Kill Your Agency Blog, Please

If you're not going to update it, get rid of it. Do you know how stupid it makes you look when you have only three posts up for 2012? While you're at it, remove the Twitter feeds from your team's accounts. When your media planner only tweets links to media planning articles she read somewhere else and your creative director only links to campaigns he wishes he'd had a part in, you're not doing yourselves any favors. We get it. You do social media. Or pretend to anyway.

Twitter Powered Agency Website Has No Soul

I was making an effort this week to be less cynical, when along comes a letter from Claire at EuroRSCG to ruin my vow. Seems the London agency's new "Twitter powered" website is up, "letting the 200 people within its office power its website in real-time."

Russ Lidstone, CEO Euro RSCG London, said, “The agency listens to its employees and connects with its clients on a completely new level. This new Twitter centric website embodies our belief that social media should sit at the heart of what we do.” OK, Russ, now let's change your title to CWO, Chief Wanking Officer.

Why won't this work? First, employees are going to be cheeky yet careful, not allowed to reveal their true thoughts, which is half the fun of Twitter. They will always be mindful of the boss and the clients watching.

How to get around that? Create fake profiles, or alternate profiles for real people so they can keep their normal lives off the homepage of the agency. What do you get? Boring, safe, company shills alternately touting client sites while trying to make life in the London office appear light and fun. This won't last, and what is its point anyway? To show clients that we understand the crazy new world of social media?

Here are the profiles of some of the recent tweeters on the EuroRSCG page:

Seeing a pattern?. All new accounts. Either EuroRSCG's employees really weren't all that into Twitter in the first place, or more likely, brass made them create alternate "work" accounts for this endeavor.

Naomi, from one of the profiles above, offers a link to her personal blog, however, where her bio tells it all:

London girl in the soulless world of advertising, seeks outlet for obsessive need to consume and own many pretty things.

Finally, honesty. But I'll bet you some money Naomi's bosses will ask her to remove the link very soon. Too much transparency. Too much truth.

Stars Falling Hard

I came across the personal blogs of some of the principals of a formerly hot shop here in Orlando. You know the type: landed one or two big clients long ago and then staked it all on those relationships, going balls-to-the-wall building a cool office with trendy art and furniture throughout; got write-ups in the paper and the local magazines mostly about how cool their space was. Now they're also-rans, big clients long gone and a website "under construction."

I went to their website looking for a job but I left in disgust. That website was your basic "look at our awards, look at our work, see how cool we still are." Then they placed links on the side to their main bigshots' personal blogs. One guy was a designer with lots of links to design stuff. Another was more personal with links to his Facebook, Flickr, etc. And one guy had turned his blog into a series of copy and paste articles on things like bridal showers and health care, sprinkling each with links to small-time clients that had ZERO to do with the articles. Just random out-of-place sentences like "For the best flower selection in Toronto, you need Flowers a Go-Go." Followed by, "And reducing your salt intake will help lower your blood pressure." (Flowers-a-Go-Go not the real name. I'd link you to it, but it's just too sad and I don't want to throw more dirt on this guy's half-buried head.)

The point, I guess, is that here's an agency telling clients they do it all - and well. They're interactive geniuses, they're social media savvy, they will bring you stellar conversions and excellent ROI - and one of their principals is practicing borderline Blackhat SEO linked right to the agency website.

If the strategy sounds shady or the magic pill sounds too good to be true... you know the rest. Sadly, most people in this business are completely full of shit - and few are the ones who will tell you straight out, "This is a wild frontier out here now. What's hot today might be dead tomorrow. We'll strike out in many directions and some of them, frankly, are going to yield dust. (MySpace) We might strike gold, but we're going to do a lot of panning before we do. We're going to play it above the board. Hang with us and be patient. You won't be an overnight viral sensation, because your business is not Ray-Ban or Nike. We're going to try it all, even the damned Yellow Pages, and we might all be surprised by what we learn."

Original image is here.

Sweat Shop

Mucho Massive

Original image from Shorpy.

This is a Lot of Work for a Free T-Shirt

You know how when a band gets big, the people who followed their earlier tours get all bent out of shape, saying things like, "Oh, you don't have the bootleg video of the Portland show? I was there, man! You guys aren't real fans!" That's how I feel now as one of my favorite groups hits the road for the third year in a row. I covered their previous two tours and met up with them when they were down here in O-town on what they called a "working weekend." (Drawing pictures in a public park downtown is hardly working.) I've had the opportunity to work with them professionally and they are a fun bunch who don't give you a lot pf pushback. Or maybe they're just so good with their people skills that when they give you pushback you don't even realize it.


I'm talking, of course, about the mentally challenged children of Plaid, a not-for-profit ministry in downtown Danbury, Connecticut. Led by a former punk rocker who had a vision of providing shelter and guidance to wayward urchins who'd been turned out on the streets, Plaid seeks to bring hope and healing to a hurting world. And I believe that children are our future.

This time, the Plaidiators will focus on the central states, taking in Detroit, Milwaukee, Chicago, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Kansas City, Branson, Memphis, Jackson and New Orleans. I will follow with interest the Branson portion of their journey, as I have experience in that region, experience I don't like to talk about unless there is someone standing nearby ready to sedate me.

And this time, the Plaid Summer Tour is different. They have sponsors now. They even got their vehicle supplied by Ford. This time instead of a giant church van, they'll travel in a Ford Flex. That's really cool. And sponsorship means the swag will be better for the bloggers who took the time to write about the trip.

It's a mobile exercise in new biz development. This is no cold call journey. The Plaid people have it all planned out: seeing new places, maybe landing a client or two, meeting the friends from Twitter and blogs they've never actually met in person. If they're swinging through your town, you'd be well-advised to buy them a beer and hang out. Until they start kissing your cheek and rubbing your leg. Then it's time to go because the weird stuff is about to happen.

Follow along starting July 20th.

I'm ready for my swag now.

Orlando Turns Plaid

Caught up with the world-renowned Plaid gang this afternoon in downtown Orlando. Plaid is here on their annual end-of-year regroup, where they assess what worked and what didn't. Had a great lunch and finally got to put faces to the people I've been collaborating with recently. Later, I'll upload the video of me stalking them at Lake Eola, where they were actually having a meeting.

You Didn't Think of This

And they did. Which makes them pretty damn smart.

Plaid Nation is back in gear, this time on a West Coast tour. The tour planners have conveniently skirted Florida on the last two tours. They'll probably do Europe next year.Darryl & Co: If you're hiring, I can take some night courses and become a Social Media Guru. I've been known to pose as a Thought Leader in the Interactive Space. But when I go on the road, I'd like to blog a cross-country Amtrak nightmare.

Have SWAG, Will Blog

I'm a cheap slut if you give me stuff.

I guess that really makes me a dirty whore, but the fine folks at Plaid sent me an email last week asking if I'd blog about their upcoming West Coast Tour in exchange for some Plaidness. Plaidness arrived today in the form of a lime green T and a cool little button, along with a nice card begging me to blog about them. So here we go.

In seriousness, I blog about Plaid because they are an agency getting it right. They did this last year, and it was a bizarre success. After their East Coast Tour, I shamelessly asked Darryl if he'd hire me on as Plaid's Southeast Doer of Whatever It Is I Do. Darryl graciously replied, "Dude. Uh. No."

Reason I'd gladly be a Plaid Head is that they're not claiming to be Web 2.0 Social Media Gurus - even though they are. They aren't claiming to understand all there is to know about traditional media - even though they do. They are innovators - in a traditional way. And like Advance out of Denmark, or Th!nk here in Orlando, they are doing the agency blog thing in a way that isn't ruthless corporate huckstering. Read Brand Flakes for Breakfast. You'll rarely find a self-promoting post in that entertaining and educational blog.

I mean seriously - who piles a bunch of media pros into a rented van covered in branded plaid stickers and outfitted with three video cameras and high-speed wi-fi to traverse the country in an effort to drum up business and draw attention to their efforts? They'll have live video, a Twitter feed, an ever-growing Flickr set and updates from not just themselves, but the people they meet along the way. That is unique, daring and smart. To top it all off, Uncle Bill is a part of it, doubling the cool factor.

It almost inspires me to be daring enough to wear this lime green T.

Keep an eye on the Plaid Tour and learn a thing or two about advertising, business development and customer service. It's not only an education, it's a fun, real-time summer diversion.

If they're heading to your town (Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, Redding, San Fran, San Luis Obispo, LA, San Diego, Vegas) get out and have a beer with them.

The Happiest Place in the World?

That would be Denmark, according to some surveys. Denmark has also been considered the second most peaceful place in the world, behind Iceland. But as they say in Denmark, "Who the hell wants to live in fucking Iceland?"

Pretty pastoral and peaceful place.

And wouldn't you be peaceful and happy if you got the whole summer off? Here in the States, we've always heard rumors of those liberal European and Scandinavian countries where the people go "on holiday" for months on end, then return to their cushy jobs where they work six-hour days, three of which are spent at lunch where they drink many adult beverages. They retire at the age of 50 and enjoy free meals at all restaurants and free rail and air travel just by flashing their "retired" cards. Health care is free and everyone lives to be 100 just by eating yogurt and fish. No one is poor and the bus drivers sing jolly songs as they cheerily drop you right at your front door.

OK, maybe some of that isn't true, but a visit to the Advance blog (an agency in København - that's Copenhagen for us ugly Americans) has a post titled Closing Down for the Summer. Another post on the blog reveals some very peaceful and happy people on a seaside film shoot. Advance has one of the few agency blogs that doesn't try too hard and yet isn't ashamed of being an agency blog. More on that in another post - this is about Denmark, Land of the Free and Home of the Whole Damned Summer Off.

Here is an inside peek at Advance, where they have perfected the Cool Agency Interior Design Style of placing things at unconventional angles, opaque divider walls, weird chairs that few people sit in, natural wood floors, exposed ductwork, track lighting, a "library" and people who look blurry walking past windows letting in sunlight.

A Creative could get Creative in a space like this

I may have found a Heaven on Earth to replace my other dream ex-pat destination, Australia.