Fallon Are So Busted

But if you really think about it, does it mean we should lower our opinion of 'Balls'? It's the same ad as it was before.

And after all, it's not the first great ad 'borrowed' from another source - Hamlet 'Photo Booth', Honda 'Cog' and Guinness 'Dancing Man' are just the first three that come to mind.

For me, the debate about whether it's right or wrong to borrow is not the right debate. Everyone borrows - Shakespeare ripped off the Greeks, and Picasso was 'inspired' by African art.

In my opinion, the debate should be solely about whether it works. The point of advertising is to sell product. If you borrow something that people know well, it won't feel fresh, so it won't appeal, and won't sell.

But if you borrow something that people don't know about, or change and adapt what you're borrowing so that it's presented in an unfamiliar way, then it will feel fresh, and it will sell.

The Return Of Guest Suit

Account Handlers. They’re always there. Making coffee, laughing at the client’s jokes… But what’s actually going on in their heads?

I’ve asked Guest Suit - a senior account handler at a Top 20 London agency – to come back and straighten a few things out for me. (N.B. this is a real interview, not one of those comedy ones.)


Scamp: You guys are supposed to be the 'make it happen' people… so how come in reality you behave more like the 'No' department?

Guest Suit: I can understand that it may feel that way to creatives. It's your job to come up with ideas, and inevitably, not every single one is going to be right for that piece of business at that time, so we do have to say no quite a lot.

Scamp: Why can't you just take the idea to the client and let the client be the judge?

Guest Suit: That wouldn't be doing our job. We’re not just there to jump up and down clapping our hands like seals when you show us the work, you know. In reality, the client briefs us on what they want, and they expect us to get it for them. They don't want us to bring them things they don't want. If we did that, we would quite soon have no clients. However, we do work for the agency – the agency pays our salary, not the clients - so we're always trying to sell the best possible work, that they will buy.
Scamp: Why do clients so often ask for 'more than one route'?

Guest Suit: They don't like to be painted into a corner. And they want the best chance possible of seeing work that is right. The fact is that what we do isn't a science. There is always more than one answer. One may be more right than another, but there are always different ways to go. It's a game of subjective judgements and the clients like to be able to participate in that judging too.

Scamp: What can creatives do to help get their idea sold?

Guest Suit: Lots. Collaborate with the account team along the way - take them on the journey that you're going on and listen to concerns, barriers and issues as they arise. They're unlikely to go away. Present your work to them in the same way that you would expect them to present it to the client. Give them the strategic rationale, the creative leap, visual reference, everything.Scamp: Do you treat all creatives the same?

Guest Suit: Probably not. After all, no one treats everyone the same way. There are people you like more than others and your attitude and actions towards them will vary accordingly. Friendliness and an appearance that you're listening and being reasonable goes a long way to getting an account team on your side.

Guest Suit's previous post

Americans Do It Better

This viral ad for the Democrats is way better than any political advertising I've ever seen in Europe. It's 4 minutes long but well worth watching to the end.



They just seem to have a handle on how the medium works. Unlike the most recent effort by our own David Cameron. (And if you get to the end of this one, I'll give you £20.)

Tone Of Voice Is Everything

Here's a lesson in the importance of having a strong tone of voice - you can get people to believe anything.

Click to play A Telemarketer's Nightmare

Thanks to Feargal for the tip.

Will It Blend?

It's been said that the most powerful kind of ad is a demonstration, and that if you can do one for your product, you should. Here's proof. Via Seth's blog.

We're In The Wrong Job

Yesterday's Campaign reports that Martin Sorrell earned £2.7 million last year. And two other unnamed admen (one at Aegis, one at Omnicom) earned £1 million+.

It's a lot of dough, for sure... but that's only 3 people in our entire industry. The BBC reports that over 4,000 City boys will be getting a £1 million bonus this year.

It's not fair.

Have We All Gone Crazy?

The most viewed video on YouTube today is a clip of John Kerry's comment about getting stuck in Iraq. It has been viewed 515,725 times.

That's not bad.

But what if you're not the most interesting thing happening in the world today?

What if you're - God forbid - outside the top 3?

The number 10 video is called "Marilyn Monroe on NCIS" and has 39, 218 views.

You will get more viewers playing out a TV commercial in the far north of Scotland in the middle of the night.

Are The PR People Writing Better Ads Than We Are?

Saw this ad in thelondonpaper yesterday.


Not bad. Relevant. With a striking and mildly funny visual.

Actually, there weren't many ads in the paper. But there was this.


Victoria Beckham, AKA Posh Spice, buying a dress in Oxfam (second-hand clothes store chain run by a charity). Now, don't tell me this is news. It isn't. (How come there were cameras there?) It was surely originated by Oxfam's PR agency.

And it communicates brilliantly. "Hey, Oxfam clothes are so stylish, even Posh shops here." I don't imagine an ad could do the job better.

Well, in a way this is an ad. It's got a 'visual', with a small 'headline' underneath it. (Oxfam... the new Gucci? The Oxfam marketing department must be cock-a-hoop).

But it's way better than an ad. For a start, it's ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE NEWSPAPER. Plus IT WAS FREE. Media spend zero. Plus it's under the radar. It's not ignorable like ads are.

Then I saw this. Page 2.


A stunt from PETA. Shocking, visually stunning image. Gets the message across. And there it is. A PR 'ad' on page 2 of the newspaper. Cost them nothing. (Presumably the ladies taking their clothes off were volunteers).

Then this.


It's a 'news story' about audience-members fainting during the movie Saw III. Yeah, right. Of course they were. But no matter, it's a powerful advertisement for the film.

Are the PR people doing a better job of promoting products than we are?

Is There Something Wrong With Capitalism?

Hilarious deleted scene from the new Borat movie, via American Copywriter.

Thank God for advertising, I say. How else could we choose between all those cheeses?

Is There Anything You Wouldn't Work On?

A Fly In My Soup reports that he has been asked to work on a cigarette account. (Last I heard, he accepted).

Would you?

His argument - and incidentally he is a non-smoker - was that if cigarettes are legal, then it should be legal to advertise them.

Are You Responsible?

>I was speaking to an old college friend yesterday who is one of the creative directors at WCRS and commiserated with him about the 3 review.

He told me it wasn't true!

He said the client is perfectly happy.

And to think I read it on the front page of Marketing magazine. I suppose journalists make things up all the time.

And why not? There's no come-back. The worst that's going to happen is they have to print a letter denying the story.

This set me thinking... how much responsibility do we ad-folk have to take for our cock-ups?

Traffic / Project Management: responsibility score out of ten - 10
If an ad doesn't get delivered on time, or is printed upside down, or all-yellow, there's no one else to hide behind. The project manager has screwed up, and is probably going to get shouted at. They're aware of this, which is why they all drink at lunchtime.

Account Handlers: responsibility score out of ten - 8
If an account walks out the door, it's the account handlers' fault. If a script doesn't get sold, it's their fault. Stuff not delivered on time? Their fault. Agency not making money? Their fault. Client not happy? Their fault. Actually, this score would be a lot higher, but they do have one get-out of jail card they can use. "Well, the work wasn't right."

Creatives: 3
Not much seems to be our fault, luckily. The only time the finger gets pointed is when we come out with a real turkey. Even then, you can normally blame bad clients, bad briefs, bad weather...

Planers: 1
Let's face it, if something goes wrong, you ain't going to see the planner for dust.

Would We All Rather Be Making Movies?

Probably.

Most ad directors go on to make movies if they can - Ridley Scott and Alan Parker being the pick of them.

Paul Weiland's record up to now is not so hot - City Slickers II and Roseanna's Grave.

But this week he has a chance to redeem himself, with the release of Sixty Six.

Apparently autobiographical, Sixty Six tells the story of how no one comes to a young boy's Bar Mitzvah, because it clashes with the 1966 World Cup Final.

Brand Republic maliciously claims that Weiland was stood up yet again, at the premiere, when the film's star Helena Bonham Carter failed to attend.

Though another news source points out that this was due to her 2 year old son breaking his arm.

Hopefully I'm being unfair to Brand Republic and they go on to mention this further down the article, in the part that's accessible only to subscribers.

Despite their cruelty to Weiland, Brand Republic is actually not a bad site. They are currently featuring the very interesting brain shop ad from Mother.

No Justice In The World

Marketing magazine reports that mobile network 3 is conducting "a major review of its brand strategy" which could lead to it putting its £39m account - currently held by WCRS - up for pitch.

Is this fair?

I'll answer that. No.

WCRS totally rescued that brand. And their advertising for it has been consistently brilliant (see latest example below)



So why the "if it ain't broke, fix it" approach?

The only conclusion one can draw is that the creative work - the actual ads - is just a small part of what matters to clients. We creatives are (sadly) very small cogs in one big big wheel. Or onion. Or pyramid. Or something.

P.S. surprise surprise the review is being led by "director of brand and marketing communications Gary Pepler, who joined the company in June".

That's right.

The first rule of advertising: new client=new agency.

Despite the fact that most great campaigns are the result of long-term agency/client collaborations, that survive many changes at each end (e.g. Economist, Volkswagen, Nike etc).

Blogosphere Welcomes Director

First it was digital types.

Then planners.

Finally, a few creatives began to blog.

But now I'm very happy to be able to announce the first blog (that I know of) by a commercials director.

It's called A Fly In My Soup and not only is it very amusing, it also provides essential insight into the mind of a top director.

(He's pretty good - here's one of his films.)

Flintham & McLeod Split

One of Flintham & McLeod's greatest hits

Campaign reports that Andy McLeod is leaving Fallon, to become a commercials director.

Scamp wishes him all the best.

McLeod and his long-time partner Richard Flintham were arguably the best creative team in the UK over the last 15 years (other contenders... Paul Belford & Nigel Roberts... Tom Carty & Walter Campbell?) and they were superb creative directors too.

Yes, there had been rumours for a long time that they weren't getting along. (These were always denied).

Perhaps they were getting along, and the Campaign story is true, and Andy just wanted a new challenge.

Who knows what really goes on inside a team...

I quite often get comments or e-mails asking 'what is the secret of a great creative partnership?'

The conventional view is it's:

1. Two people who get on well
2. Two people who have the same view of advertising
3. Two people who share the same goals

On the other hand, you could argue that the two members of a team should be very different. After all, if they think the same, why have two of them?

The cynical view is that a creative team consists of:

Two people, of whom only one can draw
or One thinker and one talker
or One writer and one pacer
or Two people called Matt & Phil, Matt & Steve, Matt & Pete, Pete & Steve, or Phil & Steve

The analogy I always make is that a creative partnership is like a marriage, and just as there are many different types of successful marriages, there are many different types of successful creative partnership.

In the end, all one can say is that the proof of a good partnership is in the ideas that come out of it.

And Flintham & McLeod produced some of the greats.

Who Needs Media Spend?

As you probably know, Russell Davies won the APG Battle Of Big Thinking contest.

One of his points (as summarised in Campaign yesterday) was: "the genius of the original brief Wieden & Kennedy got from Honda was 'We want to pass Volkswagen in sales and reduce media spend every year'... the corollary of this is that you eventually get to a media spend of zero."

Bizarre?

It immediately took me back to last week, when the Nike/Rooney poster won Gold at Campaign Poster.

The poster only ran once.

But it got millions of pounds worth of free media, making the sports pages of every British newspaper, even the front pages of some - one or two even printed it as a pull-out poster for their readers.

So maybe Russell is right.

If he is, then let's face it, this is the best news of the year for us creatives.

If media spend is going to go right down, clients will need more creativity, so their brands can capture people's attention using less money, instead of ramming a dull message repeatedly down our throats.

P.S. at the end of his talk, Russell apparently played We Are The Champions and said something along the lines of how it is planners not creative directors who are the future of creativity. Okay. Let's lock Russell and his big-domed buddies in in a room with a few layout pads and magic markers and see if they come out with the next Wayne Rooney poster or Honda 'Grrr', shall we? Hmmm? Shall we?

Sign Awakens Grammar Fascism

So go ahead and apologise then.

(spotted in Soho, London)

New Sony Bravia Ad

So is it any good?

Faulty Product

I saw Flightplan on DVD last night. (Wait! This will become relevant, I promise).

In case you don't know the plot of the film, IMDB sums it up thus: "A bereaved woman and her daughter are flying home from Berlin to America. At 30,000 feet the child vanishes and nobody admits she was ever on that plane."

The premise sounds intriguing, and that's what hooked me in to renting it. But the execution is very poor.

One reviewer (again on IMDB) comments that: "the plot ultimately makes no internal sense... you find yourself sitting in the theater snorting at the improbability of what's happening. The big twist that's supposed to shock doesn't make sense."

Another says: "the fantastical, convoluted storyline cannot be realistically reconciled. I left the theater feeling somewhat cheated... the more you think back, the more you become frustrated with how inconceivable the whole charade was"

A third reviewer, listing the plot holes, reckons "we may have some sort of record."

So my question is... could any brand get away with being so bad? Could any product (other than perhaps a book) be released that was so unfit for purpose?

How come we tolerate movies that are poorly made - basically defective - and fail to entertain us, whereas we are quick to complain about a glue that doesn't stick or a battery that won't power a torch?

Here They Are

Yesterday I asked "where are the creatives who blog?"

Well, you already know about Copyranter and American Copywriter.

Here are four 'new' ones.

1. onewomanrunning has started fake it until you make it. Today, she ponders the etiquette of eating lunch at your desk in an open plan office, wondering "are crisps allowed?" She worries about "being extra noisy". onewomanrunning is an aspirant creative, so we wish her the best of luck in breaking into our wonderful feet-up-on-the-desk world.

2. Lazbash, another aspirant, is a self-confessed art director, and newcomer to the UK. He provides this wonderfully odd clip, on his blog whatamidoing?

3. Joao and James, yet another start-up team, have created AdBook, which even (cleverly) links to their very promising portfolio.

4. Finally, do have a look at diablogue, whose co-writer is a regular and valued commenter here called Sean. Sean is digital creative director at Saatchi & Saatchi Sydney. His blog is stuffed full of gems. Here is just one - an advert for a design book.