This Week in Strategy: I took the shell off of my racing snail thinking it would make him faster. If anything, it made him more sluggish.
Hi Strat Pack,
I want to start on a downer: Andy "Train Daddy" Byford resigned from the MTA yesterday. If you don't live in New York, you're probably like "who is that guy and why should I care". And you're right, you shouldn't. But the guy (whose nickname is Train Daddy for chrissakes!) did something that almost nobody was capable of: he made us not hate taking the subway. People liked him. In New York! We will miss you, Andy.
On to more important (and hopefully uplifting news, We’re All in the Bathroom Filming Ourselves. It’s got lights and it’s got action. The American bathroom is the stage set of the moment. Friends of the newsletter know that I am a huge Taylor Lorenz-head, and this is another banger. Most home bathrooms are well lit and have nice, bright acoustics. Unlike the kitchen, living room or even bedroom, bathrooms are private spaces, where parents and siblings are trained to not barge in. It’s almost inevitable that they would become the perfect stage set for the dramatic entrances, exits, skits, dances and story times of TikTok, the short-form social video app that has grown wildly popular in the last year. Videos shot in the bathroom consistently outperform those shot elsewhere, many creators say. They call it “the bathroom effect.” This article is gold. It talks about why it works on TikTok. It then goes DEEP on finding the perfect bathroom. And on how it has a positive effect on chores: TikToks shot in messy bathrooms don’t perform as well. Ryan Ketelhut, 17, said that shooting TikToks has made him clean his bathroom at home more often.
There's so much to unpack. I wish I had more time. But alas you all constantly tell me this newsletter is too long as-is.
Alright, stop messing around trying to find the best Subway bathroom for selfies (spoiler alert: it's none of them). Let's jump right in.
The one thing to read this week
1) The Meta Trending Trends: 2020 [Matt Klein - Medium]
Guys. First and Foremost - make sure you download (or at least bookmark!) Julian Cole's Trends Folder. It's got some really great stuff in it from Forrester, PSFK, Accenture, and others.
Three high-level observations from combing through 500 trends from 30 reports by::
I. Over my last three analyses, several trend themes continue to thrive: Environmental Concerns, Prioritized Mental Wellness, Evolving Identity Boundaries, and A Physical-Virtual Blur. For three years straight, these remain the most ubiquitous subjects. Most meaningful, I believe the thread which ties these themes together is that they revolve around humanity — our habitat, ethics, mental state, sense of identity and role alongside tech.
II. Many of the +500 reported trends each year feel synthetic. In other words, nearly all “trends” feel propped up and perpetuated by business. Stop trying to make AR-shopping happen — it’s not going to happen. Cultural movements only flourish when there’s innate energy, I.e. organic behavior. There remains no need nor want behind AR-shopping, therefore it doesn’t thrive… this is despite +20 reports promising it will each year.
III. While these authors rely on reporting existing, surface-level signals, no one notes what’s not happening yet — movements beneath the surface. These reports illustrate where the puck is, not where it’s going next. It’s valuable to analyze the former, but invaluable to do the latter if we’re to strategize. Two catalytic events will transpire over the next year, which will re-model culture as we know it, however, not one report acknowledged them: The 2020 Presidential Outcome and The U.S.’ Next Recession. Both will catastrophically impact all consumers (their values, interests, and purchasing decisions) as well as all business verticals. However, because these events haven’t occurred yet, it’s seemingly difficult to report on. But such moments should not be neglected if we’re to plan ahead as businesses. After all, culture moves on even if we’re not ready.
I'll leave it to you to click through to check out the details...
2) Stop Fetishizing the Insight [Martin Weigel]
This would be the one thing to read this week for sure if it wasn't from 2011 and part of me is really hoping that you read it in or around 2011.
“Nothing is so powerful as an insight into human nature, what compulsions drive a man, what instincts dominate his action, even though his language so often camouflages what really motivates him. For if you know these things about a man you can touch him at the core of his being.” - Bill Bernbach
But I can’t help wonder if the rhetoric of insight - Bernbach’s included - has become a bit of a millstone around our necks. Because it encourages the fetishisation of insight.
Fetishising insights leads to the belief that they should give us some visceral, thrilling sensation when we encounter them. It leads us to insist that they trigger some epiphanic ‘Aha moment’.
Fetishising insights treats them as a thing, rather than a process, a way of looking and thinking about problems. It encourages us to get our knickers into a twist debating whether something is ‘merely’ an observation or a piece of information or whether it is a bone fide Insight. The fact that the majority of men’s bodywash is actually bought by women, not men would fail to fulfill the insistence that it evoke an exclamation of “ah ha!” There’s no profound wisdom here. There’s no deep psychological revelation. Yet this understanding has undoubtedly helped unlock growth.
Fetishising insights encourages us to try and be profound and clever rather than useful. It’s responsible for people passing themselves off as pseudo pyschologists/sociologists/anthropologists. No wonder so many creatives and planners squirm with embarrassment at the mere utterance of the ‘I’ word. It’s responsible for so much of the utter consumer psycho-babble that fills the pages of too many planning and marketing documents.
Fetishising insights encourages us to waste money. The belief that insight must reveal deep dark secrets about the human psyche too often leads us to throw money at lengthy and elaborate research methodologies. When - given the obvious stuff that is invariably ‘uncovered’ - just one conversation with a psychologist, anthropologist or social scientist (or indeed a moment of personal reflection) would have sufficed.
Fetishising insights can in some dreadful quarters of marketingland lead to the insistence that communications ‘dramatize’ the insight - relegating the creative department to the mindless and thankless task of simply colouring the insight in. And subjecting the hapless consumer to some unedifying and purported mirror image of his or her life.
Above all fetishising insights forgets that they have absolutely no intrinsic value and that they are no guarantee of anything. Unless acted upon and transformed by an idea of some kind, insight is worthless theory.
Dieter Rams was the head of industrial design at Braun for over thirty years and his philosophy and work has had a profound effect on the world of design. As an antidote to the rhetoric and fetishization of insight, we could do worse than take new inspiration from the words of Rams: “Indifference towards people and the reality in which they live is actually the one and only cardinal sin in design.”
With these words in mind, let’s reclaim insight as a way of looking and thinking, and take it off its pedestal of unhealthy attention and worship.
If our efforts are to be relevant, we of course need an understanding of the outside world to be brought to bear upon the creative process. However, our measure of its value should not be whether this input is an Insight or not.
But whether it is a) true and b) useful.
3) Writing made hard. [Ad Aged - George Tannenbaum]
The quality of prose is just as important in advertising copy as it is in fiction. It’s our job to make it interesting. To make it memorable. To make it informative. To make it warm. To make the reader feel smarter and happier having read it.
I’m all but positive that no one knows half of what people mean when they say reimagine, edgy, robust, scalable, brave and bold. But you’d be hard-pressed to find an ad—whether it’s for a $10 million Cloud infrastructure or a $1.29 bag of nachos that doesn’t use most of those words.
Robert Caro has taught me two things. Two things that in a better world would be guiding principles for our industry and the few remaining people who work in it.
Number one is the biggest and it’s inviolable.
Time equals truth.
There is no way to short-cut this. Getting to know what a client sells, what needs it meets in the market, the lives of those who buy it (and those who don’t) takes time. No predictive analytics and four color swatches can really pick your wardrobe. No algorithm can forecast your interpersonal preferences. No MBA, no matter how learned, automatically knows anything.
It takes time. That thing there’s just too little of.
As in brief at ten. First tissue session at two. Second session at seven. Client tomorrow at three.
The second bit of Caro might be more writer-centric. But I think, really, it is ad-industry-centric. Because we are communicators, whether we write or not, and our currency is well-thought out words
Our job, according to Caro—and me, is to:
Find out how things work and explain them to people.
That does not mean we are in the business of writing instruction manuals. It does mean that we buy into the notion that most people go through life unabashedly confused.
“How do I keep myself from smelling?”
“How do I keep a pound of bologna fresh?”
“How can I find a car that won’t bankrupt me?”
“How do I improve my chances of finding a significant other?”
“How can I use technology to give my business an edge?”
Answering those questions involves finding out how things work. Deodorant. Plastic wrap. Automotive depreciation. And so on. And explaining them to people with interesting and empathic words.
It’s not about going to Cannes. Or linking a brand to the fate of the rapidly disappearing Siberian tiger. It’s not about stunts and data and toothy celebrities.
That’s the bushwa that’s taken over our industry today. That’s the bushwa that’s allowed us to ignore the simple, seminal truths I’ve highlighted in this long-winded post. That’s the bushwa that’s led us to care more about awards than persuasion and selling. That’s fine, if that’s what you want.
I’m re-reading Caro.
4) Quick Hits: A few articles that are concise, important, interesting, impactful, and I'm not going to write long descriptions for them.
Murder Your Darlings: Why Are Brands So Hell Bent on Killing Off their Mascots? [Little Black Book] If you’re looking to change things up for a brand while generating a bit of PR in the process, an advertising assassination might hold a two-birds-one-stone appeal. But the very thing that makes brand mascots or regular characters (what System 1’s Orlando Wood calls ‘fluid devices’) compelling hooks puts their ‘murder’ at risk of backfiring. Humans are empathetic creatures, and the mechanisms that allow us to empathise with people in the real world also kick in when it comes to empathising with fictional characters. But all murdered mascots do eventually come back. And maybe the rhythmic predictability of death and resurrection has a reassuring quality. Maybe that’s why the media and social media play along with the pantomime call and response of faux horror. I have a teeny tiny suspicion that Mr Peanut won’t be gone for long. Plunging over a cliff edge – it’s all very ‘Reichenbach Falls’. It might have taken 10 years for Sherlock Holmes to come back after his ‘death’, but I’m going to guess we’ll have a 10-day gap between the late legume’s death and ‘surprising’ return.
Why are so many brands pivoting to coziness? [Vox] Marketers have always used beautiful domestic spaces in advertisements. Now even shoes and liquor are supposed to make us feel safe and warm. Last year, Venkatesh Rao of Ribbonfarm, a blog devoted to “unusual takes,” came up with a term for all of it: “domestic cozy.” He argues it’s a defining quality of younger millennials and Gen Z who care less in some ways about performing for society at large and instead prioritize their own comfort. This, in opposition to “premium mediocre,” which he uses to describe older millennials concerned with neurotically crafting an aspirational self-image. “Instagram, Tinder, kale salads, and Urban Outfitters are premium mediocre. Minecraft, YouTube, cooking at home, and knitting are domestic cozy,” he writes. “Premium mediocrity expends enormous energy preserving the illusion of normalcy. Domestic cozy slouches into the weirdness and simply ignores it.”
Fox Isolates Trump and Bloomberg Super Bowl Ads: Sources [AdAge] Fox is isolating President Donald Trump’s and Michael Bloomberg’s Super Bowl commercials so other Big Game advertisers won't appear in the same commercial breaks as the politicians, according to sources. Instead, Fox will air promos for its own programming alongside these commercials.
Pokémon GO had its best year ever, earns $894 million in 2019 [Digital Trends] Who knew anyone played anymore! It is a rare feat for a free-to-play game to make more money at a later year after launch, as most fail to keep players’ interests over time. Analysts attributed much of Pokémon GO‘s growth to the launch of in-game events, improvements to real-world events, and significant updates that keep on adding content to the mobile game
52% say poor customer service is the norm [Warc] Half of consumers say poor customer service is the norm rather than the exception, according to research from Ford and Harris Insights & Analytics in their online survey of 13,003 adults across 13 markets. Just 44% believe employees understand consumer needs well. This comes as 77% of consumers think it is now harder to trust what brands say and do. Customer experience is as important as revenue growth, but companies are risk-averse to significant change.
5) Great Work
Guys. I gotta level with you. I watched that Budweiser 'typical Americans' ad and I literally felt nothing. Sorry.
Dunkin': Talkin Hockey with Kendall & Pasta by BBDO New York [The Drum] I literally lol'ed at these spots. Yeay they've got BBDO written all over them but what can I say. They're good. 10/10 would watch again.
Planters announces Mr. Peanut dead at 104 after heroic act [New York Post] Don't @ me. I know it's not *great* but it's generating a shitload of buzz which is one of the job s of advertising? And what can I tell you...I've got a total soft spot for Wesley Snipes. From VaynerMedia
How winning an Andy could rescue you from a miserable existence in the sewers [AdAge] I really really appreciate when advertising awards advertise themselves well. The film, created by Wieden & Kennedy, depicts a creative languishing in a dank sewer with his laptop, with a shelf full of awards from lesser organizations that haven't managed to change his career. The voiceover asks "How did you end up here" and compares him to "some kind of mole person" living in a "deep dark rut." Related: The Andy's award deadline is January 29
FINALLY! A great use of influencer [Instagram] Hats off to Old Spice partnering with @dudewithsign. I saw this in my feed today and I'm just honestly so happy that there's finally some good #SponCon
This Cheeky Expedia Ad referencing 'Megxit' piggybacked on rpoyal coverage. [Adland - Twitter] Someone buy this media planner, and creative team, a beer from us please. From Saatchi & Saatchi London
Did Gritty punch a 13-year-old boy in the back? Philadelphia detectives are investigating. [Philadelphia Inquirer] Am I proud of putting this in great work? Don't ask questions you don't want the answer to. But it's a very accurate representation of Philadelphia and lets be really honest: it's just good publicity for the Flyers. Ugh. Sorry for typing that.
6) Platform Updates
As a quick aside, I would just like to say how lovely the Google AMP version of every webpage looks on desktop
Why Google added little logos next to search results this week [CNBC] Google has added small logos to each search result that appear when someone enters a search query on their desktop. For example, a CNN or Fox News logo appears next to results that come from their respective news sites. A big, bold “Ad” logo appears next to advertisements. But the logos show up for each search result -- not just news and ads.
Instagram deletes the IGTV button no one was using [TheNextWeb] Honestly though fuck that button. IGTV isn’t going away entirely — you can still find links to IGTV videos on user profiles, specific videos, and the Explore tab. But that big, bright button in the top right corner when you open the app? That’s going away, to be replaced by who knows what — Threads, perhaps?
The latest YouTube brand safety ‘crisis’ shows advertisers are taking a more nuanced approach [Digiday] Without tighter controls on YouTube, advertisers are effectively stuck in a game of whack-a-mole; they are finding out after the fact that their ads are appearing on videos that are not to their suiting, which are then blacklisted. In such instances, the advertisers are faced with the prospect of not reaching as many people online so as to avoid topics that could potentially become toxic for their advertising. To reconcile both the risks of appearing against inappropriate content and rewards of advertising to more people on YouTube, advertisers are becoming more proactive when it comes to managing whitelists and blacklists.Advertisers are introducing clauses into their contracts with agencies that state that they will pay only for ads that meet their brand safety targets, said Angus McLean, director of digital for media auditing firm Ebiquity. These criteria are increasingly being built into agency-performance-related fees or bonuses.
GIFs are coming to Venmo [Mashable] Do the pizza and drinks emojis you usually put under "what's it for?" are starting to feel a little played out. Good news: You will soon be able to include custom, animated stickers from Holler, a company that designs stickers for messages, in your transaction notes. Think GIFs on your Venmo timeline. Surprise surprise: Users should also expect to see branded stickers from companies like Subway and Ikea soon
Facebook App Has Joined Twitter & Its Announcement Tweet Is A Cringefest [DesignTaxi] Just click through. The brands are becoming sentient! (And boring)
PornHub offers Android 10 usage stats – and it’s grim reading [Trusted Reviews] Android users, apparently, don't update. Affording to its traffic by mobile OS version stats for Android, only 2% of smut fans on Google’s mobile operating system are browsing using Android 10, compared to 48% of its Android traffic deriving from the 2018 release Android Pie. As far as the iOS share goes, a whopping 71% of PornHub’s Apple traffic comes from the latest iOS 13 operating system. Less than a quarter of the iPhone and iPad crowd are on iOS 12, with the remaining 5% of users spread over older versions of the OS. (Link is SFW)
As always, the full archive is available here. Was this email forwarded to you? Want to start getting this on a weekly basis? All I need is your email, everything else is optional.Thanks for sticking around as always. See you next week!