This Week in Strategy: If you walk into a forest and cut down a tree, but the tree doesn't understand why you cut it down, do you think it's stumped?
Hi Strat Pack,
I've got to level with you. I am losing all sense of time. Where has it gone? What have I accomplished besides working, eating, sleeping, and logging 34 hrs 41 minutes hours on YouTube last week? So in an attempt to regain my sense of self I am trying to be more literary. I've been reading my bartender's self published book which sounds like it would be really bad but is actually really good. Wanna borrow it? Just @ me - seriously very enjoyable reading.
I also have been reading The Plague by Albert Camus which is available as a Kindle eBook from the New York Public Library. It is a novel for our times to say the least. And if you don't want to read that you should, at the very least check out, What Our Contagion Fables are Really About from the New Yorker's March 30th issue. Finally I really recommend the short story Fuck the Bread. The Bread Is Over from the Paris Review. Here's a passage I hope will convince you to click through:
"I have no real job,” I say. “Of course you have a real job,” she says. “I have no flour,” I say. “Fuck the bread,” says my mother again. “The bread is over.”
And maybe the bread, as I’ve always understood it, really is over. The new world order is rearranging itself on the planet and settling in. Our touchstone is changing color. Our criteria for earning a life, a living, are mutating like a virus that wants badly to stay alive. I text a friend, “I can’t find bread flour.” She lives in Iowa. “I can see the wheat,” she says, “growing in the field from outside my window.” I watch a video on how to harvest wheat. I can’t believe I have no machete. I can’t believe I spent so many hours begging universities to hire me, I forgot to learn how to separate the chaff from the wheat and gently grind.
One last thing before we jump into this week's issue. We all (some more than others) desperately miss live sports. (The Rangers were in the midst of a particularly terrible season so maybe I'm not so upset that the NHL is on hiatus but alas I digress...) So, let me introduce you to Marbula 1 Racing. That's right, it's Formula One racing, with marbles. You may think I'm out of my mind, and maybe I am, but the channel has over a million subscribers, and this video for the 2019 qualifiers (yes this is a multi-year endeavor, yes there are qualifying rounds) has nearly 12 million views. Maybe this explains how I've racked up so much YouTube this week.
Two bits of housekeeping: I might not publish next week. I might but I might not. I deserve a week off, and frankly so do you. And secondly, many of you I'm sure don't read all the way to the bottom, but please please can you this week because Taylor Lorenz wrote an absolute ripper about the rise of TikTok houses in the Times' Style section and I really need to talk to someone about it. Here's a sample to keep you engaged:
Adam Ian Cohen, 16, a founder of the Alpha House, said that six of his nine teenage housemates are planning to move in next week. They all took multiple coronavirus tests before move-in and will quarantine for two weeks, passing the time by posting sponsored content for Postmates and Xbox
What kind of alternate reality are we living in?! Please read this article. We need to talk about it.
Alright stop messing around trying to figure out which Marble Racing team Camus would root for (Renault, obviously). Let's jump right in.
The one thing to read this week
1) Creative Campaigns in a Recession [Julian Cole - Planning Dirty]
The grim reaper of creativity in advertising is coming.
With the recession on the horizon, it can look like all the creativity in the industry will vanish and be replaced by sales messaging. But that doesn't have to be the case.
Jade Wong, Ci En Li (who compiled that incredible 2020 Covid-19 Reports file) and Julian analyzed 100s of ads from the 2008 recession and we found lots of creative opportunities.
Click through for the full deck with 50+ case studies.
Here are their top four opportunities;
Everyday Luxury
As luxury falls out of reach, everyday brands (toilet paper, fast food, house paint) are able to market a little slice of luxury.Escape Door Brands
Specific brands offer an escape from the harsh reality. Brands with nostalgia cues or affordable indulgences (chocolate, alcohol, local services, video games, entertainment) and also advertising as entertainment (T-Mobile Flash Mobs)Timeless Sales Killer
People start thinking about buying things in relation to time. They’re willing to spend more on something that will last longer.Value Not Sales
Despite the recession, consumers are not looking for cheap…but are focused on value. Don’t talk to them about price, talk about the value you get for the price.
2) Brand Purpose: An Effective Advertising Response in a Crisis [Advertising Research Foundation]
(ED Note: This is an event recap and there's YouTube Video in the link. It's 90 minutes. I've watched 45 so far and It's worth a perusal)
Even though the current public health crisis is caused by a unique global pandemic, it should be viewed as a disruption – a variant of a type of event more familiar to us. Disruptions are normal. Even though we had something of an anomalous holiday from them during the 80s and 90s, they have returned with more normal frequency since 2000. Disruptions often clear the way for underlying trends to become more visible and, in some ways, disruptions can accelerate those underlying trends. He views the rising importance of purpose-led advertising campaigns as an example of this.
Advertising in the early 20th century focused initially on the attributes and benefits of the product. This was the Era of Product: of the Unique Selling Proposition (USP) and of claims that one’s product was better than the competitor’s product. Beginning in the mid-1960s, there was a cultural shift toward individual expression and advertising reflected this in the “creative revolution” (led by figures like David Ogilvy and Bill Bernbach) who shifted ad creative to be about being your better self. In this Era of Person, people bought brands because they wanted to be like the people who used that brand or were seen to use that brand. Advertising became a way of expressing identity aspirations and of making oneself a better person. That lasted nearly 50 years and is still present in much of advertising; but beginning in the 2000s and especially after the financial crisis of 2008, advertising started shifting into the new Era of Public. In this time, the public increasingly looks to brands to stand for some purpose that serves the greater good, that helps to build a better society. To bolster this point, he presented global Kantar survey data showing a 2017-2019 rise from 51% to 65% in the percentage of consumers saying that it is important for brands to be committed to building a better society. Similar findings can be found in data from the Edelman Trust Barometer, the Conference Board, and other sources.
From this perspective, the trend toward purpose marketing was well underway before Covid-19 hit, but the disruption has made the trend more visible and acted as an accelerant. Ironically, it arrives at a moment when consumers trust brands less but expect them to do more in their public roles. Brands need to be seen as looking after their employees, supporting those in need, providing reassurance, and generally being helpful and informative about what they are doing to face a difficult situation.
Kantar's Cracking Brand Purpose study synthesizes their qualitative assessment of ad creative and the input from the one-on-one interviews with the creators of those campaigns. The lessons and observations are presented as a series of workshop tools, suggestions and questions that brands should ask themselves. These include:
Be yourself. The best purpose campaigns seem obvious because they are a reflection of the brand’s DNA going back in the brand’s history. (NY Times, Levi, and Volvo were offered as example)
Be about them. Purpose campaigns should not be bragging about the brand but should about the people you care about.
Involve them. Purpose campaigns do well to involve the supporters of that purpose in the creative development.
Engage in the cultural conversation. Be attuned to the debates occurring in the moment and engage there. Examples from Carrefour and Gillette were offered.
Walk the walk. Brands should not just talk but should do something useful related to the purpose they advocate. Better yet, give the audience something that they can do too.
Facilitate effectiveness through recognizable visual or audio cues.
Be in it for the long haul. Ad campaigns should not be crisis-specific or a one-off stunt.
3) The Confidence Trap: When Data Leads Us Astray [Khorus]
More data does make you more confident. More data does not make your decisions more accurate.
One of my favorite demonstrations of this situation comes from a study done at a race track in the 1970s. The psychologist Paul Slovic of the Oregon Research Institute asked a set of expert horse-race handicappers to predict the outcomes of forty races. To help them in the task, he presented them with a list of eighty-eight variables pulled from charts of certain horses’ past performance—things like the weight of the rider in the race, the number of days since the horse’s last race, the horse’s age, its total wins in the previous year, etc. From this list of eighty-eight, Slovic asked the experts to pick out the five pieces of information they would most want to know as they predicted the outcomes of the forty races. He then asked the same experts to choose further variables they would want to know if they were only allowed ten, twenty, or forty.
Each handicapper judged all forty horse races under four different conditions: they were given their top five variables for the first prediction, then given their top ten for the second prediction, and so on. Slovic was interested in the “stresses caused by information overload.” Would these experts make more accurate, confident, and consistent predictions when they had forty data points at their fingertips as opposed to five?
The experts’ accuracy in ranking the top five finishers in the race remained about flat when they had five, ten, twenty, or forty variables available (in fact, the experts whose accuracy decreased with more information outnumbered those whose accuracy increased). What did change was the experts’ confidence. When they had more data points available, their confidence steadily increased—despite, as we’ve seen, no increase in accuracy. “These results,” writes Slovic, “should give some pause to those of us who believe we’re better off by getting as many items of information as possible, prior to making a decision.”
The point of the study is not, of course, that these handicappers could have issued accurate predictions with any old set of five data points. Instead, they were at their most consistent and accurate when using the small set of data they carefully selected from the much longer list of eighty-eight.
As leader, the metrics you could come up with to track your team’s overall performance could be just as long as that list of eighty-eight, and possibly much longer. Your task is to think up that much longer list and then, using your best judgement, narrow it down to the handful that represent true success for your team.
4) Quick Hits: A few articles that are concise, important, interesting, impactful, and I'm not going to write long descriptions for them
‘It’s not as exciting as other jobs’: The child’s view of their work-from-home parents [Digiday] This is the kind of cute article I've been saving for a long weekend. Digiday asked seven brave advertising executives to take on another temporary new role — interviewer — and ask their kids what their parents’ jobs entail. My favorite was what Andrew Dawson's (CSO at Barbarian) five and six year old kids think he does for work: Kid 1: "My dad does phone calls for work." Kid 2: "Gets money." I wish, Kid 2, I wish.
Where has it all gone wrong? - Rory Sutherland, Vice-Chairman at Ogilvy [The Marketing Meetup] Coronavirus (COVID-19) has given the agency world a chance at a reset. A chance to question why we do what we do, and how we do it. In this comprehensive (ED Note: it is an hour 45, but we do have Monday off...) webinar, Rory shares his views on where the ad industry has got it wrong so far, and where the opportunities, therefore, lie to make the industry better than it was before.
The Secret Language of Logos [BBC Radio 6] I assume this BBC's version of ESPN 8 "the ocho". Share this with your mother-in-law next time she asks what you do for a living. It's interesting to see how the outside world views the world of advertising and design. Not good-interesting, but interesting.
ViacomCBS Faces Tricky Path to Super Bowl [Variety] They buried the lede like 9 paragraphs in: Viacom is touting the involvement of a wider range of TV networks in football this year, including Nickelodeon, which will produce a broadcast of an extra NFL Wild Card game aimed at kids. Don't bother reading the whole thing.
5) Department of Great Work
Burger King uses extra onions to equip The Whopper for social distancing [Fast Company] The “Social Distancing Whopper” features triple the amount of raw onions regularly put on the burger, in the hopes that your stank breath will create a barrier of its own. Created with agency Wunderman Thompson Italia, it’s obviously a well-placed joke in a country that certainly could use even the smallest reason to smile
From Licks To Kicks: Nike SB Launches Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Dunky Sneakers [Ben & Jerry] Ben & Jerry's is collaborating with our friends at Nike SB in creating this chunky rendition of their Dunk Low sneaker. With colors and textures that look like they came straight from a pint of Chunky Monkey, they’re the most euphoric thing you can put on your feet. Blue skies, bovines and green pastures all appear in familiar form, while colorful tie-dye patterns and bold text graphics cover the shoe’s insole and heel. Chunky Dunkys will be available at select Nike SB retailers around the world on May 23rd
Admit it, you miss your noisy office. This tool re-creates all your coworkers’ annoying sounds [Fast Company] You know what they say: Absence makes the heart grow fonder. At least that seems to be the case for I Miss the Office, an “office noise generator” that plays all the background noise you used to work with back in ye olde office days. (“Close your eyes and imagine you’re in the office. Beautiful, right?” the website says, encouragingly.) Sounds from a printer, the squeak of an armchair, the glurg of the water cooler; the chatter around said water cooler. From Berlin creative agency Kids
Diners discover that Pasqually's Pizza is actually Chuck E. Cheese [Business Insider] A Reddit user was surprised to discover that the pizza she ordered last month from what she thought was a local pizzeria called Pasqually's Pizza actually came from Chuck E. Cheese. A Chuck E. Cheese representative told Business Insider that Pasqually's Pizza & Wings is a new, delivery-only premium pizza brand operating from Chuck E. Cheese kitchens. Why is this great work? Because Mr. Cheese finally figured out how to trick people into eating those pizzas without being 5 years old and having the allure of video games.
Labatt Brings the Lake to Your Backyard in Summer-Themed Ads About Vacation [AdAge] Canadian brew Labatt originally planned to debut a campaign on Memorial Day weekend all about “how to do the lake right with Labatt,” with scenes of friends hanging out lakeside. But those plans were spoiled by the coronavirus, making lake-based marketing a little tone deaf with so many people locked down inside their homes. So the brand and agency Burns Group scrambled to take a new approach, birthing a new campaign called "Fake It Until We Lake It." The agency and production company Droptree wanted to avoid using user-generated content, a tactic that has been overused during the pandemic to the point where it has become a cliche. So Droptree directors Matt Miadich and Connor Martin put themselves in the ads, which were filmed in their yards, living rooms, garages and bathrooms.
Department of Bad Work
Twitter Users Slam Pepsi Poster Promoting A Florida COVID-19 Testing Site [Huffington Post] From the folks who brought you that Kendall Jenner Cops ads. Just click through you gotta.
Kellogg's redesigns Fruit Loops mascot Toucan Sam – and people are NOT happy [Creative Bloq] Look, we're all making questionable decisions at the moment (most often in our case involving repeat visits to the fridge) – there's just a lot going through everybody's minds right now. At least, that seems to be the only possible explanation for Kellogg's Froot Loops' decision to redesign its beloved mascot, Toucan Sam, into something entirely unrecognizable and, quite frankly, terrifying.
6) Platform Updates
Delayed Moves, Poolside Videos and Postmates Spon: The State of TikTok Collab Houses [New York Times] This is an absolutely wiiiild piece from Taylor Lorenz: “In L.A., if you talk to four people, one is probably going to have over 100,000 followers on Instagram. Even people that don’t prioritize social media have 20,000 followers from just being here in L.A.” That feeling has driven the rise of dozens of TikTok influencer collab houses: palatial dorms where the platform’s young stars live, work and hustle to expand their social media empires. Influencer collab houses are nothing new — several generations of YouTubers, Vine stars and streamers have lived and worked together since 2009 — but Gen Z TikTok stars have embraced them to an extent that their predecessors did not
Facebook launches Shops to bring more businesses online during the pandemic [The Verge] The shops, which will be powered by third-party services, including Shopify, BigCommerce, and Woo, are designed to turn the social network into a top-tier shopping destination. According to a Deutsche Bank analysis Shops could pull in $30 billion a year in ecommerce.
Twitter tests letting you choose who can reply to your tweets [The Next Web] It’s pretty straightforward, from what we can tell. It seems to work a bit like Facebook — you’ll see an option on your tweet that tells you who can reply to you. Select this and you’ll be able to limit it to people you follow, or to only the people you mention in the tweet. If you don’t mention anyone in the tweet, that last option will effectively keep anyone from replying. For any tweet like this, anyone who doesn’t fall within the permitted group will see the reply button greyed out on the tweet. Just give us a damn edit button!
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!