Blog – Page 53 – Drayton Bird Associates

“Skidding about helplessly on the slippery surface of irrelevant creative brilliance” – David Ogilvy

A few weeks ago I was invited to a grand dinner in New York to mark the centenary of David Ogilvy’s birth. I was in New York just before it took place, but had to fly back to London on …

My favourite Poles, the power of brands – and slightly less rain in Spain

In the 1960’s I fell in love with a Polish girl, and discovered that the Poles, whom I had always imagined, God knows why, a calm, slightly gloomy lot, like the Swedes, were – in her case anyhow – a …

Children are suffering because of these crass oafs – or how to make 100% sure your marketing money is wasted

I sometimes have an uneasy feeling that there is a great alternative recruitment agency in the depths below which seeks out idiots for big jobs. They probably run ads headed “A unique money-making opportunity for gormless twats.” Such seems the …

There’s no hogwash like marketing hogwash … and a possible alternative

I have always thought it was hard to beat the kind of twaddle marketing people come out with, and that the absolute nadir is reached by agency people. Here, for instance, is a quote from a presentation made by one …

The great SEO rip-off – don’t sign a contract: I have a better idea

Do you get a lot of people trying to sell you SEO? I get regular emails – and another agency which has the misfortune of me for its chairman gets people ringing to sell it all the time. The sales …

Would you believe one old seaside video could build an internet business? Plus a simple thought about investment

Did you see a video I made the other day about the mysterious word Buckshee? In it I mentioned a man who had built a very successful business after watching a video made 20 odd years ago. I have never …

Gorillas make £437,000 – plus a few Euro-moans from the aged scribe

I watched a story the other day about the remarkable degree to which gorillas behave like and can communicate with humans. There has recently been a plague of fancifully decorated gorillas in Bristol, placed in prominent places to raise money …

Gorillas make £437,000 – plus a few Euro-moans from the aged scribe

The funniest direct marketing speech ever – and James Hammond

I cannot say the words direct marketing often reduce me to paroxysms of mirth. However, a speech I saw a few years ago did. It was at a direct marketing awards event which I attended because someone else was paying. …

Something buckshee after the usual touches of the ludicrous – including Beauty and the Beasts

I had a couple of good laughs the other day – one about a love triangle, the other about a predictable display of political hypocrisy from the younger Milipede. The first was a story about the wife of an MP …