This is a picture of Dave Trott.

Yesterday I went to his talk at Malmaison.

Those of you who weren’t there missed out.

You didn’t just miss out on butternut squash soup.

And sandwiches cut into triangles.

You missed out on Dave’s wisdom.

You missed out big time.

It was simple.

It was inspiring.

It was so good I even asked two questions.

I never ask questions.

At the end I was almost angry that only 25 people showed up.

What a waste.

Here are a few things I wrote down.

It doesn’t sound like rocket science.

That’s because it isn’t rocket science.

Everything comes from Persuasion, Communication & Impact.

Start with a persuasive argument.

And communicate it in an impactful way.

Complexity is a weakness.

Simplicity is powerful.

We cannot afford to be subjective.

We must be objective.

Creativity happens in the overlap of disciplines.

Creative is not a noun.

Art Directors/ designers are like the pilots of an airplane.

But copywriters are the navigators.

All the real work is done by the writers.

We just let the ADs/ designers/ stylists take all the glory.

Clients need to reduce their brand to a single point.

Agencies need to amplify from that single point.

Dave’s wife is not very good at making tea.

It’s better to be interesting and wrong.

Than be boring and right.

There was plenty more.

And a heap of diagrams.

That I’m not going to go into here.

But the good news is that you can find all Dave’s wisdom on his blog.

It’s full of beautiful insight.

It’s full of football analogies too.

And it’s always written in lots of short sentences.

Like this.

So it’s really easy to read.

Thanks Dave.

(Dave is THE most popular name in advertising. Although I have no FACTS to back this up with.)