Filed under: Advertising [Planning] School On The Web
Thank you for entering the Advertising Planning School on the Web assignment.
We hope you had fun and we are looking forward to judging your entry.
Because I’ve just moved from the US to the UK annnnnnnnd I start my new job tomorrow, I’ll need a few weeks to get the judges to review all the entries and get their feedback, so it will probably be a few weeks before you hear what we think of what you’ve done.
Regardless of what happens, I think it’s awesome you took part.
Career growth is built on learning from the challenges you expose yourself to. Given we live in a World where increasingly, the fear of failure is stopping people reaching their full potential, the fact you had a go is worthy of praise.
If we’re to get back where we belong, it’s about pushing to be better rather than settling with what we’ve got.
Thank you for wanting to make that happen.
Speak soon.
Filed under: Advertising [Planning] School On The Web
… the entry submission is September 30th.
Good news, that’s over a week away and you still have the whole of this weekend.
Even better, all you have to do is submit a single sentence.
One!
How easy is that?
More info on the assignment is here.
Filed under: Advertising [Planning] School On The Web
… the entry submission is September 30th.
Good news, that’s over 2 weeks away and the whole of this weekend.
More info on the assignment is here.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Advertising [Planning] School On The Web, America, Attitude & Aptitude, BBH, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Emotion, Empathy, Insight, Perspective, Planners, Planning, Point Of View, Prejudice, Relevance, Resonance
I know I said there’d be no blog posts till October because I’m busy moving countries [again]. but I thought I could use this ‘empty’ time to set a new APSOTW assignment.
Over the years we have covered all manner of subjects … from validating flag design to pitching new business to developing comms strategy to creating solutions to difficult problems.
But this time we’re going to do something different.
To be honest, it’s less about being evaluated on how you present your thinking and more an exercise on thinking.
Now the thing with thinking – especially thinking where advertising and creativity is concerned – is it rarely can be wrong.
Sure, people can have all manner of opinions on what you think… but it generally can’t be viewed as being fundamentally right or fundamentally wrong.
This is liberating – or should be – which is why I’m hoping as many people as possible will have a go at this assignment.
The actual deliverable is easy.
All you have to do is watch the below clip and tell me– based on what people are saying in the clip – what you think the brand could have said to make their audience care about shaving.
That’s right, all you have to do to take part in this assignment is watch a short film and then send me a single sentence.
That’s it. Easy eh?
OK, I’m not going to deny this is harder than it may first seem.
Part of that is because the clip is about African American men … so to succeed, you have to appreciate the context how African American men live in America.
The other challenge is you need to get your point of view into a single sentence.
That might sound super easy until you remember that single sentence has to also capture the context that makes your point of view so powerful.
[For a clue on how this could be done, click here … even though this example isn’t quite right as it’s based on having lots of additional information, which this challenge does not allow]
The reason for this challenge is 3 fold.
1. It will help your skills in reading subtext.
2. It will help you ability to write a provocative point of view.
3. It will help you make audiences want, or imagine, more from themselves.
As I said at the beginning, there’s probably no wrong answer to this assignment, but to win [and there will be a prize] you’ll need to see something in the conversations within the clip that you feel opens the door to a bigger, more intriguing, more exciting, more resonant point of view for the brand.
This is not about inventing something that isn’t there … this is about seeing something that is, but hidden in plain sight.
While the ultimate deliverable for this assignment is easy, your submission will be judged by some of the toughest, most experienced, most culturally authentic experts in their field, including – if I can convince him to publicly associate with me again – Jason White, the Global CMO of Beats.
So have a go, it will be fun and all you need to do is send me a SINGLE SENTENCE by September 30th to this address.
As I’ve said before, I believe the future of our industry will be built on developing ideas that are resonant with culture rather than trying to be relevant to them and hopefully this will help make that happen.
If you have any questions, please place them in the comments. Thank you.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Advertising [Planning] School On The Web, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Communication Strategy, Creative Brief, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Emotion, Empathy, Entertainment, Friendship, Honesty, Innocence, Innovation, Insight, Internet, Marketing, Martin Weigel, Perspective, Planners, Planners Making A Complete Tit Of Themselves And Bless, Planning, Point Of View, Positioning, Presenting, Relevance, Resonance, WeigelCampbell
As some of you know, I trained to be a teacher.
Admittedly it took me 5 years to qualify instead of 2, but my plan was that I would eventually leave this industry and become a teacher in the areas of creativity and innovation.
Then I started, and ran, The Kennedy’s, Wieden’s creative talent incubator and it all changed.
Not because I discovered I didn’t love teaching – quite the opposite – but that I love doing it through chaos, not order.
Now given most teaching jobs prefer the latter more than the former, that put me in a bit of a predicament … carry on with my plan and risk not enjoying myself or find another outlet.
Well, the reality is I’m a long way off leaving this industry, but if I am going to teach, I need to do it on my terms, not an education boards … especially as more and more teachers are being graded by their students which has to be one of the most stupid things I’ve ever heard.
So why am I writing this?
Well I’ve been thinking about this for quite a while and thanks to the experience I’ve had with the Advertising Planning School on the Web [APSOTW] and HOALA, I realized one area I like helping people learn, is advertising strategy.
Now I know what some of you are thinking, “the last thing Campbell needs to teach is ad strategy” and you’re right, that’s why I’ve somehow managed to convince the best advertising strategist in the World to do it with me.
Yes, that’s right … the majestical Professor, Mr Martin Weigel.
Now Mr Weigel’s brilliance is well documented – hell, I even wrote a love letter post about him not that long ago – which is why even if you ignore everything I say [which, let’s face it, we all know you will] you’ll still learn really valuable stuff from it.
I should point out, we’re not leaving our jobs* – this is a little side hustle business, where a couple of times a year, we’ll turn up in a country to see who is interested in doing a couple of days planning workshop – but it is something we both are very passionate about doing because we both feel there is not enough training going on in the industry these days.
Yes, there are schools of planning and yes, there might be the odd training workshop at an agency, but at a time where more and more brands seem to favour efficiencies and process over creativity and possibilities, we believe strategic radicalism is needed more than ever which is why we want to offer something that will help planners reveal, release and exercise their most dangerous mind.
We’re still finalising our first session, but if you want to know more [if only to start pre-seeding it with your bosses, hahaha] then visit here and put your name down so we can send you information when things are finalized or if you want to talk about your organisation’s training needs [whether you’re on the agency or client side] drop us a note at info@weigelcampbell.com
I’m super excited to be doing this, especially with a man who I bloody love to death, so I hope people/agencies will see the worth in it or our egos are about to get deflated quicker more than one of Jordan’s implants.
All this leaves me to say is a big thanks to the wonderful Mercedes – Martin’s much, much better half – who ordered us to do this because she thought we’d be good at it, though I have a feeling she talked to Jill and decided this was their way to get us out of their homes.
Now that’s the sort of strategy we could all learn from.