Which One Should I Choose?
Posted on: October 17, 2011
Coming up with great ideas is hard. Picking the best one out of three or five—that can be harder. Can we ever be sure that the other ideas we leave on the table aren’t as great as the one we chose? Especially if one or two other ideas are just as great, maybe even better?
It’s a problem everyone encounters, not just creatives. Planners and brand managers experience the same issue with strategic insights. No one is immune to it.
How can we be more positive that the idea chosen is the right one? Can we learn to know which idea has the best potential?
Here’s my take:
I think the more we work at this, the better we become at thinking of amazing ideas. Knowing which one is the best is a matter of guts and magic. There’s no amount of focus groups, colleague’s suggestions, slides, re-thinking, etc. … that can prove to us without a shadow of a doubt that our idea will blow up.
It’s become a cliché, but the Old Spice campaign was magical. Not even its creators knew that their idea would get this big, win them tons of awards, and permeate pop culture. Magic is what took the campaign beyond what they could’ve done. There was no one internally that saw this and said, “Yep, this is going to win and Emmy and be the most popular campaign on the planet.” It takes guts and magic to get past our own capabilities. It takes people outside of advertising to make it special.
I think the more time you spend coming up with ideas, the better you get a realizing which ones have more potential than others. How much potential depends on magic, but giving that idea the opportunity to flourish is our job. Great ideas are like flowers and people are like bees: They come and have sex with our idea, and then share their experience with others.
When I’m faced with having to narrow down three ideas to one, it’s better to trust my gut and go with the one that makes me uncomfortable vs. the one that plays it safe. I don’t always do this, and it’s a lot easier to say this than actually do it. A bit of false confidence helps in going ahead with the unproven idea. Those ideas reap the biggest rewards, and have the greatest impact on people’s lives.
Quotes :: 10/14
Posted on: October 16, 2011
“Deadlines are your best friend, they can become your creative caffeine.”
“Concentrate on the work and leave all the rest, don’t get caught up in the gossip.”
“Don’t play nice, bring work to your client that they didn’t ask for, that’s sometimes the only way you’ll get to do good work.”
“First lesson: help bring out the best work in your teammates.”
Bob Moore :: CCO, Publicis USA
My Fenske Poem
Posted on: September 30, 2011
I walk across the electrical wire,
my balance keeping me alive.
I tread up above the ground;
It’s a battle with my mind.
The birds antagonize with applause,
I peek down at the Earth below.
Gravity is my friend if I fall.
I will not fall,
I will not fall,
as I gaze upon the horizon.
I must beat my mind to the finish line,
if I am to complete the course.
The bird’s chirping stops.
They know they cannot win.
They know I will not drop.
Quotes :: 09/24
Posted on: September 24, 2011
“It’s all about test driving the product.”
“Have an argument that people can buy into.”
“You can’t have the world come to your event, so you have to have some kind of destination where people can experience it.”
“It’s not just about creating an experience; it’s about being there.”
Liron Reznik & Jonas Hallberg :: Co-Chief Creative Officers, Skinny NYC
Quotes :: 09/16
Posted on: September 19, 2011
“The job you want is the one you create for yourself.”
“Gameification allows for instant feedback and instant rewards.”
“It’s more about access over ownership.”
“Brands that work within a non-commitment culture can help enable sharing/borrowing of their products.”
“Gadgets are not devices. They’re gateways to experiences.”
“De-Teching is a trend in response to our connected world. We are making time for real world connections.”
“Detoxing from technology helps to strengthen our critical thinking skills.”
“Brands that tap into the growing de-teaching undercurrent will be tapping a raw nerve.”
“Sophisticated personalization techniques will increasingly distinguish e-commerce and other web brands.”
Ann Mack :: Director of Trendspotting, JWT
Quotes :: 09/09
Posted on: September 9, 2011
“When we work with cultures, we are meaning managers and meaning makers.”
“Very often we are listening to the world for something and then amplifying those things that stick with us.”
“Advertising people work as the riverboat captains on the delta of ideas and culture. Navigating us through it’s meaning.”
“We have to be the people that have to make the harder economic argument for the value we create.”
“Things like when Nirvana released the music video for Smells Like Teen Spirit, are ways for us to change cultures on a dime.”
“Gurus and archetypes are prefab marketing, it takes looking at your brand and it’s culture on a case by case basis to find meaning.”
“Now when we stand on the beach of trends we are tracking, it’s like looking at the perfect storm.”
“We need an air traffic controller like interface to show clients all of the cultural trends popping up on the radar.”
“”When we see something different and say ‘no’….it is now our duty to say ‘perhaps’.”
Grant McCracken :: Author of “Chief Culture Officer” and anthropologist at MIT
My name is Brian. I’m a 2nd year art direction student. I hail from metro Detroit, Michigan. I’ve grown fond of Michigan since moving away and I try to speak positively about Detroit and what’s taking place there.
Hopefully, I’ll still be in advertising in five years. It’d be a shame to go through all the money and energy spent at school to not be working in the business after just five years. It was my goal to become an ACD by the time I was 30, but now I’m not so sure.
Culturally, I want to live out of my comfort zone (Inspiration from JJ). It’s easier said than done, but it will benefit me in the long run, both personally and professionally. This is weird, but I think all creative people need to suffer. My parents make it hard for me to leave when I visit, because I live comfortably there. However, I take more in when I feel more on the outside. I wish I could have the best of both worlds.
I’ve thought of my exit plan if advertising doesn’t work out. I love to illustrate and I think an animation career would be lovely. When I was a child, I used to think the only job you could get, as an illustrator, was a newspaper comic artist that didn’t get paid well. I’m glad there are other options. Learning animation programs isn’t simple, but that’s why I love art direction, because it gives me an excuse to learn everything.
The more I think about it, I realize I just like making stuff. Sometimes it’s an ad, and other times it’s not. More often it’s how can I put the brand message into an experience that makes people want to play with it. I know I can’t do that all the time, but if it’s there, I’m going to try it.
Trying new things is fun.
Quotes :: 08/26
Posted on: August 30, 2011
“Attention is the real currency of the web.”
“People are creating apps to make content out there readable because online news sites are so terrible.”
“Social media is a cocktail party. Don’t be a douchebag and just blast your message in the viewer’s face.”
“We create ‘desire,’ not products. When you work in digital, you have to create products.”
“Nobody wants to talk to a brand. They want to talk to the people behind the brand.”
“When marketing and branding become entertainment, it connects with people.”
“Companies need to do more than just throw business cards in people’s faces.”
James Patrick Gibson :: Co-Founder and Creative Director, NegativeSpace
You’re an Intern. Be Dangerous. You’ve Nothing to Lose.
-Mark Fenske
I looked at that quote everyday for the entire summer. Even though summer is almost over, I want to still keep that intern mentality going back to school and not think of myself as a student. I think if you’re in the “student” mentality, you think of your projects as assignments. I want to keep looking at projects as “work”. It holds them to a much higher standard.
Our internship didn’t start this summer. It started August 2010. It’ll continue until May 2012, when we’re classified as “professionals”. Hopefully I can find a place that will let me live that Fenske quote.
During the summer, I felt I accomplished the most when I would go off by myself, to a place where people wouldn’t see or care that I talk to myself, and think. Ask myself questions. Tough questions. Then really think if I’m making any sense, or if I’m just plain stupid. Argue with myself.
Colin Drummond, Head of Planning at OgilvyWest, mentioned that Alex Bogusky believes any creative person needs to be a high self-monitor. Colin likes to look for the cultural tension that every brand has in it’s place in the world. That tension creates dialogue (good or bad) but either way, it’s get attention. It cuts through the clutter, which is half the battle.
To me, being a high-self monitor doesn’t mean watch what you say (although I can see when you’d want to), but judge your thoughts to see if they have that cultural tension. Does it make me uncomfortable?
I thought it was interesting when Colin says that he thinks of himself as a normal person. He uses himself as a barometer to measure whether he thinks an idea has enough tension. I think we all know when something is cool or not, regardless if you’re in advertising.
Thanks to everyone at Ogilvy LA for teaching me so much, and allowing me to grow through so many opportunities. It was an amazing time!
Working in large groups can be intimidating. Especially while being an intern. Normally there are one or two people who do most of the talking, while the rest listen.
These large meetings ultimately end at key decision-making checkpoints. Decisions about where to move forward. Decisions that can or cannot be the right one. What’s frustrating is that when arriving at these checkpoints, no one wants to be the one to make the call.
I’ll admit I’ve been guilty of choking when the time comes to step up. Sometimes I’m indifferent, so I vote with the majority. Other times, it’s because I don’t want to be the fall guy if the decision ends up being wrong.
While we all work as a team, no one forgets the key checkpoints and who suggested what. If shit hits the fan, it’s easy to remember who pulled the trigger. It’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t scenario. If no one says anything, we’re stuck in decision-purgatory. If someone declares a side, then he/she is taking a risk that they might fail.
Aren’t we taught to fail? Shouldn’t we feel comfortable with failing?
I sometimes have these out of body experiences, where I see the way I act in other people. I can’t stand it sometimes. It forces me to change, because I ask myself, “Is that really how I act? Because if I do, then I hate it.”
When it comes to decision-making, I should stop worrying about failure. Hopefully, instead of people looking at me as the fall guy, they’ll see me as the one who took a stand.
ADBC 
