4,500 client meetings.

Yesterday I had a couple of client meetings for a couple of different clients. Today I have a couple more.

I've been doing some calculating. If I've averaged three client meetings a week for the 30 years I've been working, I've had something like 4,500 client meetings.

I guess that's why I don't get nervous about meetings anymore. I get nervous about the work being good enough, but the actual presentation of work to clients, well, I feel ok about that.

Lately, I've been doing something I don't notice a lot of other people do. I reconstruct for the client the thinking from which the ad sprung. I give them the genesis of the thought and then how we built the concept.

They seem to like this approach.

It seems to make what is often a mysterious process and one that's hard to relate to a little more accessible. It also does something that in my opinion, is all too rare.

It lets the client in on your head. It shows them your humanity. While everyone is presenting from research and powerpoint to show how smart they are, I think it sometimes makes sense to show how human you are.

I like to say that in our industry for at least the last three or four years, we've been trumpeting the notion of story-telling. Then when we show work, we present decks. The antithesis of story.

Anyway, this is what I've been doing lately.

Clients seem to like it.