Osama loves..

While Austria is preparing itself for yet another election filled with xenophobic campaigning, I stumble across this at Mark Earls’ Herd Blog:

Osama loves
Channel 4 does a little online/interactive/online campaign that tries to give people a differentiated look at Islam and muslims. The idea itself is simple: they are looking for 500 Osamas around the world to tell who they are, what they do and what they like.

Osama loves
Osama from Indonesia loves Mangas. Osama from Nigeria loves Playstation. And I share my interest in Astronomy with Osama the Imam from the UK. Who knew?

This is great. It involves people. Makes them do something. As Mark points out it is a textbook sample for a modern campaign. But more important, this campaign lets muslims portray themselves, instead of being portrayed by hatemongers on soapboxes.

Austria could use some similar campaign these days. We need more human faces and the realization that we have more in common than what separates us in to break through the label of “non-integration-willing foreigners” (bad translation of a bad term) and whatever that may suggest. But that would be an entirely different post.

They still need around 400, so if your name is Osama, or you know an Osama, join in.

August 13, 2008 | Filed Under Account Planning | Leave a Comment 

Stay true.

honest ed's
via Flickr by Greencolander

I ran into this the other day: Kevin Proudfoot talks Intimacy It is just a short list/summary which I found to be a pretty a good reminder of the golden rules of establishing meaningful communication with consumers. I believe there is no way around them:

  • Let the person know you’re thinking about them. Consider the user.
  • Talk directly to them. Eye level.
  • Enable and encourage them to be themselves. Let people reflect themselves.( (i.e. customized Nikes)
  • Avoid schizophrenia. Find one voice.

And then this washed up here and reminded me of the one rule to rule them all:

  • DO. NOT. LIE. Reminder: It’s the age of the internet, if you are not honest, it will resurface as certain as a celebrity sex tape.

What will be the implications for the Dove campaign should it really be the case that their images were heavily retouched? Other than disastrous? I mean, doing EXACTLY the opposite of what you claim to do. What were they thinking?

This does not mean I am fully convinced by the story, but the damage is already done because the Ogilvy PR person was not quick enough to say “WTF?! Who is this guy?”. “We have to check..” sounds more like ” I am not sure what to answer. Please stand by till I have made up the proper lie.” This is a symptom of an inconsistent story and in an interrogation room Dove would now be screwed.

I remember this story of an retiring politician (as incredible as it sounds, I think that was the case): he was praised by colleagues and the press that he never forgot a name, a commitment, a discussion or a face. When asked how he archieved that, he answered: “Oh. That was easy. I never told a lie.”

It is true. If you find an honest tone and message, communication will be easy. You will know what to do, what to say and you (or your press spokesperson) won’t have to remember all the lies you told.

 

Mai 9, 2008 | Filed Under Advertising | Leave a Comment 

Account Planning Tools Workshop Day 2:

This was good. I have not seen a planning process in a team like this in action. I had exchanged mails with George prior to the workshop and he had mentioned that this was rather about “strategy being about ideas that are stimulated and confirmed by research rather than strategy being something that emerges from research”. I get what he meant with stimulation.
It really was about laying out as many potential routes as possible before deciding where to go. Getting ideas for brand values, ideas for consumer values, ideas for consumer insights, ideas for propositions and spot the route through that multitude that hums best. The hardest part about the process is probably turning off your filter that keeps trying to cut away things.

I believe this can be exciting with smaller clients and companies to produce a useful platform for communication in a day or two. It takes an experienced planner to facilitate the process, keep it running and spot the nuggets. And trigger lateral thinking.

Another nice aspect of the seminar was meeting some of the few Account Planners in Austria. I can now safely assume that there are no more than 20 people that have Account Planner or Strategic Planner as their job title. And all sit in the network agencies lik TBWA, DraftFCB, Ogilvy, BBDO et.al. or work as independent consultants.
The bad news of this: the job situation is pretty dim. The good news: there is potential for Account Planning here and especially for the agencies who embrace it.

 

notes notes notes notes George attempting to pose as a strict teacher. Me and my Baileys Group Working in groups, everybody obviously thinking hard. 

April 20, 2008 | Filed Under Account Planning, Input | Leave a Comment 

Workshop Account Planning Tools - Day 1

First day of the Account Planning Tools Workshop with George Shepherd in Vienna. The few times an opportunity for training comes up in Austria, I have to be there. Even if I pay the whole thing myself.
George, who worked with Y&R, the Leigh Agency and Red Spider, is introducing us to his Account Planning Toolkit, a blueprint and set of templates for a planning process. A lot of hands on work in groups, with a lot of brainstorming and thinking. With his templates I found you can move the results to promising routes without limiting the broadness of ideas. So far, I find this especially useful for teams that have to bring up results in a very short time.
I assume that whole thing works a whole lot better in the real world compared to five advertising people in a hotel lounge, when the client is involved and the agency has done the homework.

The LeMeridien is pretty chic, the room with the name “Eternal Black” not as dark as it’s name. Just the typical hotel conference room. No photos, yet. Hopefully, I will get around to post some tomorrow.

April 18, 2008 | Filed Under Account Planning, Input | Leave a Comment 

APSotW Winning entry: Me. Yay!

This week started with a pleasant surprise:
Rob Campbell posted Paul Colman’s reviews on the presentations for the assignment on Extra gum. After short disappointment because I wasn’t able to identify my presentation from the feedback (see whole story here) it turns out the winning presentation is my entry.

To sum this up in short: Extra is the everything else gum of Wrigley’s. The brand is spread out to appeal to everybody, and also the vehicle for new products. My recommendation was to define Extra by leaving innovation to a new brand, and putting focus on Extra as functional gum that aids concentration, focus etc.

Personally, I knew that this would taken two more slides, but ten was the limit. I REALLY would love to see Assignment “I”: “Mental Hygiene” is perfect, sums up my positioning thoughts much better. In fact, I would love to see all the other presentations. It was always great to see where all the other minds went.
BIG Thanks to Paul and Rob for taking the time to a look at the work.

But, alas, back to work. The new assignment is up already online.

Hm, I can’t help it, but I still have a suspicion that there has been an error and Paul Colman will ask me to return my price.

März 26, 2008 | Filed Under Account Planning, Output | 1 Comment 

We can sell them anything. ANYTHING.

I have just started a new category: From Hell. This will be dedicated to showcase the highlights of Austrian advertising. It was sparked when I walked through the supermarket of my choice when I ran into this: Aha. Arnold. Prominently placed before the exits.

 

 

 
 

Wow, an Ahnold endorsed product…this must be good… Styrian Power… awesome! What could this be?

The secret recipe behind Arnold’s muscles? Steroids?

 

 

 

 

 

An Apple? Just how stupid do people believe consumers are? Pay 1 Euro for one apple, while two metres away you can get 2 kilos of the same natural, Styrian apples probably even from the same farm for 2 Euros. And some Ahnold packaging will make people do this? 

WHO believes this? Who of the marketing people responsible would fall for an offer like this themselves? Why is it that the conviction still persists that advertising can just TELL things and whoever hears BELIEVES them? Why is there nobody to stand up and say: “This will not not work. I would not buy this, you would not buy this and we know it. What leads you to believe that people in stores are any different?”

Are Powerpoint slides and business suits of advertisers that intimidating?

This is for real. They even have a website, but I am not going to link there. http://www.arnoldapple.com

 

Edit: A week later that thing is gone. I can only hope they went bankrupt.

 

Oktober 21, 2007 | Filed Under From Hell | Leave a Comment 

APSotW Assignment Feedback

Gareth Kay, planning director at Modernista!, posted his feedback on the last assignment of the Account Planning School of the Web. There were 6 entries discussing Mr. Clean and Gareth has taken the time give useful critique to all. Brett and Hayley were named winners.

Here is my entry:

 

  

And here is Gareth’s feedback:

Visually I think this is the best presentation and kept my interest levels up - good way of showing competitive clutter, etc.  I like the implicit call for brand humility.  But here I had a real problem in understanding your recommendation - I see the issues you raise but don’t get a sense of what the recommendation is.  What are the things you would recommend the brand to do? Just saying make better product is not the answer.  Some seeds here, but I would have loved to have seen the flower.

Yeah, when I put the finishing touches I pretty much knew this was not complete. I guess it is a limit of the format: 10 slides without any written coming with it. You just can not add everything that swings between the lines.

The recommendation really is that Mr. Clean should try become part of the process of cleaning. Right now, people spend more time with brooms, buckets, cleaning cloth than any cleaning detergent. The P&G Swiffers of the world come with those special brooms, while Mr. Clean just handed out a license to a broommaker in the US to produce Mr. Clean branded cleaning utensils. So you see what caught my attention.

I figured that a “New Formular!” would not really help. But a brand that would start saying “We work to improve cleaning!” and does everything to relieve us of the nuissance would have impact. Instead of that magical thing out of the bottle that never cleans like on TV, Mr. Clean should become a strong, physical support. Does that make sense?

Thanks very much to Gareth for taking the time.

 

 

September 23, 2007 | Filed Under Account Planning | Leave a Comment 

the deer now have guns…

the deer now have gunsDuring the Planning seminar in Retz Oke Müller of TBWA mentioned this quote when discussing how Web 2.0 is changing the marketplace. The image above has been in my head ever since.Of course, the obvious thing of Web 2.0 are cases of corporate bloopers. Company X tries to silence a blogger who dared complaining or pointing out a major error of their product. The Streisand Effect should tentatively be taught in Public Relations 101.On the other hand, my observation is that those beloved brands envied by their competition for their passionate followers are more and more becoming the prey of their users. Especially those companies that have been able to create a passionate user base. Of course I am talking about Apple here. The iPhone is a perfect example: Apple’s users DEMANDED a breakthrough piece of perfection. No less. The pressure on Apple was immense (in fact, so immense that they preferred to push back the development of Leopard). Compare Microsoft’s Zune. Who cares about the quality of that product? Who cares it sucks?Greenpeace’s Green Apple follows the same pattern. Users were informed, they cared about the issue. Anybody seen outrage on other bad performers on the list? Steve Jobs had to act.The more passionate consumers are about a brand the more they will demand.Your best consumer will be your worst enemy. The whip that pushes you forward.

Juli 13, 2007 | Filed Under Account Planning, Output | Leave a Comment