Dichotomy Consulting

The year was 1984. I was sixteen, an automotive innocent, a child of the double-nickel. Having been one of those kids who, by virtue of their birthday, ended up being one of the youngest in their grade, I could only watch as my closest friends got their licenses up to nine months before I could. But now—with the formalities of learner’s permits and driving tests successfully dealt with—it was my turn. I joined the ranks of the wannabe fast and furious.

My weapon of choice was a 1980 Buick Regal. I was fortunate on two counts. One, because it was essentially a free car, a hand-me-down from my dad. Two, because it had been my dad’s car. My father, one of the most responsible and orderly people on the planet, handed me the keys to what was essentially a new car with 55,000 very law-abiding miles on it. The two-tone copper and brown paint still gleamed, the tan interior, unsullied by stray french fries, sand, or bio-matter of any sort, had no visible signs of wear. The vinyl bench seats shined from weekly Pledge furniture-polish treatments. The stock, chromed “mags” were free of road tar and brake dust. Only white-wall tires blemished its appearance. Read the rest of this entry »

When I arrived at my job at TBWA\Chiat\Day in New York, the fact that I was a bilingual writer had preceded me.

“Would you listen to the Hispanic radio spots we just recorded for Chivas Regal?” they asked.  “Sure, I’d be happy to,” I replied.

I was handed a cassette–yes, it was that long ago–and I made my way back to my cubicle to sit down to get an earful. And, boy, did I.

What I heard was a single radio spot, but read by three different voice talents. One stereotypically Mexican, the other just as “central casting” Puerto Rican and the third labeled as “Cuban” though it was no more than what is known in Hispanic broadcasting parlance as el acento neutro, “the neutral accent.”

What in the name of all that is holy was this?

My first agency job was in the South Korean office of Ogilvy & Mather. There I was brought up on the Ogilvy “Brand Stewardship” model and a central tenet of that model was that a brand has a voice. Literally and figuratively. Why did Chivas have–in the same market–not one, but three voices?

Recording different Spanish accents for this spot made as much sense as recording “general market” Chivas spots with regional accents for different sections of the U.S. Would the voice of Chivas have a “twang” in the South? Of course not. Read the rest of this entry »

Being that Twitter is part of that amorphous amalgam that we know as social media, it should be abundantly clear that Twitter is inherently–for lack of a better word–interactive. It is supposed to be a venue for a dialog between users of all stripes: corporate and indie, amateur and professional, old guard and avant-garde.

However, some people just don’t get it. Let’s round up the usual suspects: (Numbers as of this posting.)

News Organizations

CNN: (1,258,000 followers) follows 6

CBS: (192,000) follows 80

Government Officials

Senator John McCain (522,000) follows 42

Senator Claire McCaskill (22,000) follows 1

Celebrities

Ashton Kutcher (1,494,000) follows 132

John Mayer (872,000) follows 30

This is, of course, a small sample. Yet it is representative of the some of the hubris that is alive and well online. The celebrities are one thing. They are inherently self-involved and those that slavishly follow their movements will dream of reciprocation but won’t expect to get it. The newsies and the politicians are another matter altogether: why in the world should I follow you if you won’t reciprocate?

Why should I follow CNN when the news will probably get to me faster through other–more organic–means on Twitter. The millions of Twitter users outnumber journalists in the service of mass-media outlets. The odds that a lay eyewitness will tweet a big story before any journalist even gets wind of it are increasing every day. Stories like the crash of Turkish Airlines flight 1951, the recent Mumbai terror attacks, and the US Airways Hudson River crash all broke on Twitter.

So, If you won’t follow me, what real benefit is there to following you?

The politicos? As far as most of them are concerned–and there are a few notable exceptions–Twitter is a bullhorn or a bully pulpit from whence they can shower their subjects with their wisdom and eloquence.

So, if you won’t follow me, then why should I follow you, let alone vote for you?

Twitter is a conversation. We put things out there and hopefully connect with people. Or, maybe we connect with organizations or brands. The point is that there is as much (if not more) value in the listening as there is in the speaking. (Or, as the case may be, bloviating.)

If you want to be followed, you need to be willing to follow. Fortunately for you, on Twitter you can do both.

We’ve all had those followers. Maybe they promise that we can get rich if we do X, or that, if we just follow their this-many-steps plan, we can be making $10K a month from home within 3 days. No matter what the creepy, too-good-to-be true come-on, we decide to do them a “solid” and follow them back.

So it is that a constant stream of lame drivel enters our lives. Kind of like an infomercial but without the charm. Suddenly it feels as if you just got a really pushy friend that keeps trying to get you to sell Amway for him. Un-follow and goodbye!

Like many of you, I have a strategic reason to be part of the Twitterverse: I want to find an audience for my inane musings, especially if I ever get around to publishing some of them in bound, dead-tree form. That said, I cannot flood the Twitterverse and my poor followers with incessant pleas for them to engage in some sort of commerce. They call this social media for a reason, and it stands to reason that any behavior that is verboten in a social encounter in meatspace is a faux pas online as well.

You have a business? Great. Welcome to the Twitterhood. We’d all love to interact with you, but please remember that we aren’t here for the sole purpose of being sold to. Socialize. Engage us. You have an offer? Sure, put it out there. Just remember that it’s also important to let us into your world from time to time. Was that Kung Pao dreadful? Let us know. Did your kid do a face plant while trying to ollie the couch? Share it with us. Bonus points for making us laugh.

But, please, pretty please with Splenda on top: don’t be another tool, will ya?

In many Miami Ad School classes, a great deal of time is spent getting across a very simple yet incredibly crucial bit of information: that communication has to be memorable in order to be effective.

The genesis of this seems simple enough to grasp—that a message not remembered has no power over time. However, creating that very memorability is what makes this principle so easy to understand yet so very difficult to internalize and put into practice.

The human brain develops new connections in response to stimuli. It is these connections that are the basis of what we call memory. In fact, it is the growing inability to form these new pathways that marks the onset of Alzheimer’s Syndrome in the aged.

Contained in the previous paragraph is the key to memorability. New, as in “new connections” and “new pathways.” It stands to reason that the best remembered experiences are, by definition, new ones.

Miami Ad School President Pippa Seichrist has a great way of driving this point home. She’ll ask a class if they remember their first kiss. Invariably, every hand will go up. Everyone will remember when it was, who it was with and will have a very vivid recollection of the event. Then she’ll ask “Does anyone remember their 352nd kiss?” Invariably—again—no one remembers this one. It is the fresh experience that forms the new pathway and therefore creates the most meaningful impression.

In order for your work to be memorable it must provide some measure of that “first kiss” experience. It must create that “never seen/heard before” impression that is present in the best films, the best music, the best art, and the funniest jokes.

Take this example: eleven years ago, a graduating team from the South Beach location had a wonderful campaign for an electric shaver that featured a print ad depicting a Saguaro cactus shorn of it’s needles, ostensibly by the shaver. Within the context of the time, circa 1998, this was original, fresh and memorable. It lives vividly in the synapses of those who saw it then. If you were to see the very same ad for the first time today you would have a very different reaction. Over the years you have been exposed to similar ads using similar visual metaphors many times. Therefore, your “first time” with this genre of ad happened a long time ago. There is no room in your brain for a fresh pathway, only one more connection in the memory bank your brain has assigned to visual ads, which is chock-full of very similar images. In short, the experience is not new to you and therefore does not create a memorable impression. Very much like that 352nd kiss. Well, actually, it’s not as good. Kisses being what they are, each of them is enjoyable in it’s own way. Played-out ads, jokes or songs just make you groan.

In order to be relevant, pertinent and effective, communication needs to give the viewer a first-time experience. That is why this business is so demanding and the job so difficult and so rewarding.

Ironic but yet so true. All these months since the start of the Year of Our Lord Two-Thousand and Nine and it is only now that I get to launching the Dichotomy Consulting site/blog. Granted, there is still more work to be done but if I wait any longer I believe I may have to forgo the blog and launch that new AI-driven, holographic, talking-avatar thingy I’m sure someone is dreaming up for up for Web 4.0.

Welcome and please subscribe. I promise to make it at least somewhat enjoyable!