Okay, so everyone always seems to be talking about how ad agencies need to be making big changes. We need a new business model. A new compensation model. A new foosball table requisition model.
Sounds wonderful.
Question is, when exactly are any of us supposed to find any time to actually do any of this? From the greenest junior to the c-suite crew, agency people are spending more and more time just keeping the ship afloat. We’re turning work around faster than ever. Pitching business more often than ever. And, worst of …

Client:              Achieving maximum ROI requires our organization to periodically seek input from non-standard suppliers. We need to benchmark all aspects of business to ensure we regain momentum and evolve the brand so we’re well positioned to meet consumers’ needs. As we proceed towards critical measurement periods we must determine which vendor relationships represent net positive impact on market-critical targets. To date, despite significant progress towards EOY expectations, we have determined the relationship with ABC Agency to be suboptimal.
Agency:           Our long-term relationship with XYZ Corporation has proven the superiority of …

I’ve noticed that a lot of ad folks, myself included, have shared this article about how the business is just not that fun any more.
This lack of fun has led to some of the ad world’s top talent moving on to other opportunities, some even to other industries.
But not all of us are Gerry Graf or Ty Montague. We don’t have the built-in cache, award-strewn resumes or (perhaps most importantly) the inflated bank accounts to just up and leave our current gigs.
And if you could leave, then what? I’m sure …

Everyone dreams of hitting the big game-winning home run. You picture it: Cameras are flashing all throughout the stadium. The crowd is ready to burst with excitement. Every player on both teams is fighting to conceal the mounting pressure they are feeling.
You swing, and send the ball deep, deep, deep over the second basemen’s head. You arrive comfortably at first base with a single. The air goes out of the stadium for a second, but then it builds again as the next player comes up to bat.
This isn’t how the …

Ever seen advertising so bad that you want to beat it up but you can’t because it’s advertising and it can’t fight back because it has no fists, no weapons and it’s not really alive so why bother?
I call that Nickelback advertising because every time I hear a song by that band , I want to beat it up. But I can’t because it only a song and it can’t really fight back for all the reasons I just described.
Here’s where I need help. How do I tell people at …

Nothing kills innovation more than someone in a meeting making a “good point.”
Good points are made by people in the meeting who really don’t need to be there. People with vague job titles. Their job is to make these good points whenever someone important is in the room. Someone like a client or a CEO. These good points sound something like this:
“According to our research, humor doesn’t resonate with our target market.”
“Our audience is known for loyalty. This work doesn’t acknowledge that.”
“I’m just playing devil’s advocate here, but the work …

How many times have you seen (or heard) an ad and immediately responded to it?
Be honest.
Once? Five times? Maybe 10? If you give me a higher number I will assume you are either a liar or did not understand the question.
Fact is, you almost never immediately respond in any meaningful way to an ad. You might enjoy the ad. You might even have some vaguely positive feelings about the product being advertised. But it’s doubtful you actually do anything about it at that moment.
The impact of most advertising happens over …

I was invited to talk on MTV the other day.
They have a show called Debate MTV, where 6 people share their points of view about controversial subjects with the audience nationwide.
So they invited an ad creative (the one who’s writing), a photographer and an art director of a masculine magazine to talk with a feminist, a psychologist and a guy who runs a blog about anti-advertising or something.
The starting point was a simple question:
“Does the media treat women as objects?”
Curiously, the feminist, the psychologist and the blogger were sure about …

A wise comic-strip beagle once said, “There’s no sense in doing a lot of barking if you don’t really have anything to say.”
Somebody get this puppy a job in advertising. Please.
These are the words we all need to live by, agency and client alike. People think if you shout loud enough or make something clever enough, it will make people think you actually have something worth talking about.
More likely, they will either be annoyed by you or simply forget about you.
Think of the greatest ads or campaigns you’ve ever seen. …

If ten people, who can each pull a rope attached to a strain gauge with 200 pounds of force, were to combine their efforts, they would not be capable of pulling with 2,000 pounds of force.
The group result will be much less than the sum of individual efforts.
This counterintuitive phenomenon was identified by Maximilien Ringelmann, a French agricultural engineer, and has come to refer to the concepts of coordination losses and social loafing.
Basically, there are two reasons for this effect. The more people you have, the less likely it becomes …