The CIN Blog

As creative professionals we put a lot of ourselves into our work, but we will almost always be aiming that work at someone else. To be truly effective, we must have a real understanding of our target audience. What are their interests? What kind of language is appropriate? How should we use colour?

I recently received a letter from my credit card company explaining the benefits of its new loyalty card programme. My wife also received a letter from the company which I opened (because she won’t) and was interested to note some differences between the two.

The first line in my letter told me the date the programme would be launching and quickly pointed out “There’s no action needed on your part. You will keep the same card and your interest rate remains the same.” In contrast, the letter to my wife began with the slightly over-excited “Get ready for an entirely new and more rewarding shopping experience!”  and made no mention of the interest rate at all. As I compared the two letters I found several other differences, my letter told me that the scheme did not involve vouchers, my wife was assured she would need to worry about any “fiddly vouchers”. My letter finished with a simple typed list of participating retailers, my wife was actually presented with a map to the shops. Thankfully I intercepted this.

Now I’m not saying that this is a particularly good example, in fact I can imagine some women might feel patronised by their letter – although maybe only if they compared it to the more straight-talking ‘male’ version. But what this does show is an attempt to cater to specific audiences. This is as relevant to graphic design, illustration, photography and video as it is to copy writing. The biggest problem that I’ve found is convincing a client that it’s worth spending a little time and money on the research required to get this sort of thing right, but at the very least we should all try to speak to a couple of people who roughly fit in to the target demographic to see if we’re talking their language.

Pete Clark
Cogdon, Clark & Tranter

I recall sitting in my office this time last year thinking about the year ahead. To be honest for the first time in my career I was dreading it, as I’m sure a majority of people reading this were too.

The economy seemed to have dropped off a cliff; clients were getting the jitters, payment terms and cash in the bank suddenly became massively important to me and a general batten-down-the-hatches spirit seemed to prevail over the country.

With any downturn, and this is the second I’ve run a business in, the key thing to hold on to is it the thought that it won’t last for ever. And this time I’m reminding myself that when the good times return (as they surely will), that they won’t last for ever either.

In fact, I’m going to write a letter to the directors of BCS to be opened in five years’ time outlining what we saw, what we did, how we reacted and what got us through this recession so they can (if I’m not here for some reason) steer the company through.

So now I find myself sitting in my office thinking about 2010. I believe there are a few key factors to consider. One is that a lot of organisations have cut deep on staffing and as workloads increase will struggle with capacity and servicing issues. Another is that there is some excellent talent out there looking for a home. I’m sure you’re smart enough to see a link here and take advantage of it if it’s relevant to what you do.

So my prediction for the following year is that it’s going to be one that will be good for those of us working in the creative industries sector who are well outside of London, with its associated overheads/fees.

Yes, us.

It’s a time when larger local organisations are going to spend on things like creative services but are going to look for real value.

They will be looking for someone who can service them well, which can only be aided if you are in a sensible drive time as you just can’t beat face-to-face time. They will be looking at the actual talent they can purchase from and not take a blinkered London-centric view.

In addition, middle-end and SME operations are going to be looking to increase market share, as they have very lightly reduced everything else down (head count, new product development etc) and now are focused on increasing sales. I can see this is going to be a year of opportunity for all of us in CIN and now is the time to get a strategy in place to take advantage of it.

So, my New Year’s resolution will be the same as the one told me by an MD of mine 25 odd years ago, probably as we were coming out of our last recession… “Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell and advertise” (Ted Turner).

I’d like to introduce you to the person I believe is the king of the design studio, the master of the creative department, the don of the digital agency. In fact, whether its brochures, direct mail, websites or any other marketing material for that matter, what’s the one thing that engages us and makes us act?

The photography? A little. The gorgeous graphic design and art direction? Possibly. The whizzy way the menus download on the website? Well, they’re nice. But no, the king of the jungle when it comes to all marcomms is the copy – and long live the king!

It staggers me when clients spend a not inconsiderable sum on market material and yet skimp on the copy and provide it themselves. The approach usually ends up with the designer dropping all the copy into six point and colouring it grey (as a creative years ago I used to even call it “the grey lines” myself), in the vain hope that the reader won’t notice that the copy is, in fact, rehashed PowerPoint that is so internally focused.

It may tell you how it does something but chances are it will skip the key parts, such as why and how you will benefit from this. You often find it is full of “management speak” baloney aswell.

I assume the issue is that everyone can actually write. Yes? No, no no! They can, of course, put sentences together and may have a vague idea on grammar and punctuation but could they write a paragraph of copy that sold me something if their kid’s life depended on it?

A great writer once described to me how, upon presenting some copy, which, incidentally, the client loved, he presented his bill. The client looked more than a little concerned and asked the writer: “How come it was so much for just a few lines of copy? Surely it can’t have taken you longer than an hour?” To which, and I love this, the writer replied: “No, it didn’t take me an hour, it’s taken me 22 years!”

Now that may sound a humorous story but when you stop and think about it, it just makes so much sense. So next time you are thinking of investing in any marketing material, please don’t skimp on the actual bit people engage with.

PS: I’d also like to point out that I am not, and have never professed to be, a writer!