Making Advertising Briefs Interesting...

This evening I gave a talk to about 18 advertising aspirants at Leo Burnett. They are young, talented energetic and hungry. It reminded me of my younger days in advertising but that was 20 years ago. Today, with advancing technology, changing consumer lifestyle and evolving media environment, advertising is gradually changing from one message to many to one message to one. The emerging social media sites have created a shift of belief and people are becoming less trusting on advertisements but more trusting on friends from their social networks.

What I see is a great change in the advertising process. Advertising briefs are commonly used in Agencies and the format have not changed much. Imagine this. The AE takes a brief from the Client and distills this down into a written brief to the Creatives. What constitutes a good brief? To me it should be a clear articulation of the Client's 'problem' and how the Agency can help to 'solve' it. This is putting it simply.

A good brief is one that outlines the thought in a story telling way, fill with consumer insight, either from research work or by speaking to 'people' who use the product or service. An insight could be an observation made on how people use or talk about the product or service. It's about being interested in people and curious enough to want to find out what other 'gaps' the product or service can fill in peoples' lives.

For instance, the 3 things that people carry today are their wallet, keys and mobile phone. What does this say? A big opportunity for mobile phone. The way to leverage on this insight is for mobile phone manufacturers to develop or enhance their product to go beyond voice and SMS. That's how smart phones are born. If we look at Apple, we see the revolutionary iPhone 3GS changing the mobile phone landscape in a big way.

So how do we make our advertising brief interesting? The secret lies in how we feed ourselves. Be like a sponge and soak in as much as you can. Be open - both eyes and mind. Listen as well. Read as much as you can. Travel. Watch movies. Enjoy music, food, people and most of all - willingness to learn or unlearn. Our mind is like a storehouse. It keeps on filing new things we pick up everyday both good or bad and turn these into what we call experiences. If we add our talents, knowledge and experiences together, we become enriched. When we channel this in a group, we get what is called the wisdom of crowds.

For young people like the group I spoke to, they have so much ahead of them. The challenge is to keep on building on what you have and not being afraid of exploring or trying new things. That is how we learn and learning is naturally easy. When one shares knowledge another one gains. Both are enriched at the same time and that is what keeps the world going.

Do I have the passion for advertising? Certainly. Do I see myself going back to advertising as one of them asked me this evening? I replied honestly that I have not seriously thought about it but who knows what the future holds. As always, I'm the optimist!

Searching For The Perfect Church

Is there such a thing? I don't know but what I need to ask is what exactly am I searching for? Is it deepening my walk with my Creator? Is it spiritual growth? Is it fellowship? Or am I just going through some kind of motion?

Maybe it's not the church. It's just me. I'm trying very hard to fit into a place which I spend only 2 hours a week in. Surely this is not enough. The other pursuits in life makes church going just another list of things to do on a Sunday, Christmas & New Year's eve.

I tell myself that church service is sometimes boring. But not all services are like that. There were inspirational ones too. But why do I find some better than the rest? Is it my state of mind? My openness. My receptiveness. Or just my attitude. Perhaps I should let the things of the world grow faintly dim like the song says. I should decrease & He should increase in my life.

The christian journey is an exciting one as some might say. But the challenge is that growing in your walk means witnessing, serving and giving - your time, talent, substance and self. But being human, I am not perfect and hope the living word will gradually transform me to be more like Him.