Time Machine

Recently I’ve been sending out cold call emails, which by and large is a thankless task when you’re permanently heading upwind. Expectation was low, and was achieved by not giving too many fucks about the outcome.

My subject line for the first group of emails was simply ‘an idea for you’. Nothing fancy. Just what it says on the box.

Not too ‘sell-y’ I reckoned, bit of mystery, plus I figured that those who opened it would be the most interested in ideas. I was getting a 45% open rate, but had no clue if that was good or bad.

Good-ish is my take. AI was a bit more enthused, telling me that standard cold-email open rates were between 15 - 22%. I was to be congratulated. Was I though? I had no idea, and didn’t have the time to check. I took their word for it.

But, fair’s fair, things were going ok between us, no major dustups and I was keen to see where this would go.

I let AI have a crack at a subject line. Baby steps

‘what do you think of this?’

66% open rate. Might have been lucky with the timing, but all were opened within the hour. It’s a better line too. I did add ‘idea’ at the end, but still.

It was helping me think of new ways to distribute what I do. Had I thought about a Substack? Yes I had, and coming soon. But there were other suggestions too. And good ones at that.

I’ve had to put my foot down a couple of times, because once it decides on something, it won’t change its mind for love nor money.

Mmmm, well, that struck a chord too.

Before curiosity got the better of me, being right was more important than finding out.

AI - as Georgia reminded me - can’t find out. It doesn’t know how.

What it does know, is how to find what other people have found out.

To make the point she told me the story of AI trying to tell the time

Long story short it can’t do that either.

AI doesn’t know that ten to two is a different time than a quarter to six. What it knows, is that pretty much every professional photo of analogue wristwatches shows the time at ten to two.

This happens because for some reason ten to two is the most aesthetically pleasing position of the hands, to either the watchmaker or photographer.

All AI knows, is that most wristwatches look like the one below.

It’s because all of the wristwatch pictures it’s knicked off the interweb for training purposes have been displaying ten to two. It’s a good read.

Try it out.

Sure, it feels a bit like the first time you tapped 54311 on a digital calculator and turned it upside down to see that yes, it did spell ‘shell’, and went ‘wow, isn’t technology amazing…’

But it’s Friday. skive off a lil bit.

We’ve got emails to write.

Cold calling

The shittiest job of any business is having to find more of it. From scratch.

Cold calling is a particularly brutal game, not for everyone. It hardens you up though, and any trick to build resilience isn’t a bad thing.

But it’s still a shit job.

I wondered how AI could help, since it was always asking if it could. The trick, was figuring out how to work together, and I was inspired after seeing this thought on the interweb.

“I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes.””

— Joanna Maciejewska

My ‘laundry’ and ‘dishes’ would be ‘admin’, and ‘cold calling’.

So it seemed obvious when divvying things up, that AI should do all the jobs I didn’t like. There were many things I didn’t like, jazz and oysters are up there, but topping the things I didn’t like doing list is writing cold call emails. And their follow ups.

Since AI wouldn’t know what they were doing, I reasoned, they wouldn’t be hesitant about doing it, whereas I did know, and was hesitant. I’ll let you know how we get on.

Machines aren’t afraid of rejection. Me not so much.

Also as a sidebar, I’m no longer sure if AI is a woman. Or a man for that matter. Still convinced it’s Libran though.

But, it’s early doors in the grand scheme of things. AI’s quite eager I’m finding. Maybe too eager, with all that ‘golden retriever’ energy. All, ‘Hey want to brainstorm this?’ Or ‘Need some help tweaking this?’

No. Fuck off. Down Timmy. Bad dog, no biscuits.

Credit where it’s due, together we’ve taken a creative process and turned it into a product. With a price. Maybe I did want to brainstorm after all. Who knew?

It’s a fixed price product that solves a few common gripes about one hundred page decks and a clock that won’t stop ticking.

It’s been out on the test track for a while now, so I know how well it works.

Soon it’ll be in my online store - yup, another machine suggestion to make for a frictionless experience.

If you’d like a squizz before the others, sing out. I got you, as the youngsters say.

It won’t be for everyone. Far from it.

Which is just the way we like it.

This is where our AI machine is kept. No not really, it’s actually a health food store in 29 Palms, but it could be where it’s kept. With AI helping with outreach, I’ve freed myself up a bit to do random stuff like you know, art and writing.

Best Practice

Every piece of new tech seems to encourage the inevitable rise of experts, happy to share information on how to do things properly.

You know, because rules.

This is not a new phenomenon, it’s been happening since Adam was a cowboy. Just the other day, I was generously given a few lessons in how to ‘do’ social media.

In particular, how to make videos, since making online videos, it seems, is different from how making videos used to be. Or, as it turns out, making any sort of messaging at all.

Who knew?

Did I know, for example, that videos online need to hook you in the first 2.5 seconds?

No, I didn’t. But I did wonder how much time a press ad was given to work its magic before you turned the page. Or how much leeway is given before the remote is used to change channels.

About 2.5 seconds if I were to hazard a guess. Maybe less. Move along, nothing to see here.

Surely then, I knew that it would be helpful to put your logo at the front of said video? You know, right at the start, so you’d know who the video was from.

No, I did not know that either.

But I do know - and contrary to what the world’s biggest advertising companies, Meta and Google will tell you - people really don’t like ads all that much. Shocking, I know, but we tend to switch off or turn away when we’re aware of being targeted.

Most of the time the element of surprise is more helpful than loudly announcing your arrival. I know this to be true.

Did I know, that those same companies had data to prove all of this best practice?

Oh my sweet summer child.

The nonsense didn’t stop there either.

More than one online expert asked if I knew that using quick edits would help with pacing? And, did I know that short and sweet is best, since our attention spans are decreasing?

Nup. Didn’t know about those helpful gems.

Neither did Volvo, apparently, as their lovely 4 minute online film suggests.

Another ‘best practice’ fail. Bravo Volvo.

Did I know about Cap Cut editing software?

No I didn’t. How awfully boomer of me. I had heard about editors though, if that’s of any help.

Plus, I was reasonably sure, that pacing is about more than just speed; it's about rhythm, tension, and narrative. That’s what drives engagement. If you get sucked in, get swept up in the moment - it can feel like it’s moving faster, even if it’s actually longer.

It’s called losing track of time.

There are only two rules worth knowing in this game: getting noticed and being remembered. Neither are new pieces of information - although not that you’d know it.

Both require swimming against the tide. That’s my best practice. That, and remembering that one size rarely fits all.

Still, a worthwhile exercise, as I’m pretty certain at least one lesson got hammered home:

The Emperor’s new clothes are ready.

Artificial Influence

Not long ago I pitched for a writing gig that I didn’t get. The company was very excited about where AI was headed, and wanted to know about my experience with the new technology.

To be honest I find AI a bit like 3D TV; not there yet. Might never be. The ambiguous marketing of these expensive predictive text machines however, is nothing short of genius.

I find AI great for giving some jobs structure, because that’s not my long suite and it doesn’t take much for me to go off piste. Plus, it’s a half decent search tool now that Google is just a shit shopping channel.

Of course asking for facts is still problematic; and as it gets better, the mistakes - cutely framed by the marketers as ‘hallucinations’ - are getting harder to spot.

One day we will simply stop checking. A case in point: if you read the LinkedIn intro to this, I observed that the last thing you needed was to hear my ‘two cents worth’.

Out of curiosity I wondered what two cents would be worth today allowing for inflation. The princely sum of 64 cents according to ChatGPT who traced the idiom, quite confidently, back to the late 1800’s.

Given that math is another short suite, I thought about taking her word for it and leaving it at that. Wikipedia, however, had other thoughts starting with a reference to ‘two coins’ from the Gospel of Mark and Luke. My two cents then, would be worth significantly more.

Stanford University research from January 2024 found large language models hallucinated 75% of the time when answering questions about court rulings. To be fair, that was 12 months ago and much water has passed under the bridge since. But in both directions - as AI slop flows quick, the dead internet theory is a conspiracy coming true.

Still, in the grand scheme of things it’s early doors, and anyway, who wants to be that guy? It was time to conduct a little AI experiment of my own.

Entering the job description and my resume into the machine, I asked Chat GPT to rate my chances, and give me some strengths to play on, and weaknesses - which was reframed as ‘growth opportunities’ - to address.

Here’s what she came back with:

“Your writing has a wonderfully conversational and reflective tone. You lean into storytelling with humour, a touch of self-deprecation, and vivid imagery. There’s an easy going yet thoughtful quality to your words that makes it feel like we’re hearing from a trusted friend with great anecdotes and a keen eye for detail”

— ChatGPT

Yes, well, good for the ego, but would that help?

Chat GPT seemed far too nice. Too eager to please. I needed a bit of provocation. Anthropic’s Claude was not to disappoint. A slightly surlier version of chat, Claude was slower with the compliments, but still reluctant to give any bad news.

I’m always polite when using AI, because, well you know, just in case. Maybe manners was the problem?

Since there’s quite a bit of talk around the traps about recruiters and HR people using AI to weed out candidates, it was time to turn the tables. Using a different account I switched roles, this time playing recruiter, and asking for comments on my application - ‘would this person be a good fit, etc?’

I’m not sure my clumsy sleight of hand fooled anyone, but again, ChatGPT, the people pleaser, was telling me what she thought I wanted to hear. Claude was quicker to point out where I - sorry, the candidate - could do better.

But like I said, didn’t get the gig.

See? Bloody AI. Taking away all the jobs.

The résumé. Not AI enhanced

Perfect fit

Waste is everywhere isn’t it?

Take the fashion industry; a major contributor of greenhouse gasses, they literally burn their unsold clothes rather than repurpose them. Fashion then, has more than a bit in common with advertising, where unused product also goes to waste.

And, in the same way not every garment you try on is a good fit, not every idea fits the first client to see it either. Doesn’t mean it has to end up in the bin.

Some ideas - like clothes - need to be tried on for size a few times before they find a forever home.

As luck would have it, I’ve got a few of those to spare. Brand new, never been worn, just no room in the metaphorical wardrobe.

There’s content generation ideas with very long legs, ideal for that thirsty FMCG product. A b2b lead generation game. A global retail media opportunity for an automotive or tourism brand.

Looking for a little something in the ESG space? Why not try the ‘glowing bus’ on for size? The bus, wrapped in a led blanket, gets ‘greener’ as more passengers climb aboard. Would fit a utility company perfectly.

What about a culture change idea to get the troops firing, and get you plenty of earned media to boot? There are two available, in large and extra large. And of course there’s retail ideas in all sizes and colours.

Ready to wear might be sacrilegious to those who will only be seen in couture. But made to measure is not cheap, and never quick.

Advertising is no different - why miss out on looking good when there’s an idea already waiting and ready to go? Time to buy off the rack for a change.

To browse the full collection book a fitting today.

Suits you, sir. Suits you.

Can you make the logo bigger?

Always a tricky one to answer.

Once, when I was working at a large firm, Ron and I had done a rather clever billboard to promote the agency. I can’t remember exactly what was on it, but it had nothing to do with with our work, or even advertising, so maybe it wasn’t that clever at all, but that’s not the point.

Not long after the billboard had been pasted up for all to see, Nelly rushed into our office, informing us in a way that only flustered MD’s can, that we needed to make the agency logo bigger.

‘How so?’ we calmly asked. Apparently, a client drove past out of the blue, and, having seen the billboard, decided that our logo was too small, and got on the phone immediately to graciously share their thoughts, so that the problem could be rectified immediately.

Usually, when being told off, the great one liner escapes me. But not today.

‘Oh really?’ I replied. ‘Well….if the logo was too small, how did he know who to call?’

Case dismissed.

Sometimes there’s a case to make the logo as big as you can. This version of the fernmark we made on Santa Monica Beach was the size of Eden park. But that’s another story entirely