Time to grow up

So another week on the election trail and more policy promises from the mainstream political parties. Can you remember what they were? No, me neither. What I do remember is quite a lot of finger-pointing and name-calling.

 In fact this election campaign has been characterised by a level of personal attacks unusual even for British politics. We’ve all heard how it goes:

– You're not fit to be prime minister

– No, you're not

– You've got more kitchens than me

– You look stupid eating a bacon sandwich

– You fancy that girl with freckles

– You smell

Commercial brands rarely behave this way. We’d think it was pretty patronising if all they did was slag each other off. Don't tell me why the other cola / smartphone / taxi service is rubbish. I'm an adult, I can work that out for myself thanks. Tell me what yours is going to do for me. As my colleague Robert Jones points out, strong brands tend to treat us with a bit more respect, so why do we accept this behaviour from political parties at election time?

This focus on the negative feels like “a missed opportunity for the mainstream parties to set a new vision for Britain” according to Robert Senior, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi. And it’s hard to disagree.

Something else we’ve seen an alarming amount of in this election campaign is political cross dressing – the main parties taking it in turn to spring an ambush and steal the other’s trousers. Labour claiming they'll spend more on the armed forces than the Tories and insisting that all immigrants must speak English. The Tories in turn claiming to be the party of working people by dusting-off the right to buy policy and riding to the rescue of the ailing NHS with £8bn they found down the back of the sofa.

While the main parties are scrapping for the middle of the playground the most radical things are happening around the edges. The only really different party political broadcast so far has been the admittedly very strange Green one.

And the most eye-catching initiatives haven’t been for political parties but for the act of voting itself. In different ways E4’s shutdown, Pentagram’s I give an X campaign and Saatchi & Saatchi’s work for Operation Black Vote are all using radical means to encourage people in from the edges.

But radical thinking – fundamental and far-reaching by its nature – can work for the mainstream too. Obama triumphed in 2008 with a message of hope. Closer to home, my grandfather was elected as an MP in the landslide of 1945. The winning Labour party’s campaign wasn't based on negative, personal attacks aimed at the opposing party leader. Which is just as well as he'd just won the war. Singlehandedly. With a cigar in his mouth. Instead they presented an optimistic, radical vision of social reform which focused on the future not the past.

People want something to believe in, something optimistic and inspiring. A leadership story that spells out where we’re heading, how are we getting there and why that really matters to you. A radical story, positively told. Now that would get my vote.

For more from us on the UK election, check out Chris Moody’s article in Brand Republic on why politicians aren’t winning at social media.

 Illustration by Leon Hapka.

Owen Hughes is a Creative Director at Wolff Olins London. Follow him @OwenDHughes

Repairing party brands

Of the ten most hated brands in Britain, four are political parties, according to recent research. So there’s a bit of a problem here.

And it matters when political parties are the organisations that enable people to take part in democracy.

So what do we do?

Over the last couple of years, we’ve done three pieces of research at Wolff Olins which point to some answers.

First, successful brands are behaving differently. They aim not so much to persuade people to buy as enlist them into a cause. They're less like McDonald’s, more like Wikipedia. They don't pander to everyone, but they stand for something: and indeed some, like HBO, aim to polarise opinion rather than seek universal appeal. Political parties can learn from this.

Second, consumers are behaving differently. There’s a new mainstream of active, sceptical, disloyal consumers who sidestep the traditional institutions. They choose Aldi over Tesco, Ryanair over British Airways, Airbnb over the hotel chains, and indeed UKIP rather than the Tories. The anti-establishment alternatives look, talk and act differently. Politicians need, somehow, to talk to this new mainstream.

Third, leaders are behaving differently. According to our survey of nearly 50 CEOs worldwide, leaders are stepping away from centre-stage. Not without difficulty, CEOs are becoming more modest about their organisation’s scope, and about their own powers. They’re creating less corporate corporations, with a less controlling management style. And political leaders need to make this adjustment too.

All three pieces of research underline the familiar fact that the age of deference is over – a long-term trend that goes back to the 1960s at least. As consumers, employees or voters, we’ll no longer do as we're told. So what can the political parties do? Here are ten suggestions.

1       Be worth joining. Move away from pandering to the masses, or selling a promise, towards enlisting people behind a cause.

2       Don't attack the other parties. Strong brands don’t (though weak ones, like the big four supermarkets, do). It turns everyone off. Be positive and optimistic.

3       But don’t offer large and vague generalisations, about how ‘Britain’ or ‘society’ will be ‘better’ or ‘fairer’ or ‘richer’. The new mainstream doesn’t believe in grandiose statements.

4       Instead talk about a small number of highly practical things that you’ll do, or help people do.

5       Don't shout, or use media that shouts, like poster advertising – as my Wolff Olins colleague Chris Moody has pointed out. Use media that forces you to listen.

6       Embrace and work with ad hoc groups, global and local. You can’t suddenly be non-institutional, but you can work with others who are.

7       Break away from institutional behaviour, and find a look and a voice that’s more contemporary, less formal, less pompous, less wordy, less worthy.

8       Bring in people who aren’t career politicians, people who are outside the political mainstream.

9       Admit the things you can’t change (like the pressures of globalisation), recognise that others are sometimes right, respect the fact that voters don’t have to agree with everything you say.

10     Never underestimate the intelligence of the electorate, or its radar for inauthenticity and evasion. Be witty, be interesting, be surprising, be outrageous even, be spontaneous, be yourself. Above all, if you want to rebuild trust, be honest.

All of this is easier to say than to do. Political parties (like most brands) have to appeal to both core supporters and a wider market, which isn’t easy. Parties have party lines, and can’t afford for their politicians to be wonderfully authentic but constantly off-message. Bigger structural change may be needed, like proportional representation, to fully change the game. But if some parties achieved some of these ten things, it would be a start.

Who do you think you are kidding art director?

Picture the scene - May 2015. The Prime Minister is at a news conference in the Downing Street rose garden and to the far right stands a new coalition partner. A tiny hairy bluebottle darts from the shrubbery, lands on the philtrum of the deputy PM prompting an instinctive stroke of the lip with the index finger. At the same time the PM swipes away another pest by launching a hand high into the air. Both break into jovial laughter. At that precise moment a hundred cameras flash, the titanium bulbs casting the yew trees in the distance into dark relief. A front page image, guaranteed.

Whether its Farage’s moustachioed microphone or Obama’s multiple halos, some of the most memorable political images have been created more by accident than design. It's a real shame because well-considered, smartly executed political design can have much greater resonance and impact. Sadly, it appears that the world of design is just as bored with politics as the electorate.

Last Friday the Conservative party (big C) 'launched' a conservative (small c) poster campaign for the Great British Vote Off in May. For those who haven't seen it - it looks like the title sequence of Dad’s Army re-imagined by way of Google Street View. It is literally, metaphorically and unashamedly a middle of the road piece of communication.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party will respond today with a weak rehash of a previous Conservative campaign, bad kerning and all. But does it matter? Well, yes. Of course it does. These images were built to speak to you. They are meant to convince you to select who you want to run the country for the next few years. They are saying you are boring and unimaginative. Britain deserves more talent.

Politics should be a crucible of creative energy. Its creative output should be vital, relevant and even provocative. Obama kicked off his campaign with Shepard Fairey art directing, our Premier chose funkypigeon.com

So how can we make it better?

First up. Stop making posters. It's telling the 'launches' are for billboards - the most traditional of communication mediums. One way, shouty, the lowest common denominator.  It's no surprise that 60% of youth voters don't want to put pen to paper in the Spring. Campaigns need to engage in more interesting ways - build a mobile game, get the newly honoured Jamal Edwards to front an online panel debate. Anything other than another dull 48 sheet.

Second - have a bit a more wit. The most political poster of 2014 was for The Interview (the Third World War baiting vehicle from the people who brought you Pineapple Express). Sure they triggered a global diplomatic incident but at least they had the good manners to nail the poster artwork - a pitch perfect agitprop pastiche.

Finally, make something that has conviction. If you are going to call the UK's media to a press conference, make sure what you are going to show is memorable and meme-able. A triumph of content and communication design that truly deserves a fanfare.

Political parties should be taking design, creativity and image making seriously. It should be a valuable tool to bring to life what they believe in, rather than regurgitate what they believe the people want to hear. As Emily Thornberry found out in November and the next Prime Minister may well find out in May, take care with the art and copy what you put into the world. Because if you don't, the world is more than happy to design it, redesign it, tweak it and twerk it on your behalf. Nobody is waiting for another poster…

How could politics engage young people?

This week, the politics programme on BBC Radio 1, Newsbeat, has been running a series examining the reasons why many young people do not engage with politics.

Today, in the final programme of the series, a team from Wolff Olins and a group of Radio 1 listeners were given the challenge of co creating a set of solutions to the problem.

The challenge was an interesting one, and we would have loved to have spent more time developing the ideas. You can listen to the brainstorm on the BBC iPlayer and below we explore some of the issues in greater detail.

Firstly, lets take a step back. We want young people to engage in politics, but why? Is seems like a self-evidently good thing, but what impact would that really have? Is the truth that the need to reach out is symptomatic of politicians’ own sense of dislocation? A desire to feel more connected, more hip even? Or is it yet more evidence of the wider depoliticisation of society? Statistics show that  50% of people globally are under 25 years old. If these people don’t engage in politics now, then in the future we may have a society where nobody votes.

We want young people to take politics seriously, but do we know what is stopping them from doing so? This week’s tweets to Newsbeat tell an interesting story. The frustration at politicians’ lack of integrity is palpable. The idea that no matter which government you vote for, little changes can perhaps be attributed to the lack of immediacy we have come to expect. It also appears that the level of distrust towards politicians is as prevalent amongst young people and it is amongst adults. However, young people are deterred by and suspicious of more aesthetic cues – the way politicians dress, the way they talk and the ‘ivory tower’ of parliament they cloister themselves in.

And so to the solutions. Hands up – the following probably isn’t the absolute answer but it is an explanation of some of the concepts that came out of our session. Through ideas like these, we can start to imagine a future where young people experience politics in an altogether different way:

The alternative parliament

Youth today have different role models that don't necessarily reside in Parliament. How can we make parliament more diverse and representative of the people that young people look up to and admire? Rather than just having MPs representing geographical constituencies, why not introduce representatives drawn from different types of institutions, bodies and groups - street artists, community youth leaders, musicians, DJs, bloggers, technocrats, designers, and athletes? After all, these people not only inform, shape and influence youth culture, but are genuinely in-touch with it. In doing so, these alternative opinion leaders, thinkers and influencers can join debate, commission inquiries, make policy recommendation and, most importantly, systematically listen to and include young people in the process.

MP pop ups

Parliament feels like another world. A place which young people today feel is inaccessible- a world away from their daily life. And why should they go to Parliament when politicians rarely come to them? To take parliament out of it's ivory tower, MP s could create real-life or virtual 'pop ups' - informal stations that can appear at the end of your street or on an online youth forum (think Obama's Digital Whitehall) where young people can chat to their local MP, ask direct questions and get responses to their concerns in real-time. 

Enabling youth action

Young people have the energy, ideas and optimism to make change happen. Why not tap into that energy, support and enable it to get things done? Groups of young people can come up with an idea for social impact (e.g. getting bee hives at their local school or starting a café for the locally unemployed), put together a proposal and unlock funding to realise their idea. These projects would be ideal incubators for trialing new ways of tackling social issues in a way that is ground-up and led by young people.

Trends in 2012 Elections Messaging

The Yahoo! Advertising blog recently asked several agency leaders one question: "What are some key trends you're seeing in political advertising this election season?" Angela Riley, Strategy Director for Wolff Olins, talked about what brands and politicians can learn from each other to better engage consumers---and constituents.

Here's a snippet from the piece:

For Politicians and Brands, It's Essential to Be Clear, Consistent and Authentic.

Like a short-lived advertising campaign, political messaging platforms can evaporate into the ether without ever resonating with the voting public. Perhaps, like the all-too-common one-off approach of a glossy advertising campaign to appeal to an audience, politicians react to public sentiment and rush to get a message out before they've figured out what they really stand for.

Politicians can take a page from well-loved brands, which stand for something clear, authentic and desirable. Think Target and the democratization of chic, or BMW - the ultimate driving machine. Think too of the Obama-Biden presidential campaign of 2008 standing for "Hope" and "Change" — similarly clear, authentic and hugely desirable (given the public sentiment at the time).

So how can a political candidate get at the authentic, aspirational heart of what they stand for? Keep reading the full piece here.

Image via BarackObama Instagram