making the world a better place

In the past, I used to blog...a lot. :) I miss those days, but I also can't let my mind be consumed by the desire to blog more, because frankly, I just don't have the time. I will cultivate it in time, if I don't then it wasn't meant to be.

Anyway, I have reason and time to post now, and it's to draw your attention to All Day Buffet. I was reading a magazine this weekend that I picked up in Austin, TX at Whole Foods central headquarters. It's called L & G style. It's a flip format where one side caters to women (ladies) and the other focuses on men (gents). So far the three articles I've read have covered homeopathy, yoga, and doing something GOOD for the world.

I wrote a blog post at All Day Buffet here about a spa owner who sees it as her mission to make people feel more comfortable, more beautiful, and less stressed. Sounds pretty good to me.

tips to write strategy

Richard has written 17, but here are the first fabulous five:

1. Time is not the problem in creating strategy, ideas are. If you can find an idea the time will find itself.

2. Ideas first, facts second. Facts only make sense in the light of an idea.

3. There are only two criteria for judging your creative strategies - are they simple and are they interesting.

4. It is vital to be interesting, it is merely important to be right.

5. If you look in the same place as everyone else you will never find something interesting, no matter how clever you are.

Stay informed and plan for time to think.

Hal Curtis: Creative Director

"Brand Heroism: Advertising As a Force For Good" was the topic of the evening. Beforehand, I made some notes about what immediately came to mind with the topic: Planning For Good, Likemind, Do the Green Thing, (RED), Egg. The nights' introduction talked about how ethical issues can be interwoven through the creative (and strategic) work. For most of advertising's career, this "good" work has been pro-bono, but a new era is emerging where this work is done first-hand with intention and (financial) pay-off. It's kind of like Google doing everything it does for "free" > providing a service beyond rational benefits, but inherently being a good brand that we trust, love, and are loyal too in return.

Google is deeply, radically purposive: they won't compromise much, if anything, to achieve the goal of changing the world for the better. - writes Umair Haque of the Havas Media Lab (check out more of his writing)

Anyway, Hal Curtis, who has worked on Nike and Coca-Cola at Wieden & Kennedy since 1997, took "heroism" in a different direction. He got me to think outside-the-box. He made me fall in love with advertising (again).

The spot below was not done by WK, instead, Curtis showed it after a spot they'd done for CareerBuilder.com. He compared the spots and said we should strive to do more work like the one below. Check out the incredible spot:



It's this sort of healthy-advertising that Curtis says, we should have out there. In this sense, advertising is heroic > it lifts us up, it makes us feel, it transforms an ordinary day into an extraordinary experience. Not only does this level of work do a great job of inserting itself into the minds of customers, but it does a great job of inspiring better work from the industry it comes from.

Do good work. Strive to make it great.

Making ideas come to life

"Brands as shared objects," by Mark, gave me a thought > if we give users the tools they need to customize and make the product their own (not consumer-generated but actually building on a base product provided by a brand) then, not only are we letting them become "part of the process" but we are facilitating the manifestation of a unique idea.

A good example would be blogger.com (Google-owned). We have a platform to work from but if we have an idea to change the appearance or add something, we have the tools to make it happen. We have creative control. Part of what makes the new idea of co-creation so awesome is the aspect of ownership. Google has given us the tools to make our own ideas come to life.

And in the business of advertising, we all know how hard it is sometimes to get an idea realized. Smart brands have not only figured out how to do it for themselves but for their customers. Pretty cool.

Leading With Insight

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Got this from Think Tank Treasury (great planner thinking). If you're not sure what an insight is or how you can go about finding one, look this through.

Slide 21: "You shouldn't be afraid to reframe the problem."

Slide 58: "Insights help uncover and reframe the true nature of the problem."

Presentation by Matthew Milan of Critical Mass (site in beta).

Modernista's new website

"You are viewing Modernista! through the eyes of the web" is how the agency has positioned its new digital self. Pretty cool.

From an Adage article on the change:

"The thing about the web these days is there's all these great tools out there, you're just not going to be able to come up with a better way to share photos than Flickr or a better way to build community than Facebook," so it's wise to tap into what's already out there rather than build from scratch, said David-Michel Davies, executive director of the Webby Awards, which each year honors excellence on the Internet.

And Gareth's post about it received good feedback as well. "Ballsy" is the word on everyone's lips. It takes some, in addition to a push-the-envelope spirit and some planning thinking. It's perfect for this day in which Google is the #1 brand without advertising and Wired touts "free" is the new bling.

Modernista! has given the control to the user (awesome) and is using elements already in existence in a new way (fabulous). To quote their Facebook page: "Modernista! is making the web a little cuter." :)

The Recession (?)

Just a quick set of links for inquiring minds:

Wired News says, "It won't repeat the dot-com bust."

The American analyzes the recession debate.

U.S. News & World Report lists 4 signs that the U.S. is not in a recession.

The New York Times says Wall Street Earning have sent stock prices soaring.

Nowpublic asks if the U.S. economic suffering will result in a global economic crisis?

Supermodel Gisele Bundchen says she won't get paid in dollars here.

And get a synopsis of how each of the presidential candidates feel here.

Opinion piece to follow...

Continued information:

Just found this on Popmatters:

Gallup reported at the end of March that three in five Americans worry “a great deal” about the economy, and that a majority call economic issues the most important problem facing the country.

2008 Planning Survey

If you are a planner somewhere, go here and give the discipline some feedback. It's about 30 questions and won't take you more than 2 minutes.

Plan on.

Reading Rainbow - things to read for planners

A group of us came together to share good reads and what sucks; and as a service to my digital community, I'm sharing them with you:

"One Great Insight is Worth a Thousand Good Ideas"

• One important sentence in the whole thing: An insight states a truth that alters how you see the world. Something to keep in mind when we think we've got "it."

"What Sticks" - sucks, don't waste your money

"Made to Stick" - awesome, go ahead and spend

"Whoever Tells The Best Story Wins"

• Explains different stories and situations. It explores the topic of "who am I?" and "the qualities I have that give me the right to influence you." Our objective should be to tell a story, not give a lecture.
  

"Culture and Consumption II" by Grant McCracken - pure awesomeness!

"Lovemarks"

• Explores and explains the power of brands: Once you're loved, you're ingrained in someone and are very hard to shake. It also does a good job of inadvertently touches on the role of planning.

"Convergence Culture"

• It explores old media and new media coming together and how much consumer control is a part of the conversation now. This book was quoted as "fantastic and challenging."

"The Perfect Pitch" - Jon Steel, highly suggested all around

"Everything Bad is Good For You" - Steven Johnson

"Confederates in the Attic"

"Private Label Strategy"

• Talks about how private labels are brands' arch enemies; is very consumer packaged goods' centric; and dispels the myth that we think private labels are cheap and generic.

"Any Wednesdays" - good coffee table book, by guys at DDB, isn't on Amazon (???)

Now go find yourself a cozy place and dedicate yourself to the first chapter and see what happens...maybe you'll end up reading the whole thing. Reading takes discipline. High five, you can do it. :)

Digital Curators

a term you should know a bit about. :)

offline W/ online Together

Currently I am going through the process of combining offline with online, because I believe the two spaces should co-exist as complements. The people I tell this too in the "digital group" act as if it's the first time they've heard the idea. Really?

wouldn't it be great if everything had an interactive component? don't get me wrong, I think it's where we're going but it's SLOW, no?

Clients are asking now for website upgrades, great! But does the experience online match the experience offline, and what would it be like if you launched both at the same time?

Would we call this a marketing issue? Or rather, as a planner, If I have an idea like this who should I be selling it to? Hmmm...

______ is the new _______

Urban is the New Mainstream is a great first person perspective on what the ad world is largely missing out on: multi-cultural targeting.

"What's most tragic -- beyond the racial implications -- is how out of touch it is with the consumer reality. We are in a business where professionals are paid to be in touch with the target -- unless that runs counter to their usual comfort zone. Brands and agencies have got to get clued in or get left behind."

We're all too comfortable sticking with what we know. I agree that we can be more intuitive about what we personally have experience with, but...coming up with a target that's "mostly" white is mostly old-school thinking. Wake up and smell the urban coffee.

Sound of Color

I bet Sony wishes they'd come up with this first. Soundofcolor.com by The Gap is definitely pushing branding boundaries. No?

I would embed the video but...there are serious issues with its viralability currently. Just go to the site and check all the colors out.

And now for a little blog attention: This is a blog Post with No Thinking (PNT). Regular readers will be able to call these out from now on with PNT and PWT (With Thinking). I'm a big fan of honesty and calling things how they are, and I haven't come up with a solution for the posts that I do in lue of time. I actually Onelooked "lue" and it turned up nothing. Then I Googled the phrase and was verified by other bloggers who used the term: Everyone else is doing it. :P

A PNT for you because sometimes us bloggers have to compete with RSS feeds. I'll post a PWT soon; because on the other side of the coin, we owe it to you to give the web innovative content.

PSFK Conference 2008

Conversation topics will be:

Finding Inspiration
Michelin star chef Eric Ripert explains how his three annual trips inspire his menu, service and brand.
Good Business
Is good the new green? Does being good mean making good profits? Marc Alt leads a panel with Graham Hill , Johnny Vulkan, Jeff Staple and Jeffrey Hollender to investigate one of the key trends driving business.
Social Media
In a 'new guns' versus 'marketing gurus' debate, Josh Spear & Noah Brier join Marc Schiller & Steve Rubel to debate how social media will change in 2008 and how companies can leverage this digital phenomenon in the most rewarding way. Moderated by Noelle Weaver .
Does New York Matter?
Local observers discuss whether the culture created in New York has a role on a global stage.
Collaborative Co-Working
Etsy and NASA explain how they engage their customers, staff, partners and the community with co-working spaces (real and virtual).
Tomorrow's TV
How has digital changed the delivery, content, sponsorship and future of television? Mike Hudack and Adam Stotsky join a panel to discuss the opportunities and challenges.
Pattern Recognition
Grant McCracken explains the importance of inspiration, providing a framework for which to gather, monitor and react to trends and ideas in culture and business.

Tickets are discounted for Likeminders, pretty awesome of Piers.

blogs make us think

Yesterday I stumbled on 90 Day Jane > a 24 year old girl who has decided to blog about her last 90 days of life. Some call it a hoax, others have taken her plea for help very seriously (the amount of comments she has gotten will make any blogger a little jealous). Blogger.com finally reacted and took her blog off the map, but she persevered on her own site and now...I'm not sure what's happening. You decide. Apparently she is posting something to Post Secret revealing the project for what it is. Hmmm...

Jane made me think. Some of her posts are about the digital age, how connections made online may not be of much value when taken offline, and how relationships today may be more fake than ever because of this. I have made many connections with fellow bloggers and am inspired by Jen at Innovation Feeder to give a shoutout to those that make me think the most.

Noah Briar - always making new connections and pushing the limits of what we consider to be integrated communications.
Russell Davies - if there's a planning celebrity, I'd say it's Russell, this uber planner is seemingly down-to-earth. I'd love to chat if you ever make it to Dallas.
Daniel Mejia - from Columbia, he blogs in English and has a very on-point perspective about planning and strategically weaving brands into people's lives.
Amelia Torode - I always like what she has to say, very down to earth and super smart.

(check the side bar at right for more)

I don't know if Jane's mission is real or has been side-tracked by the numerous connections she has made with fellow bloggers, but I can say that being part of this community is important to me as if we all worked together in the same planning department. And that means something online and off. Inspiration is just a click away. :)

media snackers

Wake up: the media landscape is changing.

advertising High School

"Making young people see the relevance of advertising to their lives will be an important part of that goal." - says Ron Berger, CEO of RSCG Worldwide

Sounds like Ron has been smoking the "advertising is crack" pipe a little too long. Ya?
Read more at Ad Age about the High School for Innovation in Advertising and Media

In my personal experience of being a junior planner, real life experience and a diversity of dedicated studies/hobbies makes or breaks your career, not a major in advertising. I found the fact that I had said major to be debilitating when it came to presenting my resume. A focus in advertising seems to be as bland as a major in Business. Whoopdeedoo.

I'm not going to spend too long developing how I feel and why I feel the way I do about this high school concept; except to say that I think it's a bad idea. Unless of course the school is extremely well thought out and has teachers from all walks of life who understand the connections between business, cultural relevance and consumer behavior equally.

Amen to education. Say what? to this idea.

planners need to be storytellers

"It's interesting to see how much the amount of information (given) influences its retention."

My mom and sister are fanatical storytellers. Each time they launch into a story, it happens before I know it. I hesitate: "do I have time for this?" I'm listening for a noun + verb kind of story; But they can't tell a story like that. The details get me every time.

Someone said once that information is the currency of a planner. Damnit then, give me the details.

A story is accepted or rejected by "the telling of it." Planners need to be good storytellers. I know this; however, this particular facet of planning is one that I need to work on the most. I can pinpoint the elements but when it comes to giving you context, I'm more brief than beautiful.

It feels good to share this. Word.
(the initial quote was one I wrote after listening to my mom tell me about a memory she had of her dad when she was seven years old and he was a mechanic and had a Ferrari up on blocks in the garage and her uncle had this car like an Aston Martin you know like James Bond and her dad listened to the radio while he worked on the car and..........)

planning sells "the work"

While planning is increasingly the job to get, it's still the job that is least understood within the industry. Advertising has a creative foundation: what sorts of bells and whistles can we add so we can get more consumers interested? It was a problem + idea business. Planning introduced "a strategy" to the equation.

Planning is the middle child: not as strong as the Oldest - account management, not as protected as the Baby - creative. We are the in-betweens; the people that need to connect the two. And while planning might take a tad longer to input, it's worth it; because planning sells the work. And it alleviates a lot of the time creatives spend staring at a brief (if there is one) and concepting a solution to an ill-defined problem.

Concepting is one of the hardest f'n things to do. And if the creative team hasn't been given sh*t to work with, it's even harder. They've been given a problem (which used to work in the old days) and they'd come up with a solution because creativity was still innocent and un-competitive when it came to the marketplace.

But now, we all have to concept for a very competitive marketplace. We cannot forget this. Planners have the job of positioning a new product or evolving a brand to a new position within consumers minds and the marketplace. We don't fabricate the possibilities. Planners connect all of the dots. We define the dots. Then we put the dots to be visually connected into the brief. Then the creatives concept visual solutions. That's what they're good at! And what us planners are not so good at; and if we are, then we should switch departments.

Planners are here to help. We've put together (what should be) valuable information. We have fine-tuned the elements; we've pointed you in a direction; we've identified an opportunity. Planning sets up the problem to be solved, gives you a target to work with, identifies what works and what doesn't and is here to help give the creatives direction so they're not so frustrated.

Do you get it? Doesn't this sound great? Doesn't this sound useful? Why do I have to keep explaining it?

stressed out (of a job)

Got this in an Iconoculture newsletter a week ago:

According to a Watson Wyatt Worldwide study, stress is the leading cause that prompts people to quit their jobs. Yet stress is not even among the top five reasons cited by employers, who instead believe insufficient pay is why people generally leave.

Stress.org is another great resource for more statistics concerning Americans and their workload.

Are employers really this out of touch with their employees?