Author Archives: Walshy

What is your planning style ? – Idea of the day

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Morning

Last week in Lyme Regis the CID team (whilst generally group hugging, fire walking and naked sweat lodging), talked a lot about range when discussing facilitation styles. The point being that everyone has their own and you need to work out what you need to dial up and dial down.

I think we all need to think about our planning in the same way.

Which reminded me of this collection of genius from various advertising and planning luminaries. Take a look and have a think.

Developing your own planning style – remix

So today’s idea of the day is to think about what your planning style is?. Then start thinking about what your range is and what to dial up and what to dial down?

In case you were wondering, i would describe mine as ‘simple and sweary’

Have a great weekend

Walshy

Idea of the day. ‘We have had this great idea called the 70:20:10 principle…’

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Not really. I’m just poking fun at the advertisers and agencies who on a weekly basis seem to claim ownership and invention of the 70:20:10 principle. It’s the new Paid, Earned & Owned.

Let’s all be honest and admit it is Google’s ‘principle’ that to my mind Millward Brown have intelligently spread with aplomb. See the MB article ‘planning by numbers’.

So for those that don’t know, what is it?. Very simply it’s a media investment framework that helps bake in some form of innovation to your plans and ensure even the most risk averse advertiser is testing & future proofing their plans.

The advice of the principle is 70% of your investment should go on proven activity (media, messaging), 20% should go on evolution of the 70% and 10% should be genuine tests where you are taking risks likely to fail but from which you will learn. The point being that executed successfully, overtime successful tests in the 10 percent will move to the 20, and successful executing in the 20 to the 70. Thereby future proofing & optimizing your plans in this crazy media world. And that’s the point. in the chaotic media landscape we can’t afford not to experiment.

The reason it has captured the imagination of the advertising and marketing community is not just because it’s a googlism. Rather, and having applied it ona lot of our clients over the last few years, it’s really useful and works. Don’t worry about the actual percentages (for some clients the 70 would be much bigger) but rather focus on a plan that has one part proven, one part evolution and one part revolution.

So today’s idea of the day is apply the 70:20:10 principle to your plans.

Laters

Walshy

Idea of the day…Me and Holly Valance

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I’m currently flirting with a new brand of premium strength larger. We keep seeing one another but have yet to be introduced properly. I have seen it around, tweeted about it and even seen it in store but have yet to get the full introduction. Which has lead me to today’s idea of the day.

When you are consciously going through your own path to purchase for anything big or small, think about what touchpoints you are being exposed to, what you are thinking & feeling and write it down. You might find it incredibly useful to refer to the sample size of 1.

So my path to purchase for said Larger has been;

Poster
I tweeted about it surprised by a cooking larger going premium
I saw it on shelf when buying larger in my local off licence
I saw it on offer on the promotional leaflet at the till in the off licence
I saw a promoted youtube link at the top of the listings
I saw the TV ad
I saw the TV ad
I saw the TV ad
I saw the poster
I saw the poster
I saw the poster
I saw the celebrity in the ad is going to be on Strictly on a newspaper website
I blogged about it but have yet to buy ….

Draw your own conclusions from the above.

Go on, try it out, I think you’ll find it useful …

Walshy

Idea of the day – The 3 sources of ideas

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Hello all

As James Webb Young observed an idea “is nothing more than a combination of old elements”. With that in mind we have been talking a lot about the sources of ideas recently.

Borrowing from various of the classic advertising and creativity tomes and as a general rule of thumb I think ideas come from 3 real sources.

‘The brand vault’
A new idea is very often a repurposed form of an idea/execution from the brand’s past. This is the first place you should look.

‘Stealing with pride’
Taking ‘inspiration’ from elsewhere should always be your next port of call Other brands, categories and geographies are abundant sources of ideas for your brand.

The combination of the above
There are no new ideas. So if the brand vault or stealing with pride don’t help then combining the 2 will.

Of course this is over simplified and doesn’t do justice to true creative epiphany. But it is a proven way for you to find sources and routes to new ideas big or small.

Try & apply

Walshy