TWIS: I saw a theater production about puns recently...it was a play on words!

Hi Strat Pack!

So now it’s finally freezing. Seasons no longer make sense to me. Alas I digress...

Friends of the newsletter know that I love to eat. It's one of the few things I do every day. And while it is never fun to go to a bad restaurant, it is sometimes fun to read about them. Which is why I have to share this Infatuation review of Racine's in Tribeca. It is eviscerating. It is well written. It is worth the 90 seconds of your time it takes to peruse.

If you have a bit of time, I also recommend checking out this article from Artsy: Study Finds Artists Become Famous through Their Friends, Not the Originality of Their Work. Not advertising, per se (though very related) it hits on a lot of what we do: the memetics of communication.

Alright, stop messing around on art auction websites. Let's jump right in.

The one thing to read this week
1) What modern marketers can learn from a long lost strategic planning bible from 1974... [Shane O'Leary on LinkedIn] 
[Ed note: O'Leary takes some time to ramp up, but it’s worth it. Don't get dissuaded by scrolling] 

Stephen King (yes that Stephen King) wrote the JWT Guide to Account Planning in 1974 and it is just as relevant today as it was back then.

37 pages of stripped down, easy to digest, elegantly captured, common sense wisdom. Whether you're junior planner or a grizzled vet, you be forced to read it every month. 

And Shane ties King's work very cleanly to that of Binet & Fields, Stella, and Burger King. It's absolutely worth a read.

Want to skip straight to King's guide? Here's a link directly to the PDF

2) The challenges of the changing agency model [AdNews]
This is a long article and really hard to synthesize down. Lots of great stuff in here with views from the C-Suite at top global agencies. I really hope you read it. Because this is our job. This is how we get to make great work. This is how we get paid. 

Too many clients and agencies have lost sight of the big, creative idea and the industry is in need of recalibration; something that TBWA CEO Paul Bradbury believes 2019 will deliver.

Bradbury argued that agencies must move to different compensation models if they want to avoid being overlooked in favor of smaller agencies operating on project, value–based models.

And some choice quotes:
“The media model is fu*ked. They had to beg me to take this role,” one media agency CEO told AdNews

“The heady days of the 80s and 90s of the enormous margins and everything else have gone. It’s as simple as that,” 

“There needs to be an acceptance that you may never be as profitable as you one were. You may never have the margin you want, to be seen as powerful as you want to be, but you can still be incredible profitable. You can still have a margin, that compared to all other margins, is incredibly healthy.”

3) Happy International Women’s Day! Have a Sticker [New York Times]

A thoroughly enjoyable hit-piece on the banal, inauthentic garbage logo stunts, pop-up products and other International Women's Day marketing "integrations" from so many brands. By Jessica Powell the former head of communications for Google. Here's an excerpt:

Outside our headquarters we are installing a statue of a girl looking to the sky and the boundless future that awaits her. Inside, the women are still talking about the discrimination lawsuit we settled after an analysis found our female employees were underpaid. But look at our statue! Remember: There is no glass ceiling when you’re standing outside."

By the way...GoDaddy temporarily changed its logo to read “GoWomen" and here's how brands marked International Women’s Day. [AdAge]

BONUS ARTICLE: There should be tampons on HypeBeast [BBH Labs] A fun takedown of Hype Culture and it's infectious (and not new) nature. 

4) Have you noticed recently how many ads say the exact same thing?[Jordan Weil on LinkedIn]
Please, stop telling me that (y)our brand is different. We're not different. But we are distinct.

Branding exists because the things we make are not differentiated. When we only do half the job, anchoring solely on RTBs, not providing solutions or creating emotional connections, advertising cannot break through the clutter and make an impact with consumers.

Distinctiveness makes brands stickier, which drives brand salience, which grows our and our clients’ business.

Shameless self promotion alert. but at least I didn't make it the one thing to read...right? 

5)  Quick Hits: A few articles that are concise, important, interesting, impactful, and I'm not going to write long descriptions for them.

  • What the Dodo’s animal videos tell us about the different corners of the internet [Quartz] Some of the most-viewed videos on Facebook from the animal-centric media brand the Dodo are heartwarming clips of tiny kittens, cuddly rescue pit bulls, and tender moments with hippos. On Snapchat, viewers are more drawn to snakes and spiders. YouTube features personality-driven and human-focused series, such as The Dodo Soulmates, which spotlights human-and-animal best friends

  • Richard Shotton: Don’t applaud ads for their craft but for their effectiveness [Marketing Week] If you haven't read the choice factory, you should.

  • Confessions of a location data exec: ‘It’s a Ponzi scheme’ [Digiday] Uh. No duh.

  • 77% of US ad fraud classified as highly sophisticated, study finds [Marketing Dive] The hits just keep coming.

  • In-housing: Rediscovering the value of strategic leadership [Warc] Let's end on a high note.

6) Department of Great Work
Another week of a lot of great stuff! Keep up the good work, guys!

  • Nike Korea tells women to choose phenomenal in International Women's Day ad [AdAge] It would be more useful if I spoke Korean, but this ad is phenomenal either way

  • New Netflix ad shows how it 'makes room' for stories that don't find their way in Hollywood [AdAge] Love.

  • JetBlue contest dares Instagram addicts to delete their pics to fly free for a year [The Verge]

  • Nissin noodle vending machine swaps Instagram posts for prizes [Mobile Marketer]

  • Jameson serves Facebook Messenger drink rebates ahead of St. Patrick's Day [Mobile Marketer] What can I say? I'm a sucker for a Jameson drink rebate

7) Platform Updates
Oh Facebook. What's going on over there? We'll get into Zuckerberg's announcement in more details once the dust settles, but I think it has a profound impact on how businesses approach social media

  • Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg Says He’ll Shift Focus to Users’ Privacy [New York Times] This was covered in ALL the trades so don't burn a paywall article if you don't need to. But read about it.

  • The top trends for March 2019 [Pinterest]

  • The ad frequency debate: what works best? [Warc] The vexed issue of ad frequency has become more problematic with the proliferation of channels, shorter attention spans and active ad avoidance by consumers.

  • Please Keep the Swarms of Influencers Off Our Pastel Street, Parisians Beg [New York Mag] lol.

  • Apple is hiring an analyst to explain Siri complaints to executives [VentureBeat] FINALLY!

  • Old people in the US are watching a lot more TV [Quartz] Boring but important.

Daylight Savings time begins (ends?) in the US this week, so don't forget to set your clocks forward on Sunday night. Oh who am I kidding, all our shit is in the cloud and takes care of it self.

Thanks for sticking around as always. Have a great weekend!

Jordan Weil