Putting creativity on a global platform

OpenAd.net offers creatives worldwide a free-of-charge online platform for selling creative concepts to subscribers, i.e. companies looking for marketing communications ideas to fit their brands.

OpenAd registers more than 3 000 authors who regularly post ideas either in response to pitch competitions or into the online gallery. The global stock of advertising ideas has been recognized as a brave new medium by many in the industry.

Michael Conrad, former vice president of creation at Leo Burnett Worldwide is convinced that 'OpenAd.net could become the eBay of advertising and marketing ideas'.

Katarina Skoberne, Managing Partner at OpenAd.net, says: "The potentials are enormous. Even if OpenAd continues to fulfill the one premise of a fully level playing field, where creatives from all countries can compete on equal terms, it will have made a significant contribution."

Clients can explore a range of creative solutions for their products and brands by the world's largest creative department from the comfort of their own PCs. The service that OpenAd.net provides is a reflection of the new global reality - by enabling direct contact between buyers and sellers, OpenAd.net is a place where buyers have access to ideas without middlemen to limit choice; and sellers can participate on equal terms without deference to status, corporate hierarchy, office politics or locality.

Since March 2005 OpenAd.net has been running a series of pitch competitions in partnership with the Financial Times UK, under a common title - World's Toughest Briefs.

Three pitches have closed with major success: Virtual Demonstration, the winning idea at the first pitch, the only one which was not commercially driven as it was for the UK charity organisation Make Poverty History, saw the light of day in July, at the time of the G8 summit in Edinburgh.