Articles
MFA EX 2023: Weapons of Mass Distinction
Weapons of Mass Distinction
It’s time for media agencies to think more creatively, said Sam Geer, Managing Director, and Chris Colter, Chief Strategy and Product Officer at Initiative, during their MFA EX 2023 session “Weapons of Mass Distinction”.
Why? Because when media is as creative as the creative itself, that’s when it’s most effective. And creating distinctive media devices is the way to achieve it, they said.
Here are the key takeouts:
Make Distinctive Media Devices the Goal
What is distinctiveness? It’s those elements that trigger your memory of a brand and everything it stands for, even when the brand name isn’t right in front of you.
To achieve it, shift the focus from short-term gains to distinctive media devices with long-term potential that you can build equity in.
Think of the Coca Cola billboard at Kings Cross – a 50-year screen investment. Once you have equity and consistency in a device like this, you can give it colour with cultural moments, like Pride or The Matildas.
Plan, Prioritise and Protect
Plan
To create distinctive media devices, you need to really understand your brand. Not just Why, How and What, but Where, When and Who they show up for consistently.
Prioritise
Think about which device you’re going to back and prioritise over the long term.
Protect
Don’t measure yourself short. With a distinctive device, like the Ikea shopping bags, the purpose is to build emotional memory structures and long-term associations, not drive immediate sales.
Set the right measurement agency with your clients – for example, salience over sales, affinity over action.
Evaluate the brand experience
Conduct a brand experience audit on all your clients, looking for any distinctive assets they may already have that are just waiting to be leveraged. Then build a proper launch and protection plan around them.
Watch the video of Chris Colter and Sam Geer’s talk at MFA EX here.
You Might Also Like...
MFA EX 2023: Deconstructing One House
Deconstructing One House
Suncorp’s One House was a ground-breaking initiative in 2021 that proposed a new way to build safer homes in Australia. It won countless awards, achieved 20 million+ impressions, and sparked a national conversation around how we think about our homes.
Getting a project like this to market was never going to be easy, and its success offers inspiration to anyone wanting to get a big idea off the ground, said Lisa Leach, Head of Strategy for Suncorp at OMD, and Caroline Hugall, Chief Strategy Officer at Spark Foundry, during their MFA EX 2023 session.
Here are the key takeaways:
The bigger the idea, the better
The ideas that make you think ‘How the f**k?!” will inspire your best work, said the speakers. And they won’t always come in a brief. Know your client’s business inside out, and you’ll be able to answer a brief they didn’t know they needed.
With a big idea, the speakers stressed the importance of being part of the conversation right from the start. With One House, media were briefed at the same time as creative, and all ideas were presented to the client together.
Make it culturally relevant
When it comes to big ideas, the magic is found in the data, said the speakers. One House was conceived after Australia’s worst bushfires and during the pandemic. People were anxious and their behaviours towards a low-interest category like insurance were changing.
Rather than taking the normal route and presenting a campaign around risk stats, One House offered a solution – a proactive move that homeowners, builders and government could get behind at a time when it really mattered.
Consider how you’ll tell the story
The One House story couldn’t be told through short-form content and the usual 15- or 30-second slots. So, the agency found a new way to tell it – the One House documentary, which captured the public’s imagination and conveyed the full narrative.
For more insights from Lisa Leach and Caroline Hugall’s talk at MFA EX, watch this video.
You Might Also Like...
MFA EX 2023: A Media Marriage Crisis
A Media Marriage Crisis
An agency-client relationship is like a marriage. It requires communication, trust, honesty and a commitment to see things through.
But we’re entering a relationship rough patch, said Mitchell Long, National Head of Strategy at PHD, Pia Coyle, Sydney Managing Director at PHD, James Ledger, Relationship Consultant AU/NZ at The Client Relationship Consultancy, and Emma Mumford, Marketing Director at Celebrity Cruises during their MFA EX 2023 session.
The average client today is less satisfied than ever with their media agency partner. Client ratings are declining, and negative commentary is on the up. Meanwhile, media practitioners are under more pressure in their roles than ever.
The speakers shared three interesting relationship archetypes they have noticed, and offered advice on how to get things back on track.
The Megxit
Condition: Dissatisfaction
Symptom: Continual and ongoing dissatisfaction
This client suffers from chronic dissatisfaction. Every attempt to move things forward misses the mark.
Solution: Have open and honest dialogue with this client early, and get to the source of their dissatisfaction.
The Kimyes
Condition: Distraction
Symptom: An over-focus on the next big thing
This client’s love of the spotlight and staying on-trend means they’re distracted. All marketing science and past learnings tend are thrown out the window in favour of the latest hot topic or marketing buzzword.
Solution: Anchor the business with a long-term strategy. Consider what fundamental metrics for success look like, and how you anchor yourself on an aligned measurement framework that keeps everyone on track.
The Trumps
Condition: Division
Symptoms: Being pulled in different directions with no unified agenda
Underlying the relationship is a fundamental division in the agenda and priorities. Conflicting, often counter-intuitive, briefs coming from different factions are the norm.
Solution: Align all the different factions around the overarching OKRs. This could look like portfolio strategy work where you streamline all those briefs and get to the core of what you should be prioritising.
Get more great relationship insights from this talk in this video.
You Might Also Like...
MFA EX 2023: Eat Risk for Breakfast
Eat Risk for Breakfast:Weird Partnerships & Why They Work
Diesel and Durex? KFC and Crocs? Wacky brand partnerships are a risk worth taking, creating talkability and bringing brands to whole new audiences, said Jennifer Lohan, Communications Executive at Match & Wood in her Inspiration X session at MFA EX 2023.
Why do weird partnerships work? Because they are totally unexpected and bring two unrelated worlds together. They shake things up, start conversations, and help boost brand fame across old and new audiences. So don’t let shrinking media budgets and cluttered ad space stop you from thinking outside the box, said Lohan.
Here are the key takeaways:
Stay on the pulse of emerging trends
When vodka pasta took social media by storm thanks to supermodel Gigi Hadid, Heinz spotted an opportunity. They took a risk partnering with Absolut Vodka and entering the pasta sauce market, and it paid off.
Heinz x Absolut Vodka tomato vodka pasta sauce was a viral sensation, achieving 500 million impressions on social media and a 52 percent sales uplift for Heinz pasta sauce.
Avoid the f**king obvious
Heinz is typically associated with family, so it’s safe to say that Absolut was not top of their partner list. It’s a truly unexpected union, which is why audiences loved it.
Make it make sense
The target audiences of Heinz and Absolut couldn’t be further apart, but the brands could see how a partnership would be mutually beneficial. And from Heinz’s perspective, it wouldn’t have worked with any other brand – Absolut is trusted and instantly recognisable on a global scale.
You can watch the video of Jennifer Lohan’s talk at MFA EX here.
You Might Also Like...
MFA EX 2023: How AI can prompt a more Inclusive Media Industry
How AI can Prompt a More Inclusive Media Industry
Above all other forms of technology, AI will have the biggest influence on society in the future, predicted Toby Maclachlan, Head of Creative Strategy at Initiative and NBCS, during his Inspiration X session at MFA EX 2023. And the less we fear it and the more we try to understand and leverage its potential for good, the better.
AI is only as good as the data we feed it, so let’s give it a better diet. “That starts with prompts – and it starts with you,” he said.
Here’s how:
Change your POV
Start thinking about the voice not in the room, because it’s that voice that echoes through every touch point and experience thereafter. Get AI to critique your work from different perspectives so you can spot opportunities for inclusivity that could be hiding in plain sight. Reframe your perspective, and together we can retrain as a collective.
Stretch your legs
The first rule of marketing is you’re not the customer. Prompt AI to walk in someone else’s shoes from a customer perspective. See, hear and read what they do in order to build empathy. When you build empathy, you create space for more meaningful conversations.
Show don’t tell
Change the prompts. Use presentation visuals to show the potential you want to see. Because the way things have always been done isn’t how they always have to be. Take women’s football as an example: we have a whole generation of kids coming up who see the game first, not the gender. Use better prompts and visuals to retrain the systems so that historical biases remain in the past.
Check out the video of Toby Maclachlan’s MFA EX session here.