All pilots learn to use checklists. The reason being that when the pressure is on you cannot afford to forget things that might be important. Be a good pilot. Always use a checklist. Here is one I use when developing new campaigns.
1. Clearly define the job and what you want people to do.
2. Can people actually do what you want? Does your way really work? Do you know what is really involved in “doing it your way?”
3. Is it sustainable? How about ownership? Are your targets passive or involved in creating this campaign?
4. Is what you want realistic? Is it feasible for the target audience? Have you ask their opinion?
5. Does what you want conflict with social, cultural, or religious norms? Have you checked?
6. Have you made it as easy as possible for people to adopt your methods? Have you taken the path of least resistance?
7. Do you need to break the proposed changes into easier to adopt stages? If so, have you done so?
8. Have you identified all the benefits and any drawbacks to doing things your way? Are they real or imaginary? Are you using that information?
9. Have you identified your target audience? Can you picture your stereotype target in your mind?
10. Have you thought about why the people who already use your methods do so? What are the advantages you think they perceive? What do they say they perceive? Are the two identical?
11. Have you considered why the people who do not currently use your way do so and why? Why do they say they don’t? Is there something to address there?
12. Have you listed what you really know about your target audience? Is that enough to work with?
13. Have you written a one-page strategy paper? Does it make sense? Does it have a name?
14. How does your campaign rate on the instant gratification scale? Can you improve that rating?
Do your home work first then:
1. Get the best people you can afford, pay them well, then get out of their way and let them work.
2. Be a team leader not a team tyrant. Your job is to coordinate the team’s creative elements, and deal with the administration. If you’re a tyrant then do not be surprised if all real creative flow stops.
Tip: The trick is to “let the kids play at what they do best” while still keeping them focused.
3. Make sure the team has what they need to work with.
4. Spend a lot of time making sure you have exactly the strategy you want before you call in the gang. The time to refine is the planning stage not in production. Have all of your ideas as clear as possible before you start working on production.
WARNING! This is where most people tend to cut corners and suffer for it later!
5. Encourage “silly new ideas”. Every once in a while one of those silly ideas turns out to be a real winner.
6. Learn when to say, ”that’s good enough”. You can continue “improving and changing” anything forever, literally. If you don’t learn when to draw the line, no one else will. You will never get anything out to the people who need to start learning your message.
7. Make sure you have the text correct, tested, approved, polished, and what ever else before you give it to the designers. I have heard some of the foulest language you can imagine from the mouths of otherwise sweet innocent young graphic designers directed toward clients who keep changing the text. They feel, rightfully so, that it is a completely unnecessary waste of their time and a total lack of respect. The other opinions are unprintable.
8. Respect the professionalism of your team members. After all, did you hire them for their brains and creativity, or to be “yes” people for your ideas? If your answer to that question was the latter then do not be surprised when they stop being creative and start doing exactly what you ask for. Remember you wouldn’t have hired them in the first place if you could do it better.
9. Listen, listen, and listen closely to what your team members have to say. They have a certain experience dealing with these problems. If you’re smart enough to let them argue the problems out among themselves, they will usually find an answer. Then all you have to do is nod wisely and suggest their solution in your own words.
10. Never forget this is all new to you and what you find as new, innovative, and exciting may be old hat to your team. The smartest bosses are the ones who know what they want to happen and attend posh conference luncheons while others make it happen.
11. Never forget whom you are really talking to. It can be really tempting, and developing countries have a real problem with this, to design slick flashy materials targeted to the city populations and not the majority in the rural areas.
12. Be very careful that your local staff are not projecting an image of how they wish things would be onto how things really are. If you have rural staff, listen carefully to what they have to say. They may not be as eloquent as your urban staff, but they are the ones on the ground, talking everyday with your target audience about what they want, and how they want to hear it.
Do not:
1. Do not tinker with a strategy once it is set and approved.
WARNING! This is cardinal sin number 1, 2, 3, and 4. You will always have great new ideas as the project progresses. But remember there will be a “next” campaign. Write all of those “ great New Ideas” down in the file marked “ Next Campaign” and when the time comes use them.
2. Never, ever, ever, make changes just because you like them. If you see a change remember it, suggest it, listen to the team feed back, and if you are still convinced it’s a good idea make a few small tests to find out if others see it the same way you do.
Tip: Drivers, gardeners, and doormen make great test subjects. Just be sure they are not telling you what they think you want to hear.
4. Never try to please everyone. Do that and you will wind up with the most bland - gutless- campaign imaginable as thanks for your efforts.
Experience has proven that when you ask people for comments about something, especially employees, they almost always try to demonstrate how smart they are by criticizing it. That does not mean they find an element distracting. It just means they picked on that element as a focal point to prove they were paying attention. Once you are aware of that, and learn to draw the line between important and trivial, you will find the vast majority of proposed changes are really meaningless attempts at “ looking good in front of the boss”.
5. Never underestimate the people you are talking to. They may not have university degrees, but the people you want to help are making a living in some pretty harsh conditions. Just ask yourself if you would be smart enough to survive in their surroundings.
6. Don’t believe the myth that rural people want to see childish art and simple graphics. Remember they are seeing more and more sophisticated advertising every day. The noise level is going up. Always imagine your poster beside a COKE poster and then ask yourself which one they would prefer to look at.
Tip: Whenever you find a really good poster get a copy and pin it up on your office wall. Then, when you receive new sample posters put them one at a time beside that bench mark poster. It won’t take you long to figure out which one is the better attention grabber.