Hi friend – Rob here.

Today on Salmon Theory+: a summary of 'How To Stay Sane', by Philippa Perry.

I read this while i was going through a hard time, sometime in mid-2017.

This was pre-therapy, pre-meds, pre-pandemic (!), but it made a mark.

If you don't know her work, she's a psychotherapist.

(And wife of artist Grayson Perry, who i will also cover in a future edition.)

In this book, she talks about what sanity is, and how you can find more of it in your daily life.

So what does sanity have to do with strategy, you might be asking yourself?

Let's get into it.

📝 TL;DR:

1. Give people what they need (language), but first give them a reason to care (power)
2. Don't just tell your clients what to do, help them get there themselves
3. Cultivate moments of vulnerability with clients, creatives and colleagues
4. Identify a clear comms style, then refresh it over and over (and over and over and over and over) again
5. Treat pitches like a R&D department for your collective minds
6. Don't optimise for the sell, optimise for the opportunities to sell
7. Always ask yourself, "what would real people think about this?", then have ways of asking them

1. Give people what they need, but first give them a reason to care

True for our inner lives.

Also true for great work.

If you follow System1's work, the evidence is there, it's just a case of whether a) you take it seriously b) your boss does too.

Emotional.

Stuff.

Matters.

When people say they're lost for words on something?

That's the emotional part 'speaking'.

As strategists, we glorify being articulate so much (left brain), that we often forget our job is to be impactful (right brain).

Sure, your communications message might be clear, but... will it tickle some sort of emotion?

It should.

It must.

As Dan Wieden (RIP) famously said, "just move me, dude".

Of course, when you sell work you need to help the business rationalise things.

To find language for why it works.

But none of that matters until your client feels like there's something powerful about what they saw.

You feel your way into a good decision.

Then you come up with language to explain why.

Don't hate the player.

This is the game.

​

2. Don't just tell your clients what to do, help them get there themselves

I advocate highly for therapy, even if you think "there's nothing wrong with yourself".

You don't always go to the gym to fix something in you.

You go to be healthy in the first place.

To prevent problems.

Therapy is gym for the mind and soul.

And it has parallels with strategy too.

In essence, we help marketers observe themselves and their brands and 're-parent' their overall direction.

We're at the listening end of a brand's troubles.

Our job may be to give advice.

More often, to help them get there themselves.

Sure, we should have a clear point of view.

Know what we're saying.

Be prepared to propose a decision for them, if needs be.

But some clients don't respond well to that.

They want to be part of it.

We demonise this for some reason, when it's a blessing.

It means, if you're lucky, you have someone who's engaged enough to want to look hard at their situation.

And somehow reframe it.

3. Cultivate moments of vulnerability with clients, creatives and colleagues

We all think we are sane.

But being sane is more than just being logical.

Pure logic is a control mechanism.

It's like a central IT system.

Sanity isn't that: it's more like open source software.

When you think of a creative environment, this definition of sanity works too.

In 2023, i worked on a fast-paced sponsorship campaign which required daily check-ins.

Not because we needed to handhold.

But we needed to be honest with each other on what was working (or not) and iterate fast.

This meant we knew what the business was thinking.

Clients knew what we were thinking.

And we openly talked about it all.

Clients suggested ideas.

We suggested ways of dealing with the politics.

It was openness and emotional honesty for 8+ weeks.

You can't do this without having a level of deep trust.

We dealt with an intense project by being open and honest.

By being sane.

4. Identify a clear comms style, then refresh it over and over (and over and over and over and over) again

Let's turn the lens outwards.

Towards communication.

Not just in language, but also body language.

I love this distinction between different types of communication.

You can neatly bucket different brands within them.

Genuine dialogue: Stanleys.

​Specifically when they did this.

Lovely response.

Not just talking at people.

Talking with them.

Technical dialogue: Notion.

​Their TikTok is neat.

They talk about features in a non-featurey way.

It's technical, but also inviting.

Monologue disguised as dialogue: SURREAL.

In a good way.

​Love their stuff.

It's monologue-y.

Like lots of stand-up is monologue-y.

The point is this: all of these are valid styles.

But know which game you're in.

And then own it.

As Dolly Parton wisely says: "Find out who you are and do it on purpose."

Closer to home, it's the whole Kantar OS.

Fresh consistency.

Two words we should burn into our brains.

It's solid advice.​

5. Treat pitches like a R&D department for your collective minds

We all think we want less stress.

But some level of stress is healthy.

This is the basis of lifting weights.

Consider pitching.

Stressful.

And yet, often invigorating.

Pitches are as close as you get to an R&D programme for your thinking.

A good pitch is a high risk, high reward scenario, where the BAU rules don't apply just yet.

You're not yet part of 'the system'.

This makes your brain plastic.

You try new ways of briefing the work.

Of developing it.

Of pricing it.

Of selling it.

And what if you go too far?

Either clients respect you stretching your abilities, or they realise it's not for them.

Either way, it's a great self-selection mechanism.

Stress yielding effective results.

Shorter term pain for longer term gains.

6. Don't optimise for the sell, optimise for the opportunities to sell

This one reminds me of Byron Sharp.

And wastage.

And short vs long-term debates.

Let me explain.

We think efficiency is a way to save money.

But it's actually a way to stock up on frustration.

Efficiency doesn't just mean prioritising what works.

It means obsessing with what doesn't.

Or looks like it doesn't.

If that were the case, the above salesperson would have dropped their technique too early.

Or they'd only mirror the 50th call.

But that's not how the game works.

The brand growth game is an odds game.

So you need a wide surface area for greater odds.

In short: assume everyone is a light buyer.

​That 95% of the time people aren't in market.

Then work to maximise the odds.

This is the definition of a funnel.

It's a threshold for results.

50 calls = 1 sale.

10 drafts = 1 great brief.

30 ideas = 3 great ones.

Quantity leads to quality.

So best to plan the work, and then work the plan.

Punchy thinking plus patient execution.

7. Always ask yourself, "what would real people think about this?", then have ways of asking them

I understand why lots of businesses are doing in-housing, and in many ways i respect it.

However, yhere's a danger of losing something in the process: perspective.

There's great in-house work coming out of M&S, Specsavers, and many other strong brands.

But it works because they've not forgotten their market orientation.

Which, unless we work with intent, is very easy to forget.

Businesses work by osmosis.

The environment conditions the people.

Brands can take their role in people's lives too seriously.

So more power for the epic in-house teams out there.

But a lesson for us: creativity works best with a healthy dose of perspective.

Market orientation, not just business or brand orientation.

Otherwise, you assume what you see (cloud or otherwise) is all there is.

But reality isn't what is thought of and said within marketing departments.

It's what's effectively lodged into customers' minds.

📝 TL;DR:

1. Give people what they need (language), but first give them a reason to care (power)
2. Don't just tell your clients what to do, help them get there themselves
3. Cultivate moments of vulnerability with clients, creatives and colleagues
4. Identify a clear comms style, then refresh it over and over (and over and over and over and over) again
5. Treat pitches like a R&D department for your collective minds
6. Don't optimise for the sell, optimise for the opportunities to sell
7. Always ask yourself, "what would real people think about this?", then have ways of asking them