Ok, sometimes Seattle really bugs me, what with the no-really-you-go-first niceness and the pathetic gridlock on addressing the public transportation situation BUT this is something I love about the place: we are about to get a Poet Populist.
I’m still obsessed about this brand strategist who thinks I’m lazy. Why am I dwelling on this? Because I’m not lazy and I feel spited? Because it’s true, I really am lazy? Because a woman said this, perhaps a woman that I want to respect and support, and whom I’d like to respect and support me?
Over XL margaritas, which release the beast within, Bryan says, “Take the bull by the horns. Stop dwelling on this, call her up and go to lunch. Apologize and see what happens.”
Brilliant.
All this obsessing is because I’m feeling vulnerable. I have no Motive. The revenue from the projects that I could have had from them is gone. The week-to-week contact with the people is gone. The physical space is gone. I drive by 5th and Lenora and have no reason to drive around the block four times looking for a meter.
So this big part of my identity is missing.
When a customer base leaves, what happens to the brand? It evolves or dies. I must do the same.
I’m in this weird competitive mind-space about what I do. There’s another writer in town who is always one step ahead of me, doing the large branding projects, working with the right clients, charging more than I do, the golden-child of freelance writing. I call him Piper.
I’m in a meeting the other day about a series of brochures and I inquire as to whether they have brand standards. Of course they do and they were written by him.
He is my Newman. Whenever Newman would do something that goaded Jerry Seinfeld, he’d say, “Newman!”
“Piper!” she says, gritting her teeth.
It was just discovered that the design of a website I’m writing is nearly identical to another website. Same historical content and theme: honoring war veterans. So a redesign is underway. The producer is debating how to inform the client.
With so much information out there and the derivative nature of nearly everything creative, how do you create something truly original?
There’s a design firm in town that I used to work with frequently. I did something to piss off their brand strategist, an intelligent go-getter of a woman, not unlike myself. Rather than telling me what I did wrong, they just stopped working with me. I heard through the grapevine three years later that I “gave up” on the project.
I know that I wasn’t fully present for the project. I had many big personal issues going down. It’s hard to separate personal from professional when big life questions want answers. I could have handled the situation better, and regret my lack of professionalism.
Now this situation is biting back. I want to do more work for this design firm. They’re great at what they do, producing big budget projects for national clients. My renewed focus on branding makes me a good fit for this company. How do I get back in their favor? Will they give me a second chance?
This issue raised two thoughts. One, freelance people often don’t get second chances. Piss off a creative director or brand strategist and it’s hard to get back in the door. Two, women are extra critical of other women. Ever watched a woman stare down another woman, especially if she’s wearing a pair of shoes she covets? Go to any public place, sit on a bench and watch how women watch each other.
I’ve yet to figure out how to handle this.
Just finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I gorged on this book for four days. I feel so lonely now.
“It is my contention that the only way to adapt to the ‘new’ media ecology in an economically successful and, in a normative sense, socially desirable way is to include the former ‘audience’ as fellow narrators.”
—Mark Deuze in his paper, “Towards professional participatory storytelling in journalism and advertising” on First Monday.
“I would like to argue that a future professional identity of media work could only be maintained if it includes a participatory component—such as a notion of storytelling as a collaborative experience. In other words: advertisers and journalists should be trained to think about the stories they tell as co–created with those they once identified (and thus effectively excluded) as audiences, users, consumers or citizens.”
This is an interesting angle. I frequently throw around all of the words Deuze mentions, “audiences, users, consumers or citizens” but I also think of them as co-creators. I interview a lot of people before I ever start writing for a client. It is a very participatory process and he’s right to acknowledge the role of the person we’re trying to attract.
I’ve been working with a leading stock photography company on print and electronic pieces. They are like a bodybuilder. To look at them is inspiring. They’re huge, a global company with serious presence. Yet when they open their mouth, it’s shocking. Their brand voice is the squeaky aftermath of excessive attention to their physicality.
From my outsider perspective, their brand needs to get off the steroids. If this company were to use me as a brand voice consultant, I would start by auditing all of their corporate communications. The result would be a more balanced connection between the corporate body and soul, and clear editorial guidelines that standardize the basic yet still allow their staff writers to be more expressive.
The pitch went well. I felt like we connected about writing and working for customers rather than creativity’s sake. Had a good discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of my portfolio.
The company is egg.
I’m enchanted by their goal to work with socially and environmentally responsible brands, to pick companies that encourage people not to consume more but to consume better.