TWIS: When two vegans fight, is it still called having a beef?
Hi Strat Pack,
I found this new (to me) music thing last week that I've been really into. It's called Flow State and it's basically two hours of chill/focus music delivered to your inbox every morning. Highly recommended.
In other important news, this video of a mountain lion playing the shell game is the best thing on Twitter this week. There was so much advertising news, I didn't have time to scour the internet for fun stuff this week.
Alright guys, stop messing around trying to fleece felines for stuffed animals and let's jump right in.
The one thing to read this week
1) Why your advertising should be MAD [Graham Booth on LinkedIn]
Not every ad can be a Sony 'Balls' or a Honda ‘Cog’. But every ad should aspire to be more than the strategy put on the screen, or the brand purpose spoken over some generic visuals.
We are surrounded today by ‘idea-free’ advertising: bland, undifferentiated ‘wallpaper’ that leaves the viewer unengaged, uninvolved and unmoved. [Graham's] kids fear the ad breaks when they are watching with me, knowing that at some point I will be shouting “Where’s the creative idea?” at the screen, lamenting its absence from :30 of… what? They are so accustomed to this explosion that, when a car commercial appears (for these are perhaps the most consistent offenders), they look at me, waiting for the rant to start.
Here's an acronym that can point us to strong creative ideas: MAD. ‘Make Advertising Drastic’ – or maybe ‘Daft’, ‘Dangerous’, or even ‘Dada’ – take your pick.
But even when the action isn’t MAD, there is still an idea that pushes beyond the proposition.
Creative ideas are often characterised by the cross fertilisation of two apparently disconnected notions. In much the same way that a strong brand proposition is born out of the overlap between a human truth and a brand truth (AKA ‘consumer insight’ and 'brand properties'), a creative idea is often born out of bringing together the brand proposition and a notion from another field that is apparently completely unrelated.
2) Why agencies shouldn’t pitch for Audi's UK ad account [The Drum]
On practicing what you preach. We keep talking to brands and in trade publications about prioritizing the value of long-term brand building over short term sales. But when the opportunity presents itself, agencies resort to the same short-term thinking as our clients.
This isn’t an overwrought, overly emotional plea for some goddam human decency in our godforsaken industry, and I don’t want anyone to mistake it for that.
Every agency head out there is more than happy to bitch about procurement driving down their margins, and knowing the cost of everything and the value of nothing, but when an opportunity arrives to actually stand up and make a difference, the P&L looms large, and we jump in feet first.
We fall over ourselves to take part in transparent cost-cutting exercises like this; we’re prioritising short-term gain over long term stability and even growth for the industry.
Just imagine for a second: what if we didn’t. What if, when contacted to ask if they were interested in pitching for Audi, agencies didn’t just say ‘fuck yes’, but asked why the pitch was being held in the first place? What if they asked why a forty-year partnership had suddenly come unstuck?
The author is chief executive and founder of Creature of London. And, yes. I am fully aware that I am not taking the cynical route on this one. Just let me have it, ok?
3) Broadcast standard enabling addressable ads on TV to roll out by 2020 [Warc]
A coalition of US broadcast TV station groups has announced the rollout of what it calls Next-Gen TV in the 40 largest US TV markets by 2020. For consumers, the most obvious benefit is the ability to receive 4K broadcasts with better sound. For advertisers, it opens up the possibility of addressable TV at scale.
In 2016 I (very wrongly) predicted that Addressable TV was about to have its moment in the sun. Maybe it actually will.
Why does this matter to you? Because this means that TV advertising will now start to look more more like YouTube or Streaming Video On Demand where the commercial I see is not the commercial you see. And where you absolutely will see the same Gilette ad in 9 successive commercial breaks in a row followed by the same Ford ad. Which means we'll have to rethink the role of TV as a creative & storytelling platform. Exciting stuff.
However, like any network rollout, it will take time not only for the broadcast technology to become available, but also for consumers to adopt adequate receivers.
4) Why Lush is right to switch off social [The Drum]
Scale is a myth marketers bought back in 2010 and we're too scared to admit we were wrong. Scale was the social emperor’s new clothes.
In 2015 social truly became the content worm that started to feed itself.
In the arms race to 'be there,' many brands ended up with a mass of pages and content that were less than meaningless. Mediocre advertisers posting mediocre content catering to people that would never see it, nor care.
One brand, five platforms, 25 countries, posting three times a week? That will be 20,000 pieces of content a year please – not including ads.
I [ED NOTE: The author of this piece not me]coined the term 'social confetti' in an interview at the time – the sheer amount of 'stuff' to create was exhausting, as well as battling daily with customer complaints and issues.
Maybe it's time to follow Lush. Stop buying the hype and start asking if there is another way.
5) Quick Hits: A few articles that are concise, important, interesting, impactful, and I'm not going to write long descriptions for them.
Ad land needs smart, charismatic and decent leaders more than ever [The Drum] An article in which I learned that Keith Weed could be Unilever’s last chief marketing officer
What is Differential Privacy and Why Should You Care [Digiday] (It's a technique meant to let companies share consumer data while protecting individual privacy and, not incidentally, proprietary databases.)
How improv helped TSB’s CMO be ‘creative under pressure’ at work [MarketingWeek]
Why brands are turning to Amazon Prime Video to distribute their own content [The Drum] 1) It stands a better chance of retaining attention than YouTube, Facebook or TV. 2) Scale.
Why funky ’70s-style fonts are popping up on brands like Chobani and Glossier [Vox] As brands are moving away from tidy sans serifs — away from the possibly fascist undertones of the grid layout — they’re moving in concert toward a ’70s look.
Influencers are flocking to a surprising new kind of social media [Fast Company] 350+ influencers with a collective audience of 3.5 billion people are flocking to a platform called Escapex, which gives them their own apps. It’s part of the next wave of social media focused on smaller, more private groups.
6) Department of Great Work
North Face is joining Patagonia’s decision to favor “mission-driven companies that prioritize the planet” in its corporate sales, sparking a flood of coverage more or less laughing at finance, Silicon Valley and others essentially getting dumped by their own favorite uniform .
But fear not! There was a lot of great work this week. Let's see what I liked.
KFC spoofs influencer culture [AdAge] Introducing the Virtual Influencer Colonel, a computer-generated, suave-looking guy posting images on Instagram (well, supposedly doing the posting)
Budweiser's Emotional Ad Shows How Dwyane Wade Has Touched People's Lives [Buzzfeed News] Not going to lie. Got worked up over this.
Corona builds plastic 'trash wall' on Ipanema Beach to warn of plastic pollution [Campaign Live]
Volvo's Latest E.V.A. Ad Asks 'Are You Man Enough to Survive a Car Crash? [Little Black Book] Great work from Foresman & Bodenfors
Your hungry cat is a seductive French crooner in this Sheba petfood Spot [AdAge] 'Vincent Le Chat' is the embodiment of feline persuasiveness in this work from AMV
Adobe and Zach Braff Have Turned a Student's Movie Poster into a Real Film [Little Black Book] Pereira O'Dell & Adobe nailed it. This film stars Alicia Silverstone, Florence Pugh and Leslie David Baker taking the piss out of social media influencers. Worth 11 minutes of your life.
L’Oreal Paris Creates Astonishing New Makeup Ads Targeted At Men [DesignTaxi] Great campaign from McCann Germany that stands up for female empowerment
7) Platform Updates
Platform Updates are no time for witty banter! Let's get into it
Facebook to replace Exclude Categories with new brand safety ad filters [MarketingLand] The new filters — which include “Limited,” “Standard” and “Full” inventory options — will replace Facebook’s five exclusion categories: Debatable Social Issues, Mature, Tragedy and Conflict, Dating and Gambling.
To Answer Critics, YouTube Tries a New Metric: Responsibility [Bloomberg] But..but...my flat earth videos!
Snapchat’s new Landmarkers will make the Eiffel Tower puke rainbows [The Verge] lol.
eMarketer projected that Snapchat will lose monthly U.S. users for the first time in its history this year [Variety] Snap disputed the findings.
Pinterest top trends for April 2019 [Pinterest]
Twitter considering labeling Trump tweets that violate rules [The Hill] But they won't be taken off the platform.
Gen Z prefers Instagram when hearing from brands [MarketingDive] 70% said they prefer brands to contact them about new products through Instagram
The Golden Age of YouTube is Over [The Verge] The platform was built on the backs of independent creators, but now YouTube is abandoning them for more traditional content
Phew! That was a marathon, not a sprint.
Now that's a full email. Thanks for sticking around as always. Have a great weekend!