differential

There was a lot of press last week when it was announced that Ken Segall, the creative director for TBWA\Chiat\Day who has handled the Apple account for the last 14 years, was retiring. While he didn't come up with the phrase "Think Different" (it came from Art Director Craig Tanimoto), he did guide that campaign which led to Apples turnaround, both internally and externally, beginning back in 1997. He also can claim the name iMac, which was intentionally designed to lead to the names for the iPod, iPhone and who knows how many future iterations of iProducts. I ran across an interesting interview with him today via Twitter, and one phrase stood out more than any other (and will to most anyone who works in a creative/advertising-related field) regarding market research and testing: “Apple in my entire time never tested a thing in print or on TV,” Segall says. “Everybody else tests everything.” Think Different, indeed.

Cult of Mac: Interview: The Man Who Named the iMac and Wrote Think Different