Skip to main content

O.K. Einstein

"For an idea that does not , at first, seem insane - there is no hope"
Albert Einstein

Do you realise how much is involved in developing a paper and ink magazine? It is an enormous undertaking. I am creative director and co-publisher of the forthcoming Idealog(tm) (in conjunction with HB Media and AUT press). It is a thrilling and terrifying prospect at the same time. My greatest anxiety comes from the likely willingness of advertising agency media planners and buyers to book space in the book. In the past I have heard (time and again), 'we love the idea, but we will support you in issue two'.

In many ways it is a familiar scenario to the launch of Family Health Diary (FHD). Though my partners and I had a significant underwriting commitment from a large international pharmaceutical marketer other brands seemed sceptical.

At first.

Now FHD is the biggest single advertiser on TVONE, the biggest channel in the country. The product is the benchmark, not only for the pharmaceutical category, but also in the area known as masthead marketing - a term coined by the current owners of BrandWorld (I sold my stake some years ago and now work as consulting creative director on other properties being developed by the company).

It doesn't take a genius to realise that without innovation you will be eaten alive by competitors - and not necessarily in large, quickly fatal chunks either. The process might well be subtle, but being overrun by parasites has the same ultimate affect as being jumped by a great white shark.

In fact the need to innovate is the foundation of Idealog - the knowledge economy is dead - welcome to the creative economy. More on this follows.

Comments

  1. Anonymous10:32 pm

    Pharmac is bulk buying of drugs. FHD is bulk buying of advertising. Big pharma hates one but loves the other - isn't there a contradiction in there somewhere???

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Go figure

Took my daughter shopping tonight. We had dinner out. Got back home late. She laid her new clothes out in neat rows so she could choose what to wear for tomorrow. She's 5. I see her just every second weekend. How can such incredible errors of judgement (marrying my daughter's mother) result in such a wonderful little human being? Go figure

Mac Air Music

I love the idea of the Mac Air but, call me old fashioned, …no disk drive? How will I watch Ratatouille, Toy Story, The Incredibles, Finding Nemo, Cars and A Bug's Life on DVD? The music on the MacAir launch commercial is terrific. I tracked the artiste Yael Naim's video for you. What is the name for this genre (Regina Spectre et al)? Apparently Steve Jobs chose the track personally for the TVC. Order from Amazon: Splash out:

Sexist Advertising and stereotypes

Advertising lives in the short-form world. Because mass media is so expensive the 30 second commercial is conventional and because there is so much clutter simplified signals are essential to 'cut through'. One form of communication short-hand used as a default is the stereotype - "A stereotype can be a conventional and oversimplified conception, opinion, or image, based on the assumption that there are attributes that members of the "other group" have in common. Stereotypes are sometimes formed by a previous illusory correlation, a false association between two variables that are loosely correlated if correlated at all. Though generally viewed as negative perceptions, stereotypes may be either positive or negative in tone." In the 1950's and 60's when men dominated advertising stereotypical impressions of women as inferior or subservient were not only commonplace but usual. It was normal to show women as housekeepers, largely because most wer...