When asked what I do, I often tell people that I’m a corporate poet. So this post from Strategic Name Development made me smile: Naming: When Should Creativity Be Scary?

So I just realized that I never concluded my project summary.

This is where I left off:

“…So 4 weeks, and 7 more rounds of copy, here we are at final brochure copy.”

A couple of things I’d like to say about this little experiment.

1. It is not normal to go 7 rounds on copy. Three is typical. Some clients, especially those who work at younger companies, take more time in working out the interpertation of their messaging. Copywriting is subjective. Sometimes clients need to see it written one way to know that’s NOT how they want to say it.

2. Four weeks is pretty standard for brochure concept and copy development. Some clients try to speed up the process but I find that hurts the final outcome. After delivery of a first draft, I recommend a minimum of 3 days before feedback. Copy needs to sink in. Then I need a minimum of three days to respond to first draft feedback. Subsequent drafts flow much faster.

3. This whole “documentation of a project” made me uncomfortable. I don’t like divulging client ticks and creative partner problems. That’s just the way it is. I’m sure there are things about myself that bug my creative partners. Plus, it’s important to me that clients feel that I’m 100% on their team. I love what I do and genuinely enjoy working at this level with clients. So I’m not going to blog about that stuff anymore. I’ll try to think of another way to detail the backstage life of the creative process because I think it is important for clients to understand that there is a real art to what creatives do, and that we need each other.

Furthermore, if it isn’t clear already, I’m a binge blogger and cannot be relied on to chronicle an experience consistently and effectively.

Here’s a nice little article from Business Week about a Cornell grad student who helped a NYC panhandler increase her effectiveness by using more emotionally resonant words on her signs.

Last week was spent at Icograda Design Week in Seattle. For the past year, I was on the organizing committee. I wrote most of the materials. I spent many Friday mornings on conference calls discussing event details. I made some good friends with smart people and got what I wanted out the event, which was promixity to my primary market of designers and design firms.

However, I’m disappointed with the experience. I’m not a designer, so I wasn’t the primary target audience. I won’t rehash the blow-by-blow. You can read a critical analysis from designer Marian Bantjes at the design blog Speak Up. But I will say that for the most part I was bored with the speakers and the event structure. On more than one occasion I caught myself looking at my hangnails and thinking, “I have no idea what this person is saying” or “So what IS the solution?”

That said, I have some ideas on how to make the next Design Week the passion-stoker it could be.

1. Radically rethink the structure.
Make the international conference like the student workshop. Put practicing designers in small groups with a leader, make them solve a problem and then present the solutions. Participants would spend one day workshoping a topic. The next day the leader would present the ideas to the entire conference.

Two of the big themes in the speaker presentations were cultivating design leadership and lifelong learning. Ironically, few suggestions on how to be a design leader were presented. One of the workgroup topics could be Teaching Young Designers to Lead. How would they develop curriculum? What resources would be available? And what better way to encourage ongoing professional learning than to actually have to think, listen and design while attending a conference.

2. Treat the show like a live performance.
Have a dress rehearsal. Coach the speakers. Time them. Plan ahead. Get them interpreters, if needed. Please. It’s not good, or respectful, when three people in the front row fall asleep while someone’s speaking. Or for speaker after speaker to run past their alloted time, cutting in to the question-and-answer session.

3. Take a stand on the theme.
One thing I regret about my role on the organizing committee is not speaking up about an idea we presented for the promotional materials. Designer and organising committee member John Close and I suggested an image of a land fill, basically a big heap of trash, with the headline, “Our Legacy?”

Icograda’s stance was that the idea was too controversial and strayed from the theme of “Design on a Changing Planet.” So we went with a safe NASA satellite image of Earth. I’m happy with the work John and I did, but how can a conference stimulate discussion if the organizers are not courageous enough to confrote the theme with a compelling idea?

“Design on a Changing Planet” was too vague, or it was never simplified into a compelling argument, hence none of the speakers really nailed the emotional core of globalization: What hurts more than anything about design and marketing is that what we produce likely ends up in the dump. There’s a destructive system in place to create the products and things that are the root of many of this planet’s problems. How do we combat this with design? How do we improve the experience of living on this planet?

4. Refuse to spend money on items that will end up in the trash.
Again, read Marian Bantjes on the topic of goody bags.

Why not rally the sponsors to pony up for a cold, hard cash reward for the designer or team that solved the conference’s big question in the most creative way? The team could even donate their award to a charity of their choice. Maybe their could be a tie-in with Sappi’s Ideas that Matter campaign.

5. Have sponsored stretch breaks.
Bring in yoginis to lead a mini-yoga session in between speakers. If you’re not stretching you’re body, you’re not stretching your mind. Besides, yoginis generally have taut bodies and are pretty to look at. Designers love to look at pretty things.

So there you have it.

This is the email the Designer sent after the presentation:

They loved the brochure!

At first I presented the normal-sized version of the new brochure, and the CEO was nodding his head from spread to spread. He really liked Britt’s sample bullet point copy. They liked the illustration style as well. His main feedback was that he thinks the set-up could be drawn out a little more aspirationally in the payoff.

Then I showed them the oversized version. The Director of Marketing thought it might be a hassle for people to unfold. CEO loved it. CEO and I both talked DM into it eventually. CEO loved the boldness of the graphic at the large size, and he picked up on the timeliness and casual feel that printing oversize on fake newsprint would create. They might want to execute the brochure in both sizes, so CEO wants us to price both versions.

They bought off on the illustration style.

I told them next step would be to develop real copy (Britt, I’ll talk to you about the new opening spread), show real illustrations, and start working on mechanicals.

I think that’s about it…

Have a good weekend.

Two days after we present round 1 brochure creative, we learn the CEO hates it. It’s too conceptual. He doesn’t get what we’re trying to sell. A long way from where we need to be. Simplify.

In a flurry of BlackBerry transmissions between the CEO and Director of Marketing, the CEO hashes out how he thinks the brochure experience should flow.

This is a good thing. I appreciate that their CEO is this involved. Again, his reaction was instinctual and genuine. I admit to feeling annoyed upon first hearing that we basically have to start over with this piece.

Over the next two days, I have multiple conversations with the DM and the Designer. We buried the point under a clever concept that demanded too much of the reader. I can’t argue with that.

Finally I sit down to write out a new flow. This is the cadence of the piece. The cover is the hook, the rest of the pages are the story. My role is to make that story compelling with as few words as possible. People skim, so strong headlines and subheads are imperative.

I spend the bulk of a day writing a new content outline. Something naws at me; it’s not right. It’s still too complicated. I go on a walk. I read some blogs. I read the paper. I send some invoices. I work on another client. Then BAM, it hits.

I pull out some scrap paper and mock up a miniature brochure, writing out what it needs to say on each piece. This is it. I can feel it.

I email the new flow to the Designer. He sits on it for a number of days. I start to freak out. Two days before we’re scheduled to present round 2 to the client, I call him. He hasn’t done anything on the design. We talk. I realize that he and I are similar in our appreciation for procrastination. The best ideas do not come out until they absolutely have to.

Later in the day he sends me a PDF of where he’s at with the design. I think the primary visuals are missing the point. I email him new headlines and intro copy. We work back and forth over email and phone for the next 36 hours, refining layouts and copy. The form changes. A new wrap-up spread is inserted. I rewrite the copy at the last minute. The visuals don’t click until the day of the presentation. Love it or hate it, this is how brochures are created. This is how most creative work is created.

How many company have customers creating and sharing their own videos about an initial experience with a new product?

Here’s one from YouTube. It’s 1:20 minutes of a guy powering up his MacBook for the first time. Thanks to Johnny for the tip.

My sunglass dudes would appreciate Miss Helga’s profile. Courtesy of MIT’s Ad Tech Lab.

BTW, Miss Helga is the dominatrix from VW’s new ad campaign. I love the section on “Mein Travels.” Very funny.

Today I bought a pair of sunglasses from a slim-hipped teenager and his shaggy blonde cohort. The store was slow. While I tried on different shades, these two talked, and made a lot of personal phone calls.

“Hey. Yeah. I know. Did you know that Felisha’s working at Banana now? I thought you’d want to know.”

The blonde was configuring ring tones for his friend. I asked why he was doing that.

“Oh, he just bought this phone and can’t figure out how to work it.”

I looked at the phone, one with Blackberry functionality included.

“You bought a Blackberry?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you IM with it?”

He looks at me like I’ve got a hunk of broccoli stuck between my front teeth. “Of course.”

“What else do you do with it?”

“Talk.”

“That’s an expensive piece of technology for talking. It’s not like you need it for business purposes.”

At which point Shaggy nonchalantly remarks, “Oh, we do use them for business. We’re in DECA. And I just organized an anti-drunk driving program for my school. My advisor’s trying to get funding to take it regional. Besides, my phone cost $600.”

Trying to not appear the lame thirtysomething that I really am, I swallowed the “$600?!?” that wanted to erupt from my gut. These kids work at Sunglass Hut and apparently spend their entire paycheck on a cell phone.

“So, do you guys have a MySpace page?”

They look at each other. Shaggy rolls his eyes and says, “I can’t believe he doesn’t have one.”

Fresh off of listening to a kick-ass KEXP streaming archive of my recent crush band, Ghostland Observatory, I decide to act age inappropriate.

“So, have you heard of the band Ghostland Observatory?”

“Nope. Are they cool?”

“Check them out. They’ve got a MySpace page. Or you can go to KEXP and check out a streaming archive of a live performance.”

They knew neither about KEXP nor the term “streaming.”

“What do they sound like?”

“Danceable 80s-style synth rock. Totally different from anything you’ve heard, though.”

I know, I’m totally dating myself. But they seemed to grasp the concept, and that it was different from anything their peers might have heard of, so therefore it would make them cool if they were to “discover” it for themselves.

“Cool. Cool. Gotta write that down. How do you spell it?”

I’m sure they rolled their eyes and laughed at me when I left the store, but this exchange fascinated me from a marketing perspective. I’ve been listening to a lot of indie bands (and some not so indie) with MySpace pages, and a couple of my clients are dabbling in social network marketing. There’s something pure and democratizing going on in our culture that should be on the radar of every marketing exec.

Does saying that make me un-pure?

Today I met with the Designers to map out pagination for the brochure. This is the blueprint stage. I brought a rough content outline. We worked through each section, talking about ideas best represented visually and how to structure the copy and requisite graphical elements to maintain interest. There’s also the over-arching concept of the piece and how that builds from page to page. We need 12 pages to tell this story.

The meeting took 1 1/2 hours. Now I write a first draft of copy. The Designers will take that content and flow it into the layouts they’re developing. We’ll spend the better part of a week refining the piece before the client sees a complete first look at the brochure. And then the copy revisions begin.