Olimpiadele comunicarii

I thought that this post might have been a great moment to inaugurate my new half English half Romanian blog [yeah, I'm thinking about it] but truth is I think people who cannot read Romanian should hear about this event too.

For the second year in a row I will have the privilege to be a jury member for the Communication Olympics, an event which faces off communication aspirings with the advertising community.
I find it amazing how much energy the people participating in the event bring to the table every time they present and last year I was also delighted to see some honest sparks of strategic thinking in some presentations.
I think there is an interesting tension at play in the recent events, with the jury including more and more strategy people as opposed to exclusively creative as in the past. Leveraging creative and strategy is a hard balance to strike for any newcomer to the industry especially since they get tutored by creatives and strategists in different seminars. So, some basic advice for those entering:
- establish a clear strategy with clear objectives [brand + sales]
- decide on your target as it will influence your TOV
- outline a clear message to achieve that strategy
- deliver creative that will result in your message being understood by your target and internalized

Naturally the above are all hygiene factors so going beyond the basics would imply:
- understanding that communication is now part of culture so whatever you make needs to perform as content
- understanding that people internalize messages and then use them to compose a brand universe - an integrated campaign is important but it does not mean you deliver the message in the exact same form every time
- tailoring media to your target - just because it is cool you don't need to do guerilla or virals for every project

I am really looking forward to this....