The Clever Trap

Shortly after our son was diagnosed with autism, I began to question many of the assumptions I’d always held dear.

In the first ten years of my advertising career, I’d won more than 80 awards for my work. I loved those awards shows and, like many others in the field, felt they somehow validated my, umm, genius.

Sheesh.

You know what else? Many times those awards represented really funny, really clever ideas and concepts. That's the secret to winning advertising awards, you know. Be really clever. Write ads that impress advertising people.

You know what else? I began to notice a gap between clever, funny, creative advertising and clear, effective, persuasive advertising.

You want to get results? Write ads that persuade consumers to think of you first and feel the best about you. Become known for something awesome before you're needed.

I had a great awakening during that time – where I realized that most of the award-winning ads weren’t working nearly as well as some of the other campaigns.

And it started to bother me that so many advertising professionals didn’t seem to care. They wanted the hardware.

Me? I wanted the money it took to pay for my son’s therapy, and since our business model directly ties our income to our clients' growth, I very quickly threw all the awards in storage and worked my tail off on stuff that got results.

I also started to get very picky about clients.

We began to be very careful about aligning the building blocks necessary for success. We suspected our son’s development depended on it.

We were right. It has.

And that’s the only award that matters now.