Wizard of Ads Monday Morning Memo

People have said for decades, “Word-of-mouth is the best kind of advertising. That's the best kind: word-of-mouth.” You hear this so often when you sell advertising that my friend Bob Lepine used to joke about opening The Word of Mouth Advertising Agency. He said he was going to hire people to sit at bus stops and ride the elevators in tall buildings and say to people, “Have you tried that new res...

Standing inside Chapel Dulcinea recently, I looked up to see the great ribs beneath the roof beams above me and thought, “Jonah in the belly of the whale.” Do you remember the story? It's only four short chapters, a 5-minute read. The next morning, Princess Pennie went back to Dulcinea with me and we sat together while I read the book of Jonah aloud. Somehow, it felt like the right thing to do. Le...

Hi Roy, Thanks for the mention in the MMM today. It never ceases to amaze me the buzz something like that creates. Reading it also reminds me of the other conversation that took place at the same time, when you and Dave were talking about how a chef reduces the sauce to intensify the flavour and how that process can be related to writing. That conversation adds clarity to today's argument raging i...

People who try to stay “on the cutting edge” tend to see everything as new. But the thing that has been will be again. And that which currently is, has been, long before our time. If this observation seems familiar to you, it's probably because you remember it from a book written a few thousand years ago. Solomon went looking for the meaning of life and the essay he wrote about his journey, ...

A few years ago, your customer could compare you only to your competitor down the street. But information gathering and comparison shopping have since become effortless, thanks to the internet. Tens of millions of us are gathering and comparing info 24/7 in the comfort and seclusion of our own homes. But we're not “your customer,” right? I recently spoke to an audience of 1600 businesspeople at a...

NOTICE: This memo ends with a link to an ad writing course description. So don't be surprised. The last line in most TV or radio ads is usually a “call to action,” right? Especially if the ad was produced locally: “Hurry. These prices won't last long.” “Act Now. Offer expires soon.” “You must be present to win.” We say these things because we're trying to create a sense of urgency. We want to see...

I wrote three memos to you this week, but decided not to send the first two. The first one,  We Are Sancho Panza,  is the dancing safari into  symbolic thought  that I promised you in last week's memo. It begins,  “Who can explain our four-century attraction to Don Quixote? The book is hard reading and dull, full of inconsistencies, and confusing. A little like the Bible....

“And all shall be well and All manner of thing shall be well When the tongues of flame are in-folded Into the crowned knot of fire And the fire and the rose are one.”  In this strange passage from  Little Gidding,  poet T.S. Eliot links the mental image of a rose to the image of an infolded knot of flame. We see the connection; yes, a rose does look something like a knot of fire. Mu...

Getting confidence and keeping confidence – emotional muscle – is like getting and keeping any other muscle; it just requires daily exercise. But where does confidence come from? Is it merely a feeling – the product of an optimistic attitude gained through positive thinking rituals learned at motivational seminars – or is it something more substantial? According to Baltasar Gracian, confidence com...

This year marks the 400-year anniversary of the publication of  Don Quixote,  so I seized the opportunity to spend some hours in the study of 1605. (Arooo! Aroo-Aroooo!) And as all such beagle runs will do, this one led to a delightful surprise in the form of one 'Baltasar Gracian,' a Spaniard who was 4 years old when  Don Quixote  was published and 15 when Cervantes died. As a...

You had friends and laughter, adventure and romance. Remember the halcyon days of your youth? But then the friends went away, the laughter faded, the adventure ended and the romance was over. It was time to go to work. Do you ever feel like you're wearing ankle irons, condemned to row forever with the other galley slaves in the dim life below ship's deck? “I too have had my dreams: ay, known indee...

A brief summary of this episodeNiche marketing was born the day a clear-eyed realist chose to dominate a subcategory when the master category seemed too high a hill to climb. “Instead of trying to become a major retailer of home furniture, I'll become the king of affordable dinettes. Instead of making a run at used cars, I'll dominate used Corvettes instead.” Focused specialization makes sense, an...

I was writing an upbeat and instructional memo to send you today called  Confidence: Where to Get It and How to Keep It.  But it's going to have to wait. This other thing just wouldn't turn me loose until I wrote it down and sent it to you. Have you ever had a concept slap you in the face with every twist of your consciousness? The slap-fest began for me on Friday, when my chief media bu...

It was Christmas Eve, 1513. In just two more years, 78 year-old architect Giovanni Giocondo would be dead, having filled Europe with magnificent buildings and bridges that continue to stand unweathered in the year 2005. During that night he wrote a note to his friend, Allagia Aldobrandeschi. The note, like his other work, remains: I am your friend and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I...

Which do you think would work better, the brilliant execution of a flawed strategy, or the flawed execution of a brilliant one? In business, it's the flawed execution of a brilliant strategy that usually wins the day. Most advertising professionals are unwilling to question a client's strategy because they're afraid of losing the account. So they happily pretend that “good writing, scientifically...

“You've heard that before you die, your whole life flashes before your eyes? This is true. It's called living.” I'd love to take credit for that line, but I lifted it from an obscure novel by Terry Pratchett. It's one of the 716 random quotes that magically appear, like a secret message in your alphabet soup, each time you visit  wizardacademy.org . Most of these quotes you won't find anywher...