StratScraps_v68

Novel surprises prime the pocket*

Apr 20, 2022

This has been sitting in my drafts for 2 weeks because I wanted to add some stuff from a book I’m reading… At this point though, I just need to hit send.

…….

*A research team found that handing customers a balloon on the way into a McDonalds was worth a 25% increase in sales.

Pitching is why I chose to work in advertising. In retrospect, there is something masochistic there that probably needs to be unpacked…

But anyway, there are a few things to consider that often aren’t…

Why now? Why is the account up for review/being RFP’d at this moment? It is pretty reckless to pitch an account without knowing this information, yet incredibly common
Watch out for clients who fear their boss. Who is the client’s boss and what is their relationship? The most dangerous setting for a creative agency is working for a client who is overly concerned with the opinions of their boss (especially when they don’t actually know their boss very well).
Provide an outcome to buy. Another one shockingly absent from a ton of pitch work: “here is what we can expect based on the segment we’ve defined, our proposed approach and estimated spend.” Otherwise what are they buying? Sell the hole, not the drill.
Show something big, but suggest something smaller. “We could do this. But to be honest, we think you probably only need this” — i.e. show you have their best interests in mind.
Nobody wants to be sold to. How can you make selecting you feel like a choice they made rather than something you were able to convince them of.
Clients aren’t shopping, they are dating. When selecting an agency, clients buy the people. The secondary consideration is the thinking. The work itself is usually in 3rd place.

THE BIGGEST THING: MAKE SURE THEY CAN DESCRIBE WHAT YOU PROPOSED IN A CONVERSATION TO A COLLEAGUE – WITHOUT LOSING THE EXCITEMENT.

On a related note:

Another metaphor that loosely depicts what good advertising should be.

And as per usual, I am not going to explain.

“Meta-cognition is the process of becoming aware of your own mental process”

Other than curiosity, I think it is one of the top indicators of a good planner.

Remember in like 2015 when every consumer behavior deck had something about “finsta” ?

Then IG rolled out the “close friends” for stories.. And now apparently they are encouraging secondary accounts. Super interesting, as it suggests a move away from the FB model of each account is a user that we have data on. Instead moving towards ad targeting based on the mode you’re in.

Super smart. We aren’t each one person, but many identities packed into one mind– and the internet allows us to indulge different parts of ourself separately.

There is a lot to unpack here. Maybe another time, but my single thought is- this feels like a bigger clue about the future of the internet than NFTs, Metaverses, or any of those other topics of the moment.

I’ve always kind of hated saying “an idea has legs” — Maybe it’s just how my brain works, but it always made me think of something like this:

I finally heard a better way to describe what that phrase is trying to say– describing an idea as generative.

Way more accurate. An idea that immediately generates thoughts around whats possible.

I spend a lot of time thinking about the collapse of society. And a lot of time thinking about mass media.

Here’s a theory at the intersection of the two:
People talk about bias in the media and how divided we’ve become as a result.

But I don’t think the issue is the bias– it’s the scope.

Everything is about global issues that most people have no knowledge about.

My hypothesis is that if our news media was comprised of 90% local issues in local communities, there would be a lot less radicalization.

Who knows, but I can tell you that once society collapses, the people who are going to do best aren’t the ones with the most guns but with the strongest systems of community aid.