The Best of a Marketer’s Diary (April 2012)

Well this is it. For the last year I have been observing and capturing communication messages that have stuck. And for the last 6 months I’ve been posting my favourite from the previous month. With over 300 ads captured I have learned a lot from this experiment. I’ve learnt a lot about what stimulates my messaging receptors. In fact, considering I have been planning and making comms for the last 20+ years, this has been such an interesting experiment. It has provided me many, many new lessons which no text book, customer research or seminars from the greats has taught me. So I will capture and share these new learning in a future blog.

And next month I will be publishing the Marketers Diary 2011/2012 awards for best in class to those brands and ads which a whole year later, still linger in my ‘consideration consciousness’.

However, this post marks the final monthly batch of comms that have managed to stand out head and shoulders above the rest. Thanks for support and positive comments across the year And this month, it looks more indulgent in my selections, but these are the highlights. But this diary is my diary, so I call it as I see it.

Best inspirational execution – Lonely Planet – Fri 20^th Apr

At Lexden we help clients build propositions which create customer betterment and deliver commercial advantage. We also get approached by individuals and start ups who have smart ideas they want helping taking to market, some of which we help shape. One such idea arrived recently which we are training into an unordinary tour guide of London. We have a plan and I was looking for confidence that the idea had scale and commerciality. So for me this execution from Lonely Planet satisfied the requirement. And not only that, it got me to look at the brand and buy a new London guide too. So whilst I am convinced that wasn’t their strategy (a bit weird if it is), they got me. It just goes to show that there will always be x% of your audience who come for no reason your control – so be careful when questioning why in post activity research!

Best media placement – Direct Line – Wed 25^th April

My motor insurance is up for renewal at the moment. And the thought of going through the motions of checking if I can get a better deal on a price comparison site has filled me with dread. More so now as I have got ideas of Nectar points and free toys getting in the way of what I am there for, which is insurance. So when I went through these barriers at Victoria station and saw this I thought – there’s an option. Expensive inventory to rent just for me admittedly, but it has made me realise ‘direct’ is an option, which I think I’d forgotten, stupidly.

Best (unintentional) promotion – Amy Silverston’s Extraordinary Research Emporium – Wed 11^th April

Amy will hate me for including this example, because having known her for a number of years, I know this was simply another example of her nurturing nature we were grateful recipients of. But to me, it’s a very wonderful way of keeping Amy top of mind at Lexden. Amy and her trademark basket push bike will hunt down insight which in turn helps many agency fuel their pitch thinking, or in our case ideation development. She is a one woman tour de force when it comes to old school desk research. Recently I returned from a NPD workshop to find on my desk this jar of marmalade. Along with an email from Amy saying, enjoy! The same expression she often uses to introduce the findings from her research briefs. I knew what I would get before taking the lid off (the label helped of course). And it has made its way in to many conversations I have had since – and with it Amy’s services. Amy’s marmalade has increased my consideration of her brand in a very relevant way.

So there we go. Congratulations to all three and commendations to those who just missed the grade. Which includes Emirates for ‘tomorrow’ creative concepts, Phoenix Security for worse ad space – the side of a Smart car (strength?) and the Orient Express lounge board for reminding me of what the five steps up the ladder looks like.

Posted by Christopher Brooks.

Lexden is a marketing strategy agency which creates unordinary propositions to motivate customers and deliver commercial advantage for brands. 

For more information on how we can help you, contact christopherbrooks@lexdengroup.com orajairanawat@lexdengroup.com, or call us on T: +44 (0)20 7490 9123.  And you can follow us on Twitter @consultingchris.