It took a million years for man’s instincts to develop. It will take millions more for them to even vary. A communicator must be concerned with unchanging man, with his obsessive drive to survive, to be admired, to succeed, to love, to take care of his own.
Bill Bernbach
Among some renowned British and American agencies, account planning has been a valuable tool for developing highly effective, memorable campaigns. Among smaller agencies, account planning is too often understood as doing customer research and evolving a strategy to exploit resulting insights. But account planning is not just researching to learn the customer’s perspective. Planners must try to see the whole picture—not just the customer’s POV, but also the marketer’s business perspective and the agency’s creative viewpoint.
Account planner Jon Steel, author of Truth, Lies and Advertising: The Art of Account Planning, explains this using a navigational technique called triangulation. You can calculate where you are by identifying three landmarks that also appear on your map, aligning the map directionally with the real landmarks, and drawing lines connecting the landmarks. Sometimes, those lines cross at a single point, but more often, they create a small triangle. Transfer this idea to account planning, and that triangle resulting from connecting the customer, the marketer and the agency’s creative insight becomes the sweet spot where you find the best strategies.
The account planner’s job is to gain knowledge (data, behavioral research, social /interpersonal knowledge, etc.), analyze it, and derive insights to be used in developing creative strategies and campaigns. This is not an easy task. Often, it takes multiple focus groups, strategic discussions and much mulling over the data in the shower, while jogging, or as you have your third coffee of the day. Ideas can arrive in an instant burst of insight… or take weeks of kicking around what you know.
Sometimes, the answer is obvious; you knew it, but no one ever pointed it out before because it was taken for granted or masked by other factors deemed more important. More often, the answer must be extracted, or squeezed out from the planner’s collected data and research.
Unknown unknowns
If you break down the account planner’s job responsibility to a single statement, it might be:
Discover what we didn’t know before that will help us reset perceptions and sell product.
Knowledge is explicit; it is what you know. Then there’s implicit knowledge—implied or understood, if not directly expressed; it may be organic to the nature of a situation or thing. But it is the stuff we don’t know we don’t know, that can lead us to a new twist on marketing strategy, a different messaging approach, or an audience not previously recognized and served.
How do we ask the right questions to find out what we don’t know we don’t know? What other tactics come into play when interviewing consumers and seeking insights?
How to ask the right questions
Planners can follow some useful guidelines to help discover the unknown unknowns. Here are suggestions from Jon Steel.
Your subjective POV is valuable. Objectivity is an illusion; human nature rules out pure objectivity. Planners must learn to bring subjectivity into strategic play wherever it seems helpful, by criticizing, guiding and proposing. Don’t ignore hunches and intuitions. Only where it is the planner’s job to simplify or clarify, as in analyzing ideas or strategies, should the planner strive to be objective.
Use organic conversation to find insights. To dig out the most helpful information and data, planners need leeway to experiment and explore. Sometimes direct questions reveal nothing of importance. But letting a conversation develop until the question comes on the table naturally can be hugely revealing. Insights may emerge that the planners and creative team might never have considered.
Assume the outsider’s POV. Planners should aim for detachment. Howard Gossage called this person the “extra-environmental man,” standing just far enough outside the fray to see what others cannot because they’re too close to a project. An outside view lets planners see things invisible to the “natives.” And natives feel compelled to educate the outsider, which may lead to revelations not normally shared.
Think like a child. Contrary to what our educational system teaches (there is only one “right” answer), children up to age six have no constraints on their imaginations; they perceive many possible answers. If you think there is only one answer, you stop thinking after you find it. Peer pressure, social status and risk-aversion also cause people to follow the herd. Planners must think more like children, seeking views of a problem from multiple angles. Even better, guide focus groups to “get in touch with their inner children.” Ask participants to draw, play word games, build picture collages or just imagine explaining a concept to a small child, to get to simpler, more direct insights.
Study how real people use products, in real settings. Proctor & Gamble relies heavily on ethnographic observation for product research. Observe your audience in the environs where brands and consumers naturally meet (computer games in a kid’s bedroom; laundry products in a home laundry or laundromat; fast food research at a take-out chain or family living room). Creatives and planners should put themselves into the audience’s experience. GS&P’s Norwegian Cruise Line “It’s Different Out Here” campaign grew out of sending three creatives and a planner on an actual cruise. Alternatively, have focus group participants perform certain tasks prior to a focus group; the “Got Milk” research team asked participants to go without milk for a week prior to their focus group.
What just didn’t happen? In account planning, it’s important to listen to what’s not said, what the research does not tell you, and even what you can learn from what people are unwilling to talk about. Further, don’t just use your ears—watch for reactions, emotions expressed in body language, degree of attention, posture, and so on. Weigh physical behaviors against what a subject may say. Finally, don’t focus merely on trends; trends come and go, while longer-term conditions have a stronger impact on your audience.
Sometimes, the insight is that there isn’t one. When research tells you the product has no true claim of distinction against competitors, the only distinction may be the creative execution.
The Account Planners’ Holy Trinity:
- Simplicity
- Common Sense
- Creativity
