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Leo Burnett's Giles Hedger on being gripped by the intentionality of TV advertising
Throughout September, Marketing will be celebrating the 60th anniversary of TV advertising in the UK with a series of articles penned by influential industry leaders. The aim is to explore where TV advertising is now and, more importantly, its future in a rapidly evolving media landscape. We continue with Giles Hedger, chief strategy officer at Leo Burnett.
Literary insights - 34: Gooseberries
Book 34: A collection of short stories by Anton Chekhov is a powerful reminder for marketers of the difference between happiness and self-actualization.
Literary insights - 33: The Beautiful Cassandra
Book 33: A collection of Jane Austen's juvenilia, entitled 'The Beautiful Cassandra', is a reminder of the dangers of revering culture when we should be poking fun at it.
Literary insights - 32: A Hippo Banquet
Day 32, book 32: A subtle masterclass in self-awareness, and essential reading as marketers gear up for Rio 2016.
Literary insights - 31: The Tell-Tale Heart
Day 31, book 31: Why removing ambiguity kills brands.
Literary insights - 30: The Terrors of the Night
Day 30, book 30: Nashe's pamphlet on dreams is, for marketers, an early treatise on the extent and power of our irrationality.
Literary insights - 28: The Wife of Bath
Day 28, book 28: An exploration of gender power struggles in the middle ages that reminds us how backward most marketing still is when it comes to the female psyche.
Literary insights - 27: The Nightingales are Drunk
Day 27, book 27. It reminds us why creating the conditions for lyricism is such an important duty for marketers.
Literary insights - 26: Of Street Piemen
Day 26, book 26. As business embraces the online global marketplace, Henry Mayhew provides a timely reminder of the essence and the mechanics of selling.
Literary insights - 25: Circles of Hell
Day 25, book 25. Dante's masterpiece contains, among many other things, the most compelling account ever written of the horror of mediocrity.
Literary insights - 24: The Gate of the Hundred Sorrows
Day 24, book 24. Rudyard Kipling's stories offer a lesson for marketers in the importance of close observation.
Literary insights - 23: The Tinder Box
Day 23, book 23. Hans Christian Andersen's story is the perfect parable for the malfunction, in business, of the creative sensibility.
Literary insights - 22: How a Ghastly Story was Brought to Light by a Common or Garden Butcher's Dog
Day 22, book 22. For all the arching scale of brands and their ideas, brand building is often about teasing modest truths out of small and obscure human behaviour. Sometimes it takes a common or garden butcher's dog to bring to light the human condition.
Literary insights - 21: Trimalchio's Feast
Day 21, book 21. Petronius' book is an outrageous lesson in the need for brands to establish a level of shared taste with its users.
Literary insights - 20: The Communist Manifesto
Day 20, book 20. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels offer a fundamental lesson in the importance of difference, and the fact that all brands, in the end, need to be the enemy of sameness if they are to be embraced.
Literary insights - 19: Olalla
Day 19, book 19. Robert Louis Stevenson's novella offers lessons on how to balance purity and diversity in the open economy.
Literary insights - 18: Jason & Medea
Day 18, book 18. Apollonius of Rhodes's writings show the importance of motive in marketing.
Literary insights - 17: Caligula
Day 17, book 17. Caligula by Suetonius gives a lesson in the failures of leadership.