If you only had a 0.0004% chance of being great would you do it?

As our business changes some things don’t. We have creatives who have to come up with ideas every day. You start at zero every morning. It’s hard because the demand for brilliance is getting faster and more complex. Think what an integrated campaign or platform was 5 years ago and think what options exist today. Complexity has increased and time has decreased. We all talk about how advertising has changed, what hasn’t changed is there are 60 minutes in an hour.

This kind of pressure increases the risk for mediocrity.

To show the slim chance of excellence for creatives these days,lets look at some stats.

I saw a figure the other day that says America makes 800 000 ads a year. So if we do a rough calculation we get to give or take 2 million ads in the world every year.

Of those 2 million only 40 000 are entered into Cannes. That’s 0.02%. And that’s the work creatives thought was good enough to enter! Of those 40 000 only 16 Grand Prix are awarded. That’s a 0.0004% chance of winning.

Pretty slim. Admittedly, these are rough figures but I think you get the idea. It takes some pretty thick skin and a large amount of perseverance to be a creative.

In a world of critics, who never make mistakes because they never make anything. Where curators simply take other people’s ideas and package them and expect to be adored. Let’s remember these are very low risk endeavours.

All they did was comment or explain. They wait for the blank piece of paper to be filled.

So here is to the explorers, the risk takers and the originators.The people that make ideas. The people that have ideas.

Here is to being a creative.