Some time ago I went to see a client who asked me where I get the ideas for these effusions from.

All sorts of places is the answer, but the question stimulated me to write Where to get ideas.

I love history, so I’ll start with Vincenzo Lunardi, a Neapolitan who in 1784 was the first person in England to ascend in a balloon. They say 200,000 people watched him, including King George III through a telescope from St. James’s Palace.

Afterwards the intrepid balloonist wrote to the King describing it all. Besides a dog, a cat and a pigeon, which escaped – the pigeon, I mean – he took a leg of chicken and a bottle of wine, admirable chap. Here is a splendid picture.

The bottle of wine reminds me of an old film I saw of David Ogilvy talking about how to get ideas. He said a bottle – then corrected himself – half a bottle of good claret helped. Since I know a bottle was more about his mark, I suspect he edited the truth so as not to drive young writers and art directors to drink before their time.

I do not entirely recommend booze as the high road to inspiration, but it can be. I once drafted a mailing to get legacies for Save the Children when distinctly squiffy. It worked well for many years.

I was completely potted when I wrote perhaps my best mailing. Professor Derek Holder, founder of the Institute of Direct Marketing, had come to show me a letter inviting potential sponsors to the launch of his new venture at the Barbican.

With the refreshing candour a truckload of wine confers, I said it was lousy because it was too impersonal, but I would revise it. Gathering my addled wits, I dictated something which my then PA, Daphne, transcribed. I edited it, and off he went into the late afternoon sunshine. I didn’t hear from him until he asked if I was coming to the event. There was a full house. The letter got over 70% response. Derek never looked back.

I don’t know what happened to that letter – I wish I had kept it. But I always feel pleased to have contributed, despite my unsteady condition, to one of the most beneficial things direct marketing has seen.

One good source of ideas is called getting on with it. There is such a temptation to look at that accusing blank screen or sheet of paper and go and do something else. But the mere act of writing gets you going.

• Trollope used to get up every morning very early – I think at 5:30 – and write for 3 hours before going to his job at the Post Office.
• Richard Strauss used to be shown to his study by his domineering wife with the admonition. “Richard, go and compose.”
• Sheridan had not written the last act of “The Rivals” on the Friday before it was due to open. They locked him in a room with paper, ink and bottles of port until he did so.

But as I said, the demon drink is neither the ideal nor the only way to get ideas. Many people find exercise helps. I have had many of my better thoughts when riding my bike or walking my dog when I had one. Beethoven also enjoyed long walks. Mozart liked to play billiards.

Some years ago a French businessman lamented the growing practice in France of taking showers rather than baths, which he believed better for getting ideas. Victor Ross, former chairman of The Reader’s Digest, Europe, responsible for some of the most effective direct marketing innovations, has a theory about this.

He says these methods encourage the circulation of the blood to the brain. Another example he gives is shaving. Many people report having had good ideas when shaving.

In the film I mentioned, David Ogilvy, with one of his wonderfully frank and old-fashioned turns of phrase, said that things sometimes came to him when “at stool”. That’s a form of exercise, too. Come to think of it, it’s also where I was when I had the idea for this. I guess you could call it straining for ideas.

Best,
Drayton

P.S.  This is number 42 of Drayton Bird’s 101 free helpful marketing ideas.  You can sign up on the link below for the rest.

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