Please teach me how to be Conservatively Creative, anyone?

Posted: November 28, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: Creativity, Management, Marketing | 1 Comment

“Sam, I want you to come up with new marketing campaign for our new contrast sensor. We are competing with big players and we need to come up with something creative that leaves an impression in customer’s mind and doesn’t cost too much, since we do not have budget like the big boys.” says The Director

Pumped up and excited Sam goes to work, brain storms, talks to customers, watches random ads on TV and then acts as a Cross Pollinator and comes up with an idea. A non-conventional idea, something that will trigger memory cells of the customer and would help the customer remember the message. Since he understands how human memory works, we as humans always find it easy to remember something that is odd, ridiculous, non-logical etc that is why you have these odd looking ads by Carls Jr., Gieco, BMW (those 3-5 min movies they made with Clive Oven as marketing campaign) etc.

Anyway, Sam presents his ideas, they are funny, odd and will embed in your memory. He is excited to show these to his Director and looks towards him hoping to hear a “Bravo Sam” as he is presenting his marketing campaign ideas.

He does hear “Bravo Sam” followed by “but..” (oh, that notorious “but”), “Bravo Sam, love the idea but I believe its too radical for our image. We are a conservative company and we have to maintain our image (that’s assuming you have an image). We want to be creative, get with the new age, embrace social media, be open, be radical, be creative but do all that by being conservative. Think outside the box but conservatively.”

Its is like asking for a day but also the night, asking for hot but it has to be cold, etc.

Its amazing how management encourages its employees to be creative but do it with a conservative spirit.

So my question is, What the hell is Conservative Creativity and how can you be one? Anyone?

Tom told me today, “Sometimes, I think my wife loves her dog, Snuggles, much more than she loves me.”

Posted: November 17, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: Marketing, PR, Relationships | 4 Comments


My friend, lets call him Tom, made a statement today, “Sometimes, I think my wife loves her dog, Snuggles, much more than she loves me.” I have been contemplating over that statement and pondered why that is. The more I thought, the more it became clear, why people love their pets, especially Dogs unconditionally because the Dog loves his owner unconditionally.

What does a Dog do, when he see’s his owner coming?
He stops whatever he is doing and looks towards his owner, even if the owner is far way. Then he leaves everything behind and runs towards the owner to greet him/her. The dog jumps on her, hugs her while wagging his tail and shows her how excited he is that she is home. He looks at her with nothing but love in his eyes, making her realize that he is just happy that she is back. He dances around in joy and follows her around the house and when she is sitting, he puts his head in her lap and lays there without asking for anything except an occasional touch of her hand.

When was the last time Tom did that for his wife; greeted her with undivided attention when she came back from work. When last time he asked his wife how was her day and brought her a cup of coffee as she returned from work or even had dinner ready for her as she arrived home.

So, what can a dog teach us about Public Relations and/or Human Relations?

  • Give her your undivided attention.
  • When you see her coming from a distance, get up, go there to greet her.
  • SMILE big, show all your teeth.
  • Ask her how was her day and just SHUTUP and listen without comments or advice.

My advice to Tom, do these 4 things and I guarantee your wife will love you more than the dog.

Homeless People: Could they be part of your next Marketing Campaign?

Posted: November 16, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: CEO Corner, Marketing | Leave a comment


Here’s an idea for being philanthropic this season and also promoting your business.
Rather than printing T-shirts and having your employees wear those as advertising why not give out those T-Shirts/Jackets to homeless people. That way, they get free clothes that would keep them warm in the winter season and since they are outside all day long they wear your company T-shirts/Jackets and thus advertise your company.

I know, some of you might think as this as exploiting the homeless but I don’t see it that way. Your company can also give the homeless some gift certificates that can only be used for Food. This way, you give clothes to the homeless, gift certificates for food and your company gets advertising in return. So the homeless are working for those gift certificates and not getting them for free.