Everything starts with the consumer

4 November, 2009 | Written by edward boches 0 Comments

Picture 3In a recent interview at Boards 2009, R/GA’s Bob Greenberg gently accuses agencies of selling what they do, rather than doing what will sell to consumers.

“A lot of agencies aren’t focused on the consumer and that’s a problem if you look at consumer behavior.”  Problem?  It’s worse than a problem. Consider the fate of the once great Cliff Freeman and Partners.

Anyway, in this brief video, Bob goes on to remind anyone who’s listening what the younger generation is up to. “They’re working with multiple devices. They can block out advertising at will.” (Obvious. But worth remembering.)

Granted, Bob and friends find every opportunity they can to push their model (platforms rather than campaigns) as the ultimate solution for the digital age. And even as Bob compliments his analog competitors, he never misses the chance to explain why the R/GA’s approach is the most relevant to where the world is going. (Full disclosure, R/GA is a sister agency of ours in that they’re owned by IPG, which also owns Mullen.)

But Bob is right. Everything an agency does should start with the consumer.  And I don’t mean the insight that tells us how a consumer feels about a brand or a category; that’s just basic planning. Today it’s more important to understand a consumer’s relationship with media and content. Is she a spectator? Socializer? Critic? Content creator? What role does she want to play in the brand experience?  Does she simply want to conduct a transaction? Or is there an opportunity to forge a relationship?

Ask and answer those questions and you’re far less likely to come up with an ad and more likely to conceive a mobile application that offers genuine utility. Or a way to access information about a product while you’re in the middle of shopping. Or a community that connects your prospective customers to your existing customers so they can hear from each other rather than from you. Or a digital platform that becomes as much a part of a brand experience as the products the bear the logo.

As Bob says you’ll have to learn to make those engagements as interesting and entertaining as the best TV spots you’ve ever made, but that’s a different challenge. The first one is to stop selling what you make and start creating stuff you may never have made before if that’s what it takes to engage your prospects and involve your customers. Hint: change up the people in the room. Add a UX person, a developer and a digital media planner to your creative team.

Thoughts? Please share. And if you’re interested, here’s more great Bob Greenberg content.

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Joel Wynne's Avatar
Joel Wynne moderator
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Edward Wish I was there to see this presentation. For a creative industry we have up till now produced widgets. What Bob said holds true: "No more". The multiple platform / campaign" approach and clients no longer willing to accept widgets means the dawning of a new age (and dare I say a golden age) in customer communication. I don't know about you, but I am excited...

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Barry Wacksman's Avatar
Barry Wacksman moderator
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Edward, Nice post, and obviously a hot topic these days. However, R/GA's model isn't just about platforms. The model is called "Platforms + Campaigns". The two need to work hand-in-hand. The value of platforms is that they create owned media channels for brands and drive massive consumer engagement. The value of campaigns is that they build awareness of platforms and drive traffic. When you have a platform and run a campaign on top of it, you maintain the audience once the campaign has ended (if everything is working well), rather than losing the audience until the next campaign comes along. I belive this is what Mullen + R/GA were trying to do together on that little pitch last year... Following Bob's thread about consumers, they obviously adopt a lot of technology platforms (like this blog we are communicating through) and they continue to be exposed to lots of campaigns. The integration of these two behaviors is what's behind Platforms + Campaigns as a model for the digital age. The previous "matching luggage" model started with the campaign and tried to extrude digital engagement that consumers weren't interested in (a television advertising idea has never been a good starting point for a digital platform. That approach never worked). We believe you need to start with the platform and develop the campaign in tandem.

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edward boches's Avatar
edward boches moderator
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Barry: Couldn't agree more and did not mean to mispreseprent R/GA. In fact have come to understand and appreciate R/GA's approach much more in the last year. What R/GA does brilliantly is build the platform that is enduring and stays in people's lives. Campaigns as you say, come and go. Many good ad agencies come up with "big ideas" but only execute them as campaigns. R/GA seems to be known primarily for platforms first and sometimes for campaigns that go with them. My belief is that the best approach for any brand is to have that "big idea" expressed not as a campaign but as a platform (so we're in agreement) first (application, utility, functionality, etc.) and then have the campaign call attention to it,or help express the big idea that the platform delivers on. Historically, ad agencies have been good at big brand ideas and messages; digital shops have been good at platforms, though not necessarily at the driving brand idea. In fact in many cases it's been someone else who came up with the brand idea first. Maybe it doesn't matter who does what, but brands definitely need both.

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David's Avatar
David moderator
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Great post. At the core of it all, there's always ideas. It's the strategy for making them relevant (either in reality or artificially) that has evolved. I tried to demonstrate the importance of this thinking with my portfolio site, moremeyou.com. Thanks again.

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Jeff Shatuck's Avatar
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Bob says some smart things, and while I agree that you have to consider your audience before you speak, The Product Matters. It blows my mind that people in adland today think that USP is an antiquated notion. It's not. Every damn year we try to invent some new way to say the same old same old, but it's all been figured out: 1) Know your product 2) Know your audience (to the best of your ability) 3) Decide on a goal 4) Decide on a strategy for reaching that goal That's it and that's all it will ever be. I would even argue that agencies always follow this, but in this way: 1) Know your product (whatever, it sucks) 2) Know your audience (other agencies) 3) Decide on a goal (awards) 4) Decide on a strategy for reaching that goal (funny, edgy) What a joke. Jeff www.cerebellumblues.com .-= Jeff Shatuck´s last blog ..Can rock and roll be crowdsourced or should you look inside your own head? =-.

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edward boches's Avatar
edward boches moderator
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How come so many people in advertising or sort of in advertising hate advertising? USP is antiquated. Doesn't mean it won't work sometimes, but there's more to it these days. Blasting a message about a USP no matter how creative isn't the recipe. Of course the product (I assume you mean the product that's getting advertised or sold) matters, but no one said it doesn't. Just that smart agencies know that understanding the consumer's control and role matters as much, if not more, than anything. It informs the content an agency creates. And yes, agree that your second list is sometimes evident in the behavior of certain agencies and creatives. But not usually the good ones. Just the wannabes who think that's how to get there.

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Adam Wohl's Avatar
Adam Wohl moderator
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Not that the entire article isn't prudent - it is. And not to take away from Bob's opinions - also right, but this part of the article, when you, Edward, take away from Bob's thoughts: "Everything an agency does should start with the consumer. And I don’t mean the insight that tells us how a consumer feels about a brand or a category; that’s just basic planning. Today it’s more important to understand a consumer’s relationship with media and content. Is she a spectator? Socializer? Critic? Content creator? What role does she want to play in the brand experience? Does she simply want to conduct a transaction? Or is there an opportunity to forge a relationship?" Is dead on. As usual.

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reeegan's Avatar
reeegan moderator
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It is things like this post that make me optimistic about being in this line of business. We're starting to get past the "who does what" conversation that has been going on between agencies of all types and hits at the heart of the question these same people are avoiding. What is it you're going to do???

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  1. Weekly Recap of Mullen bloggers: week of November 2 | mullen.com says:
    November 8, 2009 at 3:17 pm

    [...] Creativity_Unbound, CCO Edward Boches wrote a piece inspired by R/GA’s Bob Greenberg titled “Everything starts with the consumer.” The post [...]