For far too long this industry has treated creatives like the goose that lays the golden egg – a mysterious creature that must be locked away, waited on hand and foot, and generally treated like a jewel that must pandered to and protected. But times are changing. Times are changing both for the industry as…… Continue reading Treating creatives like adults
Marketing services should have acquired advertising
I’m slowly coming to the firm conclusion that marketing services (and all that it comprises) should have acquired advertising – and not the other way around which is what seems to have happened in the industry. Marketing Services (despite their appalling name) agencies had one of the most interesting remits of the late 90s and…… Continue reading Marketing services should have acquired advertising
Has home entertaining died?
As my wife and I settle into our new life here in Dubai more and more, we are on the one hand very pleasantly surprised by this hybridisation of European, North American and Arabic cultures, but on the other hand there are things from certain origins (particularly the US) that we are starting to feel…… Continue reading Has home entertaining died?
Digital is not a channel, it is part of your product
How about we start from scratch? How about we look at the different pieces of the organisation and figure out how to apply digital, mobile, social, broadband and interactive to the existing structure? How would things look different if we started from a zero sum base? To start with, I think social wouldn’t want to…… Continue reading Digital is not a channel, it is part of your product
Keys, phone, wallet – what’s in your pocket?
What are the key things that you check are in your pocket when you leave the house? In days gone by, before the era of mobile phones, before credit cards and while some people still had housekeepers, the only important thing to have on you when you left the house was money. This was what…… Continue reading Keys, phone, wallet – what’s in your pocket?
Becoming a SIF is a communications opportunity
As my personal situation takes me on the route to becoming a SIF, not a Structural Integrity Field (for the Star Trek fans) but a single income family, it strikes me how much of a communications opportunity this is, and how little work is really done, either on turning these sort of challenges into comms…… Continue reading Becoming a SIF is a communications opportunity
Data is the new marketing drug
The title of this post is confusing, because data isn’t really new, but maybe we haven’t thought of it as a drug before. Data has been around in marketing as long as P&G and J&J have been developing new products and running focus groups, whether the data is quantitative or qualitative it has always existed,…… Continue reading Data is the new marketing drug
Consumers need a map and a guide
This evening I went for a run… in the dark. I had been out walking several times around the lake close to our house and I figured that if I simply stayed at the edge of the lake I would find my way home – this is a good rule of thumb (except when you…… Continue reading Consumers need a map and a guide
Onboarding for change
We are always talking about change, whether it is change for our clients as we sell them new creative or try to get them to evolve their products, or change for ourselves as agencies as we see our market, region, and industry evolving before our eyes – but with all this talk, I wonder whether…… Continue reading Onboarding for change
User experience in the pitch process
My previous CEO at RMG Connect (now JWT) Claude Chaffiotte (@ClaChaf) once compared the pitch process to a visit to the doctor, saying that “rarely do you go to the doctor and he tells you the ailments of his last six patients and what he did for them” – but this is what most agencies…… Continue reading User experience in the pitch process