on reflection

I'm taking some time with the family in France - good for the tan and good to have some time to think (but bad for doing a lot of posts).

All feedback - positive or negative - is good. And the feedback we've been getting last week has been both. In general, the reaction has been that what we said was interesting, but a little "up in the clouds". People seem to be hungering for some more practical examples and steps, some "what do I do with this stuff?" ( Jason's thoughts are a good summary).

To me the best example of someone practicing what we suggest is Google and they do not even use advertising, they use product. They are constantly trying new tools: measuring, learning and adjusting on he way. Their brand is complex - multi-layered with unusual combinations of experiences - without feeling like the old kind of portal that was very static. It's brand has larger social belief structure as well: don;t be evil (although I would argue that they have not exploited this belief on a social dimension).

Those who saw Penny Price from Google at the AAAA Planning conference last week will hopefully have seen that a lot of what he said fits with what Gareth and I were saying.

My last (I promise) I thought on all this is that I being to theoretical was slightly the point of all this. Part of what we were saying is that not enough people are doing the harder stuff, thinking about models that govern what we think. We want to provoke a discussion about it that leads to practical steps because we certainly don't think we have all the answers.