The Drip Edition 7

Welcome back to all you wonderful humans😊

It’s Friday and that means it’s THE COLLECTIVE DRIP TIME!
And obviously (less exciting than my newsletter, but still a thrill) – the weekend!

This week I have been working on some exciting new projects, including a data and analytics business project, as well as a new project involving our sound department, so staytuned(I mean if you aren’t loving my puns then are you even living)!

I also worked on a very last minute job for a new client, pitching a solution I do not have a huge amount of experience in, so I am excited to see where that takes us. It’s all about learning and growing!

Some things that have been on my mind this week:

• How to stay competitive in the advertising industry, both in attracting talent and retaining talent, but also by creating cool things (when your clients don’t always have the forethought or budget for said cool things)
• Creating a work culture that extends beyond just drinks and work lunches
• Innovating and innovation, and what that means in a world that is constantly changing and spitting out new technology and bright and shiny things to tinker with, rather than meaningful brand interactions

Ok, now they’re on your mind as well. If you have any thoughts on the above, please do share them with me. I welcome any feedback on all of them😊

This week you can look forward to useful tips for saving your iPhone battery; The Happiness Trap – why you are never satisfied and how to break out of that; Brand Purpose is Dead (is it? I am not sure); and Iconic Brands Redone with Minimalist Product Packaging.

Let’s get on with it!

iPhone Users – 7 Ways To Save Your Battery Life

This one was an entirely for personal reasons.
My battery life SUCKS.

My phone lasts all of about two hours before it’s on 10%, so I am persistently lugging around various external chargers. Bryce found this wonderful list of 7 ways to improve / save your battery life and it has definitely given me more battery life (as I type this, my battery is on 13% and it is only 13:11, and I have been in meetings since 9am and therefore not using my phone, so take this from whence it comes).

I tried to check the Battery Health function on my phone to see if there has been an actual difference or just a psychological difference, but the Battery Health check is not super helpful over long periods of time, as it only shows the last 9 days’ worth of data.

Nevertheless, watch the video here and get that much desired placebo effect.

Discovery Life and Liberty Are Currently Locked In a Legal Battle, And Now We Know How Much Spend On Digital Media (catchy title, I Know)

Discovery Life has taken Liberty to court over its Vitality offering based on the fact that Liberty is trying to use shared customers’ data from Vitality in its calculations on cashback offers. Snooze.

What is really interesting is that Discovery spends SO MUCH MONEY on advertising. It’s not quite clear how much of that is spent across digital platforms, but for Discovery Life and Discovery Vitality they spent more than R502 million on all channers in 3 years.

In that time, they have recorded roughly 34.7 million impressions on Facebook and 8.141 million Google. They recorded roughly 58,000 leads from that spend via their website.

Let’s assume that they spent 10% of that money on digital media. That’s still R50 million.

How on earth have they only achieved 34 million impressions?? That is R1.40 an impression. PER IMPRESSION. That means that in three years they have managed to reach every person in South Africa with one advert, roughly 1.1 times. If that.

On one of our last campaigns run for a client, our spend was R16,700 over a 2 week period, and we garnered 350,000 impressions. That means we averaged 0.05c per impression.

Now, I know that the insurance industry digital media costs are always more expensive, but these numbers seem fishy to me. Perhaps they are being misreported.

Regardless. They’re spending a lot on advertising, and only getting 58,000 leads.

R50 million = 58,000 leads (not sales, leads). That’s R862 per lead, roughly. And that does not even take into account how many people saw their traditional ads and went to the website to contact sales people. 

That shows us exactly what it takes to play in this space nowadays. Crazy.

Read the article here

The Happiness Trap

We’ve probably all been there.

“I can’t wait for X, because then life will be easier.”
“I can’t wait until I have this car, because then I will be happier.”
“I just need to earn a bit more, then I’ll be more content.”
“I cannot wait to go on holiday…”

These markers of success that we set for ourselves and then reach give us these little dopamine hits.

As a person achieves more success, expectations and desires rise in tandem. The result is never feeling satisfied — achieving no permanent gain in happiness after the initial hit of happiness. We tend to put our happiness against reaching these goals, and until we reach them we are in a state of failure. And once we reach the success, we are happy for a while but then we revert back to trying to achieve another goal, and therefore being discontent until we do so.

This is called hedonic adaption. The idea that we get used to our new success and it then becomes the norm, and we therefore revert to the same level of happiness as we had prior to the event. The happiness equilibrium.

This makes it incredibly hard to raise happiness levels beyond a certain point.

So what can you do?

• Set realistic expectations through self-awareness and accepting reality as it is
• Pursue ends goals, rather than means goals ( to be healthy, happy and kind, over earning more money, or reaching a certain level of success)
• Increase your perception of reality ie, define success in your own terms and then celebrate smaller wins and bigger wins
• Express gratitude for what you have and affirm your own ability to do things

Read more here

Podcast: 99% Invisible

This is one of my favourite podcasts, as it covers topics from counterfeit money and the role Hollywood plays, to articles of clothing and their provenance. I listened to one a few weeks ago which was truly fascinating, given that it was Women’s Day last week.

The specific episode I’d like you all to tune into this week is titled: “Invisible Women” and is centred around the research of a woman named Caroline Criado Perez, diving into how the world is designed for men using data that excludes women, or ignores them, or – for the most part innocently enough – simply forgets to take them into account.

One of the most fascinating case study finds is the following:

“The vast majority of medical research, for instance, is based on studies of men. Perez explains that heart attacks are more often misdiagnosed in women, in part because of the symptoms we’re all educated about. For men, chest pain is a common, prominent symptom. For women, heart attacks often present as fatigue or what feels like indigestion, with chest pain appearing in just around one out of eight cases. As a result, fewer women overall seek medical help during heart attacks and even when they do they are often diagnosed poorly by professionals.”

Another great case study:

“Snow plowing patterns seem an unlikely subject of a gender study conducted in a small town in Sweden. After all, the town’s approach appeared logical and neutral enough on the surface: plow major roads first, particularly those leading into and out of town, followed by smaller local streets. It is the same sequence played out in many cities around the world.

As researchers dove into the subject, however, they discovered that male and female driving patterns were markedly different. While men mainly commuted to and from work, women drove all over to run errands and to take care of elderly family members.

They also walked more, trudging across often-unplowed intersections, sometimes with kids in tow. Aside from health and safety, that labor, when tallied up, was found to be worth almost as much to the economy as paid work. “This work contributes hugely to GDP,” explains Caroline Criado Perez, author of Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, a book about how women are often left out of design.

In Sweden, the city council looked at the findings and reversed their approach, plowing side roads and sidewalks first. It had a huge impact, reducing the people admitted to emergency centers, women in particular, and had a corresponding economic impact from lower healthcare costs. Driving through a few inches, as it turned out, was less dangerous than walking through the snow, particularly if one was pushing something like a baby carriage as well.”

Data is delightful.

Listen and read here.

Brand Purpose Is Dead

I do love a goading title. But this article actually appears to support its controversial headline seemingly designed to stir up trouble, and the case they make is not bonkers – at least on the surface.

The author looks at why we should be retiring brand purpose, and instead looking at a youth-led strategy. After all, the youth are much more enlightened, right? They know what’s up, and we should be looking to them to guide us. After all, haven’t the youth been the ones to ignite change throughout history? Haven’t they been the guiding force in progressive revolutions? Look at the Fees Must Fall movement in South Africa.

As someone who sits between a Millennial and the “Generation X”, floating out here in the sea of “Who am I and where am I going” – the generation that truly doesn’t belong I found myself nodding along.

Nice try. They almost got me. I almost believed, just for a second, in the author’s propaganda.

But let’s look at the facts.

Brand purpose is not the same thing as a strategy that is youth-led. They can co-exist in harmony, surely? And they should. Brand purpose gives your brand just that – a reason for being, for moving forward and for growing. Part of that purpose should be a strategy to include youth in creating impactful change.

But just because the youth have insights about the youth and the world we are currently living in (a veritable minefield),and are adept at leading mass change (young people have a lot of energy and they are filled with the spirit of action)that doesn’t mean this is everything. It does not decay the wisdom and complex understanding of the world that brands operate within – and that wisdom comes from experience.

It’s just a bit too obtuse for me. How young people are going to approach the future is of course important, but remember – young people become old people, and with that age, comes change, growth and experience. Not bad things, if you ask me. The energy of youth versus the authority of experience. A fine balance.

Read the article and let me know your thoughts. Maybe I am missing something.

Some Sexy Design: Iconic Brands Given A Minimalist Makeover

Thanks Ash for sharing this with me.

This project tasked designers with taking iconic brands such as Red Bull, Nutella, Durex, Nesquik and Pringles, and redesigning them with a modern, simple aesthetic, and then a deliberately stripped down ultra-simple design.

Some of the designs:

Delightful.

And that’s it for this week.

As ever, if you have any complaints, queries, questions, and suggestions, or you’d simply like to have a chat about any of the above, or even want to send me something to include for next week, hit me up😊

Have a wonderful weekend!