This Month
September 2010 - 10 year anniversary!
Yes really. Planning above and Beyond began trading in Sept 2000. I'll spare you a detailed review of the last 10 years but wanted to register my gratitude to all of you for being a part of the journey. I've worked for over 90 clients on well over 200 projects. In that 10 years planning has spread worldwide. One of the main reasons I started the website was to provide resources for comms planning because there were so few - now there are planners posting on the internet everywhere. Research has changed dramatically and I've followed the growth of online closely and hopefully made a contribution as a practitioner but also as a commentator, speaker and writer. It has been delightful to work as a facilitator for some huge brands but also some very nimble start ups. And the scope of the training I am being asked to provide grows every quarter. Expect sometrimming of the sails but essential the same mix. Aided by my collaborators. 10 years ago Powerpoint was the only way a small business could operate alongside much larger companies. The biggest change in the past 10 years has been the ease and speed with which it is possible to build and to fold virtual organisations. Which has I think made for better work and allowed meto work alongside a range of outstanding people. You know who you are!
Marketing in Direct
On Sept 8th I shall be speaking at the Marketing in Direct conference - the leading event for direct marketers in Romania. My theme is the role of creativity. I'm very much looking forward toit because Patrick Collister former creative director of Ogilvy & Mather and editor of Director is also at the conference talking about strategy. So we have a reversal of roles. When I work on direct marketing projects I am usually working on the targeting so it has been fascinating to how strong creative work contributes to success. I shall be turning to behavioural economics - see below - for part of the answer.
Innovation Fest 2010 on video
Last month I mentioned speaking at the Brainjuicer's Innovation Fest at Ogilvy and Mather. The entire conference was captured on video speaker by speaker. So you can catch a host of interesting speakers including John Kearon talking about research robots. And Rory Sutherland talking about persuasion. If you have the patience you are welcome to see me talking about building communities of Interpretation as a research tool. I apologise for pacing in and out of shot. I'm not used to being filmed and clearly had an excess of nervous energy at the time. I hope its not too distracting!
Idea of the month: Behavioural Economics
This subject has become very trendy as a way to get advertising audiences to engage with advertising. It is much more useful when you apply it to direct marketing which you are primarily measuring by the behavioural change it brings about. The brain science of the last decade has challenged the whole way we think about customer decision making. We're not nearly as rational as we think we are. We use emotions to make rapid decisions. And while the human brain is a brilliant general purpose problem solver, the brain does make mistakes. Behavioural economics looks at the basic nuts and bolts by which we make decisions. I wasn't going to mention books but to save you mailing me and asking you could try Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely and How we decide by Jonah Lehrer as good primers for this area. A quick example for you: Human beings worry a lot more about losing than winning. So will reverse a decision between 2 winning alternatives if you ask them to chose between the same alternatives one of which involves losing. It is why FREE is such a powerful driver. Because it eliminates risk - even if we are being asked to spend 3 times as much to get the free postage! Behavioural economics will become key to how we construct offers and purchase processes.
Upandcoming
During September as well as Marketing in Direct you can catch me at the MRSSocial Media conference where I have been asked to be a panelist. Cloud 4 - in the Cloud of Knowing project is happening on the evening of Sept 22nd and is open to all. Research and training projects dominate the diary. But don't forget to call meif you have a project for me or if you have an issue you want to shape a solution to. You can always browse the 10 year old website: planningaboveandbeyond.com.
You can always catch my blog on Furtherandfaster not to mention johngriffiths7 on twitter.