Inspiration in Odd Places
I think it’s a good habit to read about anything other than advertising and marketing. If all you do is read other bloggers about what we do, we’ll all descend into some self-congratulatory or industry-loathing little corner of the web.
Case in point: Virginia Postrel’s always interesting blog at Dynamist.com. Today, Virginia links back to a fascinating article she wrote in 1997 about the “economic meaning of manicures”.
It turns out there’s a lot of great insight there.
She notes that
“The economy” is too big and complicated to comprehend, so we overemphasize “typical” jobs and industries - the ones we see on TV.”
Isn’t that what agencies and clients do? There are too many ‘different’ kinds of consumers out there, so we ’segment’ them into ‘targets’. She calls it psychological bias. And it’s a good thing to look out for on ‘our’ part, too.
Second, she warns us to “take government statistics with a shaker of salt.” In looking into the manicure business, she sees how out of whack the Bureau of Labor Statistics are with the reality of the manicure industry. How often do we look at a big, “quantitative” study and blindly accept it as the truth?
Third - and this is a great point - Virginia writes that “…because of competition, the benefits of increased productivity are going to consumers, not producers.” That’s true, except in our business. We’re still doing too many things the way we’ve always done them. Eventually, someone’s going to come up with much cheaper solutions. Angencies that don’t get it will respond to that threat exactly the same way “veteran nail techs” did. (Read the article, please).
Fourth, because most of the people who work in the manicure business are women,
our political discussions do not consider feminine occupations — however pleasant, well paid, or open to minimally educated people — viable alternatives to factory work.
What does that mean to us? Virginia spells it out. The problem lies in “distorted mental pictures”. How often do we examine our all biases? Yeah, we’re all smart, engaged people. But we’re not saints or geniuses. (Well, most of us aren’t, anyway). It’s good to remember we drag along a lot of baggage, too.
Finally, Virginia notes that “Human beings of all incomes and levels of technology crave beauty and diversion”.
How many beautiful or genuinely diverting messages did you create today?
By the way, Virginia Postrel is the author of this really good book (among others): The Substance of Style.
Tags: Inspiration, Targeting
