speaking in clicks

[August 6, 2010]

By itself, the fact that the term “integrated marketing” is over 20 years old probably isn’t very important. But considering the amount and the volume of the support the idea has received over the years, I’m surprised to see it remains more of an ideal than a reality. Take, for example, two instances of dys-integration from the same marketing neighborhood.

E-trade: Baby talk or tough talk?
Coming from e-trade’s clever “Baby Talk” ad campaign, visitors to its flat, text-based Web site are in for a major letdown. While the TV spots lead one to expect a bright, engaging—even innovative—approach to investing, a visit to e-trade.com feels like business as usual.

In the first place, the “We’re No. 1” sloganeering in the marquee is extremely boorish. More importantly, the UI is so retro, I’m surprised Gordon Gekko himself doesn’t burst out of the screen and throttle me with his bare hands. Clearly the tone stuck by the TV spots is just a pose.

Motley Fool: Lone Wolf or Savvy Insider?
Motley Fool, on the other hand, presents a mirror image of this same kind of dys-integration. First, there’s the Web site. It features an upfront use of chatty video that helps bring key issues into a human context. More important, the site allows you to experience its fresh perspective at your own pace, effectively demonstrating its value instead of merely proclaiming it.

In contrast, the company’s e-mail marketing falls back on the most archaic techniques of hard-sell direct marketing. It relies on textbook “snooze-you-lose” cajoling to assert the company’s value, to pose as a purveyor of The Truth About X That Wall Street Doesn’t Want You to Know.

Messaging: What you say or what you do?
At issue here is the relationship between marketing and your product’s actual value. Define yourself too narrowly as e-trade has done and your opportunities for engagement become more limited. It’s no good trying to humanize yourself with consumers after the fact—especially if you don’t pay it off with any change in your actual service offering.

On the other hand, the people-first approach to customer retention taken by fool.com loses credibility the moment it appears to be merely another mask. At this moment, Motley Fool’s Jekyll-Hyde brand persona is helping no more than e-trade’s is, over the long term.

Real marketing integration begins with product development.
Long ago, the Avis “We try harder” campaign made magic for the simple reason that it was not merely a slogan. It was, instead, the voice of an actual effort to upgrade the company’s customer service—in fact to elevate it to the status of a product. For a brief time, customer service, not car rentals, was the Avis product and the results were self-evident.

They weren’t positioning themselves as “the car rental company you need to meet your car rental needs,” and it showed. “We try harder” worked as an integrated message because it was integrated into the brand value of the company—not because that ugly button was plastered everywhere from Pittsburgh to Petaluma. On the other hand, Motley Fool’s original embodiment of the brand with the “lone wolf” perspective, has ossified into a ritualized rant in its “don’t get left out” scary e-mails.

Symptomatic of a greater dysfunction.
To make matters worse, given what the world has learned about the American financial system since 2008, I doubt there’s anyone left who can stomach this kind of tough-talking, hip-shooting nonsense. The “urgent, act now” tone struck by the left cheek of e-trade and the right cheek of Motley Fool is, in today’s reality, offensive.

In 2010, cowboy marketing is played out. Consumers have seen what happens when they follow a dark rider into an ever-darkening sunset: They’re led to disaster, led to pointless ideological crusades serving only a tiny group of oligarchs and control freaks. In this century, we need integration, and team work to develop sustainable models for our collective future. Between sociopathic dictators and sociopathic financiers, we’ve had enough of the “lone wolf” for one space-time continuum.

[July 30, 2010]

A lot has already been written about “the cloud” and I wouldn’t think of adding more smoke to the screen. That is, except that I’ve started to obsess about its eventual impact on civilization. If we survive Y3K, will we be better off as stateless citizens of the digital haze?

In many respects, the ability to access thousands of units of digital content wherever you go, means you can always be “in your own world.” Carried to the extremes imagined by sci-fi writers like Alastair Reynolds, we might learn how to superimpose our own personal reality on everything we see and do. Things outside our normal frame of reference would be “skinned” to conform.

Cozy in a terrifying kind of way.
By taking all the comforts of home everywhere, we’d be psychologically safe but potentially stagnant. Because, as most people eventually realize, life only begins the moment the floor caves in. Without anything to challenge your worldview, without anything to alter your vision of which end is up, you’d end up a prisoner of your formative experiences.

Judging from the last 10 years, there’s enough of that going around for my taste. And yet…

Consider Zohowriter, one of many other cloud applications available. Like millions of other people, I find the ability to make a few notes in one location on one device and retrieve them hours later somewhere else on something else—is a lifesaver for creativity. That’s “creativity,” mind you, defined in the broadest possible terms: I mean whatever mental process keeps you in touch with your heart of hearts.

Like every other technology, cloudware is to be used responsibly. The sometimes nightmarish worlds created by Reynolds and other sci-fi writers depend on a vision of technology evolving out of pace with cultural, ethical and moral standards.

Floating above responsibility?
Not that there isn’t plenty of evidence of this right now—as millions of people are cut off at the knees by the selfish incompetence of boorish oil executives. Their “What-Me-Worry?” view of social responsibility falls far short of basic human decency. And yet…

I can’t help thinking the benefits, in terms of personal freedom, mobility and access to multiple interpretations of “the truth and the way,” are worth the risks. For one thing, “the cloud” is partially responsible for exposing the callousness of so many people in positions of power.

On the other hand, I suppose the bigger “the cloud” grows—the more corners and alleyways and cul-de-sacs it permeates—the more it could cause us to drift away from the gritty, hands-on experiences that brought us down from the trees. After all, there’s nothing like a real slap in the face to change your worldview.

I also worry about the homogenization of everyday experience—another process that was well underway, back when “the cloud” only emanated from TV sets. Is that Ronald Vishnu I roll over at McDonaldsIndia.com?

A reign of risks or benefits?
Will the constant availability of “my favorite things” make me not merely unwilling to try something new, but even unable to conceive of anything new? If, as I sometimes fear, the Facebookization of culture may soon make us all “Like” the same things, what will become of the challenges to our vision that make us grow? And yet…

Whenever I do have time to access creative project files that are so often on hold, I can delve into them immediately. No quills to cut, no inkwells to fill, no foolscap to unroll and, Lord knows, no clattering, heavy typewriter.

Ultimately, even in its simplest manifestations, “the cloud” is liberating, if only because it erases one more barrier between thought and realization. For that, I’m grateful.

[July 23, 2010]

Behind the proliferation of child-oriented Web sites are a number of conflicting impulses. Concerned parents want a safe-haven apart from the Internet’s narrow alleys and dark corners. Educators persist in hoping the hypnotic power of video will motivate children to learn. Meanwhile, merchandisers vie for the most compelling word-of-mouth market on the planet (“Can I have it please, can I? Please?”).

The result is an unappealing mishmash of every societal and cultural trend since the 60s, when mass-market marketing to kids began its conquest of diaper space in earnest.

Contributing to this distressing array of mixed-messages is the thoughtlessly generic way we think about children in the first place. One word, “child,” covers about three-quarters of the entire span of human development. Sure, there’s “baby” and “toddler” and “school age” and “tween,” but their pull on our consciousness is weak. That the Kid-Sector of digital space is no less a blur of contradictory stimuli is therefore hardly surprising.

I’d like to suggest we owe children more than this. It’s not even a matter of “education” versus “entertainment:” It’s a question of craftsmanship. On the Education front, for example, the “counting and kumbaya” mode of teaching has its limitations.

At some point, educational tools need more focus than an interactive playground can provide. Yet parents seeking a digital learning experience for their kids will spend hours sorting through “Sesame Street” clones, or endless iterations of the hapless “Math Fax R Funn” approach to learning.

They’re listening…
You want to teach? Teach by example. Stop teaching children they must be too dumb to understand anything beyond another explosion, another CGI mutant or another adventure of the shy but brilliant detective and her intrepid pony. Kids only like this stuff because we can’t be bothered to offer them something better.

At the other end of the spectrum, whatever passes for “pure entertainment” ought at least to be based on a better understanding of the way kids process information. After decades of research by countless clinicians, I’m kind of amazed to see the only thing anyone outside of the lab has picked up—is that bit about “short attention span.” Well, here’s another catch phrase for you: “cognitive pollution.”

Think of it. You’ve managed to capture a young mind’s attention with the magic of narrative (or a narrative about magic). Isn’t there anything we, as adults, want to say to our children while they’re actually listening?

…to the heartbeat of an era we must shape and guide.
I suppose none of this would matter half as much—if we weren’t heading straight for a digital makeover of everyday life. A hundred years from now, every square foot of the planet will be touched, in some way, by a digital access point. The way things are going, genetically engineered cows will one day have touch screens embedded in their sides to help farmers monitor their health. At that point, the word “CowPad” will take on a whole new meaning.

In fact, we’re moving into an era in which our first language will be some form of digital communication. What we seed today in our children’s minds will determine the outcome of that future. It will determine whether we’re heightened and enlightened or whether, like the lab rats who begot us, we simply exist to click the pleasure bar over and over and over again.

For an unscientific survey of the depressing array of child-oriented sites, I encourage you to follow the links you’ll find below. Then ask yourself a simple question: Is this any way to raise the next generation of Goo-Googlers?

Starfall
Neopets
Cartoon Network
Kindersite
The Nick
HotWheels
MoshiMonsters
PBSKids
WebKinz
KneeBouncers
CIA Kids Page

[July 20, 2010]

At this point in the evolution of post Y2K society, I think we can assume that digital space is no longer a novelty. It’s where the telephone was in the 40s, perhaps, or TV in the 60s. While there are people whose access to the 3-double-ewes is limited, the lore of the online world has spread far and wide. Google up “baby’s first website” and see just one random example of how integrated digital space is, not just into our lives, but into our consciousness.

So if it’s not the novelty, what’s driving Americans to spend so much time online? I suppose one way to look at it is to track what they’re doing there and, digital space being the alpha2omega-omnibus that is it, someone has.

Yet, intuitively, I can’t help thinking these detailed statistics fail to get to the underlying cause. Leaving aside the percentage of the population who spend untold hours sending College Humor bit.ly’s to every available networking medium—there has to be more to our growing obsession than “OMG” and “ROTFL.”

While there’s no arguing that the concepts “useful, entertaining and fun” are enough to generate hours of interest, the flavor would have gone out of that gum long ago if the entire experience of going online didn’t fill a deeper need.

Beyond function…
It’s the need for personal freedom. That is, not in the far more important, political sense of universal rights—but the freedom everyone needs to have a mental “room of one’s own.” However you choose to imagine it, that “room” is the space in your heart and mind only you can enter.

To varying degrees, the time we spend online—following a personal train of thought that defies logic—equates very well to the wandering mental state we know from dreams and other forms of wishful thinking. And as digital space becomes more sophisticated, we encounter more sites with a feeling of dimension, or real time responsiveness.

Yet any site, whether arrived at by choice or accident as we continue to meander, can encourage our private inner world to thrive. Lights come on, windows are thrown open, and we breathe a different kind of air, if only for a short time.

On top of that, the total experience of drifting in this way from zone to zone, is one we can achieve without intensive training, with no self-sacrifice, no rites of initiation.

Just a slice of freedom, available for a monthly fee.

…to a flexibly defined sense of…
OK, that’s a lot of weight to put on youraveragewebpage.com, but it does make me wonder if designers and content managers can harness that wandering impulse, capture some of that same experience, and with it more “viewers.” Can we have a new generation of sites that offer:

• Choice: The freedom to select what each page will display
• Integration: The freedom to weave in elements from any other related or unrelated site
• Play: The freedom to lose ourselves here and there in relaxation
• Voice: The freedom to support, protest, share, edit—at least for our own use—all content

…whatever.
Up to a very limited degree, the modules available at iGoogle, sort of suggest what I imagine. But what if we took the concept further? What if, instead of publishing bundled up sites, we switch to publishing modules—which users can capture in any order at any time and arrange on screen, on wall, on sheet, on arm?

Apple-Apps aren’t the answer I seek: They’re simply a later stage in the evolution of the boxological constant. For a new kind of digital space, I need something more than a collection of features to “customize.”

I need, in fact, a Web of my own.

[July 17, 2010]

If you needed an example of traditional Web design, at least in the form it survives in today, Kraft offers a perfect example. As of 7-17-2010, the site is orderly, “simple,” inoffensively colorful —and utterly static.

By comparison, Dole, another brand in more or less the same category, makes extensive use of animation, some of which responds to mouse movement in a fairly natural way. While admittedly, dole.com has its share of bugs, especially in terms of voiceover talent and sound editing, this brand made a crucial realization:

Today, an American consumer’s worldview is primarily shaped, if not yet controlled, by video.

It’s no longer a trend. Even people in their middle years are accustomed to being informed and entertained through some form of moving image.

And video is, more and more, the exemplar of the digital experience. The genie is out of the bottle. Today, the part of the Web that actually ensnares its prey is the interlocking stream of video your audience is watching instead of your home page.

As with so many other cultural shifts, this one began slowly and then accelerated exponentially. From the establishment of TV as a regular feature in American households to the nonstop video jolt available to children as soon as they can click a mouse, video is more than just a common cultural reference point. It has become our first language.

The VideoFirst Century.
How did this happen? Perhaps it has to do with the rapid pace of change in the world in general. World cultures are morphing and merging; the definition of citizen and citizenship is evolving. Anything and everything, abstract or concrete, is constantly in motion. If you get most of your news and views of the world through TV, films, YouTube or your smart phone, you’re a citizen of the VideoFirst Century.

And yet, this cultural shift is barely reflected in digital space. Sure, many a site now features a video window, a slideshow or animated buttonage, but that’s not the same thing. No matter how many modules you add to an otherwise static site, it remains static. Instead of reacting to visitors, it stares at them like a crash dummy caught in the headlights.

Motion-ese: Universal language for a fractured world.
On the other hand, the rice pudding magnate Rice to Riches, (see, especially “Today’s Flavors” and “Vibe”) addresses its audience in an embryonic form of motion-ese. Despite a sluggish execution, the site goes a long way to suggesting the impact of video-driven web presence—and its potential for further development.

All that’s missing is a broader creative vision and a deeper understanding of the value of “value” (Hint: It’s not defined by how much money you save).

Nor is this continued video lensing of our world confined to digital space. Drivers are now distracted by digital video billboards, bus shelter ads tell us what shows to watch and we’re edging closer every day to the “Blade Runner” world of constant video immersion on city streets. Even the iPad’s emulation of page turning is, essentially, a video interpretation and therefore “cooler” in some eyes then the real thing.

Get moving: “What works” doesn’t work anymore.
Yes, I understand the Reality of Today’s Marketplace, where false budget constraints and best practice-fundamentalism continue to shape both Web design and content development. But I can’t walk away from an even grittier form of Realism:

In a world where nothing stands still any more, even on a metaphorical level, the stasis of the status quo is going nowhere fast. Go ahead, post another static home page—slideshows not withstanding—just have your earplugs ready. The next sound you hear will be the cumulative thunder of a million users clicking away.

[July 13, 2010]

“We have lots of information! For you!”

While that’s hardly a compelling message for consumers, it is the sum total of what they take away from many an average Web page.

Not that this message is spelled out in a headline, spouted by an expert or illustrated by a deft designer. But stripped of stock art, video, layout, functionality and by-the-numbers copy, most Web pages have little else to say to consumers.

See for yourself. Take a distance view, and total up the impact of each element on a given web page: With so many conflicting elements jostling for attention, no other unifying message emerges—regardless of topic, tone, intent or user experience.

Tagline, schmagline. What’s your site say?
The mere presence of a branded tagline is not enough. The most it can do is indicate the vague conceptual universe the brand might be traveling through on its way to your wallet. Nor are snappy headlines much help. When viewed from 30,000 feet, the cleverest sentence is no more memorable than a Webding or a Dingbat.

Because the only thing that matters in building long term relationships with your audience is your ability to deliver an overriding value message—something that sets you apart as the source of unique wisdom, entertainment, innovation or insight.

Otherwise, you’re expecting users to visit you for the same reason parents drag their kids to visit Uncle Harry or Aunt Martha—out of a sense of ritualized obligation.

“We’re the Number 1 source of information about [insert topic here]” your home page blares, “You gotta check us out!”

Yet strangely, your consumer family only stops by once or twice a year, even when Cousin Google offers to do all the driving.

Been there, ignored that—at www.clone.com
How did it come to this? Chances are you’ve neglected to consider the “content of the content” you rarely bother to refresh. Given that, there’s no unique take away, nothing audiences can’t get from another URL, including Wikipedia.org. Remember, everyone’s drinking the same theoretical Kool-aid. Is there anything about your expert video to set it apart from your competitor’s expert video? Assuming, that is, your expert isn’t working both sides of the street.

As I see it, the problem stems from the way most sites are constructed, a layering process rivaling ancient architectural practice. First there’s the content that predates the current brand manager. Next, there’s the newsfeed from 20 different sources, each with its own tone of voice and underlying message. Then there’s the leaden, branded boilerplate, offering “the solutions you need to meet the challenges of today’s competitive market.”

And the crowning glory is the new, nominally conceptual reskin of the home page, complete with obligatory slideshow marquee. “More information streams than those old-fashioned static marquees” it chirps, while simply adding another voice to the growing, discordant chorus of misaligned messages.

Of course, nothing contributes more to the background murmur than stock art pulled from a wide range of sources, each with its own lighting, perspective and color scheme. Even when a designer takes pains to select a unified photographic style, these committee-selected images leave consumers flat.

Why, in 2010, does anyone think a beautiful model of either gender has anything to do with the routine litany of everyday life each brand purports to “understand?”

Stats off? It could be that awful old Web site smell.
So if your Web presence suffers from iron-poor, tired metrics, I recommend you step away from the design studio, put down the spread sheets and listen. Listen to the cacophony of messages pouring out from each page. Then go item by item and figure out what you can do to bring the content of your content in harmony with itself—including dumping box loads of articles, video, charts, graphs and thumbnails.

When the process is finished, and at last the chorus is singing the same tune, you’ll finally know what, if anything, your Web presence says to consumers. And if the big picture takeaway is negligable, boring or inaccurate, at least you’ll know where you stand. You’ll have a basis for true, creative content development, a path to delivering a unique, motivating message to consumers. The rest is easy—like getting Aunt Martha to show you her glass menagerie.

[July 6, 2010]

A peculiar feature of the human psyche is the insatiable craving for knowing “the way it is.” While the need forclosure, psychologists agree, varies by person and situation, Americans tend to reject any train of thought that can’t assuage our national hunger for definitive, either/or decisions.

To the rescue comes ideological determinism, in an astonishing variety of species, rivaling the adaptive virtuosity of the orchid itself. It’s easy to see determinism’s appeal. When ambiguity threatens, the ideological mind is comforted by a graceful network of preconceived values that drapes itself over thought, perception, memory and motivation.

“Ahh: The Answer,” says the deluded ideologue, “now I know what to do.”

And from that hallucinogenic experience emerge the false dichotomies that tie us up in global conflict and even rock the tiny world of advertising, sales and marketing. Like “copy/art,” “traditional/digital,” or “concept/execution,” the “hard sell/soft sell” dichotomy is a perfect example of reductive thinking elevated to the status of a worldview.

Consider a key tenet of the hard sell philosophy: People are swayed by the evidence. Recent events challenge that notion. If the BP disaster isn’t evidence enough to sell people on sustainable energy solutions, it seems “evidence” has little sales value. Or does it? Doesn’t it depend on how well we package the evidence as discrete, end-user benefits?

Oh look, I’ve gone and tripped the ambiguity alarm.

When your tactics break down…
I suppose it all comes down to fear of the unknown. If we subscribe to rigid dichotomies, there’s no ambiguity, and nothing to fear. Ironically, people with the courage to embrace ambiguity, also have nothing to fear. In this case, embracing ambiguity means learning how to adjust your sales pitch to your consumer’s ever-fluctuating state of mind.

Again, consider the proposition that people are swayed by the evidence. You wanna sell? You gotta show a sharp knife cutting metal. Or show a cloth that “Holds 12x Its Weight in Liquids.”

Hard sell ideologues believe you need such brutally concrete images to “break down resistance.” But what if your customer is every bit as stubborn as you?

I remember once shopping for a camera and encountering a salesperson whose main sales tool was the (fictionalized) experience of his family members. “My mother has this one. She loves it,” or “I sold this camera to my sister. She says it’s the best.”

He almost never stopped talking. In answer to my technical questions his answer was invariably “They’re all the same.” Finally, in desperation, he told me, “I love this camera, I want you to have it!”

…redefine the meaning of “sale.”
Now maybe this qualifies as a “bad” hard sell tactic. But I’d just started looking and my goal at the moment was to find a store I could trust. I couldn’t be sold with words—“this is a great price”—or pictures—“my brother-in-law is a professional photographer…”

Had the sales person bothered to discover my mindset, he might have taken a different approach. Granted, the meter was running. But in a fraction of the time he’d taken to pressure me today, he could have earned my trust and won himself a sale tomorrow. In my case, he’d failed to realize that the first thing he needed to sell was himself.

That’s not to say the soft sell approach has no limitations. Play your cards wrong and you’ll fail to give people the encouragement they need to make a decision. But that’s just the ambiguity you need to embrace if you want to make the most of your contact with consumers. Instead of simply opting for one approach or the other, you need to grasp your customer’s mindset on a moment-to-moment basis.

While that’s easier to gauge one-on-one, with careful planning, a media campaign can also encompass multiple states of mind. Instead of taking an ideological stance, why not create a stream of communications, each one addressing the different emotional states your target moves through as a natural part of the buying process?

Now, I understand what a tough sell that might be, especially when clients demand dollar-for-digit “metrics.” But in today’s reality, success can only come to those who stop pushing consumers’ buttons, and start giving consumers the buttons to push for themselves. The process begins when you smash through the grid of either/or thinking and directly address the ambiguity lying at the core of human motivation.

[July 2, 2010]

At the simplest level, the premise of target marketing is easy to grasp. Instead of wasting effort and brand equity in a scattershot appeal, you can focus your attention on the people most likely to buy your product. In general terms, the people in this group fall into three categories: those already buying, those buying the competitor and those with similar demographic credentials who buy neither.

In many cases, brands try to appeal to all these categories within the target group at once. That each of these subgroups might have very different mindsets seems not to matter. Or rather, the success measurement shifts from “how many people we can sell” to “how many people we can convince to think about buying.”

This Spandex, one-size-fits-all approach, the diametric opposite of targeting, is fairly widespread. Having filtered out a target group from the mass audience, marketing managers proceed to take a mass market approach to what is simply a smaller mass. While the cost/acquisition/retention ratio might be more satisfactory, I doubt this has much more impact on the number of new or retained customers than a standard mass market approach.

Of course, with further segmentation, you can improve your odds, by broadcasting different variations on the current campaign to each segment. In direct mail, this has sometimes amounted to no more than minor swap outs of intro copy, offer and call-to-action. And while this mechanical approach often achieves a minor uptick in results, it’s only slightly less generic than either a mass market or “mass target” campaign.

And all because the underlying message is exactly the same.

The swagger and the confusion.
I only wish I had $1.75 for every time someone told me, “We want a targeted message, but we don’t want to turn off everyone else.” While that POV sorta sounds reasonable at first, you have to realize that adopting it effectively kills all hope of targeting. You can’t fulfill that mandate unless you run a mass campaign, whose only nod to your target is a line or two of bland “intro copy.”

Used to be, I wore myself out looking for the source of this confused thinking. That is, until I found its roots in the macho posturing of our American business model. We want, above all, to be right. We value nothing so much as a quick, shoot-from-the-hip bulls eye solution. “Why dilute our efforts?” goes the gritty, savvier-than-thou refrain.

Yet in the changing market we inhabit today, that song goes flatter every year—and it’s high time we changed our tune. We need to set aside the demands of Spandex Marketing and address, not smooth over, the real differences between people in the same demographic group.

That means finding more open definitions of “brand” and “campaign.” We need new definitions that value these differences—for the handle they give us on the human psyche. In an open campaign, you’d grab each handle with a carefully crafted, unique message stream.

Go on. Peel it off.
Sure, generic work costs less, but you get what you pay for. Contrary to conventional wisdom, greater investment is critical in tough economic times. When the pressure is on to “shop price” and save for an uncertain future, it takes a more compelling message to get people to spend for “the good stuff.”

With all these factors in play, it’s essential to make your message personal, make it resonate with the look and feel of real experience. It’s no use trying to sell a deeply conservative person a campaign full of indie-film references. It’s also no use trying to sell a world-weary hipster a straight up “the price is right” appeal. Yet, strangely, both types of high income/high education/home owner need weed killer, diapers and dog food from time to time.

What’s a marketer to do? Peel off the spandex and let it all hang out. Know that, even among your sweet spot target group, there’s more diversity than meets the eye. But be careful: Running open campaigns won’t be easier than traditional ones. They’ll only be more effective. Why? Well, I don’t know about you, but I only want a product that speaks to me—and not to some statistical mannequin looking way better in Spandex than I could ever, ever hope to.

[June 29, 2010]

“Your first thought is always the best,” goes the wizened wisdom of many a creative with no creative process. Of course, if gut instinct is your only creative tool, that tired maxim might make some sense—and my sincerest sympathies the day your gut comes up empty. Look for that to happen sometime in the near future, when everyone clamors for a “Big Idea” to shower them with millions.

Not that there’s anything wrong with jotting down any relevant thought the moment it pops into your head. The start of a project is not the time to suppress your imagination. Besides, the tiniest scraps of inspiration can sometimes come in handy as you work out the final details.

Dig into the background.
But before you commit yourself to any concept, I suggest you start by absorbing all the available background material. While no mere information-gathering process should determine the shape or scope of creative concepts, consumer “data” is important for two reasons. Properly interpreted, these shreds of insight do place the brand in a larger social context.

They also give you and your colleagues a shared vocabulary at a critical stage of the process. Considering the number of projects that get derailed because of poor internal communication, that’s no small thing.

But having absorbed the background data, shove it right back into the background. Only in very rare cases can literal quotation from consumer data be of much use. A creative concept must be more than the bearer of information. It must move, motivate and be memorable—the start of a lasting, sustainable connection to your audience.

Start with connections close at hand.

Now imagine you’ve just been briefed on a new assignment. The Ginsu knife, a legacy brand, wants to re-enter the market. All you have to go one is:

•
The knife is pretty darn sharp
•
People over 40 have fairly good recall of those classic TV spots

And one more thing, in 2010, Ginsu wants to reposition itself as the knife of choice for the upscale kitchen.

Hmm. Well, imagine a celebrity endorsement campaign featuring America’s top chefs:

Wolfgang Puck says it best:
“Any way you slice it,
Ginsu is a cut above.”

Get enough be-toqued celebs involved, create a cross-promotional tie-in with Bravo’s “Top Chef” franchise and let’s get cooking. On second thought, maybe not. Celebrity head shot or no, its appeal is purely word-based, rational and unlikely to get the phones jangling.

Now, maybe if our approach grew directly out of a consumer’s everyday experience we’d have better luck. A campaign featuring home recipes that require a lot of chopping might help us tap a deep-seated source of performance anxiety:

Gazpacho for 8!
Where’s my Ginsu?

A series of sponsored content on AllRecipes.com might give us a way to distribute the value of Ginsu’s cutting edge technology. A parallel series in Gourmet or Real Simple (online and off) giving DIY instruction, for making decorative garnishes with precise cuts, goes a step farther. At the very least, this concept has the advantage of being moored in the real world.

Reach for a broader appeal.
But what if we wanted to elevate the Ginsu to the highest levels of brand equity, by positioning it as an essential component of the “hip-to-the-minute” lifestyle. Improbable? Let’s give it a shot.

Parachute pants?
Doesn’t cut it.
Ginsu does.

The Ginsu knife as fashion accessory? With a carefully crafted brand voice, it could work, provided your writer could consistently tap the right vein of wickedly ironic humor.

At the same time, opening the brand to a wider range of emotional and social connotations also makes its entry into social space that much more natural. Sure, you could always go with “What doesn’t cut it for you?” the now-standard video upload party, perhaps grouped thematically, as:

•
What doesn’t cut it on a first date?
•
What doesn’t cut it on Flickr?
•
What doesn’t cut it at work?

Opening the shutters wider still, the brand might sponsor the discussion of larger themes, in the form of a digital petition.

Let’s tell BP: Pollution doesn’t cut it.

OK, none of these ideas are liable to win me a Clio. But at least I’ve broken through the surface. I’m starting to address the emotional center of my target’s worldview. If I actually had this assignment, and the collaboration of talented team members, there’s no telling what path my thoughts and feelings might follow.

All that matters at this point is that I’ve found a creative process, a set of techniques enabling me to clear off space and start working with emotions, themes, images, distribution strategies and—Oh, yeah—words.

[June 25, 2010]

[This post reflects the state of the sites discussed at the time. The issues raised are still relevant to the discussion of consumer-facing pharmaceutical advertising in the US.]

In a field as vast and variegated as pharma advertising, I can’t completely ignore the Voice of Reason, telling me that any attempt at generalization is “counter indicated.” Yet, like an aerial photo, the breadth and sweep of overview can sometimes tell us much about the details as it can about the big picture. So excuse me a moment while I stuff a sock in that Mouth of Reason and forge ahead.

Between pharmaceutical campaigns I’ve been personally involved with and ones I’ve analyzed for my own benefit, I believe there’s a serious problem with the entire enterprise. Despite the oceans of hard work and dedication that go into producing pharma advertising, far too much of it is ineffective, in that is does nothing more than convey information.

By now, I’d think it was common knowledge: You can’t sell anything without an enveloping emotional context. That’s certainly true of the American political system, where the smoke screen of “hot button” issues colors our perception of reality, even at the most basic level. It’s also true for anyone who has ever bought a house, a car or snappy new piece of technology. Look me in the eye and tell me you bought it “for a reason.” No matter how you crunch the stats, sales is all about romance.

Mugshot Marketing: Which one’s the perp?
That’s why I continue to be perplexed by home pages like the one built for Exjade. Now, don’t get me wrong. The idea of connecting to consumers with testimonials from current customers is theoretically sound, even if somewhat tired. But there’s a qualitative factor involved that the Exjade home page completely ignores. The bland, de-contextualized headshots and blank lead-in statements can’t hope to get consumers emotionally involved.

That’s because, like the vast majority of advertising testimonials, they are simply too generic, no matter how many details they may contain. At exjade.com, the entire testimonial panel might as well have been replaced with a single sentence: “Lots of people with this condition use our product and like it. Maybe you will too.”

Why do these playing-card headshots fail to connect? Without context, they exist as abstractions only.

Context→Meaning→Connection→Emotion→Motivation.
By contrast, the Lantus home page leads with a rounded portrait of a satisfied patient. Automatically, we’re drawn into an environment several degrees warmer and that much closer to a real-life encounter, not least because the copy is let out of its hospital bed restraints, if only for one sentence. But wait, there’s more. The smoothly integrated call to join an online community strengthens that connection with a welcoming visual style.

One layer down, the connection continues. Without a lot of fuss and bother, we get another tangible, rounded view of a real person. Not necessarily “a person like you,” but someone who’s story has the texture of everyday life. Of course, the loose-limbed photography style goes a long way toward nailing the feeling of reality—even if every image is handled with a graceful sense of design.

In all of this, I don’t find grand, sweeping “Big Ideas”—the current enemy of the solid, practical work that’s the substance of this industry. Or rather, it’s not an idea that exists to call attention to itself. It is, instead, an Ideal of commitment—a commitment to talk to real people respectfully, honestly and without a trace of today’s “iPad or Death” fashion dichotomies.

Dialogue your way out of victim status.
OK, so here’s where I see an opportunity for change. Both of these testimonial campaigns were conceived, presented and produced under the same legal and ethical constraints. Barring the intervention of a fairy godmother, I can find only two explanations for the deep disparity in quality between them.

First, I assume the Creative and Account teams managing the Lantus account were fortunate enough to work with a brand manager open to influence. There was, I’m willing to bet, none of that dispiriting “Marketing 101” talk in which a client or internal operative effectively sets aside the last 25–30 years of growth in our understanding of consumer motivation.

Second, I must also assume that both agency and client forged real communication with the brand’s internal regulatory board. By doing so, they moved the process away from the knee-jerk paradigms of personal preference (“I’m just not crazy about that photo”) an into a zone of collaboration that transcended out-moded job titles.

As I see it, that’s “the deal” that must be struck in every pharma advertising campaign if it has any hope of having a lasting impact. It’s time we shook ourselves free of that tired victim mentality (“The Man Won’t Let Me Have A Concept”). Instead of whining, agencies, brand managers and regulators must improve their dialogue with each other—and begin a dialogue with the FDA about the tools we need to sell pharmaceutical products effectively.