Communication Efficacy

Developing your own planning style

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My planning mentor would have just distilled that title down to 'Efficacy', which is the what we planners do. But in any case Richard Huntington of Saatchi & Saatchi has put a presentation up that he did at the IPA called "Developing your own style" which is the school of planning that I learned at HHCL & Partners where Richard and I both worked, nearly a decade ago. Richard also includes some words from Guy Murphy the Global Planning Director for JWT and one of the reasons why I joined JWT and would fear them in any big pitch. Guy is easily the best multinational network planner I've had the luxury of spending time with when I worked for JWT in London before heading out to Beijing.


Often it's not what Guy says. It's what he doesn't say that commands most respect and is to my mind genius clever from the perspective of garruolous planners like myself. Less is more and all that.


Anyway enough of my waffle. Take a couple of minutes to see how powerful the right combination of words can be from some of the best in the business. And as someone who has lived and worked in more countries than most as a planner I think I can seperate the politically savvy but creatively mediocre beasts from the best in class cats.

Magnetic Strip

Richard has posted this excellent piece of work coming out of the Saatchi & Saatchi stable where he works in London. The music is impeccable.

Kurt Vonnegut

'Join a gang, any gang', Kurt implores us in this one of his last interviews. I like the way he describes how the gang/group/herd is important to our well being and how the industrialised society with its scientific method spawned (my words) the atomised lifestyle and the nuclear family. He also talks about who cares if Jesus was the son of God, because what he said was beautiful and that's what matters. I've never read any of his books but hope I get a chance some time to check out his work. Somewhere that the the phone is off and Wi-Fi is out of range.

ATTENTION LEVELS

15yroldphotojournalist

Nigel Hollis, head honcho of Millward Brown asked a great question in June last year. Is the Link pre-test the equivalent of the Smith & Wesson Magnum 500? This began a much needed debate between advertising, clients and research about the value and relevancy of pre-testing that has been bubbling along quite nicely with a first response by the highly respected Jason Oke of Leo Burnett in Toronto and a further serious but welcome contribution by Fredrik Sarnblad over here. Nigel then responded in depth on his blog over here and Jason took up the debate with his post on Pre-testing part II over here.

No less a proper academic luminary than Dr. Robert Heath, author of The Hidden Power of Advertising - How low involvement processing influences the way we choose brands has weighed into the debate on both Nigel's and Jason (+Leo Burnett)'s blog. I wonder if the talented and authoritative Richard of Adliterate fame would care to chip in following his "A Kick in the teeth for Low involvement processing post" now that a robust cast of characters are assembled to stimulate the debate. This is a book that has long challenged my thinking of the different ways advertising can work as I've stated last year over here. All we need are a few clients and we might well be on the way to a civilised and constructive debate to determine when, how and if research should be used. This is what planning blogs were made for isn't it?