It’s funny how few people question nonsense passed as fact and how many question a lemon stuck between two skyscrapers 🍋

Working with ideas, I see how people can be uncomfortable with that which they’re not familiar with or used to — and I get it. After all, it’s in our nature to gravitate towards the familiar when faced with choice.

Often, when agencies show clients ideas that deviate from what is seen as ‘safe’ or ‘familiar’, the immediate question from clients is: ‘Can we look at other brands that have done this successfully?’

And while being aware of what other brands are doing is necessary, this instinctive search for the comfort of similarity is highly counterintuitive, given the whole point of advertising is to make brands different, noticed and loved.

The result? A ‘same but different’ approach where impactful ideas are diluted until they’re just another iteration of what’s already been done time and again by other more successful brands.

And while that may well be the tragedy of advertising, the hope is that clients and agencies evolve together in their partnerships to generate increasingly less comfortable, more effective work.

(Pictured: a lemon stuck between two skyscrapers. Obviously)