Finding good things can sometimes be tricky. Mobile phone company Nokia wanted to highlight this when launching its Good Things service by placing a giant 40ft-high arrow in the centre of London.
The end result bore more then a little resemblance to Yahoo's search engine poster execution and Yellow Pages' 1998 London branding initiative but the trail Nokia created caused quite a stir. It achieved this by supplementing the service's launch with a teasing trail of clues to build publicity and create an industry buzz.
Ten prominent industry bloggers selected from Twitter were sent invitations to the unveiling of its latest venture. In the lead up to the event, these ten were then sent a large green arrow containing a Nokia N97 phone with the message, "Get to the good times". Attendees then received the global co-ordinates along with the time and date of the event but no further information.
The 23 October 2009 saw the centrepiece of the promotion revealed as a giant green arrow was hung from Tower Bridge in London. This arrow demonstrated how the "Good Things" service works, where users leave arrows that flag recommendations for other users on a digital map.
Based on the simplest form of giving someone directions (pointing) it lets you share the places you love, or tells you about the places others love. When the signpost is live it constantly turns and shows the distance and direction to new Good Things. People could submit their favorite cafe, an upcoming concert or a rare record store and the signpost will automatically turn in the right direction and the giant LED screen will light up.
Tying in with the launch of the mini-N97 phone on the same day, internet blogs became awash with theories and updates as the path of clues caused plenty of intrigue before the big reveal.