zaterdag 3 mei 2008

Klaas Weima, Energize Utrecht

Building an online marketing agency succesfully is a creative profession as well. That's why this week Klaas Weima, managing director and founder of online marketing agency Energize, is in the picture. Klaas leads a team of 18 creative professionals in his office at the canals of Utrecht. The online campaigns made by Energize have lead to great results for top clients in Holland. Read about his week and you get a pretty good idea why he missed this week's deadline.

Yes. I failed. I know. I’ve let Robin down. Normally, I always make my deadlines. Impossible. How could this happen? Well, it has been a very short week. Short, but party-heavy, not much sleep and very intense. From celebrating Queens Day in Amsterdam to running 10 k’s straight near the canals in Utrecht (which as a result caused me to have a very sore back). Let’s give an overview.

Monday morning, 04:30 am. My girlfriend Esther got up in our hotel room in Zwolle and took a shower. Auch, that’s nasty early. She went to the distribution center of BroodjesExpress.com for our latest cross media campaign for investment banker BlackRock (see the site here). Over night, 1,600 sandwiches (in Dutch: “broodjes”) needed to be made and delivered to 1,600 stock advisors all over Holland. The sandwiches were ordered in a virtual boulangerie which we developed. The shop was online for only three days and resulted in over 80,000 pageviews by 2,200 targeted advisors (who received a sandwich bag on their desk with a unique code to order). 05.30 am. I turned on my MacBook and finished my article about my China Innovation Trip for The Dutch Journal of Marketing. Showed up in the office around 10.30 and worked until 23.00 (what a great night to plan our monthly management meeting!).

Tuesday, MarketingTribune (marketing periodical) called if I was interested in an interview about the BlackRock campaign. Sure. First, called the client to verify if they wanted to cooperate and, even better, have the interview planned the same day. Second, confirmed the interview to the reporter. Third, received a call from BlackRock explaining they could not cooperate, due to international PR policies. Fourth, called the reporter and explained. Fifth, called the PR agency and shared my frustration. Sixth, received an explanation and got a go-ahead for the interview. Seventh, called the reporter again and went to see her that afternoon. Nice.

That evening it was VrijMarkt (official kick-start of Queens Day) in Utrecht, means people dive in their cellars and lofts to check if they can find any old stuff to sell on the market. So did we. It was raining, but the beer and tunes from my SoundDock were prevailing. Within five hours we sold much of everything and went in to a pub for a beer. The next day, we took a train to Amsterdam to celebrate in the Jordaan. What a mad-house must Amsterdam look like if you never heard of Queens Day and arrive as a tourist. Open Bars, the canals full of beat boats and a lot of orange. That night we decided to live life and stayed at the Five Star Barbizon Palace Hotel. Frankly, quite handy that Esther used to work here.

On Ascension day, I visited the sky box of FC Utrecht for the soccer play-offs. I was invited by the Rabobank and had a great time in the stadium. I was surprised to see that all the billboards were still old-fashioned, using a roll-over technique for the different ads. Where are all the interactive and digital screens I’ve seen in Madison Square Garden and in Shanghai?

Friday, the agency was closed again but I decided to do some work. And received Robin’s mail reminding me on my obligation to write a post. Which I did.

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