URGENT GENIUS / TOPICAL IDEAS AT SPEED

21 January 2011

Fancy taking on some industry leaders to create the next uber-topical viral?

Source: News
Tags: competition; Newsjacking; real-time

Ideas such as real-time, newsjacking and generally being quick off the mark have been dominating marketing chat around the water cooler (bar) in 2011, with brands hijacking cultural memes to push their own message. One recent example was Kraft's speedy recruitment of former hobo and voiceover star Ted Williams to provide the voiceover for a mac 'n cheese commercial just days after he became an online phenomenon.

Now, Iris Worldwide has thrown down the gauntlet to spontaneous creative teams around the world with the launch of Urgent Genius. Taking place over 48 hours on 18/19 February, teams of up to seven people are challenged to produce topical content on the top trends taking place that weekend.

Grant Hunter, Iris's regional creative director APAC explains: 'We've being tracking the topical trend we call Urgent Genius for the last eight months and in recent weeks there's been even more interest around this type of content. We are interested in the possibilities the net now gives us to respond to topical trends.'

Hunter continues: 'The Urgent Genius Weekender aims to free creatives from the constraints of their day to day and to prove the effectiveness of topical social ideas at speed.'

Teams from around the world already taking part include Big Balls, Droga5 Auckland, Wieden + Kennedy, Guided Collective, Rubber Republic and BBC Comedy. The best pieces of content produced will feature in Hunter and Iris' social media director Jon Burkhart's talk at SXSW in March.

To win, simply generate the most traffic in terms of shares / likes / retweets / views in the seven days following the competition. If you want to take up the challenge head here to enter.