Brett Macfarlane

Better "Digital" to Suit the Times

There is an increasingly accepted view that the 70’s and 80’s were not the definitive model of publishing and the news business but in fact an anomaly.  The simplicity of writing some articles, filling ad pages and printing paper products downstairs in your basement with ever increasing efficiency was beautiful, and yacht buying-ly profitable.  It also wasn’t ever really going to last.  It wasn’t true to the reality of upheaval and intense competition in the news industry.

Like the music industry last decade, news reportage isn’t dying.  Far from it, for as those with a clear point of view, a body of trade craft and a business strategy that understands the real value of what they produce are continuing to find they operate a very profitable model.  Maybe less gargantuanly profitable than in the past, but really that all depends how you compare today with yesterday.

But tomorrow is very interesting, in particular when dissecting the FT’s decision to fundamentally relook at what is their core value and how they deliver it.  Digital First is the mission according to the editor Lionel Barber in a memo that isn’t your usual PR talk value over real business value of too many executives trying to feign as “getting it.”

“Digital,” as highlighted in 21 Quotes from Clay Shirky’s Post Industrial Journalism Paper, is at the centre of the production process, not simple an add on to the sales department.  “Digital” is not someone’s domain, department or a silo, it is a way of doing business.

Gone at the FT will be the multiple versions and updates of the paper late into the night on fast moving presses.  The on-going, forever updating, stream of “what is happening” will live first and foremost online through browsers and apps.  The “what matters” as a more considered view of “news in context” will be put to a single daily “paper” giving a greater sense of permanence and understanding on pre-planned versus reactive schedules.

If I am an advertiser there may be times I just want to get some exposure and reach.  Often with a real time aspect as is increasingly possible and meaningful – particularly if the media property properly tracks and shares data / usage behaviour.  Of, if I am an advertiser who wants to build margins and brand values I may want to pay a premium for placing my brand where the context of the title improves the perception of my content in a slower more considered reading context.  Many would argue the latter is what you get with the pink paper.

As has long been obvious is that media isn’t an either or debate. Offline or online.  Analogue or digital.  No it is a debate about actual usage and behaviour with an understanding of the real value of a medium in a given context for a given property valuable to certain groups of people.

When speaking of media, fragmentation has long been on the tip of people’s tongues, paradoxically as much a convergence.  Typically fragmentation is code for meaning some small guys stealing the big guy’s lunch.  For the near team the truth seems to be a race to the middle, the small guys getting bigger and the big guys getting smaller on a relative basis though still with scale and might.  Throw in some mergers and acquisitions and before we know it there will be a new model that emerges, only to be killed again…

 

EU vs. America Social Media Smackdown

Got an interesting email today from an old colleague.  We worked together in the legendary halcyon days of the term "social media."  Same agency, different departments, working together to help get our social media practice up and running (yes back in 2007 it was started organically, without acquisition.) 

The point of the email was exploring the differences between North America and EU social practices.  Very interesting query. Something over nearly 3 years living here, working with a bunch of brands and meeting lots of interesting people outside my agencies. 

Thought it worth posting the points for posterity.  I apologize in advance for the excessive of pragmatism and lack of dogma.

It seems like EU is where social was a couple years ago in the US.  
- Everyone was aware , a few had tried but were underwhelmed as expectation weren't in line and brands got a little shy.  
- But then consumer behavior ran ahead and suddenly brands had massive scale so that it became a core part of the marketing mix rather than novelty.  
- I would say there is a place for proper grown up social business and strategy - I struggle apart from AKQA to identify to many agencies at an international level here in EU killing it.  

The dynamics causing this:
- It is a huge area of responsibility that has mostly been left to the hands of media agencies - which makes sense as companies like Facebook set up sales offices long before development teams.
- Given the scale of media businesses, they went social early but brands have been slower to uptake partly as they haven't needed to as Pan EU business growth could be delivered through emerging markets like the East
- Additionally budgets are being hit hard, 20 to 30% year on year for a few years now, even growing brands
- Olympics are a great example of this - the media owner social was amazing.  Brands really didn't use the space to inspire, even those with aggressive "innovation" strategies like Coke
- It is a lot tougher over here as everything is so much more fragmented and complex with deeper cultural variance between and within nations. At the moment it is also really risk adverse given the financial crisis that is still working itself out.  Heavey oversight.  Very siloed.  People still commonly talk about ATL and BTL as though they are still different worlds.
- But some markets, like France have great isolated successes now (see the McDonald's work DDB has done for example)
- To get social through the door most agencies did a cost arguement rather than quality of engagement.

Opportunity
- It seems to me the opportunity to bring proper grown up experience is needed.
- One things euro's don't begrudge is if you don't live down the street.
- Be really sharp where in the market you fit in between brand agency, activation agency, PR, the remaining digital silos, etc, as budgets tend to be far more fragmented and protected by different hands than in the US as politics often carries more strongly over merit comparatively
- Direct to product teams rather than through marketing teams is where the budgets are shifting.  Curiously, product teams are proving more creative and innovative than many brand teams - evidenced a lot in FMCG lately. Baked in social I'd say has huge potential, though that is a feeling not fact

Strategy to Get to a Strategy

Am working on a creative brief at the moment.  Enjoying the usual grappling with all the questions and tensions needed for any brief.  Not a big deal except for the fact it will be the only brief I am a part of this year.  Still an adjustment from working on many briefs in a year, some by me some helping others get to a great one. 

Being the one, the singular brief of the year, is scary.  Induces giving much thought around how to make it the best damn possible brief to ensure the creative output is naturally as awesome as possible.  Another adjustment is not being the planner, so not officially in charge of the "strategy," but certainly not any less responsible for it.

When preparing a brief we often make a lot of decisions that dramatically affect the outcome of the brief.  Partly what goes into the brief, but how we get to what goes into the brief and why.  Decisions, outside the normal brief or agency "process" that lead to just another brief or an exceptional legendary brief.  Decisions, often seeming so routine that while focused on what goes into the brief we lose sight of why, by who, and when. 

The why, who and when are ultimately core strategic decisions, about how you get to a good strategy, or brief, or the thing that makes clear and inspiring what needs to be done which may or may not be written in a standard agency template form.

While the endless pursuit of smarter insights is an essential obsession and necessity, increasingly a successful brief is layered with solid thinking around an architecture surrounding the heart of insight.

An architecture that deeply and rigorously understands the context of the media (ways in which people will touch, see or feel whatever it is we make) and the cross interactions within that media infrastructure (aka. culture.)

However, what is desperately of concern that gets little consideration often is what we prepare around the core architecture of the brief and how people get to, contribute to and work with the brief. 

Specifically:

1. Who is going to get the brief when if first comes through the door from client?

2. Who will work on contributing to getting to a great brief and when?

3.  Who will then get briefed to solve the brief and who will help blow out the solution to the brief? When will the later happen, and why?

A lot of "who"s. 

Essentially a strategy for how you will get to a great strategy.  And a strategy for how that strategy will lead to a great outcome.

A lot of strategy, yes, I know it's not cool to use that word any more.  But really it just means a well thought out plan for how you will get to a great solution.

When a who is identified it is too easy to avoid asking why.  Because every agency has an increasing number of "Director of Something or the Other" it is an easy trait to throw these folks at everything without clarity of why.  You need them, but why and when?

Especially important as the disciplines of our little marketing world recouple, often bringing different agencies together.

It is a great problem of our time, what is the right strategy to get to a great strategy that can lead to a great solution to a business problem.

Right, time to get on with it.

In defense of social media, no, actually, in defence of any media that doesn't suck

You have probably Noticed a lot of articles of late looking at different stages of "digital" things and how people jumped on board expecting a panacea.  Currently the "participation" model is under heavy review.  The baby is mid toss out with the bath water.

An article today from Tim Malbon is particularily well argued. Arturate.  True, and something to hold up in the mirror.

But, and this is a big but, are we not missing the bigger point?  Not because they are wrong.  The smart folks writting these articles, no, they are very right.  They need to be read.

But, are we not debating ultimately, regardless of the medium, what is great versus crap?  Are we not finding that the "participation" world, like every other world, is based on being insightful, interesting and truely in touch with the consumer?  Just doing it doesn't really do it.

It is cool now to talk about Old Spice and the 48 hour thing they did.  But, it is rarely discussed why they did what many other brands could have done, but didn't.  Like when the first mile was run under 4 minutes, quickly many others could too in subsequent weeks, despite so many for so long being so close for many years with the potential but never pushing into the perceived dangerous terrain.

I am, embarred to say, on extended vacation in the alps, but just read this amazing speach by a lead researcer at Bell Labs presented in 1986.  Found it from the blog of Jelly Helm.

The speach is powerful and direct, it ultimatley looks into what makes great first class, versus good or prolific researchers.

Read it, put the word advertiser instead of researcher throughout and it will hopefully inspire you to think harder about how to make what we do better, more compelling and effective.  Regardless what medium.

We must ask ourselves if we are at peak medium range of selection - are we at the point now where deciding what medium we choose is increasingly less important than what we do with any one medium we do chose?

Is the medium is no longer the message, what you do with a medium is your greatness?

Or something like that. Back to vacation...

 

 

Post Digital Doing

For a long time, the chief skill of an advertising agency, over and above coming up with ideas, was convincing companies, aka clients, to do something.  Then helping those clients once they were convinced, to convince their bosses to approve the budgets to do that thing.

In a world where media plans in hindsight look pretty formulaic and simple - a TV spot, some radio for reach and print or more recently add a microsite and an experiential event maybe some PR - it was still damn hard to get something truly great done.

Now, when that first layer of the pre-determined media plan is long gone, is the chief skill an agency (regardless of discipline) figuring out how to make itself do something?  And not just do any something, but do something great.

When anything can be media, when any medium can be used creatively to solve a problem, where every discipline needs to hold itself to a higher, more honest, engaging and motivating standard doesn't figuring out how to solve a problem start with figuring out how you're going to go about solving a problem?

Maybe solving the problem doesn't even involve you.  In a world of infinite possibilities and finite resources maybe you should crowd source something for $1000 while you dedicate $100,000 to something that drives a much bigger return.

Then once you've figured out what to do, aka come up with the idea, you can get on with the business of convincing a client to do it.

Then once you've convinced them to do it, comes the equally difficult task of executing it.  Making sure you've got a great director/photographer or emotive storyteller along with the lighting masters and craftsmen that can make it rain anywhere on the clearest night in the middle of the ocean up a massive fjord (see above.) 

A great idea poorly executed is no longer a great idea.  Pity, if you've spent all that time doing the other stuff.

Fresh ideas take fresh approaches. Standard approaches lead to standard ideas.  This applies to every discipline, not just "agencies" .  You too designer.  You too digital shop.  You too social media expert.  You too media agency.

Might just be my personal bent, but it's going to be fascinating, as clients consolidate agency rosters, who does and doesn't master the next wave of integrative thinking.  Or maybe the integrative doing is better.  An no, this doesn't mean a heavy brand bible dictating the carpet matches the curtains, if you know what I mean...

Rise of Integration

I work in an odd space.  Not physically, that space is rather uplifting and well designed with a great magnetic wall workspace (that's it up there,) except for the overly ambitious air conditioning system.  I mean the space I do my work.  I have the misfortune of not working exclusively in a hot trendy new space, like being a pure digital person, or social media or even this summers hot ticket an augmented reality strategist. I also don't have the comforting simplicity of being an pure play dinosaur who just makes TV, print or radio ads.  Nope, I sit right in the middle of it all.  Some days I sit on TV sets, others in multi-platform content strategy sessions and others in development studios building mobile applications.  Consequently, nobody really knows what to make of me.  I hang out in all these areas but don't belong exclusively to any one of them.

I don't have the luxury of being able to live within a single silo or medium and become a deep expert.  I respect and love the depth of knowledge and expertise these folks bring.  I also have the inglorious duty of looking at client budgets and their business challenge to pragmatically and objectively create a strategy using any medium that will best serve their needs.  Though I don't plan or buy media, I do have to figure out the role of what mediums we do use, which becomes increasingly important as planning  media is not just running some numbers, but figuring out based on a target audience which increasingly is anything but simple demographics, the business problem, budget, and creative idea what mediums are best.  At that increasingly is mediums or media we create, not just buy.

And so I'm consumed and fascinated by how different mediums work together.  Not which single one is best, which is where a lot of media punditry sits.  I really don't care that much (as long as they stay in operation) that the owners of multiple media properties are having a hard time making as much profit as they used to.  It's not because the mediums don't work, be it newspaper, radio, display advertising or TV, as they are being consumed at all time high numbers, it's because their ownership model and using these media assets to fund through excessive leveraging other business endeavors got them in trouble.

 It is amazing the depth of poorly researched punditry on what mediums are dying and decades old, new to them, solutions proposed to fix them. To paraphrase a comment from a recent Noah Brier post on Business Week prospectively selling for a dollar, business reality frequently collides and destroys media punditry.   I try not to waste my time focusing on the punditry and spend it in more fruitfully by figuring out what mediums will solve a problem and how will they work together with in the mix of a brand's marketing activities.

When understanding how mediums work together a fundamental part of this work is defining the specific role of a given medium.  Absolutely the context of a particular medium shapes what you can do and how you create the content, and increasingly monitor and facilitate the content.  Therefore what really interests me these days is media properties that are doing new and interesting things. Not speculating what is going to replace another to do the same thing at a lower cost.  I love the new forms of media properties that are being created and what we can do with them that's unique and original.  I am consumed with figuring out how can we use them creatively to tells stories and build brand value, not just run a contest or deliver some coupons which seems to be the knee jerk tactic for so many new properties. 

While this may seem may seem a narcissistic post, the past few years I've noticed this need, across multiple areas of the business work, be it marketing, medicine or innovation where companies are starved in finding people that can bring together the thinking and work of differing silos.  Both in terms of someone who can work across the silos but also the people within the silos who are open and able to work and collaborate with people from other silos.  The specialist are necessary, but the elitist specialist attitude is detrimental.

The rising importance of integrative thinking isn't new but seems to be growing louder.  One must wonder if it will be the essential skill of future marketing superstars.  While redundancies are always unfortunate, there is an interesting note in the BBH announcement of letting go 10% of their London office - it enables the ability to bring on board more broadly skilled creative talents.  The most interesting educational program right now is the Boulder Digital Works as part of Colorado University with heavy involvement by Crispin Porter + Bogusky. Most interesting is its mission, not digital in place of all, but a way of thinking integrating it all.  Love that.

I wonder, and hope, that we are entering the post "death of" era.  Where the only death we are going to see is the death of "death of" rhetoric.  In fact I hope so much that I seemed to be up to do a talk on this at SXSW titled the Certain Death of Advertising Absolutism.

Could be a fiery debate...

Open Source Planning

The open/crowd source movement, much discussed and written about, really fascinates me.  A lot of debate I come across is around its use to lower costs, undermine monopolies and water down incentives for participation by talented creative/innovative folks.  A bit of a dismal view.  This is especially true in marketing where open design contests have brought the cost of something like logo design to hundreds of dollars rather than thousands. Sometimes less.

What interests me though is how open source allows us to do things we could not previously do or even think up.  Wikipedia and Linux are quick obvious examples.  In advertising we’ve experienced this movement in user-generated content.  While I’ve been part of campaigns incorporating user content with success, this tactic seemingly is waning as its novelty expires as lazy brands use it to do their marketing for them.   Others like AdHack are aiming to bring fresh minds into advertising through crowd sourcing with interesting early results.  But, what really interests me is how open source thinking/tools can aid in strategy.  This is great uncharted territory. 

Ultimately, strategy when it comes to advertising, or planning if you prefer, generally either seeks to identify all possible paths a brand can take with a POV on the best one, or within an identified path uncover deeper insight fueling the end creative product. Often both at the same time.

Whether looking at identifying possible paths or creative driving insights, the one truth is that your outcome is ultimately defined by your input, either through quality of input or volume.  Focus groups remain the primary blunt instrument, though not my preferred, along with a planner digesting every bit of published and observed bit of information they can get their hands on.  Hopefully, more often than not, direct from the horses mouth.  These approaches are still of value, but how can open source open us up to new sources of information, within a more dynamic context void of the negative focus group dynamics, to find greater volume and/or quality of input than previously possible.

Recently, I used Summize to pose a question to that community ultimately helping inform the strategy leading to what can justifiable be defined as a big idea delivering great creative and results, at least the folks at Creativity and Campaign thought so along with our client.  In another instance and I don’t know if it led to the final work, but a while back Renny Gleeson at Wieden asked his Twitter community opinions of what American Style means within the context of Levis.  Noah's Brand Tags and Branded Life that Richard Band of Egg Strategies brought to my attention are a couple other examples of open source planning input tools.  And there are lots other tools, though we're always looking for more.

The dark art of Planning traditionally keeps its thinking and thoughts precious, but like many other industries, how can we open up the planning process, the inputs, to find new possible strategies and insights of a new nature?  In the ideas business if the very nature of the strategy isn't innovative unto itself you've got a longer path to an innovative idea.  To find new insight or strategy don't we need new approaches?

It's fun to think what the next generation of tools/approaches/methodology will be.  For instance, ethnography is all about being in situ, so when researching digital habits it should probably be done in situ, through their computer while they are by themselves in their room.  Not just with a researcher, ie. adult, sitting on the edge of their bed for a chat.  Or even how we design and build products that collect better and smarter information about how they are being used, not just pools of blunt data.

It's early days,  and new solutions/ideas take require new approaches.  Best get on with that then...

Tolerate mornings

First thing on a dreary rainy Vancouver morning this little gem re-entered my brain.  On one hand it's easy to despise but peel away the reaction and sit through and it proves to be fantastic, simple and over the top in execution for an otherwise mundane, expected and routine brand of coffee.  It's also a great example of strategic thinking to start the day; a fresh cup of coffee make mornings a bit less intolerable.

analysis paralysis

As noted I’ve spent the week in the resort town of Whistler. Like any resort that’s boomed into success and has matured everyone here is consumed by figuring out how to ensure future and ongoing success. Lest they become the latest Torremolinos. 

   

Like any prudent town or organization the folks of Whistler have been doing their homework and analyzing their options to ensure the long term economic viability of a resort town that relies on large annual streams of visitors. Naturally, doing homework is a smart.  And consequently there is lots of talk about developing “strategies” to address the long term business needs. But, apparently, according to this article from the editor titled From Strategies to Accomplishments, in the well written and intelligent local newspaper – The Pique, the town of Whistler is mired in analysis paralysis.

    

This is an interesting corollary to what happens too frequently in the agency world where the paralysis of a good strategy is over strategizion. Essentially, too many fancy words and making things more complex than the need to be or really are.  At the end of the day, most business are pretty simply. For example, when it comes to tourism you just need to find a fair price point people are willing to accept to stay in your resort (basic supply and demand), and then give them an enjoyable experience once they are there (customer service 101.)  Quite simple really. 

   

Naturally, you’re thinking that just a gross simplification – someone once said the hard part of business isn’t creating a product you can sell for more than you paid, but the million of details in between.   This is especially true in a ski resort town where the logistics of what happens every 24hours is mind blowing.  But, logistics are executional details.  And the clearer or simpler the "strategies" the more easily the executional details take care of themselves.

    

I'm sure that was in mind when someone else once said (Patton I think) that a strategy executed today is better than the perfect strategy executed tomorrow.  (think I’ll look for the actual quote tomorrow as I’ve undoubtedly butchered it horrendously.)

Ask yourself:

The next time you put together a brief, ask yourself:

Did I write this brief for the client so he/she would approve it, or did I write this brief for the creative teams to he/she understands the challenge and is inspired to solve it?

You know what the answer should be.  But what is your's...

People Against Dirty

People against dirty is a fabulous blog, but more importantly a fabulous platform for a brand of cleaning products.  Like Innocent has done for juice in the UK, Method is bringing humanity to cleaning by making its brand a living/breathing entity that fights for something bigger than just to take $3 out of your wallet for a hand soap pump.   

Innocent also has a blog .  In my opinion these are two of the best consumer product blogs going.

Simplicity

Designers long heralded the merit of simplicity.  When it comes to strategies and briefs, brilliance is often found in simplicity.  You can imagine the brief for WK & Nike's latest Air campaign - "Run further."

If you're a runner, you get it.

Say it like you mean it

On a typically listless cross Canada flight today, came across a sloppy attempt by Canada's flagship carrier to make a personal connection.

While I appreciate the sentiment, it's incongruity with the actual service and cankerous nature of staff are paradoxically reinforced.  Kind of like a telco playing back a message stating that "your business is important to them" repeatedly over your thirty five minute hold.  Obviously you ain't that important.

Admittedly, airlines are always an easy topic.  The legacy of the ex-military  executives that built airlines on the military model of cargo supply lines where people are considered part of the cargo still exists today.  True customer service in the skies continues to be rare.

That said, although a close cousin to Air Canada, I always liked the United ads because they did a good job of conveying that they at least understand why we fly.  It's the destination, not the journey.

Though nice ads don't make for nice experiences.

United Airlines: Dragon

This is the commercial that United Airlines aired during the 2006 Super Bowl.

Know the footsteps you follow...

"A planner asked me recently who Bill Bernbach was. "

"I said that “he invented advertising and the fact that you don’t know who he is should be a fireable offence”. "

http://www.adliterate.com/archives/2006/08/post_1.html

Quote from a great post on the necessity of persuasion within creativity.  The philosophies of Bill and the other members of the Creative Revolution, are again becoming necessities as price competition becomes an ever more indefensible short term competitive advantage and  humanity based creativity is the driver of pricing power.