Manx marketing: Phil Woodford speaks at a meeting in Douglas, Isle of Man last month. The theme was the promotion of the island to investors.

How Sir Geoff Hurst scores for Germany in the world of location branding

David Ogilvy once observed that “people don’t go half way round the world to see things they can equally well see at home.” I was reminded of this pithy observation when I travelled to the Isle of Man last month on behalf of the Chartered Institute of Marketing. As well as spending an enjoyable couple of days at the International Business School in Douglas, running training sessions for local delegates, I had been invited to participate in an interesting meeting that focused on the question of promoting “Isle of Man plc” to potential investors.

Over the past quarter of a century, a thriving offshore finance market has developed locally which – together with the tourist industry – provides the employment bedrock for the Manx community. With an eye to the future, branding consultants and government officials have recently shot a video that demonstrates the island’s unique strengths, under the theme Freedom to Flourish. The approach is well researched and thought out and I wish them luck with it.

In preparing for the meeting, I spent some time looking at the whole business of location branding and some of the techniques that are used to encourage both tourism and inward investment. There’s no doubt that a place can become a brand in exactly the same way as a business, product or service. Its name and reputation can evoke a mood and contain a sense of promise. Australia, for instance, conjures up immediate images in my mind of open spaces, sunshine, a free-spirited population and a down-to-earth honesty. The kind of positives, in fact, that most global corporations would die for. The current “Where the bloody hell are you?” campaign doesn’t create these notions in our mind for the first time. It simply reinforces existing preconceptions and never finds itself having to work too hard.

Although it’s rather trickier to plot a creative route when your location lacks a distinct identity, the blank sheet of paper certainly has its attractions. It might be argued that if your target audience doesn’t really know who you are, you can become almost anything you want to be. Toby Chambers, Creative Director of the style magazine Wallpaper* was quoted recently in The Sunday Times as saying: “Cool destinations are those that people haven’t thought of yet. People are searching off-piste as other places become exhausted.” And there’s the added advantage that you usually do have something quite unique to distinguish you. Authors S D Jaworski and D Fosher argue that language, separation, diversity and experience combine to make something quite special¹. It’s not as if we’re distinguishing one model of PC from another, after all.

The reality though is perhaps a little more complex and restrictive. Cities, regions and nations are understandably sold largely on the basis of their geography, history and culture. And these are things that are actually fairly difficult to change. As Philip Kotler – a Professor at Kellogg Graduate School of Management in Chicago – has pointed out, you can’t easily swap beaches for mountains².

One thing, however, is beyond dispute. The battle to build brand awareness and attract visitors and investors is intensifying year on year. Huge sums of money are being spent. And some rather unusual creative approaches are being adopted. Prior to this year’s FIFA World Cup, for example, I was fortunate enough to win a competition sponsored by the German Tourist Board. One of my prizes was a football signed by Sir Geoff Hurst, the only player ever to have scored a hat trick in the final of the competition. Sir Geoff has played an important role in convincing the British to consider Germany as a tourist destination. The whole campaign – based around the idea of destroying stereotypes – has a quirky and perhaps rather brave flavour to it.

No matter how good the advertising and marketing campaigns, you should never discount the importance of individual ambassadors. Just as an employee may be the living embodiment of a corporate brand, the residents of the Isle of Man have their own part to play in promoting the Manx offer. On my short journey from Douglas back to the airport on the southern tip of the island, I encountered a lady taxi driver who engaged me in conversation. She was a university graduate and had spent time in the Republic of Ireland and also Switzerland, where she had managed a bookshop. She’d made a conscious decision to return to a place that she genuinely loved. And, believe me, there’s no better advertisement than that.

¹ National Brand Identity & Its Effect On Corporate Brands: The Nation Brand Effect (NBE) Jaworski, SP and Fosher D in Mulitnational Business Review, Fall 2003

² Mapping a country’s future by Randall Frost on www.brandchannel.com

© Phil Woodford, 2006. All rights reserved.

Phil Woodford is an associate lecturer at University of the Arts London and acts as a mentor to students on the New Creative Ventures course, jointly sponsored by the London Business School. www.philwoodford.com

Don't panic! Don't panic! Unless you're a creative who's run out of steam...

Leesten vay carefully, I shall say zees only wurnce: your World War II gags are becoming tired.

They do mention the war. And I don't think they get away with it.

The latest campaign from brewer Shepherd Neame for Spitfire Beer continues the well-worked Second World War theme. There is, however, now a topical twist. A relatively low-key sporting competition - which I believe the Americans describe as "The Soccer World Cup" - is about to get under way in Germany. To the creative teams on the Spitfire account, this is the equivalent of der Geburtstag and das Weinachten arriving at the same time.

At a purely technical level, the ads are of varying quality. They range from the subtle and moderately amusing ("Best of luck chaps - see you in Berlin) to the downright laboured ("England's reserve team", with a picture of Home Guard members on parade). I think, however, we've got past the point at which individual executions can redeem the overall campaign. There's a tiresome familiarity to it all now and a definite feeling that the creative factory is churning stuff out faster than a wartime parachute factory.

Is it all a bit of harmless fun? Up until now, the answer was probably yes. But context is everything. The British Advertising Standards Authority frequently rules, for instance, that a provocative or explicit ad is ok in certain media - such as men's magazines, for example - but cannot be used as a poster in Piccadilly Circus, for fear of upsetting passing infants, grannies and others of a nervous disposition. Here, we have ads that might be alright at another time, but look decidedly dodgy at a point when thousands of England fans are going to be descending on Munich and Berlin. Not all of these boys are known for their sophistication and sense of post-modern irony. And while I doubt that the Spitfire ads are going to provoke a re-run of D-Day on the terraces at Gelsenkirchen, they are not exactly the kind of thing designed to ensure cordial relations either.

I could write lots of pompous waffle about advertising creatives having a sense of social responsibility, but I'm not sure that it would cut too much ice with those who conceived the ads. So I'll just make this point to them: if you're going to stir things up in advance of the World Cup with references to World War II, you better make sure that your stuff is genuinely funny. And that you're not melting old saucepans to create your latest Spitfire gag.

© Phil Woodford, 2006. All rights reserved.

Phil Woodford is a freelance writer and trainer. He works as an associate lecturer at the University of the Arts London. www.philwoodford.com

More power to you: 4-wd dm letta from BT is lol

The first sentence in a sales letter is important. Especially when it’s the only one.

I’m launching a brand new course tomorrow at the London College of Communication that focuses on the mysterious world of direct mail. I cut my copywriting teeth creating direct-response ads and sales letters, so it’s a subject close to my heart. As a result, I’m always looking out for innovative new creative approaches and techniques. “Junk” mail is unlikely to go in the bin at home. The chances are that it will head to the filing cabinet or scanner.

I’m indebted to my former colleague Alice (who blogs amusingly here about her preparations for the London marathon) for a convention-defying letter that will be great fun to show in the class. It was sent out by BT in December to promote their text service that allows UK customers to send and receive SMS messages on their home phone.

What exactly made this letter different and worthy of comment? Well, direct marketing science tells us that long letters generally perform better than short ones. That’s why you see letters running to two, three and four pages in many commercial and charitable mailpacks. You need time to explain the central benefits of your product, outline your offer and overcome any potential objections. You’re not there in the room with the customer to answer questions, so everything they need to know should be written down in black and white.

But BT apparently didn’t agree. They decided that two pages would be too much. In fact, they decided that two sentences would be more than they needed. Their extraordinary letter had only one line after the salutation, which sat in acres of white space. It said simply R U OK? Some more white space followed and led to the sign-off from Jillian Lewis, the company’s Customer Services Director.

Now, admittedly they cheated just a little. There are a couple of short paragraphs in the place where textbooks would normally tell you to put a PS. The copy starts: “There are times when you just want to send a short message home rather than have a long drawn-out conversation. With BT Text you can now send and receive texts on your home phone.” The net result is that the sales letter reads more like a traditional press ad, with the truncated body copy acting as a headline. It’s very brave. And it works a treat.

I do, however, intend to teach my students some of the more traditional conventions of letter writing. After all, it’s good to know the rules before you choose to break them into very tiny pieces.

© Phil Woodford, 2006. All rights reserved.

Phil Woodford is a freelance writer and trainer. He works as an associate lecturer at the University of the Arts London. www.philwoodford.com

Why Bodyform's advertising strategy isn't working.

I obviously wasn’t the only person to notice this poster opposite Kingston train station in the suburbs of London. It’s a bizarre execution for Bodyform, which parodies a Conservative Party election poster from 1979.

Think about it for a moment. The 2006 ad is pretty lame if you don’t have a fix on the original reference. (To be honest, it’s pretty lame even if you do, but we won’t go there for the moment.) The Tory ad commented – somewhat ironically, given later events – on the supposedly high levels of unemployment under Jim Callaghan’s administration. So the only people likely to remember it will be in their late 30s at the very least. Probably more likely to be in their early 40s. Visit the Bodyform website and you’ll discover that – logically enough – the primary target audience is actually young women.

I daren’t ask the age of the creatives at BBH who came up with the campaign, because I’ll probably be told it was a couple of 21-year-old female placement students. They just happen to have a passion for British political history. And a habit of missing the target.

© Phil Woodford, 2006. All rights reserved.

Phil Woodford is a freelance copywriter and trainer. He lectures in advertising at the University of Westminster in London. www.philwoodford.com

The hired gun can't fire blanks

Once in a while, I’m going to use these pages for a little reflection on the whole process of creativity. Perhaps it’s a little self-indulgent, but the more that I teach copywriting and creative writing, the more I find myself pondering some of the fundamentals. My recent move into self-employment has focused my mind even more.

Although I’ve undertaken a range of freelance writing and training assignments in the past few years, there’s always been a day job – most recently as joint creative director of a London agency in the niche field of recruitment marketing and employee communication. Working in the agency environment four days a week, I got very used to the personalities and processes. Although the pressure of work can sometimes feel relentless in the advertising business, I was very fortunate to have a great many good colleagues that I knew and trusted. It felt comfortable. They knew how I was likely to behave and I had a pretty good idea of what they were thinking too. Sometimes, when you were brainstorming creative concepts, the old truism of being able to complete one another’s sentences really did apply. And there are undoubtedly big advantages to these kinds of relationships. People aren’t afraid to express their ideas, for instance. It’s also easier to pick up other people’s work when a job goes round the houses.

But advertising creativity is an oddity. It’s one of the few areas of working life where two people – usually an art director and a copywriter – are asked to work as a pair. Often it’s done on an ad hoc, mix-and-match basis. Sometimes, particularly in the larger consumer agencies, the relationship is permanent. It’s difficult to think of many parallels, apart from maybe American cops like Cagney & Lacey or Starsky & Hutch. These paired relationships can have their downside as well. You can get to know the people you work with too well. Sometimes this means that you don’t challenge yourself or your partner quite enough.

It can often be good to encounter somebody new who works in a completely different way. They can pose unusual questions and uncover unlikely angles. It’s a phenomenon I encountered at the start of the year when I walked into an agency as a hired gun. I’d never been there before and was teamed up an art director I’d only met previously on an awards judging panel. This guy is very good. But I’ve worked with a number of good people over the years. The thing that really forced me to raise my game was the fact that we’d never worked together before. He was seeing what I could do. In the nicest possible way, testing me out a little. Inevitably, I was doing the same. And the net result, I think, was some really nice conceptual advertising. As a freelancer, I can’t afford to fail, so my grey matter is getting an extra special workout right now.

My advice, for what it’s worth, to any aspiring copywriter or art director is to work with as many different people as you can. A little cosiness can help you magic up some really good creative work. But a little edginess is perhaps more likely to produce something great.

© Phil Woodford, 2006. All rights reserved.

Phil Woodford is a freelance writer and trainer. He lectures in advertising at the University of Westminster in London.