I read Rory Sutherland’s engaging blog post in Campaign today validating the continuing need for great copy in advertising. The only thing it was missing was a purposeful discussion on the subject within the digital world, so that’s what I’ll attempt here.
In our digital industry, we are seduced by the ever-expanding list of things technology allows us to do. With the emergence of technologies like Natal, Android and ARG, we exist in a wonderland of visual excitement and pioneering knowledge. It’s a great place to be. Even glancing back for a moment, our industry has been one that has up till now been sustained by audiovisual excitement of subservient poultry, wayward balloons and smartphone apps that really do make it look as if you are drinking that beer. We have been the Willy Wonka to the Cadbury factory of the good old traditional ads.
But social media has brought about one fundamental change and dusted down a discipline that I was worried had almost expired within the so-called ‘new media’ agency.
I doubt very much that readers can point to a piece of digital work whose awards were garnered by its masterful use of copy; the Ogilvys, Bernbachs and Abbotts would have little to detain them if they were to be brought into a judging panel for digital work. Yet, when I flick through my social media accounts, there is one thing that exerts a stopping power so great, I feel like a galloping, excited greyhound that’s just forgotten that it was tethered to a concrete wall.
You can see great copy coming. As you flick down the endless retweets and automatic blog posts, it’s almost like your eye sees the great words before your brain has had time to start reading. Beautiful writing never goes out of fashion, and it’s just about to become very important indeed.
On Twitter, there are certain people whose avatars are a prompt to stop scrolling out of pure habit. Charlie Brooker, Richard Herring and Paul Carr are all people who have the power to captivate you with no more than 140 keystrokes. They make you smile, think, flinch or disappear into a fit of giggles. On the other hand, there are people who should hold far more sway in the digital world who are truly undermined by the high volume and low readability of what they put out there. Please take a bow Robert Scoble, Piers Fawkes and Guy Kawasaki. Don’t get me wrong – once I connect with what these people are on about, they are as compelling as anyone, but words aren’t their forte.
I have seen precious few brands that have invested in a truly arresting voice. Typically, their social media efforts are a mixture of platitudes, harmless observations and @answers dripping with well-intentioned banality. Granted, Brooker, Herring and Carr all push the boundaries to certain limits, and brands have reputations to manage. But these same brands manage to approve the creation of advertising campaigns that are just as provocative and arresting as their social media voice should be. They need to develop a voice that is invested with the same brilliance and power as an ad campaign. Only this time, you add spontaneity. If that terrifies you, then it’s good confirmation of how things have changed. In terms of great examples lighting the way, it’s all a bit limited. Aleksandr_Orlov from Compare The Meerkat is only one I can think of, but I’d love to have some more voices to listen to.
So the recommendation is simple. Talking isn’t enough. Brands should actually pluck up the courage to write something involving, human and compelling. And for heaven’s sake, write it well.
Twitter: Probationary review
If Twitter were an employee, it would be approaching the end of its first three months with me – that probationary period is a vital proving period in any relationship, and it’s a good idea to take stock of what you’ve learned, what’s been fun, and what needs to change. In an attempt to make this useful for the Hive, I’m going to use the tried-and-trusted list of 11 points.
Twitter veterans will have nothing to learn here, but hopefully the newness of these perspectives will be of use to some of you.
1. Pedal! Pedal!
2. Starstruck?
I admire Stephen Fry. I think he is a staggeringly clever, funny bloke. But his Twitter feed, allegedly the non-plus-ultra of ‘Twelebrities’, was an anticlimax, and the same goes for the other famous people. Even Ashton Kutcher. I think I expected too much, and discovered instead that Twitter lays bare how embarrassingly ordinary the contents of celebrities’ heads are. But there’s a flipside to this: the same effect uncorked the personalities and minds of lots of ‘little’ ordinary people who deserve just as much adulation. In the same way as Stephen Fry has underwhelmed me, the ‘ordinary’ people I follow have been a revelation – colleagues here at Profero as well as employees at other agencies. Rather than bleat on about their work, Lean Mean Fighting Machine has popularised the ‘pant jump’ and I always look forward to the ‘squid news’ coming out of Dare. Profero has its own Yellow Bin – possibly the only recycling bin in the world to have gone on a drug-fuelled bender in Camden. This is a wonderful marketing point that I think is coming closer than ever to the magic 15 minutes that Warhol is on about.
3. Bland identity
As I’ve mentioned in a previous article, I am dismayed at the output of brands out there. Thinking that it is ‘enough’ to have someone sat at their desk, engaging with the audience, they are tweeting me to sleep with their harmlessness. I promise to buy the products of any brand that steps up to the mark and starts making the walls shake.
4. In our bubble
I’m going to take a punt and speculate that advertising and new media types might over-index on Twitter a little. Yep. Thought so. In between thrilling the crowd with urbane, witty thoughtfulness, and rehashed news, we should take time to step outside into a real world in which Twitter is about as front-of-mind as Chilean domestic politics. People in our industry are currently talking about Twitter as if it is social marketing. In fact, Twitter is the Manchester City of social media – all the news, all the column inches, much expectation, but nothing like the proven reputation, reach and size of other outfits. It’s nothing insightful to suggest that Twitter still has a way to go in terms of mainstream penetration, but I’ve got my doubts as to whether the surge will continue for long. A forgivable perception of Twitter is that you’ve got to have something to say; just look that vacant white box at the top of the page. It’s as terrifying as a switched-on mic. The problem is, the majority of our audiences don’t feel they do have stuff they want to publish, but they’re happy to listen. Twitter perhaps has to be repackaged into more of a one-way product to reach out to the real masses.
5. Two vaginas
Did you know this: residents of the Colombian town of Villa Vieja got a bit of a surprise when a mutant calf was born. ‘The calf has six legs, two vaginas and six nipples,’ explained the animal’s owner, Salvador Vanegas. Mr Vanegas, who has been raising cattle for many years, said it was the first time he has seen a calf born with that many legs and vaginas.
6. Tales of the unexpected
See previous point. The most absorbing people I’ve seen using the service understand how to stop you in your tracks, and it isn’t through being permanently relevant or predictable. They do it through building a pattern, and then throwing something in there that completely wrongfoots you.
Cricketers call it a googly.
(This the only thing I know about cricket).
Thing is, you can’t beat something that momentarily makes you think that the writer has lost his marbles. As anyone in email marketing will tell you, if you can’t mix it up, you’ll lose people.
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