Field Notes Inside an Integrated Communications Agency

I received an irresistible email this morning. It came from Ted Dale. Did I know Ted? I didn't think I did, but it had an interesting subject line, so I decided to open the email and give Ted a chance.

"Subject: When the darkness comes your watch will still show you the right time."

I read that and thought, "Ok fine, I'll see what it is Ted wants". I knew there was a 99.9% chance he was just gonna try to sell me a watch, but he went about his selling with an attention-grabbing lead, and I took the bait. So the email opens up and to my surprise, no pictures of knock-off discounted Rolex watches. There was just one line of copy followed by a link.

"Lose all your weakness with a Submariner SS watch. Come on and click"

I don't even want a Submariner SS watch, but what I did next surprised even myself... I clicked that link. I clicked it with no remorse. I didn't even feel like a sucker for clicking it.

Why was this email so effective? A creative pitch.

"When the darkness comes..." plays on everyone's anxiety about the insecurity of the economy. Then once you took the bait the email didn't use the stereotypical approach to selling watches, rather there was just one more interesting line about losing all your weakness. I assume this would appeal to the target demographic of Submariner SS watch buyers (men who are insecure about their masculinity). So there I was, responding to a SPAM email by clicking on the link. Where did it take me? Well, evidently the SPAM campaign has been so effective that the host has noticed the traffic and taken the site down. This was their note:

"SPAM Violation! This site has been banned for SPAM violations. If you have any questions please contact technical support."

So, thankfully I didn't end up with a new Submariner SS knock-off watch. But I did learn a powerful lesson.

A creative pitch can truly help sell the unsellable.

I was thinking about widely recognized icons. Those of us in the creative industry are driven to hopefully invent a lasting impression. The mother lode is to become embedded into pop culture. While looking into some of the more celebrated jewels, I discovered their intrinsic value is bargain basement. Their deeper, chord-striking value is…ahem…priceless.

Dumb graphic luck

While I suspected it to be graphic urban legend, I discovered the bargain-priced Nike “swoosh” story to be true. In case you haven’t heard it, Nike’s logo was created in 1971 by Carolyn Davidson, a graphic design student at Portland State University. She met Phil Knight (future Nike CEO) while he was teaching accounting classes. Davidson agreed to provide design services for $2 per hour. Looming production deadlines forced Knight to settle on the swoosh after rejecting others. At the time, he paid $35 for the logo and said, “I don’t love it, but it will grow on me.”

Today, most global brand evaluators place Nike in the top 15 most recognizable logos.

Speaking of bargain symbols…

The ubiquitous yellow smiley face was created by Harvey Ball in 1963 for an insurance company’s employee morale campaign. Ball never attempted to trademark it. Soon “Smiley” fell into U.S. public domain. His total income for this round grandpa of emoticons was a whopping $45. Have a nice day, Harv. : )

So, serendipity plays a big part in making some icons. Right place, right time, right voice, right marketing investment with the moon and stars in alignment.

It’s called what?

Heard of Spam? Of course. Ever wondered about the name? Kenneth Daigneau, the brother of a Hormel vice president, dreamed it up when the first can of luncheon meat was produced in 1937. Billions and billions of canned pink goodness have been sold since. Matter of fact, each year more than 90 million cans are sold in the U.S. alone. That’s three cans every second!

Daigneau was paid $100 for the name. What a bargain. Without him, it’s hard to imagine it would have survived with runner-up names like Crinkycrinky or Canned Flappertanknibbles.

The wee-wee of a generation

Kurt Cobain was the voice of a generation, but the tiny penis of a generation belonged to three-month-old Spencer Elden of Los Angeles. Spencer was the baby on the cover of Nirvana’s iconic Nevermind album. The cover’s photographer, scrambling for the swimming baby, called his friend Rich Elden. Mr. Elden had just become a new dad. Baby Spencer gets tossed into a pool. Dad got paid $200. History is made.

Each of these examples demonstrates the creation of a potentially empty thing. Without hundreds of millions invested, we may not have ever heard of these phenoms. Makes me wonder. With enough bank, can anything become pop culture history? Paris Hilton, anyone?