FAUX OOH & THE REALITY OF SOCIAL MEDIA.
A packed Tube train with luscious lashes, Nail polish painting Paris streets red, and French Handbags racing about like it’s the Italian Job. This isn’t your spotty memory of an experimental Euro-trip, it’s Faux OOH, and brands are exploring this content niche with great results.
This latest attempt to stop you scrolling is led with creative excellence by brands such as Maybelline, Jacquemus and L'Oréal. With Faux OOH, real world captured video meets a hyper realistic CGI take on an OOH marketing stunt. The nuanced beauty is that it’s almost believable making it so appealing and shareable.
This new take on an old media makes for an attractive proposition to marketers. Real material executions, while impressive, are resource intensive. These big investments of time and money are a luxury the social content brief rarely has. Let’s not forget the sheer amount of red tape a public stunt or special build requires. Permits, government regulations, even Newton's laws of motion - no longer apply. Faux OOH cuts straight to the point, delivering the most ideal UGC possible. Interestingly, Ian Padgham, filmmaker and creator of the original Maybelline Tube train mentions “My hope is that certain campaigns will do so well that the brands then actually bring the project to life.”
In a time where fake-news and ultra-filtered photos make us question what we see on social, platforms that favor less polish and raw ‘believable’ content are rising to the top. Faux OOH straddles this line very well. Suspending belief enough so people don’t feel tricked, while leaving room for their own conclusion that this is just some CGI fun. Yes the stunt is fake, but the online reactions and engagement are real.
Faux OOH is having a moment. But like anything social, once enough brands have jumped onboard it will become oversaturated and expected. It’s fun, but most likely fleeting. All things considered, it still presents a great opportunity for marketers to experiment with ideas and engage their audience with some light-hearted visual banter.