Kamikaze Creative Strategy: Tips to help Copywriters, Art Directors and other ad folk hit “The Big Idea” every time.

Kamikaze Key Fact or Client Fact?  Welcome to the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan, where Advertising Strategy is NOT Creative Strategy, where art direction and copywriting prowess alone can’t make work smart and what’s going on in an Advertising Prospect’s World is more important than what’s going on in the Client’s.  Today’s Kamikaze Copywriting Tips apply to everyone – Advertising Copywriters, Art Directors, Account Types, etc. and are the basis of great work by client- and advertising award-winning Kamikaze Copywriters.

There are probably as many different “Creative Briefs” “Strategy Documents” “Creative Work Plans” and “Creative Briefs masquerading as Creative Strategy as there are ad agencies.  They seem to start this way:

·        Creative Person X works for Advertising Agency Y where they use Advertising “Strategy” Document Z

·        X leaves Y to start his own shop, which he names Q, and takes a drawer full of old Zs with him

·        Without giving it too much thought, agency Q adopts Z – it’s what X knows and seemed to work at Y

·        Account Person W goes to work for Q.  He/she gets a .pdf of Advertising Strategy Doc Z and is told to fill it out for every creative assignment

·        Strategy Doc Z is now a five-page monster written by an AE who, never having been a creative, has no idea what we need to concept from.  It reads like a client White Paper 

·        The Q Creative Team gets through the first two pages of W’s Z.  It informs copywriters, art directors and other advertising creatives what the client wants said.  It doesn’t help conceptually with how we say it.  It has no resemblance to a Kamikaze Creative Strategy, a customized plan that can actually lead and inspire fabulous (and fabulously effective) advertising concepts

Oversimplified/over-cynical, most of the time that’s how it goes.  Someone who doesn’t understand what Ad Creatives need keeps doing what’s always been done.  For the most part, this means a Creative Brief gets approved as a Creative Strategy.  Creative Briefs are supposed to well, brief us on the details/particulars of an account, its products, etc.  Creative Strategies are actual plans (as in Kamikaze Creative Work Plan).

Creative Briefs may include an Objective, some sort of Promise, a Prospect Definition/Target Market, often a client-centered Advertising Problem to Solve* and usually, a client centric Key Fact.  Creative Copywriters and Art Directors don't write them. 

The resulting document is “what I want you to say.”  There’s very little planning involved, rarely any creative strategic thought –just an Objective, maybe a meaningful (Prospect focused) Promise.  If there’s a Problem, it’s usually the Client’s.*  Its usual “most important thing to say about the client/product/service” Key Fact can’t help but be redundant to the Promise.

This kind of Strategy Document gives Creatives nothing more than a laundry list of Client driven information, the agency’s media plan and/or production notes.  When it comes to concept, we’re on our own.

There are many differences between a Kamikaze Creative Strategy and all the rest.  The biggest: Creatives who do the work write the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan (KCWP).  Conceived and written by Advertising Creatives for Advertising Creatives, the KCWP contains everything we need to Concept a great solution, arranged in the order professional Creatives need to work our process. 

One of the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan’s most important components is the Kamikaze Key Fact (KKF).  What makes a Key Fact Kamikaze?  Kamikaze Key Facts insinuate the product/service into the context of The Prospect’s life.  To do that, they can’t be about the Product or Client.

To keep Kamikaze Strategies Prospect-Centric instead of Circular (everything loops back to client/product), KKFs are never about the Client or Client’s product.  A Kamikaze Key Fact is always about what’s going on in the Prospect’s world.

It gives you the context/concept in which the product – and your campaign - can soar.  Puts the Client/product in the context of The Prospect’s life. Makes them relative to Prospect experiences needs wants fears dreams.

I define the Kamikaze Key Fact as something out there in the marketplace – some truth about the Prospect’s world life experience heart soul whatever - which can become the driving force behind your concept.

Because a KKF is not about the Product, Client, a feature/benefit, positioning, market share, etc., there isn’t just ONE Kamikaze Key Fact – there can be dozens.  Just never more than one at a time. Most fun, you get to choose.  The key is that they (a) relate to the Prospect’s Life/World and (b) serve as a springboard for concepts that can carry the rest of the KCWP’s strategy in more conceptual – and more targeted – advertising.

The Snickers’ “Diva” campaign?  Their KKF was probably something like “People aren’t themselves when they’re hungry” or "Everyone needs a mid-afternoon pick-me-up."   No client or product involved.  Just a truth about the Prospect. Wonderfully translated to make the Client’s Product our hero.

Here are some I’ve used: It’s an election year.  The polar ice cap is melting.  Those damn Yankees won again.  President Clinton did a lot for cigar makers.  There are more shades of gray than of black and white.  Not a client or product in there, yet all inspired concepts their Prospect responded to.  Why?  Because they’re things the Prospect cares about.  They carry Clients’ message/ products/services to the Prospect within.

A Key Fact about the Client, Product or Service can’t do that.  Why?  Because it’s No. 1 on the Client's list, not the Prospect's.  (You may get a killer, benefit-driven headline/visual, but you won’t get Conceptual Advertising.)  Even if it’s a product feature/benefit important to the Prospect, it won’t connect you to them conceptually.

Does this mean the KKF must scream from the headline, concept, visual, etc.?  Not necessarily. But it must be reflected as an element that makes the Concept (and therefore, the headline, visual, product, etc.) relevant to the Prospect.  Think of it as Conceptual Context.  Think Aretha, Liza and Betty White.

The more you play with it the easier it gets.  Pick an assignment, put client concerns in your input folder and focus on the Prospect.  Pick a KKF that’s important to them.  Play with it a while, see what ideas you come up with, how you can use it to meet objectives and keep pushing til the well runs dry.

Then try another KKF. There’s no right or wrong – just better, better and best.  If you start with the obvious, never end there.

Switching in and out of various KKFs supercharges my conceptual progress.  Going from KKF to KKF, I stretch, forcing myself to think conceptually in many different ways/contexts, many different directions.  I can try on lots of ideas, approaches, directions, etc., before I decide what best speaks to my Prospect and fulfills the entire KCWP.

Where do I get my Kamikaze Key Facts?  From The Prospect’s life. (Think Clinton’s cigar, melting ice caps, etc.)  I read magazines The Prospect reads – which I may not.  I immerse myself in Prospect culture.  Historical coincidences can make cool Key Facts.  So can general truths about Prospects’ lives (the Diva’s hunger meltdown).

Always remember – it’s not your life experiences any more than it’s Client concerns.  It’s about the Prospect.  85% of the time, that won’t be you.

Be careful.  The KKF you chose must link to market/consumer forces at work.  An unexpected Kamikaze Key Fact will make your concepts what you want – fresh never been done unexpected hard-hitting effective smart.

Say you’re doing a campaign for Ostrich meat.  Think how much fun – how effective and conceptually liberating – “The FDA doesn’t see every Mad Cow” could be.  Imagine how limiting – how circular “Ostrich is a delicious red meat with less than half the fat of beef.”  Which leads the Prospect to the Product and which starts with the Product and assumes the Prospect cares?  (In Kamikaze Creative Land, that Ostrich fact is support for the Promise, a “Reason Why”.*  As a Key Fact, it dooms your creative to circling  back to client/product concerns, leaving the Prospect out of the conceptual loop.)

An expected/safe and/or Circular Key Fact makes for expected/safe and/or circular creative.  The best you can do is been there/done that disguised by clever lines/clever visuals or an expected product message carried by Style.**

A Kamikaze Key Fact does just the opposite.  Grounds your work in the Prospect’s world so your ideas – as far out as they may be – will always speak to the Prospect. 

Isn’t that what you want to get paid to do?

For your very own copy of the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan, email me at kamikazecreative@gmail.com.  I’ll send you the form and Cliff’s Notes explanation.  If you want the entire 20+ page handout (with award-winning examples, long form discussions and chock full of Kamikaze Unorthodoxy) have one of your instructors get in touch.  If you don’t have an instructor (as in, I’m not in ad school), email yourself and let me know your status.  No matter what medium you’re using – new, old, in-between, the KCWP will make your work better, smarter, more successful.   

*Ah, yes.  The elusive “Problem the Advertising Must Solve.”  This should be the Prospect’s problem, not the Client’s.  Solve the Prospect’s problem, you’ll solve the Client’s.  You can’t solve a Client’s problem by using it somewhere somehow in the work.  All you do is remind the Prospect the Client has a problem.

**Not sure about Style?  Go back a few blog posts – it’s touched upon in Concept vs. Illustration, but it's not the entire schtick.  If you want more on that, Ask.  

IOU, more from last installment, a promise, something you need to consider

IOU:  I promised something on the Kamikaze Key Fact vs. traditional Key Fact, then got distracted by other things (I represent The Prospect, Concept/Illustration, sorry and thanks to all who called me on it).  The next post will fulfill that promise.  Promise.

From last post:
Concept or Illustration?  Allstate's "Mayhem" campaign.
Additional messing with your minds:  Is the Snickers Diva campaign really a concept?  Or is it just a very funny, very creative Product Demonstration?  If it's Product Demonstration, can it also be a Concept?  If it's a Concept, can it be Product Demonstration?
Those footballing Clydesdales?  Concept or Metaphor?  Metaphor or Illustration?

A promise:
I just finished updating five divisions of a city website.  I am seriously thinking it's time I Just Do my own website for what I need now vs. waiting for what I want eventually.  As a result, I've been picking uber webster brains about Key Words, Meta Tags and SEO (Search Engine Optimization).  They are starting to agree with what I've said all along.  Even Google's catching on.  What am I talking about?  It's coming after the Kamikaze Key Fact.

Speaking of the Kamikaze Key Fact:
If you'd like the Cliff Notes version of the entire form:  complete format with quickie definitions, email me @ kamikazecreative@gmail.com.  If you want the entire, in-depth discussion (20+ pages, with examples and illustrations) and are a student, have your instructor get in touch.  If you'd like the long form piece and you're out of school, let me know about your situation.  We'll work something out.

Something you need to consider:
Mercury's heading Retrograde.  (What's up with that?  http://www.planetaryperceptions.com, click on Retrograde Mercury.)
11/22-12/9 - Mercury in PreRetrograde Shadow (starts to go awry)
12/10-12/29 - Mercury in Retrograde (go to site above, then hang on!)
12/30 - Mercury heads Direct
12/30-1/17 - Mercury in PostRetrograde Shadow (things start to gel)
1/18 - Home Free!
(Not sure what it all means?  See URL above.  Knowing what it is and how to use Retrograde Mercury to your advantage is an important Kamikaze Creative Occupational Safety Rule.)

If you'd like my old CMYK article on salary negotiation, it's been reprinted in Maxine Paetro's latest edition of How to Put Your Book Together and Get a Job in Advertising (out this year - available online everywhere).  I expanded the original piece to include negotiation tips and truths for negotiating during The Great Recession.

Something I assume you know:
Everything I write in this blog is (c)Doreen Dvorin/Kamikaze Creative in the year it appears, if it wasn't already (Copy Sins, Occupational Safety Rules, etc.  Some of this is taken from that book I've yet to finish).  Share it, print it, use it.   Let me know if you want to include it in what you write.   Don't say it's yours or anyone else's.

Kamikaze Creative: Love Poem to our Prospect

Not that I’ve ever been a poet, but I do know a thing or two about Love of Prospect. 

One of the best student, interview/freelance portfolio show questions I get is this:

What’s your role in the Creative Process?

As a Creative Strategist, the easy answer could be, “I concept the strategy.”

As a Copywriter, “I come up with concepts and write copy” works for most people.

As a Teacher/Workshop Leader, you’d think, “I teach others how to use strategy to solve creative problems” would be first on the list.

But because I am a true believer (Eric Hoffer aside), my best answer is, “In all things strategic, conceptual, copy and creative, I represent the Prospect.”

If my primary responsibility is to the Agency, I only see things through the Agency’s eyes.  I must filter focus, perspective, strategy and concept through the Agency agenda, what’s best for the Agency, what the Agency wants me to do/say/represent.  While this may save my job, it'll only be until the Client moves on due to ineffective work.  It won’t help my Client, Product or portfolio – just the Agency.  (Who does represent the Agency?  The jaded old dame says, “Anyone with Sr., VP, CD (in any variant – ACD, ECD, GCD, etc. etc.) in their title.”  The thinking person’s answer?  Well, that’s a whole new blog entry.)

If I don’t represent the Agency, do I represent the Client?  Not if I want to do them any good.  If I’m always looking out for the Client’s internal needs, the Client’s internal problems, internal politics, yadda yadda, the only thing I can do for them would be to maybe help with some of their internal issues.  I couldn’t do jack in the marketplace.  (Who represents the Client?  The easy answer:  Account Services.  The thinking person’s answer probably includes all management – including Creative.)

OK – it's got to be the Creative.  Do I represent the Creative?  This one’s a bit trickier, but I think you can intuit where I’m headed.  If I represent the Creative well, I’ll get it approved by both Agency and Client.  If it’s cool enough, I might win some awards, keep my job and become the Client’s preferred Creative.  Sweet, but like representing the Agency or the Client, it means merda in the real world of competitive market share.  (Not sure about merda?  Ask your Eye-talian Granny.)

What about the Product?  I’m a writer, so I have to know all about the Product, right?  True enough.  But if it’s my job to represent the Product, I must filter everything through that Product knowledge.  May make points w/some engineers and product managers, may isolate some interesting Product USPs (Unique Selling Propositions), but again, won’t mean squat in the marketplace. 

Which is where you need to look for me:  in the marketplace.  Because in all things creative, I represent The Prospect.

Why?  Because the Prospect wields the power.  The Prospect decides how much product is sold, how it’s perceived, whether the Client’s career lives or dies, whether the Agency is retained or gets the boot.  To make any of that happen – to motivate the Prospect to use their power, buy the Client’s Product, respond to the Creative in the desired way, keep the account at the Agency and me at my job – I must filter out all those other concerns and focus on the person I’m trying to reach. 

If you think of it in terms of the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan, while the Client and/or Agency may determine the Objective, it’s the Prospect who determines if, when, how and why that Objective is – or isn’t – met and/or exceeded. 

A Kamikaze Key Fact that’s focused on the Product may keep you working what the Client wants to say, but it won’t give you something to hang your creative – and your Prospect’s ability to grok – on.  The “Big Idea” becomes impossible.  Instead of insinuating the Product into the Prospect’s life, all you can do is be clever with whatever product feature, fact, perception you, the Client and/or Agency think important.

In a strategy focused on anything but the Prospect, a Kamikaze Problem to Solve in the Client or Product realm won’t motivate anyone.  If you’re solving a Problem the Prospect doesn’t care about, it won’t solve a Product or Client problem, either.  Product and Client problem solving is an internal function, not a function of advertising creative.

When I approach all of the above from a Prospect-centric position, I can:

·      Solve the Agency problem by keeping the Client happy and spending money

·      Solve the Client problem by meeting the Objective

·      Solve the Product problem by making it essential and/or changing Product perceptions in the Prospect’s mind

·      Solve the Prospect’s problem by instilling the Product in the Prospect’s life

·      Use the Product to solve a Problem that’s meaningful, motivational in the world where Prospects live

If you’ve seen the Kamikaze Creative Work Plan, you know I put the Prospect first.  On the form.  In the concept.  In the language of concept.   Now you know the basics of Why.

If we’re not tuned into and talking the language, lives and priorities of the Prospect, any creative we do is creative masturbation:  self-serving for Creatives, Agency, Client and Product.  That may make us seem loyal, Product smart and Client/Agency savvy.  But in the long run, creative strategies and executions that don’t reflect the Prospect’s view of the world will come back to bite you.  Hard.

In all things Creative, I represent the Prospect.  So should you.  Your work – your book and your job security – will be better for it.

©2010, Doreen Dvorin

Kamikaze Creative: Concept or Example/Illustration? Doreen tells all...

Kamikaze Creative: Concept or Example/Illustration? Doreen tells all...

Concept or Example/Illustration? Doreen tells all...

A Concept can have a Style, Illustration or Example, but Styles, Illustrations and Examples are never a Concept.

One of the most difficult lessons for beginning and student creatives is a clear understanding of Concept.  The word itself, Concept, is badly overused.  Too often, it’s used incorrectly.  Unfortunately, many working ad folks don’t know the difference between Concept and its potentially equal stepsister Style, either.  

I used to take my early quarter concept classes around the halls and riffling through award annuals asking “Concept?  Or Illustration/Example?”  Most saw a great headline/visual match-up or stylistic execution and assumed it was a Concept.  If it’s good enough for __(insert your favorite pub/award annual here)__, it must be, right? 

All too often, it was really a great headline/visual or stylistic copy/visual/design/execution.  There’s nothing wrong with that – sometimes that’s what works best.  Other times, it’s all you have.  Either way, it can be great creative.  What it can’t be is a Concept.

If there’s nothing wrong with a great headline/visual piece, what’s the big deal about Concept?  Concept is the holy grail of ad creative.  Concept elevates the merely excellent to a spiritual, elusive and deeper product/prospect connection, engaging the prospect on an inner, almost visceral level.

While we may laugh at a great line, turn envy green over an amazing execution, they’re more easily done than concept.  Clever and intelligent as they may be, they’re merely window dressing for product message. 

Think “Got milk?” with the chalky white moustache.  Great campaign, parroted a thousand ways.  But it is what it is.  A catchy phrase that makes you check the refrigerator.  A fun visual that reminds you how good a cold glass can taste.  Sure, it sold milk like gangbusters.  Sure, it eventually sold just about everything else.  But a Concept?  I don’t think so.

Lest you worry I’m going to give you that “I can’t define it, but I know it when I see it” b.s,, here are some ways to judge Concept?  Or Illustration?

Try this:

Concept=Idea

Illustration=Example

Find an ad, TV spot, video, direct, web or guerilla piece you love, admire, wish you had done.  Filter out all your appreciation/excitement for the creative clever smart words, graphics and visuals.  Then ask yourself these questions:

·      Barebones, does it express an idea about the product and the connection to its prospect?

·      Can you carry that idea into other pieces without merely saying the same thing in different ways (or repeating one headline or body copy over and over) with the same graphic and verbal treatment?  (One CD I freelanced for likened concept to a clothes rack.  A complete thought you can hang many different things on.)

·      Is it Bigger Picture (or merely a creative format (style) that communicates a feature, benefit, product position, etc.)?

·      Does it force you (and its prospect) to complete a thought – to actually participate personally, intellectually and emotionally with the piece?

·      If you take away its style (old fashioned, slice of life, editorial, music video, industrial/high techie, animation, analogy, New Yorker Magazine, rap, folk art, yadda yadda), does it still involve engage wow! you?  Is the best thing about it still there?

·      Does it have an idea that insinuates the product into the life of the prospect beyond mere use/benefit?  Does it have an “inner truth?”

If you can answer “Yes!” to each one, without reservation, it’s Conceptual.  Any less than that, it’s probably something else.

On the other hand:

·      Is the unifying factor the Style of the art direction/design and copy?

·      Is the unifying factor the repetition of the same core visual (celebrities w/milk mustache), headline (“Got milk?”) and/or body copy across various platforms?

·      Do you see it successfully “borrowed” for many different products, different prospects?  If it hasn’t been “borrowed” yet, could it be?

·      Is its impact based upon clever words/graphics?

·      Is it more entertaining than motivating? 

Too many “yes” answers to these questions, it’s Example/Illustration.

 Which of these are Concepts, which are Examples/illustration/clever execution?  (Don’t be fooled by awards they may have won – concept or not, they can still be great creative – or not.)

·      Selling newspapers (NY Times) using Norman Rockwell illustrations?

·      Rolling Stone’s Concept/Reality campaign (don’t know it?  Look it up – you should)?

·      Clara Peller and “Where’s the beef?”

·      The Snickers “diva” campaign?  Ditto the one with Betty White.

·      Budwiser Clydesdales playing football?

·      Duke the dog and the secret family bean recipe?

If your answers are Concept (NY Tiimes Rockwell), Illustration/Example (Rolling Stone), Illustration (Where’s the beef?), Concept (Snickers divas), Entertainment (footballing horses) and if you’re still trying to figure out who approved that last one (Illustration), you get it. 

If not, sit yourself down in front of your favorite award annual and ask yourself those questions about anything you wish you had done.  Better yet, do it with several friends/coworkers/fellow students.  It may all be great work, but you’ll probably be surprised (frustrated?) by the ratio of Concept to Illustration/Example. 

When you think you have it, go over everything you’ve done/are working on.  If all you have is Illustration/Example (or if your Concept:Illustration ratio is less than 1:1), you may want to revisit them in light of the questions I asked earlier.   

Now for the big question:  how do you come up with more Concepts, fewer Illustrations?  I’ll let you know next installment.

(Hint:  it has to do with the Kamikaze Key Fact.  Don’t know the difference between a Kamikaze Key Fact and the typical Key Fact?  I’ll talk about that, too.)

For Scott

I learned a former student took his own life this week.  Not a happy subject, not something to laugh, be clever, creative about.  Yet in its own way, inspiring.

Not in the sense most of us mean when we use the word inspiring.  In that sense that brings back the hope and potential someone holds in their youth, in their passions and dreams.  He lived his life with an organic problem - manic depression - had lost his job, grandmother recently.  I'm sure his life story helped feed his disease, but it did not cause it.  We had been back in touch, but he hid his fall into blackness from me.

It's as close to losing a child as I'll ever get.  Somehow, just writing that line makes me realize how far from losing a child-borne-of-my-heart-body-soul I truly am.

Unlike his flesh and blood mother, it's losing the potential of this person - the joy of his passion for writing, for accessing his creativity and power - that hurts the most.  It's the strength he showed in his striving for the best he could be that makes me realize how truly lost he must have been.  But unlike helping him realize and rise to his potential, my powerlessness - my lack of awareness -  in the face of his great pain empties me of teaching's great joy and power.

Perhaps, if I'd prepared him better for the lows our industry foists on us.  Perhaps, if I'd been more perceptive in his diminishing pride of craft and accomplishment.  Perhaps.  Perhaps.  Perhaps.

But I've run out of Perhaps, haven't I.  And so did he.

Scott, I am so sorry your physical imperfections - the very things which heightened your sensitivity and made your work powerful - blinded you to all the things the rest of us saw.   I am so sorry I couldn't read between the lines I helped you learn to write so well.

I am just so sorry.  For once, at such a loss for words.  You deserve better, brighter, stronger.  I know all our second-guessing and guilt and sorrow can't reach you now, possibly couldn't have reached you then.  As proud as I am of helping you reach inside to your potential, I despair at yours.  You are missed.  Both in your actuality and in your promise.

Doreen

Just when you think it's safe to get a job...

I’m in the mood to dish up some advertising reality.  Besides Copy Sins and Creative Strategy, I get more feedback (and “thanks for saving my skins”) from former students on my hints for a happier, healthier adlife than anything else.  While I was teaching at the Circus, I put them together as the Kamikaze Creative Occupational Safety Rules.  While I doubt OSHA would be interested, I guarantee they can save your butt. 

There are close to a hundred, but here are some I hope you’ll find worthy.  If they seem obvious to you, give yourself a pat on the back.  If they seem revolutionary, maybe you should pay more attention to reality before you get your first job in Advertising (or anything else).  (Note:  I kept the original numbers, just to mess with you.)

Kamikaze Creative Occupational Safety

1.    Do not burn your ADs, CDs, AEs or CWs behind you.  No matter how big you think it is, ours is a small, incestuous business.  You will work with that person (that person’s spouse, mentor, best friend, ex-partner, etc.) again.  (I freelanced with a CW I in MA who was my Copy Chief in TX.  Worked with an AE in TX who became my partner in Atlanta.  Ran into a guy I met at a NYC ad party at the Albuquerque, NM VW dealer.  An Account Supervisor from Houston, working for an agency in Wisconsin, hired me for freelance in Atlanta.  Ask around – you’ll be amazed.)

4.  If your boss/partner/AE/whomever is having a good day, make it better.  If you cannot make it better, do NOT make it worse.  (When possible, I choose nondescript, run of the mill days to deliver bad news.  Remember – some people prefer to kill the messenger.

14.  Learn what’s expected.  Do it.

25.  If you have nothing to do and everyone else is busy, do not ask for a raise.

27.  Practice keeping your door closed whether you need it closed or not.  If you don’t, and all of a sudden you close it, people will assume you’re working on your book, talking to a headhunter or sleeping with someone you shouldn’t be.  If your office has the “open” (cubby) system, practice making phone calls from the conference room and/or asking someone with a door if you can make a call to ___your doctor/relative/lawyer/friend with problems/bank of your choice___.

29.  Never try to win an argument with “When I worked at ______” unless you’re prepared to go back there.  Soon.

30.   Know when Mercury is Retrograde and use it to your advantage.

44.  Treat support people and their departments with Respect.  The Agency System dumps enough on traffic, admin, production, IT and media.  With very little relative remuneration.  Treating them as the true professionals they are is a strong signal to everyone you’re a professional.  It may also find you a job later.

50.  The truth is the best lie.  Tell it often.

52.  If you’re unhappy, do not moan groan complain to everyone/anyone who will listen.  Even if you’re just letting off steam, people love to tell whoever you’re moaning groaning complaining about.

56.  If someone steals your ideas, don’t go running to the CD about it.  Many more will be more annoyed with your whining than they’ll ever be at concept theft.

57.  Besides, if it’s that great of an idea, it’ll be way better than the thief’s usual work.  Let the CD figure it out for him/herself.  They like that.

62.  Don’t go to work stoned.  The Sixties (and Seventies) are gone.  In a business riddled with stoners of all kinds, everyone will know.  Even if nobody says a word, after all those Republican administrations it changes how people think about you.  (Instead of Wow! We’re going to get some great creative today! people think he/she’s not gonna get anything done.)   Nobody buys that old “allergy eyes” line – it’ll catch up with you when you least want it to.  Even worse, when you’re running on Idea Empty, and can’t get away for a toot (snort, swallow, whatever), you’ll question your ability to come up with anything.  Bummer, man.

66.  You will work with someone who fired/laid you off again.  Learn to laugh about it.

69.  If you do take a job “for the money” – or if your current employer keeps you there with killer raises and extravagant bonus’ – DO NOT LIVE ABOVE – OR EVEN UP TO – YOUR SALARY.  If you do, you may not be able to take a “better” job.  I know many, many creatives caught in that trap.  Why do you think really talented folks work on ideas like “Don’t Squeeze the Charmin?”

71.  Whatever the reason you left your last job(s), don’t dwell on it. Sometimes it’s personal, sometimes it’s professional.  It’s always a Fact of Ad Life.  Don’t elaborate or fabricate.  Telling an agency recruiter you left because The CD Is an asshole is not as professional as saying it was time to move on.

Think these are stupid?  Want to add something?  Let me know.   Did knowing one of these save your rear?  Love to know that, too.  Keep in mind these are only a few from my list, which only scratches the surface of all the ad reality you’ll soon be able to tell me about.

PS - Sorry about the formatting problem.  Not enough time to solve it.  D.

Dear MC: Go forth and sin no more (unless you have to)

A funny thing happened on the way to my blog.  I got busy.  Hopefully, this will be worth the wait.

It’s been yadda that and yadda this – but the point I want to make is:  there’s a big difference between the perfection we achieve for ourselves and what we have in our produced portfolio. 

I have been back in touch w/MC, the only Copywriting student I ever had who never committed a Kamikaze Copy Sin in class.  She’s writing something for a book I’m doing – a short piece on the Kamikaze Copy Sins telling how knowing them helped her professional career.  She wrote a great piece – clever funny sincere  smart – of course mentioning her sinless feat from PC days.  When I asked if she had a book sample I could use to illustrate her story, she offered my choice of her website. 

I love her print.  The broadcast rocks, full of truth and humor.  An article about the Chicago film industry kept me from beginning to end.  Some great lines, smart copy so far from a formula you’d need GPS to find anything close.  How fabulous – each campaign has its own copy feel.  Here’s the rub – Miss MC’s copy has taken up sinning. 

Not a whole lot of sinning – maybe 4-5 different ones, one showing up more than the others.  Of course I ribbed her, but I also forgive her. 

In the real world, there is no Doreen to rip your body copy apart with a red ink pen.  More often than not, you won’t have a Group Head or some kind of CD (ACD, ECD, GCD – too many to list) who does it, either.  Especially not if you’re Senior.  Doubly not if you freelance.

In reality, there will be higher up Creatives, AEs, ADs and clients who make you put the Copy Sins you so painstakingly exorcised back in.  Like a horse racing back to his burning barn, it seems the familiar seems better, even if it deserves to go down in flames.

There are also overnight deadlines, multi-tasking, open concept offices, proofing your own work and hour-to-hour meetings.  On rare occasions, you really do need to start the next line with  “But”  “And”  “Because” or “Yet.”  Really do need that “that.”

In reality, MC managed to string together campaigns of one, two, three, six, seven and more sentences that invited reading.  Held a common strategy.  Communicated in the language of concept.  Made me smile, sins or no sins.

Which sins did MC commit?  Find these in your own ad copy:

From _____ to _______ - clichéd excuse for poor structure and/or a writer uncertain of how to translate and relate the technology without unduly lengthening the text.

Starting sentences with But, And, Because, etc. – word wasters.  I promise.  If your structure is good, you do not need them.  (Go ahead, put your finger over one in your copy.  Count to five.  If you don’t see how much better it is, you’re either a coward or can’t see your structure problems.)  They can also indicate an implied subject habit.  A crutch I admit I was once my own addiction.

Comma before ‘and’ in a sequence – commas are pauses.  Pause your reader and you may stop your reader’s reading.  It adds unnecessary characters that could add up to a smaller type (font) size.  Exorcised from the Stylebooks before some of you were born (in the 70s).

Why do I bring these up here, now?  Because I want you to understand the true nature of Kamikaze Copy Sins.  (Put your finger over “Because.”  See how much stronger, more compelling the line becomes?  See how many characters you saved your AD or GD?) 

Kamikaze Copy Sins aren’t an arbitrary list of Doreen’s written pet peeves.  Yes, there’s a list.  Yes, they do make me peevish.  Yes, what’s on the list runs rampant in even the best ad copy.   The important thing isn’t that they represent all that’s hackneyed, boring, illogical, unnecessary and uncrafted in ad copy.  (What about “that?”  It’s on the list, too.  Go ahead, put your finger over “that” in the last un-parenthesized sentence.  Count to five.  Didn’t really need it, did I?  But this one's a red herring - use it or not, writer's choice.)  It isn’t that they waste space or activate prospect triggers that say, “OK, it’s a b.s. ad.  I can stop reading now.”  (That first that can be eliminated, with/without structural changes.  The second one I’ll let you keep.  All three create another sin – repeating the same word too closely/too often.)

Kamikaze Copy Sins are also your list of dirty little writer’s hedges, bad habits, things overlooked or copied without thinking.  My list is only the starting point.  You should each have your own. 

I admit they’re not always easy to spot by yourself.  (A long-forgotten client jolted me of out my implied-subject-starts-every-second-line crutch back when I was still Junior.)  You do need a body of work to catch their habitual nature.  (Start writing body copy for everything, even if you’re not required to.)  A tuned-in copy reading friend or art director helps, too.  The “find” command in Word works, but you still need to learn to see things yourself. 

Email me (kamikazecreative@gmail.com) and ask nicely.  I’ll send you the short form list of Kamikaze Sins.  (For the long form list w/extended explanations, I’m afraid you’re going to have to take a class from me or one of my former students, work at Miss Wexley’s School for Girls, The Loomis Agency or somewhere else where you’re exposed to my former students.  If you’re not that lucky, you can wait for my book to come out.)  Check everything you write against them.  Don’t stop there.  Start compiling your personal list now. 

Keep a running list of every bad habit you find in your own writing.  Hint:  If it’s in every piece you write, it’s a Personal Copy Sin.  If it’s something you find wherever you were uncertain what to write next, it’s a Crutch Copy Sin.  If you start every second sentence/fragment in a piece with And, you have a habitual structure problem – with those two lines and most likely, other lines as well. 

I have always said “The joy is in the edit.”  While there’s a lot more behind that line, here’s how it relates to Copy Sins – Personal or Kamikaze.  When you edit out sin, you won’t go to ad heaven.  I can’t promise you awards.  Or even that anyone else will notice.  (What about that that?  Keep it?  Change it?  Tackle my lazy structure?)  What I can promise is your writing will be better.  (How many of you would have written "that" between promise and is in the last sentence?  Obviously, you don't need it.)  Whether they know enough to realize you’re without sin or not, the people you’re writing for – Prospects, Present or Prospective Creative Directors, et.al. – will recognize subconsciously your copy stands above the rest.  They will reward you by reading every word.   In today's tight job market, with too many good writers unemployed, it could be the tie-breaker determining who gets hired among all those excellent candidates.  

Readability and hirability.  Isn’t that what we (want to) get paid the big bucks for?

Another copy blog you should check out:  http://nomagicnumber.blogspot.com.  It belongs to Amy, a former student of mine from the Circus, now freelancing and teaching in Chicago.  I promise, it'll make you wish you could take her class.