All problems
Every problem, in one place.
Each one starts with what was actually wrong — not with the brief that arrived.
Start with these three
We had more data than ever. We were still measuring the wrong things.
Clicks, page views, fans, dashboards, weekly reports. None of it answered why something happened, or what to do next.
Reporting
clickspage viewsfansopensimpressionsdashboards
Business result
what changed in sales
Decision / action
Everyone wanted the next technology. That wasn't the problem.
The request usually arrived as a tool: a new platform, a new channel, a new capability. Rarely as a need.
- Need
- Existing assets
- Audience / context
- Technology
chosen last — tested small
Most briefs arrive at 04 first.
We had a loyalty programme. Customers had no reason to be loyal.
Points, rewards, emails and a growing database were being treated as a relationship with the customer. They weren't one.
Inputs are not the relationship
Household + product profileRelevant activity or offerAction + feedback capturedEngagement view updatedNext contact refined
All problems
13 cases in total. Each one opens with the full account, the outcome and its diagram.
- Pernod Ricard AsiaThe market was ready. The organisation wasn't.A market can be digitally attractive while the organisation is not ready to act. The blockers sat inside the business, not in a shortage of digital ideas.
- Fuji XeroxBuyers weren't confused. They simply didn't care.Office technology sold to business buyers, where every company said the same things. The product was visible; it just wasn't worth an opinion.
- VeoliaThey asked for a sales kit. There was no sales process.The request was for sales materials. Looking at how the offer actually reached a buyer, there was no route for a salesperson to follow.
- LufthansaHow do you make one regional system work across 15 countries and five languages?New brand standards had to arrive across the region at the same time as communication was supposed to get more personal. Those two things pull in opposite directions.
- Product launch500,000 downloads is a target. Not a strategy.The number was in the brief before anyone had checked whether the right people could find, install and use the product at all.
- The GlenlivetA campaign had a launch. It didn't have a future.The work was being treated as an event. The real problem was what happened after it: how one idea could keep producing useful work for years.
- SingaporeThe project was clear. Why it mattered wasn't.A large national development programme had to be introduced to the people whose support it needed. Explaining the scope would have told the room what was being built, but not why any of it mattered.
- Sodexo AsiaThe offer wasn't weak. It was buried.A specialist portfolio sat behind hundreds of documents. The buyer had to do the work of finding the proposition inside the company's own material.
- Business eventRegistration looked like admin. It was the customer journey.Invitation, registration, reminders, arrival and reporting were about to be built as five separate tasks producing five separate sets of data.
- PhilipsThey had 120 Facebook pages. They didn't have a social media strategy.A company-wide review counted around 120 Facebook pages, opened over the years by different brand teams, country offices and product groups. Only six had more than 10,000 fans, and nobody could say what most of the rest were for.
Next
Fourteen ways good work goes wrong — before the answer, check the question.