2. HELLO #DIGIWORK
THE BRIEF IN THE POST-DIGITAL AGE
Gareth Kay
Director of Brand Strategy
August 9, 2010

3. This isn’t really about the brief or digital...
It’s about the long, slow stuff of culture,
not the tech du jour
It’s about digital as a type of idea, not a channel
It’s about ideas and planning, not just briefs
All that being said....

4. 1992

10. All very similar
A problem to be solved by advertising
‘Consumers’ to ‘target’
A message to say at them
Reasons to believe
Tone of voice
Maybe, if lucky, what space you’re filling

11. New technology

17. New technology, different culture

21. “This stuff is as mainstream as it
can be. Google, the iPhone -
these move the culture more
than The Beatles did in
the ’60’s. It’s shaping the human
race.”
- Andy Hertzfeld

24. “Nobody comes out of a movie
saying, “that was a really good
movie. I really enjoyed it. It
was really clear.”
- Russell Davies

26. $77 million
$220 million
$310 million

27. Technology has driven dramatic, and
continuous, change
More participatory
More social and communal (arguably amplifying who
human beings are)
More fragmented
More transparent
More playful
‘Always on’
Location increasingly important

28. So, obviously, the brief
remains the same...

32. “I’m just surprised that no-one’s
thought of a better idea yet”
- Stephen King

33. This isn’t about the digital brief.
It’s about a better brief for
the post-digital world.

34. It’s not simply about the brief.
It’s about asking having a
better map of the world
to ask better questions.

35. It’s what we do,
not what we say,
that matters

38. We’ve only ever noticed peacocks.

39. Changing our behavior
changes how we think.

40. We need to be like bowerbirds.

41. We now live in age of ideas that do.

44. Stop communicating products and
start making communication products.
Useful entertaining or memorable,
not interruptive, experiences.
Create, don’t fill, media space.

45. Ideas that can be advertised,
not advertising ideas

46. It’s not what we do;
it’s what people do
to what we do that
matters

47. We tend to design finite,
complete products.
We’re not very good at
designing for gaps.

48. From a downloading culture
to an uploading culture.

58. Customers don’t own
brands but they do
want to participate.
- Charles Vallance

62. Slippy > sticky.

66. Generous ideas
are better than
big ideas

67. Have a social mission,
not just a commercial proposition.

68. Understand what people are interested in
and work back from there.

69. Idea as bridge

71. Be media positive

72. Radiohead went out to
where people are and built
experiences there with
partnerships like:
- iTunes for remixes
- aniBoom for an
animation contest
- Google for 3-D video

73. “Media is less and less
often about crafting a
single message to be
consumed by
individuals, and more
and often a way of
creating an environment
for convening and
supporting groups.”

75. Small is the new big

76. “The bigger a brand
gets, the smaller it
should act, because
no one likes big.”

78. “Any idea is dangerous if it’s a person
only idea”
A culture full of depth and complexity
The rule of 5% requires lots of matches to start a fire
Why not when the economics have changed and the
cost of failure is near zero?

79. Roulette isn’t responsible

80. “The mistake of science is to
pretend everything is a clock
when the world is a cloud.”
-Jonah Lehrer, referencing the work of Karl Popper

81. Coherency, not consistency
specials eg
language, frappucino
eg ‘skinny’
habits
formation
‘my sister’
book range
and options
book
barista Provide an
culture reading
uplifting experience ordering
that enriches system akelah and
used grounds people’s lives the bee
for gardeners in store
starbucks
sofas and performance
company
social ambience and art starbucks
responsibility salon
africa 05
hearmusic
fair trade Xm
coffee
music cd
cause
burn your own
publicity
cd
in store
Source: John Grant, ‘The Brand Innovation Manifesto’

82. It’s about understanding
distributed identity
Google
Books
Blogspot
Youtube
Google
Google Google Scholar
411 Search
Google
Docs
Organize the
world’s information
Google and make it
Shopping universally
accessible and Google
useful.
labs Chrome
Browser
Google
Maps Google.Org
Google
sketch Fossil fuel
Challenge

83. High frequency. Low value.
Semi-predictable rewards.

84. So what does all this mean
for the brief?

85. Pre-digital Post-digital
Interruption Participation
Image manipulation Value creation
Saying things at people Doing things for people
Intangible value Tangible value
Perception Behavior

86. From saying things at people to
doing things with and for people

87. From why and what
to what and how.

88. Better questions
What’s the real problem?
Who is this among?
How might we best approach solving this?
Why might they talk about this idea?
How do they get involved?
What keeps the conversation going?

89. There are no great briefs,
only great ads.
There are no great briefs,
but there are a lot of bad ones.
A good brief is probably about as
good as a brief gets.

90. The piece of paper is less
important than the journey.

93. Communication R&D

94. In conclusion

95. It’s less about the brief and digital;
more about how we think about
modern communication ideas

96. From ‘high concept’ to rich,
generous multi-platform ideas

97. Modern communication ideas are different
They are more about what they do and how they feel, not what they say
They come from culture, not commerce, first (it’s about how you can
make a positive contribution to culture; be interested in what people
are interested in, not yourself)
They are participatory and need to be designed with gaps
They are always on
They are liquid or linked
They might not be ‘ads as we know them’
They create, don’t fill, media space; media positive not media neutral

98. But at their heart, there is simplicity
GET the audience
TO do, feel or think something
BY the power of an idea

102. And if all else fails....

105. #digiworkwinsor

106. Thank you.
http://www.garethkay.com
@garethk