The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

Over two World Wars, more people that we can ever imagine gave up their lives – or lived through hell and terror- for the benefit of our futures.

And how do we repay them?

By letting our greed, arrogance and ego put the planet in a position where it’s socio, economic, political and environmental elements are all in serious danger.

With that in mind, lets make sure we spare some thought to the real heroes of the World today.

I’m not talking about overpaid and overhyped sportspeople … actors … musicians … I’m talking about average men, women and children whose selflessness allowed today’s generation to think stress is simply not having enough money to buy the latest iPOD incarnation.

As you can tell, it’s packed to the rafters with Direct Mailers [not a letter drop] from the Maybank bank … offering all and sundry a credit card even though with the current economic crisis, it’s probably best banks don’t offer it and people don’t take it.

I know how good direct marketing can be – but it’s rarely demonstrated via this method of communication.

Not only that, but when you see a bin packed with offers that no one even wanted to read, let alone receive – it almost undermines the value of the brand who are paying for it.

Because I love financial organisations sooooooooooooooo much, I felt it was my duty to inform them that they’re wasting valuable cash on this sort of marketing exercise, so I found out the name of their VP of Marketing and sent them the above piccie with the words, “My advice is save your cash, you need it more than us”

Funnily enough, I’ve had no reply. Yet. Lets hope they don’t charge me $25 for a response.

As I said, I know direct marketing can be huuuugely effective … but it needs more than just a blanket offer delivered in the monotone of the corporate mission statement – because otherwise, the only thing it is actually doing is helping people identify what they have to ignore on top of all the usual wallpaper shit they get subjected to each and every day.

Some adfolk say DM it is the only effective advertising medium available … and apart from those people needing a good kicking … they need to know that what it actually is, is one of the only advertising mediums that can tell a company just how ineffective their communication is/was.

That’s a big difference between what they say and what they actually deliver – and given so many of these DM companies still recommend a bland letter [delivered to approx 95% of the World population] as the way to go, then you can’t blame clients when they say the ad industry is full of shit.

I know the medium is very important, but if you want to get people involved or interested in something, then you need to think about what they want to hear/do, not what you want to tell them.

A while back there was a movie called ‘Two Girls & One Cup’.

It was so sick, that people started videoing the reaction of people watching the clip and posting it on Youtube.

Well, given we live in a shock culture, some sick and twisted individual has gone and made something even worse.

Yes, even sicker than shit and vomit!!!

Apparently this new piece of filth is called ‘6 Girls & A Dead Guy’ and whilst I could direct you to the original film – which is amazingly on YouTube [though I expect it to be taken down any second now] my moral stance doesn’t allow it … so instead I post a clip of how some guys reacted when they were asked to watch it for the first time.

OK … OK … so it’s nothing to do with some sick movie, it’s our response to the car crash that was Ogilvy Athens ‘song’ for David Ogilvy.

I have a huge amount of respect for that network but this sort of thing makes me ill. Infact any agency song pisses me right off.

I know some people think it shows the company is full of passion, but in the real World, they just think it’s a company full of shit.

Remember Mindshare’s horror of ‘We Work Hard For The Money‘?

What about Bank Of America’s U2 parody ‘One Bank‘?

Then the all time classic, the Singaporean Ministry Of Embarassment?

Who the hell thinks this rubbish is a good idea?

Probably the same people who think a purple squiggle is an amazing corporate identity or the ones who issue a bloody press release just because they’ve made the ‘S’ in their name, lowercase.

Photo: HHCL/Tango

Don’t get me wrong, passion can be a true competitive advantage but this sort of thing isn’t passion … it’s contrived, humiliating and downright embarassing … especially because you just know they’re taking it all so seriously.

[At least BBDO’s ‘home of big breasts‘ rubbish was done with tongue firmly in cheek]

A while back a guy told me what he thought was the difference between a brand that had cred and a brand that was dead.

He summised it by saying Apple would NEVER have a guy dressed up as an iPhone walking around exhibitions because they know it looks sad … yet almost every other company seems to think this ‘characterisation of their product/brand’ is a good idea because it makes it people friendly. I think he might have a point – because what so many companies seem to be missing is that people friendly doesn’t always mean desirable, just like disruption, doesn’t always mean positive.

David Ogilvy was one of adlands true great thinkers/doers … he developed a network that created some of the greatest ideas of advertsing … however this clip shows how far they’ve fallen and what upsets me is they still have the audacity to claim they are innovative and interesting when in the majority of cases, what they do is churn out the same idea over and over again or – to keep some of their genuinely talented folk happy – scam.

Because of this – and because I believe this sort of thing is undermining the industry I love and work in – I ask you you to please post/pass on any one of our ‘6 Girls & One Dead Guy‘ flicks [there’s a total of 5] because as of today, I/we are officially declaring [not violent, please no legal action, ha] war on Ogilvy in the hope that naming and shaming might embarass them to be as good as we all know they can be, because as one of the biggest companies in adland, their improvement can help drive change across whole category and by god do we need it.

I wonder if this all falls within BBDO’s HR policy? Feels more like cynic than some big multinational, still, it’s better than Ogilvy’s snuff video.

Believe it or not, this is not the reason why I keep saying how great it is to work in Asia. But it helps, ha!

So today’s the 5th November – and whilst there’ll be loads of blog posts that talk about the history of Guy Falkes – I’m going to be talking about a twisted ankle.

As many of you will have probably gathered, I’m quite busy at the moment – with an inordinate amount of time being spent travelling here, there and everywhere – and whilst it is way, way, way better than working in a bank, it is still quite tiring, especially dealing with the bloody time differences that I find myself having to work with/adapt to.

The thing is, when I was a kid, I didn’t do ‘tired’ … infact, one of the main reasons I’m an only child is because I was such a little shit as a kid and survived on just a few hours kip each night.

[I’d like to take this opportunity yo publically apologise to my parents for their years and years and years of sleep depravation]

Photo: Martineno

Anyway, the point of this crappy background is that all this tiredness has made me [1] Grumpy [2] Airy Fairy and [3] Clumsy … and whilst you probably think that’s all quite normal for me … it isn’t, which is why I was quite surprised when last week I slipped and ended up twisting my ankle badly.

Except here’s the thing … while it hurt [infact it hurt like a complete bastard] the pain was seemingly overwhelmed by memories of my childhood flooding back into my mind.

I know this might be quite shocking for you to comprehend, but when I was younger, I was quite athletic. I played rugby for the school [glory boy winger], ran for the school [100 meter king], played footie … I was Mr Active … and because of that, I would find myself getting injured quite a lot, however now I’m 38 and more obsessed with sports I can either play using a Nintendo DS/Xbox 360/PS3 or watching it on the telly … my sporting injuries have reduced to nearly zero.

And whilst that might mean less physical pain for me, it also means I am getting older because I no longer feel invincible – that feeling as a kid where you believed you could overcome anything that was thrown at you.

Photo: Not me, so stop laughing

Whether it was trying to jump your heavy Raleigh Grifter over 10 people lying down in front of a makeshift ramp or simply going in for tackles against people years older and taller than you, you felt the worst you’d ever get was maybe a bloody knee or a twisted ankle so you only looked in one direction. Forwards.

The thing is, when I twisted my ankle last week, it brought back all these memories of being outdoors, breathing the air, laughing with my friends, having adventures I’d remember forever [but didn’t realise at the time] … and whilst I have a wonderful and full life, there’s something about those days that were truly magical.

Sure it might be because I was naive or simply not very worldy, but I think there should be more of it … so I hereby declare 2009 as the year of reconnecting … where we stop relying on technology for our kicks or communication and get up and get out again – experience life with the same attitude as when we thought the worst that could happen is a bloody knee or a twisted ankle.

Anyone up for it or is this a byproduct of me being in the Google boys company again?