Filed under: Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Business, Innovation, Insight, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, New Product Mentalness, Planners, Planning, Relevance, Resonance, Respect
I recently read the credentials of a design/branding company who said their processes ‘guarantees’ to be effective.
GUARANTEES!!!
How the fuck do they do that then?
Unless they’re literally buying-up whatever it is their clients are selling, there is no way they can guarantee that … even if they have more data and knowledge than God.
Which means they’re talking utter shite.
Or – at best – aiming so low with their goals, that it means whatever they do is pointless.
But what is scary is clients buy this rubbish …
They buy into a proprietary systems – that often are only proprietary because of the name they have been given – and believe it somehow has the power to dictate how people think, feel and behave.
I am not saying we can’t have a good understanding of what is likely to happen.
I mean, that’s literally my job.
But increasing the odds of success and guaranteeing them are very, very different things.
This obsession with the process rather than the output of the process is one of the major issues companies are creating. Wanting to control every detail to such an extent that what comes out the other end is far more a reflection of their ego than the opportunity they can embrace.
Martin and I talked about this at our Chaos talk at Cannes for WARC back in 2019 … but it seems to be getting even worse.
Which leads me to this image I saw recently …
Of course it shouldn’t need saying that it’s correct …
But I have to because there’s companies out there ‘guaranteeing’ success.
Process is important … it serves an important role.
But as I said, too many people look at process development in isolation to what it is there to enable … and that’s when it all goes to shit. At best you end up doing similar things to your competitors. At worse, you end up with stuff that serves no value to your customers.
Now I get the allure of best practice.
Of following what others have found to be effective.
But the thing many forget is best practice is past practice … or said another way, it’s adopting a process that is looking backwards rather than ahead.
And while adding new elements adds a dimension of the unknown to what comes out the other side, the irony is its those who are willing to fail who are the ones who will end up creating the standards everyone else will end up following and chasing.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, Business, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Content, Context, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Distinction, Education, Effectiveness, Experience, Facebook, Fake Attitude, Honesty, Innovation, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Money, New Product Mentalness, Perspective, Planners, Relevance, Resonance, Scam, Social Media, Standards, Technology
After the amazing drama of yesterday, I need to calm things down.
Not for you, but for me … because my heart can’t take nerves like that.
And yet it’s going to have to do just that in a little over a week.
Bloody hell.
So to slow things down, let me take you back in time …
Back in 1985, the band Dire Straits launched a song called Money For Nothing.
It became famous for a whole host of reasons.
It was the first song of theirs that actually sounded slightly modern.
It had ‘modern’ day references in the lyrics.
It had Sting – from The Police – singing on it.
It had this video …
Did you watch it?
You didn’t did you?
You lazy bastards …
Well, to get back to the point of this post, here’s a screen grab from it …
Now while that image may not strike you as cutting edge, back in 1985, it was revolutionary.
Digital characters living in a digital world, where their universe was a blend of normality and possibility.
Hang on, does that sound like something else?
Something that a huge amount of the tech and marketing industry have been wetting their pants over?
Something that sounds suspiciously close to this …
Did you watch this?
You didn’t did you?
You über-lazy assholes …
Well, to get back to the point of this post, here’s a screen grab from it …
Yep.
Yep it does.
A music video from 1985 by the most snooze-rock band ever formed, not only communicated the metaverse, it did it in a style pretty close to what Facebook and every other brand have shown as ‘the standard’.
How terrifyingly embarrassing is that?
All these hip, technologists, futurists and strategists trying to look like they’re on the edge of culture creation and all the bollocks they’re banging on about was expressed by bloody Dire Straits 37 years earlier.
THIRTY SEVEN YEARS.
Hahahahahahahahaha.
I mean … when that Zuck video first broke, I wrote a post about how it was missing the point by showing things we can already do, but now – thanks to errrrrm, Dire Straits, I realise it was even worse than I imagined.
Don’t get me wrong, I believe technology and – the metaverse, even though what is being celebrated as it, isn’t what it is – will have the possibility to make a huge, positive difference to humanity. Eventually.
But making – and lauding – a film and idea that looks awfully similar to a bloody 1985 music video isn’t doing them any favours. If anything, it shows how much of this industry is filled with individuals who crave attention or adoration or just desperately seek relevance.
Not helped when you learn that, unsurprisingly, the main reason Zuck is so into the Metaverse is not for changing the world but upping his bank account.
Given how much Facebook tried to label Apple as ‘anti-business’ for the amount they charged creators and partners – which is a lot less than 47.5% – it makes the whole Meta situation even more laughable.
Don’t get me wrong, I know the new is often misunderstood.
And new technology should not be judged by the standards of established technology.
But when the ‘icons and industry leaders’ stand on soapboxes and stages to promote the future in a similar way that Dire Straits brought to the World almost 4 decades ago … it’s only fair to question if these people care about the future or simply their own career image.
Even though, sadly, we keep seeing hyping can get better career growth, than grafting.
If the Metaverse could fix that, then maybe we’d all sign up.
Then again …
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Apple, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Chaos, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Context, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Differentiation, Emotion, Experience, Imagination, Innovation, Insight, Management, Marketing, New Product Mentalness, Point Of View, Premium, Relevance, Resonance, Technology
Have a look at that article.
It’s not that long ago really is it, and yet the fortunes of Apple are beyond comprehension.
Probably even beyond what Steve Jobs imagined … though I doubt, if he was alive, he would admit that.
But while the iMac was much more successful than the journalist suggested it would be … its greatest achievements were re-introducing Apple to the world, positioning them as a real alternative to Microsoft and creating a platform for the brand and products to keep rising.
Now it would be easy to laugh at how wrong the journalist was with their article, but the reality is most people in the industry at that time thought that about Apple.
However the reason had less to do with the launch of the iMac and more about the recent history of the brand.
The choices.
The decisions.
The products.
But in doing that, they highlighted four of the great mistakes so many still make:
1. Immediately skeptical of anyone trying to do something new.
2. Believed the standard for success had been set by the market leader.
3. Evaluated products against current audience needs, not future audience needs.
4. Forgot how much truly great marketing can make people give a shit.
I say this because our industry often operates like this journalist.
Basing our point of view on ‘facts’ that reflect what has happened rather than what is going to happen.
Now I get why … what we do costs a lot of money and has a lot of implications and so clients rightfully want to minimise their exposure to risk as much as they can.
But despite this focus on certainty, we still see missteps and failures every single day, largely down to us – and clients – evaluating everything by the same 3 mistakes the journalist did towards iMac back in 1998.
This is not to suggest we should ignore what clients need.
Nor is it that we should disregard costs.
It is simply a reminder that if we only judge/plan/justify/execute through the lens of the rear-view mirror, the only thing we can be certain of is we will be going in the opposite direction to culture and success.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, America, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Confidence, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Cunning, Embarrassing Moments, Fake Attitude, Food, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Mischief, New Product Mentalness, Packaging, Standards, Viz
The fast food industry is having a hard time.
As tastes change and a more healthy lifestyle becomes more desirable, it is getting more difficult for them to operate as they once did.
While some brands are evolving their offering – like McDonald’s – others are taking a more pragmatic perspective.
The most famous, recent example is the BK Mouldy Burger which ignited all manner of debate – often with people quick to say it won’t work without anyone actually knowing what the goal of the work actually was.
Well in South Korea there’s a burger company that makes BK look positively innocent.
It’s not just how they used Supreme to inspire their logo in a way Uncle Martian would be jealous of.
Nor is it their audacious copyright infringement of famous cartoon characters to talk about themselves.
And it’s not even their proud claims of being ‘100% Beef Meat’.
No … it’s none of those, it’s their utter confidence of their product over their competitors.
Take a look …
Amazing eh?
Not just the aggressiveness … but the choice of words.
Linking the words ‘burgers’ and ‘shit’ makes a mouldy burger look positively appetising.
Then there’s the fact it’s in English.
When I lived in China, there were a bunch of stores that used English in their copy.
Sometimes it was for the audience it was targeting.
Sometimes it was because they thought it made them look ‘sophisticated’.
But a lot of the time – as I think is the case here – they did it because it enhanced their ‘authenticity’.
Given burgers are very American, I feel their idea was that by using English and being aggressive in their tone, they encapsulated the American spirit and as such, could say their burgers were authentic.
Of course, given Burger King and McDonald’s are also American slightly undermines that idea, but hey – it doesn’t seem they really put too much thought into how they came across.
I must admit, when I saw it, I couldn’t help feel it was like a Viz fake-ad from the 80’s.
Viz – for those who don’t know – was/is an English ‘adult-humour’ comic.
Years ago, I approached them about starting an ad agency.
They said no, which still disappoints me as not only were their spoof ads brilliant, but based on both Billionbox and BK’s recent work … there’s more and more brands seemingly trying to copy their style but without the brilliance, clarity, humour or memorability as them.
Filed under: Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Brand Suicide, Communication Strategy, Crap Campaigns In History, Crap Marketing Ideas From History!, Creativity, Culture, Design, Embarrassing Moments, Innovation, Marketing, Marketing Fail, New Product Mentalness, Technology
Kodak.
A company that once was synonymous with photography that is now synonymous with failure.
There are a million stories detailing their demise, but fundamentally, it wasn’t because they couldn’t innovate [they were one of the pioneers of digital photography], they didn’t want to bring it to market because they didn’t want to kill their photographic developing business, even though that business was going to kill them if they continued with it.
But this post isn’t a bad history lesson, it’s about the new Kodak … the lean, mean, technology machine.
Have a look at this …
Yep, it’s the World’s first 360 degree action-camera with 4k picture detail.
OK, so you could say bringing out a device like this, years after GoPro blew-up the market, shows Kodak still have a habit of being late to change, but at least this time they are trying to offer a fundamentally better product than what is currently available – not to mention leveraging the 360 degree market, that seems to have come from nowhere.
But even that isn’t what this post is about.
No, what this is about is that based on this ad, Kodak still think it’s the 1980’s.
A few years ago, I wrote how one of GoPro’s strengths was how they were part of the culture they were making products for. This authenticity separated them from the countless other brands that tried to jump on the bandwagon – even when they had arguably better products.
Two years later and it seems some brands still haven’t grasped the importance of focusing on the culture, rather than the category.
Look at that ad. Look at it.
It’s fucking horrible.
If a photo of the London skyline from a bloody restaurant wasn’t bad enough [what the hell is ‘action cam’ about that???] … what about the utterly terrible shot of the product.
A brown square with a shitty dome on top.
It looks like a crap 1950’s robot toy that you’d find in a Kinder-Surprise.
What the hell were Kodak thinking?
And then there’s the product name and the font choice.
PIXPRO … using a stencil type font in a desperate bid to look cutting edge.
If your product is the ‘future’, you don’t need to use a shitty font because people will work it out for themselves. And even if you decide you absolutely, positively, desperately want to do it … my advice is to not use a font that is synonymous with the 1982!
And what’s that line … ‘Brings You Closer’.
What does it even mean?
Here is a product that gives you 360 degree views [which, arguably, they don’t even show in the ad] and they use that line.
Mind you, here is a product that gives you 360 degree views in 4k quality, and they don’t even help you understand what 4k quality means to the recipient.
There is so much they could do to make people want to know more – even using an old-school print ad – but no, they’ve gone for the worst advertising you could get.
Apparently the product is quite good … but sadly for Kodak, with a name that represents the past rather than the future and an ad that reinforces that perspective, I think the only view they’ll be seeing is their once great name growing smaller and smaller into the distance.