Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Context, Creativity, Culture, Dad, Health, Management, Pollution, Relevance, Resonance
Once upon a time, a creative friend of mine rang me up.
He had been offered a job in China and wanted to hear my perspective on being there.
During the conversation, he asked if the pollution was bad.
When I asked why he was asking, he said he was pretty susceptible to asthma and while on his visit to the agency there, he had felt a bit ill, despite the weather being good.
He had asked some of his prospective workmates if they felt the weather was ever bad for breathing and they all said no and he wanted to know my take on it.
I laughed.
Not just because it’s pretty well documented the air there is not great, especially for an asthmatic – despite the government being the biggest investor in green technology in the World – but because it reminded me of something my Dad had told me while watching the Tom Cruise movie, A Few Good Men.
I know this is going off on a tangent, but hang in there.
You see, at the scene where Jack Nicholson spouts his immortal “You Can’t Handle The Truth” line, my Dad burst out laughing.
When I asked why, he said this:
“There are occasions where people will openly deny truth. Not because they hold a different opinion, but because to accept it means they would have to accept their complicity in a situation truth has revealed. Sometimes, the simple act of acknowledgement means people are forced to face and question the motives and values they conveniently chose to hide away”
His point was literally what my friend had experienced.
The prospective colleagues he asked about weather conditions knew full-well there is pollution in the air. However, their mind had almost forced them to forget it. Not because they were liars or bad people, but because if they admitted the truth, then they would be forced to ask themselves why they were there when they knew it was likely to be doing them harm.
We experience this every day.
Deliberate ignorance.
From people hired to purchases made.
Not because people are bad, but because we don’t want face the questionable decisions we’ve chosen to make to benefit our personal circumstances over health, values or friendship.
Which is why my mate decided not to go to China.
The moral of the story.
Remember people sometimes don’t tell you what they think, they tell you what protects them from you knowing what they think.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Awards, Brand Suicide, Cannes, Colenso, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Crap Campaigns In History, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Distinction, Embarrassing Moments, Innovation, Insight, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Relevance, Resonance, Technology
Being old, I’ve done more than my fair share of judging awards.
I enjoy it.
Yes it’s a major investment in terms of time, but when you come across an absolutely devastatingly good submission, it’s worth every second.
However it is also fair to say that over the years, there have been some real painful experiences. Either in terms of average papers being seemingly entered into every category in a bid to increase the odds of winning something or papers that have such a strong scent of scam, even Ray Charles can see how suspect they are. [Sorry Mr Charles]
I always laugh when I come across those. Specially at the agencies submitting them … because while they obviously think they are geniuses – or the judges are idiots – the reality is they’re wrong on both counts.
But here’s the thing, people can slag off awards all they like, but they matter.
For Colenso for example, they’re important.
We’re a small agency on the other side of the planet and being able to show our creativity and effectiveness is vitally important to keep demonstrating our validity to attract global clients.
But – and it’s a big but – it only works if its real.
And that only works if all the winners around it are also real.
Now I appreciate that different clients have different needs and budgets.
I appreciate different markets have different cultural traits, behaviours and media.
I absolutely appreciate some entries use a language that is not their native tongue.
And I think that is all brilliant – though I also think none-native English speakers are at an immediate disadvantage and the award organisers should be looking at ways to change that.
However, if you need to write 8456738585463 words to explain your problem or your idea or your insight or your results … you’re not helping yourself.
Nor are you if you are using the pandemic as your strategies main adversary – often followed up with the words, ‘how do we grow in an era of the new normal?’.
Of course I am not doubting the pandemic has caused havoc among categories of business all over the world. It’s definitely happened to me too. But if we don’t explain what the challenge is – how it has affected behaviour or values or distribution or competition or anything other than it ‘made things more difficult’ … then it’s as lazy as the time I judged the Effies in the US when Trump came to power and the opening line of 85% of all submissions was:
How do we bring a nation divided together?
[My fave was when a whisky brand used that as their creative challenge. HAHAHAHA]
I take the judging seriously because I want the awards to be valued.
I want the awards to be valued because I want the industry to be valued.
And I want the industry to be valued because I want clients to win, creativity to win and the people coming up behind me to have a chance of taking us all to better and more interesting places that we’re at right now.
And I believe they can if we don’t fuck up the chance for them.
I get awards are nice to have.
I get they can drive business and payrises.
But if we keep allowing bullshit a chance to shine – and let’s face it, we have time and time again – then all we’re doing is fucking ourselves over.
I’m fine with failure.
In fact I’m very, very comfortable with it.
Especially when it’s because someone has tried to do something audacious for all the right reasons … because even if it doesn’t come off, it’s opened the door to other things we may never have imagined. There’s even real commercial value to that.
But when agencies create, hijack or exploit problems to just serve their own means – then fuck them. Maybe – just maybe – if they did it at a scale that could make a real difference, you’d be prone to encourage it. But when it’s done to achieve just what is needed to let the creators win an award … then frankly, the organisers and judges have a moral obligation to call it out.
Asia gets a bad wrap for this. And over the years that has been deserved, but I can tell you no market is immune. Hell, I’ve even seen some in NZ recently – or one in particular – and what made it worse was it wasn’t even any good.
But as rubbish as that example was, at least it didn’t stoop to the levels we have seen previously.
Let’s remember it’s only 4 years ago an agency WON MAJOR AWARDS for an app they said could help save refugees on boats by tracking them in the sea … only for them to then claim – when later called out – that the app was in beta testing hence the information being sent back to users was not real.
Amazingly ignoring the fact they didn’t say that in any of their entry submissions and if they had, they wouldn’t have been eligible for the awards they entered in the first place.
Creativity can do amazing things.
Advertising can do amazing things.
But we fuck it up when we put the superficial on the podium.
Of course, this is not just an agency problem. Clients are also part of this. Because if they let agencies do what they are great at rather than treating them as a subservient production partner … maybe we’d not just see more interesting work, but even more interesting and valuable brands.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand, Brand Suicide, Comment, Communication Strategy, Crap Campaigns In History, Crap Marketing Ideas From History!, Creativity, Culture, Equality, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Women
Years ago I worked on the shampoo brand Sunsilk.
I know. Me.
A bald bloke.
Hahahahahahahaha.
Back then, it was in a two brand fight for dominance with Pantene.
They went back and forth trying to get one over the over.
Apparently the brands had legally agreed how each one could show the ‘shine’ of the hair they washed in TV ads. A slight deviation that allowed each one to build their own distinctive look.
Back when I was on it, albeit for 2 mins, Sunsilk was a big, mature brand.
A powerhouse.
So you can imagine my surprise when I saw this:
What in gods name is that?
What is it?
It’s like the worst Barbie ad I’ve ever seen.
An ad that claims to ‘rethink’ pink but doesn’t really rethink anything.
Oh they may think they are, but the people behind this need to know you can’t just say pink now represents possibilities, future, strength and shiny [gotta get those haircare ad cues in there, even if it makes even less sense to the premise of the ad] … you actually have to make it mean that.
It’s a commitment.
A focus.
Acts beyond advertising.
So sadly, when you make an ad so bubblegum it looks like the bastard love child of the movie, Legally Blonde and a packet of original Hubba Bubba, you’re not really going to convince anyone.
On the positive, they cop out by saying ‘pink is whatever we make it’ and so I would like to tell the people at Unilever and Sunilk they did exactly that, because they have made pink brown.
Shitty brown.
Am I being mean?
Yep.
But then this is a multi-billion dollar company who has profited by putting women across Asia in cultural jail by promoting white skin as the right skin … used COVID to maximise profits for their antiseptic products and continually used stereotypes to promote it’s products … so I don’t have much sympathy for them.
Especially when they’re now trying to connect to young women by saying ‘pink’ is powerful while using all the same tropes, styles and themes that means what they’re actually communicating is ‘pink is the same old girly cliche they’ve been profiting from, for decades’.
There’s some absolutely incredibly talented people at Unilever.
Including some very good friends of mine.
There’s also some brilliant systems and processes within the organisation.
Sadly, there’s also a blinkered reliance on some questionable research methodologies, which results in a lack of self awareness so they end up with work like this.
They have done some brilliant work in the past.
Some truly brilliant.
But – in my opinion – not so much right now. Made worse with the sort of underlying messages that undermine people rather than elevate them.
If it wasn’t for their huge distribution and pricing power, it would be interesting to see what would happen to the brand.
But the thing is I want them to do well.
I want them to make work that changes and positively impacts culture.
They’re a huge spender on advertising.
They have the ability to change how culture feels and how the industry is perceived.
A Unilever that does great advertising is a Unilever that will have positive knock-on effects in a whole host of other areas and industries.
I’d even be willing to help them – for free, for a time – if their starting point was about building change through truth rather than their messed-up, manipulative version of purpose.
However given they made this ad after saying they wanted to stop the stereotypes in their advertising, it appears their view of reality is more blinkered than a racehorse.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Apathy, Authenticity, Comment, Content, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Effectiveness, Emotion, Empathy, Gaming, Insight, Love, Planners, Relationships, Relevance, Resonance, Respect, Sentimentality
When I was young, I was introduced to a whole host of iconic TV characters.
Six Million Dollar Man.
Wonder Woman.
Buck Rogers.
Superman.
The Incredible Hulk.
Of course there were more, lots more – from cartoons to local kids TV – but the one’s from America just seemed to be more amazing.
Part of this was probably the production value of the shows, but it was also the imagination they triggered and celebrated in me.
It was so much more than just entertainment, it challenged, encouraged and introduced me to a whole new way to look and see the possibilities of the World.
These characters continue to hold a lot of sentimentality with me, because despite being over 40 years ago, they were – in many ways – characters that defined my generation.
They were OUR shows, even when they were a remake of something that went before.
I say this because when I look at Otis, the characters from his shows are so different.
For a start, so many of them are born through Youtube.
Plus there’s also a huge amount from games, like Roblox or Minecraft.
But the relationships are similar to the ones I had with the Incredible Hulk etc.
And that’s because they’re his characters.
They are badges of his generation.
He connects to people who share the same love and knowledge.
Which is a good reminder that in a world where we are continually going on about new possibilities, new opportunities and new technologies … the forces that make so many of them successful and valuable are the same things as they’ve always been.
Emotion.
Of course we should know this.
Of course this should be obvious.
But I don’t know if we do.
I read so much these days that seems to be focused on efficiencies, effectiveness, experience or eco-systems … and while they’re all important and have a role to play … they aren’t the reason people connect so deeply, they’re just tools to help make it happen.
In our quest to be seen as innovative, we’re re-making the wheel over and over again except it’s not as simple. Or as effective. Or as powerful.
Because we’re so desperate to look like we’ve done something new, we walk away from the things that can make something valuable.
Beyond price.
Beyond status.
Beyond superficial.
Somewhere along the line, we’ve forgotten the value of emotion.
We talk about it. We describe it. We even attempt to show it.
But instead, we have reduced it to a set of ‘research group approved’ actions and behaviours.
A set of research group approved actions and behaviours that are more focused on telling people what we want them to think about rather than to feel.
A set of research group approved actions and behaviours that are designed to minimise the potential of alienating someone rather than making it mean everything to them.
How fucking depressing.
More than that, how fucking laughable.
Because the holy grail for all these brands is to encourage loyalty beyond reason.
Where people choose you over countless competitors.
Where they will queue for hours to stand a chance to have a moment in your company.
Where people will willingly wear a t-shirt with your name emblazoned on it.
Where people will do this over and over again, regardless of time, money or location.
For all the money, research and ‘marketing guru tactics’ so many brands adopt these days … they still don’t come anywhere close to the impact bands, gaming characters and old 1970’s TV shows have on people.
And there’s one simple reason for it.
You don’t make people care talking about them, you do it by being for them.
Not in terms of ‘removing friction to purchase’.
Or telling them you really, really care about them.
Or saying you’re committed to their progress and success.
Or you want them to get the best value deal they can get.
But by recognising who they are, not who you want them to be.
And then talking to them that reflects that.
The good, bad, weird, strange, complex, scary, hopeful, uncomfortable.
It’s not hard.
And yet it seems to be the hardest thing in the World.
Which is mad, given a man painted green and a shitty rubbery mask was able to do it and 40+ years later, can still ignite more feelings of love and loyalty from me than 98.99999% of all brands with their research and marketing guru processes.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Communication Strategy, Creativity, Culture, Emotion, Empathy, Experience, Imagination, Innovation, Insight, Loyalty, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Point Of View, Relevance, Resonance, Technology
As funny as the photo above is, the reality is it’s still a better brand experience than much of what passes for good brand experience these days.
Hell, if I was shopping there and saw that sign, it would make me smile, which is more than a lot of brands and their experience strategies achieve.
I’ve said it before but too many companies mistake basic interaction as brand experience. Or worse, think that by simply removing friction from the purchase process, they’re building a good brand experience.
Seriously, how boring and self-centred must their lives be to think that?
If done well, brand experience can be a huge thing.
And by well, I don’t mean making bad, average – or creating a consistent base-line standard across the company – I mean making the things that actually matter to audiences, personal and valuable … or focusing on the key things audiences think you actually do well and pushing that so the experience can become something that is almost seminal so people want to share, repeat and shout about.
I wrote about this a while ago [here and here, for example] … but it still blows my mind how many companies and agencies approach experience in terms of not getting left behind when they should be seeing it as an opportunity to move ahead … a chance to leave their competition looking slow, rather than themselves.
And before people say this approach would cost more money, it doesn’t. Or it doesn’t have to. It’s all about defining the experience you want to create.
Given a badly placed store sign next to some condoms gave me a better brand experience than so many of the systems, processes and strategies brand experience promotes, it’s safe to say the discipline may need to start understanding what people give a shit about rather than what they wish they did.