the art of conversation

Talking is useless. Discuss. Or rather, don't.

Research-Live.com recently reviewed 'Consumer.ology' by one Philip Graves. It's a balanced review, considering the line advanced by Graves (ex client-side researcher) is about as dumb and unoriginal as Rambo 12. The 'argument' is, because what people say does not correspond to what they do (hold the front page of Research, Marc) there's no point talking or even listening to them. Just watch what they do. 

This blinding insight apparently happened after the author finished bombarding some poor sods in Leeds with questions in a focus group. After he turned his tape recorder off they started having a proper conversation and talked about doing something different to what they'd told their interrogator. He used this as evidence that talk was deceptive, rather than that he might be a shit moderator. 

Unhindered by any such doubts, he went on to discover that people do psychoanalysis but still can't get to the bottom of their own thoughts and that our emotions shape our decisions, therefore we cannot identify what we want and don't want. (I can however identify with 100% accuracy one recently published book I will not buy.)

He says it is an illusion that we can ask people what they think and learn from it. I re-read that particular gem a couple of times to check I wasn't mistaken, but that is what it says. There goes journalism, then.

Torrid Tale of Two Beers

Our thoughts turn to beer, it must be Friday afternoon.

Steve Henry this week bemoaned the lack of creativity in Budweiser’s latest poster: “a corporate-guideliney visual” which demostrates that "‘selling’ doesn't sell. You have to stand out and you have to entertain.”

Creative it's not. But it does convey that it's a new beer that's 4% and less fizzy. Beer drinkers probably like the idea of a smoother lager (doesn't 'bag you up') and maybe know that 4 is the new 5 in ABV terms.

If you want creativity and entertainment, you might think Guinness was unbeatable. They have a new campaign out. It's such a shame.

Guinness ads used to be the best anywhere; creative, impactful and (surely) helping sales. Now they seem to have disappeared up their own black stuff. Their current ‘bring it to life’ campaign includes yet another epic, budget-busting production described as a ‘good point lost in lavish invention’. Wonderful to watch, but oddly forgettable and disconnected to anything.

Guinness ads used to tell terrific, watchable, enrolling stories, like Jonathan Glazer's Swim Black and of course the award-winning Surfer. But maybe these awards went to their head because then they abandoned narrative in favour of symbolism and spectacle. Which would be all very irrelevant had UK sales of Guinness not fallen by seven million pints in the last year or so.