Integrity in Advertising

We may not be saving the world, but we don't have to ruin it either. Here's to those who believe in advertising and want to make it the best it can be.

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day Beware the last minute request to work over the holiday weekend. If someone tries pulling that shit with you, turn the tables. Ask them if they can come by the house and whip up Thanksgiving dinner for you and your crew. Also tell them you’d like to see at least 3 options on the Turkey, and a fully integrated, 360 array of innovative side dishes that may or not make it onto the table. If they start stammering at your barrage of requests, just remind them they will be able to expense their Uber home if dinner goes past 8pm. Which it will because you’re gonna be kicking back those turkeys all night for revisions.

[integrity-in-advertising]

These weeks before a shortened holiday week can be rough. Hope you're able to find some people-free time this weekend! Love, Buford

[integrity-in-advertising]

Of all my body parts, I think I’ve gotten the most value from my gut over the years.

No, not simply because it has doubled as a nice resting place for snacks while binging old Love Boat episodes, although that does come in handy. No, the real benefit has been from it’s uncanny ability to be the voice of reason while my head and heart battle for control over my actions.

My gut told me and my AD partner to cast John Krasinski back in 2002, back when he was just some lanky kid from Brown University with a massive amount of untapped talent. Talent that seemed oh so obvious to me and my partner at the time, but managed to elude our ECD who found John to be simply, “not funny.”

Huh.

As we stared back, numbly, unsure of how to respond to such a clearly absurd assessment, my head was telling me to logic our way into it. Explain to our boss why this kid was funny. See, he says x and then you think he’s gonna say y, but instead he picks his nose. See? Funny!

My heart was telling me to beg, beg, beg until our desperation became unbearable, and our ECD folded under the weight of its pathos.

But my gut had different thoughts. My partner, our producer and I each knew that Krasinski was light years ahead of the rest of our choices. He had walked into the room and turned a pretty decent script into the possibility of genius. He brought perfect comedic timing and delightfully elastic body control to each line, leaving our faces cramped and our lungs empty from laughing so hard. So our guts gave us clear instructions. Stand up for our choice, with appropriate firmness and confidence. Own it. And so we did. And our ECD acquiesced, albeit with a fair amount of trepidation.

A week or so later, we got to witness about 10 hours of the future Jim Halpert just going to town with our idea, delivering more brilliance than we knew what do with. We got a pretty damned nice spot out of the deal. And, as for Johnny, our editor was so inspired by his genius, that he pulled together several minutes of footage (see attached video) that Krasinski would go on to use in his quest for future fame. Worked out pretty well for him, it would seem. He even gave the experience a nice shout out during an interview with NPR back in 2016, with a subsequent piece in USA Today a year later.

It’s enough to give the old gut a big head. All the better to support those snacks during my Love Boat marathons.

[integrity-in-advertising]

Some deep Monday thoughts from your favorite cat guru.

[integrity-in-advertising]

I love social media. The concept, I mean. The idea that we can be connected to family, friends and interesting people all over the world is a wonderful thing. But man do I hate the way so much of social media actually works. Worse yet, much of the stuff I hate (gross, self-serving, manipulative, virtue signaling BS) “works.” In the sense that it garners a lot of engagement, as defined by the social media companies (they’re clever, huh). I would like to see our social spaces filled with more honesty, integrity and originality. From people whose brains have not been bent into the the one-size-fits-all approach of the guru class. For good or ill, social has effectively become “the world”. It’s the way we communicate, share stories, learn, etc. It’s a big deal. And it’s not going anywhere. We should fight the powers that be to make their platforms less dreadful and less likely to incentivize awful behavior, but in the meantime, we can fight our base instincts, and try to bring some pockets of joy to the cesspool. On LinkedIn, I find joy from a number of sources, and would like to call out some of my favorites: George, Mark, Sara, Paul, Ryan, Bob, Kathy, Jocelyn, Paul Note that most of these folks are not “joyful” in their style. They’re not vomiting sunshine and rainbows into our feeds. They are truth tellers, each in their own way. Some more optimistic, others delightfully crabby. But all of them are real, and provide insights that are both interesting and useful. Oh, and they’re all selling something btw. But they manage to do it without creeping in our DMs or insulting our intelligence. No, they do it by following a pretty simple rule: they say something interesting, in a way that feels true to who they are and relevant to you and me. This is the model all of us (including brands) should follow. But sadly, too many folks feel the need to mimic the work of half-witted LinkedIn “stars” who poison our culture with postage stamp wisdom that any four-year-old could serve up—but with way more personality and charm. We are not living up to our potential as businesspeople if we travel further down that rabbit hole. We’re settling for unoriginality and mediocrity. We’re glazing our brains with indifference. And we are trapping ourselves in a perpetual cycle of GIGO. Thankfully, some folks are working hard to break that cycle. And I’m doing my best to live by their example, with the occasional assist from my cats.

[integrity-in-advertising]

Marvin is teaching a MasterClass in how to deal with the haters. Who’s in?

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day We’re all feeling overwhelmed these days. Politics, the pandemic, out of control prices—how can we possibly focus on the tasks at hand in our day-to day work? I’ve found that if I bring my laptop with me when I have my daily moment of curling up in the fetal position in the darkest corner of my bedroom closet, weeping quietly, I can squeeze in a few moments of uninterrupted productivity. Perhaps this melancholy bit of multitasking could work for you too! Just make sure to keep your tears out of the keyboard. Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

[integrity-in-advertising]

America's top advertisers gather in Telluride to celebrate SweatshopWeek Magazine's 37th annual Top 10 under 10 list. Did your favorites make it?

[integrity-in-advertising]

Find solace in the wisdom of your many disappointments. Love, Buford

[integrity-in-advertising]

During these trying times, please listen to Buford and be kind to everyone.

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day Some people are all about the rise & grind. Do not feel compelled to join them in their dangerous crusade. Just rising is a pretty big deal, sans grind. I like to take at least an hour on that step alone. I might meditate a bit, or just lay in bed wondering if Professional Sleeper is a real job, or was that something I dreamt. Heck, it’s possible I may still be dreaming at this point. Once you’re confident that you are actually awake, you’ll need at least another half hour to stretch before you even consider getting after it. Don’t forget the glutes. The grind is really tough on the hip flexors. Once you’re feeling loose and limber, you might think it’s finally grind time, but don’t forget your visualization exercises! Make sure you really understand the grindscape before leaping in. After you’ve mapped things out, it’s time for lunch. Never grind on an empty stomach. After lunch, you’ll need to wait at least an hour, to avoid any grind cramps. Then it’s time for the afternoon siesta—you’ve had a busy day and you need to replenish your grind stores. Once you wake from your mid-day slumber, you’ll need to repeat all of the aforementioned post-sleep steps, of course. If you stick to the schedule, you should be able to squeeze in a few minutes of grinding between Jeopardy and your mid-evening snack. I recommend Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, but any salty, crunchy, orange treat should ensure a quick grindcovery.

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day You don’t need to make your career a beeline to the corner office. You don’t need to aspire to the corner office at all. Because your career should be built according to your own wants and needs. It can meander, misfire, and muddle through at times. As long as you’re learning at each step, it’s all good. You’ll get to where you need to be. Maybe that’s the corner office. Maybe it’s the dusty old desk by the men’s bathroom. Heck, when most folks get back to the office, there probably won’t even be desks—just first come, first serve 8-year-old MacBooks and a closet full of hippity hops. So what are you worried about?

[integrity-in-advertising]

What’s the best thing about Switzerland?

I don’t know, but the flag is a big plus.

Humor (even in Dad joke form) is one of the greatest gifts we have. We should embrace it. It connects people. Gets people excited. Helps them like you. All of the things we’re trying to do for our brands.

Humor is how we sort shit out. It’s one of brain’s best tools for making sense of a senseless world. A way to soothe the wounds that life scrapes into us day by day. A good joke (or even a bad one) can help us make sense of absurdity, tragedy and even death. It makes the world a bit more manageable, especially when things feel particularly unmanageable. Maybe humor doesn’t work that way for everyone, but I know damn well it does for a huge chunk of us.

For our clients, we need to push into this uncomfortable territory more often. Not just with humor, but with anything that provokes a visceral reaction. Yes, you will inevitably rub some people the wrong way. But if your message is true (and it should always be true), it will resonate for many.

Here’s a good example of what I’m talking about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMnMgX7GiOA

When I first saw that spot I couldn’t laugh at it, because I’m a huge animal lover (poor Snuffy!). But I get that a lot of people found it hilarious. And I genuinely don’t care that Discovery chose to run a joke that didn’t connect with me. In fact, I respect them for it. They could have watered it down until it said nothing, but they chose to keep it pure.

It’s been 8 years since that spot originally ran. And I still remember it, fondly, despite all of my animal loving squishiness. Most ads are barely remembered after 8 seconds. And when you think about all the work that goes into to creating the work we do, that’s not very funny at all.

[integrity-in-advertising]

A cordial reminder from your bff Buford.

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day Some people wonder whether it’s okay to take a mental health day once in a while. It is. And you shouldn’t have to mention that it’s a mental health day either, if you don’t want to. In fact, it shouldn’t matter what you do with any of your days off, whether they fall under sick, personal, vacation, PTO, whatever. And you should feel comfortable using all of them without stigma. Those days are part of your compensation as much as the dollars you receive every two weeks. You don’t feel guilty about taking those, do you? Well, maybe if you’re a politician. Or play for the NY Jets. But otherwise, you’ve earned all of it.

[integrity-in-advertising]

One of my favorite campaigns of all time is from Sonic. Just two dudes sitting at the drive-in burger joint, being delightful idiots. I was drawn to it from day one and always looked forward to what stupidity they’d come up with next. As a bonus, one of the guys was named TJ (the “dumb” one) and perhaps that endeared them to me even more.

Alas, all good things must come to an end, sort of. Sonic has moved on from TJ and his bud. Probably because they’re old (my age). But instead of creating something all-new, they’ve tried to recapture the magic with a series of spots using a wide range of improv types, including some families.

The new ones aren’t terrible. Some have even made me chuckle. But the campaign just doesn’t hold together with all of the random people. Part of the charm of the old ones was you got to know these guys. So you were invested in them and all of their dopiness.

We don’t get that chance with an ever-changing cast of characters. But perhaps that’s a good thing. Because this new crew is just a little too polished, too close to perfect to really connect. The spots feel more scripted and less random, which chisels the charm away even more.

I get the desire to stick with a winning formula; it’s a tale as old as advertising time, But it’s a challenge to update an existing approach with new people. Just ask the Most Interesting Man 2.0. That was not wonderful. And it was mercifully short-lived. The new Sonic spots are better by comparison, but I wonder where they could have landed if they’d decided to do something totally new. Clearly, the brand is willing to have some fun. And I’m not sure the new stuff quite gets us there.

[integrity-in-advertising]

UnCrushTip™ of the Day Instead of revering those who shout the loudest about their hustle, let’s celebrate those who let their work do the talking. The folks who rarely use words like crush or grind, but whose eyes light up when talking about big ideas and solutions to challenging problems. You know, people you’d actually want on your team because they’re not spending half the day taking selfies for their next humble brag post.