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 ...

@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”
~OSC...

@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 con...

@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’...

@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 t...

@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 le...

@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 t...

@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 p...

@hannah_bo_banna
if you fail to understand
the people you’re trying to engage with
you’re likely to fail to create somethi...

@hannah_bo_banna
if you fail to understand
your audience,
you are in danger of
creating something that
leaves them feeling...

@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 an...

@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...

@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!
this is shallow, or this is
patronising
if I shared this it would say
nothing go...

@hannah_bo_banna
revisit this throughout the process

@hannah_bo_banna
does this content make
people feel any of these
things?
this is shallow, or this is
patronising
if I shar...

@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....

@hannah_bo_banna
big love to the team at Verve who helped me put this together
images:
no ball games: http://banksy.co.uk
...