During 2008 we started looking at how we could help the Music Industry and it’s Artistes increase their listener base and introduce them to a whole new audience. Having personally spent 12 years working in the Music Industry, I found this challenge really exciting.

We produced a game and website for Mr Ray on Universal Music in September and within the first ten days the game “Mr Ray and the Missing Colours” had over 400,000 plays, driving over 120,000 unique users to his website.

Following this success, we designed and produced a game for Parlophone to help promote Lily Allen’s new single “the Fear” and her album “It’s not me, it’s you”. Using various cues from the album, we designed a platform game that allows the player to choose their Lily before pitting their skills against various enemies including Rabid Handbag Dogs, Credit Card Throwing Bankers, Paparazzi, Spikes and the Big Fear monster.

The game is a race against time as the fear slowly creeps up on you and played over ten different levels, the game is a real challenge.

Players can listen to Lily’s new single whilst playing the game and also find links to her new video, website and myspace site. There are also direct Album to buy links to the USA, UK , France and Japan markets.

We started seeding the game on December 19th and within 20 days we had achieved over 1,000,000 plays, claiming the coveted Christmas number one spot in the Viralchart.com even outperforming the crop of Christmas games.

The game has currently been played 1.4 million times and with the single being released on January 26th, we are excited to see if our efforts have been worth it with a strong single chart entry this Sunday. 

Regards Baz Barrow 

I made a promise only to talk about good news – and it seems that Matmi’s website is brilliant news! Over the last year, even on a bad day, we had twice as much traffic on our website as our competitors did. And on a good day, about ten times more? You can take a look for yourself at www.alexa.com.

I seem to talk a lot more about advergames as branded entertainment – but if you think about it, websites are another example of branded communication at work. People remember things that entertain and amuse them much more easily than dry, factual information and “corporate speak”. (And yes, I am thinking of starting a campaign to get rid of all company mission statements – email me at jeff@matmi.com if you think that’s a good idea!!!).

The fact is that Matmi’s website is entertaining. You’re never quite sure what it’s going to do next (even we don’t know – and I still can’t get Pinhead from Hallowe’en to ever come up when I’m on the site….). Sure, it has to “talk the talk and walk the walk” because of the business we’re in. But shouldn’t your company be doing the same?

Take a look at these recent creations for ideas. One’s for rolling papers, one’s for pasties and one’s for a children’s entertainer – but all are an experience: a branded entertainment experience. That’s where we’re headed and I hope you’ll join us.

Enjoy, Jeff.

That would be a “No”. Not me personally, but it’s true for a lot of other Brits. My three weeks in Laos were amazing, but it was even more amazing to see Americans pretending to be Canadians and Brits trying to be Irishmen and Scots.

Britain can’t seem to find something to be proud of itself for at the moment, can it? It’s like we’ve lost the “Great” out of Britain. Sure, Iraq and joining up with the world’s most inept policeman was a bad idea.

I’m not even going to try to defend Great Britain’s track record on the world stage, but we’ve had our good moments and I’d love to see us back on top again. The heady days of the 60s and 70s weren’t so long ago. We ruled the worlds of music, fashion and design – and had sky high interest rates at the same time! Necessity is the mother of invention and Britain DOES have the raw talent and creativity to become Cool Britannia once again.

We need people and businesses with guts, talent and passion! Let’s inject some life into our nation and our national pride! It won’t happen overnight – and it certainly won’t happen while we’re all talking gloom – so let’s stop doing that and start being British! We’ve survived two World Wars for Christ’s sake – getting through this phantom recession is a piece of cake!

Get creative, get motivated and get going! Jeff.

Metaphorically, not literally! This so-called recession is a desperate example of self-fulfilling prophecy; we’re talking ourselves into it and it pees me off hugely. There is a ton of really good stuff going on so why are we ignoring it?

At any point in time, some businesses are doing well and some are doing badly. That hasn’t changed. And let’s give ourselves a reality check here; what better time to close those offices, make people redundant and take high street names off the high street than when lots of other businesses are doing the same? It’s a known boardroom tactic! And who’ll make the money out of it? The people in the boardroom of course…

So if you’re sick of all the doom and gloom, the grey skies and the dark nights, bookmark this page and the site because Matmi is going to make a pledge. We’re only going to talk about GOOD stuff this year. We’re in the business of making people happy and I promise it’s going to be a VERY happy year for anyone who comes into contact with us.
Our advergames make our clients happy because they help them make money. They make us happy because we love creating them – and because they’re at the top of the charts, of course! And they make the people who play them happy – or else they wouldn’t do it, right?! Now that’s a virtuous circle – everyone benefits when they’re in contact with Matmi.
Spreading joy and happiness is what Matmi does (very well, actually) and I think that’s the main reason we’re doing so well. We give. And we get it back. We did the Comic Relief game for free, got noticed by some big blue chips who are now our customers and “Let It Flow” has won six awards. We did “Ho Ho Ho Yellow Snow” to spread some Christmas cheer and that got an award too! At Matmi, it happens all the time. Not straightaway when we do something good – but we’ve been doing this for years now so there’s a huge amount of goodwill for Matmi out there. Without being cheesy, I can honestly say that I feel that goodwill every day and it’s brilliant! You can too.

Just give something for the sheer joy of it. Whether it’s helping a friend, supporting your community, championing a cause, doing some charity work or whatever. You don’t have to have millions to be a secret millionaire – you can give of yourself as well. (Maybe I did spend too long in the sun in Laos… maybe not). Even the papers are getting fed up of bad news, so think of something good or kind that your business could do and you’ll get some great PR – which helps your business! Easy, huh?

So now I’ve made a pledge to only talk about good stuff, I’m going to give you a challenge. Try doing something good. I can guarantee something good – or even better – will happen in return.

Let me know how you get on? Go for it! Jeff.