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Breakthrough Creativity: A Blend of Art and Science

Breakthrough Creativity

All diageo's marketers are put through the Diageo Way of Building Brands (DWBB). This training has become pivotal to the preparation and creation of advertising across all of its brands from Guinness through to Smirnoff, Baileys and new product development.

At the same time marketers have to be more and more accountable for the decisions they make and there are many measurement tools in place that can protect them. But equally, they can restrict and inhibit.

However, in the end, it's not really the processes that hold people back but the way they are interpreted and used. If you are a brilliant young marketer you may not have developed the confidence to rely on your own instincts, and consequently may be inclined to fall back on processes and tools to guide the creative work. If this is the case the outcome will tend to be bland and nondescript. If you rely entirely on instinct and don't apply the science, then the result can be wayward and wasteful.

This article is based on interviews with Diageo's own marketers and its agencies about what each thought of the other's approach to the creation of advertising. Prejudices were invited and, of course, given – in spades.

WHAT INHIBITS CREATIVITY?

Once we delved beneath the surface, we arrived at the main inhibiting factors on which both client and agency agreed:

  • a strained, intimidating working climate
  • the easy apportionment of blame
  • slowness
  • misinterpretation of both briefs and research to suit the agendas of the other.

But since there was a mutual desire to improve the quality of their creative output, Diageo's relationships with its agencies needed to move from being rigid and tense to becoming fluid and free before anything constructive could take place. What follows is a description of the ways we think this will happen.

CLIENTS LIKE ALGEBRA. AGENCIES LIKE ART. DISCUSS

In setting out why two types of people may be different, it's useful to first see what common ground exists between an advertiser and an agency.

Employees from both sides may come from a rich mix of creeds and colours, and they may all have been educated to a very high standard. But once these people join their respective client or agency companies, they are unknowingly acclimatised to quite different `manifestos'.

These manifestos are seldom written or recited, but they become evident to new employees after only a few weeks of arriving at their respective organisations. There will be a culture and a philosophy that will be absorbed in meetings and through talking to others.

The Agency Manifesto

  • Take risks with the work you generate and present. By taking risks the agency will escape from the parity of 80% of the advertising that we see.
  • Benign creativity is not an option, you will achieve nothing by being the same; chaos and unpredictability can fuel the creative process.
  • Look for the single most compelling message and turn this into a memorable piece of communication – don't be persuaded that there is any more than one thing to say in the advertising.
  • Use instinct, innovation, lateral thinking and the unexpected in the preparation and creation of strategies and advertising.
  • Create work that wins accolades for the company. 'If we win awards we win more business, so that we can win more awards.'
  • Your benchmarks are the other ads on air. Yours must stand out.
  • In the end, no one cares or will remember what the strategy was. But they will remember the ad.

The Client Manifesto

  • You should not be taking risks with the levels of investment involved.
  • Look for the treatment that tells a good and fluid brand story, that gets the message across. Use our tools to diagnose the appropriateness of an idea.
  • Be constantly aware of the business objectives: 'growth by x% per annum'.
  • Use research, demographics, competitive market information, tracking, Link tests – anything that will guide you in the selection of an advertising idea.
  • The work must work, whatever the work is like.
  • Your benchmarks are the competitive brands in your space, the efficacy and growth of other brands in the company portfolio.
  • In the end, judgement will be made on success – the objectives of the business plan, as defined by certain specific metrics, must be met.

Big agencies and big clients can compound each other's negatives when they work together. Corporate 'bigness' is bad for the creation of advertising and both sides need to work on bringing science and art together in small but effective teams.

Science, in advertising, can be regarded as intrusive and unwelcome. It assumes that we live in a predictive world, that we can anticipate outcomes through a series of equations and chemical reactions. The result of each reaction is a function of the composition and quality of inputs – and therefore the outcome will be logical and predictable. (see Figure 1) Art is underpinned by a rather different belief – one which suggests that brilliant creativity emerges more from chaos than logic. It believes that the challenge of creative development is to find a unique spark that makes a powerful connection with consumers, delivering a benefit (rational or emotional) that will improve the quality of their lives. It will allow the brand to fight through the clutter of consumers' lives and take up permanent residency in the grey matter between their ears.

Art requires freedom, unencumbered by the restrictions of science. It needs to be nurtured and judged by the heart, not by the head.

INSPIRING CREATIVITY THROUGH THE BRIEFING PROCESS

Storytellers and sooths like to use analogies, and Jeff Goodby, of the famous US agency Goodby Silverstein takes the fishing parallel to describe the briefing process, maintaining that it should be about guiding people to the right part of the river, advising them on the right type of fly and the common behaviours of the fish, but not actually setting out how to catch it. Another way of putting this would be for the brief to provide direction but not directives.

Agencies like, more than anything, to be invited in to the wider problem. If you tell them the entire context of the brief they will feel more motivated than ever to help you.

A typical brief can use an Activity Goal to invite the creative people into the conspiracy. However, the opportunity is often lost through the use of language that only a marketer would understand or find motivating:

'To extend the emotional relevance of Brand X for adopters, causing them to increase their frequency of consumption and reappraise their stereotypes of the consumption occasion.'

This can be compounded by the relatively unambitious Consumer Goal:

'Shift 10% of Adopters to Adorers and increase their frequency from 2.3 to 2.9 units p.a.'

How inspiring are these sentences and how much light do they shed on your ambitions for the brand? The goals are an essential part of a marketer's job and have a role to play whether they are included in the brief or not.

However, a good brief also requires a simple statement, which clearly sets out your objectives for the advertising, which the creative people can then latch on to:

  • 'Return Smirnoff to being a truly iconic brand'
  • 'Make Archers a symbol of modern femininity'
  • 'Motivate people to give to Oxfam again'
  • 'Position Halifax as a modern bank, not a building society'
  • 'Make Norwich Union one of the three companies that give you a quote'
  • 'Throw away 30 years of advertising and bring Hovis into the modern family'

Experience can considerably fuel inspiration. The government or the Home Office do not immediately spring to mind when discussing inspiration, but the COI has a tradition of immersing teams in its problems. This is why it produces some of the most hard-hitting and occasionally terrifying ads.

Creative teams at JWT have flown fast jets and looked for Russian submarines in the North Atlantic on 12-hour sorties in search of inspiration on why pilots and navigators may want to join the RAF.

THE MIRACLE OF CO-INVENTION

There is a theory that all people can be divided into two types: radiators and drains. Radiators inspire you and generate an aura of positive energy. When they leave the room, you look forward to seeing them again. Drains drag you down. They are negative, fail to inspire and have no capacity for triggering or receiving ideas. When they leave the room you are grateful.

Experienced people from both sides of the client/agency divide who 'click' can realise the true spirit of a brief and liberate it from its regimented layout and harsh verbal structures. One of the great advocates of this system is Richard Branson, who has a mantra of 'Screw it. Let's do it.' When people at Virgin got stuck analysing the restrictions of the brief, he would suggest opening the gates and developing a brand strategy from the spirit, not the detail.

Talented people who are compatible can do this more easily.

M&C Saatchi's team were given complete access to the police force and their key insight, 'Not everyone can do it', came from listening to police talking about their remarkable work. Their idea was to get people who are respected for their physical strength and personal endeavour to try and confront the same issues as the police have to do every day.

What could be more convincing and inspiring for potential recruits than to see Bob Geldof saying that he could never separate a child from his or her parents even if there was a suspicion of abuse? Never has the insight informed the advertising better.

HOW TO RECOGNISE A GOOD IDEA WHEN YOU SEE IT

A new idea is nearly always just a combination of two other thoughts. This should not trouble us as there are plenty of previous ideas around to be plundered, and the potential combinations of two previous ideas are infinite.

MTV was a good idea but it was merely the combination of music and video. Now music cannot be sold without video. Whisky and Coke is the bringing together of two previously singular drinks, which were previously enjoyed without the help of the other.

Audiences and consumers today are increasingly fickle and difficult to impress. They are quite used to being exposed to new derivations of technology, new fads and new fashions, on a daily basis. We are told by media companies that media fragmentation and low-quality programming now mean that the value of the bought TV spot has been reduced to such an extent that it is incumbent on the creative idea to have the same impact on consumers as, say, the invention of the internet or the iPod each time it runs. This is quite a tall order.

All the industry experts we have spoken to used emotional or spontaneous ways of assessing advertising before they pondered the more rational analysis:

  • Does it move me?
  • oes the idea make me want to be a part of it?
  • Does it empathise with me, and me with it?
  • Does it impress me; make me laugh or cry?
  • Does it stop me from looking away?
  • Is it truthful?
  • Does it bind the brand with my consciousness?
  • Will I be able to recite it, sing it or smile a familiar smile each time I recall it?'

RECEIVING AND NURTURING CREATIVITY

If you are trying to encourage a climate of creativity, there is a lot of anecdotal evidence to suggest that a warm supportive environment created by the client will encourage an even greater effort from the agency. Agency people have told us that the clients who place more trust in the agency and try to say 'yes' more often, will be the ones for which they will work the hardest.

Agency people take the trust they are given very seriously and will want to reward their clients by going the extra mile. Clients who attract that discretion and energy to their briefs are likely to get better work because they are competing for that energy with the agency's other clients.

WHAT IS A POWERFUL ADVERTISING IDEA?

The Leo Burnett John West Salmon TV ad caused people to stop whatever they were doing when it appeared on television for the first time. Dave Trott of the advertising agency Walsh Trott Chick Smith said that he was in his local pub when the commercial was aired and 'the whole place just stared at the screen in disbelief'.

The idea was simple. A man from John West Salmon fights a bear for the fish it has just caught as proof that only John West cans the best salmon. What happens is so unexpected, and so compellingly funny, that the viewer applauds the commercial for its entertainment value and, hopefully, can remember both the product and the point it makes. (see Figure 2)

Pub stopper and sales up 23% with 83% of the UK population recalling the ad on a budget of just £1m.

Perhaps we should have criteria for ideas along the lines of 'Will it stop chat in the pub?' or 'Will it be talked about at work the next day?' as a part of the checking procedure for all advertising.

HOW TO GET BETTER CREATIVE WORK FROM YOUR AGENCIES

  1. Agencies and clients are different, but share the single objective of brilliant creative work. Always make sure your agencies are as committed as the clients are.
  2. Processes are good, but only if they enable freedom. Inspiration, particularly in the briefing the session, will motivate agencies and their creative teams. Chaos can be good in the early stages.
  3. Immersion from both sides of the relationship is an essential component of creativity. Be a radiator not a drain. Be the reason why a creative team will want to break the paradigm for you. Tell them you will buy good work.
  4. Look for the idea. No amount of executional puffery will substitute for an idea. Ever.
  5. It's easy to say 'No', so practise saying 'Yes'. It's good for you. First, see if you think the idea can work, even if you don't like the look of it first time around. Don't fool yourself into thinking you are the consumer.
  6. Research recognises what it has seen before, and will be comfortable with it. Don't be afraid if the ad is surprising people.

Some people take the view that, as clients, they can employ an indifferent attitude to suppliers, but this attitude will ultimately diminish the quality of the work. Respect is essential. For example, the meeting called to decide the fate of a creative route must be marked in the diary as sacrosanct. Both sides will benefit from a sense of occasion and order. Not to do so sets up a killing zone into which agencies fear to tread and outcomes are ill defined.

Perhaps the best advice is to constantly focus on the idea and not the execution, and to use direct and understandable language in feeding back to agencies – including an honest opinion as to whether or not you like the idea yourself. It is perfectly possible for an idea to be right and not to like it.

USING RESEARCH WHEN DEVELOPING ADVERTISING

When people view advertising in their own homes, they don't know or care about the thought that went into it. The role of the marketer is to deliver a clear thought about a brand but to do it in a way that is seen, enjoyed and remembered – to surprise and delight real people.

Research is often used to help understand the mind of the consumer, and how that mind responds to advertising communication. Sometimes research can help with this, but all too often it is used as a pivotal step in the process that has to be completed in order to validate our belief in an idea. It becomes merely a pass/fail mechanic rather than an aid to better decision making.

As the oft-quoted Bill Bernbach once said, 'We are so busy measuring public opinion that we forget we can mould it. We are so busy listening to statistics we forget to create them.'

So, what are the pitfalls and the lessons to be learned using research? We need to be sure that we ask the right questions of the creative work and that the researcher shares the desire to nurture brilliance.

Make sure that when you brief a research company, it knows what you are looking to achieve. A harmonious, 'yeah, I really like that' kind of response isn't always desirable, and your researcher needs to know this up front.

Also make sure that you are clear at the outset about whether you are looking to understand the idea or the executions and ensure that what you present to consumers is clear. Consumers can often see through embellishment, but if they can't see a pivotal idea then the work will not be sufficient.

The main point to remember from all this is that research is not a replacement for your own judgement. It can all too often confirm the known or accepted if we allow it to do so. Research is not the enemy: there is no such thing as bad research, just bad use of research. Commissioning the right kind of research, at the right points, for the right reasons, and interpreting it sensitively will help to make better decisions. Brilliance will follow.

NOTES & EXHIBITS

FIGURE 1: ARCHERS DRINKS. 'A SYMBOL OF MODERN FEMININITY', ARCHERS BENEFITS FROM A STRONG BRAND MESSAGE

FIGURE 2: JOHN WEST SALMON


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