"Big Ideas"

What clients want most from their agencies is "the power of the big idea," said the president of Volvo Cars North America (and quoted in a column in The New York Times). (Click on the title of this post to go to the article.)

Many of the pooh-bahs of the American Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA, or "4A's," as we know it), meeting in Bermuda, of all places, repeated what I've been writing (and we at BURRIS have been talking) about for months. Consumers ignoring advertising messages, full-service agency functions fracturing among specialty resources, the primacy of ideas over developing mere creative - these are the issues the venerable 4A's are discussing among their own, as though they - and not consumers and clients - are really setting the agenda.

I'll tell you this: my thinking on these topics originates from my consumer sensibilities and then ripples out to my life as a professional marketer. Paying scant attention to the consumer - and marketers' neglect of him and her - got out-of-favor brands into the quagmire they're in. And focusing on the consumer is exactly what will get them out. That, and "big ideas."

What's on my mind today? Two big things and how we can put our thinking to work on them:
- Customer service and guest satisfaction, especially in the golf travel business.
- Leveraging loyalty and intent to enhance a brand's relationship with its customers.

I'm happy to be where I am ... instead of in Bermuda this week.