one part truth, two parts mixer

That planning lark

I'm quite lucky in that I work alongside some pretty special planning brains and some super-experienced grizzly and wise ones. As part of our training, those brains have been running a series of talks about various things. I have quite a few bits and pieces I want to get written down, but I'll start with Nick Kendall's first talk. It was about the style of BBH planning through the ages but these are the two points that stuck with me the most:

Firstly, John Bartle's tripartite principles of planning: Integrity, generosity, simplicity. The thing that struck me most is how relevant they still are today. Integrity, in there being no second class accounts. Apparently, he used to give the little spenders as much time as the bit international clients. Generosity, as in not hiding our thinking, by sharing we make it better. Simplicity, as in bloody obvious.

Unsurprisingly he also talked about effectiveness and accountability, which is the cornerstone of what we do. We discussed new ways of thinking and measuring ROI, ways that are more long-term and involve more stakeholders, for example, attracting the best staff. It's interesting that in their BrandIndex survey YouGov ask a question which is something like 'which of the following brands would you be proud to work for' and also 'embarrassed to work for'.

Responsive advertising

So we had an ad we wanted to run, but only if an event went a certain way. You'd think with online being supadupafast it would be quite easy to get a responsive ad out, but erm, it wasn't. God knows what Carling went through to sort out their World Cup ads.

Anyone had any experience doing this?

Pseudo-science

So off and on this week, I've been nosying about the (inaugural?) Psychogeophysics Summit, a meeting of enthusiasts in the pseudo-scientific pursuit of erm, pyschogeophysics. Which is in essence, adding a measurement angle to psychogeography. Participants had come from as far afield as Germany, Sweden, The Netherlands, Austria and Italy.

Basically, the guys made lo-fi equipment that recorded or was guided by light, sound, radio waves, etc, and used it to look at the city in a new way. The interesting part for me was the looking at a city in a new way, not driven by utility, as opposed to the tinkering with kit to make devices.

Some of the workshops and walks that I found interesting (didn't get to go on them all):

• The GPS walk/game: Where one group of walkers tried to avoid accurate detection by GPS by heading underground and walking down narrow streets, etc and the other group trying to be 'found' by sticking to high ground and walking down the middle of wide streets. Definitely forces you to think about yout
• The idea of 'walking algorithms': Seeing where a  'programmed' walking route, i.e. forward, 6th left, 1st right, 1st left, repeat... takes you. A different type of structure to impose on urban exploration - as opposed to tourist attractions for example.
• One of the guys, Ryan (don't have a link, sorry), managed to record a nuns choir practice from outside the convent with basically a plastic crate wrapped in copper wire, which brings up all sorts of privacy issues but was quite a beautiful thing.

On Thursday, there was a bunch of informal talks given by members of the group.
A guy called Gordo, who kinda does this for a living, talked about a project he'd done where he'd got people to walk around the city with a skin sensitivity device (basic lie-detector, records change in skin resistance, i.e. sweat) which was attached to a camera. Whenever the subjects were stressed, the camera would take a picture. Apparently there were lots of pictures at traffic lights.

Another of his projects involved a corset (think airplane seatbealts not Moulin Rouge) which tightened the more wi-fi was about. Scary.

Our friendly neighbourhood Dutchman Peter Kazil, took us through his heroes, some obscure Dutch scientists who had made breakthrough observations about the world around them for their time. Including a guy who found rocks in The Netherlands.

He also went through the stuff he'd noticed on his trip, like the wear on the city from how its used and pigeons showering in the rain (tangentally he brought up the idea of birds speaking in dialects, which i like). It was really nice to see the city through foreign eyes. "The city has a memory about how it's used". That's a nice quote that will stay with me.

Christian Nold did a similar study to Gordo's, using galvanic skin response sensors, but on a much larger scale, creating emotional maps of cities and towns (see more here). 

I kind of feel guilty about the ideas I had, which take psychogeographic principles and commercialise them, so earnest were the summit participants. So I'll keep them under my hat a little longer and bring them out only when I've exhausted the last Lolcat idea.

Some more pictures:

Fashion spam

We were having a discussion about CRM the other day, and ASOS/Net-a-Porter came up in conversation as examples of brands who do it well. The more I think about it, the more these brands don't seem to have a very intelligent system powering their email communications.

For those that aren't customers of either site, the slew of emails is pretty relentless. Asos favour a mixture of magazine style and promotion comms (buy before 6 to get free next day delivery) and Net-a-porter tend to stick with featuring products. Both are internet-based companies, so I would expect them to have a lot of data about how I shop. But neither seem to use this information to tailor their communication to me.

For example, shouldn't Net-a-porter have an idea of my style profile and the designers I would like from the stuff I've previously bought? Something similar to the Amazon recommends algorithm. Shouldn't it know that I never buy anything over £300 and therefore not offer me £1000 dresses but instead £350-400 items, on the limits of my affordability. Shouldn't they know I generally make sale purchases and rare purchases around pay-day and send me timely messages when I'm itching to spend. I've just opted out of communications because the messages aren't relevant anymore.

The inbox is even more of a battlefield than the adbreak, but email communications seem to be lazy. Have the vision, get the geeks to build it, and watch the cash roll in.

Best brand in a supporting role

The longer I left it to write a post, the more I felt as if I should write something of worth (something that has obviously never bothered me before). But I've decided against that, and will continue with more random ramblings.

So, last week a group of planners went to the History of Food thing put on by Bompas and Parr in association with Courvoisier. Agathe wrote a pretty snappy review called 'When is a brand experience, too branded?'. The event was supposed to be an epicurean adventure, taking guests through a history of British food trends, a bit like Heston's Victorian kitchen but over a longer timeframe. It sounds like it ended up being a big advert for Courvoisier. As Agathe says, if this had been a free event, people probably wouldn't mind the incessant branding, but to pay to be advertised to? That's surely enough to make anyone feel like a bit of a mug - probably something that isn't on the brand key.

It's a fine balance to get the amount of branding right, but it's something that brand caretakers need to consider more as campaigns are more joined up and include more experiences. Thinking back to my fashion days, it seems that PR companies have a better handle on how much is too much. It also depends on scale, I suppose. And the type of brand involved. But that is as with any planning, and it's disappointing to see that brands are still getting it so wrong.

Has anyone been to one of the Red Bull events? I'd be interested to know how those events feel.

Half fat

I'm new

Something that @kaigani tweeted a couple of days stuck with me. Basically, new Ping Pong staff wear t-shirts that announce that they are new. I agree with Kai, this is something I'd like to see a lot more of.

That minority sport

I normally keep this a football free zone because, well football banter goes best with alcohol and pubs. But I just need to get this off my chest.

The argument against technological assistance in football is apparently a question of 'where will it end?', i.e. it's a fast paced game and we don't want stops every five minutes. It seems obvious to me that only contentious goals should be reviewed. It wouldn't hold the game up that much (look at how quickly they showed the replay of the Tevez offside last night).

Decisions going against you - free kicks, etc is part of the game. Even if the opposing team score off an unfairly given free kick - I'd maybe even stretch to penalty - you have a chance to defend it.

Anyway, this obviously isn't going to happen, becuase Sepp Blatter is a corrupt toad.

And on the subject of England. Sigh. We're only going to win something when we play like a team. Which isn't really going to happen while certain players have over inflated opinions of themselves (i.e. think they play intelligently). Which isn't going to happen while the Premiership and the media over inflate their egos. So, we're not really going to win anything for the forseeable future. Oh well. India might qualify in about 50 years.

Do yaks really bite?

So last night I missed a world cup game to go to the Intelligence2 Mountain Festival, and actually I'm really glad I did. It's really nice to go and dip into a world that you're not part of, listen to their issues and be confused about what the hell is going on. I think all the panel and speakers had climbed Everest, but at different points in history.  Like it was interesting to find out that viola-players are the outsiders in the orchestram, it was interesting to hear the insider gossip from the mountaineering world.

As always, some random bits, in bullet points:

• The reasons why people do stuff like scale mountains: the opportunity to explore human greatness. I liked that.
• "The immensity of these aerial summits excited when they suddenly burst upon the sight, a sentiment of extatic wonder, not unallied to madness." Shelley, on Mont Blanc.
• From an essay, 'Murder of the Impossible', by Reinhold Messer, the idea that with every frontier crossed we limit what is possible for future generations.
• People used to climb mountains in tweed.
• Answer to 'why do you climb mountains' by Doug Scott: "Because I get grumpy when I don't"
• "Why is it that humans are affected by the nature/the great outdoors? We're all lifted by being out in the wilderness." Doug Scott, I think, but it's a question I've often thought about. 
• Part of the attraction of 8,ooo ft+ mountains is that even if you've never done something like that, 'there's a familiar taste about it'.
• People who live in the mountains don't need adventure because it's there all the time. We've removed risk from our lives, turned our back on natural existance and moved to technology - no wonder we seek out adventure.
• Part of the debate was about whether Everest has become too touristy. Apparently there are guide ropes to get to you to the summit and over 3,000 people have 'summited'. One of the guys on the panel, Kendal Cool, runs a service where he guides commercial expeditions to the summit of Everest, which the old guys were against ('you have to be resourceful and imaginative if there is no guide'). The elitist-democratic debate over the highest point in the world...
• 'Adventure is when planning goes wrong' - Rebecca Stephens.
• The description of the sun rising over Tibet at 4:25 and being in the shadow of Everest was pretty immense.
• That humans can be quite calm in the face of death - Doug Scott talked about being in an avalanche.

Two things struck me following the evening. One, how awesome nature is. The risk and unpredictablility of those sort of ventures is part of the attraction. Two, and someone explicitly mentioned this later on, is that humans are conditioned for optimism. Which is probably a big factor in why we attempt stuff like this in the first place.

I picked up a flyer for a similar thing in November, it looks quite interesting, I might go...

And some guy (Peter Baily I think) made a joke about being bitten by yaks. I want to know if they really do bite.

Warning: virus

"Viral is not a marketing strategy". Via the lovely Daniele. Another one to add to the obvious but true library.