Why Planners Should Love Creativity

Creativity and strategy is like a game of chess,
only with less horses and more pawns

Now and again you speak to a creative who has the impression that planners aren't that fussed about the creative output of an agency. That disappoints me, because everyone involved should care about the creativity and quality of the work their agency produces. To me it is absolutely fundamental that planners both understand and fight for creativity in the work they do.

Look at the link between creativity and effectiveness. http://www.ipa.co.uk/news/impact-of-creativity-on-effectiveness-increases

Look (in the UK at least) at the ads that the public truly get involved with and remember, they are entertaining and creative. The ones that stick in your head. It's been said so many times that advertising is far more long term than we ever try and track, and the influence of a great piece of work far far outlives the campaign.
Think about the Smash Martians that over 30 years later are still influencing people to buy Smash and have created a gigantically long term positive association. If we want to change behaviour then what way is more exciting that to create lifelong positive shifts towards our brands.

Consider those brands that have made, or reclaimed their fortune based upon great creative advertising: Stella Artois (a tiny brand until the Reassuringly Expensive campaign), Levis (a brand stuck with dated perceptions at the time - turned around several times by great work from BBH. I know personally that there are many brands that I have bought purely because of a piece of great work. (Sprite - Obey Your Thirst, Tango - You Know When You've Been Tango'd, Kia Ora - We all adora Kia Ora, etc). Hell, the advertising for Sony Minidisc not only made me buy a Sony MD player, the track on the ad was the very first thing I copied over to it.

Let's keep reading creative books as well as planning,
strategy and behavioural books.
(I just wanted an excuse to post this photo,
it took ages to set up)

More importantly, people like entertaining, engaging and creative advertising. No one wants to watch 4 minutes of being shouted at. No one wants to see ads that are painful to experience. (I once sat in a focus group where they referred to an existing ad as noisy, crowded and 'stressful' to watch. How can you expect to change behaviour if the creative idea and execution tunes people out? No one wants to see 50 ads all made exactly the same talking about the same thing for indistinguishable products.

A key part of planning is understanding the people who buy the products we sell, and finding a better, more effective way to talk to them. If you don't understand what types of advertising people like, how can you expect to produce ads that they will engage with and respond to? At the very least we should be finding exciting new ideas to spark off the imagination of the creatives. Taking the right thing to say, the right audience to say it to, and then giving the creatives a platform to create amazing work.

Maybe it didn't happen this way, but John Lewis's Always a Woman Ad perfectly nailed their target customer and brand reputation in a way that you'd hope a planner crafted into the right brief. Tango's 90's work created a brand that was bold, brave and noisy, giving the creatives a perfect opportunity to create some amazing work; the sort of brand thinking that you'd hope was down to good planning.

Every good planner I know cares about the creativity of the work. Maybe we need to put more effort into talking with the creative folk and creating some mututal understanding. Of course as planners we have other things to consider, but just because we write slides and draw graphs doesn't mean we don't love great work, and we should always be clear on that.

I believe that if we don't help inspire and fight for creativity, we really aren't doing our jobs right.

You've Been Drenched

Let's start by saying I quite like the new Drench ad. However it does appear that the script idea is quite familiar...

Tango Drench Script

We want to recreate the effect of being Tango'd Rehydrated.

We take a documentary voiceover guy doing deadpan.

We show people in an ordinary environment.

The family is hit with fruit water

No, I mean really hit with fruit water. In a big way.

But it's not as good a tango rehydration effect as Tango Drench

You know when you've been Tango'd That's Juicy Drench

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/theWork/news/1066829/Drench-smart-hydration-people-CHI---Partners/

Famous Rob's Review of 2008 Part Two

Sometimes brands get stuck in their way of doing things, and often advertisers get pulled into that trap. This award is for those who have taken big steps towards freeing their brand from bad ads...

MOST IMPROVED BRAND ADVERTISING

Winner - Microsoft

Traditionally Microsoft have been the butt of every Mac owners jokes, and also of PC owners jokes. Their branding and packaging has been at best boring, and at worst diabolical.

Over the past few years though they have made big strides, and this year saw two campaigns that really demonstrate a change in the M$ behemoth.

The ads with Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld didn't change the world, but it really boldly pushed Microsoft into a new territory. Self parody is dangerous, but they struck the fine line well.




(US version, can't see the UK cut)

Then they followed with a more upfront ad, but one that actually makes Apple look a little like the bad guy. It almost reminds me of 'being number 2' (as someone, possibly Northern said this year), Microsoft speaking from second place; a remarkable change to what has come before.

I'd love to think that this will continue, and that Microsoft will keep developing in the right direction.

Runner Up - Toshiba

One brilliant ad, compared to... erm I can't remember anything else they have done since ello Tosh. A dull safe brand brought bang up to date in a few weeks. That's an improvement I like. Also shows good progress at Grey, which is more good news.



Runner Up - Tango

BBH, as good as they are; have always struggled to make Tango ads live up to the quality of what HHCL did. It's always lived in the shadow of slaps and blackcurrant patriotism.

Not anymore. BBH have embraced their inner orange man and woken up a dying brand with the wonderful Save Tango campaign.

Welcome back Tango. Can Fist!

Save Tango!

Looks like BBH has rediscovered its inner HHCLness with the latest campaign for Tango. After years of declining sales they have launched the save tango campaign; which along with a brilliant website, appears to wholesale bring back the tone of voice much loved during the era of orange slappers and Ray Gardner fights. (In fact they even have them as classic ads to watch on the site)

Its all done with tongue in cheek and with that brilliantly sarcastic yet witty voice. The opening video is magnificent, with wonderfully written lines like: "that utterly senseless and irresponsible act was to illustrate a point, that a much loved brand is being beaten from existence." and "Even local schools are helping out, St Enids has introduced child labour to the curriculum." The 'can fist' symbol is a brilliant bit of hookery.

Games such as 'click as many times as you like, the more you click the more you help us'; in which cans constantly appear as you click; are brilliantly done.

The soprano voice for titles, the desktop images with 'Rainforests can grow back, save tango', the Tangometer sitting at 'Up the creek'; its all produced and thought out so well that it actually does remind you of the brilliance of their past, and how sad it would be to let it go.

So people. Can Fist. Save tango, if not for the drink, for the ads.

Save Tango

Why we will miss HHCL... (now with added Blackcurrant)