NORTHERN PLANNER

It's amazing how folks talk about post truth and fake news, because when it comes to persuading people, facts have always been a bit useless.

Fox Mulder from the X-Files was on to something. It's about the desire for something to be right, no more, no less.

It's a bitter truth about people that we make up our mind and then find the facts to fit. Blame evolution, no one had time to evaluate the evidence of being eaten by a Sabre Tooth Tiger, they just saw big teeth and claws and legged it.

Mostly, we decide things based on a long build up of experience, frame of reference and general world view. Facts are simply used to fit what we already believe or what we already want.

Worth thinking about when you navigate your own life, you won't change people's minds however good your evidence, in fact, you'll probably reinforce their beliefs. It takes a much longer build up of experiences, references and general change of world view…and changing how they feel before you change what they believe.

Which makes the role of a planner a hell of a lot more complicated than the textbooks would have you believe. Most research is, of course, a waste of time because what people do is very different to what they say.

But the role of research in dirty planning is also a waste of time. You know, making the research make the ideas, plan or whatever easy to buy. Because if the facts don't fit with what the client believes, they'll reject your thinking. Just as creatives, media buyers, suits or whoever else will reject your carefully developed, insight based strategy and briefing if it's at odds with what they have in mind.

It also means the role of value propositions in advertising, and reasoned arguments in general are waste of time with target audiences. No will believe you if they want to.

In other words, you have to be a lot more cunning.

The role of a planner and the role of most advertising is making people want to believe things, or think things without knowing they do. Clients, consumers, everyone.

Don't make the mistake of finding out what people think and then trying to change their mind, make it easy for them by finding out what they WANT to believe, or what they want to do, and making that fit your own agenda.

It's why most advertising works in the long term. It's not just that people are light buyers and so on, it's that changing what people think and how they feel about something takes time.

Or in the case of short term response stuff, getting the hell out the way and getting people who have already decided to buy to do it now.

It's why the most efficient predictor or advertising effectiveness is likeability. If you really like the ads, you'll then find the facts to fit why you want to buy stuff.

It's why borrowed interest, cultural appropriation and sponsorship can be so powerful. If it's familiar and fits with what we know, but retains just enough novelty, we'll give it a go.

Of course, now I've told you all this, you'll want to believe the opposite.

Tricky isn't it?