One-Liners.

How to write headlines.

A lot of people on the periphery of the business world like those of us in advertising, or what used to be advertising, criticize the tendency of business to think quarter-to-quarter.

I'm guilty of it myself. Essentially railing against clients and businesses and investors for thinking of short-term gains, as opposed to slow, steady, roll-up-your-sleeves growth. In short, a lot of the world operates on a "get-rich-quick" basis whereas, about 99 times out of 100, making money is the result of a get-rich-slow methodology.

Of course, get-rich-slow isn't much of a promise to clients, investors or ordinary people. That's why we're so susceptible to 
"in by 9 out by 5" promises. 

• Drink this beer, get the girl.
  
• Take this pill, play with your grandkids.
• Drive this car, become successful.
• Hire this agency, and see sales skyrocket.

There is such a thing in the world as long history. People who engage in it look at the world through thousand-year lenses. They realize things unfold not over the course of weeks, not even over the course of years or decades, but sometimes over the course of millennia. 

amerikka's current president thinks wars and their consequences can be wrapped up like sitcoms. We will be paying for the effects of the illegal US invasions of Venezuela and Iran for many years to come. Not to mention their multi-trillion dollar price tags. 

Unlike an episode of "Eight is Enough," it won't be over in 22 minutes. 

But this is a blog about advertising. So I need to make a transition.

When I was a kid in the business, if I was about to shoot a spot or a campaign, I'd have the future carefully charted out. I'd say to myself, 'this will be the lead spot on my reel and will surely get me a great job at either Chiat\Day or Chiat/Day, whichever way the virgule leans.' Things seldom happen that way. Seldom as in never.

One of the long-history-ish things that stuns me about advertising is how little the things we elect to watch and read and hear look like the things we're forced to watch and read and hear.

That's because we're trained to believe in a fundamentally unrealistic causality. We say, if we run this commercial that features two chalupa-grandes in a nacho-crusted shell for just $6.99, the fortunes of Taco Timpani will soar like a space-x rocket. Most often, as James Nance Garner once said about the office of the vice-presidency, what we do ain't worth a bucket of warm spit.

When I was a boy, I remember reading something about Woody Allen when he was just 16 years old. As someone with fervent creative energy, Allen would write 50 jokes a day and sell as many of them as he could--to the likes of Sid Caesar--for about $2/joke. 

I wonder if there's a strategy in that.

I wonder if instead of creating "films" for the ostensible reason of loading masses of people with copy points to get them to buy NOW, I wonder if we stopped trying to sell so much, and instead just tried to be an entertaining friend.

In other words, and I say this in part because, like Woody Allen 75 years ago, I can do it, I wonder if brands would be better served if they had their creative people just write 50 jokes a week.

A joke's job is to be friendly. To get noticed. And remind people you're there and you're ok.

Maybe that's what advertising should be.

Fun.
Funny.
Fast.
Fertile.

Rather than bludgeoning people, building synapses in their heads so when you see their logo, their colors, their typography, something clicks, a smile or some warmth ensue.

For pretty much my whole life, Tiffany's ran an index card-sized ad on page three of The New York Times. Back when things made sense, a "broadsheet" newspaper was 2700 lines. And standard advertising units were measured in lineage. 

I learned all this when I was a beginning copywriter at Bloomingdale's writing 20 ads a week, 50 weeks a year.

A full page ad was 2700 lines. A large ad with a column missing was 2100 lines. A 10"x14" ad was a 1680. And so on. 

Tiffany's ran a 300 line ad, pretty much every day. One-ninth of a page. 

These weren't great ads.
Really they were just reminders.
Like a store-sign might be before everything was taken over by global brands.

An impression.
An inducement.
A promise.

Here's my favorite New York store sign of all time. (Sorry for the 'gender'-ness.)
We need to remember the efficacy of drumbeat impressions.
The sustain. Not just the pulse.

Tiffany's in their 300-line ads weren't selling off the page. 

They were reminding people they were there and showing them they were relevant.

We forgot the "service" portion of communication--are you there for me? We over-index on the shrill, the buy now, the fomo.

Re think.