In Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products, Nir Eyal lays out a four-step process called the Hook Model for creating the types of products and services that keep people coming back for more. Although many of the examples he uses are online-oriented (Yelp, Twitter, The Bible App), there are plenty of lessons here for folks who make other things. I have to wonder if Eyal is simply looking for commonalities in all …
Spotlight On NW Creative: Rational Interaction Grows With Substance
I’ve spent a lot of time in small and mid-sized agencies that don’t seem to grow. I’m not sure whether that’s because of a lack of a management ambition, lackluster work, or a stale business model. So I was intrigued to visit Seattle’s Rational Interaction, which has grown from 5 employees to 70 in less than five years, making it on the Puget Sound Business Journal’s 100 Fastest-Growing Private Companies for two …
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Creative Side Projects Can Be A Dumb And Dumber Idea (And That’s Good)
NYC-based freelance copywriter Deanna Director always has an innovative side project idea cookin'. And this one's taking her places, notably the LA premiere of "Dumb and Dumber To." She gained the attention of Jim Carrey and movie directors The Farrelly Brothers with her Dumbure Couture project featuring fashions inspired by the movie. Tweeting the idea to director Peter Farrelly got this …
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Ad Agencies Looking To Win More Business Need The Levitan Pitch
I suppose in a perfect world, a client in need of an advertising agency would point to an ad campaign they admire and say, “Let’s hire the people who did that.” We wouldn’t need the agency pitch process that is part ‘Dating Game,’ part dog and pony show, part theater, and part…well, part marketing services evaluation. Since we don’t live in that world, we need Peter Levitan and his book The Levitan Pitch: Buy This …
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Powers Of Two Examines The Best Creative Teams
Of all the mistakes I’ve made in my advertising career, perhaps the biggest ones were not staying partners with two art directors with whom I had a great working relationship. One left an agency I was working at, the other I left behind for another agency. Because, as I’ve learned the hard way, a great partner is as good, and as rare, as gold. It’s the nature of creative teams that Joshua Wolf Shenk explores in …
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Without A Career In Advertising, Life Can Be Dull
Even on its worst days, working in an ad agency is still quite fun compared to the dreariness of regular corporate America. That's the point of this promo website and video for The Creative Circus featuring a fictional company called B.E.I.G.E. B.E.I.G.E. Recruitment Video from B.E.I.G.E. on Vimeo. Folks looking to avoid a career in dullsville are invited to attend the Creative Circus open house on September …
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Brandjack Chronicles The Brouhahas Of Marketing
Nearly every marketing book I review for AdPulp contains a handful of case studies or brand examples. But they have nothing on the sheer quantity of case studies and “learnings” to be found in Brandjack: How Your Reputation Is At Risk From Brand Pirates and What To Do About it by Quentin Langley. “Dell Hell” and “United Breaks Guitars” are two well-known cases, but Langley goes on to chronologically track 140 …
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Producing Mass Quantities of Content Might Be The New Normal
I've been working on lots of little assignments for one of my clients these days. Greeting cards, web videos, blog posts, that sort of thin. Are all these bits of content adding up to a successful career, or a successful brand? Well, I'm not sure. But it appears to be the future of advertising. We might have to face the reality that most of us in marketing are playing small ball. That the majority of our work …
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