A certain copywriter working on the Parker pens account got a story-idea for his ad after a visit to the factory. While a number of people at the agency had already been to the client's works, there simply could not be a substitute for a personal visit. And it happened that the copywriter saw walnut shells lying around on the floor and asked what they were for. He learnt that they were used to polish the gold in the nib and that nothing did the job better. He could instantly see that this point could be made to shine quite well in his copy.

There are many similar legends about how some of the striking and more original ad campaigns actually took shape. Aitchison speaks to their creators. He tries to discover commonalties of approach and attitude among them. The idea seems to be that they all have certain characteristics that set them apart from their many industry peers. There are first-hand accounts of how Neil French created the XO campaign for a fictitious brand of beer ( this was done really to prove that advertising in newspapers could have as much impact as television commercials ), the Kaminomoto hair restorer campaign etc., which have since passed into advertising lore.

David Abbott ( of Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, London), renowned for creating a well-known campaign in recent times for The Economist says it's among the best books on advertising, particularly print advertising that he's come across. Neil French ( currently of O & M Worldwide) says in the foreword that it's rather clever of the author, Jim Aitchison to have interviewed so many excellent practitioners of the craft for the book and thereby got most of his book written for him by the likes of Indra Sinha, Neil Godfrey, Tim Delaney, Nick Cohen and Jim Mountjoy. The book itself is put together in a freewheeling style, not in the manner of a meticulous investigation. There are a couple of chapters devoted to discussing the everyday, trivial tussles that take place in any agency - on using the logo, tagline, showing the product's packaging in an ad, etc etc - which art directors, copywriters, account planners and so on will certainly find entertaining. The greats let you know that they are entirely flexible in respect to all such matters, but more than that, it is gratifying to learn that every copywriter or art director, irrespective of their degree of success, has had to grapple with the client's vexing little interventions in the design of an ad.

Definitely this book will be of interest to advertising people because it is profuse with comments and quotes from the crème de la crème, some of whose names have been mentioned above. The practical value of the book perhaps lies in the cues it offers in areas like idea generation, search for the big idea, and creative execution of a strategy. The most memorable advice in the book has a ring of simplicity to it - if you are using a straight picture, use a bent headline ( a headline with a clever twist to it) but if you are using a powerful picture or a visual with a twist in it , use a straight headline, do not bend both line and visual in the same ad.

If you haven't read many award-winning ads before this in tomes like the New York Festival annuals etc., then of course there are techniques to be picked up, such as the "Before + After" ( it's about demonstrating the difference the product makes). If you happen to be a copywriter or art director, reading this book can result in your wanting to be featured/interviewed in Jim Aitchison's next book.

Beneficiary involvement

The most active people in many development networks are professionals from nongovernmental organisations, international agencies, research institutions and the like. These are not, of course, the ultimate beneficiaries, who are different groups of poor and marginalised people. The need to involve the ultimate beneficiaries or end-users in networks is generally recognised, but this can be hard to achieve in practice.

The attempt is more likely to succeed if the beneficiaries are genuine participants in network dialogue and information exchange. Moreover, a lot of grassroots networking takes place horizontally and informally, not through formal channels or network structures. Formal networks, and other institutions, are well advised to work with such mechanisms, and there is much to be learnt from them.

A good illustration comes from Nicaragua during the 1980s, when government agricultural policy aimed to empower peasant farmers ( campesinos ). There was a shift in emphasis from top-down information dissemination by NGOs to informal farmer-to-farmer exchanges (the Campesino to Campesino Movement ) in which NGOs and the main networking forum, the national farmer's union, took on more of a facilitating role.

The movement was based upon farmer-promoters who were willing to experiment with alternative techniques and share their experiences with others. Commonly, these would work with NGOs to give workshops to others within or outside their own communities. The NGOs supported the process by providing technical assistance or finance for training and field visits.

After the success of initial trial schemes, news of the movement spread rapidly throughout the country. This was done in a spontaneous fashion, through informal channels of communication between the campesinos themselves. Soon, campesinos in nearly every part of Nicaragua were coming to NGOs and their national union calling for assistance in launching similar initiatives. The process was being driven by networking from below, not above.


Decentralisation: From institution to network

The Building Advisory Services and Information Network (BASIN) was established in 1989 to disseminate advice and information on appropriate building technologies for use in the Third World.

Its principal activity is an integrated technical inquiry service where each member agency handles information on a particular area of building (such as roofs or walls); this has been supplemented by publications, research projects and seminars,. Although BASIN describes itself as a network, for its first six years it had only four members, all European agencies, who had funded it; and it was not open for others to join. It can be regarded more as an institution-based service for disseminating information than a network proper.

An external evaluation of BASIN in 1996 showed that the technical inquiry service and information materials were of high quality, but the outreach should be greatly extended in order to meet the considerable need in the Third World for expert advice on building technologies.

the evaluation suggested that this could best be achieved by involving Third World agencies more fully as partners in providing and disseminating technical information, and would require the four European core members to spend more time assisting local partners to undertake activities. In other words, what was required was decentralisation, a wider and active membership, and information exchange rather than one-way dissemination. Through such a process, BASIN would become a more authentic network.

In fact, BASIN had already begun to recognise the need to move in this direction. It had begun to widen its membership by recruiting a fifth member agency, from Kenya, and it is now planning ways of taking the process further in the light of the evaluation's recommendations.