SueUnerman

image source – www.telegraph.co.uk

Imagine that you are about to make a critical senior appointment for your company.  In fact an appointment that is widely regarded as the most crucial and high profile in the industry.  Getting the right man (or woman) for the job is essential to your immediate future success.  You consult your colleagues, you perhaps speak to some head hunters about who is out there.  Then you interview only one candidate and immediately appoint him. 

Could you do that ?  I don’t think I could.  Even if I knew exactly who I wanted for the job, and in our industry it is easy to think that you know or know of all the top people, you would want to bring in more than just one person to talk to.  I also think I would want some people who were left of field to interview if only to endorse my decision.

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This is one of my favourite lines from the classic movie “A Face in the Crowd”, which I watched for the first time this weekend, and which I hugely recommend.  Directed in 1957 by Elia Kazan it tells the story of a drifter who finds fame and fortune when randomly picked out from a crowd by a radio station. 

Bizarrely it was Bob Dylan’s recommendation that first drew me to the film.   Interviewed about what celebrity does to a person (and after all he should know), he referenced a couple of great films, including this one. 

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Last week I was invited to CSTTG (home of creative legend Dave Trott) to debate the future of branded content with Sanjay Nazerali, Director, Marketing, Communications & Audiences, BBC Journalism at the BBC. The debate covered whether the news agenda was liable to being sullied by commercial association. My co-panelist who obviously knows a great deal more about the news than I do was concerned that beyond the rigour of the reach of Ofcom there was a danger of the integrity of the news being threatened. He calls for advertisers to regard funding of news content as a part of their CSR.

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The Thinkbox conference last week was a riot of sacred cow shooting.

Professor Byron Sharp from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute of South Australia took aim at segmentation noting that for big brands it is not only unnecessary but potentially harmful.  He called talking to loyalists “marketing in retreat” and as Maisie McCabe explains here views Facebook as irrelevant for reach.

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Not me claiming this but Rory Sutherland who was speaking at the Economist Summit in early March (The Big Rethink), after Jonathan Salem Baskin and I presented on our new book Tell the Truth (www.amazon.co.uk) Sutherland explained that we discount extravagant claims for good evolutionary reasons.  We like trade-offs, they make sense to us.  We’re more likely to believe the upside of something if we understand the downside.

Chip and Dan Heath describe two basic models of decision making – the consequences model or the identity model. http://www.heathbrothers.com/switch/

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I love Converse.  Back in the 90s I worked on the account and got to know a great deal about its authentic roots. 

The company was founded in the early years of the 20th century making winterised rubber shoes originally and then athletic shoes.  In 1921 the basketball player Chuck Taylor joined the organisation to endorse and sell the product.  He literally lived out of his car touring the country selling the Chuck Taylor All Star shoe.

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There is an online survey I occasionally get asked to fill in.  It begins with two simple questions.  The first asks gender (with a picture – there is a boy in blue and a girl in yellow – I normally get that one right).  The second question asks your age bracket with more little pictures to help you decide.  As the picture for the over 40 year old bracket shows a little grey haired woman I rarely get past question two as I feel militant on behalf of the millions of women in this age bracket (without a hint of grey). (On the other hand at least the picture depicts long hair… the male picture 40 plus is greying and bald!).  I wonder if the survey designers ever note a lack of respondents from the forty plus sector or indeed if they care ?

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Which wagon now you’re asking yourself.  The truth wagon.  Martin Lindstrom, author of Brandwashed and Buyology, says that telling the truth to the consumer is the only real way forward in the current age.

I of course agree with him in this respect (Tell the Truth – Honesty is your most powerful marketing tool is my book with co-author marketing consultant Jonathan Salem Baskin out this spring http://www.amazon.com/Tell-Truth-Honesty-Powerful-Marketing/dp/1936661462/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1328610166&sr=8-1)

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