From the pulpit
The Editor’s introduction
Issue 34 | March 2015
When I worked for David Ogilvy, even then, back in the day, he was worried that the word 'creativity' had ceased to mean 'problem-solving' and had become 'wins awards'.
In this issue, we look at the Directory Big Won rankings and chart the big winners of 2014. We list the campaigns, the agencies and the people who scooped the most awards around the world. We also get a glimpse of the work that excited two of the judges at The Caples Awards in New York; and, from Argentina, we see ten of the Golds handed out at the AMAUTA awards.
Is this self-indulgence?
No, I don't believe so. For me, creativity is finding new ways to get through to people to change their minds and change their behaviours for the better.
An advertising idea has to be disruptive simply to cut through the total indifference of the people it is attempting to reach. In fact, since everyone can now zap, skip and avoid advertising altogether, creativity is absolutely essential.
To get people to choose to engage with a brand is becoming increasingly complicated as a result of the plethora of new platforms now available.
In this issue of Directory, as in every issue, we try to showcase a number of those innovations to give some sort of perspective to the shifting tectonic plates of the media landscape.
Will the ideas we've selected win awards?
No.
Many might.
Some most certainly will.
(Putting my neck on the block: 'BNZ Shred' from Colenso BBDO Auckland on pages 30-31, 'One Rand Man' for Sanlam from King James Cape Town, pages 98-99, and 'Infrequent Flyers Club' for Tigerair by McCann Erickson Melbourne, pages 100-101).
What the ideas have in common is a desire to get people doing something. Not just liking and sharing but: building a bar (Jack Daniel's), giving an ad executive
an electric shock (Hasan & Partners) and shooting a video to audition for the chance to address the United Nations (Climate Reality Project).
Every piece of work here has a point. Just as every old VW ad in the 60s had a point, argued elegantly and succinctly. The only problem being that learning to be pointed is bloody hard.
In our 'Write an Old VW Ad' competition (the winner announced on pages 20-21) none of the submissions would have made it past Bill Bernbach.
But to those of you who entered the competition; to those who submitted their work to Directory 34 and had it rejected; to those whose work was accepted and those who spent long hours and late nights trying to find precisely the right expression of their idea; those who believed passionately in what they had done and those with the gumption to buy it, we say:
It sure as heck beats mining as a way of earning a living.
Pip pip. Patrick
