Data doesn’t kill creativity, it demands it
In this guest post Paul Sinkinson, vice president Analytic Partners, argues that good data demands better creativity to make it work.
I’ve been reading more and more articles and posts about the death of creativity and many writers are naming data as the culprit.
In the recent Mumbrella post ’Will 2016 be the year Australian creativity died?’, marketers were divided into creativity-led marketers or data-led marketers. The data-led marketer is apparently led more by fear of failure, a mindset that translates into safer work.
Nice post Paul – in a way it’s common sense, but as you say for some reason data and creativity seem to line up as on opposite sides of the argument. Maybe that’s a business culture problem as much as anything else? Like the point about off line WOM being more influential than on-line too.
What I’ve noticed is at a time like this, with fragmentation creating a very challenging marketing environment, you would expect more creative solutions. Marketers want them (or say they want them) and agencies want to create them. But instead of creating an environment when nimble creative solutions can flourish, layers of extra process and over-thinking occur hampering any chance of creativity. Marketers say they want a nimble agency. A nimble model requires a light touch. Instead it seems marketers are becoming more heavy handed, more hands on and less open to fresh solutions. Just watch the TV and you’ll see the results.
Nice article Paul – and so true too,
Research shows that 96.8% of all Creatives agree that ‘Research kills good creative’.
OK I made the number up.