She also shares why she is now focused on the next frontier of growth: Connected commerce and making sure brands show up when AI agents, not just people, are making purchasing decisions. 

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

This week we're joined by Natalia Ball Global Chief Growth Officer at Mars Pet Nutrition home to brands like Pedigree and Sheba.

Damian Fowler (00:18):

Last March, pedigree launched a bold, purpose-driven campaign in Brazil celebrating mixed breed dogs, especially the iconic Vela Caramelo.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:27):

It wasn't just a campaign, it became a movement boosting adoption and challenging long held bias.

Damian Fowler (00:35):

The work went on to win top honors at the 2025 cans. Lions including the titanium lion

Ilyse Liffreing (00:41):

And its impact is still rippling across markets and media channels worldwide.

Damian Fowler (00:45):

So today we're unpacking what made it work with the person who helped drive it. Natalia, tell us about the Carello campaign and how you landed on the idea.

Natalia Ball (00:57):

Carmelos are mixed dogs that are beloved in Brazil. They are found on the streets everywhere. They are the subject of meme, street culture, and people just identify Carmelo as the Brazilian dog. However, the inside that we discover was that this dog is 90% less likely to get adopted than breed dogs. So it is the most popular dog in Brazil, but the most overlooked. And when we learned about that, we decided that we wanted to make a difference and that we wanted this dog to get the position it deserve and pedigree decided to champion the underdog and become the official brand of caramel's in Brazil.

Damian Fowler (01:41):

You talked about the caramel. Could you just describe a little bit more for people who don't really know the caramelo and that term Vita, where does that come from?

Natalia Ball (01:52):

Yes, so caramels are basically mixed breed dogs that you can find on the streets of Brazil everywhere they are called caramel because they are caramel color and that's what it is in Spanish and they tend to be that caramel color, short hair. But there are different ways that these dogs look and feel because they are mixed breeds. But like I said, they are beloved dogs in Brazil, but when it comes to getting a pet, getting a dog, they are not the ones that people are going for. They see them as street dogs, not a dog that you have in your house. And the whole campaign was about, like I said, championing these caramels, driving adoption of mixed breed dogs, not only breed dogs. And we did that by saying that if caramels were considered non breeded, pedigree was going to give them a breed and who better to give them a breath than pedigree.

Ilyse Liffreing (02:48):

Great. And then at what point did you connect that insight to the campaign itself?

Natalia Ball (02:54):

What you need to know about pedigree? Pedigree is one of the largest dog brands in the world. Pedigree feeds more dogs than any other brand, and it has been there for many years and for the past 20 years or more, pedigree has been driving adoption, encouraging people to adopt pets everywhere. We have had a lot of iconic campaigns so much which maybe you would've heard, like for example, docs on Zoom during COVID or the child replacement program, which was a very interesting one. And we were talking about adoption in Brazil, but other local brands were talking about adoption too. So we were not cutting through and it was only when this insight came to us, which was a very deeply local insight that we made the connection, if we want to drive adoption in Brazil, this is going to be the way in and we're going to make this as big as it can possibly be.

(03:51):

Because we, from the very beginning saw we understood this idea of the vi Lata. You mentioned it before by the way, the vi lata is how you call mixed breed dogs in Brazil. And so when we had these conversations about this insight, the injustice of this beautiful dog not getting adopted, but also the cultural impact that it would have on resilience themselves, who could see themselves related in the fact that they were being championed, we decided to go really big on this campaign and not only do just an activation, but actually we are doing this campaign. We did it all of last year and we continue activating through this year. And some of the ways in which we championed this was actually by creating a caramel kennel club by creating the first ever caramel DNA testing. And it's the largest ever DNA test done in mos in all of history, kept creating a Carmelo dog show and not only that, putting caramels for the very first time ever on our packs. So it was really a way to give them the rightful place.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:01):

I love how you guys just took it a step further than even just it being a campaign and you actually adopted it into your packaging and the whole bit. At what point did you realize that the campaign wasn't only just a marketing ploy and it began actually affecting culture?

Natalia Ball (05:23):

Yeah, I mean this campaign has really changed culture in Brazil, but it was a campaign that was deeply rooted in culture itself because Carmelos were part of Brazilian culture. But when we realized the campaign became bigger than ourselves, absolutely. When it started driving difference in adoption of Carmelos, we saw more than 200% lift of caramelo adoption just in the first month. And we saw a 65% increase in likelihood to adopt a Carmelo in the future with this campaign. And then when we started seeing other brands and other businesses even outside of the pet care category start using the Carmelo in their campaigns in their advertising, that's when we knew this had really hit culture big. An example of that was Chevrolet that actually launched a partnership with Netflix that launched a documentary about caramel, and several launched a caramel or a caramel colored car in a promotion.

(06:29):

Other brands like Honda or Whirlpool also feature caramels in their advertising. So we started seeing that this became much bigger than ourselves, but maybe the biggest achievement that we had with this campaign other than driving adoption itself, which was the cost at the end of the day, was the fact that we were betting on the mixed pre-doc actually not being accepted in dog shows because only breed dogs are accepted usually in dog shows. But at the end of the day, the movement became so big that after only two weeks of this campaign, the federation that actually controls the dog shows called us and said, we now want to move to accept mixed breed dogs in all of our shows. So that was a huge achievement that we never knew it would be possible.

Damian Fowler (07:18):

What's really interesting to me about this campaign is the way you focused on one region, one country, one market, but obviously you're a global brand. So how does that connection to the local end up escalating? So it became this global campaign.

Natalia Ball (07:35):

Like I said, adoption is a huge cost for us, and we have been very consistently on pedigree, driving adoption for a long time. So we have an evergreen brief that goes out to all of our agencies on adoption, and in my case in particular, I am a strong believer in creative excellence as a driver for growth. And so I put a creative excellence program in place that included building capabilities on creative excellence, but also creating a creative council where the best ideas could come faster to the marketing leadership of Mars Pet Nutrition so that we could move at speed, but also we could fund the better ideas. And in this creative council DL map team, Al Map VO, who are the agency that came up with this idea presented Carmelo. And from the very beginning, me and the whole leadership team fell in love with it, and so we decided to fund it.

(08:31):

We decided to go big and to give it our full support. We knew it had the potential to drive the business and change culture, and I think in this case, the important thing about the campaign, obviously it did a lot of good. So it's a purposeful campaign and pedigree is a purposeful brand, but it was not only about the purpose, it was also about driving business results. Through the campaign in the first couple of months, we were able to grow 15% and through all of last year, we moved to grow volume and value by double digits. So the campaign really did the job about turning around the pedigree brand and delivering results not only on the cost but also on the business.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:11):

That's great. And you're doing something right when all the other brands out there are copying you guys suddenly in pop culture and everything like that. I'm very curious about as the campaign evolved, obviously it started out from a social aspect, but as it evolved, how did you decide what other channels to bring it into? What other channels did you try out in this process?

Natalia Ball (09:42):

Yes. Actually this campaign started as social first and we then boosted with media. The way it started is we partner with local influencer called Tata Vernick. She loves caramels and she herself has adopted caramels. And we asked her to register her caramel in a dog show because we knew that her caramel was going to get rejected, which it did. And so she posted on her Instagram that had 60 million followers that she was outraged that her beautiful and smart caramelo could not be accepted in a dog show. This went viral immediately in Brazil and everybody was outraged. This went on the evening news, the morning shows everywhere, and we waited for it to gain enough fire for us to step in. So actually we were planning that this was going to take a couple of days, but at the end we had to act after only 10 hours because this became so big so quickly.

(10:41):

And we step in and we said, you know what, Tata, don't worry. Pedigrees got you. We're going to give all caramels a breed. And we launched the campaign with our beautiful campaign video that talks about our program of giving them a DNA test, giving them a show, giving them a kennel club and giving them everything that breed dogs have. And then after that, we use that video and we boost the message. The video went viral as well, but we boost the message, for example, with connected TV as well as Prime and Disney, et cetera. So in order to make sure that everybody had listened to it, but it was truly an omni-channel approach because we use a lot of offline tools like for example, the dog show itself that we created or the adoption drive that we had later on where we were invited people to adopt caramels and then online tools like Instagram or Connected TV or Disney, et cetera.

Damian Fowler (11:38):

You suggested that the kind of timeline got really sped up really fast. So this thing you had to act very quickly. At what point did you realize you had a hit on your hands in a way, and how quickly did it escape the local context and became this bigger campaign that everyone looked at?

Natalia Ball (12:01):

Yeah, this exceeded all of our expectations. So we knew that it was going to get picked up, but like I said, we were not expecting for this to become so big so fast. And the fact that it appeared in all of the big shows, evening news, morning shows, et cetera, it appeared as well on national media, on print Everywhere meant that we needed to step in faster, but we were fully prepared for that. So that didn't represent the challenge. It was more of an opportunity. And then the other thing that really surprised us was that the largest dog association reached out to us after only 24 hours to partner to see how mixed beat dogs could then be allowed to compete. We were not expecting this. We were expecting actually that to be attention point that we were going to leverage in our campaign, and this became so big that they just couldn't ignore it. So it was a big win just from the very beginning.

Damian Fowler (12:57):

Wow.

Natalia Ball (12:57):

Now one of the things that we're seeing is even though this was very, very local, as we have started sharing this work across many other places in the world, we have realized that the insight actually exists in many other markets. For example, in Chile they have a dog called the Quilter, which is the equivalent of the caramel. We have them in Philippines, we have them all over the world. So this insight can travel. The way to activate might be different because you need to localize to the nuance, but we are very excited about the potential of drive more inclusion of these dogs with these campaigns, but also for pedigree to stand stronger in culture.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:36):

I love that. As a dog owner, myself and owner of a mutt, I'm glad they're getting their time in the spotlight a little bit more around the world. Generally, I feel like post COVID in the marketing world today, some brands have actually moved away from purpose-driven marketing a little bit, but this is a really good example of it done right. What would you say this campaign proved or maybe disproved about purpose-led marketing?

Natalia Ball (14:04):

I am a strong believer of purposeful brands actually growing stronger, but it only works when it's aligned truly and authentically to the reason for the brand to exist. Pedigree itself, the purpose of the brand is we believe that dogs bring out the best in us, and pedigree wants to bring out the best in dogs. So the purpose of pedigree is pedigree brings out the good dogs bring to the world to do that. We obviously do that with our great nutrition, but we do that by putting dogs in houses so that they can bring out the best in people. That's what we do because we strongly believe that dogs make us better. So that's why we have been driving adoption for more than 20 years. And when you really make this part of your core DNA and it's authentically linked to the brand, that's when it really works.

Damian Fowler (14:56):

And one of the proof points of that is the awards that you scooped up last year. Can you tell us a little bit more about how that happened? And that must have happened quickly because the campaign rolled out in March, 2025 by June, you're already in the spotlight.

Natalia Ball (15:13):

Yes. So this campaign was picked up for a lot of awards at Cannes last year. We won the Rainbow, silver, gold and Titanium. The titanium we are very excited about because it's Mars Inc. First ever titanium. So we are really proud of that, and it's also an award that rewards transformation in the creative industry, and we believe this idea was transformational. We're also proud of, I mean, we've got the many other awards, but the other one that we're really proud of is that we got the Grand Phy in the latam phy and in the Brazil phy, which shows that this was not only a creative idea that was very strong, but also a very effective idea in driving the business. So you can achieve both. You can do good in the world, you can drive the business and you can be creative actually. So it's three.

Damian Fowler (16:03):

Yeah, that's great. I love that trifecta. What happens to the titanium award?

Natalia Ball (16:09):

Well, I have it right here

Ilyse Liffreing (16:10):

With me.

Damian Fowler (16:12):

No

Ilyse Liffreing (16:12):

Way. Very nice. Beautiful here. It's beautiful.

Damian Fowler (16:16):

Beautiful. Well, congrats again. So from that, obviously momentum has come on. We've talked a little bit about how it influenced other brands, but in terms of the campaign continuing, what's next? How are you thinking about expanding this?

Natalia Ball (16:33):

In Brazil itself? We want to stay committed to this idea. We don't want to do one and go, and we are working, we continue activating the campaign through all of our channels. We continue doing adoption drives. For example, very recently we released the results from the DNA research that we did. So we find ways to keep this relevant. But now I think the next stage is to move on from not only caramels but all mixed breed dogs. Because with this campaign, the sentiment has been extremely positive. We got 99% positive sentiment. The only 1% negative comments was what about the other mixed breed dogs? They also deserve to be adopted. They also deserve recognition. So I think that's probably where we're taking it next in Brazil and then outside of Brazil, we are working on, like I said, these inside travels very well, but we're working on how to localize it in a world that feels authentic for the specific markets. I can't share anymore. Stay tuned, because some interesting things are coming soon.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:44):

And it sounds like that theme is going to keep going with this idea of all putting mutts in the spotlights from now on too.

Natalia Ball (17:54):

Exactly, yes. This is about inclusion. At the end of the day, our hope is that mutts are shown everywhere. We also love breed dogs. They're great. All dogs deserve to be feature everywhere. So our hope is that this campaign will drive inclusion, inclusion in advertising, inclusion in homes, inclusion everywhere.

Damian Fowler (18:16):

Another thought I had actually is when you were filming this campaign, did you have any standout caramelo stars?

Natalia Ball (18:22):

Actually, actually, I think our biggest star was Patas Caramel, which we then did a lot of things with her, I think. I mean, I don't record very well, but I think it was Mia, her name, but we did a lot with her in our activation. She was present when we did the dog show, et cetera. So I think that was our biggest star.

Ilyse Liffreing (18:43):

Oh, that's great. It can't always be that easy to shoot with dogs though, even if they're very well-trained, I imagine it's still a different world than human actors. So Natalia, what problem are you most obsessed with solving right now?

Natalia Ball (18:59):

I am right now obsessed with agentic commerce and agentic search and winning the race to that

Ilyse Liffreing (19:08):

Because

Natalia Ball (19:09):

I'm really concerned that in only a couple of years, if we are not winning, we will completely disappear the way all decisions are going to be made. So together with my team, we're trying to figure out how do we stay ahead of that race and how do we crack it pretty soon, so we're ready future.

Ilyse Liffreing (19:26):

Wow. And just to press you a little bit more on that, so you're talking about probably using agents on your website directly.

Natalia Ball (19:35):

It's about we are very good about marketing to people. We have cracked the code on how do we talk to people. We have the best insights in pet care, so we know how to create compelling stories that humans will listen to, but we need to crack how to market to agents, how to market to the machine because they are going to be making a lot of decisions for us in the future, in the very near future. And that's what we're working on.

Damian Fowler (20:05):

You're talking about media buying specifically on the creative side of it

Natalia Ball (20:12):

Or the LLM. This is about how do you make your brands show up in searches that are being done on ai? This is how do you make your brands be the ones that get recommended to be bought? So for example, when you're on Cha G PT and you're asking Cha G pt, I got a new puppy, what brands should I buy for my puppy? We want our brands to be the first ones to be recommended if you are going to buy a gift, anything like that, we want our brands to show up and we want our brands to show up in good light. And so that's what we're trying to figure out and to win. There is a combination of how do you have the right content in the right places? How do you get the right third parties to talk about you in the right way? What are the media channels where you need to show up? How do you optimize your search? So it is a very complex way. We need to crack the algorithm basically.

Damian Fowler (21:12):

On that point, how do you ensure your marketing teams have the right capabilities for success?

Natalia Ball (21:19):

Well, that's a big priority for me as CGO is one of my main jobs is to make sure that we're building capabilities for today and for the future. So in my team, we have a strong capabilities program where each and every one of the people on my team owns a capability and owns making sure that we get best in class content training and as well as the tools, because it's not only the knowledge, it's also the tools in order to do that. But the reality is that none of this works unless you are creating a culture of curiosity. And I really want to instill that in myself and in my teams because the industry is changing so fast. The minute you think you have cracked something, there is a new challenge. And the only way to stay fresh, the only way to stay in line with what's happening is to be curious. Whenever you don't know anything, go and ask someone who knows, go and ask questions like really try to learn instead of fearing the change, be curious about the change, and that's the way that we will build future proof capabilities.

Ilyse Liffreing (22:22):

Beyond ai, how do you see the role of connected commerce in the pet industry? Are there any other channels, for instance, that you're testing out? I'm thinking of are you testing shopping ads on CTV or any of that?

Natalia Ball (22:40):

Connected commerce is extremely important for us in pet care. The reason for that is because this category is one of the highest engagement categories that there are out there. People are making decisions for living beings, and they need to do deep research in order to make those decisions because they have real consequences. And so people are very engaged in reading through rating and reviews, and connected commerce gives us an opportunity to connect better with pet parents in those moments that matter most. We also, when it comes to pet care, a lot of our products come in huge bags that are hard to carry. So actually the fact that the convenience of those bags getting delivered at home make so that digital commerce becomes really important in our category. And so what we're trying to is to really help consumers navigate the pet parent journey and moving from content to commerce in a seamless way so that they can make the best decisions for their pets and that we are helping them along the journey to make those decisions.

Damian Fowler (23:46):

Okay, here's another, what's one marketing rule? This campaign, the Caramelo campaign happily ignored.

Natalia Ball (23:52):

The one rule that we happily ignore is about keeping your distinctive memory structures consistent because pedigree has always had a golden retriever on its pack. But with the Caramel campaign, we thought that it would be hypocritical of us to feature a breed dog while we were championing a mixed breed dog. So for the first time ever in history, we changed our pack and we feature a caramel, and this made the news again. And this was a huge bold move that we made and that made the campaign even more authentic and more powerful.

Ilyse Liffreing (24:28):

Now we have a fun one for you. Personal one really. Are dogs better than cats when it comes to brand lift?

Natalia Ball (24:36):

Oh, when it comes to brand lift, well, actually both are great for brand Lift. We actually have studies that show that when you feature cats or dogs in advertising, attention significantly increases emotional connection, significantly increases. This is why you see a lot of brands that are not in the pet care space featuring cats and dogs. They are both fantastic. Cats are more powerful in meme culture, as you probably know. They are huge in meme culture. And then dogs are some of the biggest stars in social media today. Some of the biggest accounts on social media are dogs accounts. So we are lucky that we get to work in this beautiful category because people want to see dogs and cats. I myself have a dog. My dog's name is Bella. She's been with us for three years and she's great. But the more I work in this category, the more I'm falling in love with cats as well because they are so particular and so unique. So yeah, both are fantastic.

Damian Fowler (25:45):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (25:47):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (25:54):

And remember,

Natalia Ball (25:55):

You can do good in the world, you can drive the business, and you can be creative.

Damian Fowler (26:00):

I'm Damian.

Ilyse Liffreing (26:01):

and I'm Ilyse

Damian Fowler (26:01):

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

He joins The Big Impression podcast to explain how the iconic Italian brand is reclaiming its spot in the performance market. By leaning into a challenger brand mindset during the Paris 2024 Olympics — without the price tag of official sponsorship — Gnocchini and his team are shifting the focus from nostalgia to high-performance innovation.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler, and welcome to this edition of The Big Impression. Today, we're looking at how a heritage sportswear brand carved out its own spotlight at the Paris 2024 Olympics without being an official sponsor. My guest is Antonio Gnocchini, Chief Marketing Officer at Diadora, the iconic Italian brand known for its made in Italy craftsmanship. In the lead of the Paris, Antonio and his team launched a global brand campaign built around Diadora's roster of Italian athletes from Trackstar, Larissa, Yapacino, defensers and speed skaters, all while showcasing innovations like the Atomo Running Shoe. That's the first high mileage running shoe made in Italy in three decades. We're going to break down how Diadora timed its campaign to maximize the Olympic moment, how it differentiates itself from giants like Nike and LVMH, and what this strategy says about building awareness in a crowded high-stakes marketing landscape. So let's get into it.

(01:07):

Antonio, can you tell us about why the Paris Olympics was such an important moment for Diadora as it sought to elevate its brand name again?

Antonio Gnocchini (01:18):

So if you are a multi-category sport brand, Olympics is certainly the big event, the main event, your main catwalk of the main show. And you prepare for it for a long time because you need to be in one of the most competitive environment with the best product, competitive athletes. Everything needs to be perfect. And it's also one of those moments in which you can go deeper with attention, with messages. If you are serious about sport and you want to communicate, sport brand values, what you really stand for, it's not easy, especially today in moments in which the attention is not much, few seconds from everybody. Channels are very fast and flattened messages very easily. The Olympics is a moment in which for a few weeks you have the attention. You have people connected and engaged. You have people who care. And so it's a perfect environment to talk again about what you stand for.

(02:41):

And so going back to the Olympics was a statement to say, we actually are a competitive sport brands, a performance brand, not only lifestyle of it. And so yeah, it was such an important environment for us. Also, these Olympics was maybe one of the first ones that I've seen since I started doing this job when you could see some challengers brands activating and being visible.

(03:15):

In the past, this was really an event only for main sponsors and official sponsors mostly. Now this is a moment of challengers. And if you find the right way and if you had a good connection with your outlets, you could be doing a successful marketing campaigns and actions.

Damian Fowler (03:35):

That's really interesting to hear you say that. And I think, and I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this. Is the kind of media environment that we exist in now, does that make it possible for challenger brands to find a way to reach audiences that they otherwise might not be able to find back when it was the main TV channels and big glossy mags, there are more niches now in many ways.

Antonio Gnocchini (04:00):

There's a very interesting report that Business of Fashion and McKinsey release every year. And the most recent one was a study from McKinsey, which they were showing displaying how the sport market, which was dominated by only few incumbents. And you could see that at Olympics, still today, the most recent one, the usual suspects are dominated most of the sports. But in this past few years, there is a change going on in which incumbents are really under pressure from Challengers brand in the sport industry. They're gaining momentum. Challenges are gaining space, gaining market share, and also visibility. And you can say that maybe this is linked to the explosion of running as a global movement, but it's not only that. Running certainly as contributed, because running is one of those categories that is really extremely democratic. And yeah, sure, track and field main athletes, famous names help, but you can become a successful running brand without having only the most amazing hundred meters runners.

(05:37):

You can be successful by working in other ways. And you see brands starting to become more visible through running in the sport industry.

Damian Fowler (05:47):

What's interesting about Diadora is that it has this very significant legacy as a sports brand. I mean, I think back to my childhood when I used to absolutely love Beyond Borg. And as soon as I saw the name Diadora, I remember Borg. And of course there's other soccer legends like Roberto Baggio or Francesco Totti. But in recent years, it's been a little bit maybe eclipsed by bigger brands that you just mentioned. So you're a challenger brand, but you're also a legacy brand. Could you explain a bit more of the context around the history of the brand?

Antonio Gnocchini (06:24):

If you are passionate about sport, when you land at Diadora and you visit the museum, it is a kid in a candy store. That was my experience at the museum is you could see in real life the objects of desire of your youth. In my bedroom, I had posters of all these heroes and there's a moment, there's a scene in King Richard with Will Smith, in which you hear for a moment in the movie, you hear Venus and Serena Williams coach telling Richard Williams to wait on the Nike offer because the perfect offer for any tennis player at the time was the one Jennifer Capriati was getting from Diadora. When I watched the movie, I was like, whoa. So we wear really the tennis brand and the brand that was in relation with athletes, especially tennis athletes. We were the tennis athletes brand. What happened?

(07:34):

I think that the brand, the company really focused for few decades on product, product marketing, sports marketing contracts, traditional marketing actions. While in the meantime, other brands, other sport brands have become very sophisticated, very innovative in their marketing strategies, films where Nike's main language and they were exciting product of their marketing department. I think the brand here, the Theodo has been focusing on other things and lost the engagement with consumers globally. And then for a few years, as I was saying, the focus had been really on capitalizing on its legacy and becoming more of a lifestyle brand. But in reality, the market can tell you that if you're not serious about sport, you lose your credibility as a lifestyle of sport brand.

Damian Fowler (08:42):

Yeah. So the new campaign or the more recent campaign is about reasserting that sports connection. How else would you define the brand as it is now?

Antonio Gnocchini (08:57):

I think that what we needed to do ... So the first thing that I wanted to do is to prove that the sensation, the feeling that we had was correct. So we run a long and insightful brand health monitor study, and the results of that study was showing that, yes, that we were a legacy brand, people recognized the name, but they couldn't really link it any longer to specific performance product, and they were not buying performance product any longer from the Adora. So we were also associated linked to values like being Italian, but at the same time, it was this idea of romantic Italian, quaint, Italian, traditional. If you want to be successful in sports, you have to talk about innovation, you have to be recognized for your capacity of being a technological advanced company. And so the main effort for us in the beginning was to go back into making sure that our research and development center was up to speed and that the marketing department was capable of telling these type of stories because these stories were in fact very important for our consumer, for our focused consumers, the focus of our target, a younger consumer that wanted to talk about sport, they wanted to be capable also of discovering innovative brand sports.

(10:44):

So even if we were not one of the main incumbents by being authentic in sport, especially in running and in other categories, by being authentic, we could engage with this young consumers who was interested in discovering new brands that have an innovation angle that was really relevant.

Damian Fowler (11:11):

Yeah, that absolutely makes sense. I'm interested to hear you talk a bit more about that audience group that you really wanted to reach and the profile of that group. And presumably there's an element of conquesting going on because you've got to get them from some of the bigger names that we've already talked about.

Antonio Gnocchini (11:29):

Yeah. As I was saying, running has become one of those category, goes beyond just track and field, goes beyond the daily jogger, goes beyond ... It is really something that touches wellness, fashion is playing into running a lot. Everybody is doing running collections today, not just the usual suspects. We wanted to make sure that in this environment in which you had a lot of noise, we could be recognized as authentic, as separate from the noise. So we wanted to talk with a niche and then make sure that that authentic young athlete was putting the mileage out. So it wasn't talking about running, but putting also the miles and the sweat in running. There were those consumers that were scheduling all their weekends around the run, around the race, so the real authentic runner could recognize that we weren't distracted by all this running noise. We were serious.

(12:48):

So our messages were we run a campaign that is called Normalize iMileage that was directed only to that type of consumers that could recognize the acts and the gestures and the typical struggle of that type of runners. Even if that meant alienating for a little bit a wider audience, because we know that with a wider audience, we had less capacity of rich. We didn't have the muscle for them. But we see today that when you are authentic and strong with that type of niche, that niche creates expansion and creates influence, and then you start to resonate also in other markets and with other type of consumers.

Damian Fowler (13:39):

Yeah. Can you talk a little bit more about how you set the stage leading up to Paris to build that buzz that's going to resonate across all these different outlets?

Antonio Gnocchini (13:51):

Yeah. We decided, as you can imagine, getting attention is ex extremely difficult, especially today. The new channels are flattening everything and everything is so few fraction of a seconds between your thumb and in your face, it's very hard to go deeper with messages. And if you want to go deeper, you need to find ways in which you can. And for us, our strategy was, okay, we need to stop their attention, stop their eyes for longer.

Damian Fowler (14:35):

I'm curious now to see, given the kind of media exposure that you started to establish, how did it play out during and after the Olympics, and how did you capitalize on it essentially?

Antonio Gnocchini (14:49):

So we monitor during the main events at the Arsenal, we made sure that all the guests and all the people, all the stakeholders of sport were well-informed and also capable of giving the right message out with the proper information. And then we started collecting and amplify this type of information, then feed them also to our partners in the market, retailers, key accounts. All of this helped us make sure that the product was properly displayed and also was selling out in the right moment in time. And by being nimble and agile and fast, we had a great success on this. The content that we had created, we noticed that they were getting a completion rate of 97, 98%. We never had completion rates so high. So we knew that we had something that was resonating. We only needed to be insisting on it and fasting the reaction by feeding athletes, giving the same content to them, and that's it.

Damian Fowler (16:08):

And you mentioned that 97% completion rate on videos and things like that. That's obviously an important metric. What else did you do to measure brand buzz? And then maybe then how did you connect that to sales?

Antonio Gnocchini (16:21):

Every year we do a brand study, a brand health monitor in order to understand the feeling and how our values are perceived by consumers. If there is any change in what we're doing that is affecting their point of view on the brand. Then we do social monitoring on a daily base, especially when we post and when we have athletes performing our.com and a good connection with key accounts, get us data on results and how what we do resonates on the market. That's pretty much what keep us informed and get us a good understanding of what we're doing.

Damian Fowler (17:05):

How did this push around Paris help define the current market right now? And what does it also tell you about where you should build next?

Antonio Gnocchini (17:15):

It is a confirmation that it is a challenger moment. It is a confirmation that if you establish a conversation with your consumers, you can expand and you can gain market in a market that was completely polarized and dominated by only a few brands. It is also confirmation that if you are authentic, at times, maybe even very vertical in your attack to the market through the category, we don't do every sport. We only are focusing now on few sports, but to do them with authenticity, this is also resonating a lot and you have to be ready for sport moments, which means every sport moment that it's not only Olympics, even minor sport moments, if you're capable of being ready and capitalize on it with your athletes, it's a great tool.

Damian Fowler (18:20):

You talked about using innovation, being on the cutting edge to reach a new generation of fans, but do you also still infuse that with some of the golden age narrative that Diadora has? Yes,

Antonio Gnocchini (18:33):

We do. We balance. We try to balance the messaging in that sense, but I think what I've learned in this past few years here is that this is no longer the sneaker culture generation where you could go and have long session and education and talk about the history of that specific model, and you would have this passionate nerd of Sneakers that would then storytell the whole thing to Hollist friends and everybody were buying into it. Everybody was buying into it. I think every time we preach about our history, every time about we try to give lessons, especially the younger generation, it doesn't seem to be interesting and doesn't like it also. But what we see that they like is what they discover. So we have to be ready with the right information. We have to give them a story that is compelling in term of product, in term of innovation, and then let them discover the history behind it, the art, let's say, the origin of the whole story, and where is this coming from?

(19:54):

So maybe one thing that I'm seeing that it's also a learning is the fact that brands ... I've seen brands just trying to capitalize on the fact that one product story has to be successful because it's linked to this specific moment in time, and you consumers should know about it and should buy about it because of that. It doesn't really resonate to consumer any longer. You need more than that. And so, yeah.

Damian Fowler (20:27):

I love that. I think it's so interesting to hear you say you can't preach to consumers, but you can allow them the opportunity to discover. I think that's such a great insight. I think that goes for any storytelling, to be honest.

Antonio Gnocchini (20:45):

I think you're right, but I think it's specifically more valid now in which I believe that you need to have your story perfect and you need to have the details of your story needs to be really well done. People think that you can simply post in every second and be very fast in making sure that consumers will see fresh things every second, digest it very quickly, and then post new ones. Especially for us, this doesn't prove to be right.

Damian Fowler (21:24):

I had a good guest on this podcast a few editions ago who talked about how brand messaging is in everything, the tactile element of the brand. He used Harley Davidson as an example, it's not just a bike, it's everything you encounter in the showroom, the quality of the materials. And I'm getting that sense when I look at Diadora and the Diadora site that their brand messaging comes through in the product line.

Antonio Gnocchini (21:55):

This is very true and very valid. Again, if you want to be serious in your relationship, in your conversation with that niche audience, it means that every touchpoint, every single touchpoint needs to tell something about that story, otherwise they will immediately perceive that it's not authentic

Damian Fowler (22:21):

Any longer. So let me ask you big picture here. So for marketers listening, what's the lesson here that you can tell? You came from Nike, but now you're at Diadora. So you've seen what the big heavyweight brand has done and can do, but what can a smaller brand learn from your experience, I guess, whether it be about future forward channels like CTV or retail media or programmatic or social? Sorry, let me just ask you ask that more simply. What can a marketer learn from your experience trying to market this, bring this brand back into view? I

Antonio Gnocchini (23:04):

Think the most important thing for us has been to be capable of focusing on doing few things and do them perfectly, or at least as perfect as we could do. You are challenged to be very active and be reactive and also try to capitalize on every single product you have in the line and every sport that is played is an opportunity of doing something. The reality is if you want to start to resonate, you need to establish a valid conversation with your core focused consumers. And to do that, you need focus. And this means also at times being capable of saying no to things that you could be doing or that you get pressure from anybody or everybody in the company to do, and also the pressure from the market many times. Again, let's remember that this was a market in which you were supposed to drop a new product every few weeks, so we don't do that.

(24:23):

And we try to talk about innovation only when we have real innovation to communicate. And then when you do build an authentic story and a strong story with every touchpoint connected in the right way, this to me proved to be successful.

Damian Fowler (24:44):

Going back to Paris, that was obviously a huge high watermark for sport last year. As you look ahead to next year, is there anything that's on your calendar that's one of those moments where brand and moment have that synchronicity?

Antonio Gnocchini (25:01):

Olympics is not something that you prepare the season before. So next Olympics is already something that we are studying, preparing for, sweating about. We have to prepare all our innovations. We have to be ready with the right messaging. We have to find the right athletes, and we have to have a strategy on what type of messages we want to focus on. So LA Olympics is certainly something that we look at and we dream of.

Damian Fowler (25:40):

Let me turn to the last section here and just ask you some quick fire questions, if I may. One of the things I wanted to ask you is, is there a sports marketing trend that you think is overrated?

Antonio Gnocchini (25:51):

Maybe there is something that is a bit underrated, which is the fact that some lesser known sport events and maybe not the main athletes, but the local athletes, they are underrated. You can build excellent engaging campaign through those.

Damian Fowler (26:17):

What matters more in the next five years? Heritage, innovation, or cultural storytelling?

Antonio Gnocchini (26:24):

If I may try to put them in order, I would say cultural storytelling for me, then innovation and then heritage. If you do cultural storytelling well, I think your legacy, your heritage is probably already well told in there, but I think that you, again, it's a moment in time which I will never stop stressing the fact that you need to be capable in storytelling properly.

Damian Fowler (26:57):

Is there anything missing in the ad marketplace today that you perceive?

Antonio Gnocchini (27:01):

Data that goes beyond just the reach of a campaign. And even the reach at times is not really ... And not everything is so perfect and reliable. If you could find a way ... You remember where you were studying marketing and the sentence from Wanamaker, I don't know which half of my money spent is wasted. I go back to that. I've been promised by these new tools and these new digital tools that I will know better, but it seems that to be capable of really reading through the noise and getting valuable data that goes just beyond rich, it's still hard and it's still at times not that reliable. And then the other thing is I see an inflation in the attention economy that makes me think that I need to find new ways and new channels and not only finding great storytelling. The reality is my stories, if I even have a great way of telling, if even when I have a great story, at times I need to change it and distort it in order to be played in these new environments, in new digital channels.

(28:40):

These channels at times distort the values of my brand, and I want that not to happen. So I need to find better ways and better channels.

Damian Fowler (28:55):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression. This show is produced by Molten Heart. Our theme is by Love and Caliber and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns. And remember.

Antonio Gnocchini (29:04):

I think the most important thing for us has been to be capable of focusing on doing few things and do them perfectly.

Damian Fowler (29:15):

I'm Damian, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today, we're joined by Liam Kristinnsson, head of programmatic partnerships at Dish Media, where he's helping shape how the company connects advertisers with premium audiences across both linear and digital environments.

Damian Fowler (00:23):

Dish has been pushing hard into the programmatic space. From Dish Connected, it's addressable solution across the ecosystem to Advantage, which links programmatic buying with linear inventory in real time. It's all part of a broader move to bring automation and accountability to advanced TV.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:39):

We'll talk with Liam about how Dish is tackling fragmentation, what premium really means in a mixed green world, and where the next phase of programmatic growth is headed.

Damian Fowler (00:51):

So let's get into it.

Liam Kristinnsson (00:57):

Dish Connected has really revolutionized our product in the marketplace. We've been able to convert an additional four million to five million households into tangible CTV devices across real-time bidding systems across the industry. And it's kind of given us a leg up against some of our more linear competition where we now have full autonomy over our inventory and can enable and provide transparency downstream to any client.

Damian Fowler (01:28):

That's amazing. I mean, there was a moment there where there was a sort of either all linear or CTV, but this is something that's kind of connecting those

Liam Kristinnsson (01:38):

Two worlds. I think this is the start of the convergence. I know it probably truly started post-pandemic, I would say, but the reality is now that what is perceived as underutilized impression-based audiences are now becoming tangible and kind of overlapping with their traditional legacy linear purchases. And there's much more value to it because we are not enabling people to find attribution in a more roundabout extrapolated way, but we can provide meaningful real time results to third party attribution vendors or measurement vendors.

Damian Fowler (02:20):

And that brings us to Advantage, which you introduced in May to Power Programmatic and Linear at the same time. Could you tell us a little bit more about that?

Liam Kristinnsson (02:30):

Yeah. So the beauty of Advantage is it really expands upon what we've already built for Programmatic in Disconnected, but it provides solutions across the whole suite of products we have. Our addressable business can tap into real-time kind of innovations, real-time optimizations against audiences, ensure that we are better delivering across the target audience and finding that incremental reach that in the past may have been next to impossible to verify. And now we have all that inventory in one place. It's kind of like a grocery store when I think the industry has become accustomed to going to a bodega. That's very New York with me, I understand. I like that. But sometimes bodegas have eggs, they have a deli, they might have milk, but they might not always have milk and seltzer and all the little things that you want on a day-to-day basis. And the reality is something lacking when it comes to you being able to actually fill your fridge.

(03:35):

Now we have all those components that the customer or the client is looking for.

Damian Fowler (03:40):

Yeah. I like that analogy.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:41):

It's a good one. Yeah, no, I like that. And now Liam, I'm curious about the advertisers you're working with. Is there a new segment of buyers that Programmatic is really opening the door to here? What is basically your sense of that cohort?

Liam Kristinnsson (03:58):

Yeah, I think it really has grown overnight programmatic in general, but I think it allows us to have expanded exposure across all clients that are looking for that more meaningful kind of results. I think we are seeing a lot of success in generating a lot of traction across the CPG world, the direct to consumer world. And I think we're finding a nice overlap from a category perspective of what we traditionally looked at as direct IO or addressable business, but maybe not all those brands or clients in maybe like a pharmaceutical vertical would tap or earmark dollars for commitments early in their planning phase. Now they have the liberty and the luxury to find that right audience and enable dollars downstream where we're just not hunting in that lane and now we can kind of, instead of spreading ourselves thin, the technology can enable us to really kind of tap into all those brands, whether it be the CPG or the pharmaceuticals.

(05:05):

Now on the CPG side, I would double down further. I think because in the linear world, traditionally there's a level of fragmentation when you were to buy linear and you're only getting a percentage of the marketplace. Now the transparency and data that we're passing downstream really changes that, right? Because now these CPG brands are looking to trade off their kind of gross rating points, but kind of understand, all right, am I serving a family that would buy my products? And now we're freeing up the inventory and making it available to those brands that maybe were not always keen on addressable or linear didn't provide enough eyeballs. We're compensating for that with the data we're

Ilyse Liffreing (05:49):

Providing. Do you have an example of a brand you're working with?

Liam Kristinnsson (05:52):

Yeah. So I mean, more specifically, even though that wasn't in some of the categories I called out, there was one or two major financial brands that we've been able to elevate our profile quite significantly with and then partner with them around some of their initiatives on the backend. And I think it kind of shows some of the flexibility that a publisher can now provide brands that I don't think they ever associated with a conglomerate or a media company like ourselves.

Damian Fowler (06:23):

On that point, there is a perception that the space is fragmented and that there's linear here and then there's streaming here. Do you think that that is changing that perception, maybe thanks to some of the work that you're doing?

Liam Kristinnsson (06:36):

I think that's a lot of our goal. I think that we are simplifying the process and enabling a household or a device level, right? And the device level tends to be at the unique user level and we have the ability to kind of triangulate that and make sure that we're providing good and strong data down to our partners. I think that as a marketplace holistically, I think the fragmentation has changed and I think a lot of that's around some consumer behavior that has changed or specifically around the way consumers are watching more free content or there's pockets where they're not required to provide a subscription. And I think that there's still a gap there and we do have some front porch access to our apps, but we are looking on our end to continue to develop and then enable through Advantage how we can kind of provide those, specifically those returning viewers, that clean look to the advertisers on the back end and really kind of leveraging deterministic data and first party signals to really define that audience more cleanly in some ways that competitors of ours maybe can't do.

Ilyse Liffreing (07:53):

Overall, how would you describe your measuring the success of these programmatic partnerships?

Liam Kristinnsson (08:00):

Yeah. So I think that that's a really unique place because that's something that has been our bread and butter. We have our own targeting and attribution team. They've worked very diligently on the direct IO side. I think a lot of the legacy information that they've been able to provide clients and the insights and the ways that we've been able to either cut our inventory or kind of group or the target audiences for these clients have helped demonstrate the programmatic partners the value in not just our audience, which I think is somewhat being underserved because Dish tends to be middle America and maybe they have less apps or maybe they leverage less apps. So they have been underserved. We have a legacy of success around specific verticals and we're able to kind of provide that to these brands. I think the challenge is it's a little bit of a black hole sometimes of how they tie it back to each other.

(08:56):

And I think there needs to be a little bit more assistance on our end. And by us, I mean the royal we across the industry of like providing some of those insights that I kind of alluded to earlier, whether it's, are we targeting and talking about unique users? Are we looking at success at a household level? And there is some innovation that's required there in the industry, but I think what we're doing is really at the forefront of enabling that.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:23):

Are there any particular channels that have surprised you in terms of performance or even advertiser adoption?

Liam Kristinnsson (09:31):

Sure. I mean, I think I imagine everybody talks about the success of sports. Sports has been a real catalyst to the boon of CTV enablement in general, but I think that I'd be remiss not to call out that a lot of our entertainment brands have shined, but not in the ways that traditionally they've been leveraged, right? Even though certain pockets of inventory is not super desirable in the marketplace at times, like news, there are a ton of clients that we've seen a lot of traction there and like pick up incremental success and really drive reach by anonymizing the content that they buy and focusing on the audience.

Damian Fowler (10:20):

That's interesting. Is there still some resistance to the idea of being around current affairs and news?

Liam Kristinnsson (10:26):

Yeah. I think I myself came from the website world years ago and I saw firsthand when a certain brand would be next to a certain type of content. And I understand the urgent need to not expose a valuable legacy luxury brand to something that may or may not be bad, right? Yeah. But the reality is often there is a disconnect from the content being consumed and the pod of commercials that's watched, right? Yeah. And while we often, and I'm sure we ... My mother certainly will watch news for hours and hours upon day, which is maybe not healthy for her lifestyle, but I think what's great about it, specifically when she goes to sit down, she is glued in to the TV. And that's something I think that a lot of people are trying to figure out, are people watching? Are they tuned in? Are they walking away?

(11:30):

And that's the black box of advertising, but I know that people that watch news are glued into the TV and consuming the content between segments. It's kind of like sports, right? Yeah.

Damian Fowler (11:43):

I think that's true. And I think that's true across all channels as far as I know people reading digital news as well, but I don't want to go off on a massive digression about news, but anyway. But it is fantastic. Can we pull back and look at the big picture a little bit? And we were wondering if there were any precedents or points of inspiration inside or outside of media that inform how you think about programmatic partnerships at Dish?

Liam Kristinnsson (12:10):

Sure. I mean, I think that back to what I was saying about evolution, I think often in the media industry, we look at things like baseball teams are run today. Not to use a sports analogy. I know you guys are probably sick of them, but- We love sports analogies here. Nelly said the trade death.

(12:32):

But the reality is these days people want home run hitters. And I think back in the day, that's a little bit of a cyclical history. People always want home run hitters and like big stats, but you win championships with diversity. And I think what partnerships means today is not what it maybe meant 12 or 13 years ago. I think there's a ... We're becoming a world where people, we're all playing Tetris and there's a way to make it all fit together if we cooperate and enable each other. So it's not one size fit all fits all. I think there's a lot of small partnerships and that's good for the competition of the industry and it doesn't take away from the value of these big partnerships. And I think I don't think in my time in TV there's ever been more opportunity there than there is today.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:28):

Something we often write about at the current is the value of like premium content versus maybe like user generated. For instance, what would you say is the importance of premium and I guess what kind of premium content is most popular? I mean, you brought up sports, but are there any others?

Liam Kristinnsson (13:50):

Yeah. I mean, I think premium content, I'm sure many people discuss across the course of ad week or just in the industry and in general, how valuable, unique and what's deemed as traditionally primetime TV is. But the reality is it's even more valuable than that because you are in a lot of ways demanding an eclectic audience to watch your spectrum of content and you can't always guarantee that in other places. There is also, sure there's some oversaturation for specific channels and maybe the product that they air, but the reality is it is not what everybody is consuming these days, right? It's Halloween. Everybody can find a bunch of great horror movies or Halloween's coming up, I should say. Everybody could find a bunch of great horror movies across the board, can't always guarantee what is in that content, how glued in they are versus just kind of like, "Oh, it's in season." I think with premium content, specifically around live TV, there's 365 days a year of people competing against each other from a content perspective, but it demands eyeballs.

(15:07):

And I think we're also starting to see a surprising jump in the youth getting app fatigue, I suppose, that is better enabling that premium content to ensure eyeballs there, but they're paying attention and I cannot stress that enough. In a world of a short attention span, they want to know what's going on and they consume

Damian Fowler (15:28):

It. I would almost say it's short form content fatigue to a certain extent. There's something nice about a long form, a game,

Liam Kristinnsson (15:41):

A

Damian Fowler (15:41):

Football game,

Liam Kristinnsson (15:42):

A soccer game, or a movie. To that point, right? I was probably part of the problem with TV from a consumer point of view. I became like a cinephile which didn't help a company's ability to monetize myself, but the more meshed I get into the industry and the more, I don't know, popular I get, the less time I have to go find a film, right? The more time I have to maybe watch a drama about women in New York and I will watch the rerun that I just saw the week before at eight o'clock in anticipation of what's going to happen at nine o'clock, but really because I want to see the reunion or the interview at 10 o'clock, right? So now I'm consuming the same content twice, but I'm even more engaged in the live TV and there's something afterwards that is actually, maybe taped, but it feels live, right?

(16:37):

Yeah.

Damian Fowler (16:37):

And that's the proposition that Dish is getting into. I'd want to ask you, how's Dish Media building on the momentum that you've already created?

Liam Kristinnsson (16:45):

Yeah, I think right now it's what more can we do and how can we keep providing and enabling inventory for the right providers? I think that the assumption in the marketplace for any new product that comes out is, wow, this is it, it's here. 100% of it's enabled. That's never the case, right? It takes a year to ramp up typically for the average product, sometimes as much as three for us. We've been hitting the gas and I think now we're about to go from fifth to sixth speed and really kind of enable our inventory holistically to the marketplace. So for us, it's a little bit of crawl, walk, run from an enablement perspective and with that comes even greater insights into what are they consuming, what's the audience? How do we help define and clean up that audience downstream and then let others maybe do what they do best.

(17:45):

But we are really in a great position to keep kind of growing that and exposing net new insights about users that I'm not sure everybody's contemplating.

Damian Fowler (17:56):

Yeah, I'm sure.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:57):

Very cool. I have a question here about the economy and as you know, and everybody does, it's on kind of shaky ground, you don't know. How do you see spend evolving in the programmatic space at this time?

Liam Kristinnsson (18:16):

Well, I'm glad you asked that. I think there is marketplace concerns about what is happening on the demand side and a lot of them are valid. A lot of them are maybe being overthought perhaps, but I think there's some rocky roads ahead for specific industries, but it presents a unique opportunity. And I think from a publisher perspective, maintaining the value of inventory and the premium content that they have is absolutely a must because we are going to continue to provide insights and improve products that ultimately will provide better outcomes for backend users. If we kind of enable knee-jerk reactive spend, I think that actually goes against the grain of supply path optimization and increasing outcomes holistically under the guise of potentially lower rates or what have you. But I truly believe that if one category is down, another needs to go up. And I think advertising is like a mutual fund like that where I have lived in Europe in the past and there's a phrase in Scandinavia that like, no matter what happens to our small economy, people will advertise beer because somebody will buy it, right?

(19:46):

And I think that's much more universal than just in a few select small countries. And I think in a lot of ways we saw that in the pandemic, right? Direct to consumer brands, a lot more variety of entertainment companies or hardware products or TVs were able to kind of put their best foot forward and give the consumer options, right? And I think it's some of their responsibility to provide those options. What we, the publishers can do is enable and ensure they're getting the right results for the content and fitting them in the content or audiences that they really can get the best out of them, right?

Damian Fowler (20:28):

Absolutely. Okay. We're going to bring this home now with some quick fire questions, right? And here's the first one. What are you obsessed with figuring out right now?

Liam Kristinnsson (20:38):

Well, this might be a little divisive, but I am obsessed with continuing to improve supply path optimization, but I believe that comes with the slow sunsetting of linear. When I got to Dish, we were still primarily, while our bread and butter was addressable, we were still primarily from a percentage basis, linear, right? Since then, we've completely flipped the script. We are by far and away, mostly impression based. And the reality is I think that we are leveraging too many legacy tools to tell and provide stories on outcomes that are not always as accurate as they should be. We live in a world where transparency is key, maybe not full transparency all the time, but enough transparency where I, the client or brand should be getting a return on our investment or understanding why the audience or the content I was targeting is not working for me.

(21:42):

And I think that's, those are the pockets we need to start exploring and understanding, not so much the, how do I understand foot traffic on a day-to-day basis, but not convert that to sales when I'm extrapolating out 32 families, right? So that's really, really what I think needs to happen. And I think there's a lot of work to be done there and it's not going to happen overnight, but it starts here and starts with an advantage really.

Ilyse Liffreing (22:06):

Wow. And why do you think that the slow death of linear, as you said, has to happen for that?

Liam Kristinnsson (22:15):

I shouldn't say it has to happen. I think there is a time and a place for it, right? I think if I'm going to a bodega and I think I want a soft drink, that's their goal is to make sure that the first thing I think of is whatever the product is, but I think that time and a place is actually creating a lot of noise downstream and creating a lot of challenges for folks on the attribution and measurement side to actually understand and holistically look at their media purchases. And I think it's okay to have gross in terms of volume, ways of looking at how media should be purchased and leveraged, but I believe nine out of 10 clients really, they deserve the insights and the understanding of who is buying their products and how we can figure out how to kind of tie that together and improve into the next year.

(23:10):

That's how their products are going to build, especially with some of this like in certain categories. There's maybe too many brands or too little, right? Better data will inform beyond individual clients, but it'll enable people to start unique businesses that can compete in an area where there's clearly a lot of eager consumers,

(23:35):

Right?

Ilyse Liffreing (23:36):

Very cool. What's one piece of wisdom you'd pass on to other media leaders navigating the shift to programmatic?

Liam Kristinnsson (23:43):

Yeah. So I hate to say the same thing twice, but if I were to give one piece of wisdom is value your inventory that is going to be the future of your business and there are ways that you can improve your product and enable and improve a third party client or vendor's product, but racing to the bottom for what is happening tomorrow will not enable you next year. And it's a real concern in the marketplace, but my concern is actually twofold that it doesn't actually just hurt publishers, but it ends up ultimately hurting the brands and the people buying the inventory because they are going to receive exponentially more noise, right? And I think that as an industry with a lot of noise, we should really think about like how we can kind of isolate it into, and harness it into, into actual meaningful outcomes.

Damian Fowler (24:48):

If you could pick one brand that's really nailing programmatic right now, who would it be?

Liam Kristinnsson (24:53):

Without explicitly calling out a unique brand, but I'll give you two types of folks that are really nailing programmatic. One, I think is second tier auto brands where they are unlocking, and I really think Disconnected plays a great role here. They are unlocking and understanding how they can better access inventory for the right audiences, period. That could be isolating and understanding how I could serve ads from a reach perspective across the city of Des Moines, or it can be somebody looking for blonde-haired men that have two boxer dogs. Secondly, and I think this is part of the paradigm shift across the industry. I think there's quite a number of CPG brands that legacy-wise have really had outstanding success reaching mass eyeballs, whether it's through billboards, radio, traditional linear television. But now again, like they are able to fill a void across the whole ecosystem by getting better, more dynamic insights into the audiences that they're selling to, but also they're actually getting insights, period.

(26:13):

Retail data, you're talking about? Retail data, yes. And I think if I'm a chip brand, sometimes I want people to know my name first. And that's great. There's a need for that, but eventually you have to start focusing on how you can get money back from that. It's not just about getting your name out there, or it could be diversified. Maybe your name is out there, but now other names have come in, right? Now, how do you leverage the dynamic component of programmatic to diversify your creative and your ability to deliver to the same audience? It'll change the way we think and look at maybe traditional frequency capping or traditional exposure, but now the brand through Programmatic can really lead the new age of creative storytelling and how people understand or change the way people think they know products.

Damian Fowler (27:13):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:15):

This show is produced by Molten Heart. Our theme is by Love and Caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Liam Kristinnsson (27:22):

And remember ... We're also starting to see a surprising jump in the youth kind of getting app fatigue, I suppose, that is better enabling that premium content to ensure eyeballs there, but they're paying attention.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:37):

I'm Damian. And I'm

Damian Fowler (27:38):

Ilyse. And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

For years, ride-hailing has been optimized for speed, price and efficiency. Jessica Bryndza believes that’s only part of the story. During her tenure as Lyft’s vice president of brand marketing, she focused on reminding people that getting from Point A to Point B can still be personal — shaped by emotion, culture and the everyday moments that happen along the way.

That philosophy is at the heart of Lyft’s new “Check Lyft” campaign, which launched last fall in San Francisco and New York City. The work reframes transportation as something human and choice-driven, not just transactional.  

Bryndza argues that the future of mobility won’t be defined solely by technology, but by how intentional and human the experience feels when you’re actually inside the ride.

“I’ve cried in the back of Lyfts; I’ve laughed with friends,” she says on The Big Impression. “We have this spectrum of emotions.” Rather than treating mobility as a pure utility, Check Lyft taps into those moments — the small trade-offs, the waiting, the savings and the lived reality of getting around a city.”

Bryndza also discusses how Lyft’s founding DNA continues to influence its brand voice, why empathy matters more than ever in the battle for attention and how the campaign comes together across out-of-home, social, in-app and hyperlocal executions, with no “AI slop” in sight.  

“There’s a lot of slop out there,” Bryndza says. “How do we respect our customers enough to not put crappy work in front of them?” 

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're joined by Kate Wik, chief Marketing Officer at the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. The team behind the city's newest brand campaign, which launched in September,

Damian Fowler (00:20):

Las Vegas, is known around the world for its energy, its entertainment, and its edge. But this ladies' campaign takes a closer look at what the city means today beyond the casinos and into its growing identity as a cultural and sports destination.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:34):

We'll talk with Kate about the ideas behind the campaign, how Vegas is connecting with new audiences, and what it takes to evolve one of the most recognizable brands in the world. Q,

Damian Fowler (00:45):

Frank Sinatra. It's okay. You have an unusual role in that you represent a city as an iconic one, but could you tell us about the role?

Kate Wik (00:56):

That's exactly right. So I work for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. Nobody knows what that is or what that means. So really, I shorthand it and I say I am the CMO of four Las Vegas. Las Vegas is my product, which is very unique. It is a city, it's a destination. It's unbelievably dynamic. And what's so unique and thrilling for a CMO of Las Vegas is that our product is always changing, always evolving. If you think back, we were known as the gaming destination. We've evolved into, we're the number one hospitality destination in the US with more hotel rooms than any other destination. And we are the entertainment capital of the world. You've got the world's best artists coming and performing on stages across destination every single night. And we've worked really hard to evolve ourselves into the sports destination as well through a lot of recent things. So really the exciting thing for me in this role is no one day is ever the same. Our product is constantly iterating and evolving, and that is a marketer's dream come true.

Damian Fowler (02:10):

Just on that point about the evolution of the city and the perception of it, how fast has that happened in the last, say, five, 10 years?

Kate Wik (02:20):

Yeah, absolutely. Incredibly fast. And so today we are known as the sports and entertainment capital of the world, but less than 10 years ago, we did not have any sports teams. Yes, sports has kind of always been in our DNA. We'd host major boxing matches in the eighties, NFR we've had for decades. NBA, we hosted their in-season tournament, NBA Summer League, but really it was through infrastructure development that really led to the explosion of sports today. So what I mean by that is we had T-Mobile Arena, which was a joint venture between MGM resorts and a EG that enabled NHL to come to town with the Vegas Golden Knights in 20 17, 20 18, we purchased the WNBA team, which we renamed the Las Vegas ACEs. And so now we've got A-W-N-B-A team. And then in 2020, of course with Allegiant Stadium, we welcome the Raiders. And so now we've got the Las Vegas Raiders, and we are, so actually in four years, we went from having zero professional sports teams to having three, and we're actively working to bring our fourth to town, which is the major league baseball. We're welcoming the Las Vegas a,

Damian Fowler (03:34):

Not to mention Formula One.

Kate Wik (03:36):

Yes, exactly. And Formula One now an annual event on our calendar. So it's a lot. It's a lot. And it creates new reasons to come to Las Vegas for our visitors. And what we found through research actually, is that the sports traveler, number one, we know sports tourism has just exploded the sports traveler. Through our research, we found that it creates a new reason to come to Las Vegas for those that haven't been here before. It creates a reason to explore the destination, see it, consider it, and then ultimately come. And then most importantly, we find that they spend more money than the average leisure traveler. So it's a really rich new audience for Las Vegas. And F1 has definitely exploded that for us too.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:24):

Do you know by just how much more do they spend?

Kate Wik (04:27):

It's usually anywhere from 500 to 800 more per trip.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:31):

Wow, that's a lot. And the rest on gambling,

Kate Wik (04:36):

Anything

Ilyse Liffreing (04:36):

Extra? It's

Kate Wik (04:37):

Funny. Gambling hasn't been, revenue from gaming hasn't been the primary source of how consumers are spending their budget while they're in town. Hasn't been that for over a decade.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:51):

And

Kate Wik (04:51):

I think it speaks to the diversification of the experience in Las Vegas. And when I say we're the entertainment capital of the world, we absolutely are. People come here to see shows, to see comedians, to experience not just like a touring show, but unbelievable residencies where our property resorts will build these amazing theaters where Lady Gaga performs, Bruno Mars performs, Adele performs, they'll create these residencies, which is unlike nowhere else in the US or world.

Damian Fowler (05:26):

I mean, I've been aware of that. I mean, obviously it goes right back to the Rat Pack, but more recently, like Sting had a residency there. I've been aware, I

Kate Wik (05:34):

Just saw Backstreet Boys at the Spear, which was probably mind blowing, which was mind blowing. That's a whole nother level to the entertainment experience where it's just completely immersive that has changed the game for live music.

Damian Fowler (05:48):

The perception of Vegas has changed or is changing, and maybe that teases up to talk a little bit now about the new brand campaign and why this is the right moment to do it.

Kate Wik (06:00):

Yeah, absolutely. So we just launched a new campaign September of this year, so just a couple of weeks ago really. And the intent behind it is this notion that there are so many different reasons to come to Vegas, but there are also so many different vacation options. What we wanted to do was break through the noise and make sure that people understood that Vegas is the ultimate destination regardless of the experience you're looking for. We have it all, the breadth and depth that exists within our destination iss, it's uncomparable to any other destination. So we needed to get out there and get that message out there in big form. And why now what we found was through a lack of big brand messaging over the summer, we actually took a hit with a lot of negative headlines. And so we needed to get in front of that. And I think one of the big takeaways for marketers out there is that if you're not actively talking about your brand day in and day out, you create room for others to create their own narrative. And so after we launched the campaign, it's been about a month in market, we've seen a lot of that negativity drop because now everybody's covering, oh, here's the new elements, here are the new promotions they're doing, here are the new experiences that you can find. So it's really about driving the narrative that you want for your brand.

Ilyse Liffreing (07:29):

Very cool. And could you tell us a little bit about the campaign itself, maybe the creative, and then what channels are you leaning into?

Kate Wik (07:36):

Yeah, absolutely. In looking at how we were going to develop the work around this new brand campaign, what we wanted first and foremost was to be really authentic about Las Vegas and be very unique to a message that only Las Vegas can deliver. And so we took inspiration from our iconic welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign. So it's the sign that exists literally on Las Vegas Boulevard as you drive into town. And that sign, it's 65 years old today, but it is more iconic. And the awareness on that is it puts it as one of the highest elements assets within our portfolio. So you think Las Vegas, you think of Bellagio, you think of Wynn, even Luxor or all these amazing resorts. When we show that sign, the amount of awareness of what that is and where it is and what it's for just exceeds every other asset that we have out there. So we took inspiration from that. We took the neon, the lights, the really, the notion of setting the example of fabulous Las Vegas. That's the experience that our visitors can come to expect when they come to Las Vegas. So it truly has been our brand promise for over 65 years. So that's the inspiration behind the campaign.

Damian Fowler (08:57):

Yeah, I can see that sign now.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:59):

Yes,

Kate Wik (08:59):

That's right.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:00):

Yeah, that's right. Do you have a sense of the audience that you're trying to reach and through, I guess, which channels are you trying to reach them?

Kate Wik (09:10):

Yeah, so we have a really diverse audience set, which is very unique for a marketer, which usually has a single product or they've got a very specific audience for that product. Vegas is really the 21 and older adult playground. And so if you look at just an average audience, it's like a 45-year-old split, 50 50 male, female, et cetera. But what we offer is an unbelievable unbeatable experience at every single price point. So we absolutely cater to that high-end luxury market, that luxury traveler, all the way down to the entry level budget conscious traveler. And so we've got products from a circus circus all the way up to a win Las Vegas. And so for us, our audience is very broad, but generally it's adult travelers, people that have traveled in the past year looking to travel again,

Ilyse Liffreing (10:11):

We just had Marriott on the podcast and we were talking about how more travelers now are singles and single people. And I would think that might be particularly true for Vegas. For some reason, people are coming for a new experience and to get away.

Kate Wik (10:28):

I think that's exactly right. Not necessarily single travelers, but the idea of it's a getaway, it's a new experience. What we find from our visitors is number one, it's really high repeat visitation because every time they come, they're finding something new. So we usually get at least 80% repeat visitation from our visitors and really high satisfaction rate, but it's that mindset of wanting to try something new. For sure. Yeah.

Damian Fowler (10:56):

One thing that just occurs to me as we are talking is how the awareness of Las Vegas has been so kind of embodied in so many movies and TV shows. I was just thinking, I watched the studio recently, the Seth Rogan

Kate Wik (11:09):

Show,

Damian Fowler (11:09):

Which I think that has a combination in Vegas while

Kate Wik (11:12):

I actually haven't seen it yet. So no spoilers on my list.

Damian Fowler (11:16):

I mean, I was thinking about Oceans 11, you can go back and back. I have to see it. But that is all kind of part of the kind of braided cultural iconography as it were of the city, I guess.

Kate Wik (11:27):

Yeah, I think movies represent, you almost have to think of it as a channel for marketing. It represents an amazing opportunity to penetrate culture, reach new audiences that you wouldn't normally get to talk to. And so we have a history of iconic movies. Actually this past summer, you might've seen it, but the F1 movie, that was a partnership that we did with them to make sure that they filmed in Las Vegas and the Las Vegas Grand Prix circuit. That was really important. But again, reaching new audiences, keeping us sort of at the pinnacle and sort of leading culture. Also really awesome to have Brad Pitt lead in that. I'm not going to lie. That was pretty awesome. But a ton of movies. And it's kind of interesting to think of it as almost like a marketing channel, not a traditional

Ilyse Liffreing (12:17):

One, but yes. Yeah, like free marketing too sometimes, because a lot of things are based in Vegas,

Kate Wik (12:22):

Right? On the marketing channel front, I know you had sort of asked about how do we launch the campaign, and it was very much an integrated multi-channel approach. We did everything from brand marketing, product marketing, I call it value, but it's really promotional as well as experiential. So of course, from a brand marketing point of view, TV or movies are wonderful, but there's also tv. And we launched the campaign actually with NFL kickoff, so September 4th. We know that when people tune into tv, they're tuning in really into an NFL game. That's where the most eyeballs are at any single time. So from a marketing point of view, it's great return on your investment there. So we launched with a 62nd ad on September 4th on kickoff, but really it was about making sure that this is not just a TV campaign, but it's a platform that reaches the consumer at every different touch point throughout their travel journey or through their daily life.

(13:27):

And so we maximized the viewership by making sure that, yes, we had a TV spot, but we partnered with the Raiders to actually take over the tunnel walk. And so when players arrive at the stadium, any stadium across the us, it's usually sort of this gray back of house space. And what we did was we installed neon all over the wall as the backdrop. And so it gave our players the sense of pride as they're walking in where they see this huge fabulous Las Vegas neon sign, and then they get a bit of a swagger. And then we partnered with GQ to cover sort of the fit that the players are wearing because that's a whole thing, this sort of new cultural moment where you've got the intersection of professional sports and these athletes in fashion. And so GQ wants to cover that. And so now the backdrop for all of this is the fabulous Las Vegas neon sign that we installed.

(14:22):

And so then CVS and ESPN want to cover it because they're like, oh, what's going on with the Vegas tunnel walk? And so every time Vegas shows up, we want to make sure that we're sort of breaking through the clutter. We're doing something very unique, bold and different, and whatever we do, it's sort of Vegas worthy. So I guess another channel is outdoor. We don't just buy outdoor. We worked with media partners to find these super high impact spectacular units that just command attention. So around the corner, in Times Square, we have this huge 3D board where you've got a 3D view of the iconic welcome to Las Vegas sign that rotates and dice come out, chips come out, an F1 race car comes out, right? It's a showstopper. And when you walk into Times Square, you see people taking pictures of advertising and that blows your mind.

(15:21):

And then on the other side of the country, we've got an actual neon installation on Sunset Boulevard. So we took, quite frankly, one of the ideas behind the campaign is let's take the neon and export it. Let's take our Neon National. And so we've got these big neon relics all across the us and so this one on Sunset Boulevard is spectacular. And then you walk across any of our resorts in Las Vegas and you see our Neon Signs Launch week. We took over all of our, well in our top 10 markets, we took over our digital outdoor boards and we had a roadblock for the whole week of launch. So just doing these big spectacular moments to capture the attention of our viewers. Wow,

Damian Fowler (16:08):

That's a lot that you're doing a tremendous amount, but on the other side of it, how are you kind of measuring and tracking all of these moments that you've created?

Kate Wik (16:18):

Yeah, I think measurement is incredibly important for any brand. We are actually consistently in market every single week with a research tracker, a brand health tracker. We've been doing it for decades. Making sure that we're keeping a finger on the pulse of our consumer is really important to us. So before we launched the campaign, obviously we tested it to see, number one, does it break through? Does it resonate? Does it deliver on the message of escape? Does it make people want to go to Las Vegas? It actually tested stronger than any other campaign that we've tested, and we test all of our campaigns. So that was pretty exciting. And then post-launch, again, we're in the market every single week. We found that we continue to uptick in terms of likability of the campaign, the campaign that makes you want to travel to Las Vegas. Those metrics are really important to us, intent to travel, and so it's continued to climb every single week since we've been in market. That's really strong. I think outside of traditional campaign testing, something that we consistently do is social listening, and so understanding what the current conversation is on social, I had mentioned this summer was a little bit rough. There was a lot of negativity out there for us. What we found was we had peaked in terms of negativity online in, gosh, in August. We launched Campaign in September, and that number has dramatically reduced, which is fantastic. It goes back to this point of you have to constantly be talking and driving your own narrative.

(18:01):

Otherwise if there's a void, others are going to fill it for you. That's was a

Ilyse Liffreing (18:05):

Quick turnaround time too from

Kate Wik (18:07):

In

Ilyse Liffreing (18:07):

August to launching in

Kate Wik (18:08):

September. Absolutely. So a couple weeks. So I would say early August was peak and then Campaign formally launched September 4th, but working with our property partners to seed components of the campaign before, that was a big part of it as well. And then I think a very tactical measurement is we launched actually the first ever destination wide sale, so we called it the Fabulous Five Day Sale. Our campaign is Welcome to Fabulous, so fabulous five day sale. We wanted to make sure that we were putting a spotlight on the value that exists across the destination. And what we found was we drove four times the amount of website volume that we normally do to visit las vegas.com and that we actually were driving more referrals, so people were coming in to see what these deals were, what the sale was, this first ever limited sale, and then the traffic, the referral traffic that we were sending out to the booking engines of each of our property partners. That was 120 times the normal weekly average that we have in terms of, oh my gosh, yeah, referral, wait. So really unbelievable. It was kind of mind blowing for us in terms of the results of that. Nice.

Ilyse Liffreing (19:28):

And what was the reception from businesses in Las Vegas too, because that involved all of them?

Kate Wik (19:34):

Absolutely. Yeah. We don't launch a campaign without the support of our property partners. The reception was fabulous to use a cliche, incredibly fabulous. They leaned into it, you'll see part of the campaign. We created these neon elements and literally handed over this toolkit to our property partners so they can push out on all of their digital signage, on all of their marketing elements, sort of reflections of the campaign work as well and tie into it.

Damian Fowler (20:05):

Great. Just out of curiosity, is the campaign driven from the ground up by businesses or does it come top down as it were, from what your office, what's the kind of interaction?

Kate Wik (20:19):

Yeah. Well, the interaction is we are the DMO, the destination marketing organization for Las Vegas. So what we do is we work closely with our property partners to understand what's the business needs, what are the trends they're seeing. We do research and provide them top level trends, and then we work with them on what do we need the advertising to accomplish, and then we develop the campaigns. We're funded by them. We're actually funded by a room tax, which is paid by our visitors. And so there is complete coordination with our property partners, and we really do all of the upper funnel marketing for them. That's kind of the role we play for them.

Damian Fowler (21:00):

Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. I want to ask you, actually, I guess this is a big picture question. Are there other big cities that kind of have similar outreach or similar marketing campaigns, or are you unique in lots of ways?

Kate Wik (21:15):

I think the big destinations like New York, la, they will have a tourism authority within their destination that we'll do it for them. I think what's unique about Las Vegas is how we're funded. Again, it is through this room tax. And so generally, I'm not out there every day trying to drum up membership funds or anything. Our job is to go market the destination 365 days a year. That is why we exist. And so I think other destinations have something similar, but not quite the structure or the support behind it. And I think what is unique for Las Vegas is tourism is the number one economic driver for southern Nevada, and so we're the engine behind that. We have to make sure we're continuing to fuel that. Tourism represents 55 million or 55 billion, excuse me, in direct economic impact. That's visitors coming, spending fueling the local economy. And so the role we play matters. The advertising that we do matters because it fuels the entire ecosystem and the economic climate for Southern Nevada. Wow.

Damian Fowler (22:33):

Another quick question, follow up question there because you keep making me think of things. You have a lot of international visitors. Do you have a sense of where the majority of them are coming

Kate Wik (22:42):

From? Yeah. Yeah. So international visitors are really important to us. Interesting. Canada's typically is our number one market. We have seen a decrease this year from our Canadian visitors. That's true for the US overall. We love our neighbors to the north and we welcome them back. But Canada is generally number one. Mexico is number two. Mexico is still going strong. They've actually seen growth year over year. UK is our number three market. We love our UK visitors and our partnership with F1 continues to grow that, which is phenomenal. And then interesting, our fourth market is actually Australia, and we don't have a direct flight there today, but it's an easy stopover from la. But the Australians and the Aussies, they love coming to Las Vegas. Great cultural alignment, but in general, we love all of our international visitors, and it's about anywhere from 10 to 15% of our overall visitor mix,

Damian Fowler (23:46):

So Cool.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:47):

Well, so along with just how many changes Las Vegas has seen, how would you, I guess, describe the expectations around hospitality and how that has changed over the years?

Kate Wik (23:59):

Gosh, hospitality, not unlike marketing, it's really fueled by tech innovation. Everything from keyless check-in, you can check in on your phone, you can use your phone as your key. All of these things have been unbelievable accelerants to a great experience, but that's across the board in every city, across the world. Technology has fueled that. I think what's unique for Las Vegas is actually doubling down on the core of who we are. And that's about service, and that's about kind of going back to the brand promise of the campaign where the welcome to fabulous Las Vegas isn't just a sign. It is the brand promise of the experience you're going to have here. And before we launched the campaign, we actually went around to all the CEOs and all the presidents of all our resort property partners to say and to remind them, we're going to launch this campaign, we're going to go back to the roots of Las Vegas. And the roots of that is hospitality, and it's about making every individual feel like somebody special that is so uniquely Las Vegas. You can walk into a circus, circus, an Excalibur, and have this mind blowing unbelievable experience. You could also walk into a Bellagio, an aria, a fountain blue, and have a mind blowing unbelievable experience. It's not based on your economic value or your financial worth. It's based on who you are as a visitor coming. We're going to deliver that unbelievable experience, and that is service related, hospitality related for us.

Ilyse Liffreing (25:39):

Very cool. So what's next then? How are you planning to build on the success?

Kate Wik (25:44):

I think for us, welcome to Fabulous is not just like an A Flash in the Pan ad campaign. What we intended to do was create a marketing platform that will just stand the test of time that will continue to iterate off of it. We have three big announcements, not yet announced, but still coming out later this year that just continue to build on this platform. So it's a platform for us as the DMO, but it's also a platform for our property partners to continue to iterate because it is so unique to us.

Damian Fowler (26:20):

Now we've got some kind of quickfire questions now we've looked at that big

Kate Wik (26:24):

Picture.

Damian Fowler (26:25):

What are you obsessed with figuring out right now?

Kate Wik (26:29):

I am obsessed with figuring out how you hack the social algorithms. And I think what's super interesting is something that can go viral that isn't necessarily representative of the brand or the experience that you have. And so really making sure that for us, it's fueling a ton of content out there to make sure that we're dominating what that narrative is. And that's not just from brand voice, it's influencers or whatever, but that social algorithms I think is really important for

Damian Fowler (27:05):

Brands. Yeah, absolutely. I would love to figure that out too. It seems like a kind of a magic unlock.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:11):

Yes. Right.

Damian Fowler (27:14):

Okay.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:15):

This year you are included on the Forbes list of 50 Fierce Global leaders.

Kate Wik (27:20):

Yes.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:20):

Congratulations. Thank you. What is one piece of wisdom you'd pass on to other marketers?

Kate Wik (27:27):

Oh gosh. Constant learning, constant iteration. Nothing is ever done, right? You put something out in the world, there's always a chance to continue to iterate and learn and get feedback and continue to push it further. Yeah.

Damian Fowler (27:44):

Another is ai, a marketer's friend.

Kate Wik (27:46):

Yeah, absolutely. But actually, let's be careful with that. It's a friend, but it's like a starting point, right? I think using it as information, as research, as sort of an input but not a final output is really important.

Damian Fowler (28:01):

I like that. That distinction is important.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:03):

One last fun one for you, maybe outside of the Brad Pitt movie from the summer. What's your favorite movie set in Las

Kate Wik (28:12):

Vegas? Oh, gosh. I love Oceans 11. I mean, how can you not? I mean, it's still Brad Pitt, but

Damian Fowler (28:20):

Oh, yeah.

Kate Wik (28:20):

But it's an icon. He can be at anything, everything.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:27):

And that's

Damian Fowler (28:27):

It for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:29):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (28:36):

And remember,

Kate Wik (28:37):

If you're not actively talking about your brand day in and day out, you create room for others to create their own narrative.

Damian Fowler (28:45):

I'm Damian, and I'm Ilyse, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're joined by Emily Prazer, president and CEO of the Las Vegas Grand Prix and the Chief Commercial Officer of Formula One. She's helping transform F1 into one of the fastest growing sports brands in the world, leading strategy partnerships and fan engagement across markets from Miami to Melbourne.

Damian Fowler (00:30):

Emily's here to talk about the road to the last Vegas Grand Prix on November the 22nd. Now, in its third year, the Vegas Grand Prix turns the strip into a global stage where sport, entertainment and culture collide under the neon lights.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:46):

I love that. From the 100 day countdown events to new sponsorship models and digital fan experiences, formula One is redefining what a modern sports brand can look like, especially in the U.S. market.

Damian Fowler (01:02):

In past years, the marketing around Las Vegas, the Grand Prix has felt like a crescendo building over several months. What's been your strategy this year as you build, it's the third year, right? As you build towards those?

Emily Prazer (01:14):

Yeah, this third year, so I think the difference this year is we've had two years of a foundation to figure out what works and what doesn't work, but equally we've had our building open all year, so prior, well the first year we're obviously building the building for those that dunno, it's called Grand Prix Plaza. It's the length of three NFL fields, so it's not small. It's designed and built to service the Formula One Paddock Club, which is the most high-end hospitality that we offer in Formula One. Underneath that is where the garages are and where the teams hang out, so it's quite a significant building. When we first moved to Vegas, we purchased the 39 acres of land and have invested around $500 million in this infrastructure and so the difference I think is obviously the first year we were building it, the second year we were getting to grips with owning such a significant property in Las Vegas and then moving into the third year of the event, the building's been open all year and we built something called F1 Drive, which is carting.

(02:10):

We've had a restaurant up there called Fool and Fork, which is Formula One, themed food and beverage as you'd expect. We built an immersive Formula one experience called F1 X and so the marketing's ramped up, but that's because locally we've been able to activate since the day after the race last year all the way through to this year, and obviously how we market is very different depending on what we're trying to do, whether it's selling tickets or whether it's driving foot traffic to the building. It's all the awareness that we need in Las Vegas to continue to grow our fan base.

Damian Fowler (02:41):

The a hundred day countdown, that's important,

Emily Prazer (02:43):

Right? That was a big one. We always go big around a hundred days. We did a strip takeover, we made sure people understood that it was a hundred days ago. We did similar for 50 days, so we use those milestones to make sure, obviously Vegas is somewhat a last minute market. Some Grand Prix go on sale and sell out in 90 minutes. We see the most amount of activity from a hundred days through to November.

Damian Fowler (03:04):

That's very interesting. How do you decide which moments where you target your marketing strategy in that a hundred day buildup?

Emily Prazer (03:12):

Oh, well, we're very fortunate that the racing continues For those, again, that aren't familiar, formula One is a 24 race calendar, which spans globally, so we typically go big around the big races as you'd expect. We've just come out of Singapore where hopefully people have seen that McLaren won the Constructors Championship. We'll go big again around Austin and Mexico. They're both feeder markets to the Las Vegas Grand Prix and we'll just continue to make sure we've got major announcements, whether it be food and beverage merchandise programming all the way through between now and race day.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:42):

Now, can you also talk a little bit about the F1 business summits because you're also launching that during race week? Sure. How intentional is the idea of making Vegas not just a race, but a business and cultural destination?

Emily Prazer (03:56):

Sure. Well, if you look at what Vegas do around other major sports, it's not that we're trying to reinvent the wheel, we're taking learnings from how well the NFL have operated there with the Super Bowl, even around WWE where you see them extend from a one or two day event through to a whole week. We are very fortunate that again, for those that dunno, formula One kicks off on Thursday with free practice, we have qualifying on Friday and then on Saturday is the race. And so we are lucky that we actually have really good opportunity for shoulder programming and so it was a lot of requests coming through from multiple stakeholders saying we'd love to get the ecosystem together and talk about how we've shifted Formula One culturally into something very different. Obviously it's a sport first and foremost, but I think everyone's now seeing the change into more of a lifestyle brand and a proposition around how we're executing with some partners, which I'm sure we'll get to, but I think a lot of it has been around how we kind of talk about that strategy and how we've grown the sport over the last five years.

(04:54):

So it was very intentional, it's had really great uptake and as you'll see as we get closer to the race, we'll start talking about what we're doing kind of Tuesday, Wednesday all the way through.

Damian Fowler (05:04):

It was interesting you brought up the mention of partners and the fact that Formula One now transcends the racetrack and I for one say follow some Formula One drivers on Instagram. How do you play into that whole notion now that Formula One is this lifestyle brand and what does that mean when it comes to partnerships?

Emily Prazer (05:26):

Well, we've been really fortunate that we've, formula One was bought by Liberty Media in 2017 and the handcuffs were taken off per se, where social media was something that didn't really exist in the sport prior to that and the drivers have done a great job and the teams have done a great job of giving us access collectively to the drivers. They're all a lot younger than they have been before, so we've been fortunate enough to help them build their profiles through social, but obviously the pivot came with Drive to Survive. Everyone knows that that was a big leap of faith that Formula One took to be able to give behind the scenes access. It's a complicated sport that had traditionally been kept to a different type of club and we've opened up those floodgates and obviously we're reaping the rewards of that at the moment.

(06:10):

It hasn't been easy, but ultimately when you have the likes of Netflix wanting to display what we do, hopefully everyone's seen the Formula One movie with Brad Pitt, which is now I think the highest grossing sporting movie of all time and Brad Pitt's highest grossing movie of all time. So that again, is a great explainer if you take that concept, the strategy around all of it has to create this always on dynamic, which isn't just about the 24 race weekends, it's about how to have brand extension through partnerships 24 7, 365 days a year that's come to life through our licensing business, which I can get to and also our sponsorship business, that the thought process was we want to sign less B2B organizations more consumer brands, not because we don't appreciate, we are always going to have a B2B element Formula One lives in that space, especially on the technical side of the sport, but as it talks about how we penetrate the fan base, how we acquire new fans and how we talk to fans differently.

(07:06):

One of the big pieces of it was, well, how do we show up in every shopping mall, not just in North America, but globally and using the likes of Lego? You would've seen our recent announcement with Tag Hoya. You now go to these shopping malls and you see these different brands actually activating and taking some learnings from how the US sports do it, where everywhere you go you can buy a t-shirt. I think one of my proudest moments was being at the Super Bowl last year in New Orleans and seeing people in the parade wearing Formula one T-shirts.

(07:32):

I was like, that shows that the strategy is working. In addition to we acknowledge that pricing of Grand Prix is expensive, they're also places you typically have to travel to, and so brand extension through license partners has been really important. We have something called F1 Drive, which we'll be rolling out, which is the carting proposition I mentioned in Vegas we have F1 arcade, which is now opening up and popping up all over North America. We have F1 exhibition, which is a tribute to the history of the sport and we'll keep growing as we want to keep penetrating and explaining to those fans

Ilyse Liffreing (08:07):

Fans. That is really interesting hearing you describe just how different the strategy here is in the US too because F1 is such a global brand. How do you I guess, keep the brand though true to its global roots at the same time as also making it feel like America's race?

Emily Prazer (08:25):

Definitely not trying to make it feel like America's race. I think taking the learnings of how to speak to the audience we've acquired wherever we go, the benefit of being a global sport is we're global, but in each of those destinations we act very local. So when you're there, you very much know that when you're at the British Grand Prix that you're at Silverstone and there's all of the heritage around it, Monza, there's nothing more special in global sport in my opinion, than seeing the ZI on a Sunday run onto the grid with the Ferrari flags and what have you that you can't take that passion and bottle it up and just pop it into a US race. The US market is different, but if you look at how Miami has identified itself, you for sure know where you are. Same with Austin, where it's Texas and everybody is in cowboy boots and you know that you're in Texas and then Vegas takes it to a different level because we partner with our friends at the L-B-C-V-A and other partners in Vegas to bring that kind of extreme entertainment to life. So yeah, wherever you go, you really do know where you are and that's where I think the local element comes into play.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:28):

Has anything changed in the sports rights context in order for Formula One to really be able to create more social and organic marketing tied to the event?

Emily Prazer (09:41):

Yeah, I think it's that we've got the confidence to try different things and have given different types of access. So you'll see obviously that we have lots of short form content. Now we're noticing that this generation of fandom that we're trying to continue to excite wants to look at things slightly differently, whether it be through YouTube or TikTok. I think we're launching our first TikTok store in a couple of weeks, which I never thought we would be in a place to do, but it's a testament to where the sports got to. So I don't think the rights have changed. I think our approach to it has changed where we have the confidence because of the excitement around destinations like Las Vegas to shift our mindset. Like I say, we're not going to do it everywhere. We're going to pick specific places to test it, and Vegas for us for the last three years has served as that test testbed.

(10:28):

You'll see the collaborations alone that we do in the merchandise space we've not been able to replicate prior and we're proud of it. What we're doing there is giving us the confidence to deliver new partnerships across the sport. American Express is a prime example where they came in as a Vegas only partner, did a year of that, a year later became a regional partner, so they activated across the Americas and then a year after that became a global partner. So it's just showing that we can bring in these more consumer led brands, but also how we've shifted our mindset to be able to deliver against it.

Damian Fowler (11:00):

That happened very fast. It's kind of amazing. You touched on this a little bit, but the different audiences in the different markets. What have you learned after the first two years of hosting Grand Prix in the United States about American fans specifically?

Emily Prazer (11:16):

Just that you need to give them variety. They aren't going to come in and behave the same way as a traditional Motorsport fan that has been or has grown up with. The heritage of the British audience is a great example where I mentioned Silverstone goes on sale and sells out. We've had to adjust the product to make sure that we're very much catering to that audience and the programming around it, like we talked about, has been super important. People don't want to come just for one session, but they want the option to come and leave and go to a casino or go to a different show and what have you. So they're looking for all round entertainment, not just coming to watch the Formula One event, which we focus specifically on making sure that we deliver against.

Damian Fowler (11:59):

One thing that's interesting about Vegas as well is that it's a big draw for tourism globally as well and people fly in. So maybe that fan base is also kind of a mix of international and local.

Emily Prazer (12:11):

Yeah, well interestingly, we've seen the majority of our fan base come from Mexico, Canada, and within the United States. I think Vegas obviously is incredibly special that they cater to everyone. I think they have something like 150,000 hotel rooms that spam from five star all the way through, and so one of the things that we had to pivot from in the first year where we expected Vegas to be this really, really high end proposition was actually that we needed to cater for all different types of ticket package and hospitality package. So we've learned those differences. We thought that it would be very, very high end and mostly international. It's actually around 80% domestic, but drive in traffic and fly in traffic from other US markets in. Like I said, Canada and Mexico have been significant buyers of the Grand Prix and Vegas.

Ilyse Liffreing (12:59):

Very cool. I'm very curious what kind of feedback you've gotten so far from those fans, sponsors, broadcasters, anybody watching the sport in Vegas?

Emily Prazer (13:09):

Well, the sponsors love it because it's something different. Like I said, we put a lot of emphasis on the production. What we were all really surprised about was the quality of the racing. I think it has the most overtakes on the Formula one calendar, so that was something we weren't going to know until you can do simulations, but until you see cars going around the track in the first year, we didn't really acknowledge or understand how great the actual racing would be. So I think that was the biggest surprise around feedback and what the broadcasters and general audience have been quite positive about shifting. The mentality and mindset has been something that we're proud of, but it's all stemming from the confidence we've gained through promoting our own event.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:47):

When you look at success, what KPIs are you most interested in? Is it ticket sales or,

Emily Prazer (13:54):

I think it's all around halo effect for the sport ticket sales and revenue is obviously my ultimate goal. I'm the chief commercial officer of Formula One, so I don't think I can sit here and say otherwise, but brand extension and growing the fandom and being engaged, giving another touch point to the US audience when again, I mentioned Liberty bought Formula One in 2017, they were very clear that they had two very strategic objectives. One was growing the sport in the United States, the other was growing the sport in Asia and obviously Asia's taken a little bit longer for obvious reasons with COVID and what have you, but we're starting to see the momentum pick up again there. The US we heavily focused on signing Miami as a starting point as a partnership with the Miami Dolphins, which we're really happy with, proud of as they have shown us how to do it. Seeing how they put their event on before we even put on Vegas meant that we could really take their learnings. But yeah, the expectations are that we continue to grow it, that the production level remains incredibly high and that it's our tempo event in the Formula one calendar.

Damian Fowler (14:55):

Now, you mentioned the Netflix show Drive to Survive, and obviously there's been a lot of media around the importance of that show. Could you talk a little bit about the significance of that show, how it helps or not inspire marketing strategy?

Emily Prazer (15:09):

Yeah, it comes back to this always on point that I mentioned before, which is Formula One needs to be accessible for the next generation of fans to truly understand it and the next generation of fans care about the competitive nature of the racing, but they also want to understand the personalities behind the sport, and I think it gave us the opportunity to open up to be able to show who we all are. The technical terminology, the filming that went into that and the movie to be honest, has given us the opportunity to use that content to be able to explain what DRS means or what is the significance of each Grand Prix, what does it actually mean? So these drivers like the NFL, when a player puts on a helmet, it's hard to understand the emotion, but being able to get to know the drivers and the team behind the drivers, which is also incredibly important, has been really helpful in our marketing strategy.

(16:01):

But what it inspired was how do we talk to the different audience? Like I said before, you can't talk to that audience the same way that you talk to the 75-year-old fan that's been going to Silverstone since its inception. So a lot of it has been about how we change our thoughts around short form content and how we use different platforms. To talk to a different audience in different markets has just meant that we've had to learn how to engage and pivot from just broadcast on a Sunday to every minute of every day coming up with new ideas to talk to the fan base.

Damian Fowler (16:34):

That's pressure for sure. You also mentioned the different channels, and we do talk about a lot about how live sports is now available across many, many different channels and tech platforms are bidding next to traditional broadcasters. I wonder in the mix of things, and especially when it comes to the show and when you broadcast it, how important has that kind of explosion as it were of channels been?

Emily Prazer (17:00):

I mean we have been ahead on the curve on that somewhat for we are different. Formula One owns its own broadcast capability. We have an office or a building in the UK in Big and Hill and Kent for those that have been in London, been to Kent around London and it's incredible. We own and operate again the whole thing. So every camera, every fiber optic cable, everything you see at a Grand Prix is being produced by Formula One. We have remote operations at the track that go back to Big and Hill and we have 180 broadcasters globally. So we've always been slightly different to other mainstream sports in that regard because we produce our own show, which is helpful for us around sponsorship and what have you. But generally speaking, I think obviously the world is changing and we've got to make sure we keep up with it.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:47):

Looking forward, which marketing innovations, there's obviously a lot right now, but ai, contextual, programmatic, what excites you the most? Is there any digital marketing innovations?

Emily Prazer (18:02):

Yeah, I think AI is something that we are excited but cautious. Again, with the sport that's so technologically advanced, you've got to be thoughtful about how we use it. We also don't want to lock ourselves in one direction or the other. So we're doing a lot of work without Formula One has the most unbelievable roster of tech partners. If you think about Salesforce, AWS, Lenovo globin to name a few, they're going to tell us how to use AI to benefit our sport, not just commercially, but on the tech side. So we are very excited about it, not just from a marketing point of view, but from a just general point of view. How does AI benefit the sport? We're taking a massive amount of time to think about just general activations. I know that sounds kind of immature if you think about Formula One, but how do we bring different activity to the track outside of just races? I'm not sure if either of you saw what we did in Miami with Lego, where Lego built 10 full size cars for the drivers to race Lego cars around the track.

Damian Fowler (19:05):

I show my son that. That's

Emily Prazer (19:06):

So cool. If you think about the content that that created around marketing, that was probably the most viral thing we've done in a very, very long time. So our marketing strategy at the moment is about solidifying the brand equity, making sure that we deliver against our partnership objectives and that we continue to grow our social platforms. I'm not going to say that we're not technically as advanced, but the data capabilities is all quite new to Formula One. Loyalty programs are all quite new to us, so for us, I keep coming back to it, but it's really about figuring out how to engage with the audience and have something to sell them. Again, we're a rights holder that doesn't have tons of assets to sell ourselves. We license a lot out, and so really it's about coming up with these creative ideas to be kind of 10 steps ahead of anyone else.

(19:53):

And I think we are in a very unique space. We're very lean, which means we can be very nimble. So when we're making a lot of these decisions, it's me going to Stefano who's the CEO of Formula one saying, how do you feel about us trying something like this? And that's again, where we link the Vegas piece together with the broader marketing strategy to continue to keep everyone engaged rather than it just being like a technical marketing play. Obviously we do that day in, day out, but I think for us it's the confidence we've got now to really push the boundaries and be the first to do a lot of different things, whether it be what we're doing in the broadcast around all of the different types of digital advertising and what have you. I think again, if you watch the races, you'll start to see that we are trying and testing new technologies in that

Ilyse Liffreing (20:37):

Way. And on that note, we talked a little bit before about the timing of the race in Vegas. In

Emily Prazer (20:46):

Vegas. Yeah.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:47):

Because it's a new time for you guys that

Emily Prazer (20:49):

10:00 PM Yeah, we moved it forward from 10:00 PM to 8:00 PM which is great. I think a lot of people were struggling with how that's local time, right? Local time, yeah. When we first went to Vegas, the idea was that the timing would be in line with the boxing match or the show. So it wasn't done for any other reason than 10 o'clock on a Saturday night in Vegas is when typically you start seeing things happen. The difference being is that the distance or time you need to keep between certain amounts of sessions meant that it created gaps. So if there were delays that 10:00 PM could technically be pushed. And so we had our issues in the first year. We learned from those last year operationally delivered really well, but we still felt that it was slightly too late, hence the 8:00 PM start. So everything has shifted forward. We have F1 Academy this year, which we're really excited about, so that will, I think doors now open at 2:30 PM rather than four. So it means everything will be a lot earlier, but it's all for the show.

Damian Fowler (21:48):

And presumably you have a kind of global viewership as well, so that all impacts

Emily Prazer (21:53):

The trends. Yeah, I think it obviously will be beneficial to the east coast market, not so beneficial to the rest of the world, but we still feel good about the viewership numbers and what we're seeing. So

Damian Fowler (22:03):

The true fans will

Emily Prazer (22:05):

Watch you, right? If not next. Exactly. Hands always come through. Exactly.

Damian Fowler (22:08):

Alright, so we've got some kind of quick fire questions here to wrap this up. So first off, what keeps you up at night in the lead up to this?

Emily Prazer (22:16):

Everything in the lead up? The lead up. I'm not sleeping at all my first year as A CEO, I think last year it would've been ticket sales. This year it's probably just security and all round operations. So as my role has expanded on the Vegas race particularly, it's just we are opening and closing the track every three hours. It's not like other street races keep their roads closed for up to seven days. We are having to keep it open and close it regularly. You're in one of the busiest roads in North America, so we don't really have much of a choice and we don't want to impact the locals any further. So I think it's just being responsible for the logistics is scary.

Damian Fowler (22:58):

Wow. I agree. Closing the road down is like mind blowing.

Emily Prazer (23:00):

Yeah, it is genuinely mind blowing. If you go to Vegas now, you can see that things are still are on their way to being built and it's like, oh wow, this is happening.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:10):

That is scary. I'm scary for you. What would you say is missing in the US sports sponsorship marketplace that you would love to see happen?

Emily Prazer (23:19):

Ooh, good question. I haven't thought about the answer to that. That's a hard one. I'm going to have to sit on that one for a minute. Don't worry. Yeah, I mean I can't speak for, I can only really speak for my sport, but I'd love to have the same access to the teams that N-F-L-N-B-A have as the rights holder. We definitely don't get to just sell the team IP as we see fit. We have something in Formula One called the Concord Agreement, which means that we have some restrictions there. But yeah, let me have a think about the broader space. Sorry. I like that answer One hit me.

Damian Fowler (23:52):

That's a good answer there. We can circle back and do it again if you want, but I like that to be honest. Okay. So which other sports or entertainment brands do you think are nailing their brand positioning right now?

Emily Prazer (24:03):

I think the NBA and the NFL, they just do it so unbelievably well and they have fandom here. I've never witnessed in the UK you very much see the fandom around a specific team. Here you see genuine fandom around the NFL. And what I love as a Brit in the US obviously is I still can't believe how each of the TV channels cross-promote each other for other games. So you'll be watching Fox and they'll be like, tune into CBS to watch this game. And you're like, oh wow. They really do do it for the greater good of the league. We would obviously it's different. We don't have multiple games in Formula One, but if I think about it in comparison to the Premier League, you really do follow the team. If I'm a Chelsea fan by the way, but I would watch Chelsea, I wouldn't then flip channels to watch Man United in the us.

(24:57):

I find myself on a Sunday watching three or four games and I'm like, I'm not even your core audience. It has to be something to do with the marketing that it's always there telling me what to do, telling me how to watch it. And I really admire, maybe this is actually the answer to the previous question. I actually admire how good they are at getting in my head because I think about it, I'm like, what games are on a Sunday or what playoffs are happening in the NBA and I go to watch it because it's there. Whereas like I said, premier League, as much as I'm a huge Chelsea fan and grew up with it, you just don't seem to be able to follow it like that.

Damian Fowler (25:35):

Yeah, that's very interesting. Would you say you were an NFL fan before you came to the

Emily Prazer (25:39):

Us? No, not at all. Didn't know the rules and now I'm like hardcore

Damian Fowler (25:42):

Because of the marketing, I guess.

Emily Prazer (25:43):

Wow. Must be. They just got in my head.

Damian Fowler (25:46):

Amazing. Yeah. And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (25:54):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (26:01):

And remember,

Emily Prazer (26:02):

We've had to learn how to engage and pivot from just kind of broadcast on a Sunday to every minute of every day coming up with new ideas to talk to the fan base.

Damian Fowler (26:13):

I'm Damian. 

Ilyse Liffreing (26:14):

And I'm Ilyse.

Damian Fowler (26:14):

And we'll see you next time.

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Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing,

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're joined by Ahad Afridi Chief Marketing Officer for the Americas at Pladis, the company behind the Godiva brand, those premium chocolates we all live.

Damian Fowler (00:20):

We're diving into Godiva's bold new campaign, featuring Leighton Meester portraying the legendary lady, good diver, a modern spin on an iconic story of courage and individuality.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:31):

We'll talk about how the brand is trying to stand out ahead of the holiday season and how Pladis is evolving its brands for the next generation of snackers.

Ahad Afridi (00:40):

Let's get into it. It's a comprehensive launch. It's a launch of a new product within the Godiva range called Masterpiece, but it's also the start of a brand reset. And so part of this has an eye towards the now of launching this new product that's great, but also towards activities that are going to happen over the next one year. Godiva turns 100 next year, and so what we wanted to accomplish was the first big step in this centennial, what we call re-imagining of the Godiva brand.

Speaker 2 (01:17):

Yeah, that's a legacy brand for sure.

Speaker 3 (01:18):

And happy birthday as well.

Speaker 2 (01:20):

Thank you

Speaker 3 (01:20):

A hundred years. Thank you. Thank you to Godiva. On behalf of Godiva, I'd say thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:26):

Yeah. In that hundred, how would you define what Godiva stands for as a legacy brand over that century?

Speaker 3 (01:34):

Godiva is a premium chocolate brand. It's been called a luxury chocolate brand, but we prefer to call it premium because it makes it more accessible, which we can talk about a little bit more. It's a Belgian heritage brand. Belgian chocolates are different than the normal. 

Speaker 2 (01:51):

That’s good, in my opinion,

Speaker 3 (01:53):

Different than the normal chocolate milk-based chocolate, but it's just great tasting, high quality chocolate that you feel great giving to others as a gift and having for yourself as well.

Speaker 1 (02:08):

So just to ask you about this specific campaign, what made you wanted to bring that legacy as it were up to date? Is that the right way of putting it into today's culture through this campaign?

Speaker 3 (02:18):

Yeah, in a way. Let's say it's a hundred year reboot because turning a hundred, you have to celebrate your heritage, but reposition for the future. So it's about getting contemporary, bringing some of those traditional values and equities of the brand, but modernizing them for today and starting this, what we call re-imagining with totally new offerings coming over the next one to two years. We've started with what we call Masterpiece, and Masterpiece is a small chocolate piece that comes in a bag with multiple pieces in there, and it's great for sharing with others or treating yourself. So this is the first step. We've just launched this now it's in the market. In the next few weeks you'll see a totally reimagined what we call gold box and truffle box, which is high-end premium chocolate in specialty stores and on the giva.com website where we've totally revamped chocolate and got new offerings in that. So that's coming over the holiday period, Valentine's Day, there'll be another new collection coming next fall. Towards the end of the next year, we'll have some more gifting chocolates available that will be broadly available. And that's the start. And then after that, in the year 2027, we've got other exciting things coming in. So it's a sequenced campaign. 

Speaker 2 (03:47):

Good timing for the holiday season, I'm sure.

Speaker 3 (03:50):

Exactly, exactly. Holiday seasons are important for us. Every day is important for us, but the holiday seasons are very important for us. Yes.

Speaker 2 (03:58):

Can you describe a little bit of the campaign itself and what viewers might see and experience as they witness the campaign?

Speaker 3 (04:06):

Yeah, I guess the first thing you'll see is a wonderful cinematic traditional sort of advertising, which has got some drama in it. It's got wonderful aesthetic, but at its heart it's a product centered ad and the product is celebrated in there, the taste of that. So that's let's say the hero piece or the centerpiece. But in addition, what you'll see is a lot of social content in different variations. You'll see different versions in digital tv. You'll see a billboard coming later, so some nice still art coming there. Now what's unique about this is we didn't look at it as just a specific campaign and a point of time. We look at this as a one year program where we're relaunching the brand. So you'll see Layton Meer again in the holiday periods, Valentine's period and throughout next year. Why

Speaker 1 (05:03):

Leighton Meester? I mean, I know Ilyse is a fan.

Speaker 2 (05:06):

Oh yeah. I mean Gossip Girl lover obviously.

Speaker 3 (05:10):

Well, she's a great representation of some of the values of Lady Godiva and Lady Godiv was the, let's say the initial inspiration for the brand. It's obviously called Godiva. So she, lady Godiva played a big role in the identity of the brand. But Leighton Meester is someone that we respect a lot. She's very popular, she's highly likable, she's multifaceted, great actor, musician person who has her own specific identity, and we think that's a great person to partner with in this

Speaker 2 (05:52):

Now premium chocolate, that space is a pretty packed one. How does this campaign really help the brand stand out, especially as we head into those important holiday seasons?

Speaker 3 (06:04):

Yeah, so premium chocolate is a growing segment within overall chocolate. So certainly chocolate's a very broad area, so many different offerings, and premium is a very important segment within that. And there are different offerings within premium. We like to consider Godiva as the high end of the premium segment. And there's something special. It's like in a category full of square shapes and round shapes,

Speaker 4 (06:32):

You've

Speaker 3 (06:33):

Got Godiva coming in with something totally different. And if you see the Masterpiece product, you'll see it's a very unique sort of shape there. So we pride ourselves in being kind of the premium of the premium but being accessible. And it's our goal to provide unique offerings that really tastes great and are cut above the rest of premium, but yet at let's say a fingertip away from desire.

Speaker 1 (07:04):

When you say relaunch, what does that mean? Does it mean like you're trying to reach new audiences, new consumers? How are you thinking about the people you're trying to reach? And I guess that does tie in with getting a celebrity like Leighton Meester.

Speaker 3 (07:21):

Yeah, it's important for us to connect with a broader range of consumers, younger consumers. So we're trying to get millennials and Gen Zs now, which the brand hadn't really targeted before and over a hundred year period you will have a core cohort which will age over time, and we're making a purposeful effort to try and reach a broader audience. Now contemporize the brand and our activities around doing that,

Speaker 2 (07:53):

Does that also have to do with perhaps the decision to call it premium chocolate versus luxury chocolate or what is that thinking?

Speaker 3 (08:02):

Well, the category is divine is premium chocolate, but people say good dive is a luxury brand and sometimes people talk about chocolate as being luxury. I don't think chocolate should be luxury. Chocolate should be accessible as well. And so it's really around that. It's not a conscious big effort saying, Hey, call us premium. Don't call us luxury.

Speaker 3 (08:23):

You can call us what you want, but it's just great tasting chocolate that is accessible. And our key point is luxury is often reserved for special occasions or milestones and that's certainly fine, but could dive a chocolate is also accessible every day. A little bit of happiness and a little smile is an everyday treat that we all have a right to.

Speaker 1 (08:50):

My wife reminds me of that every day. She says, should we have a chocolate? Now she's a millennium. She'll be very happy if I give her a Godiva chocolate. Well, we have them here for you to try. Okay, well we will just pause the podcast.

Speaker 1 (09:07):

We right back anyway. So just to talk about PLAs. So good diver is one of the brands within Pladis and which has a big portfolio of snacking. I just want to talk a bit more about the consumer you're trying to reach. What kind of insights have really shaped how you think about this new strategy?

Speaker 3 (09:30):

Chocolate plays a meaningful role in people's everyday lives. It's not something that's only reserved for special occasions once or twice a year. And so what we see is that people need, if you look at what we call a demand space map of consumers needs and occasions during the day, there are many opportunities in there for us to provide little bits of happiness, little bits of indulgence, a treat for yourself that is accessible and that's important for us. That's an important insight. The second is that chocolate is more than a product, but it may provide an emotional benefit. It might make you feel good, it might help you connect with others. It might be a reboot for the rest of the day, three o'clock, little piece of chocolate it with a coffee or a cup of tea or something like that is fantastic. So we've mapped consumer occasions to see that that's important. So those are really two very important insights for us.

Speaker 2 (10:38):

Curious, now that the campaign is out, I know it's early days, but are there any KPIs that you're really keeping your eye on or your hopes around brand impact that you're going to get from this campaign?

Speaker 3 (10:54):

Yes. Well, we have a broad range of metrics that we look at. You can bucket them around awareness and visibility as one. Engagement. How consumers get involved is to sentiment, what are people saying and how do they feel about it. And then importantly, fourth but not least, is the commercial impact. What kind of sales impact do we have? How's it driving the business? And we're one week into the campaign,

(11:20):

So we don't have any of those metrics now, but we will be tracking them. But what we're very encouraged by is just the initial, let's say feedback, what people are saying, how much people are talking about it and what they're saying about it. And it's very, very positive what we're hearing about this. And even in this first week, we're seeing remarkable engagement. People are even reediting bits of the ad and combining it with Layton Meer in other roles. It's a very scene in one of her previous shows, which she's very famous for where she says, lady Godiva is my only friend. So we're getting recut edits of that with snippets of the new ad. So consumers are sending those back to us.

Speaker 2 (12:09):

Now. You've talked before about how storytelling is very key to building great brands. Has this campaign changed how you think about what really connects with today's consumers?

Speaker 3 (12:22):

I think this campaign will confirm what we think is important in storytelling. And for us, storytelling has got to be something that captures people's attention, draws some interest, so they stick with it and is something that they'll remember later on. And we are trying to find new ways to deliver that and create that impact. But within that, we have to embed elements of the brand and the product experience that's so important in that. And this first centerpiece ad is a wonderful example of that because it's a captivating ad, but at the heart it is a product brand centered ad. So I think that's very important is to combine those things.

Speaker 1 (13:14):

When we look at the sort of bigger shift, and you've sort of addressed this a little bit, but I'm just curious, we are in a moment of time where people are a little bit anxious in some cases about the economy and where things are going. How do you market into that where you're talking about the importance of premium at a time, that might be something where people would think, oh, should I, shouldn't I? How do you think about that?

Speaker 3 (13:42):

Well, the good thing about chocolate is it is something that's important every day or can be important every day. It should be accessible every day. And whether the economy goes up or it goes down, it's something that's there. And available chocolates, you were talking earlier about luxury. God, IVA is not a Hermes bag. You don't have to wait two months, or sorry, two years to get that. It's something there that you can have. And if it provides that little bit of lift, that smile on your face, that moment of connection, that's something that is important for people regardless of economic conditions. And if they're having some moments in life or particular experiences in life where they need a little pick me up even more than it plays an even bigger role. So it's our job to provide the right offerings, make them accessible and be available for them.

Speaker 1 (14:45):

Does it signal anything about how you might approach other Plaice brands? I know they're very different, but just

Speaker 3 (14:52):

Yeah, we have multiple other brands around the world and some are chocolate, some are biscuits, some are cakes. And each brand has to find a way to tap into consumer desire. And our Pladis mission we say, is happiness in every bite. And that's what we're trying to deliver. And each brand has to try and deliver that in its own unique way.

Speaker 2 (15:22):

Now with a heritage brand such as Godiva, how are you still keeping it modern while staying true to its heritage? Because the snack worlds today is changing so fast, we have new wellness trends all the time, digital shopping, et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker 3 (15:39):

Well, it's such an important question because the challenge for every brand is to be relevant today. And what got you there in the heritage is helpful, but it doesn't necessarily deliver against what makes you relevant for today. It just makes people notice or gives you a little bit of credibility or trust. So a big part of this brand, re-imagining it a hundred years is about that. It's about contemporizing the brand, making sure that we stand out in today's world, that we're conveying those benefits that meet the needs of today's consumers, that we are using the right codes to communicate Kate and making it easy for consumers to notice us, to think about us, to remember us to desire us.

Speaker 2 (16:33):

How do you think about the way modern brands are going about marketing? Are there any interesting tidbits or trends that you're noticing?

Speaker 3 (16:43):

Lots of littles. There's a study by work that talks about the aggregate, let's say the cumulative effect of little bits of exposure on your brand actually deliver more than singular big pieces of visibility. And if a brand can try and do that show up in different places, just little bites, little bite size bits of

Speaker 4 (17:10):

Content

Speaker 3 (17:11):

That comes across a lot, that is a great way for connecting and getting consumers to remember you.

Speaker 1 (17:18):

We've got these kind of quick fire questions here at the end. And what's one thing that you're obsessed with figuring out in confectionary marketing right now?

Speaker 3 (17:30):

I'm obsessed with figuring out how to connect with consumers in a meaningful way. And that is evolving. It's very difficult. Consumers are bombarded with so many stimuli that the ability to connect with them in a relevant way is so important.

Speaker 2 (17:49):

Outside of snacks, do you have a brand that you really admire for nailing culture and doing just that?

Speaker 3 (17:58):

Yes, I love what Heinz is doing. They're fantastic. They're a great example of leaning into your heritage, creating distinction versus other brands in a category that seemingly doesn't have a lot of variety. They are very strong at having distinctive brand assets that they tap into all the time. Make it easy for consumers to think about them, remember them, and they're great at tapping into culture. They've got great little mini campaigns under their overall brand platform. It has to be hez that keep the brand very vibrant. I love what they're doing.

Speaker 1 (18:42):

What's the best piece of marketing advice you've ever received and do you still follow it?

Speaker 3 (18:47):

Message delivered does not mean message received. And I think that that applies not just to marketing, it applies to change management leadership. And it's something that I think about a lot, especially now. So if you think about it from a marketing perspective, a brand manager's perspective, it's easy to fall in the trap that if you create something and you put it out there that consumers are going to notice it, love it, and buy your brand. And what we try and tell them is, this is not Iowa Field of dreams. It's not a build it and they will come. You have to really work hard at creating relevance and getting noticed and the odds are stacked against you. So making sure your message or your intent is received, not just delivered is very important.

Speaker 2 (19:42):

Very nice. One more for fun. If money were no object, what's a dream marketing move you'd make?

Speaker 3 (19:52):

So I can give you the traditional answer on top of those lots of littles. It'd be great to have some big mega programs. I would love to have, we're talking about Godiva today. I'd love to have Godiva in the Super Bowl. I'd love to have Lady Godiva show up and present the trophy, the NFL trophy or the US Open Tennis trophy or I'd love that stuff, but I'll go past that. It would be great to have Lady Godiva as a Marvel superhero movie and have her deliver chocolate to save the world. Something's going on and she just comes and gives a little piece of chocolate and everything's okay. And that's it

Speaker 1 (20:36):

For this edition of The Big Impression.

Speaker 2 (20:38):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns,

Speaker 3 (20:45):

And remember lots of littles. There's a study by work that talks about the aggregate, let's say the cumulative effect of little bits of exposure on your brand actually deliver more than singular big pieces of visibility.

Speaker 1 (21:03):

I'm Damian and I'm Ilyse

Speaker 3 (21:05):

And we'll

Speaker 1 (21:05):

See you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In this episode of The Big Impression, our hosts catch up with Sara Badler, chief advertising officer in North America for The Guardian U.S., to explore the vision behind the campaign, as well as some early takeaways since launch.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:08):

Today we're joined by Sara Badler, the chief advertising Officer of The Guardian U.S. She's leading the charge behind the Guardian's first major US brand campaign called The Whole Picture, a bold effort to reintroduce one of the world's most trusted news organizations to American audiences.

Damian Fowler (00:29):

It's an ambitious moment for The Guardian with plans to expand coverage in New York and DC launch new US podcasts and connect with readers in fresh ways. The campaign is signaling a big step forward for the brand and for quality journalism in the digital age.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:44):

From that striking yellow billboard in Midtown Manhattan to new approaches in digital marketing and audience engagement, the Guardian is proving that serious journalism can still make a splash and drive real impact.

Damian Fowler (00:58):

Let's get into it.

Sara Badler (01:01):

The whole picture is really, it's The Guardian saying, which I think now is more important time than ever, is this idea that we are completely global perspective, we are independent and we have no paywall. Everyone can read us and we are focused and dedicated to journalism. And the whole picture really shows dedicated in every sort of way of telling the facts whether that is culturally, artistically with the World Cup coming upon us. And obviously The Guardian is a massive, one of the biggest soccer ducks in the world, if not the biggest, and really showing up in different ways the whole picture. And so I'm probably talking too much about this, but you see us on the subway, we did a live activation last week in the Meatpacking District and it's just really showing who we are and what we represent.

Damian Fowler (01:59):

Yeah, it is interesting. It's one of those things like the 1111 thing when you think about it and you notice it. Once I saw the campaign launch, then I saw it on the New York subway and it was everywhere. But I'd read that the editor of the Guardian, Catherine ER had said that this is the perfect time to reintroduce the Guardian to US audiences. And I know it's had great traction in the country for a while. Why is that? Why do you think it is the perfect time, especially in New York and metropolitan cities, why is it the right time?

Sara Badler (02:34):

I think now more than ever, we really want alternative news sources. And I say that mean the Guardian's been around for 200 years. We are not new by any means, but we are new-ish and more of a teenager here in the US and we have tons of obviously news outlets and a lot of them are owned and operated by billionaires. And there's all different things that are happening to them. There's consolidation, there's putting up more paywalls. And I think now more than ever, having something free and a truly global perspective is unique and something that we have.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:11):

And the campaign itself has such a striking centerpiece, the creative looking at it, it's bright yellow, there's words that are hidden. I'm curious if you can describe a little bit about that creative choice developed with Lucky Generals and can you walk us through basically the idea behind that concept?

Sara Badler (03:32):

It was not easy. I would say that it took our marketing and cross organizational functions a long time to come up with this with Lucky Generals to credit to them. They've been amazing and they've worked with us in the UK and now in the US and we also work with PhD as an agency, which also has been amazing. And it just took time of evolving of what our real story is and what we want people to get out of it. And I think the global perspective, free independent journalism that's factual with integrity and talking about culture in these key moments is really what we wanted people to understand. And here,

Ilyse Liffreing (04:14):

Yeah, looking at the media strategy a little bit, what was the plan for go to market and for reaching those target audiences?

Sara Badler (04:24):

And I think this is with every marketing campaign. I was actually on talking yesterday on a panel and saying there's no more, my marketing campaign is like a media plan. You've got a podcast, you've got activations, you've got events. So I think one thing to really think about or that we've thought about is how do we consistently beat a drum? And people recognize it throughout, not just one moment, but multiple moments throughout their day, whether it's on the subway through the activation and events. So that's something that we really focused on and I think we're doing that and we're continuing to do that, which I'm very excited about. We've done a few things. We did a fashion collaboration with Lingua Franca with the sweaters that we're really excited in the West Village going there after this and we're having a party tomorrow evening there. And then other things like we are going to be kicking off a residency at the net, which is super exciting with our editors. And so I think keeping the drum beat and showing up at these places is part of what we want to show. We truly are the whole picture.

Damian Fowler (05:27):

Before we get to the sort of channels you use, I just wanted to ask you about that event planning around media campaigns. Why is that an important part and piece of a marketing strategy these days? The idea of the building community around events?

Sara Badler (05:44):

Well, I think there's a couple things to that. I think obviously we're still coming out of COVID in the sense that people want to go out, people want events. I also think the cultural moments are just so important and especially for brands like ourselves who, for example, the soccer World Cup coming, which is every four years. This is a huge moment for us. And so I think planning around that and the sense of community I think is important in everything we do. Even here at Advertising Week, there's a sense of community. We live and breathe kind of the same sort of things in day in and day out. Exactly. So I feel like that's kind of something that we're trying to build and I think that if you feel a part of it, it's just so much stronger.

Ilyse Liffreing (06:32):

Speaking of the World Cup, can you say anything more about your plans there?

Sara Badler (06:37):

Yes. I mean, as I mentioned, we're one of the largest global soccer desks. We have a football weekly podcast that has been in the UK forever. I actually went to their event a few weeks ago in London and it was truly, when you talk about those cultural moments, it was one of those things that I've kind of heard about it. My husband's British and a huge football fan and listens to the podcast, but I never really understood the true fans was the strike on the tubes were happening of course while I was there. Just lucky, always, always. And then of course it's pouring down rain on and off when you think it's going to be beautiful and there's still fans from all over the world coming and it's not just for one team, it's for every team and for every. And so it's just like that is kind of the cultural moment. And so seeing that we're going to be launching that here in North America, which is super exciting.

Damian Fowler (07:35):

It's interesting. In the UK there's a very distinct sense of who reads the Guardian. I'm a guardian reader, I admit. And actually it was a Guardian contributor as well for a few years. But in the US do you have a strong sense of the Guardian readership? Is that galvanizing? Is that kind of coming together?

Sara Badler (07:54):

Yeah, I mean I think to your point of what was your media plan, and I am sure we had a podcast on with Vox that we did there and I think that we're still trying to figure it out, I would say because we don't have a paywall. We really think, and I truly do believe that everyone can be as a guardian audience at one point. We do tend to have different skews of older people that have identified in the past with The Guardian, things like that. But we're also starting to create, I think a buzz in younger generations and being out here and being on the subways and having these activations and the World Cup and other things happening. We're launching other podcasts and newsletters and things like that. We're really starting to grow audience across the board.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:45):

Are there any other channels that you're experimenting with?

Sara Badler (08:49):

Everything? We are launching video, podcast newsletters. I'm just thinking events like I mentioned the NED residency, which will kick off October 14th I want to say. So we're kind of trying to do everything. I think that's another thing as we evolve as publishers is that's just something that's kind of happening and we're really excited to be doing it.

Damian Fowler (09:15):

And I guess maybe touching on the programmatic strategy on the side of things, how has that grown as it were since you've taken this role?

Sara Badler (09:27):

Definitely. I am sure it was in the press. We were in the press with the trade desk as we launched the trade desk, which was kind of ironic obviously because I think we were, when I was at DOD Dash Meredith, we were the first publisher there and then coming to the Guardian able just do it again, but is we have really looked at our programmatic strategy and we actually kind of reorganized. And so the global programmatic strategy is actually coming out of the us which is very unique for The Guardian, which obviously everything is headquarters in the uk. And I think it really actually ties to our brand campaign of the whole picture and this global perspective is that we're really becoming one global unit. And I don't think it was like that before. I think it's been siphoned in different ways and I think now this is kind of the time. And so tying that back to the programmatic strategy is we're doing that as well. So we have one global programmatic team and strategy that we're super excited about and very good talent and we're just really excited to lean in as much as we can.

Ilyse Liffreing (10:33):

Okay, cool. So I know the campaign is so new

Sara Badler (10:36):

Still,

Ilyse Liffreing (10:36):

But what kind of reaction have you seen so far?

Sara Badler (10:40):

It's really been positive. Not that I was expecting any negative, but it's just been a lot more vibrant than I even thought it would be to your point, like the neon yellow and just seeing the signs and on the subway and just constantly seeing them. We also had billboards in different places and even the meat packing district, the activation we did there, which thank God it didn't rain, but you could take off different of the wording and we had different social media people that were activating on it. It was just cool to see. And it's also cool to see the street traffic that it gets. Also, one other funny thing is we did not funny, but we did the Lingua Franco, we did the storefronts with the Guardian gear in it. And I took my daughters last week and I was so excited and one of the sweaters was sold out and the salesperson was like, I was like, who was it? I was naming colleagues. I was like, was it Jane? Was it? And they're like, no, someone came in and bought it. And I was like, yes. So I think those are the kinds of things also that have just made it really fun.

Damian Fowler (11:50):

From your perspective as a marketing chief, are there sort of KPIs that matter most for a campaign like this? Obviously sales brand lift, engagement, how do you look at it? And I know again, to Eli's point, it's kind of early days to say for this specific campaign, but in general, what are the KPIs that you kind of track on your dashboard?

Sara Badler (12:14):

We were just talking about this, we were like, how do you quantify? And obviously my background and life of programmatic, I'm like, give me some data.

(12:25):

And I think that it's hard for us. It's hard for us to say exactly what it looks like because I would say when you quantify it from how many RFPs are we getting or is our revenue growing or how we're seeing that, but it's really actually now having meetings with proactive ideas of things that we offer that we couldn't offer before. So I think tracking our global footprint and working with clients in a way that's way more collaborative rather than, oh, you're getting this RFP and it's like a circle of something that you're checking a box, giving it to us. You saw this, I think from a consumer perspective, just having presence in all of these places and we know we're growing our audiences and we can see that. We do look at the data and research all the time on this, and actually every Thursday we're figuring out what happened this week that shows that we're still progressing. And I think the other thing that we have to remember about marketing that's been different is it can't just be a one and done thing. You have to talk about this, it launched last week, now it's ad week. What are we doing? What are we doing next week? And then what are we doing in seven weeks that's going to keep this going.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:40):

On that note, how are you tying your normal content strategy to marketing strategy?

Sara Badler (13:47):

Is there a tie in? We collaborate all the time on things. I mean, even with the sweater collaboration, we have our voices and our editors wearing these sweaters and they truly are the voices. I'm just in the background trying to make sure brands are aware and audiences grow from it, but they're the voices of The Guardian and they are, I mean, they lead with integrity and independence and we have to look at that. So that's also very important and why it's so exciting for us.

Damian Fowler (14:22):

Now, I know the Guardian has a unique kind of monetization, it has a trust, but I wondered if you could sort of break down a little bit the Guardian stands, the GUARDIANIST stands. That's a complicated thing to say on monetization between the subscription and the ad supported and everything in between. Do you think about that and how do you approach that

Sara Badler (14:45):

Every day?

(14:47):

I think about it every day. It is, it's very unique. I would say we are so lucky to be owned by the Scott Trust because we look at things and we do things like this to the whole picture that are very thought out, methodical, programmatic, they make sense. We're able to do that because owned by a trust. So we're able to say, we don't need to do or worry about something that's happening in Q2. We can think about what's happening in the World Cup or the next one and what that looks like. So that's the trust and that's what we're very lucky to have from what you touched on with reader revenue is our readers really invest in us. And that's kind of something that we can say and we can say that to clients, we can say that to marketers, consumers, everyone. We can really genuinely say people are investing in us because they want to read us, they want us to do well, and that's how we need to put our story out there. And that's how I think we overlap from an advertising and our reader revenue perspective is ultimately we're just trying to grow these audiences and for people to hear our stories.

Damian Fowler (15:53):

There's something nice about that, asking readers to contribute what they want. That model works to build loyalty. I

Sara Badler (16:01):

Expect completely. And that's something that I think it takes time. And that's why I'm saying I don't know our conversions for yesterday, but I do know that we are building somewhere that's exciting.

Ilyse Liffreing (16:15):

So you've had senior roles at Hearst, the New York Times and Doc Dash. What would you say are the biggest challenges even legacy publishers face when it comes to capturing readers today? Still?

Sara Badler (16:29):

I mean, we face all the challenges, so

Ilyse Liffreing (16:31):

Many challenges.

Sara Badler (16:32):

And I feel like I would say it's pretty consistent to your point of being at a lot of publishers that have been around for a long time and huge brands. And I think some of the things that, the struggle is obviously one, there's a lot, there's so much media to consume. It's like how do you make yourself unique and different? And in that way it's also, there's been a lot of different acquisitions and things that have happened, so it's kind of like how do you make people aware of who your true brand is and where it sits. I think those are, it also is the challenge of the times, meaning the actual time of happening where when I was at Daash and we were living through COVID was a very different time than what we're doing now. I would not suggest live events at that point, but then here we are and this is what we're doing. I would say at the New York Times, it was a place, it was right when elections were happening when I was there as well. And so I think it just, it's really, everyone's got their challenges, but everyone also has placed to their strengths and I think that's really important for publishing.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:46):

Yeah. Are there any innovations, maybe particularly in digital advertising that you see as giving you optimism for even funding quality journalism in the future?

Sara Badler (17:59):

I mean, this campaign has given me a lot of optimism. The whole picture has been amazing to see and also because I think it makes so much sense, which is really nice. I think that we also live, I live in a world where everything's just completely over complicated and just what it means is independent, factual and free. That's really, it just makes sense. And I think things like that show optimism in what's going on.

Damian Fowler (18:29):

Yeah, we talked there on innovation, which means we have to ask you a little bit about ai and that has been framed in some ways as a threat, but also an ally. Where do you stand on that?

Sara Badler (18:44):

I think we're in the middle, and that's probably the most boring answer ever. But it's good, it's fine. I mean, we are actively using it and try and figure out how and where it fits in different places, but it does not change how we report and our journalism.

Ilyse Liffreing (19:08):

Good to hear, good to hear. Now some quickfire questions for you. Let's do it. What do you think is one thing the ad market desperately needs but doesn't

Sara Badler (19:19):

Have? Oh my God, we have so much of everything. The ad market desperately needs maybe some better organization of what our products are and the different types would be something

Ilyse Liffreing (19:36):

Or streamlined,

Sara Badler (19:37):

A different streamlined approach would be something

Damian Fowler (19:42):

Less fragmentation perhaps. I dunno. Yeah, I dunno. I put words in your mouth.

Sara Badler (19:47):

I think one thing that publishers need is really to work better together to figure out what the future holds for them.

Damian Fowler (19:57):

And you may have answered this already in the podcast, but a publisher you secretly admire for how they're playing the game.

Sara Badler (20:04):

I mean, I think the New York Times has been brilliant in just how they've worked through a lot of different acquisitions they've made and things like that has been great to see. But I think all publishers have done a really great, the best that it's been a tough market and I think that even from a programmatic perspective and everything, we are just trying to do our best to get through it and also understand kind of what the world will look like quarter to quarter, which is very different. And it's not those days where you could be, I remember in past lives you'd be like year over year last year at this time and you're like, well, last year at this time was such a different,

Damian Fowler (20:47):

Such point you

Sara Badler (20:48):

Can't even compare anymore. I know. Yeah. So it's like, well last year this happened. And so I think that it's a tough thing for publishers to do.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:59):

What would you say is the boldest marketing risk you've ever taken?

Sara Badler (21:06):

That's a great question. I would say just because, just to go back to also the whole picture, I think this whole thing we've done also the collaboration with Lingua franca and the sweaters, we didn't know how people would react or the world would react or if they would react, but I think that because it's something you're just putting out there, we've never done anything in the fashion world at all. And I think that was kind of something that probably not the most scary but the most scary to me this week of doing that. I was like, I don't know if this is going to work. And we don't know how people react. And you want only positive things to come out, especially after you're doing such a big collaboration.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:53):

Nice marketing every week is different, isn't it? Yeah. Just depends on the day. Yeah. I

Damian Fowler (21:58):

Guess here's the last question. If you could steal one idea from another industry and bring it into publishing, what would that be?

Sara Badler (22:07):

Sorry,

Damian Fowler (22:08):

These are hard questions.

Sara Badler (22:09):

No idea. Well, it's funny, I was thinking, I was like fashion week, we just talked about fashion, but now we're in advertising week. So they've definitely done that. I would say, I dunno, I guess we don't have a Super Bowl or anything like that. That would be good. I think we've got enough stuff really. We should stop. Yeah, we should. I'm thinking there's South by there's can we do so many things? And I think that's one thing from my perspective that again, with the whole picture that we're really trying to do is show up in the right way where it matters. And if you try to be everywhere or nowhere, and I think that's really important for us to think about. And so trying to do something that you haven't done yet, you should definitely do, but it should feel natural.

Ilyse Liffreing (22:55):

Sara, we're recording an advertising week and I'm curious if you have a major takeaway that you could share with us.

Sara Badler (23:03):

Okay, so I mentioned day two, we're on day two and I think it does feel bigger than it's ever been or busier for sure. And it feels like there's so many things going on. The other thing though is I think because there are so many of these things that it also feels like in this world right now, we're doing a lot of in-house things, if that makes sense. We have tons of our team in town this week. I know that when I talk to clients or agencies, they're doing a lot of internal stuff. So it feels like that's a big something that's changed a little bit.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:40):

I would say there's definitely a lot more people I think this week then than I remember in years past at least.

Sara Badler (23:46):

But even every time I talk to someone, they're like, well, we have a lot of internal stuff going on. And I think that there's a lot going on. So I think that that's also something that is happening that maybe didn't happen as often.

Damian Fowler (24:05):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (24:07):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (24:14):

And remember,

Sara Badler (24:15):

We have tons of, obviously news outlets and a lot of them are owned and operated by billionaires, and there's all different things that are happening to them. There's consolidation, there's putting up more paywalls. And I think now more than ever, having something free and a truly global perspective is unique and something that we have.

Damian Fowler (24:37):

I'm Damian

Sara Badler (24:37):

And I'm Ilyse, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From DoubleClick to AppNexus to Firsthand, Michael shares lessons from decades at the forefront of ad tech: what it means to build with purpose, how to hire and scale teams that thrive, and why the next wave of growth will come from brands who embrace AI directly.

If you care about founder stories, AI, ad tech innovation, and building products that last, this episode offers a rare inside look from two builders shaping the future of the open internet.

Watch their conversation: https://youtu.be/ishJspl-prw?si=Z29LpPSjK_fyUlqs

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're joined by Allison Stransky, Chief Marketing Officer at Samsung Electronics America. She's led brand strategy at global companies like Google and L'Oreal, and now drive Samsung's vision for the connected home.

Damian Fowler (00:24):

Allison's here to talk about Samsung's new campaign Your Home Speaks You launched in June. The campaign highlights the joy of a home that feels more personal, showing how Samsung's connected products and Galaxy AI come together in everyday moments. Think a washer dryer that finishes a load in 68 minutes or a fridge that tells you to order some more cheese.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:47):

I love that idea. It's an omnichannel campaign built on real consumer insights about what homeowners actually need and how connected tech can save time, reduce stress, and make life a little easier.

Damian Fowler (01:01):

So let's get into it.

Ilyse Liffreing (01:08):

So Alison, the campaign Your Home speaks to you. It really redefines the home, not just as a space but as a feeling. And for the first time, it actually connects all of Samsung's various products into one overall story where anybody can pair these devices throughout the home together. Can you discuss the campaign and then how you translated that vision into the creative?

Allison Stransky (01:31):

Absolutely. So the initial insight behind your home speaks you is that we are all unique individuals and so are our homes, but also our homes are unique reflection of ourselves. And this actually went back to a campaign that we launched in 2024, but in 25 we took a really exciting evolution, which as you said was the first time we made a wide reaching video, digital video campaign featuring multiple Samsung products working together because we wanted to really convey to consumers who know consumers who don't know how much more you can get out of the Samsung ecosystem when you connect it all through smart things and what is also net new, how Galaxy AI takes those benefits really to the next level. So we are firm believers in how incredible our products are and how amazing they can all be when they work together, but we needed to translate that into something really tangible and relatable.

(02:38):

So that's where it came to life. In this campaign we featured four different hero products, the two TVs, combo washer dryer and the Bespoke fridge in sequence with a number of mobile products because that is where a lot of the real benefits of the interoperability can start to happen and then looked for real emotional insights to drive the storyline. So to turn that idea into a campaign, it all starts with the data. So we wanted to start by understanding the features and the benefits that our consumers like the most about our products and how our products work together. And then we took that data and turned them into insights. So to give you an example of how that worked, I'll start with the bespoke combo washer dryer. This is a new product that we launched in 2025. It does a wash in a dry all in one cycle in 68 minutes.

(03:38):

So this is the fastest combo washer dryer on the market, which is great. Fast speed is a great benefit, but when you connect to smart things and you start working with all of your devices together, you can really take your efficiency to the next level through things like notifications. But the human insight that comes into play is imagine that you are coming home and have to get ready for a date and you find that your dog is sitting on the clothes that you laid out for your date and your now brief tells you you have to be out the door in 75 minutes. Well, Samsung saves the day or the date night with the combo washer dryer and the sequence of notifications so you can get ready to go. And that's how really we thought about the whole campaign of bringing it together is it started with a product, it's made better by smart things in ai, but it's really a data-driven human insight that takes the whole thing and brings it to life.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:34):

Oh yeah, that's really cool. I know it took me two and a half hours to do laundry the other night.

Damian Fowler (04:39):

That's way too long.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:41):

And your own research has found that 76% of households already own at least one SAM product and then 27% have three or more. So how did those data insights actually help you shape the campaign?

Allison Stransky (04:56):

Well, that is data that we're really proud of. We are so proud to be in 76% of households, but then when you look at the drop off, between 76% have at least one Samsung product and 27% have three or more. We really believe in the benefits that are unlocked when all of our products are working together. So in theory, only 27% of households are realizing this state that we know can be possible. So it is one of the things that has driven this is like it is important for you to unlock all of the features and all of the capabilities of whether it's your appliance, your TV or your phone. They really are better together. So that was one of the drivers behind this campaign. Another one of the drivers is we launched Galaxy AI in 2024 and now we've been over this hurdle of there is strong awareness of Galaxy AI and AI in general of what it is and what it can do, but we need to help consumers along on this journey of seeing all the benefits that AI can unlock.

(06:01):

So we talk about Galaxy AI as being your true AI companion. And what we mean by that is we've moved beyond automation and it's now personalized predictive, anticipating your needs and offering you meaningful personal insights. And that's something else that we want to start telling the story of because that's the thing that's going to get you to say, oh my gosh, my phone can do so much more and now enter smart things. My phone and my fridge or my phone and my TV can help me start building this really amazing connected lifestyle that's going to help me insert the benefit that isn't relevant to you. Is it save time? Is it have a better movie watching experience? There's so many things that this can enable that. That was, it was those things that added up to really inspiring us to create this campaign.

Damian Fowler (06:53):

I'm really interested to hear a little bit more about the style and the tone of the aesthetic of this campaign, how it aligns this futuristic vision with very human insight.

Allison Stransky (07:03):

We always think not just about the tech itself but the design. So it really goes back to the product and how we represent our products because it is not just about having this functional high tech TV, refrigerator, et cetera, but we want them to be designed forward and fit them beautifully into your house. So that's our baseline philosophy as it came to this campaign. We want to represent how beautiful and designed for the products are, but also Samsung, the brand as a whole. So we are joyful, colorful, open, inclusive as a brand. And so to get that feeling and to bring that to life, we worked with an amazing team. Crispin was our creative partner and Mathy was our director duo partner who really brought that vision to life. So Crispin was not new for us. We have been working with them since 2024, and so they really get and feel our brand.

(08:05):

But Mathy is a creative team that we and the Crispin team have really admired and wanted to have an opportunity to work with because we felt like they really get it, they get Samsung, they get what they're trying to do and then they bring their own incredible spin to it. So two of the things that I loved about them, and I will say they all this team really surpassed expectations. One was their approach to color. Like I said, we are a design forward colorful brand and they really captured a very modern look and feel. But then secondly, they have an incredible attention to detail that I hope our viewers pick up on when they watch the spots and see all these tiny little things that came together. One of my favorite examples of that was in our neo QLED eight K TV spot. The storyline was that this couple is obsessed with westerns and they want to have the most immersive TV western viewing experience, but their whole house is designed like Western fans and there's all this little attention to detail in tiny hats and cowboy boots that they strategically placed everywhere in the spot.

(09:20):

And when we saw it come to life, we just, like I said, it surpassed our expectations and we know we picked the right team.

Damian Fowler (09:31):

Allison, I'd really love to ask you a little bit more about the actual media buying strategy behind the campaign. Can you elaborate?

Allison Stransky (09:37):

Absolutely. So it's really special to work at this brand. A lot of CMOs have a lot of love for their brand. I've had love for Samsung before I worked here, so I feel fortunate to have this seat and everything that we create is so it's thought out from the product perspective, from the communication perspective, from the media buying perspective because we want to make sure, one, you understand what we are trying to do. Two, we reach the right people. Something else that is unique about working in a brand that has touched this many households is one of the reasons we've done that is we have so many products and part of that is getting the right message to the right person at the right time. Because if you're going back to school and you're in college shopping mode, I have really relevant phones and laptops and tablets that are going to monitors that will enhance your back to school experience.

(10:40):

I don't want to serve you a refrigerator ad at that time. And so that's where end to end, every detail needs to be thought out because even the targeting needs to get the right spot to the right people. As I talked a little bit about, this is year two of the campaign in the first year we created stories and vignettes around Are you a workout from Home Maven? Are you a home chef? And when I saw the corporate, the boss lady served to me, I was like, this is all working. The media is working out is the one that I've also been served.

Ilyse Liffreing (11:16):

Yeah, it seems to me like it's a truly omnichannel kind of strategy as well, and that kind of fits in with the overall smart things theme in a sense.

Allison Stransky (11:25):

It does. I appreciate that connection because smart things is one of the things that's really special about the Smart Things app is that it is an open ecosystem. It works with everything that is built on the matter platform. So it's not just for Samsung products. And not only is that in line with our value system of openness and inclusion, but that helps our consumers and smart things app users reach another level of benefits and impact. And what I mean by that is health is a big area, for example, that we focus on and sleep within health is critical, but part of your sleeping environment is are your shades open or closed? How well lit or not well lit is your bedroom. And we want smart things to be part of making that perfect sleeping environment. But we don't make lights, we don't make curtains, but we are very happy that you can connect smart lights and smart curtains to your smart things app and with Samsung products create this holistic environment where you can sleep better or wake up better. And it's all a part of our vision of Look, we want to add value to your life. We want to be a very useful, helpful brand.

Ilyse Liffreing (12:39):

And on that note, let's dive into some of the insights a little bit because you mentioned you wanted to make a smart things ecosystem feel more intuitive and easy to access. So what were some of those signals or behavior changes that you're watching for to see if this message lands?

Allison Stransky (12:54):

It starts with the KPIs. So we are looking to understand is registration smart things registration increasing? Because the very first step is hook up a product, begin to use the app, start to see what you can get out of that. But from there we want to see that multi-device accounts are also growing because if you have multiple devices connected now I'm starting to get an indication that you are seeing more benefits than, look, you can use your phone as a remote control to turn your TV on and off. That's great. I actually do that a lot in my house. But the sleep benefits, the health benefits, the full ecosystem really gets better when there are multiple products. So the first indication is sign up and start using it. The second is how many products are on there because now I know that you're starting to get a little bit more engaged and we're looking at signals outside of smart things usage as well.

(13:52):

So for example, only a few weeks into this campaign running, we saw a 55% increase in smart things searches versus year ago. And that was really exciting to us because that means there's a lot of curiosity around the app and what the app can do. And concurrently we had created a set of assets that we're calling smart things 1 0 1 and they are a series of literally 101 videos that were designed to be very SEO forward and answer questions that we either know people are asking or we believe people are asking about the app. So we've created this process whereby you see the campaign, if you're not familiar with smart things, you might go, oh, what is this? Let me learn some more. And now when you go out there, there's a ton more video to take you on your own personal journey that starts with what is smart things all the way down to, okay, I get it, I'm hooked up. How can I create this? My refrigerator helps me, meal plan experience. It's a number of signals and behavior changes that we're looking at along the way.

Damian Fowler (14:58):

It makes sense that there's an educational component to this campaign that runs alongside it because I'm curious, when people hear your home speaks to you, they may say, well, what does that mean? What does it mean to me? I mean maybe this tech is even intimidating to some people.

Allison Stransky (15:12):

Yeah, I think it is fair that this is not second nature to us yet. We are fascinated by each generation of new people who are born are going to be much more tech native than the generation before them. But right now our consumers are really, you're kind of in the millennial and exes are buying a lot of the houses that the appliances are speaking to. Zs are buying phones and certainly TVs but not as many of them are homeowners. So we do think it's really important that we make that journey as seamless and easy as possible because once a lot of the benefits are literally set it and forget it and you can go and continue on your life, but we want to make sure end to end you are supported in your journey. So even outside of this campaign, we are piloting a lot of things whereby our service line people, you can call in and get tech support to set up smart things or we foresee a future state where you can set it up, you can have somebody come in and set it up in your home so that it is all that much easier and ready to go.

Damian Fowler (16:25):

Now you talk about it. I do think maybe this is a generational thing as well. I suppose if people aren't homeowners serving them, an ad for a fridge may not be that relevant. So you must see an interesting breakdown across generational demographics.

Allison Stransky (16:39):

We do it is there's a wide range of to be in 76% of households, we have a lot of wide range of consumers too. We also have ranges within our products. We have, not all of our refrigerators have screens, but we sure do love the ones that do. But what we found is through a wide portfolio mix, so many people can see the benefits that they're looking for out of our products. And then it's really our responsibility to make our marketing work harder, to make our media dollars more impactful to and our agency partners as well to get the right content to the right people at the right time

Damian Fowler (17:22):

On the right phone.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:24):

Yeah, that is very interesting because people are using even search and AI chatbots for their questions and how to get those answers. So I think it's a great strategy. But looking at the big picture now, how do you see AI continuing to evolve the role that Samsung plays in people's homes?

Allison Stransky (17:42):

We really believe that AI is going to continue to be more prevalent, more ubiquitous, more important all of our lives. So AI is not new and we've been innovating in AI for more than 10 years. But what has changed is a lot of the LLMs and the media and a lot of this honestly just talking about it have put these benefits and the power of it on consumer's minds. So now we're in the early stages of, okay, the benefits are here. Let's start with helping you understand what Galaxy AI is and then how AI can make a difference on your refrigerator and your tv. And we are seeing this journey, and to be honest, AI is moving so fast that we could be there in a year, we could be there in three. We don't really know how ready consumers are going to be to jump in with us on all of these things, but the innovation roadmap is there and the communication roadmap is there to say, all right, we know it's going to be here and what we know, it's here to stay.

(18:44):

Let's just take you on this journey. Let's start with the features and the benefits that you have seen the most value in. So for example, a lot of people are using things like circle to search and photo editing capabilities because that is really valuable, but also on the fun side of adoption. So we've worked those into our campaigns. Another one that as an example from this particular smart things campaign in the Frame Pro spot, we showcase for the first time the frame has always been our art tv. Normally we're showing how you can put Van Gogh on your wall because the insight behind the frame is that your TV shouldn't be a black box when you're not using it. Well now it can display family art, meaning photos that you've taken and edited to take that guy in the background out that you wished wasn't in there. And you can see all of this come to life, but this is still the early stages of what the AI journey is about. It's going to be become even more automated and assistive as we get into this stage of multimodality all of your devices and apps connecting and doing more things for you. But we feel it's our responsibility to help you understand what that looks like, not just how it works, but what's the end benefit to you. And then you'll be excited to come along with us on that journey.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:02):

Now what about outside of the home? Do you envision a future where the smart things ecosystem even extends maybe in the cars travel or public spaces, maybe even as part of a new innovation roadmap?

Allison Stransky (20:15):

Yes, we would. It does exist a little bit today and we'd be so excited to see even more so we did just recently launch Smart Things Pro, which is an enterprise solution for smart things. So right now business owners can see a lot of benefits like controlling whole hotels. One of our favorite examples that we shared at CES this year was that smart things pro can control your cruise ship. Not a lot of us are in market to buy cruise ships, but showing the power of what it can do and how it exists is really exciting. And I think we envision a world where smart things pro from a business outside of the home perspective can connect to smart things on your device and on your app. And we foresee a roadmap of when you show up at a hotel, you can have your room set to the temperature you like, which not just makes it for a more comfortable experience for you, but could help a whole hotel be more sustainable by not blasting the air conditioning for everybody who doesn't want it to be 62 degrees or whatever it feels like it's set at through smart things.

(21:22):

And Hyundai, your EV can be your whole house generator. So there's cool stuff in the works that we are working on getting the news out there to our consumers because there's just so many benefits. We also kind have to start by thinking about the bigger ones, which back to this campaign, the things that people want every day are make my life easier, help me save time, help me make my home more enjoyable with my family.

Damian Fowler (21:51):

Do you think that there's any way that this campaign can help move the needle in the direction of broader acceptance of say, AI and automation?

Allison Stransky (22:00):

I think it's going to play a part in that we have so much within Samsung that we are talking about in the AI space that I think Samsung as a whole is a massive contributor to shifting the AI conversation. So fortunately there are some partners out there like Chat, GP, GT and Meta are also continuing the narrative and bringing up total awareness. So we're very excited for the more AI conversation that happens, the more interest and curiosity there is in AI benefits. And then we are here with on-device AI on our smartphones and televisions and appliances, our responsibility when you come now you know what AI is. Now our responsibility is to help you see the benefit that you can get from not just individual Samsung products but how they all work together. And I think we are at this really exciting tipping point for not just tech companies but consumer companies everywhere to help all consumers say, look, we're moving into the AI generation. It's here to stay. We're going to do it together. You find the AI solutions that are right for you. And that's how I think we'll all come along on this journey.

Damian Fowler (23:14):

I just want to know, can I ask my fridge to tell me when I need to order some new cheese?

Allison Stransky (23:18):

Cheese? I would prioritize cheese too.

Damian Fowler (23:21):

Okay. We've got some quickfire questions now that EIS is going to kick off.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:25):

Okay. Yes. So Alison, what's your favorite scene or moment from the new campaign that you believe best captures the heart of your homes beaks you?

Allison Stransky (23:35):

So in each of our four spots, there's a moment where our hero just makes this look like I've got this. So my dog is sitting on my day clothes, I've got this, my kids can't agree on dinner. I've got this. And that's the part that I think that captures because whether it comes from the surprise of dog on clothes or I got tackle dinner every single night, I think that's a very real moment that people go through every single day and you get that own personal little rush of like, you got this covered. But on a personal level, it is, I do really love the fridge spot where dad is cooking dinner for two kids because we laugh about this at home because every single night my husband is cooking dinner for our kids. And so that one for me is like a little slice of life, but there's a moment of confidence where you're in control. And that's what I think really encapsulates the spirit of this campaign.

Damian Fowler (24:37):

What's one feature of the Samsung Smart things ecosystem that you personally can't live without?

Allison Stransky (24:43):

So I am personally obsessed with all the innovation we have in this health space and sleep in particular because we know most Americans report they don't get enough sleep, but I am definitely part of that set as for mentioned to kids. So what I'm really excited about is the capabilities of your wearables to track how you are sleeping, connects that to your personal temperature in the middle of the night and auto adjust your thermostat accordingly to bring the temperature up or down depending upon what you need. So I will be completely honest, my full house is not fully smart thermostat enabled yet, but this is the one on my wishlist that I'm like, I need this because I am a wearable and health tracker enthusiast.

Ilyse Liffreing (25:33):

Okay, here's the next one. Which consumer insights helped you the most in developing this campaign?

Allison Stransky (25:40):

So when it comes to this campaign, we were looking for insights that I guess I'll say weren't so surprising as they were relatable. So I'm not sure that I can say from this campaign, but on the consumer insight that surprises me the most is that I'm not kidding and I'm not being facetious. People report saying they would rather live without their left hand than their mobile phone. I know that our phones are important, but I will say that is surprising because that is to report that that is a level of, I don't know if it's dependency or love, but either way that reminds me that we make a really special product that people really, really value in their lives. And I think that is just wild when they say it like that.

Damian Fowler (26:27):

Well, we did live without them a long time ago, so. Well, I did. I'm Gen X. Is there a brand campaign inside or outside tech that you think is nailing emotional storytelling right now?

Allison Stransky (26:39):

So it's not exactly a new spot. They've been doing it for a little while, but I loving Volvo and they released a spot, I believe it was last year, towards the end of the year for the New Ex 90 where it is a beautiful story of a couple has just found out that they are pregnant and they flash forward and they see their whole lives unfold. And then there's a moment where Volvo is critical in their safety features of making sure that this all happens. And I'm going to give you just enough tease because I think people should go look up this spot. This is a piece of art in video advertising. And I still get chills when I think about it. So that's one in particular that's really good. But then they've taken a lot of other moments with dad and daughter learning to drive together. And so many of these other things that I think cars can be emotional because they're related to safety. They also are so integral to your life. They enable you to get places to do things. So I think there's a lot of deep emotion in the auto category, but when you say emotion, that is the first one that comes to mind as I still get chills thinking about how beautiful that spot is.

Damian Fowler (28:02):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:04):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (28:11):

And remember

Allison Stransky (28:12):

The consumer insight that surprises me the most is that I'm not kidding, and I'm not being facetious. People report saying they would rather live without their left hand than their mobile phone.

Damian Fowler (28:23):

I'm Damian

Ilyse Liffreing (28:24):

And I'm Ilyse, and

Damian Fowler (28:25):

We'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're spotlighting one of the most ambitious shifts happening in brand marketing, Nestle's global push to redefine performance in a world where reach, relevance and streaming. Now go hand in hand.

Damian Fowler (00:21):

Our guest is Antonia Farquhar, global head of Media and partnerships at Nestle. Antonia has been at the forefront of Nestle's pivot towards connected TV and long-term brand building across categories, continents, and campaigns.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:35):

From Formula One to Gen Z coffee drinkers, she's helping Nestle rethink what media performance really means in a CTV first world and how brands can use new tools and data to close the loop between awareness and action.

Damian Fowler (00:50):

Let's get into it.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:52):

Antonia. So I understand that you guys are sponsoring Kit Kat's Formula One. I'm very curious to learn more about that.

Antonia Farquhar (01:03):

Yeah, one of the reasons that the Kit Kat team put that sponsorship together was to really, they've got an existing brand strategy, have a break, have a Kit Kat, right?

Damian Fowler (01:14):

Everybody loves that.

Antonia Farquhar (01:14):

Which is decades and decades old. I think it's way over 75 years old, that consistency of brand message is there and it's really part of the foundations of that brand. But the break is more important than ever in a busy world that we all live in today. And so it was really putting the brand at the heart of also everybody needs a break. How can we capitalize on that? And F1 has gone from being very much, I think known as a petrol head sports, to really bringing in different audiences, so younger, more diverse across the genders and it's global and Kit Kat is a major global brand of ours. So it was an excellent opportunity to really bring together the brand and I guess wouldn't have been an expected place. And then to capitalize on that, on giving people a better break as well.

Ilyse Liffreing (02:08):

Can you give me a little bit of background about why sports and why Formula One?

Antonia Farquhar (02:15):

I think for me, sports is one of the last truly appointment of view. Live viewing. You do not want to miss the race. You do not want to miss the final, you do not. There's so many of those moments now where it is also, people are talking about it, who won, how's the lineup, where is it? Et cetera. So it's part of cultural conversations and really the opportunity for our brands is to connect into what's happening, making sure we are injecting our brands with freshness and bringing in that new conversations. And I think sponsorship like the F1, and we also did Coffee Mate and the Super Bowl early this year, again, to really capitalize on where's the real excitement happening and how do we inject our brands in a distinct way. Obviously being true to their brand codes to new and different audiences,

Damian Fowler (03:13):

A thought a 30,000 foot view, you look across the landscaping like, well, these are the moments where we need to show up

Antonia Farquhar (03:20):

For sure. I mean, one of the role within the team is to really inspire and provoke and drive that distinctiveness for our brands. We are privileged to have a lot of huge global brands, but we're also over 150 years old as a company. So it's how do you inject that freshness? How do you stand out in a increasingly fragmented media landscape? So I think this is where we want brands to really lean in and as I said, it is holding on what is your brand territory? Where is that strategic foundations that hold true and need to be consistent, but how do you punch and become a little bit more maybe unexpected? Unexpected places is clearly one of the themes that I'm seeing in the industry lately that it drives that attention.

Damian Fowler (04:20):

When you talk about unexpected places. Could you say a bit more about that?

Antonia Farquhar (04:26):

I mean, we all know we are living in a very attention. Yeah, the second you wake up the phones, the amount of apps on your phones, it's increasingly hard and I think it'll continue to get harder to really drive connectivity to brands with people. And so I think doing something a little bit different and perhaps wouldn't, it's not predictable for that brand to be in that particular place or speaking in a different environment. I think that's an opportunity going forward. And I think when you look at a lot of the award-winning work globally this year, that's one theme that I really see coming through and I kind of love it. It's bringing a bit of fresh, it's bringing an edge, and I think it's pushing people and brand experiences to a different level to where they were before. So

Ilyse Liffreing (05:18):

Yeah,

Antonia Farquhar (05:19):

I'm enjoying

Ilyse Liffreing (05:19):

It and it's fun.

Antonia Farquhar (05:20):

Exactly. It's fun. And I feel like it's almost, there's different areas where different brands have different tone of voice, and so it's working out really what is that? And then perhaps tapping into a community really engaged in a particular community and how can you link your brand and derive some insights from that behavior to speak in that way.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:45):

Certainly. Now, I know you were talking about using sports to tap into that audience around appointment tv. Are there other channels that you guys are particularly leaned into at this time? Are there ones that you're experimenting with? How is that going?

Antonia Farquhar (06:03):

Yeah, so I think the more you know about marketing science, and I'm quite a nerd when it comes to marketing science, but the more channels you are in, the higher your effectiveness of course. So again, it's about how do we do fewer, bigger, better campaigns.

(06:21):

And media activations to really get that consistent cut through. But in terms of channels, when you look at where the growth is at the moment, retail, digital media is growing at an increasingly fast rate year on year. But connected TV is another one that I am really excited to discover the future of that particular medium. I mean, even in the last few years, the amount of ads that we serve on connected TV devices is more than doubled. The adoption rate is huge and it's from where you'd expect the more advanced markets where most of the streaming services for the US and the uk, but also in markets like India, the Philippines, Australia, the viewing habits are really shifting. I think COVID drove that acceleration and we all spent a lot more time at home and people probably spent money on better TVs because there wasn't as much to do outside. And so yeah, that's one I'm excited about.

Ilyse Liffreing (07:29):

And I would imagine for a brand like Nestle that the intersection of CTV and retail media and e-commerce is really exciting now that you can practically shop through your TV too.

Antonia Farquhar (07:43):

Yes. Yeah, it is. I think it's a great opportunity. I love the fact that that medium is back in the living room but advanced and it's now how do you make sure you are able to do a brand building experience and build an emotional connection, but also give people the prompt to buy perhaps through a QR code or through the retailer websites. And obviously the audiences piece is super attractive as well when you're really trying to nudge people to close the sale. So yeah, I think it's very exciting. It's amazing.

Damian Fowler (08:23):

I was interested in what you said just then about fewer, bigger, better, which is easy to say, but perhaps not easy to execute. What kind of mindset shifts were needed to get your teams to rally behind that concept and how does it kind of show up?

Antonia Farquhar (08:41):

Yeah, fewer, bigger, better is a phrase I feel like I say every single day in the office. We started on a journey a few years ago and it's all about the focus. So focusing on the brands, ensuring they're well fed with the right amount of investment because we know that's one of the key factors of marketing effectiveness. But so from where do we invest, how many briefs, et cetera, but actually also through to our agency partners as well. So we've done a big transformation across lots of parts of the globe to really consolidate our agency model, which has been a mindset shift to your point around if we scale and standardize, then we free up more time and brainpower to really create outstanding media activations and planning. And so we are in the transformation area of that at the moment. But yeah, it's bringing a lot of great benefits, good talent, better work, and a more we can scale faster. We are a huge organization. We operate in 188 markets, and so therefore scaling information and driving that best practice is going to go so much faster through the consolidation.

Ilyse Liffreing (10:13):

When it comes to CTV, are there specific brands that Nestle owns that kind of fit that target audience a little better?

Antonia Farquhar (10:24):

I think it's a great question. I think it fits a lot of our brands, but to your point, it depends on where that behavior is happening. Often it can be younger audiences, but we are seeing it growing to really, really broad audiences as well. And especially the move we've had in the industry from really subscription to the ad model piece allows that larger access as well. What I also am interested in this space is the type of content as well. So there's obviously a huge diversity in terms of super high production and Netflix style content all the way through to the UGC or that type of content as well. So again, going back to the point earlier about different audiences and their interests, to me that brings a really thoughtful opportunity about are there different types of content that makes sense for different brands, to your point, versus doing a one size fits all. So I think that's super interesting as we see the, well, the more and more content that comes out and the consumption increase as well.

Damian Fowler (11:37):

And what's also interesting I guess, is the global differences. I mean, I know the APAC market is very mobile first and different markets, more mature markets like the US CTV is strong. I wonder from your perspective, where do you see the big growth opportunities around the world from a media perspective?

Antonia Farquhar (12:02):

Like you say in Asia, we see huge growth of shopping online. It's seamless and you can really go from discovering a product to buying it within 10 seconds. And so that is challenging some of the norms about the amount of time but that people need. So yeah, again, it depends on the category and the purchase cycle there, but I think that's a great opportunity. Things like WhatsApp I think will be increasingly utilized by brands as a way, a more seamless way of connecting with shoppers as well. But I think social retail media and connected TV are the three areas that we really focus on, but then the important ask within that is how do we do it in a way that is quality, culturally relevant with the right context, so we are able to cut through in an effective way.

Damian Fowler (13:07):

So you're working closely with different agencies in each of those distinct markets.

Antonia Farquhar (13:12):

Yeah, exactly. To find the right opportunity and what are the local opportunities there too. Are

Damian Fowler (13:20):

There any surprises from your point of view? And I just want to say I grew up in York and it was the home of Roundtree Macintosh, which where Kit Kat started. And then over the years we've seen Kit Kat show up in different places, like in Japan, I think there's a version with green tea or green. So that's an interesting kind of way

Ilyse Liffreing (13:41):

A lot to collect them from around the world.

Damian Fowler (13:43):

And I think it is remarkable how the brand sort of KitKat brand has scaled across the world, but it's still kind true to that chocolate bar that I knew in York when I used to wake up. You could smell the cocoa. So are you kind of thinking about things like that?

Antonia Farquhar (14:02):

I think for me and with the brand team, it's about staying true to those foundations. Have a break, have a kick at, and that core bar that you grew up smelling,

(14:16):

But how can you flex into those local regions and opportunities, flavors tastes? And I think that's exciting opportunity. And obviously Japan, in fact, yesterday someone was saying about how they flew to Japan to buy the different types of KitKats. Clearly a lot of people get excited about that, but we also have factories all over the world. So it allows us to diversify and able to deliver to some of the nature, some of the local taste preferences. But for me it's about staying core to that brand really, because the foundation behind the piece. But yeah, you can also have fun with it with different flavor rotations too. Yeah.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:04):

Is there any advice that you would give marketers looking to make the same shift as you guys are doing from short term return on investment to long-term brand building?

Damian Fowler (15:16):

Fewer, bigger, better, right? Fewer, bigger better. Is that what you say?

Antonia Farquhar (15:19):

A rally cry. I'm going to have it on a T-shirt. Exactly. But no, you should sell those too. Exactly. So I think it's about focus, right? And it's about really focusing on where are the areas of the greatest opportunity. I'm also a big believer in having data points at hand. So whenever we are challenged around some of the decisions that we are aiming to drive across the business, having that the audience has actually grown by 50, 60, 70 or whatever percent, and it's no longer just teams, it's a very broad audience and our products are super broad and it allows us to connect with people daily, weekly. Again, it's that consistent piece that I think is really attractive there.

Damian Fowler (16:12):

What are you obsessed with figuring out right now?

Antonia Farquhar (16:16):

So many, many things at the moment. I just thinking about the conversation that we were having about quality of media and connected tv, I would love more understanding on the impact of ad loads. As I said, it does vary hugely across the different providers from six minutes an hour to, I dunno, probably 35 minutes an hour. And again, I'm a big believer and you get what you pay for. So if it is a higher cost, then the effectiveness is hopefully and likely higher. But again, proving the house I think would be really interesting as well and what effect, what it has on the effectiveness of that.

Ilyse Liffreing (16:59):

Yeah. So what would you say is missing from the CTV marketplace as it stands today?

Antonia Farquhar (17:04):

I would love more unification to manage, this is a very technical media answer, but to manage reach and frequency more consistently. I think that's been a bit of a downfall of the growth of things like BVO and CTV was that ability to effectively manage and not feel like you're wasting or annoying people with too many ads. So the unification of that across many devices would be my dream to be able to do. And it was never possible to unlock on linear TV for very obvious reasons, but as we are in a much more digitized world, it does feel possible. I'm not sure we'll get there. But yeah, any unification that a lot of the DSPs offer to me, they're incredibly valuable to ensure we're being more efficient and effective with our investment.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:59):

Very cool. Now I actually do have a follow up to what you said before about effective reach and cost. Do you feel like there, do you feel like most marketers still have the mindset that they want to buy in at the cheapest they can, no matter the effectiveness?

Antonia Farquhar (18:21):

Or is that changing? Do you think it's changing? I think it is changing. I do. I'm a believer that the more great effective research and the more case studies and that sort of part you read, it's not about that to me. These are soft metrics in terms of did the campaign deliver what you signed for on your media plan? But really we are here to drive business and brands and whether it's cross between equity and sales and category growth. So to me, you have to come back to, is it driving business results, making sure you're able to measure and manage those effectively because yeah, if you can't measure it, you can't manage it and you can't go back and say, well, we reached this many people, but did they convert? Did they do anything? Did they feel differently about your brands? These are the questions I'm really interested to answer.

Damian Fowler (19:15):

I guess final question, what's one of your favorite Nestle ad campaigns? Past or present?

Antonia Farquhar (19:21):

This is a tough question to answer because as my role is global, the brands are equal. I have to say some of my favorite, or I think it's timeless, is the George Clooney and espresso pieces as well. The art direction there I always think is beautiful. And I'm a big Nespresso fan, I have to say from a personal perspective. And also in Australia and New Zealand and Asia, there's a brand called Milo, and that is all about sport being a great way of bringing together people to learn and play and have fun. And they've done some fantastic ads throughout the time, really showing that resilience and the grit as well that it comes to what sport can teach you to do. So that's some of my favorite ads that we've done.

Damian Fowler (20:29):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:31):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is

Antonia Farquhar (20:37):

Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (20:38):

And remember,

Antonia Farquhar (20:39):

Yeah, fewer, bigger, better is a phrase I feel like I say every single day.

Damian Fowler (20:43):

I'm Damian

Antonia Farquhar (20:44):

And I'm Ilyse,

Damian Fowler (20:45):

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In this episode of The Big Impression, Roku’s VP of advertising, marketing & measurement, Sarah Harms, explains why the company is uniquely positioned as a publisher and an operating system.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're talking about how streaming and connected TV are transforming not just how we watch, but how brands connect with audiences.

Damian Fowler (00:17):

Our guest is Sarah Harms vice president of advertising, marketing and measurement at Roku. She leads the strategy behind Roku's advertising business, helping brands tap into streaming's growing audience while building smarter measurement tools along the way.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:32):

Before Roku, Sarah built her expertise across both the buy and sell sides of the industry with leadership roles at Microsoft XR and wpp giving her a unique perspective on how ad tech data and storytelling all come together on Connected tv.

Damian Fowler (00:49):

We'll talk about how Roku's helping brands of all scientists meet new viewer behaviors, build more effective campaigns, and push the creative boundaries of what's possible on CTV.

Ilyse Liffreing (01:00):

So let's get into it.

Damian Fowler (01:03):

So Sarah Roku is in a pretty unique spot right now, right? Between entertainment and ads with this latest brand or measurement move, what got it started? Was there an insight or audience need that really stood out to you?

Sarah Harms (01:17):

Yeah, so in my role I run ad marketing and measurement. So much of my job is us as a marketer, so marketing roku's, advertising proposition, but also in support of our marketers. And so that makes my job very fun. And so a lot of this conversation today, I'm going to go back and forth between my job as a marketer, but also my job in B2B advertising of driving marketers results on our platform. Something that's really fun about Roku is that we're a publisher, but we're also the largest operating system in the us. We see consumers come through our front door to get to the content they know and love and care about. And so that gives us a really rich canvas for supporting some of our marketers initiatives. And so for example, the Super Bowl was very fun for us, whether it was using our platform to drive traffic to Tuby or to build really fun brand experiences on our canvases.

(02:13):

So we had, when Sally met Hellman's and we had Hellman's and Roku City and we had the Super Bowl ad and a really lovely zone destination to drive shopping and drive purchases of Hellman's mayonnaise, which you really wouldn't expect from a television advertising experience. And so I think that was a fun one from us in supportive marketers. And then a whole part of my job is making sure our advertisers really know about the Roku experience. And so while it's B2B, it would be silly not to address them in a B2C capacity because our marketers could also be customers, the need to understand the value of the Roku experience even if they don't have a television

Damian Fowler (02:53):

From ro. Once you realize your customers could be businesses, consumers, or both, how did that shift your strategy? Did it change the way you approach things?

Sarah Harms (03:01):

I think it's just strategic use of our resources and a strategic use of our messaging. We certainly think the Roku experience as an operating system is delightful and easy and intuitive. We talk about how your mother-in-law can set it up herself as the example we always use. And so we certainly want our advertising customers to know that too because it really is a beautiful, elegant experience for advertising as well, for watching content.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:28):

So you've got such a big range of advertisers from big Fortune five hundreds to D two C brands to B2B. How do you build campaigns or measurements that flex for either of them but still stay true to your own approach?

Sarah Harms (03:44):

Great. So I'll address that as a speaking to the advertising community part of my job, we certainly are on a journey to evolve our strategy to be more flexible and meet our customers where they want us to be, whether it being in their buying platforms of choice or providing optionality to a D two C customer by giving them a very lightweight, intuitive self-service platform like Roku Ads Manager. And so I think a lot of it from a measurement standpoint is doing some education. I think some of the questions were ground around CTV is still somewhat new, but I don't know if it's new, but it's certainly new in the eyes of performance. And so it's a lot of education about how we can enable customers to drive true outcomes using connected television. And so whether it's ad manager or unique measurement integrations, shoppable formats, we really try to address all of that

Ilyse Liffreing (04:36):

Now. Streaming's completely changed how people watch from binging to co-viewing and basically everything in between. How do cultural or data trends help shape what you're doing on the platform?

Sarah Harms (04:48):

Yeah, I mean it's been so interesting to see it change even since the pandemic. I think for a long time CTV was synonymous with SVOD or subscription video on demand. We're very much seen that is not the case anymore. A majority of our households are using some form of A VOD, we're advertising video on demand. And so that trend coupled with live sports coming into CTV and streaming, it's really just driven a whole new slew of opportunities for advertising. And so off the back of that, that's more addressable, more accountable television because it is connected television. And so that's been fun from a education standpoint, it's been fun from a how do we enable our platform to address that and also how do we educate our customers from a measurement standpoint.

Damian Fowler (05:37):

So what's the ad experience like on Roku? You mentioned CTV and it sounds like there's a pretty wide mix of formats. Can you break that down a little more?

Sarah Harms (05:46):

I'd love to because I think that's again, where my role as a B2B marketer, it's of course helpful to inform our clients about our experiences then they might not have a Roku device or television. And so we think about our business in really two core buckets. We have the Roku experiences, which is our beautiful ui, so native home screen units, they're customized, they're elegant, and we have some of our more kind of viral experiences like Roku City, which is fun and delightful. We're now doing brand integrations there. But then on the other side, we're also a very scaled publisher. So the Roku channel continues to climb Nielsen's Gauge in terms of total TV content time. And so that is allowing us to be a very kind of open interoperable, performant publisher as well with standard video that's available programmatically. It's available with unique measurement integrations, and that's really our ecosystem being an interoperable partner in the space.

Ilyse Liffreing (06:43):

Roku City is that fun, animated screensaver, very purple that a lot of people see on their TVs. Can you tell us a little bit about it and the kinds of brands you're partnering with there?

Sarah Harms (06:54):

Yeah, so this has just been something really fun that's taken off. So Roku City is our interactive screensaver and people love it. I don't know if you see it every day, but it's cute, it's fun, it grabs your attention. We see that it's tweeted about every 12 minutes, so it is a viral experience and so much so that really our advertisers challenged us to think about it differently. And so now we have really a variety of advertisers coming into Roku City. So I gave the Hellman's example. We had Taylor Swift in Roku City. And so it's really just a fun, unique, totally differentiated advertising experience, but we tie it all to the rest of our assets.

Damian Fowler (07:36):

I heard somebody say this morning, performance media is kind of the baseline. Now with that in mind, how do you think about measuring engagement across all these different touch points that we've been talking about?

Sarah Harms (07:46):

Yeah, I mean, so much of my job on the measurement side of the house is education. And I think the challenge is that performance is in the eye of the beholder and CTV is still bought via a very different group of personas from a legacy television buyer all the way to someone that had been in social API partners and dipping their toe into CTV. And so performance is required, but it's really a matter of educating them on what that means to them and supporting them in their efforts. But what's great about CTV is its big beautiful television, but with all the addressability and accountability of digital.

Damian Fowler (08:23):

And on that point though, what is it that linear TV buyers still don't quite get about CTV?

Sarah Harms (08:29):

I think it's the ecosystem aspect of it all. I think television in the past was measured by a couple companies with a couple KPIs or just reach. And so I think this is where CTV has really unlocked really turnkey, always on easy to optimize measurement. That's very exciting.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:48):

So one thing we like to do on the show is pull our takeaways from the big campaigns. Are there any KPIs or success stories from the campaigns running on Roku that stand out to you?

Sarah Harms (09:00):

Yeah, so I think what's been fun is we see that we have opportunities for really kind of all verticals. Obviously Roku is born out of the media and entertainment industry, but we've expanded there. And so we really do have kind of a playbook for each vertical, but auto specifically comes to mind, which is a really exciting one. You don't really think of performance and auto on tv, but we've built kind of beautiful experiences like showrooms where you can configure cars, sign up for test drives. And so I think we've really changed the narrative there in terms of driving actions for that vertical all in a very big, beautiful, elegant canvas.

Damian Fowler (09:37):

Are there any other kind of surprises from your takeaways in terms of like, oh, that's popping. I never expected that.

Sarah Harms (09:44):

So for me, I don't carry a wallet. My phone is my wallet. And I think if you told me that five years ago, I would've never believed you. Similarly, I don't think anyone thought they'd be shopping with their television. That happens every day on our platform, and I think it's because of clients testing with us, but also it comes back to us as an operating system. And really our remote, it's a few buttons. It's really easy. We have a direct relationship with our customers from a billing perspective. And so the same way Apple Pay is just so easy now you can shop from your tv, which again seems insane, but maybe we'll be here in a couple years and we'll see so much direct shopping from televisions.

Ilyse Liffreing (10:23):

What about the interest from B2B brands? It just feels like that sector is really exploding across all categories, but CTV particularly.

Sarah Harms (10:33):

Yeah, I mean so much of my job as a B2B marketer is a lot of education and a lot of really, so much of our reframing away from being a walled garden to more of an open collaborative partner. And so much of it is doing, we talked in the press about our change away from doing a big new front event. We did more kind of small customized dinners instead just to make sure there is a very direct touch point, but also specifically cater to each client's needs. And so I think that's been more of our approach of making sure we do pointed conversations to address the nuances and needs of each customer.

Ilyse Liffreing (11:12):

And how was that new approach for you this year? I know a lot of brands are doing things a bit differently at the fronts. How did it go on your side?

Sarah Harms (11:21):

I think for us it's knowing the value of us as the operating system and having great content, but not being these content giants that have millions and millions and millions of dollars to spend on content. And so they should do a big show for us. We drive traffic to the big show. And so I think it was more about, yes, of course, talking about our amazing content and brand integrations there, but also acknowledging the integrations that each customer wanted, the platforms each customer wanted, and what we're doing for each of them in a really kind of catered way versus such a one to many message.

Damian Fowler (11:57):

You mentioned content earlier. Are you seeing any particular trends now? Anything that's really driving interest from certain categories or marketers?

Sarah Harms (12:06):

So we have our Roku originals, and we do very well in kind of holiday and home as you can expect, but I think this year in Cannes, you won't be in a meeting like this without talking about sports. And so we have sports rights, yes, but again, the value of the operating system, we've built sports zones to help make sport discoverable and findable. I always use the example of my husband's great Uncle Joe, diehard Yankees fan, can't find a Yankees game because it might be on four different places in five days. And so how can Roku as an operating system help in that regard? And so I think Roku is invested a ton in our infrastructure of driving curation of sports, but also we're very invested in what we call challenger sports, so National women's soccer league volleyball, stuff like that where they have really these die hard fan bases and they just want to find it. We're the destination to help them.

Damian Fowler (13:01):

We keep hearing it's not just about mass reach anymore, it's really about how well the audience, and the better you understand them, the better this whole thing works for both the platform and the advertiser. How do you see that playing out right now?

Sarah Harms (13:13):

Yeah, and they're loyal. They're diehard. They're big spenders sometimes. And so you want to kind of associate with yourself with such a kind of amazing, loyal fan base that's just so passionate about the sport.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:26):

So we have some quick questions for you now. So first of all, you've led both creative and analytical teams. What is one timeless truth about great advertising that cuts across both sides?

Sarah Harms (13:41):

First of all, it's a very fun aspect of my job having both kind of the marketing team and the measurement and analytics team. Two very different personas, but brilliant in their own ways. And so much of my focus since being here is making sure they're working together versus kind of two ships in the night with their own functions because we certainly have such amazing data, so we should use that to speak to the marketplace in a smart way. And so I think that's been really fun. I think they're getting to know the other side of the house and the creative thinkers versus the analytical thinkers like me pushing them to work together has been very fun. And I think with that in mind, a data informed approach is key. And so that's what really drew me to Roku was that opportunity of just this amazing data set that we have that we can use to optimize, but also to tell our story in a more elegant way.

Damian Fowler (14:33):

Now since you joined Roku, is there a favorite data point or piece of feedback that's really stuck with you?

Sarah Harms (14:38):

Yeah, well, I think what's interesting about my job is I should have been informing people like myself about the value of Roku. Before the process started of being recruited, I had a pretty antiquated view, the Roku advertising offering. So that's something that in getting here and in going through that process I learned so much more. I think my favorite might be that any given month, we see a user come through our front door about 25 days a month. And so that is an advertising opportunity to message our amazing footprint. But we see that on average an individual app is seven, maybe eight times a month. And so if you think about that, the reach potential, but also just the consumer habit of using our devices and seeing the messaging from our brands, I think is so compelling and something that really we're massive as it relates to our OS and footprint. And so we've designed these beautiful experiences to really account for that.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:36):

Now, Roku really helped pioneer the modern CTV ad experience. Is there a moment that's made you step back and think, wow, look how far the medium and your team really has come?

Sarah Harms (15:49):

I think the fact that the Super Bowl was really such a success story for streaming, I think we never thought the Super Bowl would be at that level, but it was streamed and it really streamable and really without a hitch, I think we've seen some live streaming events and there were some issues. I thought it was very well done. We were happy to support it. We drove some amazing traffic to Tubi. And so I just think 10 years ago, we never thought that would be the case. And so that's just been a fun thing to think about that and the Olympics and the Olympic zone that we built, just really elegant experiences and just changing television has been fun.

Damian Fowler (16:32):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (16:35):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and Caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (16:41):

And remember,

Sarah Harms (16:43):

A data informed approach is key. And so that's what really drew me to Roku.

Damian Fowler (16:47):

I'm Damian, and I'm we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From Game of Thrones maps to the open web, Roberts believes content is king in the AI economy.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler, and welcome to this edition of The Big Impression. Today we're looking at how publishers are using AI to reinvent contextual advertising and why it's becoming an important and powerful alternative to identity-based targeting. My guest is Jonathan Roberts, chief Innovation Officer at People Inc. America's largest publisher, formerly known as Meredith. He's leading the charge with decipher an AI platform that helps advertisers reach audiences based on real time intent across all of People Inc. Site and the Open Web. We're going to break down how it works, what it means for advertisers in a privacy first world and why Jonathan's side hustle. Creating maps for Game of Thrones has something for teachers about building smarter ad tech. So let's get into it. One note, this episode was recorded before the company changed its name. After the Meredith merger, you had some challenges getting the business going again. What made you realize that sort of rethinking targeting with decipher could be the way to go?

Jonathan Roberts (01:17):

We had a really strong belief and always have had a strong belief in the power of great content and also great content that helps people do things. Notably and Meredith are both in the olden times, you would call them service journalism. They help people do things, they inspire people. It's not news, it's not sports. If you go to Better Homes and Gardens to understand how to refresh your living room for spring, you're going to go into purchase a lot of stuff for your living room. If you're planting seeds for a great garden, you're also going to buy garden furniture. If you're going to health.com, you're there because you're managing a condition. If you're going to all recipes, you're shopping for dinner. These are all places where the publisher and the content is a critical path on the purchase to doing something like an economically valuable something. And so putting these two businesses together to build the largest publisher in the US and one of the largest in the world was a real privilege. All combinations are hard. When we acquired Meredith, it is a big, big business. We became the largest print publisher overnight.

(02:23):

What we see now, because we've been growing strongly for many, many quarters, and that growth is continuing, we're public. You can see our numbers, the performance is there, the premium is there, and you can always sell anything once. The trick is will people renew when they come back? And now we're in a world where our advertising revenue, which is the majority of our digital revenue, is stable and growing, deeply reliable and just really large. And we underpin that with decipher. Decipher simply is a belief that what you're reading right now tells a lot more about who you are and what you are going to do than a cookie signal, which is two days late and not relevant. What you did yesterday is less relevant to what you need to do than what you're doing right now. And so using content as a real time predictive signal is very, very performant. It's a hundred percent addressable, right? Everyone's reading content when we target to, they're on our content and we guaranteed it would outperform cookies, and we run a huge amount of ad revenue and we've never had to pay it in a guarantee.

Damian Fowler (03:34):

It's interesting that you're talking about contextual, but you're talking about contextual in real time, which seems to be the difference. I mean, because some people hear contextually, they go, oh, well, that's what you used to do, place an ad next to a piece of content in the garden supplement or the lifestyle supplement, but this is different.

Jonathan Roberts (03:53):

Yes. Yeah. I mean, ensemble say it's 2001 called and once it's at Targeting strategy back, but all things are new again, and I think they're newly fresh and newly relevant, newly accurate because it can do things now that we were never able to do before. So one of the huge strengths of Meredith as a platform is because we own People magazine, we dominate entertainment, we have better homes and gardens and spruce, we really cover home. We have all recipes. We literally have all the recipes plus cereal, seeds plus food and wine. So we cover food. We also do tech, travel, finance and health, and you could run those as a hazard brands, and they're all great in their own, but there's no network effect. What we discovered was because I know we have a pet site and we also have real simple, and we know that if you are getting a puppy or you have an aging dog, which we know from the pet site, we know you massively over index for interest in cleaning products and cleaning ideas on real simple, right?

Damian Fowler (04:55):

Yeah.

Jonathan Roberts (04:55):

This doesn't seem like a shocking conclusion to have, but the fact that we have both tells us both, which also means that if you take a health site where we're helping people with their chronic conditions, we can see all the signals of exactly what help you need with your diet. Huge overlaps. So we have all the recipe content and we know exactly how that cross correlates with chronic conditions. We also know how those health conditions correlate into skincare because we have Brody, which deals with makeup and beauty, but also all the skincare conditions and finance, right? Health is a financial situation as much as it is a health situation, particularly in the us. And so by tying these together, because most of these situations are whole lifestyle questions, we can understand that if you're thinking about planning a cruise in the Mediterranean, you're a good target for Vanguard to market mutual funds to. Whereas if we didn't have both investipedia and travel leisure, we couldn't do that. And so there's nothing on that cruise page, on the page in the words that allows you to do keyword targeting for mutual funds.

(05:55):

But we're using the fact that we know that cruise is a predictor of a mutual fund purchase so that we can actually market to anyone in market per cruise. We know they've got disposable income, they're likely low risk, long-term buy andhold investors with value investing needs. And we know that because we have these assets now, we have about 1500 different topics that we track across all of DDM across 1.5 million articles, tens of millions of visits a day, billions a year. If you just look at the possible correlations between any of those taxonomies that's over a million, or if we go a level deeper, over a hundred million connected data points, you can score. We've scored all of them with billions of visits, and so we have that full map of all consumers.

Damian Fowler (06:42):

I wanted to ask you, of course, and you always get this question I'm sure, but you have a pretty unusual background for ad tech theoretical physics as you mentioned, and researcher at CERN and Mapmaker as well for Game of Thrones, but this isn't standard publisher experience, but how did all that scientific background play into the way you approached building this innovation?

Jonathan Roberts (07:03):

Yeah, I think when I first joined the company, which was a long time ago now, and one of the original bits of this company was about.com, one of the internet oh 0.1 OG sites, and there was daily data on human interest going back to January 1st, 2000 across over a thousand different topics. And in that case, tens of millions of articles. And the team said, is this useful? Is there anything here that's interesting? I was like, oh my god, you don't know what you've got because if you treat as a physicist coming in, I looked at this and was like, this is a, it's like a telescope recording all of human interest. Each piece of content is like a single pixel of your telescope. And so if somebody comes and visit, you're like, oh, I'm recording the interest of this person in this topic, and you've got this incredibly fine grained understanding of the world because you've got all these people coming to us telling us what they want every day.

(08:05):

If I'm a classic news publisher, I look at my data and I find out what headlines I broke, I look at my data and I learn more about my own editorial strategy than I do about the world. We do not as much tell the world what to think about. The world tells us what they care about. And so that if you treat that as just a pure experimental framework where this incredible lens into an understanding of the world, lots of things are very stable. Many questions that people ask, they always ask, but you understand why do they ask them today? What's causing the to what are the correlations between what they are understanding around our finance business through the financial crash, our health business, I ran directly through COVID. So you see this kind of real time change of the world reacting to big shocks and it allows you to predict what comes next, right? Data's lovely, but unless you can do something with it, it's useless.

Damian Fowler (08:59):

It's interesting to hear you talk about that consistency, the sort of predictability in some ways of, I guess intense signals or should we just say human behavior, but now we've got AI further, deeper into the mix.

Jonathan Roberts (09:13):

So we were the first US publisher to do a deal with open ai, and that comes in three parts. They paid for training on our content. They also agreed within the contract to source and cite our content when it was used. And the third part, the particularly interesting part, is co-development of new things. So we've been involved with them as they've been building out their search product. They've been involved with us as we've been evolving decipher, one of the pieces of decipher is saying, can I understand which content is related to which other content? And in old fashioned pre AI days when it was just machine learning and natural language processing, you would just look at words and word occurrence and important words, and you'd correlate them that way. With ai, you go from the word to the concept to the reasoning behind it to a latent understanding of these kind of deeper, deeper connections.

(10:09):

And so when we changed over literally like, is this content related to that content? Is this article similar in what it's treating to that article? If they didn't use the same words but they were talking about the same topic, the previous system would've missed it. This system gets deeper. It's like, oh, this is the same concept. This is the same user need. These are the same intentions. And so when we overhauled this kind of multimillion point to point connection calculation, we drastically changed about 30% of those connections and significantly improved them, gives a much reacher, much deeper understanding of our content. What we've also done is said, and this is a year thing that we launched it at the beginning of the year, we have decipher, which runs on site. We launched Decipher Plus Inventively named right? I like it. We debated Max or Max Plus, but we went with Plus.

(10:59):

And what this says is we understand the user intent on our sites. We know when somebody's reading content, we have a very strong predictor model of what that person's going to need to do next. And we said, well, we're not the only people with intent driven content and intent driven audiences. So we know that if you're reading about newborn health topics, you are three and a half times more likely than average to be in market for a stroller. We're not the only people that write about newborn health. So we can find the individual pages on the rest of the web that do talk about newborn health, and we can unlock that very strong prediction that this purchase intent there. And so then we can have a premium service that buy those ads and delivers that value to our clients. Now we do that mapping and we've indexed hundreds of premium domains with opening eyes vector, embedding architecture to build that logic.

Damian Fowler (11:56):

That's fascinating. So in lots of ways, you're helping other publishers beyond your owned and operated properties.

Jonathan Roberts (12:02):

We believed that there was a premium in publishing that hadn't been tapped. We proved that to be true. Our numbers support it. We bet 2.7 billion on that bet, and it worked. So we really put our money where our mouth is. We know there's a premium outside of our walls that isn't being unlocked, and we have an information advantage so we can bring more premium to the publishers who have that quality content.

Damian Fowler (12:24):

I've got lots of questions about that, but one of them is, alright. I guess the first one is why have publishers been so slow out of the starting blocks to get this right when on the media buying side you have all of this ad tech that's going on, DSPs, et cetera.

Jonathan Roberts (12:42):

I think partly it's because publishers have always been a participant in the ad tech market off to one side. I put this back to the original sin of Ad Tech, which is coming in and saying, don't worry about it, publishers, we know your audience better than you ever will. That wasn't true then, and it's not true today, but Ad Tech pivoted the market to that position and that meant the publishers were dependent upon ad Tech's understanding of their audience. Now, if you've got a cookie-based understanding of an audience, how does a publisher make that cookie-based audience more valuable? Well, they don't because you're valuing the cookie, not the real time signal. And there is no such thing as cookie targeting. It's all retargeting. All the cookie signal is yesterday Signal. It's only what they did before they came to your site, dead star like or something, right? The publisher definitionally isn't influencing the value of that cookie. So an ad tech is valuing the cookie. The only thing the publisher can do to make more money is add scale, which is either generate clickbait because that's the cheapest way to get audience scale or run more ads on the page.

(13:57):

Cookies as a currency for advertising and targeting is the reason we currently have the internet We deserve, not the internet we want because the incentive is to cheap scale. If instead you can prove that the content is driving the value, the content is driving the decision and the content is driving the outcome, then you invest in more premium content. If you're a publisher, the second world is the one you want. But we had a 20 year distraction from understanding the value of content. And we're only now coming back to, I think one thing I'm very really happy to see is since we launched a cipher two years ago, there are now multiple publishers coming out with similarly inspired targeting architecture or ideas about how to reach quality, which is just a sign that the market has moved, right? Or the market moving and retargeting still works. Cookies are good currency, they do drive performance. If they didn't, it would never worked in the first place. But the ability to understand and classify premium content at web scale, which is what decipher Plus is a map for all intent across the entire open web is the thing that's required for quality content to be competitive with cookies as targeting mechanism and to beat it at

Damian Fowler (15:15):

Scale. You mentioned how this helps you reach all these third party sites beyond your properties. How do you ensure that there's still quality in the, there's quality content that match the kind of signals that makes decipher work?

Jonathan Roberts (15:32):

Tell me, not all content on the internet is beautiful, clean and wonderful. Not all

Damian Fowler (15:36):

Premium is it?

Jonathan Roberts (15:36):

I know there's a lot of made for arbitrage out there. Look, we, we've been a publisher for a long time. We've acquired a lot of publishers over the years, and every time we have bought a publisher, we have had to clean up the content because cheap content for scale is a siren call of publishing. Like, oh, I can get these eyeballs cheaper. Oh, wonderful. I know I just do that. And everyone gives it on some level to that, right? So we have consistently cleaned up content libraries every time we've acquired publishers. Look at the very beginning about had maybe 10 to 15 million euros. By the time we launched these artists and these individual vertical sites were down to 250,000 pages of content. It was a bigger business and it was a better business. The other side is the actual ad layout has to be good,

Damian Fowler (16:29):

But

Jonathan Roberts (16:29):

Every time we've picked up a publisher, we've removed ads from the site. Increase, yeah, experience quality,

Damian Fowler (16:33):

Right?

Jonathan Roberts (16:36):

Because we've audited multiple publishers for the cleanup, we have an incredibly detailed understanding of what quality content is. We have lots of, this is our special skill as a publisher. We can go into a publisher, identify the content and see what's good.

Damian Fowler (16:54):

Is that part of your pitch as it were, to people who advertisers?

Jonathan Roberts (16:58):

We work lots of advertisers. We're a huge part of the advertising market because we cover all the verticals. We have endemics in every space. If you're trying to do targeting based on identity, we have tens of millions of people a day. It'll work. You will find them with us, we reach the entire country every month. We are a platform scale publisher. So at no point do we saying don't do that, obviously do that, right? But what we're saying is there's a whole bunch of people who you can't identify, either they don't have cookies or IDs or because the useful data doesn't exist yet. It's not attached to those IDs. So incremental, supplementary and additional to reach the people in the moment with a hundred percent addressability, full national reach, complete privacy compliance, just the content, total brand safety. And we will put these two things side by side and we will guarantee that the decipher targeting will outperform the cookie targeting, which isn't say don't do cookie targeting, obviously do it. It works, it's successful. This is incremental and also will outperform. And then it just depends on the client, right? Some people want brand lift and brand consideration. They want big flashy things. We run People Magazine, we host the Grammy after party. We can do all the things you need from a large partner more than just media, but also we can get you right down to, for some partners with big deals, we guarantee incremental roas,

Damian Fowler (18:26):

Actual

Jonathan Roberts (18:26):

In-store sales, incremental lift.

Damian Fowler (18:29):

So let's talk about roas. What's driving advertisers to lean in so heavily?

Jonathan Roberts (18:34):

Well, I think everybody's seen this over the last couple of years. In a high interest or environment, the CMOs getting asked, what's the return on my ad spend? So whereas previously you might've just been able to do a big flashy execution or activation. Now everybody wants some level of that media spend to be attributable to lift to dollars, to return to performance, because every single person who comes through our sites is going to do something after they come. We're never the last stop in that journey, and we don't sell you those garden seeds. We do not sell you the diabetes medication directly. We are going to have to hand you off to a partner who is going to be the place you take the economic action. So we are in the path to purchase for every single purchase on Earth.

(19:19):

And what we've proven with decipher is not only that we can be in that pathway and put the message in the path of that person who is going to make a decision, has not made one yet. But when we put the messaging in front of it of that person at the time, it changes their decisions, which is why it's not just roas, which could just be handing out coupons in the line to the pizza store. It's incremental to us, if you did not do this, you would have made less money. When you do this, you'll make more money. And having got to a point where we've now got multiple large campaigns, both for online action and brick and mortar stores that prove that when we advertise the person at this moment, they change their decision and they make their brand more money. Turns out that's not the hardest conversation to have with marketers. Truly, truly, if you catch people at the right moment, you will change their mind.

Damian Fowler (20:10):

They'll happily go back to their CFO and say, look at this. This is working

Jonathan Roberts (20:15):

No controversially at can. During the festival of advertising that we have as a publisher, we may be the most confident to say, you know what? Advertising works.

Damian Fowler (20:27):

You recently brought in a dedicated president to lead

Jonathan Roberts (20:30):

Decipher,

Damian Fowler (20:30):

Right? So how does that help you take what started out as this in-house innovation that you've been working on and turn it into something even bigger?

Jonathan Roberts (20:39):

Yeah, I think my background is physics. I was a theoretical physicist for a decade. Theoretical physicists have some good and bad traits. A good trait is a belief that everything can be solved. Because my previous job was wake up in the morning and figure out how the universe began and like, well, today I'll figure it out. And nobody else has, right? There's a level of, let's call it intellectual confidence or arrogance in that approach. How hard can it be? The answer is very, but it also means you're a little bit of a diante, right? You're coming like, oh, it's ad tech. How hard can it be? And the just vary, right? So there's a benefit. I mean, I've done a lot of work in ad tech over the last couple of years. Jim Lawson, our president of Decipher, ran a publicly listed DSP, right? He was a public company, CEO, he knows this stuff inside a and back to front, Lindsay Van Kirk on the Cipher team launched the ADN Nexus, DSP, Patrick McCarthy, who runs all of our open web and a lot of our trade desk partnerships and the execution of all of the ways we connect into the entire ecosystem.

(21:38):

Ran product for AppNexus. Sam Selgin on the data science team wrote that Nexus bitter. I've got a good idea where we're going with this and where we should go with this and the direction we should be pointed in. But we have seasoned multi-decade experience pros doing the work because if you don't, you can have a good idea and bad execution, then you didn't do anything. Unless you can execute to the highest level, it won't actually work. And so we've had to bring in, I'm very glad we have brought in and love having them on the team. These people who can really take the beginnings of what we have and really take this to the scale that needs to be. Decipher. Plus is a framework for understanding user intent at Webscale and getting performance for our clients and unlocking a premium at Webscale. That is a huge project to go after and pull off. We have so many case studies proving that it will work, but we have a long way to go between where we are and where this thing naturally gets to. And that takes a lot of people with a lot of professional skills to go to.

Damian Fowler (22:43):

What's one thing right now that you're obsessed with figuring out

Jonathan Roberts (22:46):

To take a complete left turn, but it is the topic up and down the Cosette this summer. There isn't currently any viable model for information economy in an AI future. There's lots of ideas of what it would be, but there isn't a subtle marketplace for this. We've got a very big two-sided marketplace for information. It's called Google and search. That's obviously changing. We haven't got to a point to understand what that future is. But if AI is powered by chips, power and content, if you're a chip investor, you're in a good place. If you're investing energy, you're in a good place of the three picks and shovels investments, content is probably the most undervalued at the moment. Lots of people are starting to realize that and building under the hood what that could look like. How that evolves in the next year is going to really determine what kind of information gets created because markets align to their incentives. If you build the marketplace well, you're going to end up with great content, great journalism, great creativity. If you build it wrong, you're going to have a bunch of cheap slop getting flooded the marketplace. And we are not going to fund great journalism. So that's at a moment in time where that future is getting determined and we have a very strong set of opinions on the publishing side, what that should look like. And I am very keen to make sure it gets done. You sound

Damian Fowler (24:17):

Optimistic.

Jonathan Roberts (24:19):

A year ago, the VCs and the technologists believed if you just slammed enough information into an AI system, you'd never need content ever again. And that the brain itself was the moat. Then deep seek proved that the brain wasn't a moat. That reasoning is a commodity because we found out that China could do it cheaper and faster, and we were shocked, shocked that China could do it cheaper and faster. And then the open source community rebuilt deep to in 48 hours, which was the real killer. So if reasoning is a commodity, which it is now, then content is king, right? Because reasoning on its own is free, but if you're grounding it in quality content, your answer's better. But the market dynamics have not caught up to that reality. But that is the reality. So I am optimistic that content goes back to our premium position in this. Now we just have to do all the boring stuff of figuring out what a viable marketplace looks like, how people get paid, all of this, all the hard work, but there's now a future model to align to.

Damian Fowler (25:23):

I love that. Alright, I've got to ask you this question. It's the last one, but I was going to ask it. You spent time building maps, visualizing data, and I've looked at your site, it's brilliant. Is there anything from that side of your creativity that helped you think differently about building say something like decipher?

Jonathan Roberts (25:42):

Yeah. So I think it won't surprise anyone to find out that I'm a massive nerd, right? I used to play d and d, I still do. We have my old high school group still convenes on Sunday afternoons, and we play d and d over Discord. Fantasy maps have been an obsession of mine for a long time. I did the fantasy maps of Game of Thrones. I'm George r Martin's cartographer. I published the book Lands of Ice and Fire with him. Maps are infographics. A map is a way of taking a complex system that you cannot visualize and bringing it to a world in which you can reason about it. I spent a lot of my life taking complex systems that nobody can visualize and building models and frameworks that help people reason about 'em and make decisions in a shared way. At this moment, as you're walking up and down the cosette, there is no map for the future. Nobody has a map, nobody has a plan. Not Google, not Microsoft, not Amazon, not our friends at OpenAI. Nobody knows what's coming. And so even just getting, but lots of people have ideas and opinions and thoughts and directions. So taking all that input and rationalize again to like, okay, if we lay it out like this, what breaks? Being able to logically reason about those virtual scenario. It is exactly the same process, that mental model as Matt.

Damian Fowler (27:12):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression. This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by loving caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns. And remember,

Jonathan Roberts (27:22):

We do not as much tell the world what to think about. The world tells us what they care about. Data's lovely, but unless you do something with it, it's useless.

Damian Fowler (27:31):

I'm Damian, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On a new episode of The Big Impression, State Farm’s Patty Morris dives into how the company quickly capitalized on the opportunity despite being risk-averse. 

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing,

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're diving into one of the most buzzworthy brand moments in recent memory when Jake from State Farm crashed the Taylor Swift NFL multiverse in a way only he could.

Damian Fowler (00:20):

Our guest is Patty Morris, head of brand at State Farm. Patty and her team turned a viral cultural moment into a strategic marketing win from the sidelines of an NFL game to the front lines of CTV social and beyond.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:34):

We're talking about that famous seat swap with Mama Kelsey, and then digging into why Jake keeps showing up in all the right places and how State Farm is rewriting the playbook on building a culturally fluent brand.

Damian Fowler (00:47):

So let's get into it. We're going to go back to the fall of 2023 when Taylor Swift shows up at a chiefs game and sits next to Mama Kelsey and days later, Jake from State Farm's. In that seat, could you take us behind the scenes and how the idea came together so quickly?

Patty Morris (01:07):

Okay. Well first let me just back us up a little bit. Okay. State Farm is 103 year old, brand 103, so we have certain ways of doing things,

Ilyse Liffreing (01:19):

A lot of legacy there right?

Patty Morris (01:19):

Yes. A lot of legacy we, I think, have been successful as marketers and done a lot of great things over the decades, but we have a way of doing things and you can imagine we're an insurance company, we're risk averse, all of those things. I would just say knowing that context, how do you get from that to an agency calling you on a Friday night and saying, we have this big idea and we think you need to execute it, and it's in about 40 hours. And also it's on probably one of the biggest stages there is, and you say yes to that of course, but how do you get from A to BI think is your question. How did you make that happen? And I would just say a couple of things. One, you have to set the right conditions so that you are part of the cultural Lex Conna in a way that those opportunities come to you. And I think we had done that over time with Jake from State Farm, being really methodical about that and getting him out there in a way that people want to see him and in a way that is a best representation of our brand and allows us to be in cultural places that we otherwise couldn't without that physical brand asset.

Damian Fowler (02:30):

I mean, everyone obviously wanted to be part of that moment, and it's interesting that you bring up the fact that State Farm is risk averse, and yet you made it in it into that moment. Why was your connection to the Kelsey family and Jake's cultural capital so critical to making it land?

Patty Morris (02:47):

Yeah, I mean, I think the other context in the background around a moment like that is we've spent a long time over a decade really working to be endemic in the football landscape. Whether it was our longstanding campaign with Aaron Rogers and now Patrick Mahomes, we had brought Travis Kelsey into our football creative for the season and he was part of that work. If you remember, the Mahomes and Otto commercial was the best bundle in the league.

Damian Fowler (03:15):

Oh yeah, yeah, I do remember.

Patty Morris (03:16):

So we had all of those things working together, plus all the work we had done to make Jake from State Farm who he is, and you get this lightning moment where you have the right to be there because you have Jake and people love him, and he's a physical manifestation of an intangible product that you can put in these environments. We've built a brand that's endemic in football and is recognized in that space and just I think hats off to the creative mindset at maximum effort for calling us and saying, we think this could be a really great joyful cultural moment. And not many people could go sit in that seat next to Mama Kelsey the week after, but we think fans will love this and risk averse or not. When you hear an idea like that and you are able to put your brand in a position like that, you say yes. And if there's anybody that understands maximizing a cultural moment and doing it in the right way, I think it's maximum effort. So you trust them in that moment to do that with you. And man, we did it very quickly.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:23):

Very cool. Yeah, no, I know. I was just going to say it was very fast. The timing was impeccable.

Patty Morris (04:30):

Yeah, I think a week later it wouldn't have

Ilyse Liffreing (04:32):

Landed. No,

Patty Morris (04:33):

I agree. It had to be that weekend and just the next cultural beat right after that, and I think it really surprised people and added value to what they were seeing and during the game and just a really joyful way.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:46):

How quickly did it come together after the idea came into,

Patty Morris (04:50):

They called us on a Friday night and after a long week, a busy week said, Hey, we have this idea, but we have to make it happen on Sunday, or we don't think it'll work. And we said, we agree, but oh my gosh, how are we going to make this happen by Sunday? And so of course their next call is Jake from State Farm, are you busy? Can you be there? Can you get to New York overnight? Basically. And the actor that plays Jake, Kevin Miles is such a great partner,

(05:21):

He gets that call and says, what's the idea? And we tell him and he is like, well, we have to do it, we have to do that. We think so too. And he's like, then yes, I'll get there. I'll be there. So Friday night to, I can't remember what time the game was on Sunday, but wow, it was very fast and we're not used to moving that fast. That was an effort for us, but a really important moment. And I think in tipping point where we started to build some muscle around being able to capitalize on those kind of moments.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:50):

How long would you say campaigns usually take to come together to

Patty Morris (05:54):

Prepare

Ilyse Liffreing (05:54):

A little bit?

Patty Morris (05:55):

It depends, right? It depends. Sometimes you plan something out and you're building something big. You do that really methodically and strategically, and it takes a while. Sometimes you're doing something that is a smaller scale and you can do that faster. But these types of things are really, we call 'em lightning in a bottle moment when it has to be, the specific parameters have to be exactly right. The stars have to align, and you have to be able to do that quickly. And so we try to work with our teams to be doing the long-term things, but also have the capacity to be able to turn and burn on a great idea when we see it. And I think that's why we've been able to hop into these cultural moments and punch above our weight as a brand because they're not paid moments, they're cultural moments that get a lot of earned attention, and that can be really powerful. Very cool.

Damian Fowler (06:44):

So beyond that moment, then you've got that, you capture that lining moment, then what do you do and how do you make it, you channel the cultural impact of that moment across the different channels going forward to maximize it?

Patty Morris (07:00):

First thing you do is celebrate, right? You took a risk and it landed and it paid off. And it's important to celebrate that because it can be really scary, right? I'm sure we've got this really precious, iconic brand in our hands. We've got this really precious asset in Jake from State Farm that we've worked so hard to build. And you take a risk like that. I think it's just important to celebrate when you make the right decisions and you're able to do it quickly. But we talk a lot about an equation that we have at State Farm, and it's a shift that we've made. We of course care about how many impressions we get. We of course care about our cost pers, right? All the things that we marketers have to care about and do care about. We try to focus on putting things through a lens, especially things like this through the lens of reach times engagement equals attention.

(07:50):

So when you get this sort of lightning moment, it's just a cultural moment that everybody's already paying attention to and you sort of are able to insert yourself into it. We have a lot of great partners that we work with, media partners, and we endemic in that football space. We knew everybody was going to look at that moment. We didn't really have to do a lot. We just had to put Jake from State Farm in the seat and everybody's attention turned to it, and it created its own 360 moment in its own way. And so the earned potential you get from that, the attention, that attention metric, syndicated headlines, engagement in social, everybody talking about it on replays and highlights, it's priceless. It's priceless. So I would say a lot of things, we have to work really hard to spread it across channels and make it 360. This was really just a matter of setting up the moment and then letting it do its thing.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:46):

How do you think about where Jake will show up next?

Patty Morris (08:50):

We actually try to be really disciplined about this. He is that physical manifestation of the promise that we sell in insurance and the relationship that we sell. And so I think the first criteria is, is it authentic to the brand and how we want him to show up, and is it demonstrating relationship and connection in the right way, and is it true to our values wherever he's going to show up? The reality also is he is one human being, so we have to manage his calendar appropriately. And Jake's a busy guy, very busy guy. He is an influencer in his own right. He's got 1.4 million followers on TikTok. The TikTok job alone is a lot. So we're pretty choiceful about where and when he shows up. So it's got to be the right fit. It's got to be an opportunity for us to really demonstrate that physical connection and we got to work it into the calendar. Yeah,

Ilyse Liffreing (09:45):

That's funny. So I would love to then now dig into some of your takeaways from that campaign. Were there any results, like reactions that you saw from the mom and Kelsey moment maybe in terms of brand lift or broader cultural impact?

Patty Morris (10:01):

Yeah, I mean, I think part of what has catapulted this branded asset into the cultural space in a way that just honestly, it's hard to measure. So of course we look at individual campaign metrics. Do we see brand lift in the body of commercial work that we put out? But in a case like this, it's harder to measure. So I think we mentioned the earned and the billions of impressions that created the engagement and the chatter online and all of that. But it's really all of those metrics combined with some of the intangibles. It's like when it comes to Jake from State Farm or our brand, we're constantly testing those assets for familiarity. So recognition and relevance, and we do it two or three times a year. And so we can see where he plots on that compared to our competitors and compared to our rest of our assets, we've got six, seven really important assets that are really familiar and we've worked really hard to build. Most brands are happy and lucky to have one or two. We've got seven of them.

Damian Fowler (11:04):

So

Patty Morris (11:05):

That's a metric that we look at too, to say is what we're doing collectively and in cases like the Mama Kelsey moment, pushing those assets into higher recognition and higher relevance and uniqueness for our brand. And those are the metrics that we're looking at.

Damian Fowler (11:22):

I also want to ask you, what did you learn about your audience after the appearance and the way they engaged with Jake in that moment?

Patty Morris (11:31):

It's such a phenomenon to me that this character can be in a lot of different cultural places and be accepted. So we didn't know if you go sit him next to Mama Kelsey after a Taylor Swift moment, people are going to love it or they're going to hate it. It's not one of those things that maybe no one will notice and we'll just see. It's a big swing.

(11:57):

So I think we learned from fans that he is welcome in those cultural moments, and so that got us to have a little more confidence routes around some of the decisions we've made since then. So when you see him at Bravocon, you see him at TwitchCon, you see him at Coachella, and we do an exclusive drop with Travis Scott. And the reaction to him in those places, whether it's online and in social and how people comment and engage about it or in real life, is actually overwhelming. So many people will come up to us or we'll approach Jake, who are my kids love you. My kids won't stop talking about you. And even young kids, Jake from State Farm, they want their picture with him. So I think we've learned over time that he does have this universal appeal, and he's welcome. He's loved in these places, and so you're able to add value to people's experiences and to some of this context in a way that you just wouldn't expect from an insurance company.

Ilyse Liffreing (12:55):

So Jake obviously has become much more than a spokesperson. He's a TV personality at this point, and he's a spokes influencer as well.

Damian Fowler (13:05):

Spokes spoke.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:07):

Spoke.

Damian Fowler (13:08):

I

Ilyse Liffreing (13:08):

Liked it. Okay. Say that three times. We need to redo this.

Damian Fowler (13:11):

No, no, it was good. I think it was good, the interaction. That was good.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:14):

Okay. The spoke flu? Yes. If you'll, I think you coined that perhaps. Maybe we did. Maybe we did maybe. But he has permission to show up anywhere, basically. How did you build that kind of brand equity?

Patty Morris (13:30):

I think it's a thousand little things over a long period of time. Original Jake from State Farm, that commercial was in 2011, right? So you've got a long history of equity in 2019. We recast that role and we're very specific about how we wanted to bring that to life. So I think it's been many things over a long period of time. But also I would say especially in some of these more recent cultural things, we test in small places. We test smaller things, we build competence, and then we try the next thing and you can see the reception to it. And I would say the other thing that stands out to people are his clothes. So red and khaki and his kind of uniform that he wears has also become pretty recognizable, and people talk about that a lot. And we take a lot of care in how he dresses and how he shows up.

(14:23):

So naturally we talk a little bit about apparel and fashion places and could he be accepted in that area and we can connect with a totally different audience that otherwise again, would not be connecting with insurance maybe. And so we test into small places. You wouldn't say, let's have Jake show up at the Met Gala right out of the gate you would say, where can we try a couple of places? So we work with gq, we send him to Vogue World and just see how does it go? He does a whole behind the scenes content series around it. He shows up there and fans loved it. They're so excited for him. They feel like he's their friend and they're just excited to see how he's moving through the world and everybody's cheering for him, rooting for him. I think you try in small places and you test in small places, you build confidence so that you can say yes to the big swings and you can just kind of know in your gut when that's right.

Damian Fowler (15:15):

Are you able to connect that recognition, that brand equity to business outcomes? I know people say, oh, there's Jake, in terms of actual business impact.

Patty Morris (15:25):

Yeah, of course. We're looking at brand awareness, especially with younger audiences. And like I said, Jake is universally loved. We're working hard to make sure we're relatable and relevant with younger audiences, especially in these big cultural moments. And we see our awareness scores being at the top of our category. We see our consideration scores and the trend of improvement over the last five, six years as we've really put Jake forward in this way and become really consistent about it. And there's also sort of the offline pieces of that, and you look at how people are talking about him online and the conversation and the performance on his TikTok and the brand lift that comes from that. So absolutely, we wouldn't be doing this if we didn't think it had profound business value. And I think we cracked the code a little bit on how to do it in a way that isn't a caricature or a mascot. It's this in-between version of it can really have a personal connection with consumers either digitally or commercially or in real life. And I think that's special about it.

Damian Fowler (16:28):

We're talking about maximizing impact, especially around new channels. Are there any that you are looking at in particular? Like CTV?

Patty Morris (16:35):

Yeah, in CTV streaming, just the collapsing of the funnel is how we talk about it. Where in a lot of these streaming environments, you're really able to pull people through an experience in a way that you couldn't before. So the connected piece of that, the data that surrounds that and how you actually make that work from a customer experience perspective in a way that can pull people through, not just from seeing your ad, but actually considering you and able to take an action in that moment is really exciting. So we are experimenting with a lot of different things and a lot of different partners. We did some really great work last year with Amazon and Thursday night football. So that to me is a super exciting area and one that I think marketers are going to be able to show results from in a way that we just haven't before, all across the funnel, which is super exciting.

Ilyse Liffreing (17:27):

It's hard for a lot of brands, especially legacy brands, to be so nimble and quick with their brand spokesperson. What would you say to marketers who are hesitant to take those kind of risks?

Patty Morris (17:40):

I would say know the places where you have to be vigilant about your brand and know the places where you can turn over your pen a little bit. And I think that's especially true just with the rise of creators and creators and influencers as a very important media channel. We've been talking about that a lot this week here and can around how brands work with creators and the partnership that you have to have because it can feel really uncomfortable as a brand to turn over your very precious thing to creators, but they know their audiences best

Ilyse Liffreing (18:16):

And

Patty Morris (18:16):

They know what's going to work. And so it can feel scary, but you kind of have to turn over the reins a little bit and let them work and create with your brand in a way that's going to be relevant to consumers and their audiences. And so I think that is true in this context as well.

Damian Fowler (18:32):

To pull off a move like this, a brand has to move fast. And I'm curious just to hear from inside as it were, what structures or ways of working at State Farm made you capable first off of pulling something like this off, and then maybe what have you learned from it as a company?

Patty Morris (18:47):

Yeah, again, being 103, it's hard. We've got set ways of working and we have legal and compliance teams, and those are very real parameters that as a marketer you have to pay attention to. But culture waits for no one. Culture just keeps on moving. And if you really are going to capitalize on these moments as they happen, you have to be nimble in new ways. And I think it's just have the discussions, get on the phone, talk through it, is it the right thing at the right time? And is it worth taking some calculated risk because the benefit to the brand and the business is going to be strong enough to outweigh the risk. And there's no way you can do that or know that without just rolling up your sleeves and hashing through it with your team and making the best decisions you can for your brand.

(19:31):

And if you get it right, it can be a gold mine. If you get it wrong, it can really be hard. So I think that it is difficult and it's stressful, but for us, mama Kelsey moment was probably a tipping point where we said we have to recognize and be able to act quickly and nimbly when that makes sense. Not all the time that would be chaos, but when it makes sense and do it in a way that's going to be acceptable to our organization and feel good about that, but also in a way that is going to allow us not just to react to moments, but be moment makers. So I think we've moved on from that moment to do that in different spaces, and it's been great for the brand. That's

Ilyse Liffreing (20:11):

Wonderful. That was great. Now we have some rapid fire questions for

Patty Morris (20:14):

You. Okay. Okay.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:17):

So first one is a question that is a popular one for this podcast. What are you obsessed with figuring out right now?

Patty Morris (20:26):

Oh, so many obsessions. My biggest one right now is organic search and really just understanding how that's going to move and change with AI and generative AI and what that means for brands and how you need to show up. That landscape is changing and it's so critical to adapt to what really is consumer behavior, adapting to the consumer behavior in a way that is going to make sure we're showing up in the right places in the right ways. And it's probably one of the biggest places that I can see right now that is changing rapidly and significantly. So we're really working hard to make sure we're on top of that.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:04):

Yeah. On that note, are there other ways you are already using AI or experimenting with that?

Patty Morris (21:10):

Yeah, I mean, it's such an exciting time to be a marketer and also a little bit unsettling. And so I think like many others, we're experimenting in certain places. We've been using AI through certain things for a while, but there are other areas where we're really just experimenting. So probably the biggest is content scaling. How do you responsibly use AI to create content at scale and do that in the right way, in a compliant way? Because the unlock there is just exponential connection with consumers and personalized connection with consumers, and it has the potential to free up capacity of teams and agencies to do other things, more things, different things, which is really exciting, but we're also very focused on doing that responsibly.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:59):

Would you use it with Jake since the schedule is so packed?

Patty Morris (22:04):

That's a good question. No, not yet. Not yet. Jake. The beauty of Jake is he's a real person, and that's one of the core tenets of what we all love about him. I think we'll keep it that way for now. That's a good answer.

Damian Fowler (22:18):

Okay. So next, what's missing from the market from your point of view?

Patty Morris (22:24):

This week has been so interesting and inspirational. For me personally, and this might be a little bit weird, but my biggest takeaway from this week is making sure we're asking ourselves what are we trying to make people feel? I think as a marketer, you can just get really wrapped up in a lot of quantity over quality, and if there's anything we see here in can, it is definitely quality work from all over the world, and it's actually quite humbling and inspiring at the same time. My big takeaway and what I think might be missing is making sure we're trying to make people feel something about our brand. It's the most powerful thing you could do, I think, to move someone towards your products. And I think the balance of let's get everything done and let's get everything out there with are we making something of quality that's really going to create a consumer emotion and connect is something I'll be taking back to my team and something that I think is missing from the market.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:27):

Amazing. If Jake from State Farm could pop up anywhere next with zero constraints, where would you send him?

Patty Morris (23:35):

I would send him to my family reunion. So they will stop asking to meet Jake from State Farm. I get the question all the time, and yeah, everybody wants to meet Jake, which I love. Or you know what? Maybe I would send her to the future so he could tell us how all this is going to

Ilyse Liffreing (23:54):

Shake

Patty Morris (23:54):

Out. That'd be pretty cool. Very cool. That'd be awesome.

Damian Fowler (24:00):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (24:03):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (24:09):

And remember,

Patty Morris (24:11):

Reach times engagement equals attention. Culture waits for no one.

Damian Fowler (24:16):

I'm Damian and

(24:18):

We'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From a Hong Kong hot pot party to a Milan piazza activation, every detail was designed to blur the line between brand and experience. 

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:08):

Today we're talking about how one of the fastest growing categories in the spirits industry, tequila and mezcal, is being shaped by culture, identity, and global consumer trends.

Damian Fowler (00:20):

Our guest is Sophie Kelly, SVP of Global Tequila and Mezcal Categories. At Diageo, she's leading the strategy behind some of the world's most iconic tequila brands, helping Diageo navigate its growth, changing cultural expectations, and the new ways consumers connect with celebration.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:39):

We'll talk about how Diageo is bouncing global scale with local storytelling, and in short, how tequila has become a cultural force beyond just the shot glass.

Damian Fowler (00:50):

So let's get into it.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:51):

Diageo is no stranger to bold campaigns and really intersecting in today's culture. How does your latest work in the tequila and mezcal category continue that legacy? And with your latest campaigns, what was one core story or rather insight that you're trying to bring to life?

Sophie Kelly (01:13):

Our moment of consumption is normally when people are out socializing, trying to have the best times of their lives or celebrate a major moment in their life. So think birthdays, weddings,

Ilyse Liffreing (01:25):

Or even here at

Sophie Kelly (01:26):

Can, even here at can, right festivals. So what is really important for us as we build our brands and think about how we go to market is that we are creating experiences for consumers to participate in. I think some of my favorite stuff across the category is on Don Julio. I mean, we launched a brand new product, 1942 Manys, which was a 50 ml supposed to allow people to access the luxury of 1942 at a better price point in a fun format. And we did that in the Oscars, right? But the most recent one, which I just adore and am still obsessed with and is still going, would be our cultural global collaboration with Peggy Goo. She is a number one DJ globally. She's also an icon in the fashion world, and she creates a load of fashion jewelry. We discovered her in Southeast Asia and she was a massive fan of 1942.

(02:32):

As marketers, we just started to ride along with her and gift her and be a part of her experience. So we approached her and said, any interest in creating a 1942 special limited edition with us? And she was blown away. She was like, yes, but can I design the product? Can I design the experience? Can it be global? Can it travel? Can it be teased? We said yes to all of the above. So we started off in Miami where we had an intimate party, but that intimate party probably had influences at it that had over a hundred thousand followers on Instagram. So we started to tease the collaboration, which was called the 1942 goo. And that's a really important element because we changed the logo of 1942 to be 1942 goo. We teased the campaign with outdoor and these events and we went from Miami to New York, to London to Milan and then to Seoul and then to Hong Kong. New York had a pop-up souvenir store in a car park. When we went to Milan, we did it in a piazza. When we went to London, we did it differently. When we were in Hong Kong, we did a hot pot pop-up. One of the most special parts of the experience was in Seoul, right in her home neighborhood and right next to where she was going to perform. And that was already up six weeks before it came. So we are teasing the drum roll in and the desire for people to be a part of this limited experience.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:12):

Now, I know you're talking a lot about out of home, but what were some of the other marketing channels that you leaned into for this campaign?

Sophie Kelly (04:18):

Everything in the popup was consumable or was collectible. So whether it was the key chains, whether it was the hats, whether it was her specifically designed scars, consumers could collect it, they could create content on it and they could share it broader. So then what started to happen was they were creating their own content. She was creating her own content and influencers within her sphere were creating their own content. And then there was the tease that we were moving to a new city. So that was creating a hype in that. So when you think about channel mix, it was digital, it was static, it was experiences, real life experiences, and most importantly, actions doing something, not just talking about it and then providing people with beautiful little artifacts that they could collect from the experiences to participate and create around.

Damian Fowler (05:18):

We want to get to what your takeaways are in a minute, but before that, I want to ask you, it is interesting when you watch the kind of trajectory of different spirits, it seems like tequila's having a serious moment right now. I mean, for example, in New York, just the other week I ordered a mezcal Negroni, it was

Sophie Kelly (05:39):

Amazing. 800 new craft brands have been launched into tequila in the last, I dunno, two years.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:47):

Wow, that is a lot.

Sophie Kelly (05:47):

So we are seeing a boom in tequila in the same way we saw in North American whiskeys in bourbon in the last five, six years and as a global business unit that I represent. So you are running the gamut of understanding the benefit of the experience of tequila, which is high-end tequilas that are incredibly versatile, that are suitable for multiple occasions and multiple drinks in a culture like the US to teaching people that tequila is no longer that bad shot you had in college. How do you educate? How do you train, how do you get these drinks into culture so that people choose them? Well, you got to have strong brands. You got to have the love of the bartender and the on-premise and you create the biggest rituals there beyond anywhere else, and they travel into the home and then you've got to pick up how consumers are interacting, right? So I'll give you a fun one. For example, we were in the ski fields and we observed that people were taking hot chocolates in shot glasses and then they were tipping the mini that I gave you, the 1942 mini into the top of the shot glass, and that was a serve. So we took that and we scaled it across the ski resorts, right? So from simple mixed drinks to sipping age liquids to fun novel rituals in clubs is how you really fuel what's going on.

Damian Fowler (07:19):

In terms of takeaways, do you have any kind of data points that show the growth and interest in this category?

Sophie Kelly (07:26):

It's the fastest growing spirits segment in the category right now and is forecasted to be that way for the next five years. So if you've got spirits running at about three or 4%, you've got tequila running at about six to 11%, which is kind of amazing. It's also very specific on its development. So if you look at the US, it's more developed. You look at Mexico, it's very developed and the rest of the world it's between five and 15% penetration. Give you a fun fact like whiskey and vodka is up around 36, 42 depending on the market. Yeah, too many people associated tequila with college shots. That is not the experience of tequila. It is playing across high energy. It's in the club, it's with the VIPs, it's with the celebrities, but it's also playing in casual connect moments and simple mixed drinks. So you're able to get into cocktail culture as well as simple mixed drinks. So I think that's a lot of the key to the growth we're seeing and just the versatility and the taste profiles.

Damian Fowler (08:36):

Now that the campaign's out there, you did hit on some of these obviously, but are there key signals and metrics that you look to on your dashboard? As it were,

Sophie Kelly (08:45):

Our consumers had watched over 190 days of content. We got up to 9 billion impressions, which is pretty extraordinary. And what I'd say is lots of chat about AI and is it going to take over. I think the beautiful combination of cultural collaboration with talent, the right kind of elements in the experience to create talkability and then utilizing tech from a generate insights about the communities and how we're going to combine them and what they need in the experience to also distribution, right? Taking the influencer content, taking the bartender content, taking the experience content and amplifying that out to further bigger audience was critical on distribution.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:34):

Sophie, can you tell me whether there is a market or a moment that delivered the most surprising engagement or maybe taught you something new out of this whole campaign?

Sophie Kelly (09:46):

One of the most surprising stats was just how many hours of content our consumers consumed on the campaign because it was so engaging, right? The other thing I'd say is as she traveled, she went into global duty free, she signed bottles, she met consumers, and that exploded as well. So I think one of the surprising things for us was this relationship started in Singapore and then we cultivated it and then we were able to scale it globally, but also make it extremely local to that market.

Ilyse Liffreing (10:30):

So Sophie, from your perspective, and here's your big impression here, how are those broader cultural shifts really influencing the way Diageo approaches brand building in the tequila and mescal space?

Sophie Kelly (10:46):

You must create experiences that allow what we like to talk about, which is accessible luxury for people to engage in. So when you think about this, we created the baby mini Peggy Goo bottles, which are 50 ml bottles, and you can access the taste of the experience. I mean, I think formatting is a really simple way of doing it. I think inviting people in to experiences at multiple layers and letting them access a world that they may have sought was out of reach is super important when you're creating experiences. And then I think giving them little artifacts from that to carry through that represent that something special that represents the experience they were able to engage in. I

Damian Fowler (11:36):

Want to ask you, this is a very important question. What new drinks around tequila are available now? Are you seeing pop up?

Sophie Kelly (11:43):

I think you said it, the Negroni, the espresso martini. We're even doing old fashions with tequila, and that is a real result of, versus people thinking about tequila as just blanco or mixed in a margarita. We have this huge explosion in aged tequilas, which are really sourcing from whiskey moments and rituals as well as kind of the versatility of tequila.

Ilyse Liffreing (12:14):

So Sophie, you've worked across several iconic brands. What's one lesson about cultural storytelling that stayed consistent throughout your career?

Sophie Kelly (12:22):

Work with people who love your brand. Listen to what's happening with your brand and culture, and then add to that, enhance the experience. Don't interrupt it and don't make it up and don't play where you don't have a right to play. Is there a

Ilyse Liffreing (12:37):

Non Spirits brand that you admire right now for the way it connects with people emotionally or culturally?

Sophie Kelly (12:45):

Labubu. Have you seen these things? Oh yes. Yeah, they are little kind of monster icons that everybody is hanging off their bags. I just love it.

Damian Fowler (12:53):

A final question I think is what's your favorite drink?

Sophie Kelly (13:00):

You know what? I am a Don Julio or a Casamigos Reposado on rocks with a slice of orange. I love my 1942, but so they're mine.

Damian Fowler (13:16):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:18):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (13:25):

And remember,

Sophie Kelly (13:27):

Work with people who love your brand. Listen to what's happening with your branding culture, and then add to that, enhance the experience. Don't interrupt it and don't make it up and don't play where you don't have a right to play.

Damian Fowler (13:41):

I'm Damian and I'm Ilyse, and we'll

Sophie Kelly (13:43):

See you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

Today we're checking back in on one of the boldest moves in airline media, connected media by United Airlines as they've redefined what's possible in the world of Traveler Media Networks.

Damian Fowler (00:22):

Our guest is James Rothwell, managing director of brand marketing at Connective Media. James and his team are helping United leverage the power of 110 million traveler profiles, create new opportunities for brands across the entire customer journey.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:38):

We actually spoke with Connective on this podcast just last year and just a week after they launched. A lot has happened since then from major brand partnerships to rapid innovation in tech content and measurement, and today we're catching up on what's new. So let's get into it.

Damian Fowler (00:57):

So James, this time last year, United had just launched Connective Media. It was June, 2024 at CAN, and it was the first airline media network. Could you walk us through what's happened since then? How has the network grown? How has it attracted brand campaigns and how is it working?

James Rothwell (01:20):

Yeah, absolutely. And thank you Damian, for having me on. This is great to be here. We just celebrated our first birthday, which is a wonderful thing. We're engaging with so many different types of brands who are interested in reaching a premium traveler audience. We've seen some success in most of the key verticals that you would imagine, and then some surprising ones too. And obviously it's a slam dunk for a travel brand or a destination brand, but those non-endemic brands, the non-endemic advertisers who are trying to reach travelers, no matter where they are in their journey or even in between journeys, we're finding really interesting use cases, really interesting targeting options and ways for them to be able to reach them across all of our screens. And on,

Damian Fowler (02:08):

Let's get into it a little further. Can you give us some examples? And you mentioned non endemics as well, but maybe we could start with the endemics and then move on to the non endemics.

James Rothwell (02:17):

No, absolutely. I think travel as a category is a growth sector right now. I think ever since the pandemic, people have been looking to explore the world and get out of the, I mean, they were cooped up for quite a while there, and so travel's never been more popular. Like any industry, you've got to break through the noise and the options that you have out there. Right? World's a big place.

(02:43):

Luckily we fly to a lot of different places. We have over 330 different destinations. One really interesting case study that we've just completed was with the Cayman Islands tourist board, and they were looking to drive passengers travelers to the Cayman Islands, and they worked with us across all of our media, and we were able to do closed loop attribution based on the bookings that were then made to those destinations. So for us, measurement and measurability is incredibly strong in the travel sector and the travel space. We were able to see basically with Cayman Islands, that 9,000 bookings came from exposure to the ads that ran across email, across our club lounges and in our entertainment seat back screens on the planes. So we were able to drive awareness, intent, and then conversion, and we were able to track that and they saw a 13 times return on an ad spend against that campaign. We were incredibly happy with that. They were incredibly happy with that. We obviously made some travelers very happy to go enjoy the wonderful blues ocean around the Cayman Islands.

Damian Fowler (03:58):

Yeah, there's something nice when you see that on screen. You're

James Rothwell (04:01):

Like that, I'm going to go there. Yeah, that looks nice. That one sells itself. It

Ilyse Liffreing (04:05):

Does. So you mentioned non-endemic brands too. That's really interesting.

James Rothwell (04:09):

Yeah, I mean, we're all travelers, right? We all got on a plane to be here in Cannes. It doesn't define us, but certainly it helps to give context and potentially insights around who we are as individuals and what we like to spend our money on where we like to spend our time. And so that translates into a really interesting audience segment for different brands. So we've had a lot of luck and a lot of success with luxury brands who want to reach, especially front of plane individuals. B2B brands has been a real boon for us as well. Business decision makers, they're looking to find those individuals and we can find 'em on the planes in the clubs and through different digital channels as well. And so that's been a really interesting sector that we've been able to really capitalize on, and I think they've been able to see some significant growth on that. And we work with, for example, JIRA, which is an Atlassian product, and they did a full omnichannel activation with us and they saw some fantastic results there.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:16):

Very cool. Could you describe that a little bit more, how, I guess you worked almost in a custom way, it sounds like With Jira

James Rothwell (05:26):

For that one was very custom. In fact, they had their own branding moment and wanted to use some of that branding and creativity and plug it into the inflight entertainment screen. So we created a custom channel for them with curated content behind it, which then obviously gave them a branding moment and an opportunity to drive their messaging with more engagement. So that was a very custom moment, but also an opportunity for us to do very targeted work to find the right audience members throughout the journey.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:56):

We spoke with Mike Petre on this podcast just about a year ago, A week after you guys

James Rothwell (06:02):

Launched. That's right.

Ilyse Liffreing (06:03):

It seems that you're moving fast and obviously moving on to things like custom solutions and everything like that. What else is new in the past 12 months

James Rothwell (06:12):

Where to start? We've been bringing on a significant amount of partners, not only on the technical side, but also on the content side. So most recently we did a deal with Spotify. We're very excited about that partnership. Again, from a content perspective and an engagement perspective, that gives us a whole new set of ways and deeper engagement from people while they're on the planes. It's also an opportunity for a loyalty aspect of that as well. And we'll talk a little bit about how Mileage Plus comes into our overall offering, but if you sign up for Spotify Premium, there's a Mileage Plus component to that. We are the first airline to offer audio books and video podcasts within our planes. There's a lot going on in the loyalty space. We are working with many partners to be effectively integrated into our loyalty program with that will also be a media component as well. So this marriage of loyalty and media together is been a real, it's been very successful in terms of not only helping to drive awareness of those campaigns and those opportunities for Mileage plus members to convert, but also to drive media value for those individual brands. So Vivid Seats is another recent partner of ours where we are able to give mileage plus members the opportunity to earn miles as they buy tickets to entertainment. But you can imagine a world where for those types of companies, we know where those individuals are going to

(07:41):

At those destinations. Those companies know how many seats are available at a particular location. Can we match that data and make really customized targeted advertising campaigns to say, okay, we see you're going to Vegas, here are some seats available when you get there. So that opportunity of matching data with our partners from a targeted perspective and then a loyalty perspective is really limitless in terms of what the opportunity is there.

Damian Fowler (08:08):

Let me just ask you, partnerships like this seem hugely valuable in this space. What else are you seeing?

James Rothwell (08:15):

One of the partnerships that we're super excited about is a very recent announcement with JetBlue. We will be working with JetBlue in a number of different ways. Again, loyalty will be a component of that where we are able to, a JetBlue customer can use United Miles to fly on JetBlue and vice versa. There will be a component that will extend to airport and gate availability down the road. There's a commerce play part as part of that where JetBlue will be powering commerce for us for ancillary products like hotels, cruises, cars, et cetera. And then where it's very exciting for the Connected Media group is that we will be effectively selling JetBlue audiences under the connected media roof that will sit alongside our United Media and United audiences. So the combination of that obviously is a scaled audience across different geographies where JetBlue is stronger in the northeast where we are not as strong. So very kind of complimentary in terms of the audience. And that obviously from an advertiser perspective is great because that's more scale. It's one less phone call to make in a world where there's 280 different media networks that kind of consolidation or rather that opportunity to create an airline audience at scale. We think there's massive opportunity there, and we're talking to a number of other airlines about that opportunity.

Damian Fowler (09:36):

And when you talk about at scale, you've got 63 million mileage plus members, so that's a

James Rothwell (09:42):

Serious, yeah. And 174 passengers over the year. I think JetBlue is around 40, so

Damian Fowler (09:49):

74 million. Yeah.

James Rothwell (09:50):

Yeah, 174 million. And then you add 40 million of JetBlue you're getting up there in terms of hundreds of millions of audience members that we can now get in front of. That's a serious proposition.

Ilyse Liffreing (10:00):

Yeah, it's a great partnership really in a lot of ways. Almost a surprising one too, because you guys are competitors but are also helping each other out in ways. And

James Rothwell (10:13):

Again, it's a very complimentary partnership. I think they're strong in places where we don't have the same coverage. And so it works from that perspective. At the airline level, I think what's most interesting for me is we think we might be the first commerce media player to bring a, I wouldn't even call 'em competitor. I would call 'em a pier,

(10:35):

A pier into the garden. And this is not a walled garden. This is an anti-Wall garden straight. We've built this technology stack purpose built for the airline. We've built it so others don't have to. And we think by bringing more individuals and more airlines into this world, and it could extend to travel partners more broadly than just airlines, we think all boats will rise. I should probably say planes will fly, but we think there's value in, again, creating scale, creating efficiency for buyers, and ultimately sort of making the whole thing a little bit more streamlined.

Damian Fowler (11:14):

Yeah, yeah. We like that idea that especially when we look at advertisers and media buyers, the idea that everyone benefits from partnerships like this, so it's not like we're it locking you out. That idea of opening up, it's the value prop for media buys is huge.

James Rothwell (11:35):

Yeah, it's very new. So we're still figuring out all of the logistics. It'll start on the back seat screens and offsite, how we merge those and deduplicate those audiences through technology partners like LiveRamp is still being figured out, but we're very excited about the proposition and we'll start selling offsite later in the year. And then moving on to Seatback screens in 2026.

Damian Fowler (12:01):

Now, you did mention some metrics here, but we're just going to press you a little further on that. One of the virtues of Connected Media networks is that ability to tie back purchases to customers and some of the campaigns or partnerships you've mentioned. How is that working? What kind of visibility do you have?

James Rothwell (12:20):

So we work with a number of different measurement partners, Kantar di nata. We've just started working with Adelaide, which is an attention based measuring partner. And recent tests on that is looking pretty good. You can imagine we do have people literally strapped in by their seat belts and the screen is right in front of them. So the viewability is pretty strong, the attention is very strong too. So we're able to prove, obviously, that as an extension of television, whether you call that a CTV or digital out-of-home screen, it's a very compelling proposition for a brand, and it's an opportunity for them to tell stories on a pretty dynamic canvas. But yeah, we work with a number of different measurement partners. We continue to expand those partners because we believe that while we can choose ones that we think are good, that's not always going to be everyone's first choice. And so we want to be able to create flexibility and brands and agencies to bring their own partners to the table. And so over time, we'll integrate more and more of those partners so that again, measurability and measurement is enabled for all in the ways that they want.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:29):

Very cool. You were talking about how connective is offering omnichannel measurement. Are there any surprises that came out of that analysis so far?

James Rothwell (13:41):

Yeah, I think some of the insights that I've been most intrigued by have been around what I call the traveler mindset, this idea that individuals may act a little differently when they're in the middle of their journey. And a couple of reasons for that hypothesis. I think if you think about maybe you are a business traveler, your company's paying for your flight, your hotel, probably a little bit of your food if not all, while you're gone. I think people think they've got a little extra change in their pocket. Maybe they'll feel a little bit more open to advertising, open to brands being part of that journey and maybe even convinced that they should go out and actually spend some money on that brand. Obviously there's always the opportunity for those people who've got their sunglasses and making that a purchase in the airport, but I think it goes beyond that. What was really intriguing though for me was we did some analysis around business travelers and noticed that business travelers are actually more likely to respond to advertising than leisure travelers, which for me was a little counterintuitive because I thought business travelers might tune that out given how frequent they are. They're more likely to be frequent flyers, right?

(14:54):

But I think they may be a little bit more attuned to the environment they're in as opposed to maybe a leisure traveler or AER traveler who's going with their family and they're having to look after the kids. They're a little distracted, or maybe they're zoning out because they can't wait to get to the beach or back home, but the business traveler is a little bit more tuned in. And so I think that's why we've seen so much success with B2B brands because of that insight and that response.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:24):

And to me, it does sound like there's B2B brands are having kind of a moments, and I think this is across all categories, but it sounds like you're seeing that too, that B2B brands are even driven to the plane beer.

James Rothwell (15:40):

Yeah, I think in general, B2B marketing as digital has matured, B2B marketing looks a lot like B2C marketing. There's not a huge amount of difference. And brands, there are business brands that really invest a significant amount of money in that brand. And you don't have to look too far from across the sports world to see how many brands are investing in high profile sporting events and wanting to reach influencers and business decision makers. I think we have a great audience for that. So I think we are another choice for brands to be able to engage with them.

Damian Fowler (16:14):

Quick question here. On that note, do you have any brand partnerships with sports teams

James Rothwell (16:18):

At the United level? We do. We work with a number of different teams across the nation, obviously usually associated a lot more aligned with our hubs where we have a lot more exposure. And so yeah, lots of different professional sports teams. And then obviously when it comes to things like NCAA tournaments, we do a lot of fun marketing around that. If your team unexpectedly goes all the way, you're going to have to hop on a plane, well, we can figure we help you out with that, or you can cancel your flight and don't worry about it. We will take care of you if your team crashes out.

Damian Fowler (16:55):

Moving on here, to zoom out a little bit and look at the landscape, the big picture, as it were from, should we say 30,000 feet? Let's do it. Terrible. I love it. You wouldn't believe how many plane analogy Canal. Get the pun every, I'm sure you can every day. Lemme ask you for your favorite plane analogy at the end of

James Rothwell (17:10):

Something,

Damian Fowler (17:11):

But you've likened connectives personalization to Netflix's style recommendation engine, but with rich signals as more brands enter the traveler media space, and we don't necessarily have to name them, what do you see as United's distinct advantage?

James Rothwell (17:28):

I'm going to highlight another partnership here because I think it will illuminate the audience on where this is going. So we announced our partnership with starlink recently, and we are scaling starlink out across the fleet. That will take some time because we have to take those planes out of rotation, install the hardware, but we did a recent test and got hardcore gamers and hardcore streamers, and we were doing shopping and testing it, and they were literally trying to break it and they couldn't break it. And it was absolutely flawless super fast. That is a game changer because now you can do everything on the ground at 30,000 feet. And there's been a lot of questions about, does that mean we're going to have to take Zoom calls on the planes? And the good news is no, I think you can listen, but I don't think you can talk. So that's kind of the rule there. But yeah, we had people FaceTiming with their moms on that flight, but the reason I bring that up is because that is going to effectively create a whole world of hyper-personalization that just wasn't possible before. The technology that again exists at zero feet will be at 30,000 feet. And so you think about what that means from an advertising perspective, every screen becomes addressable. We can do programmatic delivery against those

Speaker 4 (18:53):

Screens

James Rothwell (18:54):

And we can create shoppable moments, brand integrations. It unlocks a huge amount of content opportunities as well. Now you can stream live sports, you can stream anything you want on the ground in the air. So that's where I think we already have an advantage in that we have an amazing audience, an omnichannel offering and hours of attention. We're going to supercharge that attention with incredible content and amazing brand integration opportunities and advertising opportunities.

Damian Fowler (19:25):

We have these rapid fire hot seat questions. You're not strapped in or anything, sorry. Terrible. Another airline analogy. This is one we like to ask. What is it that you are obsessed with figuring out right now about the marketplace you're in?

James Rothwell (19:40):

I'm obsessed with, I think just continuing to find out more about the audience that we get to engage with every day. I have the pleasure of not only being head of marketing for Connected Media, but I also mileage Plus. And so I'm curious every day about how I can understand more about our loyal customers, how we can enrich their experiences with us and enrich their lives more broadly. Because again, it doesn't stop with the journey from others. How do we engage with them in authentic and compelling ways in a very noisy media marketplace, but also try and get them to continue to think about Mileage Plus and the airline on a more regular basis, not just when they have to travel.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:29):

Yeah. What would you say is missing from the market and needs to be solved?

James Rothwell (20:37):

What's missing from the market? I don't think it's missing. It just needs to continue to evolve, and that's measurement. I think no one's cracked the code. It feels like every time we get close, the move a little bit, and as more and more first party data driven networks crop up, it becomes more and more relevant for us to solve the attribution game. And I think even when I understood retail media networks to be the answer to all of that because of closed loop attribution, my understanding is that is still not figured out. That's not still solved. And if retailers who operate at that lower end of the funnel and point of sale haven't figured it out, then that's challenging for the industry because we've got a long way to go still.

Damian Fowler (21:21):

You mentioned you had a favorite. Do you have any favorite airline? Do you have any favorite airline analogies or even jokes?

James Rothwell (21:29):

I try to avoid the jokes because that's a tricky one. No, I think a lot of what I talked about today, we were excited to announce it. We're still building, so I would say we're still building the plane while we're flying it.

Damian Fowler (21:42):

That's a good one. Yeah.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:42):

Yeah, we use that one all the time.

Damian Fowler (21:46):

In the business, it works very well.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:48):

Bad worlds, I would say.

Damian Fowler (21:54):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Ilyse Liffreing (21:56):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

James Rothwell (22:03):

And remember, we did some analysis around business travelers and noticed that business travelers are actually more likely to respond to advertising than leisure travelers.

Damian Fowler (22:15):

I'm Damian. And I'm Ilyse. And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler, and welcome to this edition of The Big Impression. Today we are talking about how Unilever is breaking taboos, opening up new kinds of conversations and connecting with consumers in some unexpected places. Our guest is Ryu Yokoi Chief Media and Marketing Capabilities Officer for North America at Unilever. We're going to dive into DO'S Hot Seats campaign. It's a bold effort to normalize conversations around full body freshness and engage people across both digital and real world spaces. We'll be talking about how this campaign's activating across concerts, social, retail, and digital platforms. So let's get into it.

Ryu Yokoi (00:46):

It always starts with understanding our audience and also try to make our products really relevant and desirable in that context. And so the hot seats are originated from social listening within the community. And in particular, one of our, actually her name's Dana Pucci, who leads our PR and influencer work on Dove for North America is a big Charlie XCX fan. And she noted that the Incredible Sweat tour, which was driving and kind of owning the culture last summer in the brat summer, that was

(01:21):

Unfortunately the Sweat tour smelled not great. And it turned out that Charlie and Troy Sivan were going to be performing in Los Angeles the week before the launch of our new whole body deodorant. We kind did a takeover putting our product in the bathrooms. We sent in creators to sort of experience what a show is like when you can make sweats smell great. And the results were kind of magic because we got just unbelievable. The UVC on this and the Delight with folks attending a concert that actually smelled great was really fascinating, just fantastic response. And that week we had a really great launch of the product, first hitting the digital shells on Amazon and doing great.

Damian Fowler (02:02):

That sounded like a very fast activation for a campaign.

Ryu Yokoi (02:06):

It happened literally within 10 days.

Damian Fowler (02:08):

What was the war room like for that 10 days? How did you strategize to get that done?

Ryu Yokoi (02:14):

We always emphasize we want to build worlds instead of chasing moments. So when you have an idea of what you're trying to build with the brand, how you show up, then it becomes a lot easier.

Damian Fowler (02:25):

And tell me a little bit about the tone. I mean, one of you mentioned the humor element of it. Why is that real talk, that humor so key to Dove campaigns?

Ryu Yokoi (02:34):

Well, I think there's a real authenticity that the brand has earned. We say, oh, it's an authentic, it's only authentic if people believe it. The brand is really comfortable in its own skin. We have a sharp understanding. I think that goes beyond a positioning statement to really understanding what this brand stands for, how it shows up in real life, what it would be like if you were to meet it and still be consistent in our building of that brand means to people.

Damian Fowler (03:00):

Yeah, I mean, I've got to say I live in New York and I've noticed the campaign on the New York, out of digital, out of home subway screens and it just totally cuts through and I noticed it. And of course you're standing on a New York City platform in terrible heat, humidity, and everyone's sweating. It's like a perfect placement.

Ryu Yokoi (03:19):

Well, I would say the subway work you've seen is really telegraphing that benefit, right? If you're blessed to be next to somebody who's wearing dove on the subway, then wow, this is a good ride. We've sponsored Charlie's spring tour and we're also showing up at other festivals like Lollapalooza, which have just provide another canvas for us to tell the story.

Damian Fowler (03:38):

Is it a case that once the campaign's out there in the wild, it builds its own momentum? Or are you actively trying to find new events, new points of pop culture? Kind of.

Ryu Yokoi (03:47):

That's exactly what we're trying to find, right, is we understand that if we're able to actually become part of the discourse, we're not just broadcasting ourselves in, but actively playing a role and helping people. And we had a similar case where the first weekend of Coachella people were again, lamenting unfortunately didn't smell great, and in this case somebody not us posted saying, well, I wish Dov would come and help here. We really had a lot of fun with it. We flew a plane over Coachella the second week saying, the cavalry's coming help is on the way we hear you need.

Damian Fowler (04:24):

That's good.

Ryu Yokoi (04:25):

Some help. And we're going to be there. We lined up folks around the entrances so that folks could kind of get freshen up on the way into the show or get freshened up, and more than a thousand people took advantage of that.

Damian Fowler (04:35):

Now, I wanted to ask you about some of the key signals or early reads on the campaign. I'm sure you're paying close attention as you evaluate the impact. What do you look for on your dashboard, as it were?

Ryu Yokoi (04:47):

Right. So I think first and foremost, you're right. Measurement is the most important

Damian Fowler (04:54):

Thing.

Ryu Yokoi (04:54):

But first and foremost, we did this the week before we were launching the product. So the first signal was did we turn well? And we

Damian Fowler (05:02):

Did.

Ryu Yokoi (05:02):

And the ramp on the product was really terrific. But I think to your point, it's really important no matter what the channel that you're playing in, what are the leading indicators that we can correlate with performance? In this case, it was one where things happened so quickly and we knew there was literally nothing else happening when we did this, and so we were able to isolate that way.

Damian Fowler (05:23):

Are there other channels that you are kind of thinking about or could be targeted for the campaign?

Ryu Yokoi (05:31):

In principle, I want to be able to capture signal everywhere. For me it's just around understanding where are people discussing whatever it is that we're trying to get into the discussion on and being authentic there. So for us, Reddit is a channel we haven't used as much in the past. Certainly now I find it increasingly of relevance for us. So we're trying to build up a skillset there,

Damian Fowler (05:55):

Especially

Ryu Yokoi (05:55):

Given how important it is with ais. Right.

Damian Fowler (05:58):

What about audio? Is that

Ryu Yokoi (06:00):

Podcast? Absolutely podcast. So

(06:03):

I would say, again, this was highly before it became something that we were rolling out in real life. Oh my goodness, the word is spectator events. Before it became something we were doing in real life as spectator events, it was a highly music driven campaign because we had decided to reboot this classic hip hop song from a few decades ago. And so it was already sort of music oriented and had played that way. But yeah, so for us it's exactly to your point. If we're talking about something that we're doing that's focusing on music or spectators, obviously audio is going to have relevance. Where are Charlie's fans actually discussing this? It turned out it was happening on Reddit. We go there, where are they discussing their experience at the concerts? We were seeing a lot of chatter on TikTok around that. And so we moved there. So we try to be nimble and agile and really be where the discourse is happening.

Damian Fowler (07:07):

So we're going to zoom out a little bit and just look at the big picture of the landscape beyond the campaign. But as you think about where culture is heading, whether it's wellness, inclusivity, or body confidence, what does the campaign kind of tell us about where Unilever wants to go with its brands or its kind of messaging wants to put out into the marketplace?

Ryu Yokoi (07:27):

We're all about building desire for our brands at scale. So we want to engage with communities wherever they are. It's about having a deep understanding of who our shopper is, what is driving desire for them, who influences them, and how we can really engage with them and create a discourse where we can try to move towards many to many communication.

Damian Fowler (07:49):

One of the big challenges for Marcus is balancing the long-term brand building with the short-term sales results. And do you think that there's a tension there right now in a marketplace that's very much dialed into performance?

Ryu Yokoi (08:01):

Listen, I think that it's really important that you have the right measurement in place and that you can understand both the short-term and long-term effects of the investments that you're making. That's something we really pride ourselves on. We want to be the most outcome oriented advertiser in the marketplace. But the other thing I would say is that more and more data signals and shopability are making it so the funnel is collapsing and we're nearing places when it comes to QR or having true shopability in stream where even executions that in the past would've been considered the most upper funnel can actually drive a transaction in that moment. And I think a future of that's really exciting.

Damian Fowler (08:40):

So finally, we're going to get into some of these hot seat rapid fire questions here.

Ryu Yokoi (08:44):

Okay,

Damian Fowler (08:44):

So you ready?

Ryu Yokoi (08:45):

Yes, let's go.

Damian Fowler (08:46):

Alright. What's one thing you're obsessed with figuring out right now?

Ryu Yokoi (08:50):

We've been talking about how much we've built out resources in this area and all of the interconnections that the data allows us to make. That implies campaigns that become more and more complex and much more complicated to just flight even. And so one of the things that I'm obsessed with is how we simplify that. There's so much change happening to accommodate all of this stuff. So really my big focus right now is on how we make working in this digital landscape easier for everybody involved in it because the amount of choices that we have and the richest is never ending. And so just making that more sustainable.

Damian Fowler (09:32):

I love that. That's a great answer. What's missing from the media and marketing marketplace that you'd like to see?

Ryu Yokoi (09:39):

From a Unilever standpoint, we have a few direct to consumer brands that are able to sort of track the media journey all the way through to conversion, but in the bulk of what we sell in traditional, fast moving goods are moving through retail. So what's missing is some way to penetrate that clean from a data standpoint so that those of us brands that aren't doing DTC can have that all the way through. We manage that well today with leading indicators and fast signals, but there's I think even more richness out there for us if we're able to correct that.

Damian Fowler (10:15):

To bring this kind of full circle outside of CPG, is there a brand that you think is doing a great job connecting with culture right now?

Ryu Yokoi (10:22):

Yeah, so I would name two. One that we really admire is Lego. I just see the way that they have both made their products, both a vehicle for other brands to build their worlds while also building incredible worlds for themselves. So they've become kind of this almost currency within the way that so many other brands are trying to build their IP in the world. So whether it's like a Formula One drop a Star Wars drop a Harry Potter drop, these things each have so much hype around them and they've learned while doing that so that they're able to propel their own ip, which is really impressive to me. So the other, I would say we had a fantastic opportunity to work with this year as crumble cookie. They were dove soaps, deodorant, lotions that were fragranced inspired by crumble flavors. And so in partnering then we were able to build off of that and make our soaps, our body washes, our deodorants, one of the drops of the winter. We struggled to keep it on shelf. So I'm a big admirer of the work that they've done too.

Damian Fowler (11:27):

That sounds cool. And then final, final question here. So in Unilever kind of portfolio of brands Dove Ben and, and the goal has always been to spark conversations, that's how we started this conversation. I guess I'm wondering if you could share a moment that reminded you of the importance of that brand led cultural impact that you can have.

Ryu Yokoi (11:51):

Oh wow. There's so many, but I'll give Dove so that we can show the other side of the coin because we've been talking about a campaign as I was saying, that shows a more playful side, the humorous side of the brand, but one of the areas the brand has focused over the past few years, and we just celebrated 20 years of the Dove Self-Esteem program, and Dove is one of the leading providers of self-esteem education in the world. I think actually we give the most annually self-esteem workshops. And one of the areas we focused recently is body confidence in sport. And so we partnered with Nike a few years ago to do research on the topic of young women in sport. And what we discovered along with them was that young women as they reach their teen years, are dropping out of sports at an alarming rate relative to guys.

(12:41):

And the chief reason is body confidence is feeling comfortable in your own skin wearing the kinds of outfits that you're wearing when you're playing sports. And so we set out to, together with Nike, actually develop a curriculum for coaches, which is the Body Confidence Sport curriculum that literally teaches coaches how to talk to young women about their bodies in ways that are positive and not discouraging. And so we've now been leveraging almost Trojan Horse, our participation across the big game. Our role as a sponsor of March Madness, we activated it last year with em, Navarro at the US Open really across major sports temples. We've just signed our first kit sponsorship of Gotham FC in the New York, New Jersey area of the Women's Professional Soccer League. And we're partnering with them also where they have a program called Keep Her in the Game. That's all around keeping young women in the New York, New Jersey area, staying, playing soccer. And so all of this focused again on trying to create a platform where we can talk about this and encourage people to go and learn about this curriculum. And the most encouraging thing. A really long-winded answer to your question,

Damian Fowler (13:58):

That's great.

Ryu Yokoi (13:58):

What struck me was we were looking back at the research and our spots in the big game have generated really good discourse the past couple of years. Really positive response from folks who've been inspired, not just by the ads themselves, but also I think this year we were one of maybe only a handful of brands that delivered a purpose message in the game. The really encouraging is the group with whom it resonated the most was Girl Dads, right?

Damian Fowler (14:26):

Yeah.

Ryu Yokoi (14:26):

The very guys who are probably coaching on the weekend who probably need to know more about how to speak to these young women and keep them comfortable and inspired playing. So it's stuff like that that makes me see all the time. As I was saying earlier, for us it's around how can we show up, how can we add value? How can we actually help the community? And when we do that, then we build trust and then we can have different kinds of dialogues with people and they really know who we are.

Damian Fowler (14:54):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression. This show is produced by Molten Heart. Our theme is by Loving Caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns. And remember,

Ryu Yokoi (15:03):

I think there's a real authenticity that the brand has earned. We say, oh, it's an authentic, it's only authentic if people believe it.

Damian Fowler (15:12):

I'm Damian, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:02):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing. And welcome to this edition of The Big Impression.

(00:09):

You might be wondering, wait, what? Isn't this The Current Podcast? I'm here to listen to brand marketers talk about the highs and lows of their brand campaign. I know I am. Well, rest assured, we've just had a little bit of a brand refresh. We're now the big impression, and

Damian Fowler (00:27):

That's official shout out to our creative team for the new name, which I really love actually.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:32):

So without further ado, let's kick off this new season with a great guest.

Damian Fowler (00:39):

And today we are delighted to be joined by Tim Hoppin, the chief brand and creative officer at SAP.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:45):

Now, SAP makes software that helps big companies run everything from payroll to supply chains, all in one integrated system. It was recently hailed by brand Z as a 23rd most valuable brand on the planet.

Damian Fowler (01:00):

And no doubt, some of that's thanks to Tim. He's a brand builder who spearheaded the tech company's recent B2B campaign, unstoppable, which was shortlisted at this year's Cannes Lion, and that's where we sat down with him. So we're going to start out with this sort of philosophical frame. Ryan, you have said that a brand must influence everything a company makes, says and does. Could you explain that philosophy a little bit?

Tim Hoppin (01:29):

Yeah, sure. I think a lot of people even just kind of reduce it down to branding, like the colors and things like that and maybe the expression a little bit. But the way I think about a brand transmits meaning to people, and it does that through lots of different formats. So when I say what a brand is, what you make, you're actually affecting the service or the product that you're actually delivering to the world. So my classic example is Harley Davidson. Those motorcycles don't use plastic and they do that very specifically because they want the brand to be expressed a certain way in products. And then when I say a brand is what a company says, that's your marketing, your communication, and then what you do is your activations, your choices on what kind of companies you're going to invest in and so on and so forth. But it's all three.

Ilyse Liffreing (02:25):

Yeah. Can you walk us through your recent SAP campaign, which I believe is called Unstoppable?

Tim Hoppin (02:31):

The campaign was built to communicate a new way we're going to market with our products, which is bringing together all the different parts of the software that we make. We tie together, we call it the SAP Business suite, and we're dramatizing it with sort of metaphors that bring it to life. For instance, sometimes if you're in business and you're in charge of something, like being head of it could feel like you're literally underwater. So we recreated what literally happens when the entire office goes underwater. So we filmed the entire office submerged underwater, and people are trying to go about their business. And of course at the end we introduced our product, which kind of drains it and gets things back to normal. And another example, sometimes when you're trying to innovate, it's like an uphill battle. So you start off and the entire building tilts on its side and we kind of go in this metaphor world where the COO is trying to march up a hill and things are coming at her and she's trying to dodge it. So they're all metaphors that we can kind of associate, but they're also very real stories. Every one of 'em is based on an actual customer story.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:47):

Very fun. What would you say are the key consumer business insights behind this campaign?

Tim Hoppin (03:54):

Yes, because purely B2B, our research is a little bit, you have to be more precise in getting those insights. So a lot of it has to do with doing interviews because there's not like a survey you're going to send out to a bunch of CFOs or CEOs and they're going to respond. They're pretty busy people. But we can do other things like get some individual interviews. We do quant studies as well as well, but it's easier to get real insights when you actually talk to real people. So more like anthropology research, I'd say, than sort of traditional marketing broad surveys.

Ilyse Liffreing (04:35):

Some people might say that emotional storytelling and B2B business campaigns are almost like a oxymoron of sorts. Is that at a conundrum would you say,

Tim Hoppin (04:51):

How many times have you seen a piece of content that's using just stock imagery talking about functional stuff and you just ignore it? And so there's this perception that that's what everybody wants and does. We are seeing a renaissance in B2B where emotional, strong, insight-driven work is what works. And so I think you're going to see more and more of that as people realize that it actually is more effective.

Damian Fowler (05:22):

It's interesting to me that the B2B is being put out on what you might consider consuming channels. I'm just curious to hear your take on why that was important and basically how did you activate this campaign and where did you want to put it?

Tim Hoppin (05:38):

Yeah, so our media team and working with their agency took the brief that we're trying to do two things. We're trying to both lead people that are maybe in market ready to buy, lead them into our ecosystem and get in touch with our salespeople. But we also recognize that SAP as a 50 plus year old company has some perceptions out there and we need to constantly reeducate the marketplace about who we are, what we stand for, and then also present ourselves to the next generation. 71% of all B2B buyers are either millennials or Gen Z, 71%.

Damian Fowler (06:20):

Wow, that's a amount.

Tim Hoppin (06:22):

Yeah, it's a lot. So to become and stay relevant, even as the world's largest enterprise software company, you can't rest on your laurels. So some of those media tactics, like being in airports or some television buys in very targeted ways is designed to get broad enough reach so that we can get people familiar with us and start to understand what we stand for so that when they're ready to buy, they're not just hearing about us for the first time. And then of course we're looking at the real data, what's happening out there? Happy to say that all of our creative work has got five stars, or hybrid is the highest you can get the system one, we're beating every industry benchmark. And then in market, the performance that we're seeing in the market is also way above all of our benchmarks. So we're excited because as we like to say, if creative doesn't work, it's not working.

Ilyse Liffreing (07:14):

Was there an insight that you say you took away?

Tim Hoppin (07:18):

I had a strong hypothesis that there would be some disruption just from visually the way the campaign is presented, especially the films. I think the thing that's really surprised me as we did our research, what a chord. It's striking with people. There's one comment that came through just from the qual study that we did where people were saying, you finally get me. Not only is the content visually arresting, but emotionally resonant, people really feel seen. And to your comment earlier about like, Hey, B2B is seen as traditional and there's such a, I'd say a traditional and sort of safe approach to just use business people doing businessy things and boats and cars moving fast and satellites flying by the camera and putting a logo at the

Ilyse Liffreing (08:14):

End. I've seen that one. Yeah.

Tim Hoppin (08:15):

Yeah, I've made that one unfortunately. But to really take this risk and tell interesting stories that are based on real human insights and have emotion and are disruptive and have the very people that we're trying to reach go, thank you, thank you for seeing us, telling us a story that's different. I have this saying, if you want to be disruptive, you actually have to disrupt. And so there's also sort of a hungered SAP, we have to reinvent ourselves. We are in our product and our go-to market. And so the brand platform that we created over the last three years, now this is the next level, is taking the campaign higher. So I think we're on this momentum of transformation, and so it just felt natural to do it. And the way we're investing the does part's also coming true, frankly, the way we're investing in AI and kind of transforming what's possible from a 50 plus year old company. It's exciting.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:12):

Let's talk a little bit about ai.

Tim Hoppin (09:14):

Yeah, sure.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:15):

On that note, how are you guys investing in AI and what do you foresee

(09:16):

Damian Fowler (09:23):

Creation play? Yeah, as a creative person, do you feel threatened by it or

Tim Hoppin (09:26):

Not at all.

Damian Fowler (09:29):

Jump on your question. That is the question.

Tim Hoppin (09:31):

Yeah, it's the question of the week. Big question. It's come up so much. Actually, I was talking about this the other day.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:35):

You're probably tired of people talking about it.

Tim Hoppin (09:38):

No, I actually think what's been really refreshing is two things, always the first part of your question, which is as a company, we are basically transforming into a data and AI company. I think pretty much anybody who's going to survive has to do that. So we've made software for 50 years, but what all the companies that run on our platforms, it's the data that's the most valuable part, of course. And so the AI that we've developed is allowing people to run their businesses completely different ways. So we're investing in that as a creative person.

(10:14):

We're also starting to experiment with ai, for instance, trying to understand how people might react to our messages. I don't think that AI is going to replace creatives, but I think creatives are going to have to change. So you're going to have to act more like a director than a executor. I remember when I started in the business a few years ago, 25 ish, I remember the people who were still laying down typography by hand and everything. Every piece of printed material was proofed. The proofs would come into the agency and people were looking at it. And so all those people's jobs changed. And that's all this is. Human creativity will not and cannot be replicated, but it will require us to get better at being creative and know how to use these new tools.

Ilyse Liffreing (11:10):

Yeah, that's a great answer. We've transformed so much in 25 years. It's kind of baffling

Damian Fowler (11:18):

Completely. Yeah.

Ilyse Liffreing (11:19):

So you're an agency guy. It does seem that B2B is getting better. Is it because of all these agency folks moving in? How?

Tim Hoppin (11:30):

Yeah, I think so. We're seeing, look, the agency world has changed and is contracting in some ways and it's really tough, but also it's creating opportunities for those same creative talents to move. And so it becomes a, I'd say rebalancing. I remember early in my career if you worked in a in-house agency, it was sort of looked down on like you're just not good enough for a real creative job, which was totally mean and not nice. But that was the perception. And now it's completely not that Some of the best work that's being produced is coming from in-house agencies. So you're seeing a migration from, and frankly, it's caused by clients. So clients are reducing what they're willing to pay agencies, which puts economic pressure on the agencies and they have to downsize. And then those great talented people need to pay their mortgage and put their kids through college and they're coming in house. And so my team is almost exclusively on my creative group, our exag agency people. And that's what I am too. And so that actually makes us better clients so we can work with our agencies and we know how to work with them and who they are, and sometimes we even know them from past lives. So it just makes the work better all around.

Ilyse Liffreing (12:52):

Is there anything in the creative realm that you're looking at or data about creativity that you think brands should co-op for B2B campaigns?

Tim Hoppin (13:05):

Yeah, I absolutely, interestingly, as we've seen this sort of spike in the AI chatter and everybody talking about it and sort of wringing their hands about what it's going to do for our jobs, there's been sort of a pushback in a really healthy way where people are saying, actually no humanity and really putting AI in its place, which is, it's just another tool. Yes, it's going to disrupt jobs. That is a true statement 100%, but it's not going to replace human creativity. And so as I said before, that reality is getting people back to what's important, which is storytelling, human storytelling, creativity, finding those interesting combinations that only humans can do. And that's where you're starting to see that come to life in B2B marketing is that, I said it earlier, I think it's a bit of a renaissance and a not cheesy way.

Ilyse Liffreing (14:05):

We have some last minute Rapid, rapid and fire, fire.

Tim Hoppin (14:08):

And this is your home

Damian Fowler (14:08):

Stretch. Oh yeah, stretch. Stretch. Is there anything, Tim, that you're obsessed with figuring out right now?

Tim Hoppin (14:17):

Yeah, how to keep getting better. It's like I love seeing what people can do and I want to use new tools and new solutions. And so I'm trying to figure out where's all this AI stuff going to go and where's it going to be helpful? And how do you avoid the pit of generic communications that is a real threat from ai?

Ilyse Liffreing (14:44):

Did you have a favorite Cannes moment that made you stop and say, wow?

Tim Hoppin (14:49):

Yeah, I was in line for a session and there was a group of young lions, and this one kid, he had to be maybe 18, maybe 19, he still has his braces on, and he was so excited, so excited to be there and to go in. And I've been really worried that our industry doesn't have the next generation coming up. And I saw this kid and I was just so relieved that this kid was as excited about the start of his career as I was when I started. I mean, I would fall asleep with award animals to learn how to do this stuff better and that you could feel the energy from this kid. It was awesome.

Damian Fowler (15:39):

I'm so happy that a lot of students come to Cannes.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:43):

It is great. It fills your heart. Yeah, it does. It does.

Damian Fowler (15:48):

Last one.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:49):

So who beyond SAP, who else is doing B2B brand work very well in your view?

Tim Hoppin (15:56):

Well, GoDaddy won the Grand Prix for, I thought, a really fun piece of work, and it's targeted to small business, so I think you can be a little bit more courageous than sometimes we get to, but I just loved it for its wackiness and just audacious. And then also the way that they really just kind of carried across different mediums. The thing that was the best about it was they're trying to make the case for starting a small business, and they literally did that with a celebrity. It was brilliant.

Ilyse Liffreing (16:41):

And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.

Damian Fowler (16:44):

This show is produced by Molten Hart. Our theme is by Love and caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.

Tim Hoppin (16:50):

And remember, 71% of all B2B buyers are either millennials or Gen Z.

Damian Fowler (16:57):

I'm Damian. And I'm Ilyse,

Tim Hoppin (16:59):

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

But according to Ji Heon Kim, Valnet’s head of monetization, Valnet realized it could create more value for its users by encouraging them to subscribe or authenticate themselves.

Maybe a “mass scale” of users wouldn’t sign up for their websites, but perhaps 10% would. And, as Kim puts it, that “10% would still be valuable, and we can do a lot with that 10%.”

“We created more value to [those] users, more exclusive content and high-quality content,” Kim says. “All of that became an initiative on the content side for us to deliver a premium model and give users an incentive to sign up.”

Kim further talked with The Current Podcast about balancing advertiser value, user experience and performance, which he says are “always affecting each other.”

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler, and welcome to The Current Podcast. Today we're talking to one of the biggest digital publishers. You might not know by name, but you've definitely read their stuff. I'm talking about Net. The company behind Screen Rant, the Gamer, Kaleida make use of, and a bunch of other sites that rack up hundreds of millions of sessions every month. Joining me today is Ji Kim Valnet's, head of monetization. Ji'S been leading the charge on everything from supply path optimization to first party data to figuring out how to drive real revenue without compromising the reader experience. We'll get into some of the big shifts they've made in their tech stack and how they're bringing newly acquired brands like Polygon into their ecosystem and what other publishers can learn from their approach.

Ji Kim (00:52):

At Valnet, I'd like to think of us as a publishing powerhouse. We started very small. Our motto is humble and hungry. We like to remind ourselves that it's always good to keep a humble mindset. I've been at NET for 10 years and we've grown tremendously. We've went through a lot ups and downs, but even as we grow, we like to think that we're small and agile and the publications we range from automotive, gaming, technology, entertainment, but entertainment has always been our flagship, but we've been kind of branching outside of that and trying to expand more and more. And then we have some lifestyle brands as well as sports.

Damian Fowler (01:35):

Let's talk about a moment that changed the game for Net. Can you walk us through your, I guess we're going to talk about supply path optimization at first anyway, which is a hot topic around these parts and what work you did around supply path optimization, like cutting resellers and boosting direct inventory. Could you talk us through that a little?

Ji Kim (01:57):

It's an ongoing process. It's certainly, I think most people agree that SPO is not an easy thing to achieve. You can commit to it one shot, but that's much harder to do considering that there will be a revenue impact. So for us, we tried both ways. We took a few sites and we took the direct approach and we saw a pretty decent stability, and then some other sites did not, and then we have to kind of revert back to it. SPO, it was always a topic that was talked about but not well enforced. And tradedesk took a big initiative to push publishers towards it. And then we started working closely with Jounce Media as well, with Chris Kane started kind of talking through some of the ideas, how should we go about it? How do we retain the value and still achieve removing the resale alliance and keep our inventory as clean as possible?

(02:51):

But initially our outlook of SPO was about making our inventory as clean and transparent as possible. Net considers ourselves as a premium publisher and we want to make sure that the advertisers see that as well. So we were heading in that direction. But ultimately, I think the biggest challenge with SPO was it's impossible to do an AB test because you have one A TXT file and you can't test one setup with the resell alliance, one setup without. So that's been pretty challenging to understand where's the value going, where is it coming from? And even with the Resell Alliance, when you talk to the SSPs with Resell Alliance, they'll go, oh, these are PP deals. These are not just rebroadcasting and all this stuff. So trying to understand the granularity and all that details of what each resale align means was very difficult. But ultimately we know we have to go in that direction, but we know it's not going to happen overnight, so we're kind of just taking a step at a time.

Damian Fowler (03:51):

That's great. What would you say was the kind of catalyst or moment that sparked that shift?

Ji Kim (03:57):

We always talked about advertiser value. It is important to yield as much value as possible and get the performance that we need. We always think that advertiser value is important, and when we think about that, it's like you go through stages. You go, okay, viewability needs to be important. Let's get viewability up to above standard, above average, make sure our CTR is good, but it's high quality clicks. It's not just users just clicking on stuff. Then you go through the lines and eventually you get to SPOs. Make sure that advertisers know what inventory they're getting access to, what they're buying, and make sure that they're getting insights. The transparency is there. Then we've increased the value of our inventory.

Damian Fowler (04:46):

Yeah, I mean that's the key, right, obviously. And speaking of that, having made these changes, are you in a position to be able to see the kind of impact that they've had from a revenue

Ji Kim (04:58):

Perspective? Honestly, I don't think I can everything, especially with these kinds of stuff, what I've learned is it doesn't change overnight. Let's say we remove all the reseller lines yesterday. Today, likely the performance is going to drop initially and maybe things recover over time, but there's so many moving parts that it's hard to associate the value towards SPO, and that's a lot of things that we do in this industry. But I think that's when we like to look at it as, you know what? Ultimately we are improving the quality of our inventory, so we will get rewarded at some point. And that's how you move forward. But with SPO, I think the other side is that it's not just about removing reseller lines. You also have to market yourself and tell the advertisers that, Hey, we have gone in this direction. We have removed the reseller lines. All of our inventory is direct. It's clean. And that part is also hard to do. We haven't spent a lot of time or resources into marketing ourselves, and that's why we talked about, people may not know net, but they know our brands. It's the same thing. It's like we are now making a big push to let people know who Val net is, and that's going to go in hand in hand with this stuff.

Damian Fowler (06:21):

In terms of that messaging around the surgery as it were you're doing on the supply path, does that land well with advertisers?

Ji Kim (06:32):

I think it's always positively looked at when you tell them, it's like everybody, it is never negative, but I don't know if actually if it's meaningful for them because at scale, they're buying at scale. So yeah, we're a big publisher, but they're also buying at multiple publishers. Maybe only small portion of their budgets come to us. So it's positive, but I don't know if it's all that meaningful to them. At least that's what I've felt.

Damian Fowler (07:04):

So in addition to the SPO, what other tweaks or changes are you as head of monetization looking at to basically bring in those ad dollars and keep readers satisfied, I suppose?

Ji Kim (07:17):

Yeah, so there's three things. So we looked at the advertiser value, but then there's the user experience and then the performance side. So always those three things, there's constantly affecting each other. Ad density is probably one of the biggest part of advertiser value and performance and user experience. So we are constantly trying to reduce our density, and we look at this metric impressions per session and request per session. So we look at that and injections our injections based on content length, a paragraph breaks and all that stuff. So we'll try to work with the content team to create optimal breaks. I'll have a little sit down session with the content team. The leads say, okay, this is how the admin injection works, and how you break out your content really does impact, because we won't break a paragraph in half to inject an ad. So there needs to be natural breaks for the ads to inject. So if you have massive paragraphs, we're going to have less ad injections, which is fine if the content works like that, but they also need to think about how all this stuff works.

Damian Fowler (08:26):

That's really interesting. I mean, I think that sweet spot between not being the Vegas strip, but also ads have to populate at the right time to have value.

Ji Kim (08:35):

For net, we've focused mostly on open market programmatic spend. We have a small direct initiative. This is something that we've been trying to grow, but when you don't have huge direct sales initiative and direct spend coming in, you kind of need the density because the CPMs that you get from open market is much lower. So we want to try to move away from that as much as possible. I don't think found that will ever be a publisher where we drive like 50% of the revenue from direct sales, but we want to grow it to maybe 15, 20%. And once we do that, we can yield higher CPMs, which allows us to reduce the density, which would be better for advertiser value, better for user experience, and we'll still get the performance that we need to kind of go forward.

Damian Fowler (09:24):

So it's a balance.

Ji Kim (09:25):

Yeah. Yeah. I think if we can drive higher CPMs, we would love to reduce density, but it's always the constant battle between the two of, okay, well we reduced density. Oh, we went too far. Okay, we got to bring it back a little bit.

Damian Fowler (09:38):

How difficult is it to kind of innovate in ad tech? This is a broader question, I guess given how fast things are changing, especially on the programmatic front,

Ji Kim (09:47):

It's been very, very difficult. Rapidly changing environment is definitely one of them, and you have to adapt quickly. For example, the video definition of having instream outstream, and then now there's a third definition of accompanying that stuff. When it happened, the enforcement happened quickly, so we had to adapt quickly, and that's difficult. But innovating is, I think, much more difficult than just adapting to the new policies and new rules. So many different ways to innovate pre, for example, you have the open source code, you build that, but there's so many customizations that you can do and even a single customization, you interpret how you should approach that topic and how you should build your tech. So you kind of have to talk to your developers and walk through. And our biggest challenge I would say was bridging the gap between developers and ad ops. I was like, because I am an ad ops guy, I understand programmatic landscape very well, but our developers do not. And I'm not a developer, I'm not a technical guy. Obviously through 10 years I've learned a lot of stuff, but still, if I needed to build something, I'm not going to be able to tell them exactly how to build it. So you need somebody in the middle that understands both sides,

(11:03):

And that was the most difficult part. And eventually we did find resources that they were able to bridge that gap and were able to build stuff. But ultimately, there's just so many different ways to build your product and you want to make sure that product that you build or tech stack that you build is going to keep that balance that you need between the user experience, the performance, and the density, everything that pertains to page speed as well. If you build it to be too slow, everything gets affected as well, and that's harder to tell. So yeah.

Damian Fowler (11:37):

So how have some of these technical changes influenced your broad and monetization philosophy?

Ji Kim (11:43):

Yeah, so I guess one of the things, if we talk about authentication, we talk about cookie deprecation and why authentication became so important to majority of the publishers. And I remember our thought process around authentication was pretty pessimistic, I would say. But eventually we said know what? We can create content or value for the users that's going to want them to sign up and want them to get authenticated. And we said we got to start somewhere. Ultimately, maybe we've become a little bit more realistic about what critical mass of a value would be if we're at, if we're expecting 50% of users will log in, that's not going to happen, but 10% is still very meaningful. So it was about our philosophy was changing, about our expectations changing and still understanding that 10% could be very valuable and we can do a lot with that 10%. So we created more value to the users are more exclusive content, high quality content, high quality videos. All of that stuff became an initiative on the content side for us to deliver the premium model and to give users the incentive to authenticate a sign up on.

Damian Fowler (13:03):

That's really interesting. I think one of the things that also I'm hearing is that you kind of have different audiences, but you're getting to understand your audiences. I mean, this strategy gives you more insight into who's coming.

Ji Kim (13:15):

Yeah. We also created what we call threads. They can talk about the article, talk about topics that we're discussing, and that really improved our engagement.

Damian Fowler (13:30):

As you look to the future, how do you think about, as it were, locking in some of these changes and this value that you see from this audience?

Ji Kim (13:40):

So I want to go back a little bit about innovating and how difficult it is. So I went through the stages of, okay, what am I focusing on to optimize to yield more value? And initially it was demand. Okay, we want to work with as many high quality as P as possible, but then you do work with all of them. There are going to be going to be one or two that come here and there, but generally speaking, they're not going to create incremental value. They'll just take a piece of pie that was taken by somebody else, not meaningful value. Then you work on ad tech innovation, all that stuff, and that we'll continuously work on that, but that also has lots of limitations, and you eventually reach a plateau point of say, you're not going to find a lot low hanging fruits. So now we come to premium inventory, which we need to learn our users, we need to learn who they are so we can offer these users to our advertisers to grow our PMP programmatic direct, as well as your conventional IO based direct deals that's going to yield as higher CPMs.

Damian Fowler (14:53):

Yeah, I mean, talk of premium inventories is characteristic of the moment we are in when it comes to programmatic sales for publishers.

Ji Kim (15:02):

Yeah.

Damian Fowler (15:04):

Let's draw back and look at the big picture and some of the kind of industry context. I guess think I'm correct in saying Valnet reach has more than 400 million sessions a month across its network. That's correct. And how do you think about that, that kind of scale when every property has its own audience profile and publishing rhythm?

Ji Kim (15:30):

Yeah, it's sometimes a bit overwhelming how much reach our sites have, but I always try to look at it as our advantage, and this is the opportunity that hasn't been tapped into, is that okay, we're 95% of our inventory is sold in the open market, and we have so much data that we could collect and leverage in order to drive higher value. And it's just looking at it, it's overwhelming, but you start to see the real value that hasn't been tapped into, and that's exciting, but it's also very, very difficult to manage all that information, manage that data, and use it properly. So yeah, I mean it excites me, but also I know how challenging it can be to create value through that. So we're taking one step at a time, even first party data collection. I wouldn't say we're crazy sophisticated, but we're keeping it a level that we know how to manage and understanding it well first and then starting to kind of grow a step-by-step.

Damian Fowler (16:45):

Yeah, I mean, I suppose the whole back and forth about third party cookies may have provided a spark. I know it lit a fire under the industry. Speaking of first party data, so that is a focus for you?

Ji Kim (16:56):

Yes, yes. But I believe when it was really a huge focus for the industry was when Google had first announced that they're going to deprecate third party cookies, and we had the initial moment of, oh, you know what? We also need to look into this, but we didn't want to panic. Our outlook was, I'm sure everybody went through the initial panic. We did too, but we didn't want to stay in that moment. And we said, okay, what's realistically going to happen for publishers like us? How much first party data can we collect and really sell because we don't have a huge direct sales initiative? And at that point we had none. And you can't grow direct sales overnight. It's a highly competitive environment, and you're entering that new market. You have to build relationships, you have to have crazy amount of salespeople that are constantly going out there representing balance inventory.

(17:55):

And we weren't set up for that, and we weren't willing to just fully invest everything into growing that at the time. So we said, well, maybe first party data isn't as important. Collecting first part data isn't as important as just understanding how to go about direct sales. So that's what we worked on. We've hired salespeople, we enter that space. I was very naive about how direct sales worked, and now we have a better understanding. We have good salespeople that understand our values as well. We don't want to just go out and sell anything and everything. We want to understand the creative types that we're also selling isn't going to impact user experience horribly and negatively. The high impact guys, the site scans when they're done, right, it's great user experience, but it could also go the other way. So we wanted to build a baseline first, and that's what we did the last few years. And now we can go after the first party data in a more sustainable way for us.

Damian Fowler (18:56):

Let's talk about your acquisition of Polygon from Vox Media. Speaking of inventory that expands the real estate, how does that property fit into what you're doing?

Ji Kim (19:07):

So Polygon, obviously, we go through a lot of due diligences. We look at different opportunities, and Polygon was an easy one to go through because we knew Polygon has great content, it has a great foundation of creating high quality content. But the difference was that Fox has a lot of direct sales. I can't remember the exact number, but it could have been 75%, 80% of their revenue was generated, direct sold inventory, and then 20% was open market. And for us, it would've been the other way around, flipped around even less. Maybe 95% open market, 5% directive. Initially when we acquired it would've been a hundred percent open market, but that's also why it excite us because it's a premium inventory that doesn't get seen in the open market. Open market buyers don't see the bid requests coming from that website as much. So we're super happy, but we knew this was a high quality inventory, high quality website, and we knew that there was a very small chance that it was going to go poorly.

Damian Fowler (20:20):

Interesting. When you buy a property like that, you're actually buying an audience to a certain extent.

Ji Kim (20:25):

Yeah, absolutely.

Damian Fowler (20:27):

Do you think about audiences as discreet to the publications or do you see crossover?

Ji Kim (20:34):

Crossover? Yeah, lots of crossover.

Damian Fowler (20:37):

Yeah. Alright. So I guess the big question here is for other publishers looking to upgrade this strategy that we're talking about, especially in this very complex environment, which is something you clearly understand very deeply, what's one piece of advice that you might offer?

Ji Kim (20:54):

I think you have to think about realistically what you should go after, what opportunities you should go after. So many things that come up right now, I think the big thing is curated media. And on our end, a lot of the SSPs and DSPs are doing the work for us. They going out and curating our inventory for us, and that's fine. But if you were to go after that and trying to grow it, but you don't really have the resources, it's easy to just kind of see everybody, what everyone else is doing, like, oh, I want a piece of that too, but it's not going to yield the value. Same value if you don't have the right resources in place if you're not focused on that opportunity. So my advice would be to understand which opportunities realistically are you able to get and have the right resources who are going to be passionate about that. Take accountability. That's huge, the accountability part. And that's not something you can just kind of force people. You have to believe that this person that's taking on this project can be really passionate and sink their teeth into it. If you got that, then go after those things. But it's too hard to go after every single opportunity there is. Even if seemingly it seems like a low hanging fruit. Nothing is really that simple in this industry.

Damian Fowler (22:15):

That's for sure. So finally, we're going to wrap this up with some what we call hot seat questions. So what's one thing you're obsessed with figuring out right now?

Ji Kim (22:27):

How to yield more value? No, no, no. I'll give a better answer than that right now. For me, it's how to grow direct sales sustainably and scale it in a way that we don't get too bloated. Because through acquisitions, one of the most valuable things that I get is insight. I get to see under the hood of a lot of publishers, small to medium to large, how they operate, what is their strategy and direct sales. I've learned some of the big publishers do it extremely well. It's a well-oiled machine, it's not bloated. They generate a ton of revenue, but some have a huge cost, and that's what we were afraid of. And right now it's very hard to do. So you need the right sales team, you need the right operational guys, you need account representation, you need reporting guide and all this stuff. And right now I am trying to find a way to scale it, but without having massive costs, just kind of take over and then expect this to yield value in the next year or two. I want that line to kind of grow together. And that's not an easy thing to do, obviously. And I'm looking for the right resources. I'm looking to build relationships with agencies with limited guys, just hustle through it and offer them our inventory, charm them, whatever it may take. But yeah, that's what I'm currently obsessed.

Damian Fowler (24:01):

Okay. What's still missing in the ad tech stack that you wish someone would build?

Ji Kim (24:07):

I don't know if this would fall under their ad tech stack, but I think we could really benefit from a bit more standardization around, it could be reporting and creatives. Maybe I'm speaking out of line because I'm on the inventory side, so I don't know everything that goes on the buy side and the creative side. But what I see is that there's so many different creatives that just either break the page, the creative's broken, it's too heavy, it slows down the page, and it's hard to target those and remove those. It can come through so many different channels. So if there is a bit more standardization around what kind of creatives are acceptable, I'm sure there is some or a standard already, but it needs to be honed in a bit more maybe.

Damian Fowler (25:00):

What's one thing advertisers misunderstand about monetizing Publish it inventory today?

Ji Kim (25:08):

So I thought about this and something that it's more of my frustration around advertisers perspective. I understand it, but a bit more frustration because it's hard to create context around it, which is brand safety. I understand the brand side. I advertise side on why they wouldn't want to associate their brand with certain content, but brand safety is police by keyword list and it's very restrictive. And some of the,

Damian Fowler (25:37):

It's one tool

Ji Kim (25:38):

And it's like, okay, and we have gaming sites that will, a lot of gaming, natural will talk about shooting, but some of the game developers won't want to associate with those articles. And it's like, hang on, hang on. Now you bet you guys also have games that are first person shooter or whatnot. You don't want to associate with those type of articles. There's a bit of a mismatch, and I think it's just hard to manage that. So they go with a broader approach and I get it, but I think it's just there needs to be more about understanding the context of certain articles. And it's like the word shooting can be anything, everything. Right?

Damian Fowler (26:22):

Yeah, I like that. I've been hearing more about a shift from brand safety to brand suitability, which brings in the concept of context. What's something unexpected you've learned from reader data or behavior recently?

Ji Kim (26:39):

So I wouldn't say it's recent, but it's something that's surprises me how the smallest change that I, from my perspective is like, is that really going to do anything? But at our scale, the numbers changed so drastically. Recently we were playing around with the video size because our outstream unit will float once the user are scrolling and the size of that unit. Obviously we want to give advertiser value, so we want to make it as big as possible. But then user experience wise, it could be very bothersome because as they're trying to read, there's a video playing. So we want to keep mindful of that. And we're constantly testing the size of that unit and we decreased by 10% and 10%. While it's significant, if you look at the actual size of the unit to the naked eye, you really wouldn't be able to tell what the difference is. But the CTR of that video unit changed drastically. It was cut in half, actually. And that's the thing is like, okay, users are really sensitive to these things. And to me it's not, maybe I'm looking at it too often, but that's always, that boggles my mind and it always catches me by surprise when I see the numbers is like, wow, I did not expect that. I did not expect users to behave this way.

Damian Fowler (28:00):

That's amazing. The details really matter.

Ji Kim (28:02):

Yeah, Big time. 

Damian Fowler (28:03):

And that's it for this edition of The Current Podcast. We'll be back next week. The Current Podcast is produced by Molten Hart. A theme is by Love and Caliber, and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns. And remember,

Ji Kim (28:21):

I like to think of us as a publishing powerhouse. We started very small. Our motto is humble and hungry. We like to remind ourselves that it's always good to keep a humble mindset.

Damian Fowler (28:34):

I'm Damian, and we'll see you next time.

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Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Current Podcast.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

This week we're thrilled to be joined by Rob Bradley, the senior vice rresident of Digital Revenue Strategy and Operations at CNN International Commercial.

Damian Fowler (00:18):

Now, Rob has played a key role in CNN's evolution over the last 10 years from a broadcast powerhouse into a cutting edge digital platform

Ilyse Liffreing (00:26):

That includes launchpad, CNN's AI powered advertising tool that's been driving smarter, more targeted campaigns for nearly a decade

Damian Fowler (00:35):

From global banks to tech giants like Samsung and even government launchpad has helped brands show up on CNN's platform in ways that are both innovative and effective.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:45):

So in this episode we'll explore that journey, how launchpad got its start, what it's become today, and how CNN is helping advertisers navigate a complex digital world using deep audience insights and data at scale.

Damian Fowler (01:00):

So let's get into it. So Rob, let's start by talking about Launchpad. Not everyone's familiar with it, but it's been designed to help brands market themselves to CNN's audience. So I know it's eight years old. Can you talk about the tool and how it's evolved to this point?

Rob Bradley (01:19):

Yeah, I mean, to take a step, media companies and news brands today need to be so much more than just a platform where someone can serve a traditional ad to reach an audience. Of course we do that and embrace that, but our audience exists in a multitude of different environments. Now, of course, o and O, which can be TV to digital assets, websites, but of course Fast and CTV now. And of course they're all across social, which means that when we're working with brands today, we need to have tools that enable us to reach audiences in all of those environments. Essentially our clients expect that from us. So we have to innovate to be in those places. And also of course, by utilizing areas our audiences exist in today such as social, it means we get a broader reach. So we try and of course a lot of brands are nervous about social, and of course we do compete somewhat, but I like to flip it on its head and think about how can we use audiences on off platform environments to our advantage?

(02:16):

So launchpad essentially is a good example of that. It's an in-house social media agency, essentially utilizes latest talent. I would say. I think people do come first that really understand the latest technology to help us understand our audiences both on and off platform. That did launch really just reaching audiences in places like Facebook, but now it's across all the meta platforms, YouTube, LinkedIn, TikTok, and more. And over the years that team, through utilizing technology, have automated processes. We understand sentiment of what people are consuming, how they feel against our content that we distribute both on and off platform. And then we use those insights to indeed empower the next piece of creative, let's say. And it feeds into our brand studio, which is called CNN Create, which actually touches about 70% of our campaigns now. So it's all about the way we go to market is really about selling stories and content and then utilizing the impressions and volume of scale we have around that in a smart way.

Ilyse Liffreing (03:15):

And today, CNN Parent Company, Warner Brothers Discovery has only massively grown since the launch of launchpad and has so many touchpoint and audience insights. You have the entirety of the Harry Potter world and DC comments to seen in news. How do you make sense then of all that data and how does it come together to benefit a launchpad campaign?

Rob Bradley (03:41):

So first of all, I'd say there's still a job to do and an opportunity of gathering all that together because there's so many touch points that both can power the marketing of movies that say as well as the targeting of campaigns. And those targeting of campaigns can of course be owned and operated environment. So again, we can push audience insights into social platforms to target through tools like launchpad, but ultimately by understanding who our audiences are means that we can do three things. We launched a product called WBD AIM basically, which was actually born out of CNN, used to be CNN aim, and it stands for Audience Insight Measurement. And really it means that of course we talk about targeting quite a lot, that's where the rubber meets the road. But really as a severe successful media company today, you need to go to market with insight led sales.

(04:29):

So use that data to inform sales to the clients, proving upfront why you've got the right audience and why they should trust you. And then of course there's the targeting the audience piece, and then there's the measurement of proving what you have done has worked. And so that aim piece all comes together as one kind of data play. And where we have had success of bringing that together so far internationally is CNN Eurosport D plus in the UK and TNT Sport in the UK now exists in one platform. And also of course that's really good for programmatic as well. We can push those audience insights, put them into the marketplace and enable brands to buy programmatically against that. So very much in the programmatic space, we're aiming at the more premium PG programmatic direct marketplace.

Damian Fowler (05:16):

Can I just ask you off the back of that, do you see news as part of that whole package or it's not a sort of siloed separate piece of what you are offering?

Rob Bradley (05:27):

Yeah, that's a really good question. I think if you are a brand that wants an engaged audience and you want to be part of a conversation that's happening today or drive a conversation, news obviously makes sense. But of course I wonder if this is where you're going. News environments are challenged at the moment in some respect. There is a prevalence of I think, unfair news avoidance in the industry, particularly with very blunt keyword block lists that are being used, which is pretty well covered in the press and that is a major challenge. However, sports has a similar issue, right? Because words like shoot and shot and attack are used all the time just as though are news. So actually sometimes if people think of news straightaway, but there's a broader issue with that. And the reason why I mention that because actually news and sports is both live, it's what's happening today, it's audiences certainly where we sell it can be sports enthusiasts across both platforms at the broader end, it can be business decision makers, it can be C-suites, it can be high net worths bringing those audiences and ultimately linking it to what WBD has an abundance of is very premium, very trusted, very brand suitable environments you could say.

(06:39):

And that marketplace of WBD and WBD Connect is the programmatic marketplace will keep growing.

Ilyse Liffreing (06:47):

Now you talked about how your bridging basically social to programmatic. Have you seen one success in that so far and interest from the brands you've been working with?

Rob Bradley (07:00):

I think it's basically it was quite an early adopter of programmatic in the belief that it enables the human led work media owners to grow. And that has been proven in embrace technology to do what it does well, highly scaled targeted impressions that started on the website that say ever increasing on CTV and FAST for us, joining all that together, putting our own data into those environments, trying to work at the premium end of it so that we get the yield up and really embracing the technology to do that married with what only we can do best, which is linking directly with a brand, understanding a brand on their agency. In many markets we go brand direct though really understanding what their challenges are and what stories they've got to tell. And then coming up with this multi-platform strategy that can include programmatic maybe at the mid funnel or the performance end, but also linking it to a full multi-platform strategy, which may include CTV, fast Web and tv. And actually 80% of our direct campaigns include all of those platforms and include that social piece. And I think the reason why I've sort of spoken about social in is I think people often wonder about how we can utilize it to make money, but actually it's a really important part of our business where we're kind of using the best of what programmatic can offer, the best of what social can offer and then the best of storytelling.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:27):

Yeah, perhaps I would love to hear about a brand that perhaps you guys have been working with and how you are really measuring that success. I'm curious if any platform or audience perhaps outperformed your expectations.

Rob Bradley (08:43):

Sure. Well, I spoke about linking CNN storytelling that could have social impact in some way or drive conversations or change opinions. And that is when we have a really strong partnership with the brand, that's what we do for them. Really it's about how can we change perhaps a view or input a view into someone's mind that they may not have had about a brand based on facts or something that brand is really genuinely doing to try and make the world a better place beyond just perhaps selling a product. So CNN Embarks on a really bold program with Samsung recently, it was exactly a campaign that I said truly multi-platform include tv, digital, social, so use launchpad for off platform distribution and it really highlighted how Samsung technologies are being used to make the world a better place. Everything from the way they t trawl the ocean to dig up fishing nets and some of those fishing net parts are used in their mobile phones to a great story around how their TVs add access for the heart of hearing where we had a gentleman that was on stage with Beyonce who was doing sign language while she was performing, who went viral because he's an incredible character that really can literally make you hear the song using his hands.

(09:54):

It's amazing with his

Ilyse Liffreing (09:55):

Movements

Rob Bradley (09:55):

And he uses a Samsung TV at home, he feels it gives him what he needs considering that his hard of hearing challenges. So all those stories, it does involve a product, but really it's about a person, a human led story. We know that human led stories cut through a cluttered internet more particularly if they have some sort of emotional response that they offer, I can make you sad, happy, and ultimately the goal was to shift opinions about that brand. So looking at the data that we have, but 81% agreed that seeing the branded content that Samsung made made them think they were a more socially responsible company. 86% agreed that the branded content salt told them something about Samsung they didn't know before. And 84% agreed that branded content showed the value of Samsung as being more attention grabbing. So there's those hearts and minds movements that these campaigns at the brand's level kind of goals that they have. And that's really what we did with this campaign.

Damian Fowler (10:53):

That was great. Yeah, that's an interesting convergence of values and emotion and storytelling, but if we could sort of maybe look at some of the takeaways from the Launch Bank campaign and then get bigger from there. How did you measure success? I know you just mentioned some metrics right there for Samsung specifically, but did any platform or audience outperform your expectations?

Rob Bradley (11:19):

Yeah, I think we try to be platform agnostic somewhat when it comes to what the campaign goals are. So take within social, if the campaign of course is reaching consumers, we're more likely to use meta talk environments, YouTube, however of course if the campaign is more skew towards as a business audience, LinkedIn is more increasingly used. So it's not necessarily that one platform surprises because we'd set up the campaign at the start to meet those specific goals of that campaign. And within Samsung of course this was a consumer campaign, so those consumer platforms to reach and actually for that, TikTok did provide, and I think it was one of the first times that they'd ever worked with TikTok with a media owner and they trusted us because of the relationship that we have to deliver that campaign on TikTok. So that did have for one of the first times we've used it, a really important play within our overall multi-platform strategy.

Damian Fowler (12:15):

You mentioned insight-led sales, that means you have a good view of audience segments. Could you talk a little bit more about that and how you think about audience and how you break it down? And then the second part of that I guess is was there any unexpected reaction or behavior response from campaigns from these different areas of viewership?

Rob Bradley (12:39):

Yeah, I think we've had to get really sophisticated with understanding audiences and I'm linking who our audiences with our content. It touches on something I was talking about previously when it comes to the changes around news and news avoidance and brand safety and brand suitability. But that doesn't mean that all politics content should be blocked, for example. So I suppose there's the traditional side that we have of understanding our audiences of, okay, this is someone that's interested in reading a lot of business articles around finance. And then we can layer in personal identifying data where we have it and define and target that audience. But now we also add a layer in, we built a tool called sam, which is a sentiment analysis moderator, which also now kicks out a positive and negative sentiment score on our articles. So we know that if an article is about a scientific breakthrough, for example, that's a cure for a disease that may have innovation, technology may be very positive, but actually the word disease might have been blocked if you're using a more blunt keyword list. So with our clients, they trust us to use SAM to use more positive and negative targets. So we layer the kind of contextual element as well as the data element, and that runs on pretty much every single one of our direct campaigns.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:56):

Very cool. It sounds like a use of AI right there, if I'm not mistaken.

Rob Bradley (14:00):

It's an interesting one because we've had it for about five years and it is AI is machine learning and the reason we built it is because it ultimately unlocks more impressions than perhaps some of the off the shelf tools do.

Ilyse Liffreing (14:11):

Very true. Because also you're not just selling content to, you're selling a sustainable digital business. Would you say is your North Star when balancing that audience trust with monetization being CNN is such as a storied publication and company with multiple digital touch points?

Rob Bradley (14:38):

Yeah, good question. I mean, first of all, CNN's a global brand that's built on trust. We have some of the world's greatest journalists here and in a world that's growing in myth and disinformation is vital for society that they can rely on a trusted voice and reputable news organizations like CN. So I suppose our North Star is to of course lead with that trust but then make sure that we're essential for customers every day. So there's this sort of trust, but then there's also a premium environment and experience and that kind of goes hand in hand with advertisers going back to that storytelling piece or even putting an ad in an environment that has news. Brands want to be in a trusted place, so we really need to make sure that we're premium and that we're trusted first and foremost. But then also we need to embrace new ways of driving revenue.

(15:29):

We can't just rely on advertising, which is why we're embracing this direct-to-consumer business model to succeed over long-term. Linear in TV is still really, really important as of course is web, but exploring new digital monetization models that complement all those revenue streams are really important. So look fast is one of them, and CTV audio is one of them. We have CNN underscored in the us, which is kind of product recommendations and review sites, so e-commerce and of course as mentioned, the subs business, this direct to consumer business we're building. So we have to kind disrupt ourselves and embrace that to build a sustainable future.

Damian Fowler (16:10):

Rob, your role is you work for CNN International. So you look at the big picture obviously, and this is about a big picture question here, it's global, but it's also personal. So how do you think about that interaction, building digital products and content that both may be relevant at scale but also have to have local impact?

Rob Bradley (16:31):

I'll give you a kind of recent example. We announced plans to launch some CNM weather as our first standalone digital lifestyle product very recently, the upfront over in the us. So it is about expanding our content beyond news. As I mentioned, we already have travel, business style and tech and all of these different areas, but essentially builds on what we're good at, which is best in class live coverage of what's happening. Immense resources dedicated on the ground locally in this instance can of course be weather reporting and visual storytelling around weather. It's a way for CNN to bring these major weather events. So it may happen locally, so relevant information locally, but also huge interest globally. Think about the LA fires as a mass audience around the world, but also allows just simultaneously up to date weather forecast to help consumers get up to speed of what's going on there each day. And that's just a good example of something we've launched recently that has that both local, national and global relevance.

Damian Fowler (17:29):

I think it's always been a staple of good local news. Talking about right here in the US right now, there's some challenges to public broadcasting and one of the things that they have are these local stations that inform people about local weather events and that's crucial, especially in the tornado belt for instance. So I think weather obviously is key. And it's interesting to hear you say that obviously this is a fast moving space, the digital commercial space. As you look ahead, what are the biggest opportunities you see for CNN to lead here in this space? I guess AI is one of those things, immersive content. What else are you thinking about?

Rob Bradley (18:10):

Well, the CNN synonymous with video led journalism. Ultimately we're a video company that started on cable and is now in all these platforms that are ever expanding. But really we obviously want to continue and focus on that legacy if you like. So expanding our current subscription offering in the fall, as you guys say over there, autumn, as we say across the pond in the uk, essentially the launch of a new streaming product that's due ultimately in the US then but will soon be rolled out internationally as well. Providing a individual one stop place where audiences can access our journalism, our original programming, they can choose from live channels, catch up on features, a video on demand, and it'll be on all platforms from mobile apps, CTV and the.com websites. And it's going to be part of a new subscription, which is called CNN's All Access subscription.

(19:01):

So an example of embracing streaming video led alongside the other channels. And of course embracing the fact that our audience exists on mobile vertical video has been a huge investment for us. It's what consumers want, we understand their behavioral patterns. So we've basically grown our vertical video capabilities across our platforms and will be a key pillar as we continue. I also think it's about fostering direct relationships with audience, which is something that social does really well. Actually. We've already established some of these areas. Take Anderson Cooper's All there is podcast, which is fantastic, it's around grief, but literally has led to thousands of voice notes and interactions. Ranson himself so much that he built. And we built an online grief community, which essentially is where you can hear voices and other stories of people respond to comments and stories of their own grief and there's a really engaged community around that. And then of course podcasts and audio exists in audio, but more and more they're being recorded. And actually if you look at all areas podcast as well as the assignment of Cornish and Chasing Life of Doug, Sanjay Gupta, they're all video now as well and available there. So I think you're going to see news brands like seeing and leaning into this kind of personality led kind of opportunities as well.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:18):

Yeah, that's really exciting. The streaming space has exploded, obviously. And I'm curious how CNN All Access is going to differentiate itself enough or stand on its own in order to get those subscribers.

Rob Bradley (20:38):

Yeah, it's not necessarily a part I manage directly to be honest, to be honest with you, but I say CNN, it goes into another something we spoke about previously, which is around the history of the brand, the legacy of the brand, the power of a brand, right? No one can deny that CNN is a brand that doesn't touch all corners of the world and it's still highly, highly relevant. And it's funny, when you look at sometimes when you use the word a legacy brand or traditional media, it's almost used in some sort of negative connotation. Stay with me. You asked me a question, I'm going in a different direction. But sometimes it's used in this kind of negative connotation. But if you look at other areas like Luxury UMES or Rolex Legacy has a value. Auto Rolls Royce technology, I would say even like IBM or Apple, even their legacy is important because that brand stands for something as it does for CNN.

(21:42):

So those brands also innovate and make sure they're relevant for today. And I'd say streaming is just an example as well as podcasts as well as what we're doing. Launching the weather app is an example of CNN disrupting itself, making sure it's relevant today, but as well, not giving up on that legacy of who we are because that brand stands for something. So how are we going to stand out is having some of the best journalists in the world having one of the biggest brands in the world and making sure that what we do is authentic, fact-driven and trust base.

Damian Fowler (22:15):

That's great. So we've got a few quick questions here to hit you with to close this out. So alright. First off, what brand or publisher is doing something unexpected that you admire?

Rob Bradley (22:30):

Arnold Schwarzenegger's Pump Club. What love that You should have seen my comms team face when I said I was going to say that he's a yes. Firstly, I know this is an audio recording or a video recording, I'm not, if you can see me, I'm not someone that is a bodybuilder, but I do really, oh, I dunno. I do really like Arnold Sch and actually his pump club. I use it for the emailers, but there is a podcast as well. He is got an emailer, he's utilizing an ever-growing medium, let's say, from sending out email news. He uses his personal brand to form a relationship with an audience, his heritage in fitness, the rise of emails, as I said. And he shares really valuable information to a defined audience. It's really fact driven, it's really science driven today, which proves we do read it. He was reading, basically sharing a study on potassium and the benefits of increasing your potassium intake and how it can have on the heart. So he's got lots of links to real studies. The commercial model does mean he's trying to sell you a few things along the way as well. But I find it interesting and I think it's a great use of someone using all these tools that are available today to connect with an audience.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:52):

Yeah, that's a fun one. I like that.

Rob Bradley (23:54):

I love that there's one

Damian Fowler (23:54):

Guy who knows how to connect to an audience. It's Arnie.

Rob Bradley (23:57):

Yeah. And do you know what? I saw him in New York last time I was there and he was sitting two meters away from me for at least two hours. And I didn't have the guts to say hello, but I was happy just being in Arnie's presence.

Ilyse Liffreing (24:10):

Yeah, amazing. If you could fast forward five years, what would you want CNN's digital presence to feel like to a 25-year-old?

Rob Bradley (24:23):

I mean, look super relevant, both from a personal point of view to also giving that individual information they need to know or should know about what's happening in the world. I think you don't want it too personal so that people are in their record chambers that say it should be video led. And of course it should be accessible on the platforms that that person wants. It should be ubiquitous, but it also should be predominantly on owned and operated platforms. It's important that we continue to invest in the core. And I know we spoke about social work, important to invest in the course, it should be owned and operated platforms that CNN has predominantly.

Damian Fowler (24:59):

And finally, late night breaking news alerts or morning deep dive newsletters. What's your personal preference or should we say news ritual?

Rob Bradley (25:10):

It sounds like a question as a news kind of person I should think about all the time, but I've realized, I go so deep in the mornings. I'm like within 15 minutes I've checked obviously CNN, but I've probably checked BBC, the Guardian New York Times. I check Fox News to see how they're approaching a story and then I'll go into podcasts on the way to work and then I'll probably check things like The Economist and things like that to go deeper as I've got more time. So I kind of utilize everything and I go pretty deep, but it probably tails off towards the end of the day. I think I've had enough by the evening, and that's more when I want to chill out of a glass of wine and watch a movie. I have some nice food.

Damian Fowler (25:52):

So, what was your what take, what was your big impression from that conversation with Rob?

Ilyse Liffreing (25:59):

Yeah, my big impression was really how, and this isn't surprising from CNN, but how they lead with storytelling when it comes to their managed brand campaigns. I love the example that he gave was Samsung who found when they managed their campaign across multiple digital touchpoints, they found that the audience 86% agreed that branded content told them something new about Samsung that they didn't know before. And that's really powerful when you're a brand like Samsung.

Damian Fowler (26:34):

Yeah, I thought that was very telling and I think even more the idea that CNN is really looking at and audience reaction, not just in terms of its own content, but in terms of the branded content. I thought that was also very interesting when we asked him about campaigns that have kind of caught them by surprise. And that idea that CNN International had launched a campaign that was targeted specifically a young affluent demographic in the city of London. But actually when they looked at the backend and looked at the measurement, it was hitting beyond London, outside of London to empty nesters whose kids had already left home, which was a surprising insight, but also allowed him to pivot the campaign to target that group. So I think the idea of audience strategy, being nimble with audience strategy and the fact that the digital frame allows a brand like CN International to be much more nimble right now. I guess that's an interesting takeaway for me.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:39):

Also, it helps that you have the breadth of data that a company like Warner Brothers Discovery does have across its multiple properties.

Damian Fowler (27:51):

And that's it for this edition of The Current Podcast.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:54):

This series is produced by Molten Hart. The Current Podcast theme is by Love and caliber. The Current team includes Kat Vesce and Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (28:03):

And remember,

Rob Bradley (28:03):

If you look at other areas like Luxury UMES or Rolex Legacy has a value Auto Rolls-Royce technology. I would say even like IBM or Apple, even their legacy is important because that brand stands for something as it does for CNN.

Damian Fowler (28:21):

I'm Damian

Ilyse Liffreing (28:21):

And I'm Ilyse, and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler (00:00):

I'm Damian Fowler

Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing,

Damian Fowler (00:02):

And welcome to this edition of The Current Podcast.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):

This week we're thrilled to be joined by Melissa McLeanas, Vice President of Global Media Licensing and Entertainment at Chuck E. Cheese.

Damian Fowler (00:18):

For people who grew up in the us, Chuck E. Cheese means childhood birthday parties. It's long been a go-to destination for pizza games and the giant mouse that knows every kid's name.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:29):

In short, it's a pop culture icon with over 500 worldwide venues. But under Melissa's leadership, the brand is leveling up by launching the CEC Media Network in partnership with programmatic platform future. Today,

Damian Fowler (00:42):

It's a big move that signals a shift from just a physical play space to a full on entertainment platform, think digital storytelling in store screens, branded content and advertising that actually fits into the family experience.

Ilyse Liffreing (00:57):

We're going to jump in and talk about why in venue media might just be the next big driver of customer loyalty and growth.

Damian Fowler (01:07):

Chuck E. Cheese is such a nostalgic brand, especially in the United States, but here you are launching a full media network, which is a kind of big new chapter for you. Can you walk us through the vision and the strategy behind the CEC Media network and what is bringing it to life?

Melissa McLeanas (01:26):

Absolutely. First of all, thank you so much for having me. It is an incredibly exciting time at CEC Entertainment. Then Chuck Cheese, I would say it's a bold new chapter for the company and the Media network is really just a piece of that. The brand has been going through an incredible transformation over the last few years, and really at the heart of that is the vision to establish this brand as a global leader in entertainment. Now, I say that, but it's really reestablished the brand in entertainment. Chuck E. Cheese was born in entertainment. I don't know if you know, but the E in Chuck E. Cheese stands for entertainment. And really when you think back to where we started, we were a leader and really established the category of EAT entertainment. And as that space has evolved and family entertainment centers have really taken that center stage, we've continued to be a leader and an innovator in that space.

(02:14):

But a few years ago, I would say we probably hit a wall and it was a little bit tired. The bones were good as they would say, but it was really time for a reset and bringing a new leadership team to the forefront with a new background and experience in entertainment. We established several different strategic objectives, one of them being the division that I lead, and that's media licensing and entertainment. So really very simply put, the mission is to really drive incremental value and revenue for the company in a new way. So all US locations, we've invested over 350 million back into the business, a capital investment, and I'm happy to say that right now at this point we've completed the US all US locations, so just under 500, no small feat, and we're about to finish our own Canada locations as well. And what this looks like is cosmetically update to the interior and the exterior, a revamp of menu, all new games, and that entertainment package now features a large video wall. And then of course our character program.

Damian Fowler (03:16):

That's a lot right there. It's almost like you've had a complete perception shift in terms of what you're doing. It sounds like you are a channel in and of your own right and media channel. You mentioned out of home, but there's also CTV on all those points. This is a kind of multistream content strategy. And could you just talk a little bit more about how that will ultimately reach all of these consumers and how it'll deepen engagement, I guess, for families who go to all these different venues in the US and around the world?

Melissa McLeanas (03:50):

So yeah, that's a great point. So I guess let me step back and actually talk about what that content looks like. Within our fund centers, we have entertainment programming, let's call it a 90 minute loop, and it consists primarily of entertainment, content, family friendly entertainment content. Of all these initiatives, obviously the first and foremost most important thing for us is to make sure that we're delivering an amazing experience for our guests. And so that content must do that. It has to be relevant for our families, it has to be engaging, and it really has to convey everything that our brand stands for. So that's a mix of our own original content. So I talked about that, the library. And so we continue to create new content and then we pull from our library of content. So we really look for things that are a little young, but it has to be appealing to an older guest.

(04:37):

At the same time, there can be aspirational content, so maybe some of our 10 year olds and 12 year olds are there with younger siblings, and then you got your parents. So there's a lot of opportunity there. The other thing that digital screens in this update to programming does is it allows us to do regular seasonal updates. And I think that's also really important, especially as we're growing programs like our membership program, our past program, we've got some repeat visitation, we're consistently updating and keeping that fresh throughout the year. Now as part of that, there's a lot of partner opportunities. And so for our entertainment partners, like I said, you can get the latest clips from your newest release for some of the newer content creators. We've got an active captive audience sitting right there paying attention to those screens, and we've created an environment where they're tuning into those screens. And so bringing our characters, since we do all of that content ourselves and working with other content creators to create some co-branded content, there's a lot of different ways for partners to really be a part of that entertainment experience.

Ilyse Liffreing (05:38):

Now I know it's early days too, but perhaps you can talk about some of those partnerships that you have going on with needy buyers and national advertisers and then how important the media network is to Chuck E. Cheese's broader business evolution.

Melissa McLeanas (05:54):

Absolutely. I'll actually take that moment to do a quick and talk more specifically on the advertising opportunity. I think a lot of what we're doing with the content and the characters is incredibly exciting, but it's also a really exciting time in the digital out of home and out of home space. So if you look at other venue operators and retailers, they're debuting these owned media networks. And so we've really took a page out of their book and we said, Hey, we've got this updated experience, we have this traffic. How do we really bring this to partners in a big way? And so on the, I would say the tech solutions side, we've had some really strong relationships with Panasonic so that we've got media players in advertising solutions that are going to support the various types of advertisers locally, regionally, nationally. And then we most recently have a relationship with Vista Media, so we were able to integrate their supply side platform directly into that CMS.

(06:44):

So that gives us access to a wide array of advertisers, and they're coming straight through programmatic, so turnkey solution for those who are buying programmatic space. So we're seeing a lot of advertisers come through there. And then we've got some more strategic relationships in the entertainment space. Kids BOP is one of those. They've been a partner for many, many years. And in addition to some of the entertainment content, they've really leveraged these screens to advertise tours to localize and talk specifically to upcoming tours at a specific venue ahead of that. We've worked with the Harlem Globetrotters to do the same, and then we have a various CPG toy, again, family appropriate, parent appropriate that are really taking advantage of those screens. And then of course we're talking out of home, but I don't want to forget too that we also announced a partnership with Future Today.

(07:33):

And so in addition to having this opportunity around content in our venues, we also have this content online. So we've had a lot of this on YouTube and YouTube kids. We actually started putting our content there in 2012 and have been doing so in a more meaningful way in the past few years. And with this new relationship with Future Today, a leader in the CTV space, not only are we getting content on their Happy Kids channel and their network alongside the co melons and the Paw trolls, but in the future we're working towards launching our own streaming network. So Chuck E. Cheese branded Fast Channel, so ad supported, but again, leaning into the content and the IP and engaging those guests and those fans and then offering that opportunity to brand safe and family friendly advertisers.

Ilyse Liffreing (08:17):

I know Chuck E. Cheese has traditionally been mostly about the physical experience before all of this. I remember going there as a kid, my dad brought us there all the time growing up, and obviously that part of the business is not dying down at all. I'm curious how many screens you have at each of the 500 plus venues that will be part of this network.

Melissa McLeanas (08:41):

So every location has a video wall, and that's going to be the focal point of when you walk into Chuck E. Cheese and it's incredibly important. You really can see that almost anywhere in most locations. Every one of our locations is unique, they're like children. They vary in size and layout, but really that video wall is huge. And then screens and the number of screens is going to depend on that layout and how big the location is. So it can be anywhere from six to 15 to 18 in some of our larger locations. So it's done strategically to make sure that there's visibility no matter where you are. And then audio isn't tied to those screens, so audio is just piped uniformly throughout the entire locations.

Ilyse Liffreing (09:21):

Besides those giant screens, are there any other ways you guys are blending that physical presence within the new digital touchpoints that you're bringing?

Melissa McLeanas (09:30):

So like I said, the character program is, I mean the epitome of the live physical experience. And so we really try to find a balance between how we take the digital parts of our brand and our entertainment and balance that with the interactive and the physical. So when the character, when Chucky comes out, whether it be for a birthday or for a dance, there's also supporting content on the screen that really help families follow along, be able to follow and interact with their parents and their friends and all of that. So we want to make sure it's on an interactive dance floor. So there's a lot of different ways to bring that to life. We also just recently launched a STEAM program, and so that is rooted in the media that you see on those screens, but then as part of that curriculum, those kids go off into the game rooms and they're playing with the games and they're doing all the different tasks that they've learned.

(10:21):

We did that in partnership with stem.org and then just digitally throughout the locations, our menu boards are all digital now. We've done some tremendous and deep upgrades in terms of innovation and technology, so no more tickets, which some people get sad about because that visual of having that bucket of tickets feels so iconic. But etickets are far more efficient for families that are trying to get through the price counter and out the door. So we've got Etic, we've got Play Pass, no more tokens, the menu boards, the games. We're really leaning into digital. It makes us more efficient when we need to make changes. We think about testing menu items in certain local and regional rollouts that's all supported digitally. It's far easier to make those updates on the backside than it is to roll out new point of sale and printed materials. And so we're looking for those digital opportunities throughout

Ilyse Liffreing (11:11):

Life. Things are certainly changing.

Damian Fowler (11:12):

They really are. Let's talk a little bit about some of the takeaways from all of these innovations. Now, let's say you're a family, you've been exposed to the video wall and the games room and you go home. How is this exposure being measured across the network, if you like?

Melissa McLeanas (11:28):

Yes, feedback is everything. We actually have a really active fan base and we do have guests who are reaching out to give us feedback. We have an in-house insights team and we have regular surveys, and then they're asking questions across every element of Chuck E. Cheese because we want to make sure that we're understanding as we update and introduce new exactly what's working, what's not and what can be better and happy to, the screens in the entertainment continues to have a really positive score. A very high guest are seeing it, they're tuning in and they love the entertainment. And so we'll continue to watch that. And when it comes to the advertising campaigns, from a measurement perspective, we're working with companies like Place their AI and an IMP purview to measure the impressions through our door as well as impressions against our screens, both being well-recognized auditors, if you will, in that space.

(12:20):

We don't sell tickets, so that's important to make sure that when we do these campaigns we can accurately say this is how many folks we're actually exposed to those screens. And then as we continue to work with our partners, and then I think this is something you'll see, especially in the digital out of home space, it's constantly evolving. And so for us it's really important to work with partners on their campaigns and understand those KPIs because we are a unique platform and the guests are engaging with these screens maybe differently than they might and screens out in a different venue. And so we want to make sure that the content that we're delivering, one, again, great guest experience and it's appropriate for our families, but two, it's achieving what our partners are looking to do with these campaigns.

Ilyse Liffreing (13:04):

So you've spoken about how Chuck E. Cheese as a brand spans generations. How do you ensure that the content and messaging then stay relevant to today's kids while still honoring the brand's legacy from the past?

Melissa McLeanas (13:18):

It's an amazing gift to have a brand and a character that has touched almost five decades, and that comes with great responsibility first and foremost, at the heart of what we are still, where a kid can be a kid. So as we continue to innovate and evolve for these families, we never lose sight of that. We are a kid first space. So while our content could be developed with co-viewing in mind and there's some Easter eggs that maybe parents will understand, but it's just fun silly songs for kids, we want to make sure that kids still own their space. Chuck E. Cheese is a place for kids. Our parents obviously need to enjoy their space too. And so in addition to how that content comes to life within our fund centers, we take a lot of opportunity to find extensions outside our four walls that pay homage to the rich legacy that this brand has.

(14:11):

So licensing is an important part of the strategic objective of growing this brand and increasing its value and entertainment. And so we've really grown our license program over the past five years. We've got just over 35 licensees and we've been able to really segment our brand across these decades and offer a classic Chuckie for those who know the OG seventies, eighties, Chuckie with the bowler hat. And we've got our retro Chuckie who's skater and he's the nineties, two thousands, and we offer that up to teen and young adult audiences in various spaces that make sense. We've done a few other things like we've saved our animatronics and in a few different locations, we started that in Northridge, California, wildly successful, lots of feedback there. And so we were able to extend that to four additional stores. And so those animatronics are going to live in those locations.

(15:02):

They're still fully remodeled, they're still on the media network, they still have all the new, but for fans that want to pilgrimage to see the original band in that format, those are available and we continue to look for opportunities like that. We've announced Chuck Arcade, it's an arcade space that's really geared towards Martine and adult, and there's some really fun touch points. Again, paying ho much to the legacy. And so we want to make sure that, again, our brand is a brand and we're going to take care of those kids and those families, but there's a lot of opportunity to really extend that and talk to the other generations of fans.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:36):

I certainly appreciate that. I remember Skater, Chuckie, myself, nineties

Melissa McLeanas (15:41):

Chucky, everybody has their Chuckie.

Ilyse Liffreing (15:42):

Oh yeah. I know it's early days still, but how has the feedback been so far from the brands that you guys are starting to approach about the network? Is there excitement, interest?

Melissa McLeanas (15:56):

I think a takeaway that is for brands and partners and even a lot of our guests is because just as you said, everyone has their Chuck E. Cheese and this is a brand that has such incredible awareness and strong attachment to a very specific memory and time of when you had your Chuck E. Cheese experience. As we're going through this remodel and introducing the median network, it's a bit of a surprise when they actually go in and they're like, oh my goodness, this is not the Chuck E. Cheese that I used to know. And we hear it from guests and it's why we really lean into reopening events when we remodel a location and then really make a splash in the local community. And I'm hearing that a lot from partners. It's incredibly positive once they see how their brand is coming to life on these screens and we're hosting lunch and learns with agencies, you have to see it to get it because that memory is so strong in so many people and we're doing things so differently. And so it's been really positive and it's been exciting, but it definitely is. It's a space where you've really got to lean in and say, oh, wait a second. You're right. This is incredible.

Damian Fowler (17:06):

We seem to be in a sort of almost, you mentioned the ip, but we seem to be in a bit of a golden age as it were, of brand storytelling and more and more brands leaning into sort of that owned media channel to tell their stories. How do you see this whole media network fitting into that general trend

Melissa McLeanas (17:23):

From a brand storytelling perspective? It's funny. We always make this differentiation. Our characters are part of our experience. We never look at them to tell the experience. And so as we debut all of these new channels for our content and open up to a larger audience, we have the opportunity to really dive into these characters, their personalities and invest in telling their story and in a deeper way. And so we've got so much content, but there's so many new formats that we are excited about long form formats, animation, publishing, and so much of that can be supported and come to life on these channels. But when we think about a storytelling opportunity from a character perspective, there's a great path forward to really get these beloved characters out there and to continue to build their world, their ecosystem, and not just in content. How do we take them outside the four walls? How do we create more experiences? We've taken the band out on tour, how do we do that in a bigger way? And I think these channels and this content is the beginning of a much bigger journey for the characters.

Damian Fowler (18:31):

Yeah, I imagine. Is there a movie in the works?

Melissa McLeanas (18:36):

No comment. No. In all serious, that's where we're going. That's where we're thinking for these characters. And so while nothing has been announced, I think we've been fairly vocal in the fact that that is what we would like to do and how we are making decisions on content and bringing on partners.

Ilyse Liffreing (18:55):

It's amazing. Looking even further ahead, if the movie doesn't happen, if the movie does happen

Melissa McLeanas (19:03):

When the movie happens,

Ilyse Liffreing (19:03):

When it happens,

Melissa McLeanas (19:04):

Exactly when the movie

Ilyse Liffreing (19:06):

Happens, I like it. It happens. What else do you see in terms of innovation, whether it's maybe gamified content, augmented reality, personalized experiences, is there anything else that you guys are hoping in the near future to evolve the Chuck E T's experience?

Melissa McLeanas (19:26):

Gaming is in our DNA. And so I mean we are the largest arcade operator in the world. We buy thousands and thousands of games. We've got 2 billion game plays a year. And so we're always looking and talking to different companies about how we can continue to innovate in that space. And so that's always on our radar. You've seen a change in even some of the games that have come through our doors, things like ar, you need to make sure that it's safe for our young kids, but we're always having those conversations and now that we've got more media driven experiences, there is opportunity to take that to the screens. And with the dance floor personalization, if you think about birthday and how important that is to our brand, personalization is something that we're always looking to do in a bigger way. So from tiering and offering different options to our parents who are booking parties, to giving something personal just to remind or say happy birthday to the kids and how we can do that with our characters and at scale is something that is starting to get more exciting as this technology evolves.

Ilyse Liffreing (20:34):

Amazing. Let's go into some of rapid fire questions now, some quick fun ones for you. So the first one here is actually about your background. You've held roles across licensing, entertainment and media. What would be one lesson from building these brand partnerships that served you especially well?

Melissa McLeanas (20:55):

Partnerships can be incredibly powerful and they can serve so many purposes. And I think right now in the industry, you're hearing the word collaboration a lot. And it's refreshing because I also think that if you look back a few decades, it was very rigid of this is the partnership, I need X, you get X, this is how we do it or we don't do it. And I think the openness and the receptiveness across all industries, entertainment, licensing, media of building something that is going to benefit both parties in a bigger way has really changed how a lot of these partnerships have come to life. And for us, and in this journey that we've been in, they've really been a huge benefit to us. And one telling our story, aligning with some of these best in class entertainment brands and putting Chuck E. Cheese in a conversation that frankly people weren't expecting. And as you said, I have been very fortunate to have worked with some amazing partners across my career and bring some of these different programs to life and building them around Chuck E. Cheese has been really fun.

Damian Fowler (22:02):

What other family or entertainment brand is doing something truly innovative in the media space that inspires you?

Melissa McLeanas (22:10):

So I'm a theme park nerd, admittedly because of my background, and this almost feels like a cop out, but it has been really exciting to watch Universal grow as a behemoth in this space and even their marketing and from a grassroots perspective of how they've been able to engage their fan base. It's just fun and it's exciting to watch someone in that space grow as they have. But all that said, what I think is even cooler in location-based entertainment is these snackable moments that are kind of emerging outside of these giant theme parks. I think in the beginning it was always like that can only happen if you're paying a high ticket price to go to a Universal or Disney. And now so many of the IP holders and the brands are bringing these really cool experiences to life outside of that, whether it be a mobile tour or a retail experience or maze that's themed for the season. And I think that's really elevating the space and it's giving a lot of us opportunity to activate in these ways that doesn't require a giant theme park build around it. And so I think that the location based entertainment and experiential space in general has been growing and being more creative over the past few years.

Ilyse Liffreing (23:22):

Do you have a favorite moment from launching the CEC Media network?

Melissa McLeanas (23:27):

I think something that I could really call out is the feedback from our operators. So when you work for a company that is really the life force is your field and your cast members and your operators on the ground. We've got some cast members and some managers that have been with us for over 30 years and they know this brand and they've been delivering this amazing experience and change is hard. So when this started testing in markets and we got not only good feedback, but outwardly positive feedback and managers were approaching me like, you know what you could do? I'm like, this is fantastic because not only are we updating the entertainment experience, we're delivering on all these new objectives, but we're bringing value to the team that's operating and they see this great opportunity to talk to their guests and to be more efficient. And so that was very satisfying and it made it all the better because they really are the ones that are doing the work on the ground and making sure that this brand is coming to the life in the best of ways.

Damian Fowler (24:27):

On that point, was there a personal moment that stands out that you've witnessed where the brand genuinely sort of moved you or surprised you in how it was being received?

Melissa McLeanas (24:38):

So yes, I mentioned this summer concert series, and I'll give you a little bit of context. So during the pandemic, we had to close a lot of locations and as we started to open them, we made the decision to keep Chucky outside the fun centers to our families. That message was that he was recording an album and we didn't realize that he was going to have to record a box set in the end, but when we did get to a place where we were getting comfortable to bring him back to our guests and it wasn't everywhere, we were trying to think of how best to do that. And again, this is still early for me and in my role at Chuck E. Cheese. And so we decided to, for the first time ever, create a fully choreographed scripted show, 30 minute show with our characters, took 'em out on the road, all free concerts, open air outside public parks so all guests could attend no matter where we were in the world in terms of what those restrictions looked like.

(25:33):

And it was just an amazing team building event. So it's all new music, upbeat, fun, I still have it on my playlist, but we have our birthday song as part of this concert and we do it under the guise of Does anyone have a birthday this year? Which is of course everyone. And if you're familiar with the Chuck E. Cheese birthday song, it's not just Happy Birthday, it's very specific to Chuck E. Cheese. And as it started, every single guest was up and singing along to the lyrics and dancing the food truck vendors, the parents, everybody knew this song. And from a moment that was needed, it was incredible. But from a brand perspective, that's really powerful and that's really something special. And so that really stood out in my mind of like, wow, this is something, we really got something. So that would definitely be it. And if you don't know the birthday song,

Ilyse Liffreing (26:25):

I do know we can practice it after do birthday song.

Damian Fowler (26:28):

We should play this podcast out with a birthday song soon.

Ilyse Liffreing (26:30):

Yes, we should.

Damian Fowler (26:32):

Well, first off, Melissa was so enthusiastic about this new brand, this new entertainment network that the company's launching. I almost couldn't keep up with the amount of innovation the brand is putting out.

Ilyse Liffreing (26:45):

So much, so much has happen is

Damian Fowler (26:45):

Incredible. But I feel like there were a couple of bits there where she almost gave us some news. She talked about Chuck E. Cheese streaming platform potentially on the horizon, and then we sort of joked about this, but Chuck E. Cheese movie. But in an era where IP is everything and we're thinking of Barbie, why not?

Ilyse Liffreing (27:05):

Yeah, no, there's so much value in it for other advertisers too, when they're building this media network across their 500 plus venues in the US and internationally, that's a lot of screens and advertisers want to be with kids and with their parents especially.

Damian Fowler (27:24):

Another thought that was interesting to me was the way she talked with the way Melissa talked about the digital out of home and Chuckie, she's venues being almost an extension of that channel that is on the up and up really, and especially when it comes to programmatic media. So that was also something that I found intriguing.

Ilyse Liffreing (27:44):

It's also nice to know that they're doing a good job of blending their physical footprint with the digital and keeping everything we like about Chuck E. Cheese still alive in some way. Even those who remember the brand from the seventies, eighties, nineties, check that mouse is still there.

Damian Fowler (28:05):

Yeah, well, I can't say I grew up with it, but I know you did. So it's reassuring that that nostalgia is still alive.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:11):

And maybe for my birthday next year, are you going to invite me? Yes, Damian, you're invited. Thanks. And that's

Damian Fowler (28:18):

It for this edition of the current podcast.

Ilyse Liffreing (28:21):

This series is produced by Molton Hart. The current podcasts theme is by Love and caliber. The current team includes Kat Vesce and Sydney Cairns.

Damian Fowler (28:29):

And remember,

Melissa McLeanas (28:30):

Our characters are part of our experience. We never look at them to tell the experience. I'm Damian and I'm my, we'll

Ilyse Liffreing (28:38):

See you.

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