Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Ambition, Attitude & Aptitude, Audacious, Audio Visual, Brand, Brilliant Marketing Ideas In History, Collaboration, Content, Context, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Design, Distinction, Emotion, Environment, Fans, Film, Imagination, Loyalty, Management, Marketing, Metallica, Miley, Money, Music, Perspective, Planning, Provocative, Relevance, Reputation, Resonance, Respect, Rick Rubin
So we got through the first week of this blog in 2025.
Congratulations … we all survived and no one died. I think.
That said, the subject matters of the posts have been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster with things such as anger, frustration and loss. So with that in mind, I thought I’d end the week on a more positive tone.
Kinda.
One thing I have always actively rallied against is stringent strategic processes.
That doesn’t mean I don’t care about rigor or standards – obviously I do – however I don’t think that is demonstrated by blindly following a set process that has pre-determined what is or isn’t of value.
There’s 3 main reasons for this.
1. It automatically narrows and filters what can be used.
2. It ignores differing contexts, situations and categories.
3. You are actively stopping the chance for happy accidents and/or better answers.
It’s one of the main reasons I love working with artists, because at the end of the day – they are the creative – so for them, they determine success by what they FEEL is better rather than what the process tells them it is.
Nothing brought this home more to me than a scene in the documentary about the making of Do They Know It’s Christmas back in 1984.
Bob Geldof and Midge Ure had got together to write a song that they hoped would raise money for the starving in Africa. The single – launched in December ’84 – featured many of the up and coming posters of the era, ‘bullied’ into turning up by the irrepressible Geldof.
Over the space of a chaotic 24 hours, singers … duo … bands … all traipsed into SARM studios to record a song that had just been written and no one knew. Amazingly, there were few egos, with everyone focused on what they had to do, but it’s here that we see a brilliant example of letting the process play second fiddle to perfection’.
George Michael was at the mic and told how to sing his line.
He did it, but while sounding good, he felt it did not reflect the power he wanted to put into it.
So he suggested changing the intonation and sang it.
And he was right, it did sound better …
In fact, it became an iconic moment in the song.
But it might not have been if he was working with people obsessed with following the process than valuing what the process is supposed to deliver.
Fortunately, George was being produced by 2 other singers – and the incredible Trevor Horn, who owned SARM – who recognized that what they had suggested was no where near as good as what he had delivered. And so while it had an impact on how the following lines of the song were structured, they embraced it because ultimately, they knew it was better.
Have a look at this:
[As an aside, you should watch this fascinating interview where Geldof explains how self-awareness about his career meant he was uniquely positioned to identify the need and opportunity for the Band Aid single]
Now you may think this is obvious and I shouldn’t be making a big deal out of it.
And you’re right, it is … except we live in an age where too many companies focus more on the systems, processes and marketing practices than what they produce.
If you think I’m talking rubbish, ask yourself this.
Is there more conversation, debate and value placed on the process being put forward or the work delvered?
I would hasten a guess it’s the former.
It blows my mind.
As I said, process is important – but often its developed without any consideration to what it needs to create or change … blindly believing that if the process is ‘right’, then whatever comes out the other end must be too.
Which – as history and marketing has continued to prove – is bollocks.
Almost as bollocks as people sticking with whatever is made – even though they know it’s not as good as it could be – because ultimately they can point to ‘a process’ and outsource any responsibility of output to that.
How fucking cowardly.
But musicians don’t do that.
Musicians play for the song. Always.
Which is why they’re open to possibilities because the goal isn’t control, it’s expression.
Here are two other examples of it …
First Rick Rubin with his suggestion to Jay-Z on how to start 99 Problems
And Eddie van Halen, rearranging Michael Jackson’s ‘Beat It’ so the solo sounded better:
Let’s be clear here, Jay-Z is hardly a shrinking violet. Same for Jackson. And yet they were open to their guests making a suggestion because they [1] knew it was coming from a good place and [2] it was better.
How often does that happen in our line of work?
How often does someone with ZERO experience in a particular discipline tell someone with a track record how to do their job. How to make something better?
It’s why I laugh when people like Mark Ritson comment on what is/isn’t good creativity.
Don’t get me wrong, he knows a huge amount about marketing practice … he offers real value in developing important marketing 101 rules and behaviours, but he knows fuck all about creativity or innovation.
And I wouldn’t care a less if he didn’t bang on like he was God.
As I said, he is very smart and can make a huge difference to certain sorts of companies. But – despite what he likes to think – not all companies. And the reason why I will always value someone like Rubin more than Ritson is that Rubin plays for the work, not for his own ego.
Open to someone being better. Or smarter. Or just making a better idea.
Not because they don’t care about the process, but because they care more about what it’s supposed to deliver.
Musicians often get dismissed as ramshackle and chaotic.
But if you look at some of the approaches adopted by artists such as Bjork, Metallica, Miley, Travis Scott, ABBA, Radiohead, Dolly Parton, The Black Keys, Rihanna, Marillion, Kendrick Lamare, Prince, Queen, Def Leppard, Pharrell and a whole host more – covering everything from crowdsourcing, business models, brand extensions, distribution management, brand assets, copyright investment, differentiation and distinction, gaming, brand experience and overall innovation in communication to name but a few – you will see they have pioneered more business and communication approaches and practice than almost any of the brands and gurus out there. Or at least done it before most of them.
Part of that is because they’re driven by their need to express themselves with total authenticity. Part of that is because they’re very aware of the context they’re entering – rather than blindly thinking what worked before will automatically work again. And part of that is because the process stops when things outside the process offer something better.
Which is why if you want to increase the odds of making something truly special happen … think like a musician, not a marketing practitioner.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Colenso, Collaboration, Confidence, Consultants, Context, Creativity, Culture, Cunning, Distinction, Effectiveness, Experience, Honesty, Individuality, Leadership, Management, Marketing, Mediocrity, Metallica, Money, Perspective, Planners, Planning, Relationships, Reputation, Resonance, Strategy, Success
I recently interviewed a successful artist.
What made them especially interesting to me was less their fame and more the fact they’d left a very popular group to go out on their own.
Not because they were ‘guaranteed’ success, but because they didn’t like how their management and record company dictated what they had to do.
As they told me the thinking that went into their decision, they said something I loved:
“Working for yourself is like being an artist in a studio. You’re free to create … you’re open to possibilities. Where most people have a dream, those with the lust to go out on their own stand the most chance of making their dream happen. Even if I failed, I would have felt good I had failed on my own terms”.
How good is that?!
Of course, I appreciate that when you’re successful it’s dead easy to say you would be OK to have failed … but I believed them.
Part of that is because they walked away from a very successful group. Part of that is they did in the knowledge their contract stated they would no longer be eligible for royalties. Part of that is before they launched their own career, they took time off to reclaim who they were. But most of all, I adore how they equated working for yourself as an artist who is in their own studio.
Despite having – and still – working for myself, I’d never thought of it that way and in the big scheme of things, the work I do for myself is the most indulgent, wonderful shit I have ever done. Not just in terms of freelance work, but in my whole career … and a lot of that has been pretty wonderfully indulgent.
But even with that, I looked at working for yourself much more in the way Michael Keaton looks at working for yourself …
Put simply, you love that you have more freedom, but you’re also aware you are the business … so every decision is weighted with more consideration or deliberation.
It’s why the two things that have helped me embrace what excites me rather than do what makes sense is Harrison Ford’s know the value of your value and the conversation I had with Metallica’s managers before I started working with them.
Now I say all this, but the fact is I also work for Colenso – however the reasons I did that were less about financial security and more about appreciating what makes me happy:
1. I need to work with people and build teams. I’m good at it, it makes me happy and I love seeing people grow and the reality is, when you work on your own, you rarely get the chance to do that.
2. Colenso is a place I’ve always loved and so to have the chance to work at a place that truly believes in creativity when so many just want to monetize any-old-shit was both hugely appealing and exciting.
3. They were totally open to me working a different way, which – for all the talk – few companies would ever consider, let alone allow.
4. When you work on your own, your development is more influenced by the projects and clients you work with, whereas when you are part of a team, your development is pushed and prodded every day. And I like that.
5. It offered us a chance to leave COVID-stricken Britain, even though within months … it hit NZ, ironically via the parents of a planner in my team. The second country brought to its knees by someone I’d managed. Oops.
So while I completely appreciate the privileged position I was in – and am in – the point is there was a lot of consideration about working on my own and working at Colenso … not just in terms of what I can gain but working out what I don’t want to lose.
Of course, there are going to be sacrifices along the way … but if you don’t think it through, you may find you’re running away from something rather than running towards something.
For me, that differentiation is a really important one to identify.
Don’t get me wrong, I get that sometimes you just have to escape the situation you’re in, regardless of where you’re going to end up.
I’ve experienced that situation twice in my life and it was horrible. Horrific even. And so getting away was real, urgent and necessary.
But I’m not talking about people in those situations, I’m talking about the folk who simply didn’t want to work for someone else. Didn’t want to deal with the expectations, the politics, the time pressures and the bullshit.
I get it.
I appreciate the appeal.
I basically covered it in a conversation with WARC back in 2020.
But there’s a major difference between not wanting to do things and creating the conditions to ensure you never have to do them and I’m surprised how often people haven’t done that.
Especially planners.
For example:
Do you know enough people at a high enough level who could be clients?
Do you have the experience that can command the rate you want/need to make?
Do you have the reputation that can protect you from commodification?
Do you have the expertise that ensures you don’t just shitty jobs no one else wants to do?
Do you have the network to ensure your abilities grow rather than stay where they are?
Do you have the commitment to keep learning and developing when it’s all dependent on you?
And while they may sound big questions, they’re not. Not really.
In many ways, they’re the difference between full independence and short-term escape.
I should point out I don’t mean this to sound like criticism.
I also don’t want this to be an obstacle to someone going out on their own.
My intent actually is the opposite. I want more people to prosper on their own terms … and by prosper, I don’t just mean financially, but also professionally and emotionally.
This is not because I am some wannabe Saint, it’s because it’s the only way creativity and strategy can regain the influence, credibility and power over the whims, wants and egos of agencies and companies.
Of course not all agencies and companies are like this … but sadly it seems more are than not.
And the more they try to commoditize the value of the independent professional – and boy, do they want to do that – the more we all end up paying the price.
Because suddenly people have to take whatever they can get.
Have to do whatever someone wants them to do.
Has to accept what someone wants to pay them.
I don’t blame them. Fuck, if I was in their situation, I’d do whatever it took – or whatever I could get – to put food on the table.
But it doesn’t have to be this way, or at least the odds can be improved if we – as an industry – talk more about how to think like an independent rather than talk about the benefits of it.
You see, while I love the sentiment of the artist I interviewed and their definition of ‘working for yourself’, I also deeply value the attitude of Michael Keaton. And maybe you need to embrace both to ensure you can be as free as you choose and be able to stay that way for as long as you want.
Because while the benefits of independence are very easy to see … it takes a fuckload of hard work to achieve it.
But it’s worth it. Or at least worth giving it the right shot to achieve it.
Just ask Zoe Scaman, Graham Douglas, Ruby Pseudo, Jason Bagley, Joy At Large.
And a million others who have done it. Not always the easiest way, but have done it.
Filed under: Advertising, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Australia, Bank Ads, Communication Strategy, Context, Corporate Evil, Culture, Customer Service, Loyalty, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Money, Perspective
Another day … another rant.
Whereas yesterday I went off at a brand I love/d, today is different.
It’s a bank.
Not just any bank … but a bank who once made me fly from Singapore to Sydney because they insisted they could check my passport ‘by sight’ before they released our funds for us to buy our house.
I should point out they weren’t our mortgage lender … they just wanted to make life very difficult for us and when I rang their ‘helpline’, I was told:
“No one is going to help you here”
Yes ladies and gentlemen, I’m talking about ANZ Australia.
A bank only second to my nemesis – HSBC – for terrible behaviour, which for anyone who knows the hell that HSBC put us through when we lived in China, will know this means ANZ Australia aren’t too crash hot in my opinion.
So what have they done this time? This …
Why the hell are they writing like they’re doing their customers a massive favour saying they’ll keep paying them interest – “even if you make a withdrawal or can’t make a deposit that month” – when your base rate is 0.01%.
ZERO POINT ZERO ONE PERCENT.
To put that in context, if you had AU$10,000,000 … you’d make $1,000 over a year.
Banks charge you for holding your money.
They charge you for using your money.
They close branches to give worse customer service.
They ask you to deal with your own financial issues via the internet.
They find any reason and way to be able to increase their fees.
Many got bailed out – or helped – by our tax dollars.
And then they offer you an interest rate that is so below the current rate of inflation that their ‘financial advice’ equates to literally having less money than you started with and they act like you should be grateful to them for it.
What the fuck?
Either they don’t care or they’re totally delusional.
No wonder people are open to things like crypto … because however much of a risk it is, at least there’s a chance – however small – you may get something out of it, which 0.01% is not going to offer.
Seriously ANZ Australia … stop taking your customers for fools.
As the old adage states, ‘action speaks louder then words’ and your actions continually reinforce you’re about the money not the service. And you know what, I think everyone would have a better opinion of you if you just owned up to that.
We need you and you will charge us for that privilege.
I get it. And – ironically – I’d think more of you for doing that than this ‘helpful and considerate’ tone you’re trying to present. Or even more bizarrely, maybe believe.
I get no one wants to admit they’re an asshole, but regardless what your ‘brand tracking’ and focus groups say, most people think you’re a great dump of calculator catastrophe.
Filed under: Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Business, Corporate Evil, Creativity, Culture, Embarrassing Moments, Finance, Grifting, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Money, Scam
Scams.
They’re bloody everywhere.
SMS. Email. People knocking on the door.
There seems to be three types …
The hopeful … which is sending the same thing to tons of people and see if it will stick.
The too-good-to-be-true … which is promising untold riches for a fraction of investment.
And the invisible … where it has been so well planned, you may not realise it’s happened until its happened.
While I understand how the latter works – having once been a victim of it – it’s amazing how often the first 2 do.
Part of that can be down to blinkered greed.
The belief we’re all ‘special’ and while friends may think it’s a scam, they stick with it as it reinforces what they’ve aways felt about themselves.
Until it doesn’t.
The other group are people who are desperate – whether financially or lonely – so they take part in a desperate bid to escape their own personal hell.
So while its easy to laugh at people who we think have been stupid, the reality is there are always mitigating circumstances that add to the scammers success.
And nothing shows how successful the crims are by their exaggeration. Look at this …
For just NZ$400, you can get a ‘guaranteed’ NZ$7800 every month.
EVERY MONTH … where do I sign?
But the scammers aren’t completely stupid, so they’ve added a picture of Elon Musk.
Now whether that’s because he’s super rich or is OK with losing billions – as demonstrated with Twitter – is anyone’s guess, but given they’ve bought a ton of ads all over Facebook and other social media channels means they think it makes what is one of the most ridiculous financial investment promises in history, legitimate.
And you know what, it seems it has … which is a great reminder for the marketing community that while customers are often much smarter than we give them credit for, they rarely adopt the logic we like to think/claim they do because ultimately – and here’s the big reminder – they buy for what they’ve need, not what we want them to need.
Filed under: Attitude & Aptitude, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Consultants, Egovertising, Finance, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Money, Standards, Strategy, Technology
One of the topics that is everywhere right now is the topic of AI.
What I find particularly amazing is how many people are talking with such certainty about it, given the reality is it’s still in its early days of infancy and possibility.
The reality is – like most things – it will likely have good and bad uses.
As I wrote a while back, my brilliant son – Otis – has dysgraphia.
Dysgraphia is a form of dyslexia … except it’s less about mixing letters and more about a difficulty in writing them. In essence, dysgraphia has an impact on your motor skills and while it won’t affect his ability to learn, it will affect how he does it and what he may be able to do because of it.
More than that, there’s no ‘cure’, but with things like ChatGPT … I can see how AI could enable him to express his stories and imagination that otherwise, he would struggle to convey.
I cannot tell you how much that fills me with joy and it serves as a good reminder to stop judging and evaluating new technology by the rules, standards and experience of established technology.
But we do.
We all do.
Desperate to throw our opinion in the ring with the confidence and certainty of a mediocre white man.
[That’s for you, Chelsea]
However the recent story of Twitch streamer, Atrioc, highlights how AI can definitely be used for terrible, terrible things.
Brandon ‘Atrioc’ Ewing was live-streaming when he accidentally showed a tab that showed he had been visiting a deepfake pornography site featuring popular female Twitch streamers.
Popular female Twitch streamers he had previously claimed were his friends.
As if that wasn’t despicable enough, the site he was on requires a subscription to view its content and the page he was on was centred entirely around making deepfakes of famous Twitch streamers … which means he didn’t just choose to do it, he paid for the privilege of doing it.
Paid. For. It.
Which highlights another narrative that maybe we should also be considering about AI.
Maybe we need to discuss the character of the developers behind the tech rather than simply arguing about the value or threat of the tech.
Or said another way …
Why aren’t we having conversations about why investors place greater value on speed of monetisation than focusing on educational or humanitarian benefits of tech.
Please do not me wrong.
I’m not making any excuse for Atrioc … that fucker made his choice and there’s no way he gets to blame that on anyone else but himself … however for all the talk about the good or bad of AI, I’m not seeing much conversation about the character of the people behind it – technically and financially – when ultimately, it’s their intent and influence that shapes what it is and what it can become.
As the old saying goes, follow the money and you find the truth.
The industries problem is we have too many following their ego.
Coming from me, that say’s a lot. Hahaha.