Fear

Attended a presentation last Thursday evening by key players in the campaign for Thomson Holidays that won the Business Performance Awards from the Institute of Direct Marketing.

Brilliant work. A great example of the kind of creativity, precision and skill that I want to deliver too. Hats off to the client and to their agencies WDMP and Creatormail.

Also learned something acutely depressing. It appears that the same agency is behind the excellent work for Carphone Warehouse that created highly personalised - and effective - welcome books and upgrade packs.

So three examples in the UK where data, creativity and technology have brought fantastic direct marketing results (the third is the TUI travel ticket book, now copied by Thomas Cook too) - are all from the same agency. I asked the guys what they thought was stopping anyone else doing this kind of work.

Their answer was that clients were afraid.

If that's true, then we're all falling down on the job. Or, maybe, from the 'glass-half-full' view of the world, there's a huge opportunity out there.

Photo by Terry Goss