When did we stop making time for curious conversation? For immersion?

And no, I don’t mean the lengthy deep dives for agencies to get onboarded on all a brand’s charts that nobody even understands and not even the client really cares about. That’s a necessary step, such as putting on a safety belt or taking out insurance. It’s there for emergencies, but not to find the extraordinary. 

By immersion, I’m talking about products and conversations with consumers. Meet the people who made it and ask why. Hang out where people use it (or you want to use it) and ask how. 

It doesn’t need to be a big or lengthy step. Spoiler: You don’t need a full sample size to make an outsized difference.

Is it “research”? Sure, if that’s what you need to tell yourself or your boss or your client to get it approved. But, honestly, why do you need to ask? 

I’m baffled when clients say there isn’t time for this stuff. What are you talking about? This planning job is about value creation, not wordsmithing a client brief into a ChatGPT brief that all but lobotomizes the creative—just to get it into creative quicker.

Clients, please don’t tell the agency you just did the immersion so they don’t have to waste time doing it. Agency planners need to feel it. It’s all about feeling. We’re trying to get an emotional reaction and need emotion in the process to uncover emotional outcomes. 

Strategists, planners, proactive account managers and forward-thinking creatives all need to fight for the time and support to immerse themselves in the product and the consumer’s world. Or support the person in your team who does. If you don’t get permission, do it anyway.

Chances are your client or manager is out of touch with reality (yes, I admit as a CEO that often includes me). Use a lunch break, duck out at 3 p.m. instead of 5 to hang out in a bar or supermarket aisle or a sports center. Be uncomfortable.

Act now and ask for forgiveness when you show up to the client meeting with actual verbatim anecdotes from the real world about the consumer’s drivers and barriers. Oh, and that quant study the client sent you but hasn’t read or understood? Yeah, maybe it’s got a handy stat that may help prove a point, but it’s not going to make the difference. It’s a freaking stat, not a feeling. 

At best, there are a couple of weeks between the client brief and the creative brief. My advice? Read the client docs really fast and then use as much of the time to immerse yourself out there— away from your desk. Don’t text people, talk to them. Watch for body language—how they gesture is an important part of the communication too. 

And clients, if a strategist asks for a few extra days to talk to some product people or customers, resist the urge to say, “We really need to get going. How soon can we get into creative and see some ideas.” You are missing the entire point; meaningful insight is part of the creative.

You are not just buying the quick-witted words of a writer and the dynamic images of an art director. They are probably awesome but to be powerful, they need food, and fresh insight is food. You should be fighting for your agency to eat its greens. The stuff with mud on it that you need to wash before you eat.

Face it, when it comes to unlocking creativity, charts are mostly junk food. So are meetings. Give your creatives a muddy carrot of an insight. A fresh messy little thought from a conversation someone actually had. It’s probably gold.

Great insights are not written, they are felt. And consumers feel it in the work it inspires.