Representing 4 continents, @cpbgroup about to share the work they do across the world #GreatTalent #AWXI pic.twitter.com/Y63J2l7Zh4
— MDC Partners (@MDCPartners) October 2, 2014
CP+ B brought its creative talent to Advertising Week New York from around the globe last week, with none other than Chairman Chuck Porter on hand to emcee a select panel.
While CP+B has a worldwide presence, many of its offices are small. Porter likes it that way; as he noted during the event, strong collaboration between offices works well in serving the agency’s varied clients.
One such location is CP+B’s Copenhagen, Denmark office, which handles the account for III, a brand of headphones used primarily by DJ’s. Mathias Birkvad, CEO of CP+B, Copenhagen, outlined the “how” behind a agency’s creative approach which led to a rap contest that generated lots of media attention.
Birkvad said:
“Our objective was to create branded headphones for III, a niche player. They’re sold in Apple stores around the world but have a limited marketing budget. We wanted to get closer to hip hop culture, so we reached out to the Stones Throw label with hip hop artist Peanut Butter Wolf.
We spent a couple weeks working on a breakthrough creative idea. Then as we were playing around with the headphones we focused on the two cords. They’re the perfect headset for rapping and talking.”
CP+B launched the World Premiere Rap Mic contest with the website MyWorldPremiere.com. The original Charizma line, “When I didn’t have a mic, I rapped on headphones” turned into a rallying cry: make music however you can.
Contestants were invited to rap over Stones Throw’s first album. The rules: download the app to your iPhone and connect a headset. Record your verse. When done, upload the rap to the site for everyone to listen to (and judge).
Here’s Peanut Butter Wolf himself explaining the idea behind the project:
One contestant, PB Smatt, incorporated the contest rules into his rap.
Birkvad played it for the Ad Week audience:
CB+B also generated interest in different ways, including social media and T shirts. “To let people know about it, we used Peanut Butter Wolf’s Facebook page, and we also reached out to SoundCloud”.
As Birkvad noted, both helped the contest gain more attention.
To date there have been thousands of uploads, and the contest is now closed as Peanut Butter Wolf prepares to announce the winner on Friday, October 10.
Stones Throw will release a single by the winning rapper, so stay tuned.