About 5 years ago, I wrote an eBook called, "Use A Stick." I released it just a little over 4 years ago. You can tell it was a long time ago by the clunky site, and the fact that you can download it in Palm format. Several things inspired me to write it.
I knew I was headed back, in some unknown capacity that had something to do with digital, toward the agency side. Truth is, the production business roller coaster was getting to me, but more importantly, the means of distribution for moving images was beginning to change. I have been a geek since 1984, so I was keeping up with, and participating heavily in, early forms of social media -- especially this new thing called YouTube. Seemed like it might turn into something. I figured agencies wouldn't figure this stuff out very quickly, because my experience with agencies (both inside them, and as a supplier to them) told me that agencies, historically, don't figure out much very quickly. I wanted in on this new web-based way of approaching moving imagery. (I called it moving imagery, because back then, if you were good, you were a "film" director. I was a "film" director, so I couldn't call it "video," even though that was and is the correct, and prevailing, term on the web. It implied cheap, and low-quality. HD, and then the Red, changed all that, but it hadn't, yet.)
I also knew, from being a director attempting to sell my services to agencies, that agencies tend to pigeon-hole everything and everyone. I swear to you, I had one agency who considered me only an "action toy" director -- they would only hire me to shoot toys kids pick up and run around with, like Nerf guns and the like. They would never, ever, hire me to shoot action figures. And I had another agency who ONLY considered me an action figure director. Yet another would only hire me for comedy aimed at adults. And still another would only hire me for fashion. It was downright weird. That's a part of the roller coaster I was tired of. But I digress....the point is, agencies pigeon hole. So if I was to be taken seriously by agencies, and prospective clients, I had to remind people that I knew, and still know, how to create things for a broad swath of media, and more importantly, how to think strategically.
Before I was a director, I was a creative director. A copywriter before that. So, for the entire 15 years I directed, I understood and participated in the marketing conversations surrounding the spots I was shooting. (Few directors can, or even care to.) Yet, ask one of my agency clients of the time, and they'd tell you I was a guy who took their boards and put it on film. I wore the director's hat, so I was a director, and nothing else. In order to counter that pigeon-holed perception, I wrote Use A Stick.
The premise of the book was pretty loose. Knowing strategy, and agency culture, agency-client, and agency-supplier relationships, I found myself in a pretty good cat-bird's seat. As a director, you're not the client. So the agency tells you all the dirt about how the spot came to be. As a director, you're not the agency. So if you can talk with the client, the client tells you all the dirt about how the spot came to be. The constant disconnects were enlightening, entertaining, and at times, infuriating.
So the premise of the book (in my head) was something along the lines of: "Here's a bunch of ways that agencies and clients have consistently messed up with each other for the last 50 or so years. And guess what? There's a bunch of new stuff coming along very quickly that's going to radically change the economics and structure of this agency-client relationship, and give them even more ways to mess up. But the good news is, most of these problems actually have simple solutions. Be mindful, though, that simple isn't always easy. But that doesn't change the fact that it's simple."
Ok, so that was a long premise, but you get the drift. Truth is, the book is a bit of a rant (a nice rant, but a rant, nonetheless) about stupid stuff I saw in agency-client relationships, and particularly in production, over the course of 15 years. This stuff cost the agencies money, it cost the clients money, and it didn't contribute at all to a better product. And with the web coming quickly to change the game, I just thought that somebody ought to think about it a little bit.
The other truth is, I think the book is pretty naive, when you read it now. It's also not the best eBook in the world. But it was decent for its time, and it served its purpose. And it's still downloaded regularly, so go figure.
This blog started out as a support mechanism for the book. Here, in many early posts, and in the book, I wrote about stuff like: Agencies throw too many people at most projects. The web allows for much more personal communications and experiences, and thus, narrower targeting -- so your creative product has to be designed with that in mind. Agencies would do well to think in terms of a production company model, where specialists are hired as needed. The economics is going to radically change. The cost of delivery has been reduced dramatically, so the justification for a high cost of production is no longer there, especially in the face of new technologies. Agencies have to think in terms of ideas that can be accomplished with the new tools, within the new budgets. And finally, everything is just going to get faster and faster. Stuff like that.
So I find it interesting that today, I read and tweeted an ADWEEK article with the headline: "Ad Biz Faces the 'New Normal'." In that article, the author talks about pretty much all the points I just listed. The catalyst for the change, according to the author, is the recession. But, I don't think so. The recession accelerated it. But the change has been coming for a long time now. Just sayin'.
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