Recently, Ben Kay had a debate on his blog about what sort of creative director you should work for.
Ben finally decided it should be one you respect.
The issue then becomes, how do you define respect?
I guess everyone has to come up with their own version of how you pick who you work for.
For me it was always, can I learn from this guy, and is their opinion better than mine.
I worked for John Webster for 10 years.
I kept trying to leave, I had lots of interviews.
But every other creative director wasn’t as good as John Webster.
Every interview I had just made me realise I was working for the best.
What John did for me was make me better.
He made me braver, he made me take chances, he made me do better work.
Isn’t that what you want from a creative director.
So for 10 years I couldn’t leave.
Then John made someone else creative director.
And I didn’t want to report to him, I didn’t think he was as good as me.
So I left and started my own agency.
But the problem was, I didn’t have a creative director anymore.
And I think we all need a creative director to make us do better work.
To push us beyond what’s comfortable.
Even if it’s only someone in our own mind.
So I had to create my own creative director.
And I found three people who, put together, were better than me.
An art director, a copywriter and an account man.
Gordon Smith would never get seduced, as I would, by complicated marketing logic.
Working with Gordon is like working with a copy of The Sun.
I’ll spend ages working on the strategy, the tactics, the research findings, the consumer insight, the brand personality.
Then I explain it all to Gordon and show him the ad.
He says, “Yeah, but it ain’t funny.”
And I think, shit he’s right.
Working with Gordon reminds me that we’re not in marketing.
We’re in advertising.
All the logic in the world won’t work if that ad’s dull.
Being reminded of that makes me do better ads.
Paul Grubb was a trainee copywriter from Sheffield.
I was briefing him on a TV ad we had to do for Knirps umbrellas.
I said the brief was ’structural integrity’.
Grubby said, what’s that?
I said, “It’ll bend but it won’t break. So we need a strapline that says that. But we have to lock it into our brand. No one knows the names of umbrellas, so we need a mnemonic.”
Grubby said, what’s a mnemonic?
I said a catchy device to make the name stick in your memory, a gimmick.
Grubby said, like what?
I said, “I dunno something like….er….you can break a brolley but you can’t k-nacker a K-nirps. Do something like that.”
Grubby said, what’s wrong with that. I like that?
I said, “Don’t be daft, you can’t do that, it’s swearing.”
Then I thought, hang on, maybe he’s right.
Grubby reacted the way a punter reacts to a copy of the Sun.
It’s funny, it made me laugh, that’s good.
Being reminded of that makes me do better ads.
Mike Greenlees was the Chief Exec at GGT.
When we were starting the agency we were doing a pitch for a beer account.
I wrote a campaign and showed it to Mike.
He said, “It’s a very good beer campaign, I’ll have no trouble selling it. But it doesn’t scare me. Can’t you do something that scares me?”
Sometimes I forget that.
That consumers aren’t interested in the subtle differences between ad campaigns.
We’re competing with everything else in the media.
Newspapers, TV, internet, magazines, films, music, everything.
If we’re too comfortable, then what we’re doing won’t be different.
And if it isn’t different, it won’t stand out.
And if it doesn’t stand out, it has no chance of working.
I need reminding of that.
It makes me do better work.
So I put those three guys together in my head, and made them my creative director.
If they all agreed on something, I’d over-ride my own opinion.
Because I had a creative director made up of three people who thought like Sun readers.
They liked to laugh, they gave a genuine consumer response.
And they weren’t seduced by marketing bullshit, as I can be.
So, I’m not so sure I go along with respect as my motivation for choosing a creative director.
Personally I look for someone who can make me better.
And if you can’t find one, build your own.
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I’d say try and sidle on up to one who you feel a sense of kinship with. I know I would have loved to work with John ‘cos he reflected life’s everyday ups and downs in his work. It was all about humanity. I love ads that reflect the sense of everyday.
I hear ya 100% It isn’t just true of advertising though, its true of Digital Marketing as well. Twelve years ago I worked with a creative director who is still in a limited group of 1 that I would legitimately call a genius. His creative was simply the best out there which is one of the reasons we grew the agency from 5 guys in a basement to an International company with a presence of 3 continents within 5 years. When I started to set up my own digital marketing agency I thought where the hell am I gonna find another Will, and then it hit me, I won’t.
For a start the game has changed and what we did then isn’t going to work now, so I went out there and picked up an arm here and leg there to put together a creative team that I think works. When you have worked with the best it is sometimes tempting to just have that picture in your head of how the team should look and run but that isn’t how great teams work. A football manager isn’t looking for as close a fit to George Best as he can find to recreate the Man U side of the sixties. He is looking for as best a set of players as he can find to create something new. As part of what I do I am constantly banging on about digital marketing strategy but it took me a while running my own agency to see that you own skill strategy is just as important to deliver benefit to clients.
Macromind SelfDirector 3.0: Unleash the inner bastard.
Dave, I find it hard to believe you are seduced by marketing bullshit…
Dave, did you ever think of becoming a Sun reader, firing the other three and spending their wages on wine, women and amateur dramatics (© Ben Elton/Richard Curtis)?
Hi Neil,
As regards marketing bullshitr, check this out from on one of my favourire blogs:
http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/
Thanks, Dave. Who would you say is a modern-day Web equivalent? I know what you mean about being upset that Web made someone else Creative Director. For years, friends and I have watched undeserving people (who might as well have been a suit or frock) made Creative Directors. After a while, when these people get pushed up the greasy pole, they then hire someone who is even more deserving. Funny how in your piece, ‘awards’ nevet came up once. Whereas these days, people look to work for Creative Directors who have won awards - or who can help them win.
Can I just fly the flag for Marketing?
It is the same - great creative marketing ideas are what should be strived for.
All the empty rhetoric etc is exactly that - the best marketing minds are intuitive and creative and surprise the consumers with ideas that often lead to great advertising…
There is plenty of advertising BS to compliment the equally vast amount of marketing BS out there!
Hi Sully,
It isn’t so much marketing I have a problem with as bullshit, wherever it comes from
Marketing bullshit is harder to spot because it sounds more credible, the language is better disguised.
e.g. the current buzzword in marketing b/s is ‘granular’.
whereas the current buzzword in creative b/s is ‘random’.
I think it’s probably worth expanding into a post.
So thanks for that.
“Sonic brand trigger.”
Was half-way through the brief when I realised the AD meant “jingle”.
Iron sharpens iron.
Hi Dave,
I’ve always had this thing about ads having SHARK’S TEETH.
If a line doesn’t decapitate me immediately,
it never will.
The Sun is amazing at advertising itself. I remember a section in Andrew Marr’s book on Fleet Street where he describes Kelvin MacKenzie’s policy on which stories he would put in the paper. MacKenzie said that if someone in the tea room could say, \Listen to this Doris\ and read out a story, then it would go in.
That immediately strikes me as a similar way to decide on an advertising campaign. If someone asks you \Have you seen this advert?\ then the advert works.
Sadly, I think this probably means that it’s more successful to appeal to the lowest common denominator, or maybe I’m being elitist.
I built my own creative director. and he fired me.
Cal,
You should have done a better job.
Ha! That’s the thing Dave. The Creative Directors in my head are George Lois, Neil Drossman and Ed McCabe. I’m not sure if it’s made me a better creative but I do now throw a much better punch.
Cal, no shit.
Neil Drossman was a writer at my first agency: Kurtz Kambanis Symon on Madison Avenue.
He worked with a guy called Joe Genova.
Typical NY team, Jewish copywriter Italian art director.
Dave, I worked for Neil for a while. Great guy. Very demanding (of excellence). Definitely made me a better writer cause I was scared to show him anything ordinary.
Dave, I think you have become my Creative Director.
Hi Catalba,
A pleasure to be the creative director in your head.