Welcome | Jerry Fields

We are all emotional creatures

On average, we smile fifty times a day. Laugh, seventeen times. Become
annoyed, three. Introspective, twelve. And if we're in our teens, we fall
beyond-reason in love somewhere between once a week and once a day.

What matters then, in creating a brand that people will wrap their arms
around, is touching the right emotion.

A business card may read, "Writer," "Creative Director," or "UX Minister,"
but each of us, fundamentally, has the same job—to connect with people
as one emotional creature to another.

Medium Emotional Trigger

View the work by:

An insight makes us stop, think, and "Ah-ha." An
"Ah-ha" that's entertaining delights. Delighted people
like, remember, and talk about you.

Lemons to lemonade for the Illinois Film Office.

Most hiking boots fight over the same ground. They claim they'll take you to a place
where spirits are renewed. Nice as that sounds, serious hikers want serious footwear.

A brand that owns the "serious hiker" high ground is admired by everyone. An oldline
name needed to leverage its real-world credentials and modernize its image.

NICORETTE
"Always"

White papers and brochures for External IT guide CEOs and CTOs on a cloud computing
purchase process journey. Logic, with a confident wit, speaks to their competitive drive.

FOSTER'S
"Marriage Councillor"

FOSTER'S
"Locksmith"

FOSTER'S
"Hopless Romantic"

FOSTER'S
"Stylist"

Science in the service of avarice, a watch that picks lottery numbers at the push of a button.

As premiums go up, and coverage declines, how do you make people feel that you're on
their side? You make yourself a likable, healthy-living resource.

Ireland had been a perennial number three or four on people's list of "Next Places to Visit." Moving it up the ranks required bringing it to life with a distinctly Irish personality.

The right 25% of a Business Milestones Timeline. One of two wall-size office murals. The
message to staff and prospective clients: External IT exists to help companies make history.

My friends at Brooklyn Outfitters know a lot about wilderness survival. T-shirts tell this
story in a humorously misguided way.

Create the right attitude and you stir the right emotion. Offbeat humor, almost
jazz-like in its left-field origination, makes a very cool music house cooler still.

JAGUAR
"Minivan"

This outdoor board, placed in front of MOMA New York, didn't make their management terribly happy, a point they made via phone call to our client, the Guggenheim.

As Guggenheim ticket sales were rather brisk, there was a limit to how much sympathy our clients could feign.

Osmocote is a premier plant food. Scotts needed
to convey this distinction while tonally appealing to passionate, and rather competitive, gardeners.

A dozen "type as art" lines from the newly launched External IT website were printed on mugs.
A morning shot of the new corporate confidence to go with everyone's Columbian Roast.

Website. Attitude: ambitious, skewing masculine, upscale. A digital
expression of the early adaptor, cloud desktop, SMB founder mindset.

I was a hero at NISSAN. At Porsche, not so much. They actually contacted Lee Clow
and asked that we pull the print run.

(Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

Observation: Food is not only seasonal but in places like L.A. and N.Y. it goes in and out of style the same as fashion. A restaurant poster campaign. (Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

(Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

OUR APPETITE FOR TRENDS Garden variety shirt. Pants available in almond and pecan. Made from 100% raw materials.

An Indian cosmetics company whose products are particularly good for your skin.

An app created for the OS33 cloud platform. Folders swing when pushed.
Files flutter like paper in a breeze when swiped. In development.

Radio Oxi-gen, in Istanbul, plays an eclectic mix of modern music. The client requested a campaign that would set the Twittersphere atwitter.

"Mixed up music for mixed up times" provided a sufficient challenge to fundamentalists that station management received death threats. The campaign gave new meaning to the phrase "Top 40s, with a bullet." Two months after the ads went up they came back down.

A modern twist for a "White Shoe" law firm. The job offer acceptance rate
jumped 57%. Webby and Interactive Media Awards followed. Click to view.

Up Down

Science in the service of avarice, a watch that picks lottery numbers at the push of a button.

This outdoor board, placed in front of MOMA New York, didn't make their management terribly happy, a point they made via phone call to our client, the Guggenheim.

As Guggenheim ticket sales were rather brisk, there was a limit to how much sympathy our clients could feign.

Osmocote is a premier plant food. Scotts needed
to convey this distinction while tonally appealing to passionate, and rather competitive, gardeners.

Create the right attitude and you stir the right emotion. Offbeat humor, almost
jazz-like in its left-field origination, makes a very cool music house cooler still.

An insight makes us stop, think, and "Ah-ha." An
"Ah-ha" that's entertaining delights. Delighted people
like, remember, and talk about you.

Lemons to lemonade for the Illinois Film Office.

Ireland had been a perennial number three or four on people's list of "Next Places to Visit." Moving it up the ranks required bringing it to life with a distinctly Irish personality.

An Indian cosmetics company whose products are particularly good for your skin.

As premiums go up, and coverage declines, how do you make people feel that you're on
their side? You make yourself a likable, healthy-living resource.

A brand that owns the "serious hiker" high ground is admired by everyone. An oldline
name needed to leverage its real-world credentials and modernize its image.

(Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

Radio Oxi-gen, in Istanbul, plays an eclectic mix of modern music. The client requested a campaign that would set the Twittersphere atwitter.

I was a hero at NISSAN. At Porsche, not so much. They actually contacted Lee Clow
and asked that we pull the print run.

L.A. Weekly decided to run a story on Chiat. Not knowing how they would brand us,
we hedged our bets and ran an ad to say a few words on our own behalf.

White papers and brochures for External IT guide CEOs and CTOs on a cloud computing
purchase process journey. Logic, with a confident wit, speaks to their competitive drive.

(Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

OUR APPETITE FOR TRENDS Garden variety shirt. Pants available in almond and pecan. Made from 100% raw materials.

Observation: Food is not only seasonal but in places like L.A. and N.Y. it goes in and out of style the same as fashion. A restaurant poster campaign. (Mouse over or click to enlarge.)

A modern twist for a "White Shoe" law firm. The job offer acceptance rate
jumped 57%. Webby and Interactive Media Awards followed. Click to view.

An app created for the OS33 cloud platform. Folders swing when pushed.
Files flutter like paper in a breeze when swiped. In development.

A rebrand, including website, for OS33. More polished, confident, and
smartly self-aware than typical tech B to B brand personalities.

Website. Attitude: ambitious, skewing masculine, upscale. A digital
expression of the early adaptor, cloud desktop, SMB founder mindset.

External IT newsletter. Written in a clever-confident voice to convey
leadership, and prompt people to actually read it. Click to view.

WE ALL HAVE DIGITAL PROJECTS THAT CLIENTS HAVE TRAGICALLY
FAILED TO BUY. HERE ARE A FEW OF MINE:

HONDA
Gaming for Discounts

An idea presented to Rubin Postaer for Honda. People shopping for a new car log on, play a game, receive a score. Their score then corresponds to a particular percentage discount on accessories
for their new car.

Each game concept reflects the personality of specific models. For example, the Odyssey van: Living
a Balanced Life. Insight Hybrid: Making the World a Better Place. S2000 sports car: Revenge.

Within each game there is an action that unlocks a "Cheats Vault." There, players learn how to
maximize their score. Consistent with gaming psychology, in discovering the Cheats Vault they're
made to feel intelligent, and that their deal from Honda will be especially good.

They can choose to have their score posted on the website, along with video clips of their best and
worst moves, and share both on social.

MILLER LITE
“What’s keeping you?”

An integrated campaign presented to Miller: TV, mobile, ambient.

Strategic background: A majority of beer is consumed by men 18 to 30. They are aware that after a few light beers the flavor is less apparent. The point of the "What's keeping you?" campaign is that no matter how long it takes you to get to the party, it will still be going strong as Miller Lite is brewed so that the flavor doesn't quickly disappear.

App: When someone is running late, you send them a "what's keeping you?" text via the app. Each text is accompanied by an amusing photo or illustration. Whomever is tardy can answer, "What's keeping me," with a funny photo response, and/or text. Both people can choose from a photo file, or upload their own.

TV: The VO says, in part, "He's not worried because he knows that Miller Lite is brewed
an extra step, for a flavor that doesn't quit, so the party will still be going strong....What's keeping you."

In the spots, people are being delayed from getting to the party as a result of things like being chased by a cruise missile.

Ambient: We would stage things such as a window washer in Times Square hanging from his platform. Video of the event would go online with an opening title reading, “He’s/She’s not worried.” End title: “What’s keeping you?”

Fan Created: Miller would host a "What's Keeping You" page where fans post illustrations, snaps or videos showing what’s keeping them. App users could their favorites to their app. for more "What's keeping you?" options. The best/craziest photos, via fan voting each week, would earn the winners adventures: swimming with sharks, a bobsled run, paragliding, working with a bee keeper, window washing 20 stories up, white water rafting, and so on.

DETROIT TIGERS
Ringtone Fan Solidarity

My sister and I own the song “Go Get ‘em, Tigers!” It’s played at Comerica Park after each win. The idea is for a cellular carrier to offer a free ringtone version of the song to new and current Michigan customers.

On the carrier’s website, fans would list which Tiger games they’re attending. They would then receive a call five minutes before the game. This ringtone legion would then stand from their seats and raise their phones skyward in a several thousand ringtone chorus of “Go Get ‘em, Tigers!”

Fans not at the game could also sign up for the call, hold up their phones, and show their support from barbecues, bars, parties. Everyone could post videos of their musical solidarity moments on the carrier’s website. A search-by-location option would let them see videos from Tiger fans around the world. They could naturally share their photos, with comments, on social sites as well. The app would have the same posting/sharing capabilities.

REI

Cross-Selling Retail Meets Social Media and Elves

A proposal to REI designed to strengthen a sale, the brand personality, and top-of-mind via social.

For REI I proposed placing cards, with entertaining outdoor stories, on/in store items. These would direct people to other products. For example, a person tries on a pair of pants, reaches in a pocket, and finds a card reading:

Last night a group of elves camped in this pocket. They stayed up until the sun came around, dancing by the light of a tiny Goal Zero solar powered lamp. A word of caution. If you prefer that elves do not dance in your pockets, keeping you awake, we suggest that you purchase our human-sized solar gear. The full-size Goal Zero products have buttons that are too large for elf-size hands to operate.

Flip Side: Keep this card and follow this map on a short hike across the store. It will lead you to all of our Goal Zero solar products. Snap a picture of yourself camping with elves at our National Parks photo campground (next to Goal Zero), post it on Instagram or Facebook, and get 10% off at checkout. We'll additionally donate 5% to the National Park Service.

BELL HELMETS "If you're going to be stupid be smart"

In several states motorcycle riders are not required by law to wear helmets. It is in the best interest of riders, and Bell Helmets, to point out the folly of not leaving your head exposed.

In states where helmets are required, many people opt to wear inexpensive, less effective brands. It's in the rider's best interest to wear the best helmet they can buy, and Bell's best interest to explain the need.

The campaign I wrote for them was "If you're going to be stupid be smart." Motorcycle riders often push their luck, even to the point of doing wheelies on a highway, or building ramps and jumping over cars. Each ad would show a rider in the process of doing something stupid.

The ambient/interactive component is a series of sculptures, placed across the country, made from crashed motorcycle components. The sculptures would function as kiosks. People enter, sit, and watch a video about the crashes that led to the components used in the sculpture.

Visitors can record their own crash stories, then upload them to a crash film archive website.

NEWFOUNDLAND "Ship Horns"

The people of St. John’s, Newfoundland are friendly and funny. Even their homes are painted bright colors. Newfoundland Tourism was looking for a way to spotlight the colorful character of the city. Their primary summer audience is affluent. Couples in their 50s.

I proposed a television series and website entitled “Colorful Cultures and their Music.” The first show would feature an opening concert composed by John Williams. (John Williams of Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Schindler’s list soundtrack fame. He also was the conductor of The Boston Pops Symphony for many years.)

The symphony would have three video feeds: the Boston Pops orchestra, ships in Boston Harbor blowing their horns, orchestrated as part of his symphony, and St. John’s, Newfoundland harbor where ship horns joined the symphony.

For six months of the year on Wednesdays, St. John’s ships perform an orchestrated, semi-melodic, horn-honking cacophony bon voyage to the departing cruise liners. Mr. Williams also wrote his first symphony while in the military, stationed in St. Johns. We would have an accompanying Colorful Cultures and their Music website, Instagram account, Facebook page.

FOSTER'S
"Stylist"

FOSTER'S
"Hopless Romantic"

NISSAN
"Relativity"

CHICAGO TRIBUNE
"Manganese"

FOSTER'S
"Marriage Councillor"

FOSTER'S
"Locksmith"

JAGUAR
"Minivan"

NICORETTE
"Always"

A FEW TRAGICALLY UNAIRED COMMERCIALS

BARNEYS
"Walk,Walk"

Music: Quirky. Rubbery.

Visuals: A man is walking down the sidewalk. He looks happy, in a goofy, Mr. Bean sort of way. His walk is amusing, a bit rubbery. He comes to a cross walk. Instead of stopping, waiting for the light to change, he continues walking in a small circle.

The light changes and he crosses the street. As he passes a sign post on the other side, he grabs it, prompting him to walk in circles around it. Each time he faces the street he puts up his arm to hail a cab. After a couple whirls, a cab pulls up.

He gets in, closes the door, and as the cab drives away we see his feet walk up the side of the taxi window and then across the back window.

Title Card: Barneys. Shoes so comfortable, your feet won’t want to stop. © J. Fields

SONY "Pants"

A store similar to GAP. A worker is folding pants and neatly placing them into the shelf cubicles. Cut to another worker switching on the Sony GTK-XB7. The music kicks in big time, with super strong bass.

We watch the first worker (dissolves, jump cuts), work his way down the wall of cubicles, filling them with his folded pants. He finishes, takes a deep breath, then turns to see his work.

We cut to see his perspective. The wall is vibrating to the music and half of the pants have fallen out on the floor. Several other pairs are vibrating out of their cubicles and falling.

He's slightly shocked. Then shrugs. He's into the music, so he just walks back down and begins refolding.

Supers: BOTTOM ON TOP OF BOTTOM / GTK-XB7 / SONY / JOY, INC. (c) J. Fields

FLOWER GROWER’S ASSOCIATION
"Joy of Love"

Visuals:   Shots of men and women delighting in each other’s company, in romantic settings.
Intercut are shots of men, alone, glum.

VO:   The most common theme in poetry is the joy of love. The second most common theme is
heartache. Guess which poets sent flowers.

Visuals:   White letters fall like flower petals onto a red backdrop, spelling the theme line.

Title Card:   There’s nothing on earth like flowers.      © J. Fields

CRUNCH
“Biscotti”

Visuals:   A naïve, friendly, twenty-five-year-old is passing out Crunch health club flyers on
a busy street in SOHO. A high-strung woman, carrying groceries, walks past him. He speeds up and tries to hand her a flyer and sell her on Crunch. The girl goes off on him, talking a mile-a-minute, letting out her frustrations. He’s taken aback.

Crunch Flyerboy:   “Excuse me. Can I interest you in Crunch, the friendly health club?”

Neurotic Woman:   “I mean, if I use hair spray, I’ll knock a hole in the ozone layer. If I eat a little desert, I have to run three more miles. If I wear anything Norma Kamali or DKNYish, I'm trying to construct self-esteem out of matching separates. And what about a career? If I focus on that I’ll wake up at 35 dancing on a table at some office party desperately trying to recapture the fun I should be having right now. (pause) “Want a biscotti?”

Super: Crunch Fitness. No judgments. © J. Fields

JOHNSON & JOHNSON
“Hope”

Visuals: Greenwich Village. A charming neighborhood. Shop keeps are opening up. As a florist is setting out flower boxes in front of her store she stops, turns her head, and listens. A harmonica can be heard. She then speaks with the bookseller, next door.

Florist: “You hear that?”

Bookseller: “What?”

Florist: “Is that…Michael?”

Bookseller: “Our Michael? Can’t be.”

VO: Did you ever wonder what hope sounds like? What freedom sounds like? What contentment sounds like?

Visuals: Cut to a young man, suitcase in hand, climbing the stairs to his apartment. We cut to him inside exploring his belongings, lost in remembrance. He touches, books, photos, and so on.

VO: With each passing day, more and more people are finding out. Witnessing something close to
a minor miracle. Where once people with schizophrenia were confined to a hospital, many are now finding their way back home. Back to productive lives with the help of a prescription medicine from Johnson & Johnson.

Visuals: We see Michael now in his back yard playing his harmonica.

VO: Did you ever wonder what happiness sounds like?

TITLE CARD: Johnson & Johnson Take good care of yourself. © J. Fields

A dozen "type as art" lines from the newly launched External IT website were printed on mugs.
A morning shot of new corporate confidence to go with everyone's Columbian Roast.

A dozen "type as art" lines from the newly launched External IT website were printed on mugs.
A morning shot of the new corporate confidence to go with everyone's Columbian Roast.

A reminder to prospective clients and staff that External IT is in the business
of serving real people, in the real world. We're not just introspective tech geeks.

Champagne, given to clients their first week in the cloud,
underscores the higher-end External IT brand image while dialing
down their immediate, post-migration anxiety. The card reads:

Welcome to Champagne Week, your first week with the world’s
most fully-featured, ready-to-roll cloud platform.

We chose Veuve Clicquot as our official drink as Veuve was the
first modern Champagne, incorporating advancements in the
Method Champenoise. Since we are very much about the modern
way of advancing the competitive stance of business, the pairing
seemed fitting. We also happen to like the bubbles.

Here is to many more celebratory occasions, and a very long,
rewarding relationship here in the cloud.

All the best.

Your friends at External IT

The right 25% of a Business Milestones Timeline. One of two wall-size office murals. The
message to staff and prospective clients: External IT exists to help companies make history.

My friends at Brooklyn Outfitters know a lot about wilderness survival. T-shirts tell this
story in a humorously misguided way.

Up Down

FOR ITS 10TH BIRTHDAY, A COMPANY GETS A PERSONALITY

The day I put on the Chief Creative Officer hat for External IT, a cloud desktop hosting company,
their growth rate was steady, but shy of exciting. It didn't help that the national economy was
busying itself with going nowhere.

Happily, after a comprehensive rebrand (strategy, advertising, website, videos, brochures, tagline,
logo, white papers, pitch proposal) there were smiles all around. The close rate tripled, and new
clients were over twice as large, on average.

What follows are a few items from two brand reinventions, External IT and sister software firm
OS33. Given the budget, I handled all writing while overseeing design and production teams.
A personal "thank you" to Design Director Karolina Pietrynczak, and to External IT VP/Marketing
and Sales, Ken Garber, who helped me to see into client brains.

Website. Attitude: ambitious, skewing masculine, upscale. A digital
expression of the early adaptor, cloud desktop, SMB founder mindset.

White papers and brochures helped me to shepherd CEOs and CTOs along their purchase
process cloud computing journey. Logic plus numbers plus wit equals SMB catnip.

You can't beat face-to-face selling. I came close with brochures for External IT. An excerpt
from one that fosters a personal connection by pitching a client at an imagined barbecue.

External IT newsletter. Written in a clever-confident voice to convey
leadership, and prompt people to actually read it. Click to view.

A dozen "type as art" lines from the newly launched External IT website were printed on mugs.
A morning shot of new corporate confidence to go with everyone's Columbian Roast.

A reminder to prospective clients and staff that External IT is in the business
of serving real people, in the real world. We're not just introspective tech geeks.

The right 25% of a Business Milestones Timeline. One of two wall-size office murals. The
message to staff and prospective clients: External IT exists to help companies make history.

Champagne for newly cloud-migrated clients. The card reads:

Welcome to Champagne Week, your first week with the world’s
most fully-featured, ready-to-roll cloud platform.

We chose Veuve Clicquot as our official drink as Veuve was the
first modern Champagne, incorporating advancements in the
Method Champenoise. Since we are very much about the modern
way of advancing the competitive stance of business, the pairing
seemed fitting. We also happen to like the bubbles.

Here is to many more celebratory occasions, and a very long,
rewarding relationship here in the cloud.

All the best.
Your friends at External IT

A rebrand, including website, for sister comany OS33. More polished,
confident, and smartly self-aware than anyone else in the category.

Irrefutable logic in support of using the OS33 cloud platform instead of the long-in-the-tooth industry
standard, Hosted Desktop.

An app created for the OS33 cloud platform. Folders swing when pushed.
Files flutter like paper in a breeze when swiped. In development.

Up Down

NO ONE FINDS YOUR PRODUCT AS INHERENTLY INTERESTING AS YOU DO

Sad, but true, but then it stands to reason. If someone builds their career around a particular product or service, say "The Wonder Flange," odds are they're much more interested in flanges than someone whose career is "Jiffy Perfume." Marketing, therefore, must create an attractive brand personality above and beyond what the product is as it rolls off the assembly line.

TO BE GOOD IS TO FAIL

Nearly every moment of our lives we live in a marketing-message swarm. In response, we emotionally swat away the onslaught. If your strategic insight is merely good, that's not enough. If your insight is smart, but expressed in tepid fashion, you still may fail. Plain old "good" lives precariously close to "meh," and "meh," is the same as never having existed.

NO ONE TURNS ON A TELEVISION TO WATCH THE ADVERTISEMENTS

Advertising interrupts an otherwise entertaining moment. If you want to be remembered and liked, if you merely don't want to be resented, you need to entertain. You can be profound, comedic, heartfelt, shocking, but one way or another you must reward people for their time.

SUPERIOR PRODUCTION VALUES PAY FOR THEMSELVES

You don't dress shabbily. You don't neglect your grooming. Neither should your brand. Your production values have a tremendous impact. If the price of creating appropriately stylish messaging is a slight drop in exposures, it's money well spent. Or, as Hal Riney once said, "Better a sharper nail than a bigger hammer."

"HOW DO YOU FEEL?" REVEALS MORE THAN, "WHAT DO YOU THINK?"

Virtually every decision in life has more to do with emotion than logic. Even if you're compelled to refute this statement, what compels you is an emotion. In a standard research setting, people typically reveal little more than what they think about your company. However, what they feel about it is vastly more useful. If you seriously want to unearth the truth, talk to people where they're most relaxed, at home, in a bar, at the corner diner--and do it one-on-one.

A STORYBOARD IS NOT THE SAME THING AS A PRODUCED COMMERCIAL

Doodles on cardboard can tell a consumer exactly what we plan to say, but they can't convey the impact a finished video will have. At best, research can only tell us if our words and pictures are headed in the right direction. We could draw a close likeness of you, then expound on your many virtues, but the result will pale compared to meeting the real McCoy.

BRAINS APPRECIATE A CHALLENGE

When you spoon-feed people your message, they emotionally spit it back up. When you engage their minds, they become emotionally involved. Challenge or suprise them enough, and you flip the dopamine switch. Prompting thought is not unlike leading someone to the end of a diving board, but allowing them the pleasure of the jump rather than jumping for them. Imagine an action adventure film or murder mystery that left nothing to the imagination. Each would bomb.

THE ENTIRE ADVERTISEMENT SHOULD BE A LOGO

If you have to make a logo extra large, just to ensure that people know the ad is from your company, it isn't much of an ad. Everything about an advertisement should convey your brand personality. As you go through your day you don't carry a sign proclaiming, "I'm Bill." Why? Everything about you, taken together, makes a more emotionally engaging statement.

WHEN MAKING FRIENDS IT HELPS IF YOU DON'T TALK DOWN TO THEM

The average Joe may not be able to quote Tolstoy but he or she was smart enough to install the wiring in your house, solve your city's crimes, even repair the jet engines that fly you away on vacation. One in a thousand commercials, if that, is too intelligent for regular folks to follow. Talking down to people does nothing to make them love you. As David Ogilvy once said (in a more male-centric time), "The consumer is not stupid. She is my wife."

BE A BACK PORCH LAMP

Attract people the same way that a lamp attracts a moth, through radiance. If you try too hard, you won't have a confident voice. If you come across as chasing, they’ll instinctively move away. Even a moth will flee from a lamp if you pick up the lamp and run after him.

IF AN INTERACTION ISN'T POSITIVE, IT'S NEGATIVE

We look forward to seeing people who smile. We look forward to seeing people who laugh. We look forward to seeing people who bring us insights. If you fail to create a positive, memorable, emotional bond, even the world's biggest media buy will fail to make you popular. In fact, with every dollar you spend you'll be driving people away.

PEOPLE LIKE TO PERSONIFY BRANDS

Even if you address an emotional need, stand for something that matters, have a winning style and confident attitude, people usually want more. They want to talk back to a brand. They want to shape its direction. They want to connect with other users as part of a brand family. Indulge these desires and you’ll not only build a business, you'll created a community. And maybe, if you're really good, you'll found a movement.

NEW VS. GREAT

"Great" rings the bell every time, provided it's original enough to have some integrity. But
"New" will usually outsell "Great" provided that "New" is relevant, understood, and it doesn't require time for people to learn to love it. The music business has often seen an original artist fall short, wheras the next person with a similar sound walks away with a hit.

SOMETIMES PERSONALITY WINS, SOMETIMES IT'S TRUST THAT MATTERS MORE, BUT THEY'RE BOTH IN PLAY

The same as with people. With brands, the deciding factor is usually visibility. Jeans are visible so they need an attitude. Mouthwash isn't. What it needs is credibility. In the end, however, even mouthwash benefits from having an emotionally relevant brand personality.

WILL IT MAKE THE WORK BETTER?

A lot of issues can be resolved by simply asking this question. It won't clear away the weeds surrounding every problem, but a surprising number of them.

THE ONLY REAL RULE IS THERE ARE NO RULES

True, most marketing creative elements are similarly structured, but styles change over time. Many of the most successful campaigns have departed from the prevailing norms. If everyone were afraid to depart from convention we'd still be waiting for blues, bluegrass, cubism, pop art, rock 'n' roll, deconstruction, and musicals, just to point to the very tip of our cultural iceberg.

WE WIN AS A BRAIN COLONY COLLECTIVE, WE LOSE AS A BRAIN COLONY COLLECTIVE

Yes, "Search the parks in all your cities, you'll find no statues to committees." (Again, D.O.) Rarely is group-think the catalyst for originality or greatness, but none of us are genius at everything.

This means that in order to succeed we have to recognize our respective responsibilities and talents, and then find opportunities to work together. In so doing our brains team to accomplish things otherwise impossible, not unlike the combined power of ants in a colony. A collective brain is hard to beat. If we're hard to beat we're also probably having fun.

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cell: 212 518 3747e: jmfnyc@gmail.com

General Backstory

I've been fortunate to have worked at some of the more creatively distinguished advertising agencies, on staff and freelance, winning awards across all mediums. Along the way I've guest lectured at SVA, Michigan State, and North Carolina State universities, written for Communication Arts, been honored to judge half a dozen shows and serve as CCO for an innovative DaaS company.

Backstory Details

2013 through today

Writing, creative directing, strategic development. I've identified new segments and product concepts for the sports and nutraceutical markets. Created a global brand concept designed to advance women's equality, spanning multiple industries. Communications Strategy development work for iTrek Israel and Food for Thought. I worked in conjunction with Michigan State University to develop an integrated marketing platform. Penned campaigns for Standard & Poors, Newfoundland and Labrador tourism, the College of the North Atlantic, GE Healthcare Life Sciences, Singapore Business Development, and a summer-long email campaign for ad:tech NYC.

2010 – 2013 CHIEF CREATIVE OFFICER, EXTERNAL IT

Ran the research and wrote the communications strategy. Creative directed a new identity program. Wrote and creative directed print ads, brochures, white papers, newsletter, press releases, search ads, landing pages, websites, trade show displays, pitch proposal. (inhale) Directed client testimonial and trade show videos. Teamed with an interior designer to internally highlight the company values, while helping to close sales. Created integrated marketing campaign concepts. Creative directed UX, UI for OS33 app and website, along with a new OS33 identity. Worked with CEO and CTO on innovative end-user, cloud desktop concept.

Results: In just the first six months of Brand Reinvention the close rate tripled among qualified leads. New clients were, on average, over twice as large as those we were already serving.

1995 - 2010 FREELANCE ADVERTISING WRITER / Projects CD

Accounts [ abbreviated list ]

apple, bermuda, changingthepresent.org, crunch fitness, foster's beer, hershey's, ibm, intel, ireland tourism, jaguar, miller lite, perrier jouet, radio oxi-gen, saab, samsung, schroeder's soloman smith barney, scotts, sony, sundari, wolverine

AGENCY STAFF and Contract POSITIONS

ad:tech, arnold, ath, changingthepresent.org, ddb, doner, doremus, east house, food for thought, havas, jwt, mccann, tbwa, mckinney, merkley, ogilvy, radio oxi-gen, riney, shearman & sterling, sundari, y&r

AWARDS

communication arts, chicago film festival, clios, interactive media awards, effies, one show, webby awards

Design: Karolina Pietrynczak Development: Island@Onedotover

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