Ramblings on media, advertising, clothes and music.
March 31, 2010 Leave a comment
Brilliant, delightfully subversive, work from Tourism New Zealand.
Yesterday Tourism Australia launched its new campaign line – ‘There’s nothing like Australia’.
Tourism New Zealand grabbed the Twitter profile @NothinglikeAus,
I wish I’d thought of that.
March 25, 2010 1 Comment
I closed my Twitter account about a month ago.
I did it for a couple of reasons, one of which I suspect must be very common.
The first was that what I was tweeting had drifted into an unfortunate territory. I found there was a risk for me in the way in that Twitter works, a dangerous confluence of immediacy, brevity and superficial community. I’d become one of those tiresome characters who feels the need to chip into conversations at a dinner party with what he thinks are witticisms, but are actually inanities. It was just too easy to say something off the cuff, which would be OK but for the fact that it’s being shared with the world, and so rather than the mild contempt of a few fellow diners you find you have a large group of people thinking you’re a twat. And because it’s often ostensibly a ‘direct’ conversation (even when you’re not DMing) you get lulled into thinking that it’s a private conversation, when it obviously is entirely public.
And worse than the inanities, I’d become snide. Twitter was all a bit insular, lots of advertising people talking to advertising people (with the grandstanding and one-upping that goes along with it) making comments that wouldn’t be at all outlandish when shared between a few friends with the context considered, but that were quite childish when shared with the world-at-large with the context removed.
Part of the problem is that Twitter has no nuance. When I make a throwaway comment to friend, experience informs meaning – there’s a tone of voice, a nod and a wink, an understanding of what I really mean, or, more importantly, the tone with which I mean it. But there’s none of that when a tweet or a post is read. It’s cold and literal.
None of this would be such a problem if not for the way in which Social Media has changed our attitude towards opinion. To state the obvious, one of the benefits of Social Media is its ability to let people share opinion. But one of the increasingly apparent downsides is the concomitant capacity for those opinions to be judged. We have a mechanism that encourages people to share opinions, quickly and widely – at a basic level encouraging people to say what they’re thinking without really thinking about what they’re saying. But then that same system fuels the judgement of what they say, treating them no longer as throwaway comments but as considered opinion.
You see it in how social media channels fuel controversy. There’s a momentum that drives people to share their view. The community finds an issue and lights a fire under it. But once the views start coming out there’s a parallel momentum to judge the validity of those views. At the risk of sounding ridiculously dramatic, it’s a subtle form of entrapment – Social Media facilitates the crime then casts the judgement.
I also started to get this sense of a different world. I found myself believing that a different set of rules applied, that the world of social media was creating something new, a place in which things were done quite differently. And this was beautifully self-reinforcing. I’d find myself mocking the people who ‘don’t get social media’ convincing myself that because there were people I could judge not to get it, that that must mean that there were different rules.
I thought I was fine because I had a basic principle I operated by. I’d puff out my chest and proudly say that I’d never post or tweet anything that I wouldn’t be prepared to say to someone’s face. Which was true, but missed the rather obvious point that I wasn’t saying it to their face. I was really saying it behind their back, but in a very public way. And the problem came when someone else said it to their face for me.
I don’t know who originally said it, but I’ve always loved the description of hotel rooms existing on an entirely different moral plane – the idea that things get done in hotel rooms that just wouldn’t be contemplated anywhere else, by people who know better. I guess I worry that Twitter’s a bit the same. It just has a dynamic to it that seems to draw a different line around acceptable commentary. (Tim Burrowes at Mumbrella does a lovely job of describing this phenomenon here. As one of the comments says, ‘I will endeavour to read this post at least once every three months’.)
The second reason I closed my Twitter account was that it just got so time consuming (I’m guessing this is quite common?). I realise that this is a failing of mine, not Twitter’s, but I was just never that good at being able to duck in and duck out. Once I started to make a few interesting connections via Twitter (and I did make some really interesting connections) I started to worry about the connections I was missing out on. So it all got a bit frantic, and I spent too much time on Twitter when I should have been spending time on the guitar, too much time on the keyboard when I should have been on the fret board (sorry).
So I’ve had a month off. I’ve recalibrated. I’m giving Twitter another go. And I’m trying very hard not to be concerned about what I missed out on during that month.
March 25, 2010 Leave a comment
I judged an awards’ show the other day. It reinforced my pathological hatred of the exclamation mark. Why do people believe that a transparently unimpressive claim is lent weight by the simple addition of an exclamation mark?
The exclamation mark is to the award submission what the moan of pleasure is to the pornographic film. It’s distracting, it’s never in the right place and it doesn’t make the performance any more convincing.
Please stop.
March 18, 2010 Leave a comment
I saw the Old Crow Medicine Show at the Powerstation last night. As advertised, they raised a ruckus. They’ve got to be close to the best live band I’ve seen.
They’re touring. If you get a chance, do.
March 17, 2010 Leave a comment
I had an interesting taxi ride last night. Interesting in the ‘I learned something from a very pleasant driver’ way, rather than interesting in the “I stared death in the face’ way.
I wandered up to a Shortland St rank to be met by a beaming driver. He told me he hadn’t had this good a week in five years.
He’d recently taken delivery of his new car – a Camry Hybrid. He’d only had it a week. He told me two things had changed since he got the new car.
He was finding that people were treating him with more respect. On embarkation they complimented his car instead of just barking a destination. And once people commented on his car, he would take the opportunity tell them why he chose this particular model and why in his mind it was a good investment for his business. He said he felt that this was the reason why his passengers were treating him with more respect – not because his car was new, but because his car was an investment. He was very proud that to his passengers, even if briefly, he stopped being a taxi driver and became a businessperson.
He was also finding that people were taking his advice. He said it was his policy to suggest a couple of ways they could get to their destination and to ask passengers if they had a preferred route. He said that most would be very specific, and gruff, about how they wanted to get there. But since he got his new car more people told him to go whichever way he thought best. He said he believed that this was because ‘I look like a professional and people take the advice of people who look professional’.
Which were two of the most insightful observations I’ve heard all week, and prompted me to re-post this piece about what media people can learn from taxi drivers.
What media people can learn from taxi drivers
I flew back from Sydney last night. I spent a little bit of time enjoying the hospitality of the Qantas Club before my flight. And by hospitality I mean Campari.
I also enjoyed the in-flight service (and by service I mean Gordon’s) before having a nice little sleep. Which meant that by the time I got into a cab in Auckland I was a little…vague. Which may be reflected in this observation.
Because on the journey home I came to the conclusion that there’s a remarkable similarity between the media business and the taxi business. Here goes:
Everyone thinks they can do your job because it’s actually not very hard.
People pretty much begrudge what taxi drivers do. Most people know how to drive, so at a basic level believe they could do the job.
It’s the same for media people. Most people read, watch, browse and listen, so at a basic level believe they could do your job.
The answer is never right.
If a cab driver takes you to your destination via the most obvious route, they haven’t added any value. But if they take you via an unexpected route, they’re taking a risky option that you suspect will probably cost you more and take longer than the conventional route. You sit in the back of the cab suspicious that the other option would probably have been better.
It’s the same for media people. If a media person recommends the most obvious solution, they haven’t added any value, or, more damningly, thought innovatively. But if a media person chooses an unexpected media vehicle, they’re taking a chance on a risky option that you suspect will cost more and be less effective than the conventional choice. Either way, there’s always the sense that you might have done something else and that the other option might have been better.
Technology and costs are your problem.
People believe they should really only be paying for the driver’s time. I bet you do it. You take a 20-minute trip to the airport. It costs you $65. You think ‘that’s outrageous, that’s nearly $200 an hour he’s making’. Only he’s not. He’s running a car, paying for petrol, a GPS, a mobile eftpos machine and probably plenty more besides. But people don’t see why they should pay for that, because he needs them to do his job, so they’re his responsibility.
It’s the same for media people. Agencies pay significant amounts for research, training, premises etc, but clients don’t see why this is their issue (partly, in my view, because we keep telling them that people are our only asset). They pay for those people to work on their behalf. What we are required to provide those people so that they can do their job is our problem.
You should be able to anticipate problems before they happen.
If you’re a taxi driver you’re supposed to be able to anticipate when there are likely to be traffic problems. Two car collision outside a school on Remuera Rd at 3.06pm? You should have seen that coming. You are also supposed to know an alternative route that no one else is aware of that will allow these problems to be avoided. If you can’t anticipate these problems you have a passenger in the back unhappy because you’re obviously not very good at your job.
It’s the same with anticipating media problems. Banner for an oil company served on the same page as an article about irreversible environmental damage caused by excessive mineral exploration? You should have seen that coming. Two ads with very similar blue backgrounds on opposing pages of the Saturday paper? You should have seen that one, too. Because if you can’t anticipate these problems you are obviously not very good at your job.
What it says on the meter isn’t what it costs.
When you finish a taxi journey, what it says on the meter isn’t what it costs. There are things called ‘Extras’. That’s a word that immediately gets you offside. Extra? To what? And why? Then there are the surcharges and the service fees and it all just seems complicated and somehow underhand. It doesn’t matter whether the total cost is reasonable, it’s messy and carries the unmistakable whiff of rip-off.
It’s the same for media agencies. Commissions are awful. So are levies and monitoring charges. The simple outcome is that clients aren’t sure what they’re paying for. And clients don’t like that.
So then I got to thinking that if we are similar to taxi drivers, what might we be able to learn from them?
Be the best Taxi Driver you can.
There are some people who just want to be good at what they do. They take pride in the job and all that goes with it. While they very probably would like to be doing something else, you’d never know. While lots of media people broadly like what they do, they often wish they were doing something a bit cooler – a more senior job, a more interesting client or task – and you can tell.
It’s seldom the driving. It’s knowing when to shut up.
Most taxi drivers are adequate drivers (though we’ve all had the horror experience). It’s what goes around the driving that matters. Some passengers like to talk. Some like to listen. Some like silence. Clients are like that, too.
A clean taxi is good. A taxi with an in-seat DVD is bad.
A clean taxi suggests pride in one’s work and respect for one’s passengers. A clean boardroom and the offer of a glass of water do the same. A taxi with an in-seat DVD suggests an indulgent driver and fares that are probably too high. A retractable 52” flat screen and a tray of almond croissants do the same.
Confidence goes a long way.
I don’t like being asked which way I think we should go. But I don’t mind being told which way the driver thinks is best, and asked whether I agree. My sense is that most clients feel the same way.
March 14, 2010 Leave a comment
Found this on BoingBoing over the weekend.
In very brief it’s the work of a guy who wrote letters in the guise of a ten-year old boy to famous people or surprising institutions. He received some memorable replies. A book has been produced that collects the best of these.
The letters below, between Billy and America’s National Hobo Association, are fantastic. (Click either image for more, or here for the official book site.)
March 10, 2010 3 Comments
I’ve written about this before, but I’m consistently surprised by how often we use language in ways that undermine our efforts as an industry. It surprises me because communication should be the one thing we nail – clear, precise language that explains exactly what we mean – but actually we’re often pretty bad at it.
On one level I think this is a problem for Marketing in general. We’re an industry that’s quite comically inclined to invent language, largely in an attempt to lend weight, substance and (we hope) credibility to what we do. So we’ve invented a language that’s high on complexity and low on meaning (I highlight ‘granular’ and ‘conversation-catalysts’ as recent favourites). In an attempt to make our discipline sound more like, well, a discipline, we’ve succumbed to the easy temptation to develop an insular language, one designed to exclude. It’s a carefully constructed façade of inside knowledge, based on the flawed logic that if we appear to know something that others don’t then that knowledge must somehow be important and valuable.
On a second level, I think there’s also an issue with the looseness of the language we use to describe what we do. And this is closer to the point I want to make here.
I betray my age when I talk about formative years spent poring over anything I could find on the subject of advertising written by David Abbott, Tim Delaney and Indra Sinha (when he was a humble advertising copywriter). They all wrote about the importance of precision in language, the need for what we write to communicate its meaning clearly and its point powerfully.
But it’s a looseness with language that I think catches us out so often. The precision we (should) apply when communicating on behalf of our clients’ brands is often lacking when we communicate on behalf of our own.
I think a good example is the ‘ideas agency’.
As a concept it seems to be having something of a renaissance. I don’t mind admitting that I’ve used the phrase myself, as I, like many others, have tried to describe my company in a way that makes it feels bigger, more vital, than just an advertising agency. I also absolutely agree with the endeavour, the goal of being a business that helps clients succeed, whatever form that help might take. I’ve also worked with a number of agencies that deserve the label – brilliant, diverse groups of people delivering a breadth of ideas with the potential to deliver huge client gains. So my issue’s not with the concept, more with how we describe it.
Because I read an interview the other day in which someone was describing the change he is trying to bring about in his business, to reinvent it as an ‘ideas agency’. What he said didn’t quite make sense, not because the agency he described isn’t capable of delivering ideas both valuable and beyond advertising, but more because of how they’d arrived at ‘ideas agency’ as the description of what they want to be known as.
“We can’t be an advertising agency” he said, “because CEOs aren’t looking for ads. We need to be an ‘ideas agency’ because what CEOs are looking for is big ideas”.
Which is what didn’t make sense to me, because in my experience they’re not. I don’t think CEOs want big ideas at all. What they’re looking for is big results. And while I acknowledge that might seem like a rather trivial, cavilling distinction, I think it’s important for a couple of reasons.
We know that the point of ideas is to deliver results. Some CEOs agree (while some, rather cynically, believe that the point of ideas is to be interesting, results being at best a secondary motivation). But irrespective of the CEO’s view it feels like an example of an industry failing to take its own advice. Aren’t we confusing feature with benefit, something we regularly criticise our clients for doing?
We’ve all had the conversation. We’ve all told a client at some point that the world at large doesn’t care what they produce, only what benefit they deliver. We’ve all counseled clients to move past the infatuation with what they do, to focus instead on what their customers need, the problem that they can solve.
And I would argue that clients need results. That we know that ideas are fundamental to delivering results is our issue. But what matters is that ideas are our feature. Ideas are not our benefit.
To most CEOs, the world of Marketing is beset by a frustrating vagueness. It’s not concrete and measurable. It’s notoriously difficult to predict what will work and why. It’s not spreadsheetable, or inclined to accurate modeling. In short, Marketing’s a bit nebulous. Which is also what ideas are. They’re leaps, bridges intended to take you somewhere new. (Which is the very thing that makes them exciting to us, and dangerous and unsettling to CEOs.) But my worry is that our focus on ideas reinforces for CEOs this sense of vagueness. To them it’s a wooly word describing a nebulous concept. In contrast, results sounds like a precise word describing a concrete concept.
My second issue with the concept of the ‘ideas agency’ is that it highlights a fundamental distinction in what we value.
In the world of agencies, ideas are the currency, the thing most prized, because we believe that it’s ideas that change fortunes. So we like the thought of being an ‘ideas agency’.
We do acknowledge that ideas alone are kind of worthless, and that until an idea is executed, made real, it doesn’t have actual value. But ultimately we do believe that it’s the idea that matters, and we do love them for themselves. In the final analysis, our fondness for the idea sometimes dwarfs our enthusiasm for the result.
But I’d wager most CEOs don’t see the world this way. They see ideas as the loose start point for results. The idea matters and is necessary, but it’s the execution, the implementation, that matters at least as much. And the focus is always on the outcome. The result is the goal, and, in the final analysis, it’s the value delivered by the result that dwarfs the respect for the idea.
And this is where I worry that the language we use undermines us. Because when we talk about an ‘ideas agency’ we do so based on our world. And in our world idea trumps result. But when many CEOs hear us talk about an ‘ideas agency’ they interpret it based on their world. And in their world, result trumps idea.
We call ourselves an ‘ideas agency’ because we think it makes us sound bigger. But I worry that to clients it might actually make us sound smaller.
March 4, 2010 2 Comments
Not much posting in the last week or so. Been a bit busy with work and trying to sell my car.
And I’ve been thinking about how resoundingly negative I seem to have become on this blog. But there’s a lot to be positive about. It’s Friday. I’m off to my niece’s wedding tomorrow. And a number of good things have happened this week.
For a start, I found these two albums, both of which are brilliant.
David Rawlings is the recording partner of Gillian Welch. He takes centre stage here, though she’s still very much involved. I particularly like the idea of an old-school country band called the Dave Rawlings Machine. This album also features my favourite song about a monkey driving a train.
Then there’s this album from the Avett Brothers. They were responsible for ‘The Weight of Lies’, one of my favourite songs of all time. This is their first album since joining a major label, Rick Rubin’s wonderful American Recordings. Pleasingly it sounds pretty much like everything they’ve done before. About the only difference seems to be that when you record for a major label you can afford a cello.
I also bought these shoes, which may well be the loveliest pair I’ve ever owned. I’m particularly excited that they cost me about 25% of their original retail price. They’re from Canali.
And lastly, via a perfect piece of mis-typing I discovered a new word yesterday.
Cinenema
A movie that gives you the shits. Or, as it’s more commonly known, Avatar.
March 4, 2010 Leave a comment
Three weeks after I first saw it I still smile at this. A lovely way of celebrating an achievement while casually rubbing salt in the wound of a less successful competitor.
Comparative advertising is so hard to do well. It’s just so easy to tip over the line into snark. But this does it with an admirable subtlety, delivering a nod and a wink to those car enthusiasts to whom the reference means something while making perfect sense to those to whom it doesn’t.
Very nice indeed.
