Late last week, I submitted a photograph to ABC Television here in Melbourne for consideration as the “weather photo” on ABC News Victoria.

Yesterday, I was watching the weather segment when I realised that my image of a cold morning on the Yarra River had been selected!

The ABC uses the same image for several nights in a row, so I was able to record the broadcast this evening. You can watch the segment below (or on YouTube):

If you’d like to have a photo considered for broadcast, you can upload your image to ABV2 via their “weather photo” website at http://www.abc.net.au/victoria/tvweather/upload.htm

Yesterday, the Australian Tourism Commission released their latest attempt at a commercial designed to lure the world’s tourists to Australia. Entitled There’s Nothing like Australia, it showcases some of Australia’s finest clichéd attractions and a truly awful song.

One would consider that after Where the Bloody Hell are You? and Go Walkabout, the government’s tourism agency could produce something substantially better. Alas, they’ve remained true-to-form and produced an absolute shocker of an advertisement: A tuneless parade of clichéd scenes, sedated animals and people who really can’t sing. Take a look for yourself:

The problem I have with this woeful presentation is that it appears to be so astonishingly amateurish. For starters, the lyrics to the song are poorly-written. To suggest that kangaroos are “furry things that bounce around in herds” is neither factually correct (they form mobs) nor particularly cute. And “Da-da-da-daaaaa, da-da-da-daaaa” in place of half a verse suggests that we lack eloquence or even verbal skills. Is this really the best song-writing that several million dollars can produce?

What I also dislike about this embarrassing film is the lack of any real message. Apparently Australia consists almost entirely of larrikins, some sedated animals and various Outback landscapes. There are almost no references to our vast cultural heritage including aboriginal traditional painting, stage performances, our vast music scene, our architecture or our unique sports such as Australian Rules. Even the tokenistic opera singer at the Opera House is overshadowed by a Missy Higgins look-a-like in the front row!

But finally, I think the cinematography compares poorly to the previous advertisements. Couldn’t they at least film the rowers on Melbourne’s Yarra River on a sunny day? That aside, the overall presentation isn’t especially creative and lacks the crispness that one would expect from a national tourism campaign.

The big question we have to ask is “Why are Australians so poor at marketing themselves?“

Look at our last effort: Filmed by Baz  Luhrmann, it starred a stressed American woman (played by an Australian) who is stalked by a creepy Aboriginal girl in the middle of the night:

The Walkabout campaign was regarded as a failure despite it being linked to the release of the film Australia. Tourist numbers declined, and few people understood the true message of the advertisements. (In addition, walkabout can be a racist reference to the supposed lack of discipline and work ethic that Aborigines are said to possess; they’d rather ‘go walkabout’ or wander off).

Before Go Walkabout, there was the much-criticised Where the Bloody Hell Are You? campaign that was banned in Britain and censored in other markets such as Singapore:

Whilst in Australia the word bloody is just considered course, in most English-speaking countries it is considered offensive. So whilst creating a controversy might have seemed like clever advertising tactic by media-savvy marketing boffins at the time, it backfired in most markets and tourist numbers fell.

Looking back now, Where the Bloody Hell Are You? looks like the work of a genius when compared to There’s Nothing like Australia. The music was better, there was more personality expressed, a more representative image of Australia was shown and the cinematography was polished.

So what should we do? I guess we have three options; 1. Give up and accept that Australia is ‘out of vogue’ as a holiday destination; 2. Consider asking foreigners to make our ads, since they are probably more in touch with what works than we are or 3. Consider a serious brand transformation (i.e. no more clichés and the development of a memorable slogan).

We weren’t always so poor at marketing ourselves. Despite the fact that Australians call shrimps prawns and rarely barbecue them, Throw Another Shrimp on the Barbie was a worldwide hit because it increased brand recognition and tourist numbers.

I have no idea whether this advertisement will work. And as an Australian, I am admittedly not the best person to judge. But the reception domestically hasn’t been too good thus far. But for what it’s worth, I reckon we’re going to have to do a lot better than this if we’re seriously going to get recession-affected foreigners to come to Australia for a holiday.