"And that Nike World Cup video (here) is not going to help.
With its millions of viral views, brand managers and creative directors worldwide are going to be viewing it as the gold standard.
Which is a huge mistake.
You see Nike is a Prom King brand. A brand people like because Nike’s discovered the secret sauce that makes people view them as “cool.” So they’ll want to pass around a Nike video because they get some sort of cool points for doing so.
Add the World Cup to that equation. Another Prom King brand, and, for anyone who remotely likes soccer, another source of cool. Factor in too the fact that the young male demo likes to share video, particularly video from brands that have a strong cool factor and you’ve got the perfect storm.
Which is not to take anything away from the actual video, which was exceedingly well done, but reality check: even a really bad Nike World Cup video would have gotten millions of hits. Having a really well done one probably doubled or even tripled what was destined to be a very large number.
The bigger problem, as I stated earlier, is that brands are going to start wanting “something like that Nike World Cup video... you know, the one with Homer Simpson in it.... it got 90 million viral hits.”
It’s the same speech an earlier generation of marketing and ad people got about the Apple 1984 spot.
But if you’re advertising corn chips or diapers or a cellphone service, you’re never going to get a Nike World Cup video. You’re just not cool enough. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing."
from here
6/24/2010
6/04/2010
The hardest year of my life
I turn 31 today and this past year has been, by far, the most difficult one I have ever had. I am a workaholic, so most of my joys and disappointments are generally related to my work. This past year has been a landmark for me professionally and as a human being.
A while back I said yes to a position I thought was the ultimate challenge in my career. I had never done management before and when I took it on - running a small agency I mean - I thought that it would be a piece of cake, especially since I seemed to be surrounded by a lot of people trying to help, and had a well of enthusiasm boiling inside of me, mainly generated by the novelty of the situation.
All this was happening in 2008, October, just as the financial crash came tumbling over Eastern Europe and made everything different. I was 30, I had never been in charge of anything other than my strategy presentations and my power point slides and my own flat and car. All of which I seemed to manage satisfactorily.
Being a manager has changed everything I though I knew and everything I though I knew about myself. I used to think that I was able to muster up endless resources of energy to finish up everything. I used to think that if something was not being done I could do it myself. I used to think that I could be very good at almost anything. Having to manage a team of people, revenue, salaries, clients, strategies sometimes gets pretty overwhelming and it took me a while to realize that some of the things I knew didn't really apply. The one constant realization is that dealing with failure is the most important skill one can develop in order to progress. Strangely enough though, I don't feel like writing I have learned a lot about teamwork and people skills and client management. I think all I knew about that before I became this new person largely still applies.
But I turn 31 today and if there is anything I have learned is that nothing works unless you keep it simple and have fun with it; and that the hardest thing to do is always, but always, remember that it will not work unless you stick by the two things said before.
So what I wish for myself this day is to always remember to not complicate things and have fun with whatever I am doing. Because only then, it all seems to work out fine.
A while back I said yes to a position I thought was the ultimate challenge in my career. I had never done management before and when I took it on - running a small agency I mean - I thought that it would be a piece of cake, especially since I seemed to be surrounded by a lot of people trying to help, and had a well of enthusiasm boiling inside of me, mainly generated by the novelty of the situation.
All this was happening in 2008, October, just as the financial crash came tumbling over Eastern Europe and made everything different. I was 30, I had never been in charge of anything other than my strategy presentations and my power point slides and my own flat and car. All of which I seemed to manage satisfactorily.
Being a manager has changed everything I though I knew and everything I though I knew about myself. I used to think that I was able to muster up endless resources of energy to finish up everything. I used to think that if something was not being done I could do it myself. I used to think that I could be very good at almost anything. Having to manage a team of people, revenue, salaries, clients, strategies sometimes gets pretty overwhelming and it took me a while to realize that some of the things I knew didn't really apply. The one constant realization is that dealing with failure is the most important skill one can develop in order to progress. Strangely enough though, I don't feel like writing I have learned a lot about teamwork and people skills and client management. I think all I knew about that before I became this new person largely still applies.
But I turn 31 today and if there is anything I have learned is that nothing works unless you keep it simple and have fun with it; and that the hardest thing to do is always, but always, remember that it will not work unless you stick by the two things said before.
So what I wish for myself this day is to always remember to not complicate things and have fun with whatever I am doing. Because only then, it all seems to work out fine.
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