CHANGE THE GAME WITHOUT THE GAME CHANGING YOU…
- Hans Ebert
- 11 minutes ago
- 5 min read
Having started out in advertising before the online world came into being and helping to launch McDonald’s in Hong Kong when Director of Creative Services with DDB before running the regional offices of Universal and then EMI Music with Norman Cheng, below, and seeing streaming services and algorithms take over the magic of music, one learns how numbers, research and Human Resources can be the enemy of creativity that’s borne out of being intuitive.
This was when karma came into play and being asked to create the Happy Wednesday brand for the Hong Kong Jockey Club which I managed for twelve years before there were a flurry of reasons given to move the goalposts and someone new brought in who apparently didn’t go the distance.
It’s been quite a trip that continues today, because all that’s come before is in my collective DNA force field.
It’s from where one never stops learning, especially about corporate politics and personal mistakes that snake into institutions like marriage and watch these being detonated in slo-mo.
Though not aimed at the horse racing industry, what I see missing from my experience and all these 5-8 year plans being conjured up by Mandrake The Magician, and those looking for early retirements and getting the most they can before contracts expire muddies strategic marketing and which is why standards of everything have fallen off the cliff.
This is why there’s a world in Reverse largely because of poor leadership built around the Peter Principle and where incompetence is promoted.
At most, what’s produced is low end promotions dressed up in a nice bow tie for The Big Cheese to approve. It’s what some people think advertising and marketing should look like and with everything quickly becoming a mewing litter of offline pussies.
Gawd knows I have dealt with many ninnies and pussies and watched those whom I once thought to be game changers going through the motions of playing the same old games because idle hands are quickly spotted. It’s
why so many “campaigns” go straight to the keeper and completely miss reaching even the thought threshold of the end consumer.
Forgetting “the art of the deal”, what’s going on in the Dark House is non-stop Trumpeting by the human dumpster with a subservient media turning bullying and lying and tweets into “news” when it’s just cornball showbiz schtick and something that should be ignored.
Instead, this crap is elevated to nauseous levels of testosterone induced importance for today’s neanderthal market.
Hummus or Hormuz, Jeffrey Epstein or Brian Epstein or Howie Epstein? How many really know, let alone care?
The weirdness of and attachment to “social media” gives TikTok dumpster fluff importance that it doesn’t deserve and diverts attention to side alleys and streets named Redact and a swarm of mindless tweets.
Me, I care about what the next generation will inherit from us and I don’t see this inheritance adding up to much, which is why I write. Writing is not only therapeutic, it helps make me see through especially serial corporate doodah from where so much of nothing grow wings and flap around.
The horse racing industry has always always always looked rudderless to other industries I have been in. It’s some place we saw always being busy talking to itself and blowing smoke out of its backside and only being a one trick pony with those perhaps Oliver Twisted buying for more time.
The entire racing industry needs Ricky Gervais to talk some sense into it before the dead people walking and talking leave this world.
Today’s companies and organisations need more people like the character Don Draper from the brilliant television series “Mad Men” and played so intelligently by Jon Hamm.
Don Draper is a streetwise, manipulative and charismatic human being who falls into the arms of the early days of advertising on Madison Avenue.
He’s hired by a small advertising agency and goes about selling himself with his raw creative talent, winning businesses, making a name for himself, wooing and bedding women including females clients with decision making power and forgetting that he’s married to a beautiful woman and with a young family. Sounds familiar…
There’s much that those running horse racing can learn from this series about, let’s just say, how to use what, delete the rest and place renewed importance on OneTeam success and the need for new business streams run as separate profit centres managed by different teams.
As most of what I am writing here is for a presentation I am giving in Denmark and Sri Lanka next month- not at the same time- about “Communicating In The New Weird“, this sidesteps anything where the technology is the idea and where there’s always room for common sense.
For my money and whether trying to make a sale to GenZ, X, A,B, C or Why, it’s about inspiration and engagement and interactivity. It’s nothing to do with glib theme lines unless Nike and “Just Do It” which is selling inspirational and ASPIRATIONAL values.
Horse racing used to sell “Aspiration”- at least in Hong Kong and wherever there was racing in Asia.
This was especially done through concepts where racing played a major part in advertising for cognac brands with a simple marketing premise: When a winner at the races, one celebrates by enjoying the most expensive cognac amongst good friends and beautiful women in an aspirational setting. This was while a remix of Shirley Bassey by Propellerheads screamed out “Hey, Big Spender” in the background.
For those cheesy whizzy Hong Kong and even the international Clubbing set influenced by the ‘look’ and vibe of the television series “Miami Vice”, it worked.
I would love to continue, but time waits for no one and I have things to do that are slightly more important than playing Rope A Dope with the fragile egos in horse racing.
Frankly, I am making the horse racing industry part of my presentation and about where I see things with this particular world- a world hardly crackling with strategic and creative thinking, a lack of empathy, a conga line of mediocre hires, and why those who have been in the game for decades have saddled up and said Adios to what they describe as a “sunset industry”.
Are things really this dire, Trigger?
Where tips appear to be the lifeline to the present and future of horse racing, think about these…
*Have a jockey unveiled as the Masked Singer. Hopefully, this can be Saffie Osborne.
*Show a commitment to the community and causes needing more awareness, create and produce Public Service Announcements.
*If trying to be part of the showbiz entertainment world, keep the horse racing and skipping around by artists miming to backing tracks VERY separate.
The round peg in a square hole stuff has never worked- especially when this singing and dancing that might work in a concert setting takes place on a racecourse in the afternoon.
Why don’t racing clubs from around the world come together in different cities for something TOTALLY ENTERTAINING with a Feel Good element including music, fashion, cuisine, lifestyle etc- everything other than another talk fest behind closed doors?
Create an event- maybe a three day event in different parts of the world- for a global audience and create ONE SPECTACULAR global event with a strong interactive element.
There’s more…
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