Search results matching tag 'Planning'

Why brand-planning is not as good as planning

1762305 — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 12:47:00 GMT

Stephen King at JWT and Stanley Pollitt at BMP came up with the idea of Planning at roughly the same time.

I’d only just started at BMP, and I was a junior. Stanley explained his idea to me roughly as follows. There are two polar opposites in advertising: Account Handling and Creatives. They both have different criteria.

Account Men worry about holding onto the account and keeping their clients happy. They worry about maximising billing and consequently profitability for the agency.

Creatives worry about winning awards. They worry about what their peers will think of their ads more than they worry about what the client will think.

The problem is no one’s worrying about the brand/product we’ve been asked to advertise.

No one’s looking purely objectively at the consumer, the competition, the opportunities in the market place, the long-term strategy. No one’s thinking dispassionately about the thing we’ve been asked to advertise. Everyone’s involved in the detail of their own discipline. No one’s standing back and looking at the big picture.

How can we move into an area that no one else has seen? How can we take an advantage no one else has spotted yet? How can we think laterally about this? Instead, everyone’s concentrating on their own agenda.

Of course their own area is important, but it’s just part of a much bigger whole. A whole that no one is even seeing, much less exploiting. Stanley saw an opportunity here.

He wasn’t looking to start a new discipline. He thought he’d come up with something that would give us an advantage over other agencies. What we needed was ‘a free-floating intellect’ that would be liberated from the mundane concerns of the other departments.

Someone who could look almost academically, certainly objectively, at threats and opportunities, both strategic and tactical. That was the vision for Planning. Overall big-picture objectivity, lateral thinking. Radical creativity if you like.

Sure the brand was an important part of that. But it wasn’t the whole, anymore than account handling or creative. But somehow it’s become the whole. There’s no such thing as Planning anymore.

It was originally called Account Planning, now it’s only ever called Brand Planning. The answer’s Brand, now what’s the question? I don’t think that’s how Stanley or Stephen King saw it. I think if they were around today they’d invent Planning.

How to built up a media portfolio?

2643433 — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:30:23 GMT

Advertising students have ads in their portfolio, multimedia design students stuff like websites. But how do you built up a portfolio if you want to work in media planning and buying?

Dreaming up ideas

1365368 — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 08:03:00 GMT

Has anyone ever had a great planning / creative idea in their sleep? Surely this must happen more often than not!

Last night I had an advertising idea in my sleep for something we're pitching on and in this dream I kept shouting to myself 'Wake up! Wake up! Write this down, this is genius!'. I woke up this morning having remembered it and burst out laughing. It was not genius at all. It was very random, I'll give it that.

So, I got into work and showed the Head of Advertising my nocturnal creative thought, to which he shook his head and laughed as I'd expected. My planning colleague wasn't so critical and said it was interesting, so it's not all bad, there may be something in my REM-based thinking after all!

I am now thinking of creating an ideas bank for all of our creative and planning thinking that we have when we're asleep, just as an interesting record. I know my planning colleague once rebranded Stockholm in a dream. After all, you never know when genius will strike!

Brands are looking more and more at Live Brand Experiences as it is the leading platform to connect directly with consumers

1914250 — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 21:54:50 GMT

Over the next few years brands will up their marketing spend on experiential marketing due to the mass audiences declining to respond to TV advertising. Digital is always on the rise due to new technology, digital plays a significant role in the live brand experience as it amplifies further channels which will gain maximum reach for campaigns. What are your thoughts about the above integration and what the future holds? Marvin

From client-side marketing to planning?

1786828 — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 17:02:44 GMT

Hi all I’m a client-side marketer that at the age of 30 has realised that he wants to be a planner. Just wondering if anyone out there has made the switch from client-side to planning and whether you have any advice for me? Cheers Simon

Re: How do agencies get the best out of planning?

2302181 — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 11:10:20 GMT

Peace & Quiet and a very good client brief.

Trying to avoid 'it's a black art' mystique response, planning ultimately comes down to detective work and a capability within an agency that isn't scared to question the inbound information; standing away from the business need temporarily (the driver for the planning activity) and questioning the consumer and their behaviour both directly with the brand and the wider influences of 'our day to day lives'....

Is planning, planning?

1365368 — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 14:04:00 GMT

Being a young brand planner, I often think about what other juniors are up to in the big wide planning world and I always get to that age-old question, is planning just planning? Or is planning in different types of agencies - advertising, digital, DM etc. - make it a different discipline in each area? If so, how much better / worse off am I brand planning? I think it is the same discipline, whatever the media. We are essentially working on marketing briefs which involve the same sort of elements. Some agencies may be into more data planning, some may be really data-light, but I reckon the essence of planning is the same. Although, I don't know really, as I don't know any digital / DM / ad planners! What does everyone else reckon? It would be nice to get some posts from some other types of planners to see if they think we're all in the same boat!

Why great planners have to be dumb

878512 — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 14:19:04 GMT

Tod Norman, partner at brand response agency Watson Phillips Norman, on why great planners have to be dumb.

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What makes a brand?

878512 — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 16:34:15 GMT

Lest we forget:

I think we've typically thought about marketing as the creation of moments - communications, events, spectacles, launches, etc. Similarly, I think these moments make up only a very small part of the view customers have of a brand. Instead the vast majority of what informs a person's view of a brand is the day in, day out usage of the product/service.

[via]

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How to do Direct (and Digital)

878512 — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 08:42:53 GMT

Shaun McIlrath, Creative Director at Hurrell and Dawson on how to do Direct:

it is your job to help your clients be uncorporate - to be human. You can do it through comms, or by working within the company to help make it more accessible and helpful to the customer - but do it, because it will make their behaviour more distinctive and their comms more engaging.

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