tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post469003027340973312..comments2023-09-16T12:49:54.607+01:00Comments on The Sell! Sell! Blog: Let's Talk AdvertisingSell! Sell!http://www.blogger.com/profile/10702354938890218799noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-77450628535709871452014-09-12T17:37:10.633+01:002014-09-12T17:37:10.633+01:00Anon from 15:53 here. Found this so thought I'...Anon from 15:53 here. Found this so thought I'd share. <br /><br />Here's the Minutemen in 1984, predicting the fall of the modern planner in 2015.<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCnXf9RfxfU#t=19 <br /><br />Play it before every brief. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-8641378535437582312014-09-12T15:43:02.016+01:002014-09-12T15:43:02.016+01:00After 15 or so years in the industry I have only o...After 15 or so years in the industry I have only one observation: the amount of bullshit being spoken in the room is directly proportional to the amount of shirts tucked into jeans.Piemanhttp://simon-griffin.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-58452195050037157542014-09-11T15:59:42.704+01:002014-09-11T15:59:42.704+01:00Hello Anon of 15:53*. I don't think having onl...Hello Anon of 15:53*. I don't think having only been in the business a few years is necessarily a bad thing, especially if it means you haven't picked up any of the bad habits or poor received wisdom that blights it. And your comment bears this out I think - I think you're spot on.<br /><br />Previous Anon* - very good.<br /><br />*If people used names instead of Anons this would be a lot easier.Sell! Sell!https://www.blogger.com/profile/10702354938890218799noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-17062944198226253052014-09-11T15:53:56.152+01:002014-09-11T15:53:56.152+01:00I've only been in the industry a few years so ...I've only been in the industry a few years so apologies if I've got it wrong. But here's what I think:<br /><br />To do a lot of the latter work (a rational truth told well) again, creatives need to get off their arse and stop letting planning and accounts do everything for them. <br /><br />Factory visits. Client meetings (with every level of client). Talking to regular people to find out what they think. Thinking about what they think. <br /><br />All of these are responsibilities that should be a part of a creative's work. <br /><br />Most of these things are humbling and quite fun, too. <br /><br />Hopefully they'll remind us what we really are - creative salespeople. That's a great thing to be! <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-56946723077019614132014-09-11T15:52:16.614+01:002014-09-11T15:52:16.614+01:00@SellSell: you're welcome. Now give us a job a...@SellSell: you're welcome. Now give us a job already (winky smiley face)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-5283794427550203312014-09-11T15:32:51.124+01:002014-09-11T15:32:51.124+01:00@Cecil: hence why agencies need great leadership.@Cecil: hence why agencies need great leadership.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-51556824071522450792014-09-11T15:16:16.638+01:002014-09-11T15:16:16.638+01:00Interesting Anon, thanks for the replies. Personal...Interesting Anon, thanks for the replies. Personally I think the business problem and context should dictate the solution more than my own preferences. More diagnostic than prescriptive. Although I would agree that we always like to approach things with intelligence (by the way genuine thanks for the description of our work as intelligent and witty, much appreciated).Sell! Sell!https://www.blogger.com/profile/10702354938890218799noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-70803560097116593852014-09-11T15:14:26.233+01:002014-09-11T15:14:26.233+01:00I could trot (no pun intended) Dave Trott's me...I could trot (no pun intended) Dave Trott's method out, but I won't. I, too, am firmly in the last camp. However, for a creative team to produce such things requires that their ideas be nurtured instead of killed by the people above them who think from one of the other two camps.<br /><br />True story: trying to do a community service program for a large client. Creative team wants to make it about the community, the action, the benefit and use the client presence as the surprise. Inform + entertain. Someone higher in the chain on the AGENCY side wants to turn into something resembling some reality show that makes the client's participants into characters of some kind of asinine bullshit like that. Entertain only.<br /><br />We fought. Every single member of the team fought that drivel to no avail.<br /><br />The problem with advertising, then, often lies with creative directors who are simply neither. They're arrogant, self-involved charlatan prima-donnas who've never done anything original and are afraid to start now. They're the stars. They're the guiding light. They're the problem. It's not a conversation at our level, or even a debate. It's a door that's always closed from a mind that's never open.<br /><br />It's the kind of thing that makes creatives look for other employment.Cecil B. DeMillenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-79888625994154129202014-09-11T15:10:03.579+01:002014-09-11T15:10:03.579+01:00"Is that how you feel or is that an unfair as..."Is that how you feel or is that an unfair assessment?" I think making the advertising I like to make to solve the problem at hand is the best way of going about it. The two aren't mutually exclusive.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-83786092973238125752014-09-11T14:29:17.289+01:002014-09-11T14:29:17.289+01:00Also, just coming back to this again Anon, this fe...Also, just coming back to this again Anon, this feels like it comes from a very introspective point of view, as if getting to do the kind of advertising you like to make is more important than doing something that is right for the problem in hand. Is that how you feel or is that an unfair assessment?Sell! Sell!https://www.blogger.com/profile/10702354938890218799noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-33562273264553790892014-09-11T14:20:36.639+01:002014-09-11T14:20:36.639+01:00Interesting point-of-view Anon. Am I right in conc...Interesting point-of-view Anon. Am I right in concluding then that you think agencies should pick one approach and stick to doing that?Sell! Sell!https://www.blogger.com/profile/10702354938890218799noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4169807398234019196.post-64838369947484590832014-09-11T14:15:30.495+01:002014-09-11T14:15:30.495+01:00Here's what I think.
No matter what group of ...Here's what I think.<br /><br />No matter what group of thinking you belong to, as long as you are able to practice it then that's fine. If you like making ads that only entertain and get the chance to do so then that's great. If you like making ads that communicate a product benefit in an interesting and memorable way and you get the chance to do so then that's great too. <br /><br />The problem starts when these different groups of thinking clash in an agency that doesn't have a leader with a clear vision of what ads should be like. A planner who wants to make something entertaining faces a creative team who think they'd be better off communicating a product benefit. No one's there to put their foot down. <br /><br />Agencies need this leader who wants to make a specific kind of advertising everyone else can buy into. They're usually associated with one name (Bernbach, Ogilvy, McCabe, etc...).<br /><br />What happens next is that creatives are being spoonfed ideas disguised as briefs written by planners/strategists, without the chance for them to have an idea themselves. Sometimes the briefs are so narrow that they naturally lead to a specific idea the planner/strategist had, that when the creative team comes up with anything else they're dismissed as being 'off-brief'.<br /><br />Which in the end leads to disenfranchised and frustrated creatives who stop giving two shits, leading to the boring mediocre crap you can see everywhere.<br /><br />I've seen A-list agencies fuck up a brief so hard that they had to pull the finished TV ad before it even had the chance to air. I've also had an idea of mine being picked up and being presented to the client I thought would never ever make it. I just included it as cannon fodder to make the good idea stand out.<br /><br />It's up to the agency to define what a good ad is but most of them don't.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com