The Upper Storey headquarters in Singapore celebrated the holidays with some mini-golf, prizes, dinner, and drinks…what a great celebration and an even better end to a fantastic year!

Happy Holidays!

In this article – which was a reaction to an original post on Adweek – I argued that I do not think there is any digital shop in Asia which can lead Brand Strategy (for large scale multinational companies).

This got some heated reaction from a few people. Not surprising, many people confuse the issue. This is not to say Digital Shops don’t understand brands, or cannot develop great strategic campaigns which build brands.

In the end actually I am getting tired of media trying to make division between ‘traditional’ and ‘digital’ agencies. My end point was to agree with Barry Wacksman of R/GA about recognizing “agencies of the digital age” whatever their background.

Digital shops as Asia’s new brand leaders?

In the US digital agencies are transforming from simple to web gurus to leading the overall brand strategy for their clients. Euan Wilcox, business director of The Upper Storey, explains why most digital outfits in Asia are not ready to take this step and how size and talent is key to this eventual evolution.

Adweek recently reported that more web shops in the US were starting to be appointed as lead agencies on brands, tasking them with traditional work as well as digital duties. In Asia we are seeing the same trend of agencies leading campaign engagements.

However, engaging at a ‘brand’ level is something I do not think Asian digital agencies are ready for. And I do not necessarily think it is an issue of digital or not – but a more practical issue of size and talent.

The full article on Marketing Interactive.

TUS launched a pan-regional photo/video competition microsite for Sentosa Leisure Group last month. Barely 3 weeks into the first launch for Malaysia, the site has already generated more than 8000 visitors with limited media buy. To date, there are over 200 entries from people who shared their favorite moments in order to win a trip to Sentosa. Join the fun @ www.myfavouritemoments.com

“Being at the cutting edge of new technologies, especially in a web 2.0 world, is critical for a great digitally savvy agency.”

I couldn’t agree more (well I did say it). The Upper Storey wasn’t ‘one of the first’ – but the first agency in Singapore to use Google Street View in a clients work. We implemented it to show people interested in the OCBC Cycle race, what the riders course is like at street level. And this was wrapped up with a nice promotion for KLM on the very popular Route Maps section of the OCBC Cycle site.

This wasn’t a major campaign. But it is great to bring exciting new opportunities and ideas to clients. And having it tied to the offical Google launch means we generated some nice buzz on the social aggregator via the Blogs and Twitters.