Art, virtual snowballs and the feels - BrightonSEO

@hannah_bo_banna
art,
virtual
snowballs
& the feels
@hannah_bo_banna

@hannah_bo_banna
I’ve just started working with this lovely lot @VerveSearch

@hannah_bo_banna
but for most of this year I’ve been on sabbatical

@hannah_bo_banna
prior to that I worked at distilled

@hannah_bo_banna
I’ve been involved in making stuff
that gets coverage, links & social shares
since 2011

@hannah_bo_banna
there’s some stuff I’m really proud of

@hannah_bo_banna
this was my first taste of success

@hannah_bo_banna
but it’s been a pretty bumpy ride

@hannah_bo_banna
failure
really hurts

@hannah_bo_banna
want to fail less often?

@hannah_bo_banna
that’s what today’s talk is about

@hannah_bo_banna
last time I was here
I spoke about a framework for pitching creative ideas

@hannah_bo_banna
I don’t want to spend
today covering old ground,
but some of that thinking led to this talk

@hannah_bo_banna
& I think it’s useful to give you a bit of context

@hannah_bo_banna
back then, we found we were having trouble
getting our clients to sign off on ideas

@hannah_bo_banna
so we came up with a framework
to help us get better at pitching

@hannah_bo_banna
relevant / resonant / different

@hannah_bo_banna
relevant
this is about “brand fit”
here you’re explaining why this is the right thing
for the company to do

@hannah_bo_banna
resonant
here you’re explaining why people will care

@hannah_bo_banna
different
here you’re explaining how your idea is different
from what’s already out there

@hannah_bo_banna
the purpose of the framework is two-fold

@hannah_bo_banna
it forces you to think harder about whether
your ideas are any good

@hannah_bo_banna
it also forces you to think harder about
whether or not your ideas make sense
for your client

@hannah_bo_banna
I still think this is a really useful framework

@hannah_bo_banna
but the
resonant bit has been bugging me

@hannah_bo_banna
resonant: why people will care

@hannah_bo_banna
but resonant is not just
“why people will care”

@hannah_bo_banna
I think it’s more than that

@hannah_bo_banna
I also think it’s more important than the
framework suggests

@hannah_bo_banna
it’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot

@hannah_bo_banna
this talk is in 3 parts:
a bit about art (yes, really)
a bit about work
a challenge for the future

@hannah_bo_banna
part I
a bit about art

@hannah_bo_banna
this year I took a sabbatical

@hannah_bo_banna
I wanted to write a book

@hannah_bo_banna
I went on a writing course
& on the first day,
we were asked this question:

@hannah_bo_banna
*why*
do you want to write?

@hannah_bo_banna
some said money

@hannah_bo_banna
some said fame

@hannah_bo_banna
one person said revenge

@hannah_bo_banna
none of these reasons
sat comfortably with me

@hannah_bo_banna
I think writing is an art

@hannah_bo_banna
& so rather than thinking about why I wanted to write,
I started thinking about
why artists create things

@hannah_bo_banna
I’m in danger of getting horribly abstract,
so let’s look at some art

@hannah_bo_banna
the piece depicts
two children playing with a
no ball games sign

@hannah_bo_banna
but what does the piece really communicate?

@hannah_bo_banna
how children are impacted by the urban
environments we’re creating?

@hannah_bo_banna
or perhaps…

@hannah_bo_banna
it’s a celebration of children’s
healthy disregard for authority
& obsessive regulation

@hannah_bo_banna
you might regard it as a call to arms…

@hannah_bo_banna
“IT IS THROUGH DISOBEDIENCE
THAT PROGRESS HAS BEEN MADE,
THROUGH DISOBEDIENCE AND
THROUGH REBELLION”
~OSCAR WILDE

@hannah_bo_banna
for artists: money, fame,
(& possibly even revenge)
are a by-product of success

@hannah_bo_banna
but how do artists become successful?

@hannah_bo_banna
by making
people feel something

@hannah_bo_banna
by capturing people’s imaginations

@hannah_bo_banna
by helping people gain new perspectives

@hannah_bo_banna
by making people think

@hannah_bo_banna
right now some of you are thinking
WTF has this got to do with link building

@hannah_bo_banna
but doesn’t some of that stuff sound familiar?

@hannah_bo_banna
just like money & fame are a by-product of success for artists,
links are a
by-product of success for content

@hannah_bo_banna
people link to your stuff
or share your stuff
only if it resonates with them

@hannah_bo_banna
if your content makes
them feel something

@hannah_bo_banna
if your content captures their imaginations

@hannah_bo_banna
if your content helps them gain new
perspectives

@hannah_bo_banna
if your content makes them think

@hannah_bo_banna
this stuff is really important

@hannah_bo_banna
if you create something
which doesn’t resonate,
people won’t feel anything

@hannah_bo_banna
when we don’t feel anything,
we don’t share, comment, or do anything,
we simply move on

@hannah_bo_banna
I get emails like this fairly frequently:

@hannah_bo_banna
Hey Hannah!
We made this thinger, and we all think it’s great!
We’ve gone to 200 journalists, but no one’s picked
it up, and we’ve seen no social shares either.
Any idea where we’re going wrong?

@hannah_bo_banna
this next slide may sound mean
(but it’s meant with love)

@hannah_bo_banna
when people tell me
their piece isn’t working,
& I take a look,
I typically feel one
(or more)
of these things
this is shallow, or this is
patronising
if I shared this it would say
nothing good about me
I don’t think this shows what
you’re claiming it shows
there’s nothing I can identify
with here
there’s nothing new or
different here
I’m confused – I don’t get it
this isn’t something I care
about
this isn’t something I’ve ever
wondered
you’ve promised me
something but haven’t
delivered
cool, but so what?

@hannah_bo_banna
what do all those things mean?

@hannah_bo_banna
“this piece doesn’t resonate with me”

@hannah_bo_banna
right now, you’re probably thinking all this is
pretty obvious

@hannah_bo_banna
you’re right

@hannah_bo_banna
no one sets out to create content which
doesn’t resonate

@hannah_bo_banna
no one sets out to create content which is
patronising,
confusing, shallow, unoriginal,
uninspired, or leaves people feeling nothing

@hannah_bo_banna
& yet sometimes,
that’s exactly what
we do

@hannah_bo_banna
where are we going
wrong?

@hannah_bo_banna
Part II
a bit about work
(or where I think we’re going wrong)

@hannah_bo_banna
I don’t claim to have all the answers,
but I have identified what I think are some of our biggest problems

@hannah_bo_banna
we *think* we understand
why a piece was successful,
but we’ve not looked deeply enough

@hannah_bo_banna
(this is not a piece I created)

@hannah_bo_banna
this gained coverage on over 500 sites

@hannah_bo_banna
beer isn’t *quite* the reason,
but it’s easy to jump to that conclusion

@hannah_bo_banna
from time to time
we’re all guilty of taking things at face value

@hannah_bo_banna
we only see what’s explicitly depicted,
rather than seeking any deeper meaning

@hannah_bo_banna
hold on to your hats,
I’m bringing back the art

@hannah_bo_banna
explicitly,
the piece depicts
two children playing with a
no ball games sign

@hannah_bo_banna
but that’s not
why the piece resonates with people

@hannah_bo_banna
what resonates is what lies beneath,
or what’s being expressed implicitly

@hannah_bo_banna
maybe it makes you think it’s about
how children are impacted by the urban
environments we’re creating

@hannah_bo_banna
maybe you see it as a celebration of children’s
healthy disregard for authority
& obsessive regulation

@hannah_bo_banna
maybe you regard it as a call to arms…

@hannah_bo_banna
let’s try looking at the beer map
in a similar way

@hannah_bo_banna
what’s going on here?

@hannah_bo_banna
explicitly this shows the beers people drink around the world

@hannah_bo_banna
“…the first thing I like to do, is relax
with a cold glass of the local amber
nectar.…
“glancing around the countries filled
me with nostalgia”
“I can still remember the amusement
when I discovered that that Skol was
still going strong in Brazil, when in
Britain it was a long-forgotten lager
synonymous with the 1980s. Of
course, it tasted somewhat more
pleasant at sunset on Ipanema beach
than it did in rainy west London. ”

@hannah_bo_banna
this is not a beer map – it’s a trip down memory lane

@hannah_bo_banna
when I first saw this piece…

@hannah_bo_banna
America - land of the free, & the home of the Bud Light drinker

@hannah_bo_banna
this is not a beer map – it’s something I can torture Shelley Wilson with

@hannah_bo_banna
having a clear understanding of this stuff is
important

@hannah_bo_banna
if your takeaway from this piece is
people like beer
we should make something about beer

@hannah_bo_banna
then you’ve missed the point entirely

@hannah_bo_banna
also,
the success of this piece has nothing to do
with the damn format

@hannah_bo_banna
no one shared this
*because*
it was a map

@hannah_bo_banna
no one shared this
*because*
it was an infographic

@hannah_bo_banna
people do not share formats
they share ideas

@hannah_bo_banna
some solutions…

@hannah_bo_banna
practice taking ideas apart
& putting them back together again

@hannah_bo_banna
review successful pieces:
try to figure out what worked & why

@hannah_bo_banna
read the coverage!

@hannah_bo_banna
read the comments!

@hannah_bo_banna
read what people said on social media!

@hannah_bo_banna
don’t be lazy

@hannah_bo_banna
those tools we’re all so fond of can tell us
*what* was successful,
but not *why*

@hannah_bo_banna
knowing why is infinitely more useful

@hannah_bo_banna
ok,
let’s move on to problem two

@hannah_bo_banna
we rarely take the time to
truly understand
our audience

@hannah_bo_banna
I’d like to tell you
another story

@hannah_bo_banna
we’re going back to 2008

@hannah_bo_banna@mattbeswick was making facebook apps

@hannah_bo_banna
‘snowball throw’ was the most
popular app he made
(this was c. 2008)

@hannah_bo_banna
the app let you throw a virtual snowball
at a friend on facebook

@hannah_bo_banna
within a week of launch
over 800,000 people
had thrown snowballs

@hannah_bo_banna
I asked Matt why
he thought the app was so popular

@hannah_bo_banna
“ummm, people like doing dumb sh*t on the internet?”

@hannah_bo_banna
throwing virtual snowballs
does sound pretty dumb

@hannah_bo_banna
but if that’s the case
why did 800,000 people throw them?

@hannah_bo_banna
*why*
do people do
(what essentially looks like)
dumb sh*t on the internet?

@hannah_bo_banna
what does throwing a virtual snowball mean?

@hannah_bo_banna
it is wickedly ambiguous…

@hannah_bo_banna
it could mean…
hi

@hannah_bo_banna
it could mean…
I’m thinking about you

@hannah_bo_banna
it could mean…
I’m thinking about sleeping with you

@hannah_bo_banna
which makes virtual snowballs a
pretty useful way to communicate

@hannah_bo_banna
now all this might sound like
“people doing dumb sh*t on the internet”

@hannah_bo_banna
but I suspect we’re getting closer to the truth

@hannah_bo_banna
there’s an important lesson here

@hannah_bo_banna
“people like doing dumb sh*t on the internet”
shows an
alarmingly shallow & dismissive
understanding of people’s motivations

@hannah_bo_banna
if you fail to understand
the people you’re trying to engage with
you’re likely to fail to create something
which resonates with them

@hannah_bo_banna
if you fail to understand
your audience,
you are in danger of
creating something that
leaves them feeling one
of these things
patronising
with here
different here
about
wondered
delivered
cool, but so what?

@hannah_bo_banna
if you take the time to listen to your audience
you might make better things

@hannah_bo_banna
this allows you to create a playlist of the hits, (or the obscure stuff)
from the artists of virtually any major festival line up

@hannah_bo_banna
it wasn’t our idea

@hannah_bo_banna
it started with a tweet from a journalist…

@hannah_bo_banna
what did she really want to do?

@hannah_bo_banna
“I figured that
a list of the least popular songs
from the artists playing Glastonbury might
get me a bit of traffic…”

@hannah_bo_banna
we can do that…

@hannah_bo_banna
but actually,
maybe we could make something
even better

@hannah_bo_banna
we added a couple of extra features

@hannah_bo_banna
in addition to creating the playlist,
the piece also tells you how mainstream the
festival is:

@hannah_bo_banna
& we included historic line ups,
so you can use the Playlister as a time machine:

@hannah_bo_banna
& journalists at the Mirror have featured
it again & again & again

@hannah_bo_banna
your audience can be a great source
of inspiration:
take those ideas & build upon them

@hannah_bo_banna
part III
a challenge for the future

@hannah_bo_banna
when you start working on that
next ‘thinger’

@hannah_bo_banna
think like an artist

@hannah_bo_banna
set out to capture people’s imaginations

@hannah_bo_banna
or help them gain new perspectives

@hannah_bo_banna
or make them think

@hannah_bo_banna
right in the feels
focus on making people feel something

@hannah_bo_banna
NOT
one of these things!
patronising
with here
different here
about
wondered
delivered
cool, but so what?

@hannah_bo_banna
revisit this throughout the process

@hannah_bo_banna
does this content make
people feel any of these
things?
patronising
with here
different here
about
wondered
delivered
cool, but so what?

@hannah_bo_banna
if the answer is yes,
try to find a way to fix it

@hannah_bo_banna
you may not be able to solve all the issues

@hannah_bo_banna
but do the best that you can

@hannah_bo_banna
launch things!

@hannah_bo_banna
learn things!

@hannah_bo_banna
& seek to continually evolve & improve!

@hannah_bo_banna
good luck out there x

@hannah_bo_banna
Hannah Smith
Head of Creative
Verve Search
send questions and/or pictures of cats to: hannah@vervesearch.com
tweet things @hannah_bo_banna

@hannah_bo_banna
big love to the team at Verve who helped me put this together
images:
no ball games: http://banksy.co.uk
I’m out of bed & dressed - http://banksy.co.uk/
nobody likes me: http://www.iheartthestreetart.com/street-2/#lightbox[group-26481]/39/
alien: http://www.wired.com/2010/02/0205hr-giger-born-science-fiction-artist/
beer map: http://vinepair.com/wine-blog/most-popular-beer-every-country-map/
economist coverage: http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2015/03/countries-favourite-beers
editors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_End_Has_a_Start
festival playlister: https://playlister.expedia.co.uk/
feels: http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/531/319/99f.gif
danbo - https://www.flickr.com/photos/nomadic_lass/6889892777/in/set-72157629144987013
unicorn - http://queenofheartsonthesleeve.tumblr.com/post/58736423727/ok-not-much-but-here-it-is-3
credits

Art, virtual snowballs and the feels - BrightonSEO

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (19)

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (20)

Similar to Art, virtual snowballs and the feels - BrightonSEO

Similar to Art, virtual snowballs and the feels - BrightonSEO (7)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Art, virtual snowballs and the feels - BrightonSEO