The professional comics, well the ones I have read about all
mutter the same sort of advice. Richard Pryor says, "Tell the truth
and funny will come." Others talk mainly of keeping an ear out for
funny characters and incidents you see or read about. Everyone
agrees that it is mainly down to hard graft?"It took me ten years
to become an overnight success," said Jerry Seinfeld.
Considering who these people are, this is pretty boring, obvious
stuff. But they don't fill venues talking about the process of
writing great material; they fill venues with great material.
Much unlike our own industry, we fill venues and conferences by
mostly talking about the process and technologies involved,
innovations, new buzzwords and platforms. Which, don't get me
wrong, are of huge importance and considerable interest.
But it's far easier and far more interesting to talk about
innovation and technology than about someone who sat down trying to
write something funny, or moving or persuasive.
And so, the blend of ingredients required for great work has
been skewed. Technology and innovation have become, dangerously,
the main criteria for success. The less interesting writing process
is seen as a less important skill. Or worse, a skill that anyone
can do if they decide to turn their mind to it.
To simplify this and redress the balance, we often use a "joke"
analogy with our clients. It serves primarily to get beyond all the
buzzwords, hoopla and complications. It helps us remember what our
goal is, which in this case, is to make people laugh.
We ask them to imagine that instead of writing adverts, we write
jokes instead. (An invitation for them, and you, to politely inform
us that they already knew that).
A joke, as we all know, can appear on TV, a poster, mailer,
banner, blog, twitter, AR, app or whatever platform we'll be
evangelizing tomorrow. The most important thing is how funny that
joke is. If it doesn't make the person who sees it, in whatever
guise, laugh, then they won't remember it and won't retell it down
the pub/school gates/office.
It's the writing of the joke and all its nuances that is clearly
the vital ingredient. And just as not everyone is a comedian not
everyone is automatically a good advertising writer.
Granted in the real world our job isn't to just make people
laugh, it's to sell and persuade. These days we use an ever
expanding array of tools to reach our audience, engage with them
and be of some use to them.
No crappy analogy can address every variable this beautifully
complicated industry throws up, but for us it serves to make it
less complex to our clients and also gives balance and respect to
all the different types of skills needed to make great work.
I know. I should have really ended with a joke.