NORTHERN PLANNER

I was talking to someone the other day about the brilliance of the Internet.

If any agency professional was really, really honest, they’d tell you that they never know 100% how well something will work. With the Internet, you can try lots of stuff without a big enough, see what works and then ramp it up. Testing in real time.

But there’s a danger. Just because you’re in ‘test phase’ that doesn’t excuse slackness. When things can be shared and gather pace at a frightening rate, you have to be sure you’ve accounted for things going wrong as much as you can. When it’s out there, it is very hard to recall. A bit like the email you reply to instead of forwarding I guess.

That goes for bloggers too. You don’t know which posts will take off and which ones will be ignored, and it’s often surprising. That doesn’t excuse not putting yourself in the shoes of the reader and making sure it doesn’t needlessly offend anyone, or can be taken the wrong way. I think I wrote one of those posts today.

It was supposed to be about the highs and lows of working with people who have different skills and different ways of working, but it seems like it came across as having a pop at creatives. It wasn’t supposed to, without them, my agency would fall down, just like it would without suits, production or accounts. I just wanted to point out that maybe we should celebrate ALL departments a bit more and try to hold each other to the same standards.

But that’s the web for you, when you make mistakes you make them in public. So the post has been deleted. You live and learn.

I’m sitting on a train en-route to London. Last time I mananged to swing first class, and demonstrated that I was anything but by trying to pay for the free tea, and after realising everything was gratis, troughed free sandwiches and made myself ever so slightly jittery after over-dosing on the caffeine in all the free tea and coffee I availed myself off. Anyway…………

It’s standard class today, which is fine. But then I hear the latest snippet of ”helpful information’ from the tannoy. "Please be careful when alighting from the train, as the heavy rain has made it slippery". Do I really need to be told this?

I’ll be merrily navigating the Tube in a bit, with the constant reminders to mind the gap, and the at some point, they’ve decided to inform you what station you’ll be approaching and what station you’ve just left, despite the perfectly brilliant Tupe map and line map that adorns each train.

Whenever we drive, they’ve taken it upon themselves to tell us to slow down, despite the fact we all know the speed limit, to take a break when we’re tired, to think don’t phone.

How did this happen? When did we become a nation that needed it’s little hand held wherever it went? How did we agree to be pelted with useless intruction? To be bossed and cajoled wherever we went?

Of course, having reached the venerable age of 34, you may be justified in accusing me of descending into grumpy old man territory, but this really does feel like a cultural phenomon the right brand could get its teeth into. 

Someone from Brazil emailed me recently wanted a head up on planning and stuff. I deleted it by mistake (are you sure you want to take anything I say seriously?). Do get in touch, and sorry if I appeared rude, I’m just an idiot.

According to Adam Smith, suddenly achieving blazing success can actually be the route to misery. Not is the praise from your peers less than sincere, as the green eyed monster takes hold, the established players in the elite you’ve just joined do not always welcome upstarts.

Now, this is of course true, envy is intrinsic to human nature, as is group think and snobbery (inverted or not). I think this comes down to how you meet your success. With humility, gratitude and never false modesty. There’s nothing worse than seeing someone change over night. You know who you are.

But then, you have to question the ones who have been left behind, or those in the higher echelons the person has joined.

Those left behind can let envy consume them, or they can be inspired into pushing themselves a little harder. Human societies have always had elites, some would argue that the cult of the celebrity enables us to dream of being as wealthy and glamorous as them. Watching Michael Phelps in the the pool makes me want to work on my freestyle.

And, of course, elites need to close ranks, otherwise there’s nothing special about them, but without the possibility that the lucky few can join in, the lower orders eventually rebel. From a sociological point of view, that’s why actors and rock stars are so potent for capitalism, in theory, anyone could do it. Talentless celebrities like Jordan and other reality stars are even more useful, you don’t even have ti be any good at anything.

And anyway, you should always welcome new additions to the tribe, the diversity will make you stronger.

So there you have it, success can be dangerous for all, but the bit I find interesting is the role of emotion within this. No emotion is bad, it’s how you use it. If you’re other half was never a little jealous when you flirted with someone, would you really feel loved? Without envy, would you ever be inspired to surprise yourself? Without fear of challengers, would you ever push yourself to stay ahead? 

I’m sitting alone the Breakfast Club in Soho.It’s the first time I’ve been in here without the coffee morning/planning cabal type people, which feels a little strange, but good strange, it’s quiet and, on your own, this is a good place to sit think and reflect (the carrot cake is beyond reproach too).

Soon I’m off to one of those IPA events full of earnest, slightly scary Unilever type people, I’m sure I’ll learn something, but you can guess where I would prefer to be.

All I have is a notebook, a pen and a relatively decent book on what makes ideas sticky. The phone is off to conserve power and the laptop is kaput (forgot both chargers). And it’s a joy.

Time to slow down, think properly about one or two things. No need to talk, no need to answer persistent emails. Sometimes it’s the little pleasures that you really savour.

Then I walk, I don’t run, to where I need to be. Others are hustling past me, some fizzing with purpose, others needlessly impatient. Time has slowed down for me, everyone is else is a blur, like those stop motion films of clouds hurtling across the sky.

I’ll be them again in a few minutes but for now, it’s nice to exist in different dimension to every one else.   

I’m a fan of Jeremy Bullmore – not least his agony column in Campaign. His ‘why is an insight like a refrigerator is pure classic genius. But I did disagree with something last week.

The subject matter was proprietary brand models, good/bad/how do you manage do get good thinking when you’re wedded to a process and tick box? Now for the record, I’m not the greatest fan of fixed process and models, but I also believe some sort of framework for your thought process can be useful, most of all when you’re starting out.

But the general rules of developing strategy are pretty universal I think, maybe with a modern emphasis on finding out what people are interested in more rather than assuming they’re sitting waiting for your selling messages.

Put simply, delve into the consumer culture, delve into the brand /product /service culture, find the connection. A more detailed way of looking at stuff can be found here if you’re interested.

Anyway, back to that Bullmore column. I kind of agree that few agency brand planning tools are really unique, but I really didn’t agree with the assertion that all are merely there to enable execution tweaking which was his take.

Take Brains’ , sorry, Maurice Saatchi’s One Word Equity –  I hate it, I don’t agree you can always shove all the nuance of a brand into one word. BUT, it’s an attempt to frame all brand thinking well before execution and do something appropriate for the messy media world brands inhabit.

Take TBWA’s Disruption, I’m saying for a moment that just being different is enough (and it’s more complex than that anyway) but still, it’s a way of thinking that can get to the heart of the business model, even before brand frameworks.

Now, Mcann’s demand chain IS bobbins, that’s as generic as they come.

I guess what I’m saying is that models and stuff have a place, some do exist as ‘ad tweakers’ but some are sort of useful, and work at the level of brand frameworks. And I’d take any agency over horrendously overpaid brand consultancies any day. 

Even more contentious, what’s wrong with ad tweaking anyway? I’m not sure that the quest for the big idea is always the best approach. There’s plenty of great brands that do what’s right for right now, and let the little stuff build up to richer picture, a little like Pointillism I guess.

Tone of voice doesn’t get into briefings and strategic development enough, and it sort of should. Come to think of it, I’m all for something that helps us develop the most appropriate way in, but that wasn’t the point so I’ll end it here.

(can you tell I have time to kill on a train?)

Mark Foster will be swimming at the Olympics at the grand old age of 38. As someone beginning to grudgingly give in to the gradual, inexorable decline of his body, I find this inspiring. Not least his assertion that you should stick to what you’re best at.

On the other hand, this is an article about running a 100k race. Profound in many ways, it suggests that the author only had so much running in him. This kind of thing always makes me wonder, is this the case for all of us? And how much is this psychological v physical.

Thinking about creative people, there seems to be a pattern where they burn brightly for a period, before going into a gradual decline- still brilliant but never matching the heights of their pomp.

As far as the physical stuff goes for me, I bitterly regret the things I’ll never know about. The cartilage in my left hip has worn away, so I can’t run for more than twenty minutes these days. I’ll never know how a marathon feels, how I could handle an iron man triathlon,  I can’t even find out if I can beat my 10K best time. This means sticking to swimming, tennis and cycling, which isn’t too bad I suppose. I’m thinking of trying some cycling challenges next year, 50 mile races or something.

Nike and Federer do Kato v Clouseau.