A lovely piece of creative for The History Channel, executed here in a platform poster on the London Underground. It's promoting a new show called "Just Another Day", in which presenter Adam Hart-Davis investigates the history of everyday objects. The copy - which parodies a long-running Gillette campaign - is as sharp as a razor. And the art direction is a joy too.Wednesday, September 19, 2007
A lovely piece of creative for The History Channel, executed here in a platform poster on the London Underground. It's promoting a new show called "Just Another Day", in which presenter Adam Hart-Davis investigates the history of everyday objects. The copy - which parodies a long-running Gillette campaign - is as sharp as a razor. And the art direction is a joy too.Friday, August 31, 2007
Smashing read: Sam Delaney captures the spirit of London's adworld in the 60s, 70s and 80s.Back to the 70s for Life on Mars
If you’d arrived from another planet and were hovering above London’s Soho sometime during the mid 1970s, you might have been surprised to see a group of young, drunken and immensely wealthy humans having the time of their lives. These Bacchanalian admen had forged a revolution in their industry and had broken the monopoly of the suits and straight men who’d previously guarded client relationships on the golf course. As they experimented with their creative craft (and a number of illegal substances), they found themselves inventing ads about Martians in spacecraft. The Martians, however, weren’t interested in the admen. They were more concerned about potatoes.
Confused? Well, it’s time to take a look at Sam Delaney’s highly entertaining book Get Smashed, which documents the antics of the adworld from the buttoned-down days of the early 1960s, through to the hedonism of the 70s and the gluttony of the 80s, when the Saatchi brothers actually believed they were about to purchase the Midland Bank.
There were two truly influential agencies in the transitional period of the 1960s. The first was Doyle Dane Bernbach in New York City, which is perhaps best remembered for selling the Nazis’ favourite car – the Volkswagen – to an American nation that had been happily shooting Nazis a couple of decades previous. The other agency was London’s Collett Dickinson Pearce. Both traded in single-minded ideas, strong art direction and an unshakeable belief in the creative product. CDP were so certain of their proposals that they only ever took one concept to a client, who could choose to take it or leave it. Few agencies today would be so bold.
I was talking recently to Glenn Tutssel, Executive Creative Director of branding agency Enterprise IG, who’s been kind enough to host some of my students on a few occasions now. In his view, it’s only big ideas that are truly memorable. If something’s big enough and strong enough, it’s the kind of thing that you can sum up to a friend in a sentence the next day. An example he gives is the famous poster from Jeremy Sinclair at Cramer Saatchi who’d been briefed back in the 1970s to promote sex education on behalf of the government. His picture of a man with a bulging stomach was accompanied by the line “Would you be more careful if it was you who got pregnant?” Tutssel rightly makes the point that this idea stands the test of time. Take away the 70s haircut and cardigan and the basic premise is still incredibly strong. And when you mention the advertisement to a friend, it’s simple. It’s the poster of “the pregnant bloke..”
Another strong theme of Delaney’s book is the way in which advertising was a training ground for luminaries of the movie industry such as Alan Parker and Ridley Scott. This was an era in which advertising ceased to be a science and took on a new artistic and cultural significance. People were exploring and experimenting. Perhaps that’s why the story is packed full of outrageous anecdotes of transvestite chauffeurs, wanton acts of violence and Serbo-Croat account handlers who’d only ever address fellow agency staff in Ancient Greek. I’m sure it all happened, just the way they said it did. Unfortunately, I arrived a generation too late.
Confused? Well, it’s time to take a look at Sam Delaney’s highly entertaining book Get Smashed, which documents the antics of the adworld from the buttoned-down days of the early 1960s, through to the hedonism of the 70s and the gluttony of the 80s, when the Saatchi brothers actually believed they were about to purchase the Midland Bank.
There were two truly influential agencies in the transitional period of the 1960s. The first was Doyle Dane Bernbach in New York City, which is perhaps best remembered for selling the Nazis’ favourite car – the Volkswagen – to an American nation that had been happily shooting Nazis a couple of decades previous. The other agency was London’s Collett Dickinson Pearce. Both traded in single-minded ideas, strong art direction and an unshakeable belief in the creative product. CDP were so certain of their proposals that they only ever took one concept to a client, who could choose to take it or leave it. Few agencies today would be so bold.
I was talking recently to Glenn Tutssel, Executive Creative Director of branding agency Enterprise IG, who’s been kind enough to host some of my students on a few occasions now. In his view, it’s only big ideas that are truly memorable. If something’s big enough and strong enough, it’s the kind of thing that you can sum up to a friend in a sentence the next day. An example he gives is the famous poster from Jeremy Sinclair at Cramer Saatchi who’d been briefed back in the 1970s to promote sex education on behalf of the government. His picture of a man with a bulging stomach was accompanied by the line “Would you be more careful if it was you who got pregnant?” Tutssel rightly makes the point that this idea stands the test of time. Take away the 70s haircut and cardigan and the basic premise is still incredibly strong. And when you mention the advertisement to a friend, it’s simple. It’s the poster of “the pregnant bloke..”
Another strong theme of Delaney’s book is the way in which advertising was a training ground for luminaries of the movie industry such as Alan Parker and Ridley Scott. This was an era in which advertising ceased to be a science and took on a new artistic and cultural significance. People were exploring and experimenting. Perhaps that’s why the story is packed full of outrageous anecdotes of transvestite chauffeurs, wanton acts of violence and Serbo-Croat account handlers who’d only ever address fellow agency staff in Ancient Greek. I’m sure it all happened, just the way they said it did. Unfortunately, I arrived a generation too late.
© Phil Woodford, 2007. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford lectures in copywriting and creative writing at University of the Arts London.
Get smashed: the story of the men who made the adverts that changed our lives by Sam Delaney is published by Hodder & Stoughton: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Get-Smashed-Story-Adverts-Changed/dp/0340922508/ref=sr_1_1/026-0379973-1636424?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188515810&sr=1-1
Monday, May 28, 2007
Word up
Who’s the daddy? The copywriter or the art director? It’s a battle familiar to anyone who’s worked in an agency environment. Designers are notoriously frustrated by the inability of their writing partners to contain their purple prose and horrified when 50 words of lorem ipsum in a dummy press ad become 150 a week later. The scribes, on the other hand, want as much freedom to express themselves as their artistic colleagues. After all, how difficult can it be to change a layout?
In the early days of advertising, the copywriter was definitely 1-0 up. That’s because the whole idea of art direction was actually only borrowed from the movie industry at a later stage. Yes, design was recognised to be important, but it wasn’t institutionalised within agencies. In a world where traditional press dominated, it was something that was often left to staff members on newspapers and magazines, who tended to have very conservative ideas. By the 1920s and 1930s, there was more understanding of issues such as the importance of typography in conveying messages to an audience. And with the later explosion of colour photography in print and the dawn of the TV era, the balance started to shift in the direction of the artists.
The old adage that a picture speaks a thousand words can certainly be true. I remember an ad for Frazzles crisps that I saw a year or so ago which contained no copy apart from the brand name. (Frazzles, for the benefit of readers outside the UK, look and taste like little rashers of bacon.) The ad showed a cartoon pig who was mistakenly sticking a knife in an electric toaster. It’s an extreme example, but there’s undoubtedly a vogue in this era of texting, email and truncated conversation for advertising copy to be reduced to an absolute minimum. The belief is that no one will tolerate lengthy, explanatory copy of the type that was common in the 1970s and 1980s.
There’s a lovely ad for Royal Ascot on the escalator panels of the London Underground right now. The upmarket racing event is known for its sartorial glamour and elegance, particularly in respect of the costumes and hats worn by the female visitors. In the foreground of the ad, we see a lady dressed up to the nines, with the brim of her hat shading her ample cleavage. In the background, a horse appears to have been distracted by the alluring guest and is glancing towards her. The line simply reads “Heads will turn”.
Hats off to the art director, because this is an ad in which design is king. It looks classy, witty and conveys an idea beautifully. But the three words - “Heads will turn” - are still essential. And this is a point that I labour in my copywriting and advertising classes. The very best ads are still the ones where words and pictures combine to create something that is more than the sum of their parts. An example I often show is an ad for a domestic violence charity in the US that was created by award-winning writer Luke Sullivan. It shows pictures of flowers on a coffin and runs with a headline that says: He beat her 150 times. She only got flowers once. There is a shock value because of the confusion between flowers as a symbol of romance and flowers as a token of affection after death. But it’s a confusion that is only created by the combination of the photograph and the writing. Words alone don’t cut it, because without the image of the coffin, we don’t have the association with a funeral. But the picture of the coffin on its own is meaningless in this context and doesn’t necessarily have a relation to domestic violence.
My conclusion is that copywriters and art directors have to learn to live together and will be much happier if they do. If they could manage a smile for the cameras in Northern Ireland after centuries of conflict, I think we should be prepared to bury our own hatchet. As long as it’s understood there will always be a need for some words.
© Phil Woodford, 2007. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is a former advertising creative director who lectures in marketing and advertising at Birkbeck College, University of London. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing’s Faculty of course directors.
Who’s the daddy? The copywriter or the art director? It’s a battle familiar to anyone who’s worked in an agency environment. Designers are notoriously frustrated by the inability of their writing partners to contain their purple prose and horrified when 50 words of lorem ipsum in a dummy press ad become 150 a week later. The scribes, on the other hand, want as much freedom to express themselves as their artistic colleagues. After all, how difficult can it be to change a layout?
In the early days of advertising, the copywriter was definitely 1-0 up. That’s because the whole idea of art direction was actually only borrowed from the movie industry at a later stage. Yes, design was recognised to be important, but it wasn’t institutionalised within agencies. In a world where traditional press dominated, it was something that was often left to staff members on newspapers and magazines, who tended to have very conservative ideas. By the 1920s and 1930s, there was more understanding of issues such as the importance of typography in conveying messages to an audience. And with the later explosion of colour photography in print and the dawn of the TV era, the balance started to shift in the direction of the artists.
The old adage that a picture speaks a thousand words can certainly be true. I remember an ad for Frazzles crisps that I saw a year or so ago which contained no copy apart from the brand name. (Frazzles, for the benefit of readers outside the UK, look and taste like little rashers of bacon.) The ad showed a cartoon pig who was mistakenly sticking a knife in an electric toaster. It’s an extreme example, but there’s undoubtedly a vogue in this era of texting, email and truncated conversation for advertising copy to be reduced to an absolute minimum. The belief is that no one will tolerate lengthy, explanatory copy of the type that was common in the 1970s and 1980s.
There’s a lovely ad for Royal Ascot on the escalator panels of the London Underground right now. The upmarket racing event is known for its sartorial glamour and elegance, particularly in respect of the costumes and hats worn by the female visitors. In the foreground of the ad, we see a lady dressed up to the nines, with the brim of her hat shading her ample cleavage. In the background, a horse appears to have been distracted by the alluring guest and is glancing towards her. The line simply reads “Heads will turn”.
Hats off to the art director, because this is an ad in which design is king. It looks classy, witty and conveys an idea beautifully. But the three words - “Heads will turn” - are still essential. And this is a point that I labour in my copywriting and advertising classes. The very best ads are still the ones where words and pictures combine to create something that is more than the sum of their parts. An example I often show is an ad for a domestic violence charity in the US that was created by award-winning writer Luke Sullivan. It shows pictures of flowers on a coffin and runs with a headline that says: He beat her 150 times. She only got flowers once. There is a shock value because of the confusion between flowers as a symbol of romance and flowers as a token of affection after death. But it’s a confusion that is only created by the combination of the photograph and the writing. Words alone don’t cut it, because without the image of the coffin, we don’t have the association with a funeral. But the picture of the coffin on its own is meaningless in this context and doesn’t necessarily have a relation to domestic violence.
My conclusion is that copywriters and art directors have to learn to live together and will be much happier if they do. If they could manage a smile for the cameras in Northern Ireland after centuries of conflict, I think we should be prepared to bury our own hatchet. As long as it’s understood there will always be a need for some words.
© Phil Woodford, 2007. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is a former advertising creative director who lectures in marketing and advertising at Birkbeck College, University of London. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing’s Faculty of course directors.
Sunday, February 25, 2007
If your brand were a person, what would the upshot be?
Later this week, I’ll be hosting a workshop for the Chartered Institute of Marketing in London on the ways in which marketing communication is changing. It’s a chance to give professionals in the field an overview of new media and techniques. Everything, in fact, from blogging and podcasting through to guerrilla advertising and alternate reality gaming. Should be fun.
While preparing material for the course, I chanced upon a brand called Upshot Energy – an American drink that packs a lot of power in a small bottle. Upshot have been doing quite a number of interesting things recently, including miniature rock concerts where they crammed a band into a tiny lorry and took them out on the road. Lots of energy, you see, in a small space. Passers-by could watch the musicians perform through glass panels.
Even more interesting is Upshot’s appropriation of myspace.com. Of course, they aren’t the first business to have seen the potential of so-called social media, but their page at www.myspace.com/upshotenergy is interesting on two levels. First, they’ve very successfully adapted to the milieu of the myspace crowd through their extravagant and garish approach to graphic design. Just as importantly, however, they’ve also managed to create a personality for themselves. They unashamedly declare themselves to be a 25-year-old female living in Santa Cruz. Just the kind of person, I would hazard a guess, who typifies their key target audience.
This reminds me of the kinds of questions that get asked at focus groups. If this car were a celebrity, which celebrity would they be? If this celebrity were a car, what kind of car would they be? Brain teasers like this are beloved of agency planners and market researchers as they often reveal surprising things that will never come out in a straightforward discussion. Usually you find out quite unpleasant things that you’d rather not have heard. What Upshot are, in effect, saying is that brands can actually become people on the web. All they have to do is act like an individual rather than a product or a business.
We discover that Upshot would love to meet Mini-Me from Austin Powers and trade blows with martial arts legend Bruce Lee. Her star sign is Cancer and she describes herself as a swinger. All in all, she has a more rounded personality than many of her fellow myspace contributors and you can’t help feeling that it would be nice to meet up with her sometime real soon.
Hey, maybe next time I’m over in Monterey Bay? It would be like so cool to call Upshot up and head to The Wharf and like chill together.
© Phil Woodford, 2007. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford lectures in advertising at the University of Westminster in London and teaches copywriting and creative writing at University of the Arts London. www.philwoodford.com
Later this week, I’ll be hosting a workshop for the Chartered Institute of Marketing in London on the ways in which marketing communication is changing. It’s a chance to give professionals in the field an overview of new media and techniques. Everything, in fact, from blogging and podcasting through to guerrilla advertising and alternate reality gaming. Should be fun.
While preparing material for the course, I chanced upon a brand called Upshot Energy – an American drink that packs a lot of power in a small bottle. Upshot have been doing quite a number of interesting things recently, including miniature rock concerts where they crammed a band into a tiny lorry and took them out on the road. Lots of energy, you see, in a small space. Passers-by could watch the musicians perform through glass panels.
Even more interesting is Upshot’s appropriation of myspace.com. Of course, they aren’t the first business to have seen the potential of so-called social media, but their page at www.myspace.com/upshotenergy is interesting on two levels. First, they’ve very successfully adapted to the milieu of the myspace crowd through their extravagant and garish approach to graphic design. Just as importantly, however, they’ve also managed to create a personality for themselves. They unashamedly declare themselves to be a 25-year-old female living in Santa Cruz. Just the kind of person, I would hazard a guess, who typifies their key target audience.
This reminds me of the kinds of questions that get asked at focus groups. If this car were a celebrity, which celebrity would they be? If this celebrity were a car, what kind of car would they be? Brain teasers like this are beloved of agency planners and market researchers as they often reveal surprising things that will never come out in a straightforward discussion. Usually you find out quite unpleasant things that you’d rather not have heard. What Upshot are, in effect, saying is that brands can actually become people on the web. All they have to do is act like an individual rather than a product or a business.
We discover that Upshot would love to meet Mini-Me from Austin Powers and trade blows with martial arts legend Bruce Lee. Her star sign is Cancer and she describes herself as a swinger. All in all, she has a more rounded personality than many of her fellow myspace contributors and you can’t help feeling that it would be nice to meet up with her sometime real soon.
Hey, maybe next time I’m over in Monterey Bay? It would be like so cool to call Upshot up and head to The Wharf and like chill together.
© Phil Woodford, 2007. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford lectures in advertising at the University of Westminster in London and teaches copywriting and creative writing at University of the Arts London. www.philwoodford.com
Saturday, November 04, 2006
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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
Sunday, June 04, 2006
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
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
Sunday, January 29, 2006
More power to you: 4-wd dm letta from BT is lolThe 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
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
Monday, January 16, 2006
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.
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.
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Breaking the language barrier: Alex Woodruff and Vanessa Cisz in englishtalk's Stuttgart offices.
Interesting discussions in the land of wild boar
What separates true entrepreneurs from the wannabes? I suspect it’s an uncanny ability to spot an opportunity or niche in the market and act quickly to fill it. That’s exactly what marketing consultant Alex Woodruff did when he founded englishtalk (www.englishtalk.net) – a business that assists German advertising agencies and corporations to promote products and services more effectively in the UK, US and other English-speaking countries around the world.
I travelled to Southern Germany recently to meet Alex and his colleague Vanessa Cisz, who oversee the englishtalk operation. Their offices can be found in an attractive suburb of Stuttgart, where German football coach Jürgen Klinsmann’s family runs a traditional konditorei (http://www.klinsmann.us/bakery.htm) and wild boar roam freely in the local woods. Once Alex and Vanessa are checking their e-mail, however, the romance of the countryside soon gives way to hard work. Englishtalk is linked with a number of leading businesses in the regions of Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria, but actually has clients as far north as Hamburg.
Often deadlines are tight and it’s not unknown to work into the night when an ad agency is preparing a pitch for new business. Certainly the service on offer – colloquial adaptation of translations, or the creation of bespoke marketing materials by native English speakers – is essential for marketers and advertisers. From a creative perspective, there are huge dangers in relying on a straightforward translation from one language to another. Even good linguists may miss subtle nuances. And it’s often at this subliminal level that advertising and marketing material actually works. Alex and Vanessa, who hail from England and America respectively, ensure that a vibrant and persuasive piece of copy in one language doesn’t become incomprehensible or tedious in another. More importantly, perhaps, they look out for those giveaways that sound warning sirens for the reader. Odd turns of phrase or poorly interpreted idiom.
And these things can be very subtle indeed. On a short connecting flight between Zürich and Stuttgart, Swiss International Airlines handed me some chocolate with the following message: “Two reasons to be happy: We are Lufthansa’s partner airline and we still serve Swiss chocolate.” It’s difficult to criticise the way in which these heart-warming thoughts have been translated into English. At a purely technical level, there’s nothing much wrong. It’s just that an English copywriter like me would have written the lines differently. The airline’s “reasons to be happy” sound a little too much like an instruction or order to the British ear. And the two joy-inducing facts are, of course, completely unrelated. Which means they’re better written as two sentences rather than one. Tiny, pedantic changes, but ones that can shift perceptions.
I’m sure the englishtalk business is likely to grow as more German businesses grasp the importance of native-speaker involvement in marketing. The result will undoubtedly be sales growth. And perhaps even tastier copy for Swiss chocolate.
Phil Woodford is a freelance copywriter, trainer and lecturer. www.philwoodford.com © Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Sunday, November 06, 2005
Where's the proposition? How cars, fries and bras have been defying convention
I was preparing a lecture recently on the theme of propaganda and advertising for the University of Westminster in London and it got me thinking about the way in which major corporations have become wary of traditional approaches to ad campaigns. I’ve blogged before about Volvo’s “Mystery of Dalaro” mockumentary and the “Life on Board” project, which take a surprisingly subtle approach to selling cars. It’s almost as if the in-your-face hard sell is thought to be counter productive nowadays. Perhaps the public is just too street wise? If we know we’re being sold to, we turn off. It’s therefore better to dress your commercial message in some unusual clothes. You can catch folk unawares before they dismiss your creative approach as commercial propaganda.
Audi’s “Art of the Heist” is perhaps the most elaborate exercise in this new ‘project’ genre and what they did to promote the A3 in the States is almost too complex to cover here. You can get a flavour at www.theartoftheheist.com and www.stolena3.com In a nutshell, agency McKinney-Silver created a three-month storyline involving a vehicle that had supposedly been stolen and then embellished it with movie content, multiple websites and real-time gaming that involved the general public. It all ended in an event at a Santa Monica hotel that was broadcast live over the web. Certainly a long way from the TV commercials we all grew up with. Whatever happened to the motor chasing its way through narrow mountain passes or skidding to a halt in the middle of the Arizona desert?
It’s not only car manufacturers that have got in on the act, however. Early in 2005, Americans were treated to the McDonalds French fry that looked like Abraham Lincoln. Blog pages and auctions on Yahoo! were just as critical to the success of the campaign as the TV commercials (see http://lincolnfry.yahoo.com/), although it has to be said that the television spots are beautifully written and directed.
At first glance, these campaigns seem to break some of the basic, age-old rules of advertising. Why isn’t the product centre stage? Where is the core, compelling proposition? On the first point, I’d argue that Audi A3s and the McDonalds fries are still core products, even if they’re ‘stolen’ in a make-believe game or shaped to look like former US Presidents. There’s no denying, however, that the classic sales pitch is hard to identify. The directness much beloved of old-school advertising executives has been replaced by something that’s altogether more touchy-feely. One can only assume that it’s thought to work though, as the budgets involved in some of these exercises would make failure difficult to contemplate.
When it comes to weird and wonderful approaches, there is of course a sliding scale. Some brands don’t go the whole hog, but still find an unusual and offbeat angle. A good example would be the recent UK campaign for Wonderbra, which doesn’t feature the product directly but concentrates instead on the public’s reaction to it. Experience WonderYou by clicking here. It may not be as elaborate as some of the other campaigns, but it does still defy convention to a certain degree.
American adman Rosser Reeves is credited with inventing the concept of the USP, which has served marketing professionals well over many decades. If he were working today, I’m not entirely sure what he’d make of cars that disappear and bras that hide themselves away. But to paraphrase one of his own famous remarks, if it makes the goddam sales curve go up rather down, it can’t be all bad.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
W www.philwoodford.com E 108th@philwoodford.com
I was preparing a lecture recently on the theme of propaganda and advertising for the University of Westminster in London and it got me thinking about the way in which major corporations have become wary of traditional approaches to ad campaigns. I’ve blogged before about Volvo’s “Mystery of Dalaro” mockumentary and the “Life on Board” project, which take a surprisingly subtle approach to selling cars. It’s almost as if the in-your-face hard sell is thought to be counter productive nowadays. Perhaps the public is just too street wise? If we know we’re being sold to, we turn off. It’s therefore better to dress your commercial message in some unusual clothes. You can catch folk unawares before they dismiss your creative approach as commercial propaganda.
Audi’s “Art of the Heist” is perhaps the most elaborate exercise in this new ‘project’ genre and what they did to promote the A3 in the States is almost too complex to cover here. You can get a flavour at www.theartoftheheist.com and www.stolena3.com In a nutshell, agency McKinney-Silver created a three-month storyline involving a vehicle that had supposedly been stolen and then embellished it with movie content, multiple websites and real-time gaming that involved the general public. It all ended in an event at a Santa Monica hotel that was broadcast live over the web. Certainly a long way from the TV commercials we all grew up with. Whatever happened to the motor chasing its way through narrow mountain passes or skidding to a halt in the middle of the Arizona desert?
It’s not only car manufacturers that have got in on the act, however. Early in 2005, Americans were treated to the McDonalds French fry that looked like Abraham Lincoln. Blog pages and auctions on Yahoo! were just as critical to the success of the campaign as the TV commercials (see http://lincolnfry.yahoo.com/), although it has to be said that the television spots are beautifully written and directed.
At first glance, these campaigns seem to break some of the basic, age-old rules of advertising. Why isn’t the product centre stage? Where is the core, compelling proposition? On the first point, I’d argue that Audi A3s and the McDonalds fries are still core products, even if they’re ‘stolen’ in a make-believe game or shaped to look like former US Presidents. There’s no denying, however, that the classic sales pitch is hard to identify. The directness much beloved of old-school advertising executives has been replaced by something that’s altogether more touchy-feely. One can only assume that it’s thought to work though, as the budgets involved in some of these exercises would make failure difficult to contemplate.
When it comes to weird and wonderful approaches, there is of course a sliding scale. Some brands don’t go the whole hog, but still find an unusual and offbeat angle. A good example would be the recent UK campaign for Wonderbra, which doesn’t feature the product directly but concentrates instead on the public’s reaction to it. Experience WonderYou by clicking here. It may not be as elaborate as some of the other campaigns, but it does still defy convention to a certain degree.
American adman Rosser Reeves is credited with inventing the concept of the USP, which has served marketing professionals well over many decades. If he were working today, I’m not entirely sure what he’d make of cars that disappear and bras that hide themselves away. But to paraphrase one of his own famous remarks, if it makes the goddam sales curve go up rather down, it can’t be all bad.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
W www.philwoodford.com E 108th@philwoodford.com
Sunday, September 04, 2005
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Trained by Jerry. Banned by train bosses.
Advertising creatives usually love to shock. And there’s no better way to prove you’ve shocked people than to have one of your ads banned. That’s why I was a little surprised that one of the younger members of our agency creative team seemed to endorse the censorship of a provocative poster from TV music channel VH1. The ad in question is promoting a show that airs in the UK for the first time on 4th September – Jerry Hall’s Kept (http://www.vh1.co.uk/vh1.co.uk/shows/kept.jhtml) To summarise this televisual trash in a nutshell, the glamorous Texan model and actress spends a few weeks vetting a bunch of hunky toyboys. They are eliminated one by one in classic reality TV style, until only one remains. This lucky fella gets to live Jerry’s millionaire lifestyle for a year and is handed the keys to a Jaguar, along with an American Express Gold Card. I’m still waiting to hear about my application for the show, which must have got lost somewhere in the mail.
In the controversial poster, which was plastered up around London by Viacom but taken down by bosses of London Underground, Jerry is seen at the bottom of a spiral staircase, presiding over a number of scantily-clad, leashed men who are down on all fours. The copy says simply: Twelve get trained. Only one gets kept. Jerry Hall’s Kept. Starts this Sunday at 6pm.
At a pure advertising level, this ad does exactly what it should. It catches your attention. It tells you everything you need to know about the product. If you’re advertising a TV show, you give the name of the programme and say when it’s on as quickly as you can. But you add just a touch of panache and style. Great examples include the headline “Parole Denied” alongside a picture of the cast of Bad Girls announcing a new season on ITV1. Or a picture of Kiefer Sutherland as Federal Agent Jack Bauer in 24 with the line “If you don’t have Sky One, you don’t get Jack.”
So where has VH1 gone wrong? Our young copywriter agreed with the tube chiefs that the poster was treating the pictured men as sexual objects. Presumably, this is felt to be demeaning. Her argument was that if the sex roles were reversed and it were women crawling around the floor, the poster would obviously be unacceptable. I wholeheartedly agree. But the poster doesn’t feature women. It features men. Men, I believe, who should be big and testosterone-filled enough to take this tongue-in-cheek poster execution in their stride. Even when they’re on all fours.
We live in a world where women often feel threatened by physical and sexual violence, earn less than men and struggle to make it into the top echelons of business and politics. In this context, there is a big difference between presenting men as subservient slaves and presenting women in the same light. The first is a joke. The second, for far too many women, is a rather too close to reality. Maybe I should never have studied sociology at university, but I find myself in the weird position of championing the feminist cause to a younger female colleague. Perhaps it’s one stage better than the position I’d be in if I were one of Jerry’s kept men.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer. www.philwoodford.com
Advertising creatives usually love to shock. And there’s no better way to prove you’ve shocked people than to have one of your ads banned. That’s why I was a little surprised that one of the younger members of our agency creative team seemed to endorse the censorship of a provocative poster from TV music channel VH1. The ad in question is promoting a show that airs in the UK for the first time on 4th September – Jerry Hall’s Kept (http://www.vh1.co.uk/vh1.co.uk/shows/kept.jhtml) To summarise this televisual trash in a nutshell, the glamorous Texan model and actress spends a few weeks vetting a bunch of hunky toyboys. They are eliminated one by one in classic reality TV style, until only one remains. This lucky fella gets to live Jerry’s millionaire lifestyle for a year and is handed the keys to a Jaguar, along with an American Express Gold Card. I’m still waiting to hear about my application for the show, which must have got lost somewhere in the mail.
In the controversial poster, which was plastered up around London by Viacom but taken down by bosses of London Underground, Jerry is seen at the bottom of a spiral staircase, presiding over a number of scantily-clad, leashed men who are down on all fours. The copy says simply: Twelve get trained. Only one gets kept. Jerry Hall’s Kept. Starts this Sunday at 6pm.
At a pure advertising level, this ad does exactly what it should. It catches your attention. It tells you everything you need to know about the product. If you’re advertising a TV show, you give the name of the programme and say when it’s on as quickly as you can. But you add just a touch of panache and style. Great examples include the headline “Parole Denied” alongside a picture of the cast of Bad Girls announcing a new season on ITV1. Or a picture of Kiefer Sutherland as Federal Agent Jack Bauer in 24 with the line “If you don’t have Sky One, you don’t get Jack.”
So where has VH1 gone wrong? Our young copywriter agreed with the tube chiefs that the poster was treating the pictured men as sexual objects. Presumably, this is felt to be demeaning. Her argument was that if the sex roles were reversed and it were women crawling around the floor, the poster would obviously be unacceptable. I wholeheartedly agree. But the poster doesn’t feature women. It features men. Men, I believe, who should be big and testosterone-filled enough to take this tongue-in-cheek poster execution in their stride. Even when they’re on all fours.
We live in a world where women often feel threatened by physical and sexual violence, earn less than men and struggle to make it into the top echelons of business and politics. In this context, there is a big difference between presenting men as subservient slaves and presenting women in the same light. The first is a joke. The second, for far too many women, is a rather too close to reality. Maybe I should never have studied sociology at university, but I find myself in the weird position of championing the feminist cause to a younger female colleague. Perhaps it’s one stage better than the position I’d be in if I were one of Jerry’s kept men.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer. www.philwoodford.com
Sunday, June 05, 2005
Go MK? I'd rather go to L.
Can cities become brands? It’s a question a colleague placed in my mind recently when she told me about the efforts of Milton Keynes to promote itself as a “thriving, cosmopolitan city”.
For those of you who’ve never had the pleasure, Milton Keynes is a British ‘new town’ created after the aerial bombardment of World War II. Uncharacteristically for the UK, its anonymous streets run in a grid pattern reminiscent of cities in the USA and the place is about as pedestrian-unfriendly as you can imagine. If you conducted a public poll on perceptions of the place, I guess that people would think of it as pretty boring and sterile. Which must be the thinking behind its recent reincarnation as “MK”. While Milton Keynes sounds 1940s and rather austere, MK is go-getting and oh-so-twenty-first-century. A logo and a website have been produced (see http://www.gomk.net/), along with an excruciating exhortation to local residents to champion the city’s further progress. The slogan “Go MK” is so trite and embarrassing that it’s only possible to imagine endorsement from earnest local government officials and primary school children. Or perhaps it’s a description of what happens to residents if they spend too long in the place? “He’d only been here five years and went completely MK.”
No doubt, some important folk feel that the abandonment of Milton Keynes is some highly original piece of rebranding, but I have to say I’m not entirely convinced. Has the local population really bought into the whole MK phenomenon? Because if it hasn’t, it’s very difficult for a few advertisements and web pages to make much of an impact in the outside world. It’s just the same when businesses rebrand. Unless the employees of the company understand and endorse the changes taking place, it’s difficult for customer perceptions to shift.
And as for originality, Milton Keynes isn’t the only town on the rebranding trail. Nottingham, according to news reports in early 2005, has junked Robin Hood as its symbol in favour of the letter ‘N’. A slanted ‘N’, to be precise, that cost £120,000. And this is where I think the marketers really are losing the plot. The brand ‘equity’ – to use a hideous piece of marketing jargon – of Robin Hood is rather stronger and longer-lasting than anything that’s likely to replace it. In fact, it’s been tried and tested for several hundred years. The notorious outlaw is not only well known in the UK, but he’s been robbing rich Americans of their tourist dollars for a while too. If the old boy’s bow and arrow ain’t broke, why fix it? The next step, of course, would be to change the name of the place entirely. Constantinople did, after all, become Istanbul. But I think that was after the fall of the Byzantine empire. The relegation of the local football club, Nottingham Forest, to what was once League Division Three isn’t quite on the same scale perhaps.
If cities need brand identities – and I suppose in this crazy, mixed-up, competitive world, they probably do – I think a lesson can be learned from the American states. Whilst some, such as Kansas, favour obscure Latin mottos (Ad astra per aspera), others like Indiana (The Crossroads of America) have gone for the compelling and self-explanatory. In common with any good advertising tagline, it does exactly what it says on the tin.
I'm off to work on a new campaign to promote London. It's called Go to L.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Can cities become brands? It’s a question a colleague placed in my mind recently when she told me about the efforts of Milton Keynes to promote itself as a “thriving, cosmopolitan city”.
For those of you who’ve never had the pleasure, Milton Keynes is a British ‘new town’ created after the aerial bombardment of World War II. Uncharacteristically for the UK, its anonymous streets run in a grid pattern reminiscent of cities in the USA and the place is about as pedestrian-unfriendly as you can imagine. If you conducted a public poll on perceptions of the place, I guess that people would think of it as pretty boring and sterile. Which must be the thinking behind its recent reincarnation as “MK”. While Milton Keynes sounds 1940s and rather austere, MK is go-getting and oh-so-twenty-first-century. A logo and a website have been produced (see http://www.gomk.net/), along with an excruciating exhortation to local residents to champion the city’s further progress. The slogan “Go MK” is so trite and embarrassing that it’s only possible to imagine endorsement from earnest local government officials and primary school children. Or perhaps it’s a description of what happens to residents if they spend too long in the place? “He’d only been here five years and went completely MK.”
No doubt, some important folk feel that the abandonment of Milton Keynes is some highly original piece of rebranding, but I have to say I’m not entirely convinced. Has the local population really bought into the whole MK phenomenon? Because if it hasn’t, it’s very difficult for a few advertisements and web pages to make much of an impact in the outside world. It’s just the same when businesses rebrand. Unless the employees of the company understand and endorse the changes taking place, it’s difficult for customer perceptions to shift.
And as for originality, Milton Keynes isn’t the only town on the rebranding trail. Nottingham, according to news reports in early 2005, has junked Robin Hood as its symbol in favour of the letter ‘N’. A slanted ‘N’, to be precise, that cost £120,000. And this is where I think the marketers really are losing the plot. The brand ‘equity’ – to use a hideous piece of marketing jargon – of Robin Hood is rather stronger and longer-lasting than anything that’s likely to replace it. In fact, it’s been tried and tested for several hundred years. The notorious outlaw is not only well known in the UK, but he’s been robbing rich Americans of their tourist dollars for a while too. If the old boy’s bow and arrow ain’t broke, why fix it? The next step, of course, would be to change the name of the place entirely. Constantinople did, after all, become Istanbul. But I think that was after the fall of the Byzantine empire. The relegation of the local football club, Nottingham Forest, to what was once League Division Three isn’t quite on the same scale perhaps.
If cities need brand identities – and I suppose in this crazy, mixed-up, competitive world, they probably do – I think a lesson can be learned from the American states. Whilst some, such as Kansas, favour obscure Latin mottos (Ad astra per aspera), others like Indiana (The Crossroads of America) have gone for the compelling and self-explanatory. In common with any good advertising tagline, it does exactly what it says on the tin.
I'm off to work on a new campaign to promote London. It's called Go to L.
© Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer. www.philwoodford.com
Friday, February 04, 2005
Channel 4’s Nathan Barley Campaign: it’s well weapon
If you’re a regular user of the London Underground, you will probably have seen the recent poster campaign for an unlikely mobile device called the Wasp T12. I was particularly intrigued by the headline. Apparently, the phone or gaming machine or whatever the hell is featured in the ad is ‘well weapon’.
The heart of this 36-year-old copywriter sank immediately. What future is there for an ad man unfamiliar with such scary street vernacular? I just had to visit http://www.trashbat.co.ck/ to find out more. (And, yes, you did read it correctly. That’s .co.ck.) On the site, there’s a chance to explore an alarming amount of technical detail on the T12. But dig a little deeper and you’ll find evidence of a highly sophisticated marketing campaign for the new Chris Morris sitcom, Nathan Barley, due to air on 11th February. The show centres around a young guy working in new media and the trailers are viewable online. It’s the kind of thing that will only truly make sense when we’ve seen the first episode. But I know that Channel 4 has already attracted at least one viewer.
Although completely different in content and tone, the spirit of the Barley campaign is very similar to the work being done for Volvo with the Mystery of Dalaro and the Life on Board Project. It’s difficult to find new and original ways of promoting TV shows and cars, but intriguing, slow-build multimedia campaigns often have a strong viral effect. I’ve told a number of people about Barley already, for instance. The website becomes the hub of the campaign, because it’s so easy to pass around links via e-mail.
Chris Morris is a highly controversial figure and I’ve no doubt that this sitcom will cause a bit of media stir. In the meantime, I’ve ordered my Wasp and plan to stream the programme direct to my handset.
Copyright Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
If you’re a regular user of the London Underground, you will probably have seen the recent poster campaign for an unlikely mobile device called the Wasp T12. I was particularly intrigued by the headline. Apparently, the phone or gaming machine or whatever the hell is featured in the ad is ‘well weapon’.
The heart of this 36-year-old copywriter sank immediately. What future is there for an ad man unfamiliar with such scary street vernacular? I just had to visit http://www.trashbat.co.ck/ to find out more. (And, yes, you did read it correctly. That’s .co.ck.) On the site, there’s a chance to explore an alarming amount of technical detail on the T12. But dig a little deeper and you’ll find evidence of a highly sophisticated marketing campaign for the new Chris Morris sitcom, Nathan Barley, due to air on 11th February. The show centres around a young guy working in new media and the trailers are viewable online. It’s the kind of thing that will only truly make sense when we’ve seen the first episode. But I know that Channel 4 has already attracted at least one viewer.
Although completely different in content and tone, the spirit of the Barley campaign is very similar to the work being done for Volvo with the Mystery of Dalaro and the Life on Board Project. It’s difficult to find new and original ways of promoting TV shows and cars, but intriguing, slow-build multimedia campaigns often have a strong viral effect. I’ve told a number of people about Barley already, for instance. The website becomes the hub of the campaign, because it’s so easy to pass around links via e-mail.
Chris Morris is a highly controversial figure and I’ve no doubt that this sitcom will cause a bit of media stir. In the meantime, I’ve ordered my Wasp and plan to stream the programme direct to my handset.
Copyright Phil Woodford, 2005. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
Friday, October 29, 2004
Suits you, Sir: the wonderful world of Mr Raja Daswani
Hong Kong tailor, Raja Daswani, always makes for an interesting discussion point at my copywriting seminars. I treasure an advertisement I found a year or two ago, in which he announces a visit to the UK and reassures lady readers that the men in their lives can be transformed through the purchase of bespoke suit. The language is curiously olde worlde and colourful, with phrases such as "fear not" and "significant other" making an appearance. At one level, I produce the ad as an ice-breaker, to demonstrate how quirky and idiosyncratic copy can actually be. The initial reaction of most students is to assume that Daswani is simply an eccentric and rather immodest businessman from Kowloon, whose grasp of English idiom comes from a formal schooling in a bygone era. Perhaps that's true. But over time, I admit that I am beginning to doubt this rather simplistic explanation. Could it be that Daswani is simply very clever in his application of advertising creativity? Is it possible that he - or those who advise him - realise that the more exotic and foreign he sounds, the greater the chance that customers will take an interest? It's his very eccentricity that provides his unique selling proposition.
A recent advertisement in The Sunday Times seems to confirm my theory. "Would you rather pay the same sum for a single, off-the-peg, chain store suit cut by a computer or sold to you by a spotty boy who thinks side vents are to be found on a Lambretta scooter, or for two bespoke, custom cut, hand-stitched suits, measured and sold to you by a man for whom suits are a lifetime passion?" That's a sentence and a half. It produces serious green wavy lines in the Microsoft Word grammar checker, as I prepare this blog entry. Not the kind of English easily constructed by a man who was schooled in strict rules of grammar forty years ago. More the kind produced by someone who's trying deliberately setting out to create a piece of copy that is exotic, amusing and memorable.
By the time you head towards the end of the ad, you get a sense of a man who is having some fun with the newspaper's readers. Daswani promises customers "the full Kowloon monty" and finishes with a real flourish. "It now remains to see whether the Raja revolution, with its inspired mix of artistic flair, entrepreneurial genius and digital technology, will see the end of the off-the-peg British chain store suit. On price alone, it's a sartorial solution that will even please the Suits in accounts." The suits in accounts? Suddenly, we have a level of colloquialism and wordplay that even many native British writers would find hard to match.
A quick web search reveals that Daswani is not only the chosen tailor of a number of British celebrities, but also running a highly profitable business. This kind of success almost certainly comes from nous, rather than naiveté.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
Hong Kong tailor, Raja Daswani, always makes for an interesting discussion point at my copywriting seminars. I treasure an advertisement I found a year or two ago, in which he announces a visit to the UK and reassures lady readers that the men in their lives can be transformed through the purchase of bespoke suit. The language is curiously olde worlde and colourful, with phrases such as "fear not" and "significant other" making an appearance. At one level, I produce the ad as an ice-breaker, to demonstrate how quirky and idiosyncratic copy can actually be. The initial reaction of most students is to assume that Daswani is simply an eccentric and rather immodest businessman from Kowloon, whose grasp of English idiom comes from a formal schooling in a bygone era. Perhaps that's true. But over time, I admit that I am beginning to doubt this rather simplistic explanation. Could it be that Daswani is simply very clever in his application of advertising creativity? Is it possible that he - or those who advise him - realise that the more exotic and foreign he sounds, the greater the chance that customers will take an interest? It's his very eccentricity that provides his unique selling proposition.
A recent advertisement in The Sunday Times seems to confirm my theory. "Would you rather pay the same sum for a single, off-the-peg, chain store suit cut by a computer or sold to you by a spotty boy who thinks side vents are to be found on a Lambretta scooter, or for two bespoke, custom cut, hand-stitched suits, measured and sold to you by a man for whom suits are a lifetime passion?" That's a sentence and a half. It produces serious green wavy lines in the Microsoft Word grammar checker, as I prepare this blog entry. Not the kind of English easily constructed by a man who was schooled in strict rules of grammar forty years ago. More the kind produced by someone who's trying deliberately setting out to create a piece of copy that is exotic, amusing and memorable.
By the time you head towards the end of the ad, you get a sense of a man who is having some fun with the newspaper's readers. Daswani promises customers "the full Kowloon monty" and finishes with a real flourish. "It now remains to see whether the Raja revolution, with its inspired mix of artistic flair, entrepreneurial genius and digital technology, will see the end of the off-the-peg British chain store suit. On price alone, it's a sartorial solution that will even please the Suits in accounts." The suits in accounts? Suddenly, we have a level of colloquialism and wordplay that even many native British writers would find hard to match.
A quick web search reveals that Daswani is not only the chosen tailor of a number of British celebrities, but also running a highly profitable business. This kind of success almost certainly comes from nous, rather than naiveté.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director and lecturer.
Sunday, September 12, 2004
Advertising creativity and the things that happen in supermarket aisles
"What if...?"
It's the question that all good advertising creatives have to be able to answer. When confronted with a selling proposition for a product or service, they ask themselves what would happen if they took the idea to extremes. It's in this zone that agency copywriters and art directors are at their most deadly and most innovative. It's here that they really earn their inflated salaries.
A good example would be the notion that the Danes love Carlsberg. On its own, the proposition is nothing special. But when you take it to its logical conclusion, the idea suddenly finds a new lease of life. If the Danes love Carlsberg so much, how might their adoration manifest itself? Perhaps they would marry the lager or send it love letters? Maybe they'd treat the brew with special care and attention? Alternatively, they might react angrily to the idea of anyone taking it out of their country. This latter twist was translated into some great television advertising. Once you've taken the idea to its limits, the scripts start writing themselves.
The latest Lynx campaign by BBH is also a great example of a proposition being worked through to its logical conclusion. A young couple wake up after a night of passion and retrace their steps. They find their underwear in the apartment, but have to wander the streets to pick up other items of clothing. Clearly they'd been undressing each other en route to their love nest. Eventually we arrive in a supermarket. Two trolleys have been left unattended, along with the couple's footwear. We've travelled back in time to the moment they first met. The idea is that you never know when you might need your Lynx. It's beautifully art directed, to be sure, by Nick Gill. But it's the leap of logic in the concept that makes it an exceptional piece of advertising.
I hope it brought the client out in a sweat.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is a creative director at a London-based advertising agency and a lecturer in advertising theory. www.philwoodford.com
"What if...?"
It's the question that all good advertising creatives have to be able to answer. When confronted with a selling proposition for a product or service, they ask themselves what would happen if they took the idea to extremes. It's in this zone that agency copywriters and art directors are at their most deadly and most innovative. It's here that they really earn their inflated salaries.
A good example would be the notion that the Danes love Carlsberg. On its own, the proposition is nothing special. But when you take it to its logical conclusion, the idea suddenly finds a new lease of life. If the Danes love Carlsberg so much, how might their adoration manifest itself? Perhaps they would marry the lager or send it love letters? Maybe they'd treat the brew with special care and attention? Alternatively, they might react angrily to the idea of anyone taking it out of their country. This latter twist was translated into some great television advertising. Once you've taken the idea to its limits, the scripts start writing themselves.
The latest Lynx campaign by BBH is also a great example of a proposition being worked through to its logical conclusion. A young couple wake up after a night of passion and retrace their steps. They find their underwear in the apartment, but have to wander the streets to pick up other items of clothing. Clearly they'd been undressing each other en route to their love nest. Eventually we arrive in a supermarket. Two trolleys have been left unattended, along with the couple's footwear. We've travelled back in time to the moment they first met. The idea is that you never know when you might need your Lynx. It's beautifully art directed, to be sure, by Nick Gill. But it's the leap of logic in the concept that makes it an exceptional piece of advertising.
I hope it brought the client out in a sweat.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is a creative director at a London-based advertising agency and a lecturer in advertising theory. www.philwoodford.com
Friday, July 09, 2004
Corporate giant kicks ass
Any good salesman knows that the trick to securing a purchase is the small talk. I've been out on the road with reps in my time and it's the idle chit-chat with the customer that often makes all the difference. When the sales pitch isn't obvious, we tend to be at our ease. And before we know it, we're parting with our money.
Marketing people can be just as clever as the field sales team though. Take the latest effort from corporate giant, GlaxoSmithKline, for example. The owners of Ribena have created a website called www.ilovemydonkey.com, which looks for all the world as if it's a teenager's homemade homepage. The graphic design is atrocious, with turn-of-the-century, clip-art wallpaper and irritating animated gifs. And the copy has a beautifully naive quality to it too.
"Hello, my name is Nick. This website is about donkey, my best friend in the whole world! I won donkey in a Ribena competition - cool or what? He doesn't live with me, Mum says that's because there's no room for donkey in our house. He lives in a special donkey sanctuary."
The only way to understand this site fully is to visit it. There are donkey webcams and family albums and goodness knows what else. For the purposes of this blog, however, it's enough to say that GSK are making the most of the mania surrounding the movie Shrek 2 and are offering lucky punters the chance to win a donkey in a promotional competition.
The make-believe website carries banner advertisements claiming sponsorship from a certain popular children's drink. And, as if that weren't enough, there's a link to a real sanctuary, which genuinely seems to have money pouring in from Ribena.
The site made my friend Ropey laugh and he forwarded me the link. It made me laugh too and I forwarded it to others. This is what people in Soho like to call viral or what most ordinary folk used to call word-of-mouth recommendation. The salesman is putting his foot in the door. We'd like to say no, but we're smiling and we invite him in against our better judgement. Guess we just liked the look of his ass.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director in London, England and lectures in both advertising theory and copywriting.
Any good salesman knows that the trick to securing a purchase is the small talk. I've been out on the road with reps in my time and it's the idle chit-chat with the customer that often makes all the difference. When the sales pitch isn't obvious, we tend to be at our ease. And before we know it, we're parting with our money.
Marketing people can be just as clever as the field sales team though. Take the latest effort from corporate giant, GlaxoSmithKline, for example. The owners of Ribena have created a website called www.ilovemydonkey.com, which looks for all the world as if it's a teenager's homemade homepage. The graphic design is atrocious, with turn-of-the-century, clip-art wallpaper and irritating animated gifs. And the copy has a beautifully naive quality to it too.
"Hello, my name is Nick. This website is about donkey, my best friend in the whole world! I won donkey in a Ribena competition - cool or what? He doesn't live with me, Mum says that's because there's no room for donkey in our house. He lives in a special donkey sanctuary."
The only way to understand this site fully is to visit it. There are donkey webcams and family albums and goodness knows what else. For the purposes of this blog, however, it's enough to say that GSK are making the most of the mania surrounding the movie Shrek 2 and are offering lucky punters the chance to win a donkey in a promotional competition.
The make-believe website carries banner advertisements claiming sponsorship from a certain popular children's drink. And, as if that weren't enough, there's a link to a real sanctuary, which genuinely seems to have money pouring in from Ribena.
The site made my friend Ropey laugh and he forwarded me the link. It made me laugh too and I forwarded it to others. This is what people in Soho like to call viral or what most ordinary folk used to call word-of-mouth recommendation. The salesman is putting his foot in the door. We'd like to say no, but we're smiling and we invite him in against our better judgement. Guess we just liked the look of his ass.
© Phil Woodford, 2004. All rights reserved.
Phil Woodford is an advertising creative director in London, England and lectures in both advertising theory and copywriting.
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