I’ve recently been chatting to one of the all-time gurus of media strategy about the state of planning in the industry.  He worries that good consumer insight is being overshadowed by big data, that the exciting developments in this field will lead to real deep human insight being of less value to marketers and overlooked.  Judging by the debates I have listened to at conferences and seminars over the last couple of weeks, this is a question that is looming over our industry and worrying many.   Read more on The new imperative for great consumer insight…

This seemed like a theme that speakers came back to again and again during the Warc MAP conference this month.  (By the way, I don’t know whether to put “siloed” or “silo’d”.  I’m drawn to the apostrophe but decided against it because I know some people get very annoyed by its misuse.)

The two days covered a range of subjects and included David Smith’s vision of global futures (the rise and rise of the middle classes around the world), Colin Strong’s challenge of the smartness of Big Data (needs the perspective of market research), new research technologies based on neuro-marketing and facial recognition and Les Binet and Peter Field’s new take on the IPA Datamine. Read more on Conference speakers call for an end to siloed thinking….

I spent some of this morning in the inspiring company of Mat Hunter, Chief Design Officer at the Design Council .  (If you’re going to be Chief Design Officer anywhere it can’t get better than that job can it ?) We were sharing a panel at a local government digital summit, compered by the wonderful Spencer Kellyand giving our experiences of driving digital change. 

Mat talked persuasively about the key difference good design makes.  Like so much else the secret is to make it relevant and attuned to the customer rather than merely to the needs of the organisation.  Read more on You have to see what the customer sees, feel what the customer feels, know their truth to get it right….

Twitter by candlelight – highly recommended in case of emergency, keep your iPad charged.