5 sure-fire ways to know when your agency might be tired
By Mat Morrison October 13th, 2006
In Stories
If a lot of these ideas turn up in their presentations, then you should either give them more time, or give them a better brief. Or consider refreshing your agency.
If you’ve actually asked them for any of these yourself, you should probably stop reading the trade press as a way of generating your ideas.
5) It involves early-1980s video-game IP
You’ve only got to look at JoyJam, Yahoo! Games, or Pogo to know the game’s up with corporate games.
And that’s even before we ask, “What on earth were you thinking!? Did you really think you could engage with young audiences by showing them crap games, grandad?”
Coca Cola, Stop it. British Gas,
Ad agencies don’t make games. Brands don’t make games. Games companies make games.
As a side issue, if they suggest a keepy-up game, threaten to sack them on the spot. That should wake them up.
Go talk to Massive Inc. instead.
4) They plan to build anything in Second Life
Is there anyone in Second Life who isn’t a journalist, or ad agency these days? Iain Tait speaks for me when he says that he can’t get his head round it. If you want to talk virtual worlds, let’s talk World of Warcraft. There’s more people living in Leeds between the ages of 20-35 than active Second Life users.
Yes, it was briefly cool at the beginning. And now it isn’t. BBH has built a virtual agency there. Or rather, they’ve paid Rivers Run Red to do it. And so has Leo Burnett. As Tim says, it’s “like watching your Dad dancing at a wedding.”
Brands would do better to engage consumers in Real Life™.
3) Your content is so good that audiences will seek it out, and/or send it to each other
Are you sure? No. You’re not. You’re going to invest in a seeding programme, aren’t you? You’re going to encourage pass-alongs using a little “Send to a friend” mechanism aren’t you? Wimp. Real viral is only for the he-men of marketing, the masters of the universe (and people who make money from writing scripts and shooting video).
Face it, if you’re going to pay for distribution, you may as well just think in terms of planning a media campaign.
This is like the folk tale about nail soup/stone soup.
2) You want Users to Generate Content about your brand
Well, they’re not going to. Not unless you’re already one of those brands (for better or worse) in which case, you won’t be able to stop them.
Stop trying to own your audience. They’ve got better things to do with their time than deal with your delusions of grandeur.
1) The pitch involves the words “It’s like MySpace for…”
No it’s not.
Need we say more?
1 Nathan Williams // Oct 13, 2006 at 4:29 pm
Spot on. I was going to comment on Iain’s point yesterday regarding SecondLife. The video he points to is complete and utter arse and it beggars belief that anyone would believe that consumers can actually ‘experience’ a company’s products and services in what is - lets face it - only slightly better graphics than the VRML is was playing with way back in ‘95….. utter shite (never mind touch, smell, force-feedback, texture etc etc etc blah). Maybe when we have a ‘holo-deck’ or ‘Tron suits’, but not now, sorry.
2 Nigel Shardlow // Oct 17, 2006 at 4:44 pm
I used to think that SL interventions had some value to some brands as a source of market research: apparel manufacturers, for example. But then I looked at the gear I had bought for my avatar, and at my avatar herself, and realised just how wrong I was.
3 livingbrands // Nov 1, 2006 at 9:30 am
October’s Top Blogging…
It’s been a bumper month for good posts (harvest season and all that, maybe). So, if you find you have a few spare minutes, you may want to acquaint yourself with the following… Format wars David Armano’s Manifesto for life…
4 5 surefire // Aug 28, 2007 at 10:58 pm
Hi Mat,
You’ve made some excellent points. This article is very blunt, but I think we all need a dose of reality once in awhile. Thank you for speaking the truth.
Point #2 (”You want Users to Generate Content about your brand”) is a very good point. Any of us who have a little bit of narcissism in our thinking need to face reality: people aren’t going to create buzz about an obscure little product or service offering. Apple, for instance, has an incredible amount of buzz behind it’s products; however, they may put as much money into marketing as to product innovation.
I used to think “Apple has so much continual buzz about its products…I guess all we need is good products.” Now I realize that there is a lot more than meets the eye. Apple’s publicity experts may be laboring night and day to stay in news headlines, etc.
Thanks for the great advice!
Justin
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