What others are saying... (continued)
John Dalla Costa, Marketing Magazine, 1995
"While the $52M ad campaign won advertising awards, it had little impact on getting consumers to drink more milk. But the Milk Calendar has [resulted in incremental sales of] about five million litres of milk. Despite a huge level of market success, the calendar has been largely ignored in the advertising business ... and has never won an award."
Keith Rodgers, Toronto advertising executive, on the difference between winning creative awards and getting business results for clients.
"The ad [an award-winning "image" or "stunt" ad with low information content] triggered a brief spike in visits to our website, but failed to lift sales. Almost nobody knew from the ads what we did... [The following year we created ads which] showed what the site sells and promised free overnight delivery. We actually spent ten percent less [on the new ads], and still web visits rose steadily and sales tripled from a year ago."
Robert Bowman, CEO of Cyberian Outpost.com, commenting on his experience with "image" ads that didn't generate bottom-line results, versus informative, educational, persuasive ads that did. ("The big sell is hard for dot-coms", The Ottawa Citizen, January 21, 2000)
"Survival in an economy of such uncertainty requires a passionate capability to exploit ambiguity... The core management competency is therefore ingenuity, not imitation...The most effective strategies are first acts of creation, involving interpretation, synthesis and integration. To repress creativity is to diminish strategy. And to ignore creative practice is to limit the very possibilities of management."
John Dalla Costa, Marketing Magazine, 1997
"The computer has convinced a lot of people they can be designers. It's just another tool, like an X-ACTO knife, and it has limits. Good design comes from good designers, regardless of the tools they use."
James Curl, CEO, RKD Inc. Palo Alto, CA
"One of the best things about everyone having access to desktop publishing and inexpensive printing is that they see how difficult it is to produce really good design and typography and printing. I know a lot of people who have tried, and have come away with a much greater appreciation for professionals."
Wendy Richmond, design and technology guru and futurist, Harvard University, 1996