The crazy days, and all the graze – By @MalouStitz
By Malou Stitz
The crazy days, and all the graze
The title is formed of words from my favorite song, ‘Young and Beautiful’ by Lana Del Ray. This song makes me cry, laugh and think, and if it were an advert, it would be the best advert in the world!.. At least it would be for me. Though it’s unlikely it would be for everyone in this world. And thats fine, because it shouldn’t. Yesterday we had a masterclass on exactly this; “Everyone is not your audience”
An advert – or a campaign – can not and should not talk to everybody. And this is true. What may affect you, could be completely irrelevant for someone else. (insert funny example yourself of what elderly people vs. young people give a damn about)
Phew I’m not trying to solve the world’s problems, I just have to create ads which solve one type of person’s problem at a time.
And this realisation makes is a lot more straight forward to create ads with meaning.
- Identify – Narrow down your target audience,
- Examine – Really look into the habits of your audience.
- Interrogate – Get to know them. Examine every journey they take during a day; what they like, don’t enjoy, believe in, eat, drink, work as etc.
Simply ASK QUESTIONS all the time.
Another great mind said that what makes a great ad is when you get the audience to cry, laugh or think – preferably all three. My favourite song gives me all of the above, which makes it a 10 out of 10 to me.
You see, at SCA e v e r y t h i n g is rated on a scale from 1-10. Therefore I’ve made my own little rating of this mad place.
1. My lowest score goes to a factor that I can’t do anything about. Time. Time is sort of your enemy here (one you want to keep close). Your idea of deadlines will go from “Ah. We still have time” to “deadline is in 3 seconds” in 3 seconds! Days at SCA just fly by, which is a by product of business. But I kind of don’t want them to.
2. My second least favorite thing is stress. The amount of stress is more than just stress. Does that make sense? No, ok
Workload = stress
Getting ideas = stress
Throwing them away = stress
Finding better ones = stress
Bad conscience = stress Brain = stress Eating = stress Body = stress Limits = stress
And the rumors that we haven’t seen the top of the iceberg yet = Yes, stress
But we’re penguins. And there’s something about this clip that reminds me THAT WE WILL OVERCOME
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?
3. Three goes to the mood swings you’ll have. For this: I’m sorry.
4. Fourth place goes to faith/hope. Even though the first 3 on my list may sound a bit scary and terrifying, they’re also things to embrace. Cause it gives you hope and faith. We hear over and over from previous intakes, that we’re all going to make it. We will all survive and do great. We are students of SCA, after all.
5. Which leads me to my next point. Number five. The middle one. The nut to the bolt, the hinge, the avocado stone, the whole reason why we are here…. To create stuff. You, human, create yourself.
6. Number six is understanding. The more we understand, the better results. The more we understand our creative techniques the more easier they seem to us. The more we understand our audiences the better we are at speaking directly to them.
7, Purpose. Finding purpose in what you do is one of the best feelings I can imagine. I’ve found my purpose by coming to SCA. I’m sometimes so full of excitement, when for example listening to masterclasses or just pep talks, by the inspiration they bring me, the thought of bringing purpose to others, that I can barely sit still. I just want to get up of my chair and create value and purpose. A word you hear a lot at SCA.
8. Having this said. I couldn’t get so excited to the point of exploding if it wasn’t for fantastic mentors. Listening to some of the most inspiring, energetic, driven and passionate mentors that invest their time to SCA daily. I feel so lucky and privileged to have these masterminds in my everyday life.
9. The no. 9 medal goes to “Push yourself”. Being surrounded by all these great, fantastic people, all the times you fail, all the times you get back up, just to be pushed off the edge again. The many times you stumble, all the pretty (by pretty I mean fucking ugly) babies* you’re killing/having killed every day. All the defeats you face. All the great work. All the mistakes: all of it makes you push yourself. And that is such a.. a… ‘mmm’ feeling.
(*ideas that should never grow old enough to speak.)
10, Finally we’ve reached the top of the list, the place we all want to stay forever, we have reached FUN.
Learning about so many things we didn’t know we needed to know, so many insights and human truths that shock and surprise and delight. We play every day. Not only in school. But also outside school. On Sundays. On bank holidays. When we do our groceries, when we’re waiting for a bus, when we’re brushing our teeth, we find FUN.
Because opportunities are now here, everywhere.
SO that’s my top ten SCA, what are yours?