What do you mean; “wear a plain, white suit or dress”?

The last episode of American Idol featured a scene where contestants from the previous 14 seasons took the stage together to pay tribute the show in song.

I can just imagine the show’s creative director asking all contestants to “wear a plain white suit or dress”.

What they got is a wonderful visual example of how different people interpret and respond to the same information in different ways.

For those who like to keep all the puppies in the box, this scene must have been a bit of a disaster because no two people on that stage were dressed alike.

For those who celebrate diversity this must have been inspirational.

I love it because it helps me illustrate why it’s so important to know more than your product and your audience. You need to really get into the wide variety of ways your product can be used and hacked and adapted for purposes you never dreamed of.

P.S. If a uniform understanding of a physical or mental state is important to success in your organization, do what really smart organizations do – invent your own new terminology and carefully define the new word’s associated meaning.

https://youtu.be/8L_iKgkFqsY

President Barack Obama congratulates American Idol on 15 successful seasons and uses the opportunity to stress the importance of voting. I’ve posted this link for a few reasons:

1.  The President’s message is such an important one that it should resound with anyone who lives in a democracy and wants to defend it.

2.  This is the first serious program endorsement I’ve seen from a sitting President of the United States of America.

From a creative, public relations or media (buy) standpoint this moment really is priceless. One that no amount of money (or your Mastercard™) can buy.  

https://youtu.be/fAU0Bhb0EcE

We all know how proud and self-righteous Uber has been about being a disruptive technology.

Here’s a bit of B.S. from their website:

“Drive when you want. Earn what you need.”

“The more you drive, the more you’ll earn.”

“Don’t wait to start making great money with your car.”

Here’s a little reality check. Drivers say they earn much less than $10/hr after deducting HST, personal income tax, car expenses, phone expenses and the 20% Uber takes off the top. Drivers make even less on the days that Uber offers riders special discounts (at the driver’s expense). Reports also suggest that Uber will take heavy-handed measures against drivers who "push back": suspending drivers who attempt to organize or speak out against the company.

Now Uber is up in arms because of the threat of collective bargaining in Seattle and the reality that Seattle’s law will inspire copycat legislation in other states and countries.

Too bad. So sad.

What goes around comes around.

I don’t think anyone who isn’t part of the top-end of this kind of pyramid scheme is going to miss any organization like Uber that exploits employees by classifying them as contractors in order to deny them benefits + steal their wages.

Smells like common sense and common decency are finally being recalled to life in America.

While I now spend most of my agency related time as a creative director. I come up with ideas that the agency’s Art Directors refine, their Account Director’s sell in and their Media Managers place on the client’s behalf.

Over the 30 or so years I spent working with ad agencies like McCann, BBDO, Ogilvy, MacLaren and their derivatives, I was only exposed to two approaches to selling in a commercial idea.

1. You come up with three (equally) great ideas for the client to choose from.
2. You come up with two great ideas that the agency would kill to produce (because they’d look good on their reel) and throw in a 3rd rate alternative that won’t be selected but allows the agency to walk into the meeting with “three great ideas”.

Over those 30 years I watched the sales process from more vantage points than most because I’d worked as a media buyer, planner, and media director, account manager and director, agency coach – and creative director.

I rarely saw a batting average better than 70%.

• 30% of the time the client didn’t buy, or insisted on major changes before buying.
• 70% of the time the agency sold some of the work but needed to some fine-tuning.

I found this three-option approach strange coming from a Media Direction background.

• The Creative Department had a budget of $750,000, present three options, and got into VERY messy debates with the clients – who all thought they were qualified creative critiques.

• I had budgets of nine million dollars and presented NO options. I presented a summary of the problem, the media objectives, one comprehensive recommendation, explaining in detail how it met all defined objectives, and a detailed budget allocation. No one ever questioned my recommendations because I know more about media than they ever will.  

When I became an Account Director I approached account management the same way. “Sell in context”. I asked the creative department to only present their best two options.

Before they presented, I spent a significant amount of time reviewing the business terrain, sought consensus around the impact that a good advertising campaign could have if it was coupled with a good operational plan, and explained what kind of message they would need to help suspects, prospects and customers listen to their brand’s story.

Selling the creative in context worked well on many fronts:

• Happier clients b/c the meetings became shorter and more productive.
• Happier agency teams b/c there were far fewer client-required revisions.
• Fewer hours per agency design project b/c we did less work twice.
• Fewer hours per agency production project b/c we did the job once.
• My batting rate approached 90% almost overnight.

When I’m working on large projects ($100,000+) this is still my preferred approach.

Read the following post if you want to sell small projects more successfully with-in budget.

But it doesn’t work well for small accounts (under $10,000) when the client is just buying “campaign parts": a website or an identity face-lift.

In these situations there is no big strategic communications plan to fit these marcom bits into – so I talk about my process and I show them my work.

I show them five, sometimes ten options “in process” and get feedback (before I waste my time finishing any one piece). This process works wonders because it allows me to blend the client’s POV into the final design.

The products I end up with are rarely “award winning”, but they sell the 1st time round and the clients love the work because the work embodies their ideas.

I don’t worry about the ad not being an “award-winner” for a few reasons:

• There is no correlation between award winning and sales award winning ads.
• Neither good nor “bad” ads will increase sales if they are not an integral part of a smart operations plan – which is based on an insightful marketing plan.
• This is not about me or my ability to win awards. This is about me helping my clients achieve their (realistic) objectives.