MarkLives.com • Page 104 of 579 • Independent industry news for marketing, advertising & media execs

Only Connect: B2B influencer marketing — a first primer

checklist check list marker courtesy of Pixabay

by Bradley Elliott (@BradElliottSA) How do you go about creating an effective influencer-marketing campaign for a B2B brand? The first step is to fully appreciate the significant differences between business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) marketing.

Love affair vs arranged marriage

Here’s a great analogy that will set these two disciplines apart, and create instant understanding. Think of B2C marketing as a love affair, and B2B as an arranged marriage.

When you are thinking about buying a new pair of jeans, and Levi’s is the brand that’s captured your heart (some people even have the Levi’s brand tattooed on their body), this is an emotional decision. The trigger is emotional, there’s not a lot of logic that goes into the equation, and the transaction is one of immediate gratification. B2B marketing is all about pragmatism and pedigree. Like an arranged marriage, logic plays a really important part in the decision-making process. Typically, an arranged marriage is orchestrated by grandparents or parents, who make choices based on social standing, education, community position, religion, politics and education.

A B2C transaction is typically a quick purchase that only requires a willing buyer and seller. Boom! Cash in till. Deal done. But B2B sales cycles may be lengthy and complex, and may take months or more to complete. This type of marketing is all about building trust and relationships, because a B2B investment can run into millions of rands. Unlike a pair of Levi’s, B2B products are complex and buyers will diligently evaluate the fit, the leadership and team, the cost, service levels, return on investment and more. If the buy is of high-strategic value to an organisation, and millions are going to be spent, you’d better believe that the sales cycle is going to include a lot of scrutiny, and will involved multiple decision-makers.

The B2B context

So how do you successfully use influencer marketing in B2B contexts? You need to think of influence this way: who has the knowledge, respect or market authority to sway complex decision-making? This kind of influencer could be an analyst, researcher, author, educator, expert or industry heavyweight who’s deeply respected for their credibility and/or wisdom. By aligning with this individual, you garner greater trust for your B2B brand, or may be able to use this person to help open doors, draft educational white pieces together, or conduct research that will educate the market about a key issue.

To determine the right approach for your B2B brand, go back to basics and investigate the resonance between your brand and your influencer’s brand. Then investigate how relevant this influencer is to the target you wish to influence. Take time to craft your marketing goals, and to determine what you want to achieve from using an influencer.

There is a huge range of marketing tactics and content marketing that you may employ, but here’s some wisdom from Bernie Borges, the CEO of B2B consultancy, Find and Convert. In an article headlined B2B Influencer Marketing Done the Right Way, he writes that “B2B influencer marketing isn’t about simply showcasing a product; it’s about building relationships with other businesses in your industry and expanding your network. A good influencer marketing strategy is consistent and encourages engagement and interaction.”

Tips

With this nugget firmly tucked into your strategic toolkit, here are some influencer-marketing tactics and content ideas to get you started:

Podcasts: a great vehicle for co-hosting influencers
Research: projects that reveal trends or deep insights, and that are conducted with authoritative co-authors, work well for publicity or getting quick market traction
Brand ambassadors: people who love and use your services or product, and who are trusted and influential, may yield strong brand gains
Similarly, inviting credible influencers to attend, and report on, brand events and conferences may boost your marketing efforts.

#Campaigns: Ballet shaped by real-time data mined from social media

by MarkLives (@marklives) This week we feature insight into the brief, creative idea, production challenges and results of the ongoing “Breaking Ballet” campaign for Joburg Ballet by TBWA\Hunt Lascaris.

View all the #Campaigns at a glance on our #Campaigns Pinterest board!
Watch our #Campaigns playlist on YouTube

Client: Joburg Ballet
Ad agency: TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris
Title: Breaking Ballet

Information supplied by TBWA\Hunt Lascaris

Brief

Joburg Ballet knows that, in order to sell more tickets, it needs to appeal to a younger, more-diverse audience. Despite the company having incorporated more-contemporary, African-inspired works into its repertoire, most millennials still think of ballet as a stale, old-fashioned dance form. Joburg Ballet approached TBWA\Hunt Lascaris to help change this perception and encourage young South Africans to consider ballet as a viable form of entertainment. The agency thus needed to demonstrate that ballet can tell stories about anything, that it can be contemporary and relevant, and that it’s certainly no boring relic of the past.

Creative summary

#BreakingBallet is an ongoing series of bite-size ballets inspired by the biggest stories online. These take the form of short films, which are seeded straight back into trending conversations on social media. The entire process — from identifying the trigger and briefing the dancers to producing the film and seeding it back into the conversation — takes 3–5 days. This ensures that the stories are still highly relevant when the films are launched.

Resources

Because the target market wasn’t coming to Joburg Ballet, it had to go to them. The films were released through the Joburg Ballets’ social channels: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram. Because it had zero media budget, the subject matter of each film had to be released at the speed of culture for it to be picked up and shared. A broad audience was reached, from radio stations, influencers, news broadcasters to fashionistas and musos. The campaign has been running since July 2017 and is an ongoing series.

Production

Ordinarily, a ballet production involves many months of conceptualisation, choreography and rehearsals. The most-exciting thing for all parties involved in this series of ballets, from the dancers to the audience, has been not knowing what story is coming next. The campaign is 100% shaped by real-time data mined from social media. This is then artistically reinterpreted as a brand-new ballet.

This data also shapes the short film, in terms of the mood, location, cinematography and art direction.The series has responded to a range of topics, from social issues such as gun control, LGBTQI rights in Africa, women abuse and the Cape Town Drought to sport and blockbuster films such as Black Panther.

“Teaming up with a production company like Darling was crucial,” says Peter Khoury, TBWA\Hunt Lascaris chief creative officer. “We needed a wide range of talented directors that have different points of view and approaches to filmmaking. This is what gave Breaking Ballet a distinctive aesthetic, a range of storytelling styles that differed from film to film and also managed to evoke a wide range of emotions.”

Measurement

By feeding highly relevant stories straight back into trending conversations, the campaign has earned a lot of success. Ballet, and Joburg Ballet in particular, is being spoken about in places it never dreamed of.

Important stats include:

560% ROI in earned media
24m media impressions
91% engagement rate
39% increase in social media followers
Ticket sales are at an all-time high and climbing show on show.

[Editor’s note: We did query the 24m impressions stat after taking a closer look at social media traction for the campaign. The agency has come back with the following clarification, which we accept. A third party was engaged to do the social media campaign analysis for the case study. The report was dated 20 April 2018; the entire campaign-period analysed was July 2017 to April 2018. The total number of media impressions for this period was 24 185 736. The agency further clarified that the metric used was “Opportunities to See” as opposed to Reach.]

Full playlist

Credits

Ad agency: TBWA\Hunt Lascaris
Chief creative officer: Peter Khoury
Executive creative directors: Rui Alves, Kabelo Moshapalo
Creative director: Nikki Taylor-Garrett
Copywriter: Jeff Tyser
Business Unit Director: Debbie Pienaar
Head of TV production: Sandra Gomes
TV producer: Boitumelo Rabosiwana
Senior motion designer: Sibusiso Mkhwanazi
Designer: Khethiwe Makhubo
Production company: Darling Films
Directors: Jeana Theron, Ross Garrett, Chloe Coetsee, Zee Ntuli
Executive directors: Melina McDonald, Lorraine Smit
Producers: Saskia Finalayson, Lindsay-Jane Barnard, Mmameyi Mphahlele, Liz Dahl, Allan Glogauer
Sound engineer: David Law
Freelance DOPs: Adam J. Bentel, Michael Cleary, Devin Toselli, Willie Nel
Ludus editors: James O’Sullivan, Evy Katz, Marc Ash, Nick Young
PR: Sasha Kupritz

#Campaigns is the new weekly MarkLives column featuring insight into the brief, creative idea, production challenges and results of South African communication campaigns, both ongoing and recent. Have a campaign worthy of being featured in #Campaigns? Submit a short motivation to and we may well be in touch. Please include links to campaign material, when it ran/is running and why you believe it should be featured.

Adnalysis: Why I’ve left advertising strategy

by Bogosi Motshegwa (@Thinkerneur) I’ve not left advertising (no-one ever does; those who claim to just don’t know their comeback date yet) — I’ve left agency strategy. There are two issues at play: ad agencies are dead (they just don’t know it yet); and strategists or planners are under threat.

If agencies are dead, the biggest casualty isn’t creative departments but, rather, strategic planning, which is being dealt a huge blow (creative ideas will always be around as ideas are currency, whether or not they’re based on sound strategic thinking).

Process has begun

I’ve deliberately used “dead”. But aren’t ad revenues still a thing and aren’t thousands of people still employed? Yes, the advertising matrix is too huge to dismantle at once but the process has begun. Those in denial will definitely be out of business, and those who concede will plan accordingly to set themselves up for a lucrative future.

Ad agencies are in trouble. I hope they know and are aware of this. Agencies that continue to be driven by creative departments aren’t going to last because creativity is an expensive commodity. If your agency isn’t driven by strategy and data, you’re selling dreams, and clients in today’s world can no longer afford to invest in dreams.

Ad agencies aren’t organised optimally to deliver on clients’ best interests as they’re still governed by agency interests, one of those being creative awards.

A huge blow

Strategy is being dealt a huge blow because it’s undervalued unfortunately. Planning in advertising agencies is so grossly underused, it’s sad. Most ad agencies talk about the value of strategy but there isn’t anything being done to at least invest in its so-called value and longevity.

Strategists and strategies in advertising are primarily used to rationalise creative ideas, whether pre or post — extremely reducing the role of strategy. The implication is that strategies are used as launch pads for creative ideas as opposed to strategy being the linchpin for brand and business growth and therefore, the real and only valued aspect of the marketing or brand-building process is the creative output, and not the thinking that leads to that output. This is why creatives are deliberately encouraged to produce big ideas and concepts before the strategy is even complete, leaving no room for original strategic thinking, and then inevitably having to post-rationalise the strategic thinking to fit the creative work #SadFace

It’s nobody’s fault, although I’d like to blame someone or, better yet, someone to take responsibility and be accountable. For the longest time, creative heads in ad agencies have been leading the conversation — not that they shouldn’t or can’t but, when a dentist is leading a healthcare convention or forum, the whole conversation may end up being centred on oral care, whereas it should be about health care and wellness overall.

Creatives leading the conversation

Chief creative officers (CCOs), executive creative directors (ECDs) and creative directors (CDs) are leading the conversation, and they are leading with the creative, and not the bigger-picture, lens. I might be making assumptions but, if we’re honest, where does a CCO’s real interest lie? Show me one ECD or CD who isn’t interested in winning awards.

Winning awards and creating work that they can brag about in their portfolios is important to them because how else do they showcase their creativity, worth or value? If how creativity is measured based on how many awards won, where do you think their priority lies?

It’s rare to find creative work that’s driven by long-term strategic thinking, based on sound thinking, that’s meant to have impact and add real value to not just the awards cabinet but real people and clients’ bottom lines. Clients are now looking for solutions and not creative ideas; they want to play a meaningful role because they are in it for the long haul. No brand is ever created with the intention of dying but, if brands continue to be built with no strategic intent behind them, they’ll suffer the same fate as Toys R Us and the like.

What to do?

Strategy is evolving; it’s just that ad agencies are slow to reconfigure the planning departments to match client needs. We must move away from strategic platforms that lead or feed into a creative platform. That’s old strategic planning. Strategy must lead business conversations. I admit, it will take time for agencies to think beyond strategic platforms, and more solutions.

I believe that strategy shouldn’t live in untouched folders but in everything a brand does, both practically and tangibly. It should be at the forefront of any brand marketing conversation, which includes creative executions.

By focusing on strategic platforms that lead to creative platforms only, strategy as a result becomes hugely underplayed, and honestly, disrespected. This is unfortunate because strategists are who clients should be in close contact with; strategists need to be at the forefront and drive brand growth conversation. Brands must be built beyond briefs. A strategist’s role is to find opportunities for clients and brands. Brand-building and -growth shouldn’t be confined to official briefs in the system; strategists should be encouraged to find opportunities premised on strategic intent.

The future of a brand doesn’t lie in a TVC but in how it connects to people, solves problems, and has a real impact on both people and the environment, especially the client’s bottom line. Brands and companies need to be prepared for the future and agencies need to start helping clients become future-ready and ask and answer pertinent questions such as: What does our future consumer look like? What will the company look like in 20–30 years? We need more human and data-led strategic solutions; planning inside agencies doesn’t allow for this — roles get reduced to sitting behind a computer and Googling stuff, and also being told what and how to think.

Other reasons I’ve left

It hasn’t been good for my health. It’s been draining. Soul-draining. Nothing is worth losing yourself for. This is actually a life lesson. Don’t compromise yourself for anything that or anyone who doesn’t add value to your life or happiness.

No-one is as important as a creative, which is ludicrous because, if you remove any department from the ad-agency model and value chain, there won’t be any creative work to produce, anyway. Only one department is encouraged to be creative and, as a result, the only thing open is the office plan. Some brands and companies have shown that ideas may come from anyone and anywhere, and therefore they encourage thinking. The irony in advertising is that you aren’t actually encouraged to think creatively. Those who know, know.

Bogosi Motshegwa (@Thinkerneur) truly believes that advertising can really change the world. He believes that brands, marketers and ad agencies can do even better branding building and advertising. He shares his thoughts on the industry and sometimes has unconventional views. A former committee member of AMASA, an Advisory Council member, a guest speaker and lecturer at Vega, Rosebank College and Red & Yellow, he also does speaker management at TEDxJohannesburg. He is currently a freelance strategist and has founded Thinkerneur, a brand consultancy firm, and is also the co-founder of Melanoid Éclat (for finding black entrepreneurs). He contributes the monthly column, “Adnalysis”, which analyses adland from a strategist’s point of view, to MarkLives.com.

#Marketers: Gumtree’s Claire Cobbledick on leadership

by Julie Pughe-Parry (@pugheparables) In the first quarter of 2017, Claire Cobbledick (@clairecobbles) ‏had her leadership skills put to the test, following a disastrous redesign of the Gumtree South Africa website. Feedback was largely negative and had “disastrous consequences” for the brand and its users at the time. Making it through this challenging time, Cobbledick learnt a key lesson: resilience. “Dig deep and keep going. Face the problems and try to fix them.”

At the time, she was head of core business at Gumtree SA. She outlines the problems experienced as a misalignment between the user needs, and the product and tech team. This resulted in issues regarding the speed of the site and its SEO performance. The new UX confused users, as uncovered by the tracking of key metrics: listings and replies. To tackle the issues, the changes were rolled back and creating small incremental changes became the focus instead, with more-rigorous testing.

Facilitators of connections

The website redesign hasn’t been the only bump in Gumtree’s road. The brand hasn’t been immune to the impact of a mobile-first market and a struggling national economy; however, being a useful online classifieds service strengthens its standing. It sees its role as trade engineers — facilitators of connections between buyers and sellers, explains Cobbledick, who was promoted to GM in June 2018 (she joined in January 2014). Many people have taken to trade to create an alternate stream of revenue. These individuals have been lovingly dubbed “Gumtrepeneurs,” and they embody the vision of the brand.

In talking about the future of the Gumtree brand and business model, she explains that the business model will be expanding to be able to support and empower South African businesses in marketing themselves and connecting with their consumers: “We need to earn our keep in the eBay universe and generate revenue but the principle of helping people and businesses become economically active is a very strong motivating force.”

She has focused on increasing proximity to consumers. “We’re calling it the ‘Season of the Customer’ and we’re making sure everyone feels closer to our users,” she says.

Career path

Cobbledick’s career path has taken her on a winding journey through the marketing and advertising landscape of SA. Her past experience, at Red Bull and The Jupiter Drawing Room (Cape Town), has shaped her to be the leader she is today.

Red Bull presented her with the opportunity to really become involved in the business of brands. She reminisces about her time with the company and highlights the less-glamorous aspects of the job as the areas in which she learnt the most: specifically, negotiating with store-owners for shelf space and advocating for the product, right on the front lines. At Red Bull, she often felt a sense of myopia — becoming too immersed in the importance of the brand and not really being able to contextualise. In search of a more-diverse experience, and one that allowed her to dabble in strategy, she joined Jupiter.

Looking back on her time in agency and the state of adland in SA, she has a few observations on the industry as it now stands. With the digital wave building strength and encroaching on more areas of our day-to-day lives, some agencies are experiencing a struggle for relevance. When she started out in industry, “there was quite a big rock-star association with advertising and that has shifted over time.” She notes that it will take more than an epic TV ad to become a ‘Hero of the Adworld’ today, and agencies need to be aware of that.

More natural style

Faced with a “more masculine-defined role” as the precedent familiar to her, she grappled with the idea of being an “authoritarian” leader. This was soon overcome as she realised that leadership would suit her more comfortably if she led in a way that’s more natural to her: “I was trying to play the role rather than just allowing my own leadership style,” she says.

In coming to this realisation, she’s been able to settle into her role and forge a path of her own. She emphasises the importance of soft skills in her approach, and ensures that the understanding of people is a top priority.

Through her career, Cobbledick has challenged herself through a variety of different roles but, underneath all the strategy and structure, is her irremovable sense for people — an understanding of how they think, how they feel and all that it takes to motivate them. She credits this quality as the reason she was moved into leadership roles to begin with. “It’s about focusing on, understanding and orientating around people,” she explains.

Julie Pughe-Parry (@pugheparables) graduated from Vega Cape Town with a BA in creative brand communications in 2017. A copywriter by day and freelance content writer by night, she continues to pursue her passion for the craft of written word.”

MarkLives profiles South African marketers in its regular #Marketers column.

SA TV Ratings: SABC 1 — primetime top 20 for Jul 2018

South African TV Ratings Top 20 shows 2018

by MarkLives (@marklives) The hottest primetime shows on SABC 1 in South Africa revealed: TV ratings for July 2018.

SABC 1 July 2018

BRCSA TV Ratings July 2018 primetime SABC 1 — Click to enlarge to view clearly.

Source: BRCSA July 2018

In 2016, the Broadcast Research Council of South Africa (BRCSA) changed its policy about giving away TAMS and now only monthly reports, highlighting the top 20 or 30 primetime shows on several popular channels, are available.

The Broadcast Research Council of South Africa (the BRC) is a non-profit, industry body that was incorporated in 2015 to cater to the audience research needs of the radio and television industry in South Africa.

#AgencyFocus: The “AuSome” agency behind the new Cell C look

by Carey Finn (@carey_finn) Historically, 1886 has flown under the radar but the ad agency is starting to share its stories in a bid to boost brand awareness. Key among them are its work on the recent Cell C brand and corporate identity shift, as well as the agency’s own new CI, and its ethos of fun, fast creative work.

Standalone

A wholly owned subsidiary of the FCB Africa group, 1886 is a fully fledged, standalone agency operating out of Joburg since 2012, with its own strategy, operation teams and clients. Executive vice president, Derek Coles, says it was set up as “a separate shop” able to handle conflict pieces of business. The agency has done “reasonably well” over the years, he says, reporting revenue growth of upwards of 50% over the past three.

Front and centre of the agency’s work in 2018 is its collaboration with Cell C on the telco company’s new look — both internal and external. Following its recapitalisation in December last year, which sees the shareholding restructured to include employees, Cell C started rolling out its revised brand identity, which has seen its colours become orange and purple and its payoff line change to “Connect your way”, with the help of 1886.

Coles says that Cell C was looking to modernise its brand, and make it more relevant and accessible to consumers. With concern that Cell C’s previous colours may have been a bit recessive, particularly in the retail space, 1886 was tasked with helping it to stand out better in the market. Chief creative officer, Stuart Stobbs, says that they had to “modernise, simplify and orangify” the brand, and feels that seeding the changes slowly has helped the new identity to be well-received and viewed as an evolution, rather than a radical new identity.

“We brought orange into a number of things before we went full orange with the new logo and the new payoff line, so it wasn’t a big surprise when it happened” he explains. “But I think it certainly stands out a lot better, and people have been noticing it more. The logo itself is not radically different, so it’s not like you’re going to go, well, who the hell is that? It’s not like on the Absa level.”

Use resources differently

Coles adds that, by avoiding the “lightswitch” approach that characterises some rebranding efforts, the agency was able to use resources differently. “The aim was to spend money more in the product space and retail space, in the brand space from another point of view, and not just on telling people we changed the colour,” he says.

When it came to the new payoff line, says Coles, the idea was “to move towards what consumers are looking for, especially in the data space, knowing that millennials and Afrollennials are keen to be able to use data to connect with whoever they want, in the way they want.” The “Connect your way” phrase was initially brought in as a campaign line that started appearing across materials before its launch at the end of last year.

1886 has seen other success with the Cell C brand: the awarding of a Silver Lion for its C Surance radio ads and a Merit at the One Show this year. It’s also garnered attention with its recent “Food Baby” campaign for Steers, whose lead agency it has been for over two years, says Stobbs. Other major brands include Nivea (Beiersdorf), which was the agency’s first-ever client, Sasfin Bank and Easy Waves.

Pace and flexibility

Key to growth has been the agency’s business model, which, says Stobbs, is the pace and flexibility with which it operates. “The pace of advertising has always been fast, but it’s accelerated to an almost-ridiculous level,” he says. Taking the need for speed into account, 1886’s creative workflow typically involves an initial brainstorm with a client “to get an idea of where they’re going,” with sufficient numbers of senior team members involved to effectively interrogate the brief. This is followed by what Stobbs calls “bullet brainstorms”, where ideas are fired off rapidly within a deliberately constrained time period. After these, the best suggestions are sent for approval and further development.

The strategy staff members follow a similar approach, says Coles, “to come up with insights and quickly bounce them off the client”. This doesn’t mean throwing any old ideas and solutions out there, though, he emphasises — speed is critical but so is quality, and that requires a thorough understanding of what the client needs. “We just find that, in the digital age that we’re in, if you’re working on something today, it might be too late to have it happen tomorrow,” says Coles. “So much of the stuff that we’re doing has to happen now, because it’s pertinent now, but it might not be tomorrow.”

Agency culture

Another pillar of the operation is the agency culture, says Stobbs, which he describes as “very much a can-do kind of attitude that gets shit done”. He and Coles have tried to create a fun and open place to work — and they reckon they’ve succeeded. “There’s quite a large range of weird people,” he quips, “which is fantastic, because great creativity can happen when you mix a bunch of different people together. People are at their best when they feel they can be themselves. It’s a very inclusive work culture and inclusive kind of mindset.”

The agency is gearing up for a couple of shifts, one of which will see Stobbs and Coles step back from day-to-day operations “a little bit” to focus on growing the business. To this end, they welcomed Terry Unser, who was previously executive business director, back, after a stint at Alpha Investment Group, in the capacity of executive director: integrated business in April. The increase of Gareth Lessing’s commitment from freelance to full time in the capacity of ECD under Stobbs last year was another decision made with this role refocus in mind, as was the recent re-onboarding of Brendo-lee Tobias, who has returned to the fold to take care of operations as creative services manager.

A second shakeup is the rolling out of a new CI over the next few months. “We looked at our branding and identified that we needed to breathe some fresh life into it,” says Stobbs, explaining that the new look is all about gold, discovery and value creation. “1886 was when gold was discovered in Joburg, and we thought, in 1886, there was buggerall here, really,” he says. “Who would have known by pulling up that gold, all this stuff that would come out of it?”

The agency’s new colour scheme is gold and black, with the former reflecting the value that can be built out of a brand, like a gold nugget, he says. He adds that, in its work, 1886 will be focusing on three things: data, storytelling and emotion. “If we can get those right, we’ll be able to find the nuggets and do some amazing stuff,” he says. In this vein, the agency now encourages the people it works with to be ‘AuSome’.

1886advertising.co.za • Ramify Premium

Office locations: Joburg
Revenue band: R50-R60m
Staff count: 55
Key clients: Cell C, Steers, Nivea, Sasfin Bank, Easy Waves
Services: Full service (ATL, BTL, retail, design, digital and social)

Carey Finn (@carey_finn) is a writer and editor with a decade and a half of industry experience, having covered everything from ethical sushi in Japan to the technicalities of roofing, agriculture, medical stuff and more. She’s also taught English and journalism, and dabbled in various other communications ventures along the way, including risk reporting. As a contributing writer to MarkLives.com, her new column “#AgencyFocus” is an ongoing weekly series updating the market on agency performance, including business performance, innovation, initiatives, the work, awards and people.

The accountant in advertising

ROI piggy bank means investing financing and return by Stuart Miles courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net amended for slider

by Siwe Thusi (@Siwe_Thusi) John Wanamaker, an American marketing pioneer, once said, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” If I were his accountant, Wanamaker would have made me hyperventilate internally, muffle silent screams and break into theoretic hives.

First, hi, I’m Siwe, the CA(SA) lost gleefully in the world of advertising as a creative (creative strategist, if you want to be technical). But what I soon discovered is that, in this world, the sooner you rightfully start describing yourself as a creative, the easier it is for you to see yourself as part of producing the creative-end product.

Wait. What the heck is an accountant doing in advertising?!!!!!!

All too often, inspired advertising is not produced in a traditional working week.

Subjective

How’s this for another shocker? Creative work is also subjective, so a great idea to one person is a complete head-scratcher to another. That means that, unlike an accountant, there are no right or wrong answers.

Oh, and in advertising they encourage you to get out more. An ExperiencesChaser-DoThings-MakeThings-SeekDailyDosesOfInspo-IDoItForTheCulture mind is a good advertising brain. The best agencies will expect you to fill yours with experiences that will benefit the work. Nice. Or not, if I have my accountant hat on. Coz, personal-budget-excel-spreadsheet.

And I guess that’s my fascination. The anomaly of an accountant working creatively in advertising allows for the one-up of viewing two worlds running in parallel, at any given time. I get to see the fact that accounting and advertising share a similar mission: they both need to get results.

Accountability

Accountability, at the core of the word, means to account for the stuff you’ve been up to. Pretty self-explanatory, if you’re an account-ant. Not so much if you’re a market-er. Or creative.

Which makes it apparent that accountants and marketers could actually be distant cousins. Much like accountants, marketers have the clear mandate to always work to connect the dots between activity and revenue. Marketing is about generating revenue. For marketers, art, humour, or creativity are the means to an end, not the end. Marketers who aren’t serious about tying their activity back to revenue are missing the bigger picture.

So, what helps us tie activities to revenue? Measuring return on investment (ROI) in advertising does.

ROI is a shared term in both the accounting worlds and the advertising worlds. How we get to that measurement, though, is an entirely different exercise.

Accounting: return = revenue divided by the cost of investment.
Advertising: err… the jury is still out.

ROI

ROI is basically about saying, “Has this idea been worth it?”

Calculating ROI for marketing/advertising work may be tricky, depending on how you measure impact and costs. The easiest is calculating the target revenue to marketing/advertising cost ratio which represents how much money is generated for every rand spent in advertising. I’ve seen these costs come dressed under a veiled budget whose strain becomes even more fragile in the current VAT-at-15% economic climate, years after the Mad-Men era that I missed. The costs aren’t only the obvious and measurable ones. A type of immeasurable cost can come in the form of losing control over data, which could ultimately mean losing control over media spend. Add to that that the “influx of the online revolution” comes with its own measurables which influence costs. These are the types of metrics that help clients to make informed business decisions — and can position creatives (and the one or two accountants who are now creatives) as business partners.

Creatives want to win awards, but the higher purpose should be about being business problem-solvers first. This is what your Accentures et al have one up on us.

Inyuku

How dos you conclude if inyuku^[1] is being wisely spent on advertising campaigns? That’s right, money.

Advertising can’t happen without money. Clients can’t make money without advertising. The singular connector in both the advertising and accounting worlds will always be money. And what really excites me is when I see compelling insight-driven storytelling that makes the money allocated to it work hard.

This is why platforms such as the recent APEX Awards are important. Because they remind advertisers to be accountable for all the pieces of work put out. That it is bizarre not to do post-campaign analyses. That a wasted budget gives the real accountants back at the client theoretic hives.

And that maybe, just maybe, we could start looking at another measurable called return on insight (ROI), too — but that’s a Cannes of words to be opened on another day.

References

[1] inyuku — money, moolah

Siwe Thusi (@Siwe_Thusi) is a qualified South African chartered-accountant-turned-creative-strategist at FCB Africa and a working photographer. Since mid-2015, she’s been in strategic planning, working on some of South Africa’s big brands in different categories and industries in the ATL space. She contributes the monthly column “An Accountant in Adland” — exploring where, when and how the two ‘disciplines’ overlap… and why they should! — to MarkLives.com.

Wimpy fires agency amid plagiarism claims

by Herman Manson (@marklives) Wimpy has confirmed that it’s “terminating its relationship” with advertising agency, The Odd Number.

“MMS and McDonald’s have alleged that certain of our staff members used confidential information and transgressed copyright in relation to a Wimpy advert,” reads a statement by Xola Nouse, co-founder and MD at The Odd Number. “This is the subject of a dispute. The allegations are unfortunate. We are engaged in ongoing discussions with Wimpy and McDonalds to resolve the matter.” Nouse declined any further comment.

No comment

Wimpy wouldn’t comment on its reasons for terminating the relationship, citing legal processes. It wouldn’t confirm whether the account will be going out to pitch again, or if a new agency partner has already been selected.

“The Odd Number is an excellent agency and we have been impressed with their work and method of engagement,” says Jacques Cronje, Wimpy marketing executive, in an apparent attempt to soften the blow dismissing an agency only several months into its contract. “On behalf of everyone at Wimpy, I’d like to wish the team at The Odd Number all the best for the future. I have no doubt they will continue to produce compelling work for their clients.”

The Odd Number won the account in May 2018 — following a five-way pitch that included then incumbent agency FCB Africa, King James II, Grey South Africa and Net#work BBDO — to become lead agency for Wimpy. The Odd Number, launched in 2015 by Xola Nouse and Sibusiso Sitole, was named MarkLives’ South African agency to watch in 2018. Co-founder Sitole was named as MarkLives’ most-admired creative leader in Jozi for 2017.

Herman Manson (@marklives) is the founder and editor of MarkLives.com.

Loeries strips TBWA’s awards for Apartheid Museum

Apartheid Museum, TBWA and Loeries ad controversy slider

by MarkLives (@marklives) The Loeries has decided that all work entered by TBWA\Hunt Lascaris for the Apartheid Museum in this year’s awards be disqualified, including the full “Past and Present” campaign, as well as a separate campaign titled, “The Old South Africa Flag.”

All awards — a Gold Loerie, Silver Loerie, Bronze Loerie, and Craft Certificate, as well as all finalists — received by TBWA\ Hunt Lascaris for its work done for the Apartheid Museum have been revoked.

TBWA\Hunt Lascaris had already decided to hand back the Gold, Silwer and Craft Loeries* it received for the “Past and Present” campaign, after it misquoted apartheid prime minister, Dr HF Verwoerd, and current US president, Donald J Trump, in a radio ad done as part of the campaign. At the time, the agency said “[seven] of the 27 quotes it used in the campaign appear to be in question as to their true authenticity.”

Rankings

The Loeries Official Rankings are impacted by the disqualification of these entries. TBWA\Hunt Lascaris Johannesburg falls off the Top 3 ranking for Agency of the Year. Joe Public remains in first place, followed by Impact BBDO Dubai in second, then King James Group in third. The TBWA\ group remains in first place for the Regional Agency Group of the Year, through the collective contribution from TBWA\ agencies across the region.

“The Loeries Board accepts that this was an error and that it was not the agency’s intention to attribute the wrong quotes to anyone,” reads a statement issued by the Loeries Board. “The Loeries continues to encourage brave and innovative work, but actively discourages work that does not reflect the high standards required of all brands, and that does not meet the eligibility criteria. The Board believes that all work — whether pro-bono for a good cause or for a major brand — should be afforded the same attention to detail. Pro-bono work entered into awards such as the Loeries should be held to an even higher standard and scrutiny, to ensure that agencies and their brand partners are truly working to make a difference, and not creating work merely for the sake of winning awards.”

As reported previously, Sean Donovan, TBWA CEO, has already apologised for the campaign. “We always apply in-depth research and fact-checking in all our work, and it was certainly never our intention to attribute the wrong quotes to anyone. For that we unreservedly apologise. But the lesson is certainly that even trusted sources need to be questioned.”

* Updated 2018/08/31: A previous version of this article reported that only a Gold Loerie had been returned.

Book Extract: Growing Greatness — Pepe Marais cuts his teeth on booze

Growing Greatness: Cutting My Teeth On Booze

MarkLives is running five extracts from Joe Public United founding partner Pepe Marais‘s first book, “Growing Greatness — A Journey Towards Personal and Business Mastery”, over the next few weeks. Here’s the second, “Cutting my teeth on booze”.

by Pepe Marais (@pepemarais) It was 1994, the year before the historic 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa, and I had been working on a tactical print advertisement as part of Smirnoff’s ‘Through-the-Bottle’ global advertising campaign. It was a concept where the Smirnoff bottle was placed over various situations, each time transforming that situation into something spectacular on the inside of the bottle, whilst remaining the same on the outside.

My idea was a simple, visual pun. I wanted to place the bottle over what would seem to be the front row of the Australian rugby team, transforming the hooker into a hooker — a prostitute. My creative director loved the idea, but he wanted us to ‘push’ it. We decided to make the hooker inside the bottle a transvestite. Our client, Mark Morris, somehow trusted us enough to approve this risky direction.

We managed to cast a transvestite from Woodstock in the role and chose a Cape Town photographer by the name of Jan Verboom to execute our idea. We also cast our three rugby lookalikes, two props and a hooker, from a local rugby team. On the day of the shoot, we chased them up and down the hill on Roodebloem Road, putting them in the correct position as they returned to the studio, huffing and puffing. This approach resulted in the most spectacular and authentic action pictures, with sweat and drool dripping from their exhausted faces and mouths.

The same could not be said of our transvestite, who we shot separately. No matter how hard we tried, he just did not add any flair to the shot; in fact, he pretty much took the humour away from it. In the end, the client ‘bombed’ the idea, insisting that we cast a Julia-Roberts lookalike as our hooker — a challenge we delivered on by finding the perfect candidate from London and booking her for our reshoot.

And, so, through this sequence of events, I found myself in my office one morning with sweaty palms and my heart beating in my throat. I was about to meet my first international model, an extra from the latest James Bond movie, who happened to be in Cape Town for the summer season. I had some weird premonition that something was going to go wrong, and repeatedly recited my introduction in my head, “Hi, I’m Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom? Hi, I’m Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom?”

But what if I stuff it all up? I thought. What if I embarrass myself by saying the wrong thing? Looking down at the Polaroid camera in my clammy hands, I decided there and then that I would leave it behind, as a Plan B, just in case I put my foot in it. I could always make some lame excuse to go and fetch my camera if anything did go pear-shaped. But, why would it? I knew that I was a shy guy, but I also knew that I was pretty good at my job, and equally well prepared in my head, “Hi, I am Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom? Hi, I am Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom?”

The phone on my desk rang. My heart nearly popped out my mouth as I grabbed the receiver and pushed it to my ear. It was our receptionist Gill. “Pepe, I have Sandra here to see you,’ she informed me. Gill also happened to be dating our Smirnoff client and eventually married him. I got up and, with my heart thumping in my chest, I started walking down the long passage towards reception. “Hi, I am Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom? Hi, I am Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the boardroom?”

I turned that final corner to see her standing there, her hair blowing backwards in slow motion. She was drop-dead gorgeous. I walked up to her, giving my sweaty right hand a quick wipe on my trousers before confidently thrusting it towards her and saying, “Hi, I am Pepe Marais, the art director, would you like to step into the bedroom?”

I remember that moment of confusion in her brown eyes before her questioning, “Excuse me?” Feeling hot blood rushing to my face and beads of sweat forming on my forehead, I blurted out, “I have to go and fetch my Polaroid camera!”

Love affair vs arranged marriage

The B2B context

Tips

See also

View all the #Campaigns at a glance on our #Campaigns Pinterest board! Watch our #Campaigns playlist on YouTube

Client: Joburg Ballet Ad agency: TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris Title: Breaking Ballet

Information supplied by TBWA\Hunt Lascaris

Brief

Creative summary

Resources

Production

Measurement

Full playlist

See also

Credits

Process has begun

A huge blow

Creatives leading the conversation

What to do?

Other reasons I’ve left

Facilitators of connections

Career path

More natural style

SABC 1 July 2018

Standalone

Use resources differently

Pace and flexibility

Agency culture

Subjective

Accountability

ROI

Inyuku

References

No comment

Rankings

See also

View all the #Campaigns at a glance on our #Campaigns Pinterest board!
Watch our #Campaigns playlist on YouTube

Client: Joburg Ballet
Ad agency: TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris
Title: Breaking Ballet