I’m convinced that we don’t improve by evolution, only by revolution.  I seen massive brands like Kodak and closer to home Ansett die. Trisha’s toys, the toy store in Cottesloe I used to get my toys from as child couldn’t compete with the category killer ‘Toys R Us’ – it’s now dead too. Same with agency brands – The Campaign Palace, dead, and many other successful brands in limbo.  We can’t change by evolution – if change is required – and it often is then revolution is the only way to go.

Let me explain.  Some years ago I was invited (potentially by mistake) to an exclusive lunch at Fairfax to hear the then CEO of Ford speak about the car market and how they were evolving with the times. He mentioned Ford had just introduced ‘intelligent turning headlights’ as an example of evolution. I asked him ‘What about electric cars from Ford?’ His answer was evasive. He spoke about lead times, and capital investment costs, and how it was important to keep up with consumer demand, but not change things to radically.   He said ‘At Ford we believe in evolution not revolution’.

Now compare the car industry to that of our lunch’s hosts, Fairfax, the ‘Newspaper’ people.  They, I believe have got it (a little more) right.  The newspaper industry has the legacy issues of all legacy issues – massive printing presses, and the massive challenge of the increasingly ubiquitous nature of information. However, they haven’t tried to change their entire business model by evolution – creeping towards digital day by day. Instead, they’ve created new brands and businesses and jumped into the online world headfirst.   Within this environment they (and their friends at News) have been occasionally getting it right (Domain) and sometimes getting it wrong too. They’ve done this whilst the legacy business news-paper chugs along.  It will die at some stage, but they are managing the decline, and whilst at the same time have different businesses looking forwards towards growth.

So if the answer is revolution not evolution then how do you easily jump from one thing to another – revolution, not evolution?  There is one simple rule all brands should embrace. Define yourselves by an emotional promise, or attitude, not by what you make.  Think Virgin ‘the consumer champion’ they can apply that promise no matter what industry, verses Ford ‘we make cars and trucks’.

Interestingly, I see a similar thing happening with advertising and media agencies.  Those who think they are (for example) a media agency who buy and sell media will not evolve as media buying becomes commoditized. Only those that have a higher order promise will. A promise that can umbrella other business models other than just the trading of media.   However, think of the media agencies you know – what do they stand for? What’s there promise? Will it carry them beyond buying?  And it’s not just media agencies!  What about the creative agencies, or research agencies, or PR agencies, and so on.  They all have a factory and define themselves by what they ‘make’.

So many of these agencies have the audacity to tell their clients to understand what their promise is, and to not define themselves rationally (by what they make), yet PR agencies do PR, research agencies do research, and advertising agencies do ads (or the work the work the work).  Most define themselves rationally – and few have a promise with stretch beyond what they currently do.

The future proofed business models are the ones who understand their promise, and don’t build factories making just the one thing. Think Virgin, or Apple (what business are they in? Laptops, Tablets? music, phones?) Who are the Virgin’s and Apples of the advertising and media industry – the brands that are defined by an attitude and a promise, applying that to what comes in the door, rather than having a factory to feed.

So coming back to Ford, and there struggle to remain relevant in the 21^st century.  It was their founder who once said “If you asked people what they wanted they’d have said a faster horse’, (I agree consumers are not good people to ask if you want to understand what they want). He also was very clear to explain Ford were in the transport business, not the automobile business.  However, if that’s the case where are the innovations for Ford in electric vehicles, bikes, airplanes, rail, shipping? Why is it that Ford has 99% of its business in cars and trucks with combustible engines? Why do they have factories dedicated to making (more or less) the one thing?

In the future there is only one guarantee things will change faster, quicker, and more dramatically than they have till now. What seems relevant today will be obsolete tomorrow. The power of a well-constructed brand is that it can ebb and flow and manifest itself in all sorts of different ways. However, it can only do this if it’s constructed to be a ‘why’ based brand – a brand with a purpose, rather than a what based brand – a brand that defines itself by it’s output, what it actually makes (e.g. ‘the work the work the work’).

So if you work with brands, or you’re a brand yourself what is it that you stand for, what’s your promise? If you know you’re in for the long haul – if you don’t then I hope luck is on your side.

Finally, I want to say thanks to B&T for having me back as one of their regular contributors. I’ll be writing for B&T monthly after a 4-year hiatus.  It’s nice to be back. This article first appeared in B&T May, 2013

Here’s a radio interview I did with ABC Perth about the recent victory the ‘environmentalists’ (i.e. general population) had over the $45 billion proposed Browse LNG project in Northern West Australia.  Towards the end it touches on business models and the balance of capitalism and socialism.

Some years ago I worked in the area of forensic psychology, assessing sexual offenders for court and parole.  Assessing the dangerousness of a sex offender involved looking at many facets of their lives including their living circumstances, interpersonal skills, and offending behaviour.  However, one of the more interesting things we assessed was their masturbatory habits.  I say interesting, as it’s something often joked about, but rarely discussed in polite, contemporary culture. Who wants to be the weirdo talking (or writing) about masturbation?

However, it’s still an area shrouded in mystery and mythology, much of it incorrect.  I was at a dinner party recently and was telling some guys what I knew about masturbation, one of them said “I wish I had known that 10 years ago’. I didn’t ask why, but instead decided to write this article.

In a world that has experienced an exponential proliferation of easily assessable pornography these learnings about masturbation become even more salient.  Here’s everything I (think) I know about masturbation, and lessons for the  ‘normal’ (pronounced with tongue firmly in cheek) among us.  This article is for men. Women are another thing altogether.

Rule 1: Avoid Zeroing in

One of the hallmarks of a sexual offender is that they learn to masturbate to maladaptive themes during seminal years in their development. They may begin to masturbate about a particular younger person, or someone with a particular mannerism and stick with that fantasy. If they lack the social skills, or life experiences to broaden their masturbatory repertoire they may zero in on that particular fantasy.  Masturbating about it repeatedly.   The issue is masturbating to orgasm is such a pleasurable experience that it becomes an incredibly strong conditioner of human behaviour.  Image within masturbatory fantasy equals very pleasurable orgasm. Repeat times a thousand will condition people to really desire that particular image. Therefore if something is fantasied about enough, under certain circumstances, it can become a pre-curser to acting on that fantasy (or put another way a sexual offender will more than likely have masturbated about their criminal activity many times before doing it.)

For the ‘normal’ ones among us if you zero in on a fantasy figure you may soon find that you have difficulty enjoying sex with anything other that that particular masturbatory fantasy.   The proliferation of pornography has worsened the situation. People can ‘zero in’ on exactly the type of person and/or situation they want to masturbate about, and then that becomes the only thing they look for in real life.  It can make sexual gratification in reality much more difficult.

If you keep your masturbatory fantasies broad then you’ll keep the number of sexual experiences you can really enjoy broad too. The same applies not just for ‘who’ you masturbate to, but what you imagine happening. Just keep it broad.

Rule 2: Include your partner or likely partner

When masturbating we tend to have rotating themes we imagine.  Be sure to include your partner in these fantasies some or most of the time.   If you don’t have a partner, then masturbate to the types of people you are likely to meet. You’ll have a more fulfilling sex life if you do. The reason being is that masturbation is again a strong conditioner of behavior. You’re pairing something highly enjoyable (ejaculation) with a particular stimulus (the person fantasized about).  You’re best off conditioning yourself to enjoy the types of sex you’re having (or are likely to have).

Rule 3: Masturbate Nice

There is so much pornography out there that is nasty and degrading.  Again what you masturbate to, is conditioning you to the type of sexual experiences you’ll enjoy.  Masturbate to mutually satisfying themes where both parties are respected and enjoy the situation.  Try honoring your partner when you masturbate, and it’s what you’ll want to recreate in the flesh (so to speak).

Rule 4: Masturbate before bed

If you’re having trouble sleeping masturbation can help. Ejaculation releases a powerful combination of chemical compounds including prolactin oxytocin and vasopressin, apparently all aiding sleep. It also explains why men like to fall asleep after sex!  Also, if you think you are going to have sex that night, and you want it to last longer, then masturbate before hand.  You’ll last longer if you do.

In Conclusion

Ok so it might be creepy writing an article about masturbation. I apologise if the article offended you. I apologise too, if some of this feels overly mechanical, a bit textbook.

I can assure you that masturbation and masturbatory fantasies are something taken very seriously within the world of sexual offenders and reform.  However, most sexual education in schools I believe is still too similar to my own. It involved Mr Murray putting a condom on a banana, the classroom erupting in laughter, and he telling us we were all to immature to learn about sex, putting his banana away in a huff. Seriously, that was it. So perhaps there is merit putting this masturbatory guide out there.

Finally, as an aside I have to say I have no credibility or training in sexual therapy. So if you want to know more about sex or sexual dysfunction then please visit a psychologist or doctor (good luck!) Please do not visit AMI (the guys with the ‘Longer lasting sex’ billboards) – this is my investigation on them some years ago.

This is a campaign for a business called Good Goods, who has a toilet paper called Who Gives A Crap.  The campaign nominated as one of the Top 12 Entrepreneurial Campaigns world Wide by Indiegogo in 2012.  It also just took out the Grand Prix for Australia’s PR awards, Commcon. The campaign involved CEO Simon Griffith’s sitting on a toilet until people had donated $50,000.  We decided on this activity as we had seen the principle of scarcity work in many other crowd sourced programs. By giving people only time limited opportunity to get involved in something ‘silly and talkable’ we hypothesised that it would create demand, and it did.  Further, we provided social proof the campaign was working, encouraging others to join in.

The other key element of behavioural economics principles informed was the prizes we offered for donations.  We offered very high end prizes (up to $2,500 donations) to anchor the expected donations as high as possible (we presented the list in ascending order of donation – in retrospect it should have been in descending order).  We also ensured there was an honour role to further incentivised donors with public recognition.

In the end 1333 people donated a total of $66,000 dollars. We learned a lot about human motivations and how to incentive action.

Have a look at the video for you behavioural economics junkies out there if you can help inform us on other behavioural economic principles we’ve used it would be appreciated.

I HAVE a very strong emotional connection to Twitter. What does that mean? I use it a lot, I talk about it often, and I love it. I really enjoy it, and I don’t use any other social media service to anywhere near the degree I use Twitter.

Why do I have an emotional connection to Twitter? Because it does what it does really well. There has been no advertising that has formed that emotional connection — it has come from experiencing the product itself. Everyone knows the power of a brand creating a strong emotional connection with consumers.

Having a connection with a brand that is emotional — not just rational — creates “perceived value” in the brand, beyond that which one would expect a “rational” person to pay. It also creates loyalty, and a sense of connection between brand and consumer.

However, what worries me is that somewhere along the line the benefits of having an emotive brand has become confused with the benefits of “emotional advertising”.

The two are very different concepts. Let’s look at some of the current “hot” brands — beyond Twitter. Zara, Facebook, ASOS, Carmen’s Muesli, none of these advertise, so where is the emotional connection coming from? It’s coming from everything those brands do — they do well, and do in line with a strong central purpose. In short, they’ve made the consumer a promise, and they deliver on that promise in everything they do.

The emotional connection is created by doing what you do well, not through advertising. In fact, it could be argued that advertising is the least sincere way for a brand to create an emotional connection with their consumers. The hallmark of emotional advertising has historically been the big-brand ad. An ad that has a very high production budget, and doesn’t have a call to action — it just shows the brand in an evocative manner.

Think things like Cadbury’s Gorilla ad, or closer to home Carlton Draught’s “Beer Chase” ad released last year. Big-brand statements — that don’t say much about the brand at all.

I often struggle to see the benefits of these big-brand ads as a good investment in money. As I heard the legendary Larry Light, ex-CMO of McDonald’s, once say: “Everything that builds the brand should generate sales, and everything that generates sales should build the brand.” Hence if the brand ad isn’t generating sales: why do it? We are now in a communications landscape where this is possible.

Every piece of media is now interactive and can, if we want it to, combine brand building and direct response. Every ad in the newspaper can have a QR code, every ad on TV can link to the second screen, every ad on the internet can have a direct “click to purchase” button.

So now is the time to reconsider investing big dollars in the brand ad. Now is the time to reconsider why you are trying to form an emotional connection with your advertising rather than getting your product right (and then just using your advertising to tell people about it, and let them try the product).

These are exciting times for marketers as the thin veneer of advertising agencies preaching “lovemarks” and building brands through one-way advertising is crumbling. The rhetoric that advertising is a great way to create an emotional bond is falling flat as more advertisers begin to question the merits in an emotive piece of film, as opposed to getting the core of the brand right. Brands are being built from the inside out by their owners, refocusing on their products.

Further, an emotional bond is enhanced by interacting with — and being a part of — the development of the brand. It’s easier to change attitudes through actions, than to change actions through attitude. So get people involved with your brand. Open it up and give ownership to the people. Ask their opinion, build your community of brand advocates. Build the number of people who’ll build your brand on your behalf.

A positive emotional bond between brand and consumer is a must for creating a strong brand. The least effective way to do this is with advertising. The least effective way to spend your money is arguably all the dollars you’re investing in your next big-brand ad.

The above is an article that appeared in Adnews.  It’s a relatively funny tale about an experience I had at MONA.  I asked readers of the column to say hi to the store owner involved in the article. From the tweet below a few of you have.   Point of the article is a) ask for favours – everyone benefits, and b) visit @monamuseam now.

I also like this quote “If he was a cocktail he’d be one part concerned psychologist, one part hopeful social commentator, two parts provocateur. Add a dash of ’96 time warp then top to overflowing with familial pride”.