Making New Things: Information and Ideation for Creative Digital Experiences

INTRODUCTION

The average person requires a few distinct necessities in life. He needs meaningful work. He needs meaningful relationships. He needs to know himself.

The creative man (and woman) has one other driving force within that is so strong, it can sometimes overshadow all these needs: The need to make new things.

This is a passion that only another creative person can understand. Now I know everyone is creative. Of course to an extent every person is. Everyone can draw. But not everyone is a Warhol. Everyone can sing. But not everyone is a Pavarotti. Ok. You get the picture.

To a professional creative, being creative is a big part of who they are. For some, creativity is synonymous with their existence. Sound insane? If it does, you are probably not a creative by calling nor profession.

For myself, I started out as an advertising copywriter busting my ass working myself to death for the next big idea. I dreamt of winning big, shiny awards. I did. But it was never enough. I needed new awards. Awards aren’t bad. They push creative thinking forward. They reward innovation and punish mediocrity.

A few years later, the digital wave emerged. I switched from mainstream advertising to interactive. I had to. I had to make new things. And digital was the new thing.

A few years into the digital scene, I realised that to climb the creative ladder, I had to think more broadly than I did already. I had to be more than just a creative guy. I had to be strategic in output. So I embraced strategy. I fused digital planning with creative. I found that I had what it took to dive into data to find pearls of insight.

To make new things, I first had to sell new things. Strategy doesn’t just inform creative work. It sells creative work. Now I had control over the thinking behind the creative solution as well as the solution itself. Score! So this is how my mentors succeeded in becoming the awesome creative leaders they were. Over time, they mastered both sides of the equation.

TWO LOVES

To do great creative work today, I believe you need to love information and ideas. It used to be all about ideas – stories that said one big thing. That was fine in the days of analogue media, where brand communication was a one-way street. Brands spoke. People listened. Those days are over. I don’t need to explain why because you know the reasons already.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying ideas aren’t important. Great ideas are how we will forever powerfully persuade people and create fantastic emotive experiences. Ideas built empires. Inspired the renaissance. Raised Disneyland.

INFORMATION

I’m talking about facts, statistics, trends. You need to love data. You need to understand how people plug into and use the Web. You need to keep abreast with ever-evolving digital technology. Have an awareness of how stuff works.

You don’t need to know everything in detail. Just enough to help you reach and talk to people in ways they care about. You need to know how best to bring your digital ideas to life. And you will only know how to if you love information.

I know how creatives generally like data as much as they like a butt rash. But, really, the more you work with information, the more priceless it’ll become to you. Especially when it’s time to ideate.

These days I look back and cringe when I think about how naive I was to believe all I needed was a kick ass idea and (a) the client will love it and (b) the product would fly off the shelves. My work would’ve been better if I hadn’t bought the lie that strategy wasn’t my business; that all I had to be concerned about was with my ideas, copy and art direction.

IDEAS

In addition to loving information, you need to love ideas. I think you, being a creative professional, already love great ideas and know how to generate lots of them. So I won’t elaborate here.

LET’S MAKE NEW THINGS

Information and ideas. These are keys to making awesome digital work happen. Think about it. All the most envied creative digital work in the world are great ideas founded on useful information. I think I’ll just end here.

Design Strategy

How to make better creative products. Creative Innovation 101.

The better you meet a need, the more awesome your end product will be.

We often begin the design or creative process with “what’s the problem we are trying to solve?”

This is not wrong, just myopic, in my opinion.

Because that starting point, more often than not, tends to focus on the CLIENT’S business goals above all else.

Somewhere along the line, the creative industry has left the USER/consumer/person out.

Example: Nokia and Apple make mobile phones.

Global mobile giant Nokia has lost out to Apple in the smartphone segment due to the latter’s broader product and services ecosystem and its smooth integration -meeting a need to fit everything together; its vast offering of entertainment (games, music and movies), practical apps, and other content (podcasts) – meeting a need to be entertained and learn; and a religious emphasis on usability and simplicity (notice how Apple devices come with minimal user manuals?) – meeting a need to use something quickly and effortlessly.

To end users, the iPhone simply meets needs better than Nokia.

Whether you’re making a digital or physical product, it all begins with the correct understanding of latent needs.

Upon that understanding or insight, build unmatched experiences and you will have a killer product.