I’ve been thinking about my last post. Objective Based Creative Strategies – huge. One post can’t do it well, or even adequately. To help any confusion I created, with apologies to the CD expecting Kamikaze Creative Design Strategy (check back next week – it’s almost done), before and after rereading it, I had these thoughts on KOBCS (and the post itself).
If anyone missed it, the example I gave was way too easy. It’s the kind of idea that gets presented a lot because too many creatives, AEs and clients stop there. Exactly why you shouldn’t. It’s a first idea, not a great one. Way too obvious – keep pushing. It may get attention, but is so predictable, it’ll sell category, at best. It’ll never imprint the brand.
How do you push it? Like you push any Kamikaze Creative Strategy: Push the Prospect. What have you overlooked? Push the Promise – does it really matter to the Prospect; is it truly something no one else can say? Push the Reasons Why – don’t overlook Perceived Benefits. Push the Competition – what’d you miss and how does that relate to your Prospect? Always, always - Push the Key Fact. Especially the Key Fact.
Here’s a real life crazy example I got from a friend who works high up on a lot of fast food, consumer packaged goods, etc. Big budget accounts. Huge. Not sure how it came up – possibly in a discussion on the ways agencies approach e-media. A few jobs back, his agency was presenting phone apps. Not because anyone truly understood them, why they're needed at that particular time or had even a rudimentary knowledge of how to qualify their creation/design/ programming. Worse, they had no idea what – if any – real, measurable benefit the client would reap. Let alone if the benefit was worth the cost.
No, he admitted with candor, they were pushing apps because everyone else was doing them. If competing client corporations and their agencies were doing apps, his agency and client had to be doing them, too. Can’t be left behind – even if we’re blowing smoke.
This isn’t an example of Kamikaze Objective Based Creative Strategy. If anything, it’s a media based strategy. I hesitate to call it that, as no media planner/buyer I know would propose any medium if they didn’t have stats to back it up. Especially as a good deal of client faith in e-media has to do with click-through and quantifiable ROI.
If you don’t do apps because everyone else is, how do you get there? Once there, how do you know if your app (or whatever the vehicle to the Objective is) will at least meet – if not exceed – it’s Objective? You know this one. You go back to your Kamikaze Creative Work Plan (Objective Based or not).
Always to the Prospect First. What’s going on in their world(s)? How can you make your client integral to something you know the Prospect cares about? It’ll be right there in your Kamikaze Key Fact.
Find and play with your Key Fact just as you do in a traditional Kamikaze Creative Work Plan. You just choose/interpret your Objective Based Kamikaze Key Fact so it leads to an actionable way to deliver the conceptual message to your Prospect.
Don’t stop at the Concept itself and apply the concept to the medium. In Kamikaze Objective Based Creative Strategies, your concept is part of the medium.
Back to my friend’s story, what apps do you have that you actually use? Not which apps did you find amusing enough to play with for bit then forget. Which do you actually use?
Why? They relate to your life in a way that is somehow beneficial. They deliver on their Promise. You gave them a try because not only are they integral to who you are (Prospect knowledge); they grabbed your attention and imagination for what they are – and for how you learned about them.
Sounds like a wrap to me. I hope this helps. If you have other questions, you know how to find me. If I awake in the middle of the night with a big OH NO HOW DID I FORGET THAT? I’ll find you.
Thoughts about the last post itself: Mea culpa. Should have given it one more edit (at least).
Since this is a learning experience: after a week away from it, I saw another 15-20% I might have been able to cut from the word count without hurting message or style. I found at least one word that made me cringe (“exploit” – never admit that about the biz unless you’re 100% sure who’s reading). I also found a few (very few, but there) Copy Sins. All laugh derisively.
Something fun to consider: A former, very smart and talented Circus student of mine asked me about a piece of music I once played in class. Although I answered her directly, I want to share it with you.
Ima Sumac. Selection I played from was on Mambo! CD, which I highly recommend. Most of her others can be an acquired taste. I also played from Leonard Cohen’s I’m Your Man, Herbie Mann’s Push, Push, don’t remember what else. If I didn’t include Caesar Evore, Charles Aznavour, Desi Arnaz, Edith Piaf and The Red Elvises, I should have. I believe the discussion was Music as Branding/Concept. Think great spot brands Infiniti Cool as Dave Brubreck.
Looking Ahead/More Promises Kept: By request, my next post will be Kamikaze Design Strategy.
As with all Kamikaze Creative Strategy, strategic design starts with the basic Kamikaze Creative Work Plan. Kamikaze Design Strategy speaks to the way both strategic and production qualities affect graphic and conceptual excellence. Tell all your AD, GD, WD (web design) friends if they don’t read this blog already. And don’t skip it yourself (if you’re a CW, AE, yadda yadda). Knowing it will make your work better by making it more conceptual/integral to the graphics.
