One of the things that separates creatives from mere mortals, (I jest) is the ability to finally accept that your idea didn't fly with good grace and resilience. Nobody understood it. Nobody liked it. You could never afford to do it. It had been done before. ''Don't worry I'll think of something else." All those... Continue Reading →
The old egg and lightbulb rule.
In research it's always nice to hear that respondents 'liked' your idea. But so what? The problem is people like a lot of things, pictures of puppies, pretty colours, the way the model looks strong, the happy setting of a family on holiday because it reminds them of that time in Corfu. It doesn't really... Continue Reading →
Survey this.
Frankly, I have had enough of survey requests. Not the door to door type, just the incessant 'how was buying that door knob for you' type of survey. I don't want to be part of the big data I want to be small data, in my own house, leave me alone thank you very much.... Continue Reading →
Dear Mr Hammer, your problem isn’t a nail.
Aren't all branding ideas sort of advertising ideas and vice versa? Well, sometimes, I guess, but not always. In Pharmaland we can lean towards treating every problem as if it needs a good whack on the head. Give it a brand image that people will remember, plaster it all over the congress stand and the... Continue Reading →
How a brand can punch above its weight.
Back in the 90s I was fortunate to do a fair amount of international jet setting due to being the jammiest git alive and working on a car account. The ads were popular somewhat but never that great - which was always unsatisfactory, but the trips were the consolation prize. We used to go to... Continue Reading →
The 50+ guide to surviving advertising.(extended edition)
It hit me a couple of years ago many of my friends and ex-work colleagues started to turn fifty. I was at one such one event, standing outside a pub in Berwick street, and I realised everyone was of a certain vintage, all still talented, all still enthusiastically talking about the work they were doing,... Continue Reading →
Being funny without telling a joke.
I once did a freelance stint in a German office of JWT and the CEO there was quite the cliche 'American' ad-man, not a German. An ex-creative director himself, he had a good sense of the process and was no fool. But we differed on some points, one of which was that he thought the... Continue Reading →
1.Your concepts stinks 2.they loved it.3 Now what?
One of the curious things about Pharmaland is, given the greatest drug ever, say the cure for all Cancer, the cure for Alzheimer's or Diabetes, you could literally run a picture of a pig in a pair of knickers and as long as the headline still said "IT CURES ALL CANCER" nobody would care, the... Continue Reading →
Why are creatives creative?
Does that seem like a daft question? Why are footballers sporty? Why are politicians political? In Campaign magazine dated 29th July 2016 there was a question put to Jeremy Bullmore in his 'on the campaign couch with JB' column. It read : Dear Jeremy A lot of creatives also write books. Why? JB's answers are... Continue Reading →
It’s how we do it, so it must be right.
Take GM crops. We all know they are bad for the future of the human race. The scary world of science is mutating our crops and causing us all to grow two heads and speak in squeaky voices. Or something. It’s what we call 'received wisdom'. Received wisdom can be a bit of a bugger... Continue Reading →