Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Brand Suicide, Comment, Corporate Evil, Technology
Gifts are always nice to receive.
You feel a sense of specialness and love and it’s delightful.
Even when you get a gift voucher – which is the equivalent of a bunch of flowers from a petrol station – you kinda are happy, such is the power of the present.
But what if you have to get something for someone who has everything?
Well, I once bought Richard Branson a vanilla latte on his birthday and I can tell you, while he was gracious … he obviously thought, “what the fuck has he got this for me, for?”
Which – ironically – is exactly what Jill said to me when I told her what I’d done.
Well, recently I saw something that may be a solution for you – should you ever find yourself in this predicament. It’s this …
Yes … it’s a computer mouse, with a leather jacket.
And according to Liam, once you’ve used it, you will never go back to a regular, ‘naked’ mouse.
Now this may sound like I’m about to be hypocritical but if someone bought me this – even if I was the richest person in the entire world – I would want to smash them in the face.
Not because it’s bollocks.
Not because if I’m that rich, I’d have someone doing the ‘mousing’ for me.
But because they cost TWO HUNDRED QUID and they refer to themselves as ‘pointer instruments’.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
I love how they are trying to elevate the appeal and craftsmanship of what they’re doing by referring to it as an ‘instrument’ … but whatever way you look at it, they’re charging you 200 quid for a shitty mouse wearing a teeny-tiny leather jacket.
But they’re going all in on it.
Read their website and the descriptions of the various products they make.
It’s hilariously depressing, but not as much as the fact they’re selling a ton of them.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Communication Strategy, Cunning, Devious Strategy, Education, Otis
Despite using examples that probably featured perspectives that were the opposite of every MBA case study they had read, it all went pretty well.
I got a bunch of questions and even received some lovely notes from people in attendance.
But the reality is, I kind of ensured that the end would be remembered better than the beginning.
You see Otis saw me writing my talk and asked if he was in it.
So I added this as the last slide.
Which means regardless what went on before, the ending was always going to be perfect.
#Strategy
Filed under: Advertising, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Communication Strategy, Culture, Insight, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Planning, Point Of View, Relevance, Resonance
Recently I saw this …
Quite a headline eh?
Amazingly, it wasn’t from the Sunday Sport ‘newspaper’ … though it was from The Daily Mail, so it’s kind of the same thing.
And while it makes for entertaining reading – unless you’re the vicar in question or the Henry Hoover – it did make me think about how rubbish his attempt at persuasion.
Now to be fair, being found with your penis in a vacuum cleaner while wearing stockings would test the limits of any act of persuasion, but even so … it’s just rubbish isn’t it?
You don’t believe it.
You don’t consider it.
You are not in the least moved by it.
And that’s kind of what I feel about a lot of the ads I see these days.
They say stuff but they don’t make you think, feel or react to any of it.
No persuasion … just a rather rubbish demand that you now go and do something or the insane ramblings of an 18 year old French philosophy student. In their first year.
I swear a big reason for this is the lack of actual interest in knowing culture.
A narrowcast attitude of either assuming people blindly love you and wait on your every word or only showing an interest in how people use your product. And nothing else.
An egotistical assumption audiences don’t need to be encouraged to consider why you may be beneficial to their life or the belief people are thick as pig shit and so need to be instructed in detail what to do with you.
So you end up with bullshit like:
Future is an attitude for Audi or Cure Housebarrassment for Wicks Kitchens … which are so stupid/blatant you start to think saying undiagnosed diabetes led you to stick your penis in a hoover while wearing stockings is at least an attempt to make an attempt at persuasion.
Filed under: Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture
Timo Kiuru has written a book on creative leadership.
He said …
“I wanted to find out how the leaders of the most creative organisations in the world do their job. I contacted people I had a lot of respect for and was very thankful for their time. I interviewed countless leaders.
It was hard to narrow them down, but this book includes the fascinating stories of 15 of those inspirational people – stories that dig into your very soul. I hope that the book will encourage readers to be braver in their search for that something special”
One of the people he interviewed is me.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
He’s utterly misguided but my parents would be so proud of me. For once.
So thanks Timo and all the colleagues, agencies and clients I’ve worked with who somehow fooled him into thinking it had anything to do with me.
You can find out more [without having to read me] by clicking here.
And yes, I fully appreciate this is a #UnhumbleBrag … but in my defence, I’m from Nottingham and the only books we tend to be mentioned in are a Police Officers.
Filed under: Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Culture, Education, England
Rishi Sunak, the potential Tory leader, has laid out a three-point plan to transform education in the UK – including that statement in the photo above.
Yep, he wants to ‘phase out university degrees that do not improve students’ earning potential’.
What the absolute fuck?
Apart from the fact the easiest way to transform education is to actually invest in schools and teachers across the country rather than continue to see anything other than private education as a wasted expense – mainly because they all went to private schools so have a misguided and warped view of what teaching, learning and intelligence actually is or can be – can you imagine what their idea of subjects worthy of a degree actually are?
There will be no arts. [Waste of money]
No history. [Except about Britain, presumably]
No languages. [As it supports Brexit and immigration]
The only thing we’ll see are subjects related to business, maths and maybe law.
I cannot tell you how angry I got reading his ‘plans’.
Those degrees he hates, aren’t worthless. They’re life.
They’re what helps stops society fall down a blackhole of endless repetition, mediocrity and middle-management.
A production line of duplicate attitudes, approaches, values and experiences.
Not only that, those degrees that ‘do not improve earning potential’ contribute far more to the economy than he knows or wants to admit … even with their best efforts of killing it.
Like those gun lobbyists in America whose attitude towards stopping ‘gun attacks’ is to either give more guns out to people or make schools buy bullet proof rooms… not forgetting those pricks who have decided woman can/can’t choose what is right for their own bodies … Sunak and the rest of his Tory scum seem to think the best way to help a generation they’ve actively and purposefully robbed of hope through deliberate acts of underfunding, denial and obstacles is to tell them what they should find valuable and what they should do for the rest of their life.
10 years ago I wrote a post about a Dad who wrote a letter to his son about his impending liberal arts education.
I suggest every Tory – and parent – should read it, even if they will never understand it.
We all want the best for our kids.
We all know education is a vital part of that.
But it blows my mind that so many people – including those in power – fail to understand the better the education we give to all – not just the privileged – the better the chances people, communities and the country as a whole will have to prosper.
Or said another way …
Education can help a nation achieve what all politicians say they are there to make happen.
Which highlights that Tories don’t actually want that to happen. They just want it to happen for people like them. Rich people. Rich, white people.
But here’s the thing, private education does not automatically guarantee smart people come out the other side. Yes, they have more advantage and opportunity … which they would pretty much have anyway given they generally come from affluent families … but there is plenty of evidence to suggest many create more myopic, self-focused and damaged individuals.
And here’s the thing …
In a world that is increasingly encouraging, valuing and producing the same thing over and over again, we need to remember the arts aren’t worthless to society and economies … they create the value in the known and reveal the opportunities in the things Rishi and mob would never see on their own.
Fuck the Tories.