is where the Araw Values Awards stands unique versus other award- or recognition-giving events in the industry,” says Sunico.

“It's the only industry event that has industry values formation and advocacy as its main essence and we judge based on this above all the other criteria. I understand that the Araw Values Awards is the only one of its kind in the region and probably in the world.”

Sunico is aiming to gather as much as 500 entries from the industry and the academe. Supporting their call of entries will be a campaign spanning social media to be developed byDM9JaymeSyfu, the current 4As Agency of the Year title holder.

The AVA Awards night show will be produced by ABS-CBN and will heldin November at ABS-CBN’s Dolphy Theater.

Sunico has been with Unilever 2010, first as communications channel director in Vietnam for three year. He then went back to the Philippines to have the media director role for a year which was later expanded to media director of South East Asia and Australia. Sunico started his current role just last April this year.

Unilever has consistently won the top awards at AVA. But while expectations high that the brand will keep their track record, Sunico said that they are not driven by the accolades.

“I think winning an award is great for Unilever or for any company, but I think the motivation shouldn't be winning an award rather the sincere desire to create big, positive change through our brands and services,” he said.

“As an industry, we constantly need to ask ourselves whether we are contributing to the promotion of positive values through our brand and corporate communication. This is important because we believe that the promotion and inculcation of positive values is vital to nation-building.”

McDonald’s Malaysia has placed a full page ad on Malaysian newspaper Sinar Harian, to reiterate its stand that it is not supporting Israel.

According to the Malay Mail Online, the ad, which ran on page 11 of the newspaper, repeated its previous insistence that the firm was not related to “any political activity, violence or oppression”.

“The real victims of these allegations are friends, workers and families who are the subject of discrimination and our franchisees who are working to make a living,” it said.

When contacted by Advertising + Marketing, McDonald's Malaysia said it wishes to clearly state that McDonald’s Malaysia does not support nor condone the current conflict in the Middle East.

"Like all Malaysians, our utmost sympathies go out to the innocent victims in Gaza," a spokesperson said.The fast food giant added that while it understands and respects that the act of boycotting is an individual decision, it is nonetheless  disappointed that McDonald’s Malaysia has been unfairly targeted.

"We urge Malaysians to remain calm and to refrain from carrying out any acts that may harm any parties [...] As a consequence, our employees who are practically all Malaysians have had to endure harassment, threat, and verbal abuse. Some of our restaurants have also been subjected to acts of vandalism to the extent that we had no choice but to shut down our operations for the day. The reality is that our employees and franchisees have done nothing wrong, and it is grossly unfair that they should be targeted in such a way," he added.

Click to see the full ad:

(Gallery available on web)

Earlier this week, Advertising + Marketing reported that Malaysians were rallying to create “No McDonald’s Day” as part of a campaign against corporations who allegedly help fund to Israel. McD's has been struggling with the issue in Malaysia for nearly a month and has been fending off allegations that is funding Israel against the Gaza conflict.

Last month it issued a statement on Facebook saying:

“We wish to reiterate that McDonald’s does NOT channel any sales, profits or franchise fees from our restaurants to support ANY political causes or conflicts in any part of the world. There is absolutely no truth in any online allegations suggesting otherwise. Our core values dictate that we operate our business ethically and to the highest standards. This is a value that we uphold with utmost conviction. In Malaysia, we are proud to be part of the local community –   providing opportunities for local franchisees and careers for 12,000 Malaysians, serving our customers with passion and respect, and actively supporting meaningful causes to enhance the lives of the needy.”

In an earlier statement to Advertising + Marketing, McDonald’s Malaysia said, “We are disappointed that the unjustified boycott of our restaurants in Malaysia have caused the vandalisation of a few restaurants and even threatened the safety of our employees.”

(Photo courtesy: Shutterstock)

KFC Philippines has turned the negative publicity Jollibee has been getting this week to its advantage by poking fun at its rival’s menu shortage problem on social media.

Jollibee patrons vented their disappointment online after finding out that several branches are running out of old time favorites like fried chicken, pancit palabok and burgers. It spurred the hashtag #ChickenSad, a funny takeoff from the brand’s popular ChickenJoy.

It was just a matter of time for KFC to spot the opportunity.

//

“No such thing as #ChickenSad in the house of #SoGood,” assures KFC on Twitter and Facebook.

In its defense, Jollibee Foods vice president for marketing Harvey Ong said that the company is having a major systems upgrade but assured that there is no shortage of chicken.

"Unfortunately, this change in system has initially affected the delivery schedule of raw materials from our commissary to select stores," he said in a statement.

"We would like to clarify that this is NOT a supply issue or a chicken shortage situation. Rest assured that this is only temporary as we are working round the clock to ensure that all our products – including Chickenjoy, Jolly Spaghetti and Yumburgers – will be made available again in all the affected stores soonest. In fact, some of these stores have already begun offering these Jollibee favorites again."

GMA Network is on the tail of ABS-CBN in the nationwide TV ratings race last July, reducing their’s rivals lead to just 0.5 percent with its 33.4% total day household audience share.

The media giant also outscored TV5’s 11.5 percent by huge 21.9 points. The claim is based on Nielsen’s National Urban Television Audience Measurement date, which covers 95% of all urban areas of the country, with a population of more than 34 million individuals.

GMA grabbed the lead in the morning block with 32.4% audience share, outscoring ABS-CBN’s 29.1 percent by 3.3 points and TV5’s 12.4 percent by 20 points.

Its success continues in the afternoon with a 35.4% percent audience share as against ABS-CBN’s 29.8, and TV5’s 12%. GMA likewise improved its shares in the evening block to 32.3% from the previous month’s 31% but comparative figures for ABS-CBN were not cited.

In comparison to ABS-CBN dominance in the provinces, GMA’s key strengths has been with urban audience, particularly in Urban Luzon and Mega Manila, which accounts for 77 and 60% of all urban TV households in the country.

The Kapuso Network dominated Urban Luzon with a 36.9% total day audience share, ahead of ABS-CBN’s 29.9% by 7 points, and TV5’s 10.8% by 26.1 points. It also remained unrivaled in Mega Manila with a 38% total day audience share, outperforming ABS-CBN’s 27.8% by 10.2 points and TV5’s 11.4% by 26.6 points.

GMA ranked high in the overall list of top programs, including specials, in Urban Luzon and Mega Manila with 19 Kapuso programs out of 30 making it on both lists. The poll leaders, however, were not revealed since the complete list was not available at press time.

Hong Kong Disneyland has appointed two new agencies, Anonymous and Cheil, to take care of its creative account.

Anonymous is a start-up founded by ex-Ogilvy and ex-M&C Saatchi ECDs Simon Handford and Sandy Chan.

The agency will work with Cheil together on campaigns, with the breakdown of work between them varying on a case-by-case basis.

Anonymous was the creative agency behind the Summer Playtime campaign for Hong Kong Disneyland Resort launched in July.

"The win proves our model has potential," Chan said.

While one might assume that small agencies like Anonymous would be the underdog in a pitch against big agencies, Chan added this was not the case for the Hong Kong Disneyland.

"Big agency presentations are often fragmented, dull and repetitive, or worse - contradictory, no matter how much they practice. We can have fun."

Cheil China hopes to put more effort into exploring new Internet-based businesses as potential clients, according to Vanessa Ding, vice president of Cheil China.

The agency has just closed a deal with online financial services platform 9fbank.com, which has appointed Cheil China as its branding and communications agency.

“9fbank.com is our second Internet-based client after Letv.com," Ding said.

9fbank.com provides services such as micro-lending and wealth management services targeting entrepreneurs, merchants and private individuals.

The agency's scope of work will include implementing communications strategies, producing creatives and providing integrated creative media buying across traditional and digital platforms.

Good news to disgruntled Jollibee patrons: the fast food giant has confirmed last Friday that there is no supply shortage of their chicken, burgers and other top sellers.

The real problem? A sales order and delivery network bogged down by a major system upgrade.

“The Jollibee Group has sufficient raw materials, finished products and production capacity to meet the consumer demand for the entire month of August and for the months ahead, both for local and imported goods, in line with its sales and product supply planning,” Jollibee Foods Corporation (JFC) assured.

However, the company said in a disclosure that a current shift to a new IT system lead to a slowdown on supply distribution since the month began. This has now escalated from just limited menus to the temporary closure of 72 stores, or 3.2% of its store network of 2,244 various JFC brands.

JFC estimates that they have not been able to serve 6% of its normal nationwide sales in the first seven days of this month. Sales, however, remained afloat with same store sales improving 4% for the period year-on-year.

The system overhaul, which includes the central integrating system and store information systems, is the company’s largest IT investment yet, amounting to over P500 million.

JFC expressed their apologies, promising its customers that operations will be up to speed withun the remaining weeks of August.

“The organization is doing its best to restore the availability of all its products to normal levels in the next few days, to reopen temporarily closed stores and to restore its excellent service to its customers,” it adds.

Jollibee patrons vented their disappointment online after finding out that several branches are running out of old time favorites like fried chicken, pancit palabok and burgers. It spurred the hashtag #ChickenSad, a funny takeoff from the brand’s popular ChickenJoy, which KFC Philippines quickly used to its advantage.

Apple Lam, sits down with Ivy Wong, CEO of HMV ideal and Kelvin Wu, owner of the HMV brand in Asia, to talk about the overhaul of the retail group.

https://vimeo.com/103091343

KFC Philippines was quick to spot the opportunity to poke fun at Jollibee and its #ChickenSad problems last week but it seems that the brand may have “chickened” out.

Marketing reported last Friday about the brand’s witty attempt to turn the negative publicity their rival has been getting to its advantage. Jollibee received a bit of flak from diners on social media about an alleged supply shortage, which led to the spread of the hashtag #ChickenSad, a funny takeoff from the brand’s popular ChickenJoy meal.

KFC consoled disappointed patrons with a funny social media campaign saying that there is “No such thing as #ChickenSad in the house of #SoGood.” But upon checking KFC Philippines’ official Facebook and Twitter accounts, the posts have mysteriously disappeared.

Here is a snapshot of the original post on Twitter.

And here is the post today.

This is the embed post on our “LOOK KFC, Jollibee begins chicken derby” story dated 8 August, now also MIA after being shared by over 1,800 people on Facebook.

Discussions about the missing posts in the interwebs have yet to take off and both companies have not revealed anything about possible friction caused by the spoof.

Tit-for-tat responses have become fairly common in the ad industry and it often does not result to heated debates or lawsuits.

A recent example was MRM Manila and Kitkat Philippines last June, which made fun of Facebook’s worst downtime in the last four years – an example of remarkable real-time marketing at work. The post can still be viewed to this day.

Did this chicken derby backfire on KFC Philippines? Your thoughts are very much welcome below.

JWT and Mindshare have partnered with JCDecaux Cityscape to launch the first Augmented Reality bus shelter panel in Hong Kong for HSBC, as part of an integrated campaign for the bank's annual summer Red Hot Festival.

One experience that audiences can engage live for themselves is wild animal photography.

With real-time augmented reality technology, passersby will have the opportunity to be in the middle of a zebra migration right along Charter Road.

Embedded sensors and cameras along the display allow users to interact with the wild zebras, creating a unique scene for them to photograph and post on their social networks.

https://vimeo.com/103094911

"Apart from the strategic importance of its location, bus shelter's unique nature also makes it the best media to bring this idea to live," said Alfred Cheng, deputy leader of Mindshare.

It provides a platform to combine real-time street view AR effect to create a seamless experience while it also allows time for people to have some fun, he added.

Credit:
Mindshare:
Deputy Leader: Alfred Chang
Director – Client Leadership: Winston Tai
Supervisor - Channel Planning: Polly Lee
JWT:
Group Account Director: Ernest Ma
Group Creative Director: Terry Tsang

For someone like me who spent a lifetime in marketing, the change in marketing over the past decade has just been amazing. For almost 50 years till the turn of the century, marketing had a clear code and the insight processes also had a settled feel about it. We knew how much we could find out and what approaches we could use. The differences between brands were all to do with how well these processes (including creative) were applied.

With that, changes have been nothing short of a tsunami, with only some solid processes remaining in place.  Almost all processes have changed to a degree.  While qualitative and quantitative research remain the key to insights, social listening and online research has made these insights more real time. Similarly, the ability of the marketer to collect granular information and use statistical methodologies has changed the “warm and fuzzy” aspects of the earlier marketing paradigm and brought hard data to the forefront. This trend is getting more accentuated with data exploding all around us and the ability to manage this is already deciding who the winners are in the new marketing world.

We have read a lot on how digital online platforms are real time in terms of analytics and we need not focus on that again. All kinds of tools are available to the marketer to understand the impact of different online elements such as ad impressions, social buzz, impact of communities, contextual targeting etc. What is not clear to many a marketer, is how the other 90% spend that happens for a typical brand on offline media, consumer offers and below the line activities can be looked at with the same rigour. The good news is that Marketing Analytics has made huge strides in the offline space as well, making nonsense of the oft repeated quote “I know half of my advertising is wasted, but I do not know which half”.

Not only can you identify which half but can also predict with reasonable accuracy what will work in the future and by how much. Marketing Analytics can tell you which of your inputs are working (and which money is going down the drain) but also give you insights on which of the competitor activities are impacting your brand sales and equity. Optimization of resources available to marketing is now leading to effectiveness improvements of as much as 20 -30% for the same budgets spent, according to papers published by many learned researchers. Therefore it is not a surprise that analytics is an integral part of the strategy development of all leading brands world-wide. Analytics is also now identified as one of the key ingredients for the secret sauce of many leading brands such as P&G, Coca-Cola and Capital One.

Let me give you a few examples of how analytics helps in redefining a path that a brand takes. The first example is that of a cookie brand, leader in its market with a solid equity. This brand had however, after decades of delivering growth, started to deliver flat sales for the last few years. With a settled marketing deployment strategy, continuing high scores in brand tracking studies – the marketing team was in a fix. A complete mix analytics project was conducted across key sub markets. Apart from many insights on which media was working and its ROI at a channel level, the price impact at an a key SKU level that added to a more effective deployment, the astonishing insight was the complete ineffectiveness of a big consumer scheme run for the past few years. The key recommendation was to drop this promo and move the money to equity building new “news” on the brand as advertising was returning a good ROI. The result was a 20% growth in sales.

Another example is of a luxury brand, which found that its strategy worked in some markets but that similar deployment was not giving it results in other markets. Analytics could build models at a market level and come up with reasons for this difference in performance. In this case a universal strategy had its pitfalls and unless the marketer recognised the difference, it would be perplexing. The brand has now divided the market it operates into 3 clusters of sub-markets and designs strategy at a cluster level. The “difficult” markets are again on the growth path.

The above two are examples of how data available to a typical marketing company can be used for insight. But you can ask if this is so useful, why is marketing analytics not used more extensively? The reason for this is simple – the time for Marketing Analytics has only come now. With more data getting collected, faster computing possible, eco-system of consultants, data scientists and statistical software developing fast, Marketing Analytics has started the journey to redefine marketing as we know it.

Watch this space for more on this subject.

The writer is Manoj Tadepalli, director at RainMan Asia Consulting, a Marketing Analytics Consultancy.

The number of "likes" is often a benchmark for a brand's successful Facebook strategy, but how many are genuine likes or what Facebook calls “quality connections” is often under question.

Often called “Like-Gate", forcing users to like their pages to gain access to apps and games, is a widely employed strategy by brands to inflate their popularity.

Now Facebook is trying to make sure when users "like" a page, they truly like it.

The social media giant has announced a new policy on a developer blog to knock down the "Like Gate" to ensure "quality connections", effective 5 November. It reads:

"You must not incentivize people to use social plugins or to like a Page. This includes offering rewards, or gating apps or app content based on whether or not a person has liked a Page. It remains acceptable to incentivize people to login to your app, checkin at a place or enter a promotion on your app's Page.

“To ensure quality connections and help businesses reach the people who matter to them, we want people to like Pages because they want to connect and hear from the business, not because of artificial incentives. We believe this update will benefit people and advertisers alike."

In a nutshell, brands are no longer able to force user to “like” their page to enter contests or to receive incentives.

Rudi Leung, general manager of Social@Ogilvy, regards the new policy is a “positive change” for not only brands, but also agencies.

“As Facebook users are moving away from desktop to mobile, the Like Gate Tactic will be obsoleted sooner or later anyway.

“A lot of brand pages have been relying on the Like Gate tactic to acquire new fans. From now on, they need to give a stronger reason to make someone liking their page.”

Apparently Facebook is now looking for true love, and so should brands, Leung stressed.

“As a brand, you should also give true love back to your customers rather than just want to acquire huge volume of them without building a genuine relationship.”

“In the past, a lot of marketers are still living in the reach/broadcast mindset. When it comes to social media, all they care is how many people they can reach, how far they can amplify their marketing message.

“From now on, they should stop just counting the numbers of customers that they can reach. Instead, they should start considering to reach the customers that count,” he added.

Mark Chan, managing partner of CMRS, considers the policy as a reasonable one as it allows a “grace period” for app developers and marketers to adjust their Facebook strategies.

“It affects most of the local marketers I believe, as they tend to do fan acquisition through giveaways or incentives,” said Chan.

“Now they have to look into how to connect with the fans, who are ideally the brand lovers and advocates, customers or potential customers, by portraying the brand story through right content.”

He said it’s observed that many pages are able to acquire fans, but are not engaging and responding to fans, more importantly, not doing advocacy for their pages or the brands.

“I believe only genuine fans are useful to brands. Hence the new rules will restrict those who are chasing after sheer ‘likes’ number but not the quality of fans,” he added.

With this golden gate for “likes” demolished, where should brands go looking ahead?

“Social media is all about building relationship,” said Leung, “so consider your fans on Facebook an extension of your CRM practice. Pampering them consistently rather than feeding them like zombies with random incentives,” he suggested.

“Don't invest Facebook media only during a campaign period.

"Consider an always-on Facebook media strategy for fan acquisition. Have a long-term strategy rather than tactical one,” said Leung.

Ben Woo, project director of Pixo Punch agrees the value to maintain quality content, but stressed the importance to beef up investment in the social space.

“Given the organic reach for wall contents are dropping occasionally, the only way out would be allocating larger budget on social ads placement, increasing ad spending to maintain the reach and attract new fans,” said Woo.

“Marketers should also redefine the KPI for maintaining the page, they should no longer cherish only the number of fans, but more on the engagement of each piece of content,” he added.

Read Also:

Facebook weeds out fake fans

Has Facebook’s clean up affected brands?

Your Likes are fake and it’s making you look

Now selling: Fake Twitter accounts

Canva, a budding online graphic design platform from Australia, has expanded by opening an office in the Philippines just 11 months from its debut.

An idea in the works since 2007, founders Melanie Perkins, Cliff Obrecht and Cameron Adams created a way to simplify graphic design with a drag-and-drop tool paired with a library of more than 1 million photographs, graphics and fonts.

By boiling down the design process to its simplest components, users from any experience level can now create professional looking projects like those done in Photoshop of InDesign - a particular interest to marketers especially in the digital and social media space who need to quickly create content like a picture or a header.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FZGN7BCs6k

“Canva can be used to create almost anything for Web and print, including presentations, blog graphics, Facebook covers and invitations. Our biggest users are marketers, bloggers and small business using Canva to create their own marketing materials,” Perkins, Canvas CEO, shared with Marketing via e-mail

Since its launch, the company has amassed over 650,000 users and has piqued investor appetite. Just this July, Canva raised an aditional $3.6 million in funding from Shasta Ventures, Founders Fund, Matrix Partners, Blackbird Ventures and Square Peg Capital.

Canva Manila, formally launched last 8 August, will be the startup’s first shop outside its home country, which will be manned by eight people to work initially on marketing, customer service and graphic design. The office will be headed by Kei San Pablo as Manila Office Manager.

Perkins confirmed that they are currently recruiting marketers, graphic designers and customer service professionals sourced from the local talent pool.

Without citing hard numbers, she confirmed that the Philippines is one of the company’s top 10 markets, owed to the Filipinos’ strong design aesthetic and being fast adopters of new technology. So far, over four million designs have now been created using the Canva platform.

Supporting the company’s overall strategy is Guy Kawasaki, which joined Canva last April as Chief Evangelist, a former role he had with Apple in the 1980’s. He is also an advisor to Google, co-founder of venture capital firm Garage Technology Venture and behind the online magazine rack, Alltop.

To add to Canva’s creative muscle, Peg Fitzpatrick has also joined Canva as Head of Social Strategy. Prior to this, she worked with Kawasaki as his social media architect, and she was the co-founder of the 12 Most website.

Canva has also announced a series of partnerships with companies including GoDaddy, Tailwind, Agora Pulse, Post Planner, and TabSite. Users of these websites will be able to create Canva graphics without leaving their page vial the newly released Canva Button.

German Insurance group Allianz has appointed Ogilvy & Mather its global creative account, according to M&M global.

Previously, Grey held the account and was worth £60m in 2009, when Grey was appointed. The WPP agency set up a dedicated global team called Team Allianz@Grey to handle brand communication, digital marketing, internal engagement, corporate design, sponsorship and the Allianz Group's media budget.

Allianz could not be reached for comment at the time of publishing. The article will be updated.

Instagram has launched its latest standalone one-to-one visual messaging app Bolt in Malaysia and Australia.

The two markets are the fourth and the fifth countries to see the launch after the initial roll out in Singapore, New Zealand and South Africa.

“As we looked at the messaging space, we realized that sharing an image is still requires too many steps and takes too long, and we wanted to fix that. Bolt is the fastest way to share an image — with just one tap, you can both capture and share a photo or video with your favorite people. You can also add text captions,” a press statement from Facebook said.

Users can sign up for Bolt using their mobile phone number, which will then sync with the contacts/address book to find friends who are also using Bolt. Users can select up to 20 contacts, or “favorites,” and send them a message with a single tap.

The company is promoting the app through mobile install ads on Facebook and Instagram, prompting users to download.

When you tap the profile photo of someone in your favorites, you'll capture and send a photo at the same time. To capture and send a video up to 5 seconds long, tap the profile photo and hold it down. To see the messages you’ve received, simply tap on the tray at the top of the screen. Once you’ve seen the photo or video, swipe it away and it's deleted for good.

The launch comes at a time the press have been discussing how the Malaysian government is looking at a potential ban on the social networking platform. Authorities are denying this, however. Communication and multimedia minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery, according to the Bernama news agency and as reported by The Sunday Times said: "If the people are of the opinion that Facebook should be closed, we are prepared to look into the matter but it is a radical approach. Many business people are also using Facebook, others to forge family ties and have nothing to do with politics...and the complaints received were around 2,000 only. Should we completely close it down because of 2,000 reports? We need to relook this."

Marketing has reached out to Facebook for comments on the matter.

In the run up to Singapore’s 49th birthday, Tiger Beer has actively been encouraging Singaporeans to up their game and unleash their pride.The brand itself shed its iconic blue livery to turn a patriotic red and white.

Going back to the basics of how Singaporeans have come to adore the quirks and nuances of this uniquely Singaporean culture, Tiger Beer also collaborated with YouTube stars Tree Potatoes to produce a video titled “You Know You’re Singaporean When...”.

http://youtu.be/hFhkjM_7r4I

Meanwhile, over the weekend Tiger Beer held two activations in the run up to National Day.

The brand asked Singaporeans to dye their hair red and white and to get locally-inspired permanent tattoos to unleash their pride. Yup, you read it right - permanent.

Check out the results:

(Gallery available on web)

“Singapore is the birthplace of Tiger Beer, and since 1932, the brand has grown to become an intrinsic part of the Singapore identity. What better way then, to wear our pride on our cans and display where our roots truly are! This National Day, we would love to paint the town red and white with our fans and consumers, and encourage them to join the ‘seven acts in seven days’ movement to showcase their appreciation for the country in their own creative ways," said Rene de Monchy, head of marketing, Asia Pacific Breweries Singapore.

The coveted award for the best campaign that best made use of the out-of-home medium, The Campaign of The Year, was awarded to Wildlife Reserves Singapore for their River Safari Campaign.

Close to 200 out of 600 campaigns which ran between March 2013 to March 2014 were shortlisted for the first round of voting under four categories at the Clear Channel OOH Media awards titled “OOHPIA 2014”. The catagories were Best Use of Multiple Clear Channel Formats, Best Delivery of Create, Best Use of Digital In Out-Of-Home (Play) and My Favourite Poster.

Here are the rest of the winners:

Best Use of Multiple Clear Channel Formats

Company: H&M

Campaign: H&M New Outlets

Media Agency: OMD

Best Delivery of Create

Company: Wildlife Reserves Singapore

Campaign: River Safari

Media Agency: ZenithOptimedia

Best Use of Digital in Out-Of-Home (Play)

Company: McDonald’s Singapore

Campaign: McDonald’s National Breakfast Day

Media Agency: OMD

Creative Agency: DDB Worldwide

My Favourite Poster

Company: Unilever Singapore

Campaign: Magnum Pink or Black

Media Agency: Mindshare

Recently appointed chief executive officer of Clear Channel Singapore, Kelly Khoo (pictured) said:

“Our success in the business is contributed by the unwavering support and friendship of our partners in the industry, of which a great number is here this evening. Our partners can continue to count on us to deliver on our hallmark customer-centric approach: forward-thinking and fulfilling promises. In the next couple of weeks, we are rolling out more network options (ProxPax), and mobile-enabled shelters islandwide (Connect).”

Meanwhile the judges for the awards were:

1) A S Anam, creative director for J. Walter Thompson Singapore

2) Chloe Neo, managing partner for OMD Singapore

3) Kelly Khoo, CEO for Clear Channel Singapore

4) Ng Peng Hui, general manager for Warner Brothers Singapore

5) Pat Lim, managing director for IPG Mediabrands

6) Vivian Yeung, general manager for Mediacom Singapore

7) Wayne Goh, chief operating officer for Goh Joo Hin