There's power in simplicity

I believe in making things simple.

It is something I have always done and having tuned into that a few years ago with my professional coach (Michelle Duval), it is something that I consciously focus on.

It requires more listening than talking, which is a skill that I am always seeking to improve.

I keep challenging myself to say the least in the room, as my role is to enable others to share and build upon ideas.

That can only really be done effectively by listening and asking questions.

Because only when you really understand something can you simplify it.

Which is why I loved this article around why strategies fail.

It illustrates the point that an effective strategy is simply a set of clear choices.

Choices that determine what you will do, and crucially what you will not do, with clear logic behind each decision.

We can often confuse using complicated language as sounding smart and many people hide behind that to appear so.

But what we do only makes up a fraction of what our clients have to think about every day, so it is our role to make the complex simple.

Not hide behind purposefully confusing jargon to justify (or create!) a need for why we are required.

So instead of talking about programmatic buying, attribution modelling or data-led precision targeting let’s keep it simple:

People hate ads.

They press the “skip ad” button every single day.

They are paying money to avoid the things we make.

So let’s make better things.

Things that dramatise the benefit of the product or brand…but things that are more interesting than just an "ad".

Things like dramatising the benefits of AR technology through giving deaf theatre-goers their own subtitles:

Things like dramatising the benefits of organ donation through a piece of design:

Things like dramatising the gender pay gap through an out-of-office message:

Things like raising awareness of the potato shortage in New Zealand through a beached whale : )

Things that are interesting, useful and/or entertaining.

Things that people won’t want to skip.