Filed under: 2024, A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, Brands, Communication Strategy, Complicity, Confidence, Consultants, Context, Contribution, Corporate Gaslighting, Crap Marketing Ideas From History!, Creative Brief, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Delusion, Differentiation, Distinction, Effectiveness, Egovertising, End of Year, Experience, Fake Attitude, Honesty, Influencers, Leadership, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Mediocrity, Only In Adland, Perspective, Planners, Planning, Point Of View, Positioning, Pretentious Rubbish, Professionalism, Provocative, Purpose, Relevance, Reputation, Research, Resonance, Respect, Ridiculous, Standards, Status, Status Anxiety, Strategy, Stubborness, Stupid, Success, Talent, Toxic Positivity, Truth
As tomorrow is one of those terribly indulgent ‘thank you and goodbye to ’24 post’ [the blog equivalent of boring someone with ‘what they dreamed about last night’], I thought today should be a RobMegaRant™ post … ending the year as I hope to start next year, hahaha.
So with that, take a look at this bloody amazing picture.
How awesome is it?
I have absolutely no idea where it’s from or when it’s from but I can’t stop looking at it.
The browns.
The clothes.
And then – of course – the egg salad machine.
You can imagine that at the time, this was a demonstration of innovation.
Of technological advancement.
Of commercial optimisation.
A glimpse into an automated world of high efficiency and effectiveness.
Removing barriers and friction to provide audiences with consistent, satisfying results.
Except it wasn’t was it?
Not in the long-term … and most likely not in the short-term either.
Oh sure, there’s machines that make industrial amounts of egg salad to shove in cheap and cheerful sandwiches you get at the local petrol station … but in 54 years of being on – and around – this planet, I’ve never once seen any ‘public egg salad maker/dispensers’.
Not even in Japan.
And that’s because it’s a shit idea, for a shit-ton of reasons.
Taste.
Quality.
Consistency.
Health and safety.
The fact no one wants egg salad every single day of their life.
And that’s before we even get to issues such as ‘appetite appeal’.
Looking at the picture and you can’t help but wonder, “what the fuck were they thinking”?
Except our industry does a similar thing ALL. THE. TIME.
An endless production line of ‘proprietary’ systems, processes, models and formats … promising the world and promoted using almost identical language and benefits that was likely used for that bloody egg volcano machine.
Innovation.
Automation.
Optimisation.
Advancement.
Transformation.
Effectiveness.
Efficiency.
Put aside that in most cases, the only ‘proprietary’ element is the name that’s been given to it.
Put aside that in many cases, the people behind it have never created something of disproportionate value and impact.
Put aside that the vast majority of these ‘innovations’ are more about not being left behind rather than moving you forward. [Read: marketing transformation]
Put aside that in many cases, the real purpose of the product is to reinforce the ego – and/or bank account – of the person claiming to have all the answers.
Put aside that many of the companies who flock to it tend to be those who choose to abdicate and outsource their responsibility for decisions and choices.
Don’t get me wrong, there are some really good innovations in our industry. There are also far too many people who dismiss change simply because they don’t like it. And we cannot forget that we unfairly expect new ideas to deliver the results of established ideas.
However, when certain parties peddle their products, tools, services, models, formats with the attitude of it not just being the right way, but ‘the only way’ – where they guarantee success regardless of category, country or spend – then frankly, not only should we see their declarations as an admission of [at best] blinkered thinking or [at worst] evidence of being a chancer and/or hustler … we should be asking ourselves why the fuck are we blindly trusting the self-serving voice and opinion of those whose only major commercial achievement is elevating their own name and image.
I am over efficiency and optimisation being peddled as innovation and progress.
I am over process being regarded as more important than output.
I am over loose association being reframed as expertise.
I am over easy being more valued than quality.
I am over people thinking being good in one thing means they’re excellent in all things.
We need to stop thinking of insurance salesmen as pioneers.
Sure, the good ones have a role to play – especially when companies are downgrading training for their employees – but it’s not as a leader of marketing/brand/creative innovation. Even more so when the reality is many are either riding on the efforts and achievements of someone else or simply communicating the 101 of particular disciplines under the guise of it being at the highest academic standard.
Forgive me for my skepticism, but even if it was true – which it isn’t – I don’t see many universities achieving cultural status and influence through their marketing approach. Hell, most universities don’t even know how to differentiate themselves from each other.
Please don’t read this as being anti-education. God no.
The reality is the industry needs more teachers. Or should I say better ones.
Not the self-appointed guru’s who peddle their self-serving blinkered services for profit, but those who have been there and done that. Who have consistently done things at a standard that goes way beyond just basic levels of achievement. Who can talk from the perspective of being at the coalface, not from a pedestal. Watching on with their binoculars. We need to celebrate those with actual experience, not just assoicated opinions.
Or said another way, we need chefs not egg salad salesmen.
Lets hope in 2025, we get back to valuing the ingredients, not just the convenience.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Communication Strategy, Complicity, Corporate Gaslighting, Crap Marketing Ideas From History!, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture
So here we are, the final week of blog posting for the year.
Last week was a lot of reasonably heavy posts but this week will be different.
Not just because it’s the holiday season, but because I’m in full-on scrape-the-barrel mode for content.
I know you probably think that has been the case for the last 10 years, but trust me, it’s even worse than you have previously experienced, exemplified by this:
This is an ‘adult store’ in Melbourne, Australia.
They’re probably in more cities across the country, but I passed this one on my way to the airport a few weeks ago.
I must admit, I burst out laughing when I saw it.
Not because ‘adult stores’ are funny, but because the name and the environment couldn’t have felt more opposite.
Maybe it’s just me … but a beige box, located on a miserable-looking industrial estate, near an airport, doesn’t scream SEXY to me.
Especially when that beige box displays a logo that looks like it came straight out of 1990’s UK kitchen or bed retailer.
It’s very much like those ‘experts’ on Linkedin who show they don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about by expressing their misguided opinion with blinkered and blind conviction and confidence.
Hence, we see people who are closer to insurance salespeople acting like they’re business liberators. We hear people who’ve never made anything great talking like they’re the ultimate educators. And we have adult retailers promoting themselves like the authority on expression.
We seem to forget there’s a major difference between those who exploit a category for profit and those who evolve the category through what they add and do … but in this world of quick wins, easy answers and justifiable delusion, quality of work plays a distant second to quality of ego.
And that’s why I hope for one major difference between 2025 and 2024 … which is we stop blindly following people based on popularity and start getting back to valuing what people have actually done. Because as the old adage goes, anything is easy when you’ve never had to do it and so the only way we can all be better is if we get back to focusing and valuing those who create the change, rather than those who simply offer their own self-serving commentary about it.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand, Communication Strategy, Content, Context, Creative Brief, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Packaging, Planning, Point Of View, Positioning, Relevance, Resonance, Strategy
This is a shop near where we live.
Now I appreciate the above is basically an adoption of the TK Max strategy – reframing ‘random stuff’ to the joy of discovery and exploration – but I love it.
I especially like that it offers a far more compelling reason for people to keep visiting than simply saying ‘cheap stuff sold here’.
Now I get on face value, reframing is easy to do – but based on a bunch of effectiveness papers I’ve read – it isn’t.
Right now, the basic approach to a lot of strategy appears to be either ‘state the bloody obvious’ or ‘live in a dream-world’.
Logic or fantasy. [Though it’ll be called ‘laddering’ to make it sound smart]
But what I love about the Opportunity Shop is that it does neither of those.
What they’ve done with that name is take something inherently true and then convey it in a way that opens possibility.
Elevation rather than explanation … helping you connect to it because it doesn’t ask you to reject your perceptions, but invites you to interpret them in a new way.
It’s part of the reason why I loved living in Asia so much … because there was so much that operated in similar ways there.
When we lived in Singapore, there was a market near our apartment on Club Street.
A bric-a-brac place … full of stuff like single shoes or jigsaw puzzles with pieces missing. Totally random stuff.
But one of the reasons it was popular was because of the name it had … the ‘thieves’ market’.
How great is that?
A name that not only defines the weird shit you will find there, but also gives you a reason why you would want to keep going there.
A proper reframe. Not trying to associate with stuff they wish they were associated with but acknowledging the starting point of how they’re actually seen.
Emotional self-awareness rather than blinkered ego.
And that is why most companies get ‘reframing’ wrong …
Because they want to hammer home how they want to be seen.
So they repeat it ad nauseum … regardless of perception, reference, context or reality.
And the irony of this approach is rather than capture people’s attention, imagination and emotion, they kill it.
Pushing people away rather than inviting them in. Kind of like a lot of the effectiveness papers I’ve read.
Where I have to keep re-reading them to try and work out what the hell they’re trying to say.
What their idea is.
Why it’s right.
How it worked.
A constant stream of explanation which – ironically – never really explains.
And while I appreciate effectiveness papers require a lot of information, there’s 2 quotes that I feel everyone should think about when defining an idea, be it for an effectiveness paper or to get a client to buy.
The first is something we heard from a chef when doing research for Tobasco who said: “The more confident the chef, the less ingredients they use”.
The second is even more random.
It’s from ex-US President, Ronald Reagan, who said, “If you’re explaining, you’re losing”.
[You can read about them more here and here]
Think about those and you’re basically being given the rules to develop a reframe that can change minds, behaviours, and outcomes rather than build cynical – or just indifferent – barriers through rationality, fantasy or bullshit association.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Auckland, Communication Strategy, Context, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, New Zealand, Perspective
A few weeks ago, while going for my daily walk, I saw this:
I know there’s nothing new in this concept.
Let’s face it …
+ Solving problems are more powerful than communicating problems.
+ Talking to someone is always more effective than talking to everyone.
+ Changing contexts and perspectives helps change contexts and perspectives.
+ Being self-awareness opens up possibilities for who you can become.
… is well established and been practiced for years – such as this iconic piece from London’s V&A years back – but I still like it. A lot.
I know it won’t change the world, but it’s an idea that may change somebody’s … because to paraphrase Ferdinand Porsche, ‘its better to be everything to someone than try to be anything to anyone’
So to the Auckland Museum and the people behind it, well done.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Apple, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Communication Strategy, Complicity, Corporate Evil, Creativity, Culture, Design, Differentiation, Innovation, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Packaging, Perspective, Positioning, Pride, Purpose, Reputation, Respect, Steve Jobs, Technology, Values
I’ve written a lot about the bullshit of brand purpose.
Or should I say the hijacking of purpose by marketing departments and agencies.
Far too often, we see companies where their ‘purpose’ has no day-to-day impact on the operations or decisions they make beyond pushing their marketing messages and promotions. For these orgs, purpose is positioned simply as ‘something we hope might change’ rather than actively doing stuff that actively pushes it.
As they say in the UK, “the truth of the pudding is in the eating”, and a lot of corporate brand purpose tastes like bullshit.
That doesn’t mean the concept of purpose is entirely wrong.
Oh no.
However the reality is true brand purpose is born rather than manufactured – especially by a marketing department – so for every Patagonia, there’s a Unilever … which is why I find the easiest way to see who is talking truth versus shite is simply by exploring how much inconvenience they’ll accept and embrace.
Recently I saw an interesting example of a brand who not just embraced inconvenience, but demanded it.
An example which I imagine caused all manner of friction and tension throughout the company.
And yet, when you think about who the company were and – more importantly – who they wanted to become, you see it as absolute commitment to their beliefs and ambitions.
Take a look at this …
Now I appreciate some would read that and only see the problems … the costs … the disruptions … the impact on productivity … the C-Suite ‘bullying’. But they’re probably the same people who think purpose is about ‘wrapping paper’ rather than beliefs and actions … which is why I kinda-love this.
I love how much they were pushing it and how they pushed it.
It was important to them.
Not for virtue signaling, not for corporate complicity – though I accept there’s a bit of that – but mainly because a company can’t talk about technology, creativity and the future while asking your very own colleagues to embrace the cheap, the convenient and the conformist.
Just to be clear, this is VERY different to companies who mandate processes.
That’s about control and adherence.
A desire to keep things as they are rather than what they could be.
And to me, that’s the difference between those who ‘talk’ purpose and those whose actions are a byproduct of it.
Every day in every way.
Because as the old trope goes, it’s only a principal if it costs you something and the reality is – like strategy – too many talk a good game but will flip the moment they think they could make/save a bit more cash.
Apple may have a lot of problems, but fundamentally, they mean what they say and show it in their actions – both in the spotlight, but also in the shadows … where very few people will ever see – as exemplified by Jobs famous ‘paint behind the fence‘ quote.