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, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, Business, Comment, Confidence, Corporate Evil, Creativity, Culture, Cunning, Devious Strategy, Finance, Honesty, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Money, Relevance, Social Divide, Social Media
Back from a nice long weekend.
Hey, if this makes you feel bad, imagine how my poor colleagues feel.
Anyway …
I recently read the book Hype, by Gabrielle Bluestone.
It is depressingly brilliant.
While it covers a huge range of topics, it centres on the actions and behaviours of Fyre Festival founder [or should I say, scammer] Billy McFarland.
Now I appreciate with worldwide coverage and 2 documentaries on the subject, you may think you know all that needs to be known, but apart from Gabrielle bringing some new information to the table, what makes it especially interesting is how she compares his actions to others who are regarded as business geniuses.
Like Elon Musk.
Now you might think that sounds like the actions of someone desperate to create hype for their new book. But no. It’s incredibly well written and researched … and as you turn page after page, with hustler/liar story after hustler/liar story, you come away thinking the whole world has fallen for the Emperors New Clothes trick.
Not to mention that either Billy McFarland is unlucky to be sentenced to jail or Elon Musk – and countless other business people and influencers – are lucky not to be.
Society loves its success stories.
It loves trying to ‘codify‘ the system.
But while only a few ever succeed, it doesn’t stop people blindly following some ‘proven’ rules. Often losing themselves in details rather than appreciating context.
All the while making the originator [or person who shouted the loudest, quickest] even more powerful and famous … before they end up a caricature of what they once were.
I’m seeing a lot of this in marketingland at the moment.
Now, I am not suggesting these people are doing it to ‘con’ anyone. Far from it. In fact their intentions are pretty wonderful. But somewhere along the line, their perspective has developed into a ‘system’ and that system now has a number of unquestionable and unshakeable rules attached to it which, ironically, is starting to negatively affect the very industry they want to help.
To be fair, they are not entirely responsible.
They are a bit … because they give their ‘system’ names that suggest intellectual superiority when it’s really ‘an educated beginners guide’, plus they conveniently turn a blind eye to how many of their students are executing what they learnt – without context or real audience understanding – so it ends up just being lowest common denominator thinking. But the real reason this situation is occurring is too many companies aren’t investing enough in talent or training, so they send people off to do courses with fancy names so they can all look and feel like they are.
Putting aside the fact this also highlights how many companies lack a philosophy regarding their approach and value to marketing, what this ‘one size fits all’ approach is doing is educating a whole generation of marketer/advertiser/company that talent, standards and creativity are not nearly as important as having people who can follow – and police – process, formats and parity.
We’re in danger of getting to the point where independent thinking is seen as dangerous.
Or weakness.
Or anything other than strength.
And while understanding how things work is important, creating a singular approach and process where building brands and creativity is approached like an airfix model – where the outcome is always the same, albeit with different brand names/colours attached – seems to be more about undermining the purpose of marketing rather than liberate it.
What makes this even more amusing is the brands who are attracting the greatest cultural momentum, loyalty and brand value right now are not following any of these ‘process rules’. More than that, they’re building their reputation and value through the creation of distinctive brand ideas that talk directly to their audiences rather than focusing on brand attribution that aims to be slightly memorable among their category.
[Please note, I’m talking about brands with a real business behind them, not just social hype]
Now I appreciate the context and circumstances of cultural brands and the brands who are adopting a marketing ‘system’ are very different … but what I’m trying to highlight is that we now find ourselves in this weird situation where the ambition for many brands is to not find ways to get ahead but to not be left behind – all the while bombarding the market with claims of innovation, new thinking, new opportunities.
And that’s why I loved reading Hype so much.
Not just because it pulled back the curtain on the hypocritical bullshit of so many self-appointed ‘business icons’, but it revealed where we’re all heading if we’re not careful … even though I know there will be people out there who read it and see it as their goal rather than their ruin.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Corporate Evil, Creative Brief, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Differentiation, Distinction, Imagination, Innovation, Insight, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Perspective, Relevance, Resonance, Talent
I still remember buying a movie soundtrack only to discover none of the songs had actually featured in the movie.
When I looked at the cover, I saw “songs inspired by the movie” … in other words, the film company couldn’t get the rights to release the actual music, so they got some two-bit band to write some nondescript music supposedly after watching the film.
It wasn’t as bad as those albums where they got a covers band to sing a well known song – rather than the actual artist – but it was close.
The reason I say this is that I’m seeing a bunch of ‘write-ups’ of ads that seem to adopt the same position.
“Inspired by”.
“Influenced”
“Reinterpreted”.
Now there’s nothing really wrong with this … it’s something that’s been done by all manner of industries for centuries … however while there’s a common belief that ‘genius steals’, the counter to this is ‘lazy borrows’.
I know … I know … I’m being deliberately assholey, but the beauty of our industry is when we allow creatives the freedom to create.
To allow their crazy minds to take us all to crazy intriguing places.
But instead … thanks to budgets, timelines, dictatorial research, corporate fear, layers of management – and countless other things – we don’t.
Which is why we see so many pieces of work that are replications of a film, a meme, a song, a TikTok idea … basically a version of an album of popular songs that haven’t been played by any of the original artists.
Our industry is capable of brilliant things.
But we’ve sold creativity down the river in a bid to make things easier for people who don’t even value the power of creativity.
Nothing smacks of madness as much as that.
Meanwhile, culture leads change of behaviour, attitudes and choices through its endless energy to explore and express.
So while being inspired is one thing, duplicating is another and when certain brands expect people to spend hundreds or thousands on their products, it blows my mind they want to under-invest in the way they actually present themselves in their communication.
Oh they won’t see it that way.
They’ll talk about the celebrity they hired to front the campaign.
Or the music they licensed.
But underneath it all, they’ll they’re taking shortcuts.
They’ll kid themselves it’s working with charts on optimisation or efficiencies … but the reality is they’re trying to work out how long they’ve got before it all falls apart, because the difference between leading and chasing is not about spend, it’s about attitude.
Or said another way …
You either make music or you’re just a cover band.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand Suicide, Comment, Consultants, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Differentiation, Diversity, Emotion, Empathy, Experience, Honesty, Imagination, Innovation, Insight, Loyalty, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Perspective, Professionalism, Relationships, Relevance, Resonance, Respect, Standards
A while back I read an interview with film director, voice of Yoda and countless muppets and expert puppeteer – Frank Oz.
It was a beautiful interview … a story of friendship, loyalty, creativity and compassion, so I urge you to read it … but there was one thing that really stood out to me and it was this:
Now it’s fair to say it’s no longer just corporate America who don’t understand the value of the things they’ve just bought. In some respects, we see it every day from clients who dictate and demand changes to a piece of creativity that an experienced professional has custom made for their specific situation … right through to companies who blame talent for circumstances and situations that they were directly complicit in creating and encouraging.
As I see it, the problem is three fold.
1. People judge output without any appreciation of how it happened.
2. People wildly overestimate their own talent.
3. It’s easier to look like you’re doing things than doing things.
None of these should be a surprise.
It’s why we tend to lavish our attention on individuals who are associated with ‘results’ rather than recognize the people around them who made it possible. It’s why we talk about wanting to follow similar paths to others but dismiss the pain, hardship and conflicts they endured to get there. It’s why companies build in-house creative departments without understanding the importance of objective viewpoints that lead to the work they want to replicate. It’s why people dismiss what others have done despite never having done anything of note themselves. It’s why companies talk about the importance of experience but see them as an expense. It’s why industries talk about D&I but don’t change the situations and contexts that make it an issue. It’s why companies talk about teams but have departments of exactly the same sort of people. It’s why companies become obsessed with proprietary processes even though the work and results it produces is nothing special. It’s why many consultants tell you what is wrong but never take responsibility for making it right. It’s why someone I once worked with on an airport project said – no word of a lie – “why don’t we push out the architects, because we could do a much better job”, despite the fact he wasn’t an architect and our role had little to do with it.
I could go on.
And on and on and on.
The reality is we’re all complicit in some way.
And the irony is if we learn to value what it takes to get the results we want – rather than simply focusing on the speed, power and control of ownership – then we’d all stand a much greater chance of achieving the things we want.
Or said as the wonderful Lee Hill once said to me …
Hire well.
Pay well.
Brief well.
Value well.
Trust well.
Have a good weekend.