JUICING THE ORANGE

How to turn creativity into a powerful business advantage

Author : Pat Fallon and Fred Senn

Publisher : Harvard Business School Press 2006

Fallon and Senn have used a clever advertising technique to attract attention to their book.  The hook to uncover “what on earth does juicing the orange mean?” is irresistible for the bookshop browser.

Turns out it’s a metaphor for extracting the most bang for buck from advertising campaigns.  Outsmarting, not outspending, the competition.

The book describes the principles of the advertising agency that the authors founded, Fallon Worldwide.  Their passion for creativity and account planning is shared in several extensive case studies, including Citibank, Holiday Inn, United Airlines, BMW, SKODA and Lee.

In an era where consumers are inundated with advertising messages, and can switch off advertising by watching TV online, the need to break through is critical.  The authors posit that creative is more important than ever to ensure advertising “delights, not annoys”.

Fallon and Senn describe principles to leverage creative;

• Starting from scratch – getting out of existing mindsets “this is how we all advertise in this category”.  Breaking out of advertising formulas, for example, dog food ads with shiny coated happy dogs, and airline ads with beautiful smiling air stewards.
• Ruthlessly define the problem, aka, ‘relentless reductionism’
• Find an emotional connection with the consumer.  A crackly insight that makes people feel something.

If you get true creative leverage, you cross over from merely advertising, and become part of the popular culture.  Think of slogans that have become part of the lexicon, such as Uncle Toby’s “That’s not how you make porridge” and MasterCard’s “Priceless” campaigns.

Fallon Worldwide have worked hard to build an agency culture.  They have clear values, including;

• A devotion and belief in the power of creativity
• Seeing risk-taking as a friend
• Being humble and having fun (which reminds us of our plaque at the entrance to Meerkats, “Please leave your ego at the door”)
• Identify and encourage culture players (people who are outgoing and optimistic team players) and fire the assholes (self explanatory)!

In conclusion, Fallon and Senn claim that creativity will be an increasingly important business tool due to constrained financial resources of advertisers and consumer inattention.  They say, “it’s not an easy path, but it’s worth it”.

The book is very readable (in fact, we read it in two blissful uninterrupted hours).  The case studies are good for understanding the role of Planning in campaign development.