As published in PM360

This is a faster, better, cheaper world. But big ideas are big ideas. They know neither price tag nor timeline. They come when they come.

Wait. Is that true? Then why are some agencies renowned for delivering creative breakthrough campaign after campaign? Is creative ideation a process you can influence with a degree of confidence?

In my experience, yes. I’ve run creative departments at several global agencies. And while creativity remains a mystery even to those who’ve made a career of it, there are a few “tips and techniques” to get impressive results, often sooner. Share these with your agency.

1. Create a creative environment. You would be amazed how many agencies thwart the flow of great ideas with punishing deadlines, soul-killing competitiveness, physical surroundings that are unkind, and more. Change the experience. Make creatives feel comfortable and appreciated. Some crave privacy. Some work better remotely. Some love it when you buy them lunch. They’re the talent. A big idea is expected of them. Their internal state is critical. Do what it takes to make them feel special.

2. Know your big idea go-to people. Chances are a big idea will come sooner from creatives who produced big ideas in the past. Insist these people work on your project. Common sense? You’d be surprised how often clients don’t insist.

3. Bring in outsiders. Your agency—and you—should cultivate a list of the best freelancers, even if pharma is not one of their specialties. The best creatives have highly developed empathy, which is key to any category, and they bring humanity and a sense of daring lateral thinking that is refreshing in healthcare creative. I used to hire outrageous brand creatives to work on direct marketing campaigns. They’d give us big ideas that we’d then have to “directify.” Extra work for us, but it got us to a place we wouldn’t have reached otherwise.

4. Experiment with team building. Try upsetting the usual twosome. Have your agency create a threesome. A foursome. Talent can be combined for positive effect. I was once teamed with a hot young duo from Europe. Despite our initial reservation and multiple decades between us, we produced exciting ideas far faster than we would have individually. Do you have in-house creatives? They have a lot of knowledge. What if you teamed them with agency creatives? If you set the challenge, territoriality won’t happen.

5. Lose the nitpickers. Details and wording can all be corrected and honed later, but get those people out of the room when you’re evaluating big creative ideas. They are possibility destroyers.

6. Brainstorm with care. Nothing sinks the heart faster than having to spout a great idea on the spot in a roomful of people. Brainstorms save time, but successful creatives have their own way of working. Brainstorms can be useful, however, as an adjunct to the creative briefing process. Have a free-flowing conversation before anyone goes to work. It helps open up the problem and inspires greater flights of imagination.

7. Be an active participant in the briefing process. Don’t leave it all to the agency planner. Bring the project alive for the creatives. They’re looking for someone to excite them. Why not you?

As published in adweek.com

It takes art and science to build social awareness and lift bottom lines.

Over the past decade and particularly as millennials have flexed their buying muscles, marketers have learned the value of being “socially conscious” in attracting and retaining consumers. But as marketers attach themselves to specific causes, it’s worth noting that some have failed spectacularly. Misses can take many forms—from having no apparent relationship with the cause itself to poor implementation or just overall lack of authenticity.

Doing cause marketing well requires a bit of art and a bit of science. And increasingly marketers are seeing that when a campaign is planned, well-executed and nurtured, it does more than build social consciousness; it makes money. Here are a four quick guidelines to create beneficial results for the brand and nonprofit:

1. Make the synergy apparent. The common ground between a for-profit and a cause should appear as more than a random or haphazard decision. Some are easy to understand, like Patagonia and the environment, or Staples and education.

Still others need to be explained. Take for example Häagen-Dazs’ seemingly irrelevant connection between ice cream and honeybees. By explaining that just under half of the Häagen-Dazs flavors are impacted by bee pollination, a clear connection can be made between the brand and the cause of stemming bee colony collapse, resulting in a powerful message that consumers can understand and embrace.

Now contrast that example with a poorly executed one, as when Baker Hughes partnered with Susan G. Komen to raise awareness about breast cancer (and funds for research). Baker Hughes painted 1,000 of its giant drill bits pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month while it launched 1,000 new fracking projects across the country. Better known as “frack-for-the-cure,” it is an example of “pinkwashing” and a thinly veiled cause initiative done poorly.

2. Take a long-term view. Many successful brands have baked cause marketing right into their DNA and have made it an unwavering component of how they act. There’s nothing new about this—Ronald McDonald House is over 40 years old. AmEx has been linking nonprofit donations to consumer behavior since 1985. And when Procter & Gamble develops brands, it looks for natural ways to extend the brand values into long-term cause-based initiatives. For example, Tide’s Loads of Hope brings clean clothes to areas around the globe that have been devastated by natural disasters. Pampers partners with Unicef to provide vaccines to eradicate neonatal tetanus in 58 countries.

According to P&G’s global marketing and brand building officer Marc Pritchard, building brands that serve a higher purpose produce better business results. Brands like Pampers and Tide have consistently delivered double-digit sales growth.

3. Walk the talk from the inside out. The CMO’s commitment to the cause starts internally by engaging and activating the entire company. By seeking and identifying internal brand ambassadors who are empowered to motivate employee participation, internal adoption is accelerated and becomes just as important as external activation. It’s about taking the same amount of effort and rigor you’d take with any other marketing program.

Employees are a significant component of a successful cause marketing campaign, not just because they may contribute on their own, but because they become evangelists for the cause. This is especially true in retail where a significant majority (70 percent) of U.S. consumers indicated they are more likely to participate in a cause-related purchase/donation if an employee recommends it.

A prime example of this is Kmart’s raising $22 million for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in 2014. Despite the fact that Kmart has struggled as a retailer, the initiative was an unparalleled success. And much of this was due to the zeal of Kmart employees. According to Kmart, not only was this “a cause that clearly resonates with our Kmart Shop Your Way members and customers, but Kmart associates were as dedicated as ever, consistently reminding and educating our shoppers about the campaign.”

4. Demonstrate real-world commitment. Creating connections that go beyond just saying you care serves to validate a brand’s commitment to the cause and becomes a publicity treasure trove via social media and other channels.

A great example is Patagonia, which tied its value proposition—making lasting products that are environmentally friendly—to an ad asking customers to reconsider their purchases because continued consumption increases stress on the global environment. Patagonia also created actual events where consumers learned how to fix worn garments, could share their stories on the Worn Wear blog and carved out a section of its Portland, Ore., store to sell second-hand clothing. Not only did consumers keep their clothing longer, but revenue and sales actually increased the following year.

By strategically and thoughtfully aligning a for-profit’s core values with the cause and identifying a correlation between mission and the brand, there are tremendous opportunities to make a long-term impact and build customer loyalty that will likely lead to increased purchasing. Supporting a cause is no longer just a marketing tactic; rather it is becoming a brand attribute.

Post this simple question to your social media profile when you get home tonight: Describe in one word (and one word only) each of these political candidates – Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

I did this following the Milwaukee debate between Clinton and Sanders. Now admittedly there are many biases in sending out political or any other kind of polls among social media friends or followers. Nevertheless, my totally unscientific method yielded interesting findings about the value of each candidate’s brand.

Political leanings of my respondents aside, the words used to describe Trump (blustery, outspoken, brash), Cruz (religious, God-fearing, conservative), and Sanders (change agent, idealist) were remarkably consistent. But the words used to describe Hillary were all over the map – from “qualified” and “experienced” to “scandals” and “untrustworthy.”

Could this reflect the larger brand problem that others have pointed out in the Clinton campaign? It seems likely. Bernie is relentless in his messaging about inequality.  Trump remains as brash and outlandish as ever. And Cruz’s faith is an integral part of his beliefs. Hillary’s messages run from being “qualified” in all aspects to her years of experience to international diplomacy to a defender of rights. She can be all of these things. Still, people have a hard time describing her.

Consistency is at the heart of any good brand. As is trust. Yet brand perceptions of Hillary indicate that she is not scoring well on either of these dimensions. For one, her messages keep changing. This may be due to the constant reliance on data from polls and focus groups that can shape any political candidate’s campaign. Tailored messaging is important, but in the absence of a clearly understood brand ambition or purpose, it does very little to build a brand. Simply put, knowing where a candidate stands on issues does not take the place of knowing who they are.

While people usually build trust in established brands, lack of clarity of purpose may also be working against Hillary. It’s not that she’s an unknown. She’s been around forever. But the public has watched her struggle through many different kinds of crises – Whitewater, Monica Lewinski, Bengazi – and she has not come out the better for it. Basic crisis management principles reinforce the power of a strong brand as an “inoculation” against bad times or events. But in the absence of understanding Hillary’s sense of purpose, many questions remain – not just about what she knew or how she acted, but who she is.

Is it too late for a total Hillary to become a more focused and purpose-driven brand? Probably not. Defining who she is and what she stands for and projecting consistent core values could be key to winning the nomination. But she’d better move on it.