Transcription
What was that, uh, parable of three men getting onto an airplane?
>> And it's a joke. It's an old advertising joke, which is: you have a copywriter, an art director, and an accountman, okay, who are boarding a plane to present work to a client. And they open the overhead locker, and somewhat implausibly, a genie gets out and says, "I've been trapped in that overhead locker for years. To thank you all for releasing me, I'll give you each a wish, so you can choose anything you want."
And they go to the art director, who says, "I want, um, I'd like Picasso's life. The locations, the eye, the artistry, [music] probably the women folk, the romantic life. That's what I really want." And whoosh, the art director disappears.
And then the genie turns to the copywriter, who goes, "It's got to be Hemingway." He enumerates a whole load of reasons why he'd like to be able to write and live like Hemingway. And whoosh, disappears.
And then the genie turns to the account man and says, "What about your wish?"
"I want those two guys back. I've got an important meeting in two and a half hours."
There is that element, undoubtedly, in all kinds of areas. What's urgent crowds out what's important in advertising? Too much money is spent on short-term performance advertising and too little is spent on long-term brand building. And that's not because it's necessarily more valuable. It's because it delivers measurable results faster.