Connections Planningness
Transcript of Connections Planningness
Caveat – we don’t mean to paint everyone with the same brush. There is brilliant work
done by connections planners out there. But as a total discipline, it’s in trouble.
Once upon a time, some rich white guys decided to make money by spinning off
media from creative agencies.
The underlying assumption is that media is a container for holding messages – and
turned media into a commodity to be bought primarily on price.
It wasn’t trying to build greater value for brands or people.
It was solving for agency problems. New revenue stream
Sexy new business tool Award show friendly creative
It was dependent on the person who did it.
We got connections planners, instead of connections planning.
We don’t have a shared approach or way of working.
We applied the lens of advertising (interruptive, message-based) to
new media.
Instead we should apply the lens of new media (interactivity,
iteration) to advertising.
A process of putting human connections at the heart of
everything. Grounded in a deep understanding of
what people are trying to do, what the brand is trying to do, and how people use media.
A journey, not a destination.
Ideas as unfolding stories, a stream of iterations and interactions that
invite people into the process.
Think of the flow of information over time.
365 day planning instead of 360 degree.
Cultural latency is a strategic tool.
Think of the flow of information over geography.
How do you create contextual value in each particular space?
Think of the flow of information over technology.
How can each medium & technology be used to its full
potential? The role of creative technologist is
increasingly important.
A plan for what happens after the connection.
What will people do with it? How will they use it & share it? What might they remix?
And what will that mean for the brand? How will we change because of our
interaction with them?
Learn from other disciplines that create meaningful interactions.
We need to absorb practices & approaches from design, information architecture, and
user experience planning. Things like agility, rapid iteration,
prototyping.
Connections Planning has more in common with Experience Planning
than media planning. We are all experience designers,
whether we think of ourselves that way or not.
Focus on maximizing value for all.
Create thick value, with interactions that are rewarding for everyone –
media provider, participant, brand.
Solve real problems. At the end of the day, our job is straightforward:
What’s the business problem? What audience can best solve that problem?
What response do they need to have? What experience could generate that response?
Embrace the one-off. Do we worry too much about campaigns?
Sometimes, affecting one thing well is powerful. Commitment, not campaigning
It gives you a chance to learn: a one-off is just something you haven’t figured out how to
dimensionalize yet.
We all have the same job: making better ideas.
Whatever the job function, everyone’s job is additive to a shared goal. You’re not
responsible for the brief or the channel plan but for the idea. That requires a fluid
iterative interchange of strategic, media, and creative thinking.
The $64,000 question:
Is connections planning a separate discipline?
Are we niche-ing ourselves into irrelevance with splintered sub-disciplines?
Should these just be core planning skills?
Topics for discussion:
1) Is connections planning a separate discipline? Or a core planning skill?
2) What skills/methods do we need to absorb from other disciplines?
3) What could the new ‘idea’ team look like? 4) What’s holding us back from evolving?