Financial services provider Publicis is to position PostFinance as an independent brand. "If we have to read about Publicis' new campaign for Swiss Post in Advertising Week, then we've done something wrong," said consultant Markus Binggeli at the presentation of the new campaign for PostFinance. In future, this name is to become just as independent a brand in the minds of consumers as Swisscom Mobile was when it was replaced by Swisscom.one partner for everything
As one of Swiss Post's four strategic business units, PostFinance is the leading provider of payment transactions in Switzerland. The aim of the strategic realignment is to fully meet the customer's need for a single partner for all financial services, in line with the advertising slogan: "Everything from a single source".
Building on this position of expertise, the offering now includes "everything to do with money", as the new claim puts it in a nutshell. PostFinance's services in the areas of payments, savings, investments, retirement planning and now also financing, which have been supplemented and expanded with new offers, are already comparable to those of a bank. "But for legal reasons, the word bank cannot be used in advertising," explains Marco Stettler, Head of Corporate Communications at PostFinance.
Publicis therefore looked for other solutions to make its expertise in the financial market as comprehensible as possible. The main target group is the existing 2.4 million PostFinance customers.
Symbol for safety
At a brain workshop in May, the briefing was formulated together with those responsible at PostFinance. The color yellow was to play an important role in the campaign, which was the basis for the new branding. A second requirement was a symbol for goal orientation. "Anyone who crosses a pedestrian crossing wants to move forward and reach their destination," the creative team came up with. In addition, a pedestrian crossing symbolizes safety in road traffic - and more recently also money traffic, as the campaign ultimately found its decisive symbol for the alternative to the big banks. "Familiarity" was the fourth concept that can also be conveyed with the yellow stripes.
"The most human of all traffic signs is now part of PostFinance," says a delighted Publicis. PostFinance thus accompanies the Swiss "safely through the financial jungle and also helps them to cross obstacles". Incidentally, this advertising property even generates added value for the brand on an ongoing basis: the real yellow stripes are free reminders on all roads every day.
A pre-test confirmed these considerations. Since then, the image has been used consistently in everything from films, posters and advertisements to brochures and employee cards. The entrance to the new headquarters, which PostFinance will move into in Berne in February, will also feature a yellow stripe. And on the PostFinance Christmas card, the top management had themselves photographed on a pedestrian crossing, just like the Beatles on Abbey Road back in the day. It goes without saying that the stripe can also be perfectly integrated into sponsorship events such as music festivals, open-air cinemas or ice hockey.
PostFinance guides you safely through the financial jungle and helps you realize your dreams.
Christmas greetings from PostFinance: Like the Beatles on Abbey Road.
TV commercial: The pedestrian crossing always leads directly to the destination of the respective stage of life.
Andreas Panzeri

Balance sheet German pay-TV Premiere closed the 2003 financial year with a loss of 10.5 million euros before taxes, interest, depreciation and amortization, compared with a loss of 339 million euros in the previous year. Channel boss Georg Kofler wants to generate a profit for the first time this year.

Competition The international creative competition Cresta Awards will be held for the 12th time in 2004. Entries can be submitted until March 12 and further information is available at www.cresta-awards.com or directly from Nancy Ross, [email protected]. As last year, Switzerland is represented on the Cresta Grand Jury for 2004 by Jean Etienne Aebi, Publicis.

Publishers Former Federal Councilor Kaspar Villiger is to become a member of the Board of Directors (BoD) of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung.The BoD of the Zurich publishing house is proposing him for election at the Annual General Meeting on April 24. Villiger was already a member of the board in 1988 and 1989, before he was elected to the Federal Council. Villiger has also already been nominated for the Board of Directors of the reinsurer Swiss Re.

If you want to understand the present and help shape the future, you need to know the past, especially in a scientific and industrial sector that is as dynamic and powerful as the media. This is why Marshall McLuhan is a must-read - for budding journalism students as well as mature managers. 40 years have passed since the Canadian communication theorist coined and described the term "global village" in his "Understanding Media". As a reminder, the start of the PC revolution at the beginning of the 1980s marks almost exactly the halfway point between McLuhan's far-sighted hypothesis and today's reality.
However, the re-edition of his magnum opus also provides an opportunity to re-evaluate his cultural pessimism. Or does your company now only have remote-controlled, will-less creatures running through the corridors controlled by "palm-sized electronic devices"? No? Then congratulations on your cell phone ban. (oc)
> Understanding Media. The Extensions of Man by Marshall McLuhan. Routledge Classics, London 2003. 392 pages, 37.90 Fr.

Awards The ADC wants to improve its reputation again with stricter judging, especially among clients.
Swiss advertising rarely makes a name for itself internationally. As a corrective, generous national competitions succeed in creating a different domestic image. So much patronage is damaging to the industry, the ADC managers agreed and opted for a radical change in the judging process for this year's competition. On the one hand, the club of critical creatives abolished the 25 percent quota system and introduced a rigorous criteria scale instead. On the other hand, the first use of this tried and tested tool was inspired by its internationally renowned creator - Michael Conrad, former Worldwide Chief Creative Officer of Leo Burnett and Cannes jury president.
However, the new mode was preceded by a public dispute that did not exactly do credit to the ADC's credibility. And this at a time of scarce resources, when creative advertising was having a hard time with more and more clients. The spokesman for the community of critics was Frank Bodin, who described the ADC result two years ago as a disaster because six out of nine gold awards were economically irrelevant and, in his opinion, "didn't stand a chance" at international competitions.
Quantity instead of quality
At the heart of Bodin's philippic against the rain of dice was the fact that, according to the jury rules at the time, the ADC did not base its decisions on binding qualitative criteria, but initially on quantitative ones. Not only were his demands for clearly formulated and almost standardized evaluation criteria met, doubters of Bodin's selflessness were also proved wrong, as his Euro RSCG, like most of the agencies previously pampered by the ADC, won just a single bronze award.
The signal effect of rationed prizes is quite something, but officially it didn't upset anyone, "because a shortlist placement is now worth more than a bronze award used to be", is how many explained their modesty. ADC honorary member Michael Conrad explains the uncontroversial introduction of his criteria scale for the jury pragmatically: "Our only weapon against advertising overkill is the more critical assessment of advertising in order to achieve the 'want to see again' effect with the public with better quality." It goes without saying that this ultimately pays off for the client, as can be seen internationally with examples such as Nike, Ikea, Budweiser and Pepsi.
Its ten criteria are solution-, culture-, market-, creative- and customer-neutral and also separate detrimental advertising that is frightening, destructive, uncompetitive or even clichéd from that which exhibits qualities that must be taken for granted, such as innovative strategy and idea as well as excellent execution. From now on, only campaigns that set a new standard or achieve world-class status in their category or in advertising can expect to win ADC Gold. His agency Leo Burnett is not the only one to prove that this way of determining quality leads to high-end creative output. Meanwhile, even Jim Stengel, Global Marketing Officer at P&G, has included Conrad's "want to see again" factor in his push-for list, because award-worthy advertising makes the brand likeable and is the only way to achieve leadership positions in saturated markets.
Three silver medals: the bar for an award was higher than ever.
Luca Aloisi

Guest commentary "Radio 24 has even less to fear from Energy Zurich than before", was the headline in the last Advertising Week. Far from it, writes Jürg Bachmann.
It is clear that the completely new direction of the station, which was launched as Energy Zürich on August 15, was associated with the risk of losing listeners in the initial phase. However, the feared decline did not materialize, and it is of course not the half-year figures that are decisive for Energy Zürich, but the figures between August 15 and December 31, 2003. During these first four months, we have already been able to maintain and expand the overall level of the previous program (target group 15+). Specifically: In the fourth quarter of last year, 17,000 listeners in the greater Zurich area listened to Energy Zurich every working day.
Such a development for a relaunch is unusual and therefore pleasing. In the advertising-relevant target group of 15- to 49-year-olds, the increase in listener figures for Energy Zurich compared with those of Radio 24 is even clearer: while the latter fell below the figure for the first half of the year in the greater Zurich area from Monday to Friday in the last quarter, our station was the only private radio station in Zurich to record a significant increase, reaching 126,000 people every day.
The program's focus on the target group of 15- to 34-year-olds has also fully achieved its goal: In contrast to the first half of 2003, when the two stations were still far apart, Energy Zürich caught up with Radio 24 in the most recent measurement period from October to December, with 70,000 15- to 34-year-olds in the greater Zurich area listening to our station every day from Monday to Friday.
The positive trend is clearly evident in the youngest target group, the 15 to 24-year-olds. In the last quarter of 2003, Energy Zürich, with 32,000 listeners daily on weekdays in the greater Zurich area, has already overtaken Radio 24 as the market leader.
No wonder, we are a little proud and believe that the repositioning has paid off. The fact that an ever-increasing number of listeners are convinced by the good music program, the appealing campaigns and the expert information provided by Energy Zürich is proven not least by the correctly cumulated and interpreted figures from Radiocontrol.
Our team will therefore continue to fine-tune and perfect the program over the next few months. We are already working flat out on new events, concerts (for example another Energy Stars for Free) and encounters with stars. In doing so, we can and will benefit from our international network.
Pro memoria: In addition to traditional radio spots, our advertising customers also have numerous promotional and sponsorship opportunities at their disposal.
> Jürg Bachmann is Managing Director of the radio station Energy Zurich.

Competition The FAB Awards are launching a new prize. From this year, the competition - whose full name is the International Food and Beverage Creative Excellence Awards - will recognize the "FABulous Client of the Year", and participating agencies can nominate the clients whose campaigns they submit for the award free of charge. To do so, they must state what exceptional contribution the client has made to the campaign. A jury assesses the nominations on the basis of the contribution and the quality of the campaign. How well the customer performs has no influence on the judging of the campaign itself. The winner will be announced at the end of May.

ADC Three gold and nine silver dice are the meagre yield of the ADC judging for 2004. Alea iacta non est: While outside Mother Hulda made the flakes dance generously, in the World Trade Center in Oerlikon the dice fell very rarely on the tables - but the voting folders fell all the more frequently under the tables. The jurors of the 28th ADC Awards rated only nine of the 1011 entries submitted as outstanding and just three - all in the film category - as groundbreaking. With 48 awards, the bronze cubes were also around two thirds below last year's yield. On the other hand, 132 entries made it onto the newly introduced shortlist. The result can be explained by the new mode, which was used for the first time this year (see page 9). But the icy economic climate, which caused many large advertising budgets to freeze, was also reflected in the entries. Markus Gut, jury president of the Outdoor Advertising category, concluded: "A strong mode plus a weak year equals fewer prizes." Protests from the administration
Another indication of a weak year was the high number of individual entries. These were often subsequently combined into series by the juries, which caused some protests from the administration. In this way, the original 1011 works submitted were ultimately reduced to a total of 996.
There were no high-flyers this year. Nevertheless, something has changed at the top of the cube ranking this year: last year's second-placed agency Ruf Lanz swung onto the top step of the podium with a total of eleven precious metal awards, ahead of Publicis. The creative duo Markus Ruf and Danielle Lanz won gold in the supreme discipline of film for the Mühlehalde home for the blind and silver for the Ed Fagan commercial for Bank Coop. There was also silver in the advertising category for VBZ and in the radio spot category for Sport Factory Outlet.
The Migros series of commercials "Advertising ideas from customers" made by Publicis was also unanimously awarded gold. The films had already won second place in the 2003 Campaign of the Year competition. However, the Feldschlösschen films showed that professional and public opinion are not always congruent: while the readers of Werbewoche relegated the spots to seventh place, Spillman Felser Leo Burnett was awarded ADC gold. The agency also received a silver cube for the Mammut advertising campaign.
For ADC jury chairman Andreas Prokesch, the fact that the sparse gold awards were all given in the supreme discipline is a signal to the clients "that we can actually do it, but are not allowed to prove it enough".
Added value of the awards
Markus Ruf is also convinced that the low dice count should not lead to the conclusion that Swiss advertising has become worse. "A shortlist this year is worth more than a bronze a year ago," emphasizes the jury president of the sales promotion category. The majority of the jury members also responded positively to the tougher judging criteria. Nevertheless, in the sometimes heated discussions, there were occasional comments that this was still Oerlikon and not Cannes.
When, after almost 24 hours of marathon judging, the last gold cubes were (not) cast, the jury chairman's arbitrary rules of procedure slowly began to falter. Despite fierce protests, Prokesch allowed the jury to vote three times on the Sporttip radio spots by Jung von Matt (JvM). However, this did not change the final result: silver for JvM and a thick blanket of snow for Oerlikon.
Shooting star Ruf LanzJust nine heads make up the
advertising agency Ruf Lanz. Nevertheless, just two years after it was founded in 2001, it advanced to second place in the ADC rankings and outshone the Goliaths of the industry in this year's judging with the strictest mode and the largest yield of precious metals. The agency of the two former Advertisers of the Year Danielle Lanz and Markus Ruf (r.) expanded its business in March 2003 with the
advisor Marcus Gretener (l.) and generated a profit of
sales of 2.7 million francs. Despite the great success
The desire for growth is limited: "We want to continue to make interesting advertising for customers who allow it. And that's not an unlimited number." (la)
The jury only saw groundbreaking work in the film category: the advertising for the Zurich Mühlehalde home for the blind, for Feldschlösschen and for Migros was worth its weight in gold.
All roads lead to McDonald's: DDB won silver for the idea.
Mammoth in the fog: This brought SFLB a silver lining.
Simone Keller

Acne care The Biel-based agency Virus Ideenlabor is advertising the acne treatment Leucen, and the pharmaceutical company Tentan in Ramlinsburg BL has entrusted Virus with the development of all communication measures for the market launch of the new product. Leucen is a complete acne care line that is sold exclusively through drugstores and pharmacies. Virus is implementing a campaign aimed at both retailers and those directly affected. It includes TV commercials, advertisements, mailings, a website and various promotions for retailers. The launch is in April.

The Fédération Romande de Publicité has relaunched its monthly magazine Com.in. Instead of the previous magazine-like layout with a cover picture, Com.in now has a newspaper-like format with a lead article and editorial. The relaunch is intended to make the magazine a reference title for communication professionals and interested parties in French-speaking Switzerland, according to a press release. In terms of content, Com.in now consists of two parts. The first deals with the advertising scene in French-speaking Switzerland. The magazine is cooperating with the Association des Créatifs Romands. The second part is dedicated to the areas of media, marketing and research. Victoria Marchand, previously a business journalist at the magazine L'Hebdo.VR of the reinsurer Swiss Re, will take over as editor-in-chief.

Financing Peter Kölbel wanted to invest three million euros in DDP, the German news agency. The condition: He remains anonymous as financier, but where does the money come from? The question was first asked by the news magazine Focus and now also by DDP boss Lutz Schumacher. He wants to cancel the contract with Kölbel and has reported the Austrian, who is also a member of the management team at Swiss broadcaster U1 TV Station, on suspicion of money laundering. According to Focus, Kölbel is an authorized representative of the Liechtenstein trust company Mitsui Securities Eastern Europe, which did business with Slobodan Milosevic's clan despite the EU embargo. According to Facts, Mitsui also provides the loans used to finance the development of U1 TV.
The official main shareholder of U1 TV is the Viennese building tycoon Hanno Soravia. In addition to the Swiss channel, he also operates TV Berlin and TV München. Kölbel acts as program director for the broadcasting group. No comments on the affair were available. U1 managing director Thomas Sadecky is currently on vacation, as is Peter Kölbel.
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