Bloody excellent post. Finally, an evidence-based planner! :)

As everyone flocks to BE and Nudge, this is a very timely post. Rory Sutherland (of whom I'm a big fan) said: "We've aligned ourselves with a recognisable and credible scientific discipline [behavioral economics] which we can use to take on the pseudo-science of accountancy which dominates thinking... behaviorial economics can trump accountancy in terms of scientific credibility in a way that marketing language never did". Everyone seems overly-eager for BE to be "the cure". My trouble with it is that it, too, is a "pseudo-science". A useful tool? Yes. Some great insights and ideas? Yes. But some rock-solid science for taking on accounting? I'm not so sure. I think we need to use Nudge for all it's worth, but recognise that there is no silver-bullet cure for the advertising/marketing world, and that reality remains awfully complicated. We're going to have to muddle through with bits of Nudge, bits of Herd, bits of Blue Ocean, bits of Eat the Big Fiish, etc. It feels like some are hoping for a unified theory of 'how it all works'... which I don't think exists. There is no spoon.