How do we break the monotony of Advertising Country? MARKETING SECRETS

The honest and entertaining handbook of McCann Erickson Budapest makes the process of creating advertisements more human.

Tibor Kaszás's 2001 book is essentially a kind of creative talking book. The author has collected the most characteristic basic situations and sources of conflict in agency life: the tendering process, the creation of creative and text plans, presentations, submission deadlines, or even corporate gifting, and provides tips on how to perfectly ruin all of these.

„How to ensure that gifting backfires?”

Suggestion 11: Engrave the name of the managing director on the 11 forint 30 fillér plastic ballpoint pen and send it to him.

The „reverse stance” advice makes the individual situations much more entertaining than if they were just giving advice or solely beneficial guidance for specific situations. This is a wise, humorous, and honest book that radiates the often painful professional experience gained along the way.

„How to ensure that your business letter is thrown in the trash without being read?"

Suggestion 1: The most important thing is that the salutation should always be Dear Madam/Sir! This way, you will please every hermaphrodite recipient, and even more: you remind all your partners that they could have been born as intersex.”

The 26 topics covered in the book are still relevant today, discussing evergreen themes while providing insight into the often strained, overdriven, and far from perfect world of agency life. A place where just as flesh-and-blood people work as on the client side. Where making mistakes is not only inevitable but also necessary, as errors and misjudgments are an integral part of successful tenders, good text plans, or successful campaigns. In other words: behind every successful assignment lies numerous flawed text plans, unawarded assignments, and poorly sent business letters.

The greatest advantage of the little book is that the tips can also benefit the client side. There are many great recommendations on how to make life miserable for your agency, how to drive a creative crazy, or effectively ruin the texts written by a copywriter.

Of course, there are also many great tips for tenderers:

„Do not announce a winner, but try to buy the parts you like best from all twelve materials and have them assembled with a thirteenth agency.”

In a perfect world, every agency would create such a talking book based on its own flesh-and-blood experiences, which could then be given as a corporate gift to its clients. There is certainly no shortage of raw material („case studies” and stories) on the agency side, but the question is much more about what the client does when they recognize themselves. (This, of course, assumes that in a perfect world there is at least one colleague on the client side who actually reads it...)

However, it would indeed be important for marketing and communication departments, and decision-makers to gain insight and understand how an agency struggles in the sea of incomplete briefs, inaccurate target group definitions, and indecisive managers, and how the joint work could be made more effective, successful, and ultimately more enjoyable.