There’s something uniquely intimate and direct about video shot on a mobile phone. One of the examples we often point to is the work we did with the cast and production team of the hit West End musical Wicked.

The show’s leading man Oliver Tompsett took a mobile phone behind the scenes at the Apollo Victoria Theatre for a month to show what it’s really like working on a big London show.

His videos of cast workouts, dressing-room banter and backstage action in the wings were a big hit with the show’s vast army of passionate fans. The video blog approach made you feel you were getting much closer to the cast and crew than even the best fly-on-the-wall documentary crew can achieve. As a viewer you know you’re sharing something personal between the people on the camera – you’re not seeing it through someone else’s lens.

Oliver’s video blog was part of Wannabe Wicked, an initiative designed to give fans of the show the opportunity to get closer to their heroes, to actively feel a part of Wicked – and, for one lucky person, win a walk-on role in the show.

Fans sent in videos of themselves performing a song from the show and these went into a knockout contest decided by the votes of customers of Orange, the show’s official communications partner.

Orange wanted to raise awareness of its mobile portal Orange World among the valuable Wicked fan base, typically female, aged between 16 and 24.

Orange and Wicked used fan sites and groups on My Space and Facebook to reach out to fans – as well as the show’s large fan club – and the fans themselves set up their own social networking groups and uploaded their clips to YouTube to discuss the contest and appeal for votes.

The effect was to create a real buzz around the fan base and drive a completely new audience to Orange’s multimedia services.

You can still see some of the entries – including winner Louise Henderson’s – at www.wannabewicked.co.uk.

Michael McCabe, UK Executive Producer for the Wicked, said: “IMP have created a completely new way for us to interact with our audience and give them a unique chance to get closer to the show and feel intimately involved.

“We’ve been hugely impressed by the way IMP combine genuine creativity and innovation with the technical capability to deliver services that fully exploit the combination of web and mobile.”

Posted by Mark on 16 October 2009, 16:54

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At IMP we create new ways for businesses and brands to engage with their customers across mobile, web and social media.

Our team has a unique blend of complementary skills and experience – we’re great believers in the power of multi-discipline teams to achieve breakthrough thinking and true innovation.

So at IMP you’ll find creative thinkers, practical thinkers, software developers, interaction designers, strategic planners and deadline-driven producers working together at every stage of the product process – from idea generation to launch and ongoing management.

The result is that our clients can rely on us not just to deliver a great one-off product based on their brief – but to constantly and quickly build on and enhance live products through watching what users are doing and spotting key developments in technology and media.

That’s what makes us very different from traditional, campaign-focused digital agencies. Our background is in creating and running media services, so we know about managing a constantly-changing, constantly-developing relationship and dialogue with viewers, readers, users.

We’ve also got a great track record of anticipating and acting on the technological and social changes that transform the way people live their lives and the way companies do business. We’ve steered businesses through the hype-driven ups and the bubble-bursting downs of new media by judging which are the bandwagons to avoid and which are the behaviour-changing breakthroughs to pick up on fast.

Before setting up IMP in 2006 Mark Hird and Tony Cuthbertson, IMP’s founding directors, built and ran the UK multimedia operations of mobile operator Orange, developing a range of innovative information, entertainment and communication products at a time of rapid advances in mobile data network and device capabilities.

Prior to Orange the team ran the pioneering new media division of the Press Association – which was sold to Orange in 2000 after the creation of the Ananova news service and the world’s first virtual newscaster. Take a look back at the worldwide TV coverage Ananova received.

Back in those days we predicted a world where everyone would be empowered to access or create live information and multimedia content on mobile devices and be able to share it and act on it instantaneously. Within a few years all that was happening.

Now our focus is on how businesses and brands can change the way they interact with their customers by harnessing the power of the mobile phone – and its very intimate nature – as part of wider multi-platform services and experiences.

Linear consumption of media and entertainment services on the TV, mobile phone or PC has been giving way to more sophisticated user behaviour as people rapidly switch modes from passive viewing on one platform to active participation on another depending on their changing needs, mood or situation.

This – and the growing popularity of social network sites where people are comfortable to converse, share and publish on the web – opens up huge opportunities for media owners, retailers and brands to be much more creative in the way they engage and interact with audiences and individuals.

Posted by Peter on 14 October 2009, 16:16

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When Orange asked us to help develop their new film service for web and mobile the brief was to provide top-quality trailers, clips, behind-the-scenes video and supporting material for every movie out now or coming soon – but to take a different approach from other movie sites.

Instead of focusing on the views of professional film critics or appealing to out-and-out movie buffs, Orange Film is all about the reactions of “real” movie-goers – and in particular the huge numbers of Orange customers who make use of their 2 for 1 tickets on a Wednesday. The aim is to help you decide what to go and see with your friends or family, so as well as providing listings, showing times and trailers the service uses people’s snap reactions to answer the question “Has anyone seen this movie? What’s it like?”

We gather reactions on the Orange Film website, mobile site (left), by text and through social networks like Twitter. And we also get instant reactions in the foyer when the Orange Film crew goes out to speak to audiences as they leave screenings on a Wednesday.

The Orange Wednesdays 2 for 1 promotion has been a phenomenal success over the past five years. Wednesday is now the most popular day for going to the cinema outside the weekend when it used to be the quietest. Back in 2004 in the first week of Orange Wednesdays 12,000 people texted FILM to 241 to take up the offer. Now up to 300,000 people go on an Orange Wednesdays outing together every week.

We’re regularly among the audience ourselves as working on the film service at IMP means every day we’re seeing loads of new clips and trailers, as well as moderating all the comments coming in … and it really whets your appetite for movies you’d otherwise miss.

We’ve got a fun new audience-based application coming soon on the Orange Film service so we’ll tell you all about it when it launches.

Posted by Paul on 13 October 2009, 16:29

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