Andrew Chamberlain

Now this is funny actually. Atheists groups and individuals have clubbed together to run an ad campaign on London buses. Their slogan ‘There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.’ just left me laughing. In a time where the church is buffeted on all sides by aggressive secularism and a range of other faiths, its good to see some comedy.

I guess it’s worth a bit of deconstruction. For a start, did the agnostics chip in? What’s this about there’s ‘probably’ no God? And pin up atheist Richard Dawkins is paying for some of this? Surely they should have gone for ‘There is no God’, that at least would have reflected the atheist opinion. I think they would have got in to trouble with the Advertising Standards Authority though, so it’s the more tame ‘probably’.Next we come to the latter part of the statement ’stop worrying and enjoy your life’; so do religious people worry only and atheists enjoy life, only? Think about it for a moment, it’s patent nonsense.

I think what this ad will do is just comfort the believers (or non believers in this case) and they are not the first or last to do this, people of all faiths like to encourage each other by restating their beliefs, declaring who they are to others.

Meanwhile, cheer up deists! And remember if you want you’re beliefs to be respected follow Jesus’ advice - love your neighbour as yourself. Enjoy!!

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I was amused to see Cherie Blair saying this week that history might judge her husband, the former Prime Minister Tony Blair, as having made as much of a contribution as Winston Churchill, the wartime PM. Her comments have been ridiculed by the Tories and treated with some amused derision by the press. The Telegraph had some choice quotes from one unnamed MP. These sorts of comparisons, where they involve people who are still alive, do end up sounding fanciful. The Tory party might be quick to defend the (rightly) exalted reputation of the great Winston, but we should not forget that there are many people on the left who respect and admire Churchill’s legacy. The socialist writer and commentator George Orwell used the name Winston for the hero of his dystopian novel ‘1984′ and Churchill is often seen, for all his Tory credentials, as something of an anti- establishment hero. We might also see another reason for Cherie to share Orwell’s liking of the great PM, after all ‘Geroge Orwell’ was just a nom de plume ;his real name? Eric Blair.

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Browsing the channels last night I came across a program about children’s fantasy literature. Some of the contributors I recognised: Philip Pullman and China Mieville (whose work I actually enjoy). What was telling was that this  collection of very post modern writers and commentators talked about the Harry Potter series as extremely moral and “like something from the 50’s” - a thinly disguised association with C S Lewis’ Narna books. Some of them were struggling to see why kids loved old Harry P so much when its themes seemed (to them) to come from a previous era.

I’ve been reflecting on how times have changed. A few years ago there was, and to an extent still is, a backlash amongst some evangelicals against the Harry Potter books. This was fueled by some Christians believing and quoting various hoax and spoof articles claiming that either the books and/or J K Rowling promotes satanic activity.  Well - what a load of rubbish that turned out to be. A cursory glance at the evidence suggests that Ms Rowling is a Christian, and a member of a Church of Scotland congregation. That she keeps her beliefs relatively private is a matter entirely for her - and wiser folk in the church at large know that it’s a good idea not to be too quick to judge the faith of others, especially on the back of second hand material in the press.

But you can judge her work, although if you are going to do that you have to read it first. Having done so I have to say that - especially towards the end of the series-  the story has a very rich moral, even didactic, feel to it - even I thought I was being taught something. It turns out that this is not just a story about wizards and witches and magic, in fact its not even primarily a story about these things. They are the medium for the message, and that message is about loyalty, friendship, and above all - love. It’s classic good versus evil, and forgiveness triumphing over hatred, it’s about laying down one’s life for one’s friend. It may not look as Christian as Narnia but believe me it certainly ’smells’ Christian.

So much so, that some of the commentators on the TV program I watched were mystified by it’s popularity. Why? Because they have a subjective, relativistic mindset; they distrust the themes that Rowling so proudly advocates (pure love, friendship, loyalty, an objective something worth fighting for) because they see, quite rightly, in these things the seeds of a philosophy that points to an objective, external set of values; and that flies in the face of the post modern agenda. It was no wonder some of them were thrown by Rowlings work; it is in fact that most powerful piece of counter cultural writing that has emerged since the postmodern age started. It is a light in the darkness, and as the phrase goes, the darkness simply doesn’t understand it.

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This from the Director of Strategy at Saatchi and Saatchi, Richard Huntingdon:

“Much advertising is self indulgent nonsense that serves simply to wate the client’s money and the consumer’s time.”

Now this guy has a senior role at a global ad agency; he isn’t a Consumer Rights champion, or a data protection advocate; he comes from adland, and that’s what he has said in the trade press this week.

He goes on to give some context to his words, taking both clients and agencies to task, and in his own way making the point I’d like to make - it’s not that all marketing and advertising is rubbish, it’s just that most is, and the bar needs to be raised quite a bit to achieve something worthwhile.

To emphasise the point - some pure opinion - if I were running the marketing budget for just about any automotive firm, I’d be shaking my head at the moment. Car ads - it’s hard to tell one from the other let alone the brands their selling, someone please have a good idea in the area soon.

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Working as I do, on the edge of the digital marketing industry, I get an insight in to what digital marketers, and the journalists who write for them, are thinking. I’m following a story that’s been bubbling away for a while - the debate around whether ISP’s should be able to target users with online ads. For those who don’t know, ISP’s (or Internet Service Providers) are the people who provide you with the connection to the internet, it might be Virgin media, or BT, or Tiscali, or a service provided by one of the mobile phone companies.

The idea is that, if ISP’s track consumer behaviour online they can use this to fire targeted ads at their customers. Not surprisingly, a majority of customers don’t want their surfing habits tracked and used by ISP’s for marketing purposes; they are concerned about data privacy issues.

Industry journal, New Media Age, has been wrestling with this issue and this week they report from their own research which shows that 58% of consumers think on line advertising is irrelevant (I’m surprised it’s not more) and 81% would opt out if they could from their ISP tracking their behaviour. What is interesting is reading Deputy Editor Nic Howell’s mild indignation at the fact that consumers don’t want to be ‘helped’ by more targeted advertising. His argument is that if consumers think on line advertising is irrelevant then they should welcome a more targeted approach. Nic says:

“58% of users think ad’s they see online are irrelevant, yet they are suspicious of relating ad’s to behaviour”

Well of course they are Nic. The belief of a lot of people in the industry is that somehow they are doing consumers a favour by making advertising more targeting, that it will make the ads more relevant - and that’s the argument that they tend to present. But what these guys don’t get is that consumers are never going to buy the line that the ad’s can be there for their benefit: the truth that consumers understand, and most marketers don’t is that generally ads are just a necessary irritation and making them a bit more targeting isn’t going to change that. They pay for the content, that’s what they are there for from the consumers point of view. If the industry tries to use the line that ads can somehow benefit consumers their words are going to fall like seeds on stony ground. What makes this situation even worse is that consumers perceive this to be an infringement of their privacy, and tthey care about data privacy much more than better targeted ads.

The irony is that behavioural targeting can be anonymous and personal, you don’t have to know who someone is to understand their behaviour, and advertisers needs be none the wiser about their customers if behavioural targeting is adopted. But somehow I suspect that the industry wont be able to get this message across; it will be people’s perceptions that count and so far it looks like a lot of people are giving a more targeted approach the thumbs down.

If the ISP’s and their advertising paymasters lose this one, in part it will be their own fault - they have tried to sell behavioural targeting as a benefit for consumers and the consumers have seen this for the bunkum that it is; they will need to change strategy soon or they will lose the chance to use any kind of targeting with an ever more sceptical public.

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On Sunday (13th) cast and crew at Cambridge’s Corn Exchange rounded off a memorable if exhausting production of Oliver! knowing that they had done themselves great credit in putting on an excellent, sell out show.

For some of the performances I was backstage helping, and it’s interesting to see the stark contrast between the world on stage as the audience sees it, with set, costume, lighting and the magic of the theatre brought to life - and the world back stage, with it’s frentic activity, lack of space, organised chaos, anxious breathless actors, and yet also a cameraderie that seems even more magical than the spectacle which greets the audience. I’ve seen artists young and old bond together for what was a great purpose.

By Saturday we had a review from the local paper, you can read it here, and by Sunday I think everyone was exhausted; but as the title of this blog suggests, a successful stage performance is happiness and hard work. Even with my very marginal involvement I loved it, roll on 2009!

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There has been a lot said in condemnation of the murdering tyrant Mugabe, so I won’t add much more; suffice it to say that, when these things happen there is a temptation to assume that this is the norm, the usual. Some might be tempted to think, variously ‘This is what happens in Africa’ or ‘This is what happens in Government’ or ‘none of our business’.

Well morality is everyone’s business, complicated and awkward though it is. When we moralize about others the standards we set have a nasty habit of coming back to judge us. Some of the African leaders meeting in Egypt this week will find it a struggle to lecture Mugabe on democracy, and none of us are immune from the need for integrity when we start to point the finger.

But we must not be afraid to speak out on these issues; to guard the concept that something is objectively wrong, and deserving of condemnation. Mugabe’s actions are not simply regrettable, or disappointing, they are a moral outrage, and should be regarded as such, in any state, in any government.

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I’ve been to the Online Marketing and Media confernce to hear Michael Nutley, editor in chief of New Media Age (NMA) speaking frankly about the state of play in the industry. Nutley had a few words to say about why the great British public find marketing irritating and are now able to ‘tune out’ a lot of marketing messages.

Well of cource people avoid marketing messages, consumers are not engaging with content (on the web, TV, print, or whereever) to see the ads, most people consider exposure to marketing commmunication as a necessary evil and as a consequence do indeed try to screen it out.

Nutley touched on what I think is the main reason why most people have a stressful relationship with marketing. He was talking about Nike, the sportswear manufacturer who came up with the idea of ‘Nike +’ an online community for runners. This has been a successful venture for Nike, but these on line initiatives are like getting a pet, you can’t just get bored with it and walk away. To borrow from the popular phrase, online community involvement is for life not just for Christmas (or the lifetime of a traditional campaign). So whilst Nike may well have benefitted in terms of sales, they have also built an expectation that they need to fulfil. Herein is the problem for this sort of marketing, at the end of the day commercial marketing is there to sell stuff; even if a particular marketing campaign is all about brand, the fundamental goal of marketing activity is to make money.

Conversely, the fundamental goal of an online community is to create an environment for quality interaction, and the development of relationship. Sure that might involve buying the odd pair of running shoes, but if a company is spending money on creating the environment and there’s no tangible benefit in sales, someone in the board room will soon be asking hard questions.

It’s because, as consumers, we know that this conflict of interest exists that we get suspicious or even cynical about marketing activity, even the covert brand stuff. We may enjoy the few campaigns that are genuinely witty, funny, or insightful. But we know what the real agenda is.

The challenge for mareters is to account for our suspicions and still delight us, and motivate us to engage and buy. Only the best marketing can achieve this.

Don’t believe the hype

On a more straightforward note, we are told to shop around for the best credit card. That’s fair enough, and in such a business brands can be discarded for the irrelevance that they are, but behind these cards are one of the  payment processing companies (Visa, Mastercard, AmEx etc.). For most consumers the significance of these brands are nil. And yet Mastercard are spending big money on sponsorship and advertising during Euro 2008, with amusing little bits of fluff like this. Maybe they are really trying to reach the retailers, I don’t know. Meanwhile, for us consumers getting the card that has the right benefits will laways be much more important than who is processing the payments.

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By which I mean Nearly All Marketing Is Rubbish (NAMIR) which brings a broader scope to my series.

I want to highlight anything in marketing that I think is especially bad (not just the slightly bad, of which there is legion) but the particularly bad, and maybe also what is good.

It was interesting to see the ‘Drench’ ad which I thought was a rare good ad, making it in to the ‘most recognised ads’ chart last week at 3rd place, so there’s one highlight amongst an awful lot of nonsense.

I was intrigued to see what the chief exec of an integrated marketing agency said in ‘Marketing’ magazine this week

“We are a nation of self-obsessed cynics and all we really care about is what price we are paying and the level of service we are receiving.” Adam Leigh, The Communications Agency

Ouch. Well he’s half right; we do care about price and service, and there’s nothing wrong with caring about these things, after all when you cut through all the marketing bull these are the things we care about as consumers, and quite right too. It’s about the price we pay and the experience we have, that encompasses the quality of the product or service, it’s reliability, after sales service, and so on… the experience of the product or service we are buying. It’s not about the ads or the marketing or the brand development.

I can hear the marketer in me howling - ’sometimes the brand is the experience!!!’

Yes, rarely it is, that’s true. There are a few brands that really have some integrity behind the promise they give, just a few. You can maybe think of some, here are three I just thought of:

• Marmite
• Apple
• Google

These are really strong brands, if you don’t come from the world of marketing believe me people get really excited about this sort of thing. You might disagree with these, you might be able to think of some yourself, but for every one of these there are a hundred brands that are shallow and fake and need to be treated with indifference.

In a world where the smart consumer is king, some marketing still works well, but not much. If I see any that’s really good I’ll let you know, and if I see anything I think is exceptionally bad I’ll call that out as well.

In the meantime as the phrase goes, don’t believe the hype!

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I have really enjoyed watching ‘the apprentice’ on BBC. Based on the series from the US with Donald Trump in the chair this one has Alan Sugar - near billionaire and no nonsense East End lad made good. Alan is flanked by two steely looking professional heavies - one of whom, Margaret, is normally the model of competence and respectability - I think she’s a corporate lawyer. But then one of the rounds involves hiring out some very fast and mean cars and Margaret can’t help but have a go. Check it out here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/apprentice/videos/vid/338.html

Nice one Margaret!

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