advergirl

Recommended resolutions for advertising types

2012 planning may have wrapped up four or five months ago, but 2011 actually still persists ... hanging on, in fact, for four more lazy end-of-year days. What will next year really bring to the friendly confines of agency life? What will you promise yourself to make it even better?

A few friendly suggestions (from the girl with an opinion about everything):

For better work:

• Don't stay too long: Even the best people can't keep doing the same thing forever. We get clouded by what we've done before, what rejections we've heard, and what roadblocks we've hit. Keep changing it up - new account, new role, new hobby, new gig.
• Wander around: Get out of the hotel rooms, conference rooms, observation rooms more. Wander around the mall, the medical center, every city you find yourself in. Make time to check out the world.
• Read more: Refresh your RSS feed, find a new periodical (One Story, HBR, BigThink), follow your customers' blogs, generally consume more fodder and inspiration (mental fiber). Share the best stuff.
• Take a break from all the metaphors: Yeah, I know it's like riding a bike, but people are only nodding at that because (1) you are and (2) they know what riding a bike is (not necessarily how it applies to creating a chemical compound)
• Invite strange people to lunch: Maybe strange is the wrong word. How about: different. Have great conversations about everything and nothing that lead you to think about things in new ways.
• Design a better expense reporting system (ok, that one's just for me, but if you're up for it...)

For better life:

• Cancel fewer plans: Treating every RSVP as a maybe is the epidemic of our generation. Make the plans you want to make, keep them. Turn all others down gracefully. 
• Write: Not just in PPT.
• Meet normal people: Yesterday, a colleague asked me to recommend a mom roughly our age for a panel. The only catch: She had to be outside the industry. I came up with ... ONE, and she's married to an ad guy. (Do you know normal? Hardest Advergirl quiz ever)
• Get inspired: Beat back the cynicism of office life with a little real life inspiration. Go to the theater, see more live music, buy art. (Spending an hour on Pinterest does not count)
• Read your Rob Brezny horoscope: It's 60 seconds/week that are like reading a Hunter S Thompson, being back in college and thinking about your life as a Blitzen Trapper song. Seriously, sign up.

For good intentions that will be left behind by January 6 (at the latest):

• Don't eat the random junk food and cold pizza that people leave in the office kitchen (that's their garbage - not your lunch)
• Do your timesheets daily
• Show up to meetings on time
• Give a little email amnesty (borrow from VW and resist the urge to email before 8 and after 6)
• Don't work at least one day every week: No email on your phone, no PowerPoint over breakfast, no highlighting the RFP in front of the TV. Just don't work.

Anatomy of an advertising emergency

There's a curious phenomenon that happens in advertising agencies ... Despite our annual planning sessions and relatively-long project lead times, every other month or so, we have a genuine Advertising Emergency. An all-hands-on-deck, everyone-cancel-their-plans, someone-place-a-takeout-order humdinger of a crisis. No matter the cause, each emergency plays out nearly the same way:

Why I work in healthcare (ok, I'll say it: pharma) marketing

Almost two years ago now, I left the world of retail agencies to join up with a specialist: one of the leading healthcare marketing organizations in the world. It was a good opportunity to refocus on digital and innovation, but, I'll admit:

I was pretty nervous about it.

I had the same question almost every job candidate I talk to now asks: What's it like to work for pharma (often asked with a grimace)?

If there's an industry out there with a black hat, it's this one.

Pick your complaint: cost, claims, commercials that warn of anal leakage. (ew)

Working inside this industry, though - it's a completely different story. And, the gap, I think is what regulations can do to communications.

Here's what I like about it:

I've never been closer to my customer:
Close your eyes and think of a patient. Chances are that word brings to mind someone in a hospital gown shuffling down a hospital hallway. The truth is that most "patients" are people out living their lives who happen to also have a chornic or acute disease to deal with. Getting that context that keeps real people at the center of what we do requires a lot of listening. I've read blog posts to packed conference rooms like a preacher at a pulpit. Watched patient advocates paint (literally) pictures of what the experience is really like. LIstened to survivors talk about how being diagnosed changed how they and their families live their lives... it is incredibly powerful stuff that will completely change perspectives and create better, more advocacy-minded work.

Or more challenged to figure out how to make a big idea work:
If you've ever worked in a highly-regulated industry (finance, military, health), you know the easiest answer is no. The hurdles are high. The rewards in the distance (and the reprecussions close in).

Getting a big new idea through the system can seem daunting, if not impossible. Creating the business case, the compelling experience, the can't-miss storytelling around a new technology, a new tool, a new market is harder here than it is anywhere (and it's that much more rewarding when it pays off for the people we ultimately serve).

All in an industry that really is changing people's lives
90% of new treatments and drugs are created by private industry (plus/minus depending on whose numbers you look at - either way, most). Those new treatments extend and improve life: In the last two decades of the 20th century, new medicines accounted for 40% of the increase in life expectancy in more than 50 countries (Columbia University economist Frank Lichtenberg). In other words, for every year that life expectancy has increased, five months can be attributed to the availability of new medicines.

Believe it or not, marketing plays a significant role is making these new drugs available. Physicians are busier now than ever - longer days, more patients, more paperwork. The time they spend in the exam room is down to an average of 7 minutes/person. The treatments they rely on tend to be the ones they learned in residency. Bringing innovation to the practice, well, that's what we do here.

Is it perfect? No way. No business is. But I'll take this over selling you a holiday ham most any day.

Holy brand, president man

Along with Pottery Barn, LL Bean, Uncommon Goods and the other deluge of holiday catalog mail in my box yesterday, I found this:

 

It's the 2012 Obama catalog - where you can get everything from Obama wine glasses to necklaces to dog bowls to this weird t-shirt that makes it look like the president is coming out of your pants.

Hysterical. Not even Bono has this kind of brand.

The boom of candidate affinity - from something expressed through free yard signs and buttons to a virtual revenue-driving mall of political gear - is an interesting mashup of the consumer trend of wearing brands (Old Navy, AE, Coach) and the acrimonous political encampments being built between blue and red.

Mostly, though, it's just funny that you can buy an Obama cutting board in the year he's arguably on the chopping block :)

Remember when I used to write this blog called Advergirl?

Over the past few weeks, I've been working on this big pitch with good people from all over the agency. It's the kind of opportunity that warrants some serious planning sessions and big, dramatic staging. In other words: It's the best kind.

As we were talking about who would be on the team, this old blog came up in conversations a few times ... people read it before I started working here, they'd heard it mentioned from this colleague or that, basically they consider Advergirl to have been just a little internet famous.

That got me thinking about writing again. Or, writing here again. When I joined GSW, I put all my blogging energy into starting up some agency blogs. Three of them, actually: WhatsYourDigitaliQ.com, BrandLiberators.com, and BeShareworthy.com

Ok, so that last one did totally fall off. But the other two are doing pretty well. BrandLiberators has 30 contributors from all over the organization - executives and newbies, nurses and coders. And, WYDiQ was named one of Facebook’s top 50 healthcare blogs (whatever that means).

And, even better news? They don't need me any more. The two surviving blogs each have their own editors, writers and readers ... so, I'm off to the next thing. Or, back to it, I guess.

It turns out I miss writing here - trading emails with readers, cracking bad jokes, sharing my favorite things. I miss that connection.

So, my long-abandonned readers, I hope you're still out there ... I feel like typing with you again.

(Oh, and I think I'm going to do some more advertising resume makeovers - so, if you've got a bum CV, send it my way)