Briefly

““If the brief isn’t true, stop working on it. STOP””

John C Jay Global Executive Director, Wieden + Kennedy

“Fuck! Why can’t we just!? Bleugh..And there it is. That’s all you gotta do, let’s just do that!”

John Boiler CEO, 72 & Sunny

(via @neilperkin @fragglapp)
 

Why Tech-Savvy CEOs Rule the World

Microsoft's Bill Gates, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Google's Larry Page...the list goes on. Each of these leaders possessed a deep understanding of the technology that their business was built upon. ...the best ones are those who really "get" their products--from the inside out.

One notable outlier here was Steve Jobs, but his vision clearly negated that issue.

Via Inc.

Sir John Hegarty on How the Ad Industry Has Lost Its Courage

Sir John Hegarty seems to be saying this a lot lately, but a good article in AdAge nonetheless.

Sir John's first job was at Benton & Bowles' London office. "I was this upstart young creative who was very lippy, who had all the opinions going for me in the world." And he soon found out he was dealing with people "who just didn't get it."

But he kept offering up his unadulterated opinions on how things should be, "and in the end it was kind of, 'John, I think our paths should now part and you should seek your fortune elsewhere.' It was a very nice firing in a way."

I can't help but feel an affinity for his first job where people 'didn't get it' to how many people today don't really 'get' content marketing and how to be truly effective in marketing their brand/product/service by using content properly (not just using it as a way to get your logo on minutes of video, for example). (It's funny how he even places disdain on "some bloke in a sweaty T-shirt who's 18-and-a-half has said to you, 'You don't need to do that.") Does Hegarty now not 'get it'? (don't shoot me!).

With regard to content marketing, it certainly feels there's still a lot of educating to do to bring people (agencies, brands, colleagues) around, and in line with Hegarty's point - everyone needs to be brave and courageous with their budgets to really be successful.

Make the most of your platform

This post from Brendan Gahan really nails some key points with how to get the best out of YouTube, and the audience you want to reach. One point really sticks out though for me, the use of gadgets or microsites embedded into a YouTube channel. It doesn't make any sense, there's a website for that.

Use YouTube for videos, not a website jammed into a separate tab on the channel.

Oh yeah, it doesn't work on mobiles or tablets either.

Lot’s of brands use channel gadgets (here’s an example of one). These gadgets are apps in an iframe on the Youtube channel. It interrupts the user experience and forces viewers to interact with the brand in a manner that they’re unfamiliar with. As a result there is a ton of dropoff (50% fewer viewers convert to subscribers, and there are 15% fewer shares than brand channels without gadgets).