This is the reason no one cares about your campaign

The secret sauce

Successful advertising campaigns follow a formula. 

Each one unearths a hidden human truth (the insight). Translates it into a cracker of a creative concept (the idea). And crafts it using a particular type of media (the execution).

If you can’t find an insight, that’s a boo-boo. If you find an insight that isn’t hidden or truthful or it takes long pitch decks to explain the vibe to a boardroom of yawning executives, that’s also a boo-boo.

Razer pointy insight = campaign success.

Insights are like acorns. Tiny seedlings of potential that determine whether a campaign captures attention, generates emotion and creates memories. Or whether it’s forgotten in two seconds flat.

A not-dictionary-approved definition

in · sight /ˈɪnsaɪ̯t / n 1 a truth

good in · sight /ˈɪnsaɪ̯t / n 2 an unspoken truth

An insight can be about anything. A product. An audience. A behaviour. Strategist Mark Pollard calls it, “An unspoken truth that sheds new light on the problem.” 

A good one makes you go, “Oh yeah, that’s so true.” Or: “I never thought of it that way, but you’re so right.” “Lol, that’s so me.”

It is not a trend, a fact or an observation. Save that kind of info for the background research page. 

Brand tracking platform Tracksuit analysed The Ordinary’s The Periodic Fable last week. A scientific table with zero science. Also a Cannes Lion winner. This campaign exposed the beauty industry’s flagrant misuse of buzzwords, exposing 49 fake elements—from Pore Erasing and Dream Serum to Instant Youth and Freshly Made—under the microscope. 

The insight was not: Gen Z likes to shop for skincare on TikTok. That’s an observation. Instead, it might have been: skincare brands condition Gen Z to seek out misinformation by deliberately inventing buzzwords that imply authority and luxury. Or: the average Gen Z knows less about "phosphorus" than “porelessness” because only one drives the hamster wheel of consumerism. 

Tracksuit said, “It worked because it tapped into a cultural truth.” From June 25 to May 26, the campaign drove +12% consideration with 18-34 year-olds. 

The cold-hearted business case for warm and fuzzies 

Emotional campaigns create more profit. 

Hand on heart. Time to be honest. The path that guides a CMO is the bottom line.

We’re not crafting a headline that sounds like music on the tip of your tongue because we’re interested in exploring the theory of language. We’re doing it to sell supplements. Success equals more bottles on consumers’ bathroom shelves. (For example.)

Tracksuit finds 29% of emotional campaigns result in very large profit growth. 16% of rational campaigns result in very large profit growth. James Hurman, co-founder and author of NZ’s most backed book on Kickstarter ever, describes it like this. “When we elicit emotion with our marketing, customers don’t just know the brand, they feel something for it. And when customers feel emotionally connected, they are far less price sensitive.”

p.s. you can’t elicit emotion without an unspoken truth.

Okay, I’m convinced. How do I craft a good insight?

You dig beneath the surface. Why crack the creme brulee, and not scoop out the vanilla custard?

Beige insight: Wearing PJs is a form of self-care.

Scrumptuous insight: Putting on a clean pair of matching PJs after a nighttime shower is the only hour in the day mums feel put together.

Beige insight: Gen Z doesn’t trust influencer ads.

Scrumptuous insight: Gen Z doesn’t mind if an influencer slides an ad into the feed, but they do mind if they lie about it.

Beige insight: Of the 17 pairs in her shoedrobe, the average woman wears 3 regularly.

Scrumptuous insight: Brands sell shoes by ascribing transferrable archetypes, like the Femme Fatale or the Rebel. If the rest of her wardrobe doesn’t match it, they’ll gather dust.

Beige insight: Men like jumpers made from natural fibres.

Scrumptuous insight: Men flash luxe cashmere jumpers to signal quiet luxury and adult elegance to potential mates in the top end of Collins St.

Beige insight: Women like to try before they buy.

Scrumptuous insight: For a busy woman, trying to find the time in the day to return an online purchase they could have just tried on first is a fate worse than death.

Let’s break down how we got there. 

The fact: 41% of Australian births are delivered via C-section. 

We always ensure the source is reputable. In this case, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s National Core Maternity Indicators. 

The insight: Mothers face judgement for an experience that often isn’t their choice. C-sections are not the easy way out.

This was inspired by an anecdote from a woman who passed out in pain on the operating table. The comments she received afterwards? She took the easy route. She was too posh to push. It wasn’t a real birth. 

The idea: Strike out C-section stigma. Literally.

We distilled the narrative down to its simplest form. One headline. One scar. One logo.

Founder and CEO, Lara Henderson, acknowledged the power of the insight at the centre of the campaign. “When you articulate something people already feel but haven’t said out loud, it stops the scroll, cuts through, and generates conversation.”

+429% engagement growth. +65% increase in views. 1 month of stock sold in 2 days.

Let’s apply the same logic to another recent campaign for Franjos Kitchen. 

The fact:

A mother lifts her newborn baby an average of 50 times a day. That’s while recovering from pregnancy and birth, operating on limited sleep and carrying the mental load of an entire household.

The insight: 

There’s an ocean of breast milk between motherhood and the way it’s depicted by the media.

The idea: 

Reframe motherhood through the lens of physical and emotional endurance.

Out with soft pink fabrics and talk of nourishment. In with real bodies and real power. Co-founder Kate Howard, explained how the campaign stemmed from its initial insight. “We didn’t start with a brief or a trend report. We started with a feeling… [That’s how] we created something that felt less like an advertisement and more like a rallying cry.”

It’s your turn now. Craft a campaign that gets remembered. It all starts with an insight.

This is our checklist. 

1. It holds a mirror up to an audience/behaviour 

2. It pins down a wriggling, squirming tension/contradiction 

3. It feels more human than ChatGPT

4. It reads more specific than the grams of protein listed on a yogurt container 

Good luck. And if you ever need an extra brain in the room, you know where to find us.