‘What gets me to buy? A really dull, boring ad.’
Said no-one.
Ever.
I started as a junior copywriter in 2000, working for Bloomberg.
In the 25+ years since, I’ve moved into strategy, but creative is never far from the surface.
Here are three projects that stood out — along with what matters most:
Their results.
1: Three / SingItKitty
SingitKitty was a major campaign for Three, featuring a singing cat. I worked on developing the email and social campaigns to go alongside the TV ad (above).
The result?
On day one it went out to almost 21 million people: over 950,000 actively engaged on social. In the first six weeks, five million people watched the ad on YouTube, with 73% of people saying they liked it. It is now widely considered a flagship campaign both in terms of creativity and effectiveness on social.
2: Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders
Médecins Sans Frontières is an international team of surgeons who go into warzones to treat the wounded. They liked Christian Aid’s witty slogan, ‘We believe in life before death’ and commissioned me to write theirs. They wanted it to be fiery, blunt and provocative. Above all, they wanted to be noticed.
I came up with We stitch up bloody foreigners.
The result?
Rather than using it as a slogan, they used it in campaigns. It provoked amusement, outrage, attention and — ultimately — donations. The NGO has gone from strength to strength. In 2023, for example, they had a revenue of €2 billion, a 5% increase on the year before.
3: Getty Images
Getty Images felt stale. As the world’s media agency they wanted to inject more life and wit in their communications.
They wanted to offer picture editors unique prints and suggested a social campaign. “How about we try a postcard campaign, first?” I suggested.
The result?
The campaign got the highest-ever revenue for a Getty Images UK end-of quarter campaign. Its success led to me doing more work with Getty Images UK as well as projects with Getty Images Germany, from advertorials to conceptualising forthcoming promotions.