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So after 2 weeks, Heather’s gone on to the next chapter of her adventure.
To be honest, I don’t know what she made of it.
It was certainly enjoyable to have her here … she’s full of energy, ideas and questions … but I still have that nagging fear we didn’t give her what she was looking for.
We talked a lot.
We covered a lot of ground and she was very generous with her knowledge and experience … including how some people need to get out more because they’re slowly going mad … but I just don’t know if she is walking away with the experience she was looking for.
That said, we certainly exposed her to some of the weird and wonderful elements of China, including this pre-conference ‘entertainment’ that occurred just before I got up to speak.
[And yes – the karaoke opera singer was better than me and better received than me]
What I hope is that she goes away thinking this part of the World is wonderfully mad but full of promise and potential.
While it might not yet have the ‘creative cred’ of cities like London or NYC, I don’t know if they really have them anymore either … I mean, have you seen the majority of the work coming out of those ‘creative hubs’?
Without doubt, the overall standard of work out here is lower than many in the West, but the potential to do things that can affect culture on a massive scale dwarfs most of the established ‘advertising cities’ put together.
As I said in my post when Heather arrived, my main reason for doing this was the hope the experience captivates, intrigues, excites and challenges her so when she gets round to writing her book about this whole wonderful adventure, she encourages planners to venture – physically, or at the very least, mentally – beyond their own shores.
I don’t know if we have achieved that, but what I do know is we’re better off for the experience of having had her here for a couple of weeks.
Thanks Heather. Safe travels.
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One of the things that I find interesting about planners is how much emphasis they place on writing a really cool proposition on the creative brief.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s really really important – however more often than not, it’s just a fancy way of expressing a very traditional point of view.
Again, that doesn’t mean it’s wrong either, however sometimes there’s an opportunity to fuck things up a bit … develop an idea that ignores the ‘fancy-pants’ proposition and just has a totally new and interesting way to approach the challenge.
Some call that lateral thinking, I call it thinking.
The problem with planning is that at its heart, it’s inherently logical.
It makes sense.
It all flows.
And while you need that to help a client appreciate the power, beauty and simplicity of what you’re suggesting – that doesn’t mean the whole process has to be that way.
When we had cynic, we had this ‘game’ that basically forced us to throw away logic, at least at the initial stage.
We had a bunch of cards – I think 400 of them – which each had a ‘solution’ written on them.
These covered a wide range of possibilities from ‘help the poor’ to ‘write a book’ to ‘open a bank’ to – you guessed it – ‘make a car’.
It also had stuff like ‘make them feel like superman’, ‘make them love the elderly’ and ‘encourage them to change jobs’ … so basically everything and anything.
What we did was place all these cards upside down on a table and then – once we’d clearly articled the objective we had to achieve – we’d individually pick a card up and then, regardless of the response, we would have to develop a ‘logical’ argument for why [1] it would solve the clients objective and [2] why it was right for the brand to do it.
Without doubt there were times it was near impossible, but you’d be amazed how often we were able to come up with some genuinely sound ‘logic’ for things that – on first impressions – sounded like utter madness, but it’s because of our ability to identify a clear and concise logic for some of those ideas that gave us the confidence to present them to clients and you know what … some of them loved the ideas too, which is why I’m still hugely proud that we got to do a bunch of wonderfully interesting stuff that other agencies can only dream about pulling off, from helping design the interiors of jumbo jets to creating a moped [around a countries needs, not a riders] to getting a hotel to install mobile phone signal blocking devices to positioning NASA as if it was a FMCG, to name but a select few.
Sure, not all of the stuff we came up with ended up happening …
Sure, some of the stuff we did turned into an unmitigated disaster …
Sure, we often ended up doing planning/creative development in the ‘traditional’ way …
… but I’m OK with that because apart from the fact a lot of ‘classic advertising campaign’ turn out to be a crock of ineffective shit, it helped everyone involved see – even if it only lasted for a single meeting – just what they are capable of developing and for that alone it was worth it.
I suppose what I’m saying is that it doesn’t matter how creative you might be – or think you are – everyone can benefit with a little push to think broader, weirder and better so whether that’s with the help of some stupid cards or working with a broader team, don’t sit there thinking “you’ve cracked it” just because you’ve come up with a fancy proposition … force yourself to think outside of traditional logic because that’s where the truly interesting things live and where your brain can get a truly good workout.
So over the years, I’ve written a bunch of blog posts slagging off banks.
For example here and here and here.
The reason I’ve slagged them off is not because I think their ads are crap – though that’s definitely the case with many of them – it’s because they basically are lying.
Yes, lying.
Millions upon millions of dollars gets “invested” in campaigns saying banks are fully committed to helping small business or they’re focused on customer service but far too often, the average man in the street only ever experiences this through the ad.
Or the brochure.
Or the print ad.
And that’s why I love a little company in the US called Square.
Square – for those of you who don’t know – is a company that has made an attachment and app for the iPhone that allows people to take credit card payments whenever and wherever they are.
Sure, you pay a small premium to use this service, but what Square have done is help small business improve their odds of survival by not just increasing their options of receiving payment … but by guaranteeing their ability to get paid.
No waiting.
No false promises.
No bouncing cheques.
PAYMENT. GUARANTEED.
For a very, very low cost of entry, Square has empowered small business to survive and thrive and what have the banks done – banks, let’s not forget, that spend untold millions talking about their commitment to helping small business – well all they’ve done is make a shitload of empty promise ads, a bunch of meaningless brochures and an environment where customer service has become customer disservice with huge fees attached for every little transaction.
But here’s the thing, as much as a bank should have – and could have – come up with the concept of Square, so should one of the banks ad agencies?
Let’s face it, the issues relating to small business and cash flow is hardly something new … so why didn’t an agency come up with the concept of inventing a low cost, portable credit card reader?
For all the talk of ‘solving business problems’, our ‘solutions’ highlight our ‘truth’ … we make ads, we generally only know how to make ads and we generally only like to promote making ads. No wonder we’ve lost our seat at the boardroom table!
Square is a fantastic idea for small business, but more than that, it’s a great kick in the ass for adland because if we’re to get our influence back, we need to use our smarts to create change, not just create ads.
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So I got an email from BrainJuicer inviting me to a book club event they’re holding.
In short, if you agree to attend, they’ll send you a book to read [which unsurprisingly relates to issues and viewpoints held dear by Brainjuicer] and then you attend the event so you can chat about it with a bunch of other people who have taken part.
What an intimate, simple and lovely idea.
I know it’s not a new concept, I know many people may claim they’re too busy to read a book … but this approach not only demonstrates their belief in the value of human emotion, it show more understanding of their audience than 99% of other research companies who either:
1. Ignore you.
2. Send you copious amounts of bullshit.
3. Invite you to a conference where they can bore you with copious amounts of bullshit. *
Sadly – or fortunately, depending on which way you look at it – I cannot attend, but I hope I will get invited again because if for nothing more, I want to show my support to research companies who treat people as humans, not robots.
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* Yes, I know there is a worse scenario, such as inviting you to a conference that either:
1. States the obvious about China being big & rich and digital’s changing everyones lives.
OR
2. Has me presenting how China is big & rich and digital’s changing everyones lives.
… but I’m assuming no one would be so stupid to attend either of those ‘events’, even if a gun was pointed at their head. Probably by me.
Filed under: Comment
Everyone loves Dr Seuss don’t they.
Children.
Parents.
Grandparents.
Even bloody businessmen.
One of histories ugliest children’s characters has somehow elevated himself into a position of being societies all-seeing, all-knowing knowledge bank and teacher.
Yoda must be fucking livid.
I can understand why children and their parents like Dr Seuss but I have to say I find the fact the business community have re-embraced the long limbed feline, bizarre.
Actually, it’s worse than that, it’s frightening.
I know it sounds like some terrible plot from a Nickelodeon show, but there really are some corporations – some billion dollar corporations – who make a big deal about what Dr Seuss can teach them about being successful.
Seriously, is that what the business community have come to?
Needing to be taught common fucking sense by a character from a children’s book?
But that aside, there’s a counter point of view to all this ‘common sense’ being banded about.
Take “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened” …
On one hand I appreciate it’s saying how important it is to look at opportunities with a positive frame of mind because sometimes the fear of failure or loss makes us not try stuff … but what the hell is wrong with crying?
Crying is good.
We spend so much time in a bubble of fakedom, that crying gives our other emotions a workout … emotions that keep us human, teach us stuff, give us clarity and generally help us realise what is really important in life.
Besides, as much as I’d like to pretend I am mature and sophisticated – I’d be pretty pissed off if my wife announced she was leaving me and smiled because overall, “the experience had been pretty good”.
I’d want her to cry.
I’d want her to be devastated.
Giving me a smile and saying ‘it was fun’ wouldn’t make me feel good – it would be like rubbing salt in the wound.
Dr Seuss is – in my opinion – a great example of what is wrong with society these days.
Everyone and everything seems to say we should be focusing on the future, being sensible, not having regrets … well fuck that.
Some of the best things humanity can do is doing the complete opposite of the Seuss sentiments.
I’d rather have a life full of regrets than live a life full of sensible decisions.
I’d rather be stupid with love than have relationships that feel cold and inhuman.
I’d rather treasure what I’ve got than chase what I can’t have.
Life isn’t about being sensible and it shouldn’t be.
People are human, not robots which means we live and act on our emotions, not a circuit board where every eventuality has a pre-calculated response.
Laughter … tears … screams and stupidity are easily as valuable as smiles, politeness, calmness and common sense and anyone who says otherwise needs to get out more.
Or have a good kicking.
Smile because it happened?
Why don’t you fuck off Dr Seuss and keep your opinions to yourself.