MarkLives.com • Page 154 of 579 • Independent industry news for marketing, advertising & media execs

Customer experience the panacea for CMOs

Customer Experience Meaning Know How And Proficiency by Stuart Miles courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos

by Leeya Hendricks (@LeeyaHendricks) Customer experience (CX) is no longer a nice-to-have but a strategic business imperative. Given the immediacy and dynamism of real-time online channels, CX has become a vital consideration for doing business — and marketing organisations will experience this most keenly as its primary custodians.

In this environment, chief marketing officers (CMOs) have an opportunity to lead the business in re-architecting its platforms, channels, roles and processes, with the customer at the centre. CX will change the functional remit and contribution of CMOs as it becomes the glue for integrating brand touchpoints to create an end-to-end experience for the customer. Gartner predicts that, within two years, most organisations will make significant changes to their business models to improve their customer experiences^[1].

Increasingly, the role of the chief customer experience officer will be to build relationships across various business channels to drive a cohesive customer experience.

Traditional customer service functions will change accordingly but will remain central to customer experience. In short, as Panacea was the Greek goddess of universal remedy, CX is the modern panacea for marketing and customer service organisations. 3

The customer age

As the vanguard of this customer-centric age of business, the CMO’s role has become both more important and complex. Many CMOs report feeling pressure to lead the charge to strengthen the nexus between customer and brand. Thus, leading CMOs are assuming responsibility for revenue-generating systems and applications, thereby boosting their role’s status as a growth hub in the business.

According to the CMO Council, 68% of CEOs endorse this view^[2].

This functional evolution of the CMO’s role will naturally have an impact on the marketing function and organisation as a whole. A customer-first CMO’s first consideration will be to ensure the customer’s needs enjoy the constant consideration of corporate decision-makers. This means that, in addition to other changes in their function, CMOs will assume increased responsibility for setting customer strategy and defining comprehensive customer experiences.

CMO to join forces

In coordinating customer experience across departments, CMOs must be conversant with various different customer-engagement channels, devices and technologies to provide a consistent experience across channels, irrespective of where in their journey customers are.

CMOs must ensure business resources which create customer communications are in sync to ensure consistency across the customer lifecycle. In this, CMOs must work with multiple departments to create experiences that satisfy customers and create brand advocates that can support overall growth objectives of the business.

The business evolution along this path is fraught with difficulty, as the customer journey offers many opportunities for missing customer expectations. Companies’ vulnerability to this is amplified by the ease with which customers can share their experiences online, so it’s imperative to ensure seamlessly integrated, end-to-end customer experiences with no gaps in quality.

CMOs that can achieve this will become strategic partners to the CEO.

Owning the change

In conclusion, CX and the role of the customer experience should be driven by the CMO. We must engage at every point; curate content which is effectively measured across voice, topic and channel; create compelling stories that recognise customers are leading the way; and we need to get all this onto the balance sheet for the C-suite.

For CMOs to lead the change, we need to own the overall CX of the brand, and only when that happens can the customer experience becomes the ultimate remedy for achieving results. For a holistic end-to-end brand experience, place the customer first.

References

Gartner: Gartner Says Organizations Are Changing Their Customer Experience Priorities, June 2016
Deloitte: The CMO Shift to Gaining Business Lift, CMO Council and Deloitte, December 2016
WSJ: The CMO as a Customer Champion — Deloitte Report, April 2017

Media Future: Mobicel is changing the mobile game

by Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee) It’s a South African brand that is little-known in higher-income segments, but Mobicel is about to break out of the entry-level mould.

South Africa has a long history of unknown mobile brands that start off catering for entry-level phone users, briefly threaten to challenge the big names, and then fizzle out like a fading signal from a derelict cellular mast.

Barely a year ago, for example, AG Mobile was the big story in local branding. It had sold millions of feature phones and low-cost smartphones through mass-market retail chains such as Jet and Pep. It was designed locally, manufactured in China, imported, and packaged for local tastes. It was a decade-long success story. But then it overreached, produced a series of phones aimed at both low and middle-income segments, all the way up to mid-range smartphones. Not only that but it flooded the market with handsets in the hope of replicating its success at the low end. Overnight, the business collapsed as sales failed to keep up with the heady pace of imports. In a matter of days, the brand vanished from the shelves.

Replicating success

Meanwhile, a second South African brand had been replicating AG’s success at the entry level. The decade-old Mobicel had catered for every budget, if that budget was below R500 to buy the phone outright. At the top end of the market, where that amount and more is spent every single month on contracts, Mobicel was completely unknown.

Soon, that may change. Mobicel is about to venture on the path treaded by AG Mobile when it ventured outside its comfort zone.

There is one fundamental difference, however, says founder and CEO, Ridhwan Khan: not only are quantities being carefully managed but Mobicel is not committing itself to manufacturing capacity that cannot be covered by existing resources, and it is hitting the market with what it calls premium phones, at reasonable prices.

Change the mobile game

The Mobicel R9 and R9 Plus, launched several weeks ago, are rare examples of devices that really can change the mobile game.

The R9 Plus is an Android phone that sports not only a 5.7-inch touch screen but also edge-to-edge display. Samsung has pioneered the concept with its flagship phones for a number of years, with Apple following suit in its latest iPhones this year. Only LG, with its Q6 released a few months ago, had introduced edge-to-edge screens in a mid-market phone.

So is this a mid-market phone? Perhaps a new category is needed. In a sense, Mobicel is following the lead of Chinese brand, Xiaomi, which markets its mid-range smartphones as “high value, affordable devices”. But, at a price of R2 999, the Mobicel R9 Plus probably represents the best value-for-money yet in terms of features vs cost.

Truly remarkable feature

The truly remarkable feature of the phone, which does not appear to have been adopted by any other major manufacturer, is that it has flipped the traditional approach of having a premium camera on the rear of the phone and a lower-quality lens on the front for selfies. With the R9 Plus, the selfie takes pride of place, with a dual front camera. One lens comes in at 20MP and the other at 8MP. Mobicel describes it as the “Super Selfie” dual lens camera. It also offers a 120-degree wide angle view, along with “Super Low Light capability”. And, like most mid-to-high-end phones, it sports a fingerprint sensor.

The slightly stripped-down sibling of the Plus, the R9 Lite, will come to market at just under R2000. Both offer a 24-month warranty.

“We’ve created a handset with exceptional build quality, offering the latest technology, and the kind of features only ever before seen on handsets that cost four times as much,” says Kahn. “We’ve used our experience, our understanding of the customer base and our economies of scale to offer them an opportunity to migrate from whatever device they’re using to our premium smartphone.”

Strategic advantage

Mobicel’s stratetic advantage is that it distributes through more than 4 000 retail outlets, ranging from the smallest store to large discount chains. It has begun selling the new devices both through retailers and online via Takealot.com.

“There is a big void between phones like the Vodafone Smart Kicka at R399, and the feature-rich smartphones from Samsung and Huawei,” Kahn said in an interview after the launch. “No one’s filling that massive gap, almost indoctrinating consumers to the idea that, if you really want a nice device, you have to pay R6 000 upward. There’s a massive opportunity. If we can play in the space between R1 500 and R3 000, we will start filling the void.

“Our biggest challenge is making the user experience an awesome one so that, when people buy and use the device, whatever reservations they had about the price point is gone. We want people to experience the brand, so we are keeping margins very thin, and a big part of our margin is being put into building a local brand.”

Uncharted territory

This is uncharted territory for a businessman who entered the cellphone industry in 2002 by bringing in refurbished handsets from the UK. He would clean them up, and sell them as demo units. By 2007, demand had exceeded supply, and he realised there was a massive market waiting for him.

The first Mobicel handset, back in 2007, was the M404, a1.8-inch dual-SIM feature phone. That’s the year Apple launched the iPhone and sparked the smartphone revolution. It’s taken a decade for Mobicel to break out of the feature phone market, and now it wants to spark an equivalent revolution in the SA mass market.

Says Kahn, “The end game is to provide powerful smartphones without the hefty price tag.”

Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee) heads up World Wide Worx and is editor-in-chief of Gadget, a personal technology magazine. He is a consulting editor to MarkLives.com and our media tech columnist. This article has been republished from Gadget.

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Dear Radio: Radio to the rescue

by Paulo Dias (@therealptp) When devastating and destructive natural disasters such as the ones in the Americas strike, radio comes to the rescue. This month I take a look at the role radio plays in helping communities mobilise when the humble radio is the only way of connecting devastated victims.

When Hurricane Irma ripped through the Florida Keys, it took with it most forms of communication. No electricity and TV coverage or internet and cellphone reception was available in the immediate aftermath of the storm, cutting the worst-affected residents off from vital disaster management information.

FM radio waves

When cellphone and other such services are lost in an area due to a major storm or blackout, FM radio waves are one of the most-effective ways of distributing information to the public in an emergency.

In the case of Irma, US1 Radio kept affected residents connected to civilisation. Suddenly, people so dependent on digital devices were huddled around their radios, waiting for information on where to find fresh food and water. Residents were also showing up at the station, appealing for medical care for loved ones at a time when even the infamous 911 was unavailable. As cell service started being restored, the station played a role in allowing people in the Keys to call in to the station to let their families know they were alive.

Radio became even more real and rudimentary when Hurricane Maria silenced Puerto Rico.

Ham radio

In a country with an obsolete power grid that will be without electricity for the foreseeable future, and where food, water, fuel, and battery power are running out, ham radio enthusiasts have come to the aid of thousands.

Amateur radio or ham radio is a service that allows users to talk across town, around the world, or even into space. These networks are fairly unaffected by bad weather and allows users to send voice transmissions and Morse code, and even allows for file transfers.

After the 9/11 attacks, hams helped to transmit messages when cellphone networks were overloaded and, in the case of Puerto Rico, ham radio enthusiasts are helping out the American Red Cross by letting residents know that their loved ones are safe. Ham radio also helps to forecast weather, plus broadcasters can give frontline accounts as weather builds in various regions.

Simple and basic

From family check-ins to pleas for fuel for generators at hospitals, hams are connecting a broken country through very simple and basic technology.

We’re so connected to our mobiles and the internet, it’s just assumed they’ll be there, should we find ourselves in the midst of a terrible natural disaster but, even if available, networks would become quickly overloaded. So, even in 2017, when disaster strikes, those affected are turning to radio to help them get their lives back on track.

Paulo Dias (@therealptp) is the head of creative integration at Ultimate Media. He works closely with the programming teams at leading radio stations to help implement commercial messaging into their existing formats. He contributes the regular column, “Dear Radio”, looking at the changing radio landscape in South Africa, to MarkLives.com

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Ad of the Week: Shake it, Vodacom

by Oresti Patricios (@orestaki) Vodacom, Ogilvy & Mather South Africa and director Teboho Mahlatsi of Bomb Commercials celebrate its refreshed image with a summer campaign that aims to get mobile users movin’, movin’ or, rather, shakin’, baby, shakin’.

For mobile network operators, summer is the ideal opportunity to promote their services — December is the time when friends and families reconnect. Vodacom continues its strategy of enticing customers to interact using its cellphone app. Why not, given how successful the mobile operator’s competitions generally are? Last year’s “Play Every Day” campaign, which rewarded customers with daily prizes from airtime to cash, was reportedly the its most successful campaign to date; publicity material states that the campaign engaged 16m customers over a 10-month period. The mobile operater is building on last year’s gains with #ShakeEveryDay: a new app-based interactive campaign that gets customers to shake their phones in order to win prizes. The gamification is simple but solid; the concept is based on the fun use of motion-detection that is standard in most smartphones.

Vodacom also revealed its brand refresh a month ago. It’s changed its logo to a simplified form with a flat design execution, the ‘speech mark’ in white reversed on red; this is in line with Vodafone’s new look (Vodafone owns 65% of Vodacom). The new slogan is “The Future is Exciting. Ready?”

View all the Ads of the Week at a glance on our #AdoftheWeek Pinterest board!

Watch our 2017 #AdoftheWeek playlist on YouTube

But back to the campaign. The ad revolves around a character who introduces himself at the beginning as “Bra Shakes”. Throughout the TVC, he’s is dressed in a variety of different, brightly coloured outfits, from a lime, green and gold suit to a cream-and-gold Bollywood outfit, and a few others. The whole ad is a kaleidoscope of colours and shake-worthy activities.

“Vodacom is giving you stuff for free. Well, there’s a small, nyenyane [little] thing,” he says. “You must shake, baba.”

This launches the ad into a montage, set to a jazzy uptempo piece.

Tsonga women do a traditional dance shake their hips in time to the music, with cellphones attached to their waists. In a bus driving down a bumpy road, there is a ‘Bra Shakes’ bobble-head doll on the dashboard, beside a cellphone in a mount. The shaking of the bus has triggered the Vodacom app, which comes alive with a graphic displaying a prize of 2GB of airtime, and confetti flies out of the screen. (In the actual app, when you win a prize, there is a graphic animation of confetti — so this is a bit of fun poetic license that takes the ad into the realm of fantasy.) In the next scene, a carguard is directing a car into a parking spot, and holding his phone in his hand. The result? His phone also explodes with confetti, and he exclaims: “Yay! Dis hy! Yay! [Hooray, that’s it!]”

“The carguard shake!” says Bra Shakes, seated at a nearby table.

In a scene that could be taken from a Bollywood movie, all the dancers are holding cellphones, and their energetic moves are making their phones shake. Bra Shakes appears in their midst. “The Bollywood shake!” he laughs.

In the final scene, two men are filmed from behind, seated on deck chairs at the beach. Two women in bikinis walk past and wave to them, saying, “Hi, Bra Shakes.”

Both men reply, “Hi.” They catch each other’s eye.

“No,” says Bra Shakes, “I’m Bra Shakes.”

The camera cuts to a closeup of the other man. It is none other than Shakes Mashaba, former Bafana Bafana coach. “I’m Bra Shakes,” says Mashaba.

The app works as advertised, although I felt a little silly shaking my phone until a graphic circle filled the screen. But this is aimed at the younger crowd, for whom airtime and data are often much needed. There are also 12 cars to be won, and a grand prize of a million rand.

This is a vibey, fun refresh of a campaign that proved its mettle. Well done to Vodacom and its brand team for an advertising effort that drives efficacy and great returns.

Credits

Agency: Ogilvy & Mather South Africa
Chief creative officer: Matthew Barnes
Creative director: Nashville Mungofa
Copywriter: Balekane Mokoditoa
Art director: Nyiko Mahange
TV producer: Helen d’Hotman
Brand lead (client service): Kim Kullmann
Senior digital project manager: Brandon Schimper
Production company: Bomb Commercials
Executive producer: Gavin Joubert
Director: Teboho Mahlatsi
DOP: Werner Maritz
Post-production company: The Upstairs Ludus Johannesburg
Special effects: Sphere
Editor: Andrew Trail
Grader: Michelle Wilson
Online operator: Schalk van der Merwe
Audio engineers: Sean Williams and Lorens Persson

Ad of the Week, published on MarkLives every Wednesday, is penned by Oresti Patricios (@orestaki), the CEO of Ornico, a Brand Intelligence® firm that focuses on media, reputation and brand research. If you are involved in making advertising that is smart, funny and/or engaging, please let Oresti know about it at clientservice@ornicogroup.co.za.

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Dissident Spin Doctor: Resisting change doesn’t make it go away

innovation by jarmoluk courtesy of Pixabay 770

by Emma King (@EmmainSA) It’s easy to start lamenting about the end of days for our industry and about the glory days of past. But there is value in seeing the current tough times as a vehicle of opportunity instead.

The last few months have not told tales of Mad-Men-like decadence and creative glory but, instead, have whispered of retrenchments, shrinking budgets, disappearing clients and iconic businesses closing their doors. Grim times, indeed. But innovation works best in times of financial hardship, and recessions generally show a surge in startups and entrepreneurial thinking. This makes sense. Why change things when everything is easy? Limited resources, however, force us to change and find new ways of doing things.

The ad industry, as it stands, has been a lumbering behemoth of a dinosaur for eons. I cannot count how many clients have complained about huge account teams, lengthy creative processes, and, most importantly, the eye-watering fees that are needed to keep the beast alive. Yet, although many of the big agency bosses have known this deep down inside, they have been unable to radically change this business model, as they struggled to keeping feeding this beast on a daily basis.

Exciting

But, during these times of limited resources, of financial hard times and economic decay, wouldn’t it be exciting to see we may be forced to radically relook at what we do and how we work?

With massively reduced creative and account teams comes the need to critically relook at how they are structured. It really doesn’t need an account executive, an account manager, an account director, a business unit director, a traffic manager, a production manager and three creatives to take and implement a brief or sit at a shoot. So why keep working that way?

Can clients not deal directly with the strategists and creatives that are the custodians for their brands, and can account managers not amend the odd line of copy every now and again, instead of briefing 10 other people to carry out a job-bag instruction? It seems silly spelt out like this but, in reality, it’s how many of the bigger agencies are working — and these same agencies are the ones that are struggling when the client questions their budget.

Clever thinking

Smaller hot shops that create beautiful work quickly and nimbly with teams and costs at a fraction of that of their larger counterparts are picking up the work which the big boys are missing out on. And clever-thinking entrepreneurs are looking at ways of delivering services and talent on a pick-and-mix basis, rather than lumbering on with massive teams on retainers — think Uber for the ad industry, if you will.

We’re entering into scary times and we’re all going to have to tighten our belts a bit. But resisting change doesn’t make change go away — just ask Kodak and VHS. Instead, seeing this economic downturn as an instigator for innovation may just be the thing that kickstarts this industry into the next century.

Emma King (@EmmainSA) is the owner and MD of The Friday Street Club (@TheFridayStClub). She is allergic to bad grammar and ampersands, but likes working her way through piles of novels and travelling the globe. She contributes the monthly “Dissident Spin Doctor” column on PR and communication issues to MarkLives.com.

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Shelf Life: Beautiful News a winning formula

MarkLives Shelf Life slider 31 October 2017

Cheryl Hunter (shelflife at marklives.com)’s weekly pick of all things new — product, packaging, design, insight, food, décor and more!

Ginkgo’s Beautiful News reaches 500m
Bringing Showmax alive
Marlboro Originals’ latest MAL Art Series t-shirts

Inspiring South Africa

Content marketing platform, Beautiful News, has achieved its target of sharing 365 uplifting short films in one year about the positive South African experience, reaching more than 500m consumers across all platforms.

Created by Ginkgo Agency, and made possible by Mercedes-Benz South Africa, Beautiful News is a dedicated to unearthing inspiring, uplifting and authentic South African stories. From its launch on 1 November 2016, it set out to share one short film every day, telling a positive South African story. Today it delivers on that promise with 365 stories that celebrate the SA spirit.

Statistics supplied by BMI indicate that Beautiful News achieved total international reach of over 500m and a market research survey, conducted by Publicis Machine on behalf of Mercedes-Benz South Africa, showed 70% of the sample audience felt hopeful about the future of the country after viewing Beautiful News, compared to just 47% pre-exposure.

Says Adrian Steirn, founder of Ginkgo Agency and Beautiful News, “It has resonated beyond South Africa by reaching over 67 countries. Content was shared with local and international passengers through distribution partnerships with Airport TV, Mango Airlines, African People Mover, and the V&A Waterfront. By delivering daily authentic and meaningful content that is beautifully crafted, we have cut through in an always-on environment and engaged a growing and loyal audience.”

Selvin Govender, marketing director at Mercedes-Benz South Africa, adds “Partnering with Beautiful News allows MBSA to continue its legacy of supporting South Africa at its best and has afforded us an opportunity to meaningfully engage with our audience beyond the buying cycle.”

Beautiful News will continue to deliver on its promise of releasing one short film at 4.14pm every day.

beautifulnews.co.za • Facebook • Instagram
ginkgoagency.com • Facebook • Twitter
mbworld.co.za • Facebook • Twitter

For the love of stories

With internet TV service, Showmax, as a client, it was important that The Star Film Company’s Jonathan Parkinson created a commercial that felt as cinematic as the thousands of shows available on the channel. The result? A heart-warming new ad about a grandfather trying to connect with his granddaughter.

https://youtu.be/2zcLO1LAAWo

Written by Showmax’s creative team, “Love of Stories” reveals Ernest Ndlovu as a lonely but resilient 75-year-old grandfather and Unathi March as his easily distracted five-year-old granddaughter, who together keep the balance between realism and emotion alive.

Says Phi director Parkinson, “I always enjoy working on stories that are real and authentic, so I was really drawn to this script. Everyone on the Showmax team was willing to explore, and they appreciated the strong push towards the emotional, rather than the practical, going for ‘feel’ rather than overloading with too much information.”

According to Nicola van Ast, head of acquisition for Showmax, a strongly emotional ad was chosen because SVOD is jargon and internet TV can be scary: “We needed to bring our brand into people’s homes and hearts. Then, just maybe then, they’ll be open to being educated on how to use our product.”

showmax.com • Facebook • Twitter
starfilms.tv • Facebook

Profit with purpose

Men’s clothing brand, Marlboro Originals, has announced the launch of a limited edition Make a Living, Make a Life (MAL) Art Series collection at its store at the V&A Waterfront, Cape Town.

The launch encourages South Africans to “wear it forward” as proceeds from sales of this quirky new designer range of T-shirts go towards building libraries in township schools.

Mike Schalit, founder of MAL, says this is the first of many collaborations between MAL — the not-for-profit arm of creative agency Net#work BBDO — and South African brands looking to give back to communities: “We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give. It’s time South Africans explored more sustainable ways forward, where the ‘haves’ are able to put something back into society but, hey, have some fun — be mal — do it with gees and style.”

The range includes eight Marlboro Originals t-shirt designs, produced in grey and white. Everything is locally sourced and produced.

ideas4good.co.za • Facebook
marlborooriginals.co.za • Facebook

Shelf Life is MarkLives.com’s weekly column covering all things new. Notify us of yours at shelflife at marklives dot com. Want to sponsor Shelf Life? Contact us here.

Cheryl Hunter (@cherylhunter) has written for the South African media, marketing and advertising industries for more than 15 years. A former editor of M&M in Independent Newspapers and contributor to Bizcommunity, AdFocus, AdReview and the Ad Annual, she has also produced for various television networks and currently consults on communication strategy and media liaison.

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

The Martini Shot: The state of SA commercial production 2017

office-feedback-exchange-of-ideas courtesy of Pixabay

by Bobby Amm. With the commercial production industry in flux, and the economy under strain, sustainability has become a hot topic. Nothing clarifies it like the annual survey of the Commercial Producers Association (CPA) of South Africa. This year, we’ve uncovered some striking results that put things into perspective.

More about the survey

Every year, the CPA runs a survey to determine the size and scope of the industry and to identify opportunities, challenges and trends. The results are collated into two sets of data:

The total group: 40–50 survey participants in any given year
The control group: 30 South African production houses that participate every year

Although the number of companies surveyed isn’t high, most large and medium players are involved, so we believe the results are good reflections of the industry. In fact, the control group alone accounted for R1.25bn in turnover in the last year.

2017’s survey results

Number of commercials: A total of 703 commercials were made at a cost of just over R1.6bn — a conservative evaluation considering that not all companies participated.
Shoot days: To make these commercials, 1 680 shoot days were needed and the average daily budget was just short of R1m.
Different commercials: Slightly more local commercials were made (368) than service commercials (305); local directors made 30 commercials for international agencies.
Production footprint: As much as 58% of the commercials was filmed in the Western Cape, while 39% was made in Gauteng and 3% in other provinces.
Largest client: Germany was SA’s largest client, with 74 commercials produced. The UK came in second with 72, followed by the US (51), France (40), and Scandinavia (26).
Production expenses: Crew remuneration is the biggest expense when making commercials, followed by equipment hire. These areas account for almost 50% of the total costs. Other significant expenses include: set construction and art (13%), location fees (5%), talent (9%), and post-production (6%).
Location expenses: While production remains affordable in Johannesburg, escalating costs are making it difficult to produce commercials in Cape Town. With its relative inaccessibility, the region is consequently becoming a service-only destination.

What this means for us

After a surge in 2014, the industry appears to be dipping, mainly due to a rise in production costs and no notable change in turnover. In the control group, the cost increase is more gradual but the trend persists — indicating that budgets aren’t increasing in line with costs.

As the gap between cost and turnover widens, so, too, does the risk to the industry. This is a red flag for us: other countries, after similar phenomena, have taken years to recover.

Losing overseas clients

Another trend we’re seeing is that CPA members are missing out on international work. We believe the reasons for this could include a combination of the following variables:

Global uncertainty: Brexit, Trump, North Korea, terrorism… the world is an unstable place at the moment, making clients less inclined to travel.
Exchange rate: The UK has lost its place as our biggest client base, mainly due to Brexit and the weaker pound. The rand had also been gaining strength against the dollar and euro, which could make shooting in South Africa more expensive this season.
Destination fatigue: Many clients are looking for new, fresh locations. To an extent, SA has priced itself out of the market, so countries such as Portugal, Thailand, and some South American countries are emerging as the new players.
Political & economic instability: SA isn’t as politically stable as it used to be. This sways clients (particularly newer ones) into choosing other countries. We’ve also been in the grips of a local recession, which causes prices to rise, too.
The greed factor: Some international clients believe South Africans have become greedy. Departments are larger than they were a year ago and talent want to be paid handsomely for working remotely. With little inflation at home, overseas clients may find it difficult to understand the SA tendency to increase costs.
Red tape: Although there’s been a substantial improvement in the admin surrounding locations and visas, it still deters clients from using SA. Jobs are lost every year because a director is not available in person to apply for a visa.

Our industry’s future

On the one hand, views on the coming season are mixed, with a lot of concern from those who market to clients abroad. On the other hand, we have reason to be optimistic as we have a solid reputation in the production world for hard-working crews and quick-thinking solutions — not to mention our great SA hospitality. We need to concentrate on keeping costs to a minimum and reigniting our brand internationally.

While some of these concerns are rooted in elements beyond our reach, there are many issues that can be addressed with some creative flexibility. If we work together to secure these jobs, we may be able to turn it around — for all of our sake.

Bobby Amm is chief executive of the Commercial Producers Association of South Africa (CPA), the trade association of production companies that produce television, cinema and internet commercials for the local and international market. After a brief stint in journalism, she began her career in the industry at the Consultative Committee for the Entertainment Industry in the early 1990s. She first joined the CPA in 1997 but left three years later to join a production company. After finding that she missed the big-picture perspective of the CPA and the interesting issues which continuously perplex the production industry, Bobby returned to the CPA in 2003. She contributes “The Martini Shot” column monthly, covering developments, trends and insights into the commercial production and film services industries in South Africa, to MarkLives.

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Pendoring 2017 winners

by MarkLives (@marklives) The 2017 Pendoring winners were announced at the annual awards evening held at Vodacom World in Midrand, Johannesburg, on Friday, 27 October 2017. Of the 10 Golds that were awarded to agencies, The Odd Number walked away with four, followed by J. Walter Thompson and 7Films/Y&R South Africa with two each. Joe Public and Abnormal Group were each awarded one Gold.

Umpetha Award

For the second year running, the advertising agency, The Odd Number in Johannesburg, walked away with Pendoring’s sought-after Umpetha Award for the best advertisement in an indigenous language, excluding Afrikaans. The Odd Number’s winning campaign (in Zulu), titled Hell’s Kitchen, was created for BBC Lifestyle. No Prestige prize was awarded.

In terms of silver, Joe Public and Ogilvy & Mather Johannesburg each took four, followed by Abnormal Group, Black Khaki and FCB 1886 with two each, and FCB Cape Town, Just Design, Fort, Newton’s Third, Lucan, 7Films and The Make Beautiful Agency with one silver each.

Besides the single gold trophy in the student category that went to Greenside Design Center College of Design, silver was awarded to: Northwest University (two), Stellenbosch Academy of Design (two) and Red & Yellow School of Logic and Magic (Cape Town) (one).

The judges also awarded a once-off prize for an outstanding Afrikaans Public Service advertisement. 7Films and Y&R South Africa took the laurels for their TVC, Everybody Knows, for the Western Cape Government.

All the winners

Category	Title	Award	Language
Television/Cinema Commercials with a production budget exceeding R1m	Silly Spender	Silver	Zulu
Television/Cinema Commercials with a production budget exceeding R1m	Vat die Stof my Bra	Silver	Afrikaans
Television/Cinema Commercials with a production budget under R1m	Everybody Knows	Gold	Afrikaans
Television/Cinema Commercials with a production budget under R1m	Pocket	Silver	Zulu
Television/Cinema Commercials with a production budget under R1m	Krieket	Silver	Afrikaans
Television, Film & Video Communication: Internet Video	Ag Shem	Silver	Zulu
Television, Film & Video Crafts – Direction	Everybody Knows	Gold	Afrikaans
Original Afrikaans	Vat die Stof my Bra	Silver	Afrikaans
Communication Design: Brand Identity & Collateral Design – Posters and Billboards	Campaign: Die toep vir tuinmaak	Silver	Afrikaans
Communication Design: Three Dimensional & Environmental Design – Package & Industrial Design	Keldermeester-versameling	Silver	Afrikaans
Communication Design: Motion & Digital Graphic Design – Broadcast Design and Graphics	MTV Base Africa Channel Rebrand	Silver	Zulu
Integrated campaign	The Ridge	Gold	Afrikaans
Outdoor & Out-of-Home: Ambient and Alternative Media	Campaign: Bossies oor Baarde	Silver	Afrikaans
Print Communication: Newspaper Advertising	Campaign: Spasie vir die hele gesin	Silver	Afrikaans
Print Communication: Magazine Advertising	Campaign: Kopseer	Silver	Afrikaans
Print Communication: Indoor Posters	XXXL Chips	Silver	Afrikaans
Print Communication: Indoor Posters	Zam-Buk Pocket-sized Heritage	Gold	Zulu
Print Communication: Outdoor & Out of Home Crafts – Art Direction	Zam-Buk Pocket-sized Heritage	Gold	Zulu
Radio Station Commercials	After Tears	Gold	Zulu
Radio Station Commercials	Campaign: Valentines	Silver	Zulu & Sepedi
Radio Station Commercials	Campaign: Hy het daarvoor gevra	Silver	Afrikaans
Radio Station Commercials	Campaign: Valentine’s Day Inner Peace	Silver	Zulu
Radio Station Commercials	Campaign: Amagxaba Angay’zolo	Gold	Zulu
Radio Station Commercials	Campaign: Hell’s Kitchen	Gold	Zulu
Branded Content – Radio	Zazi Mother’s Day Dedication	Silver	Zulu
Radio Communication Crafts – Performance	After Tears	Gold	Zulu
Radio Communication Crafts – Performance	Campaign: Hell’s Kitchen	Gold	Zulu
Retail Communication	GeCell C	Silver	Afrikaans
Retail Communication	Silly Spender	Silver	Zulu
Student Integrated Campaign	Suiwerbek Slingersous: Rêk Jou Bêk in Jou Eie Dialêk	Silver	Afrikaans
Student Print Communication	Campaign: Kalklig – Geslag en Gevangenis	Silver	Afrikaans
Student Communication Design – Collateral Design	Wild op jou voorstoep	Silver	Afrikaans
Student Communication Design – Logos and Identity Programmes	“Shibit! Soet en Suur Grafies Ontwerper”	Silver	Afrikaans
Student Communication Design – Logos and Identity Programmes	Umoya by DJ Zinhle	Silver	Zulu
Student Communication Design – Publication Design	Reviving the “Bantu Symbol Writing” into contemporary visual culture	Gold	Ndebele
Overall Student Winner	Taurai Valerie Mtake for her entry Reviving the “Bantu Symbol Writing” into contemporary visual culture in Communication Design	Ndebele
Umpetha Award	The Odd Number for their Campaign Hell’s Kitchen in Radio Station Commercials	Zulu
Public Service Award	7Films, Y&R South Africa for their entry Everybody Knows in Television commercials with a production budget under R1m	Afrikaans

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

Gerry Human’s 23c on what it takes to be a C#D

Gerry Human DPS within Creative Director book slider

by MarkLives (@marklives) Instead of looking back at Net#work BBDO’s last 23-odd years, Mike Schalit, founding partner and CCO, thought it’d be more instructive to look forward and see what wisdom could be identified on what does it really take to direct creativity. The result? The Creative#Director (C#D) coffee table book, curated by Schalit and designed by Emma Strydom. Over several weeks, MarkLives is featuring the pearls of wisdom from five of the 30 participants — next up is Gerry Human.

In order to create C#D, Schalit approached as many creatives as possible who’d passed through the agency’s doors since its birth, in May 1994, as the very first agency in the new South Africa, and posed six basic questions.

Gerry Human
Global ECD, Ogilvy & Mather London
Years at Net#work BBDO: 3.5

Mike Schalit chose a fitting quote when he wrote to us about the idea for this catalogue: “Life is lived forwards yet understood backwards.” It’s so true of advertising people — most of us haven’t got a clue what we are doing, or why. Creative directing is a type of cultivated naivety. Or perhaps just plain old naivety.

Basically, not the most scientific of jobs. Apologies if you were hoping for a deep and meaningful theory here; if so, you may be better off turning the page now.

But since you are still reading, either you’re my mum or you have some spare time on your hands. In which case, may I suggest you pick up an entirely different book: Malcolm Gladwell’s “Outliers” — a brilliant hypothesis about the factors that contribute to success. According to his “10 000 hour” rule, the key to achieving world-class expertise in any skill is, to a large extent, a matter of practising the correct way, for that mind-boggling length of time.

Well, I’ve been at it for over 50 00 hours, and I still don’t know my arse from my elbow. In most jobs, people get paid to do a similar thing over and over again. The thing about advertising is that, no matter how much experience you have, you never get to do the same thing twice. We are paid to be original. Even with access to vast quantities of data, sophisticated testing methods and complex behavioural analyses, there is unfortunately, no correct way to have, or evaluate, an idea. Instead, you have to develop, and carefully hone, a certain part of your anatomy that you come to depend on. It’s not the grey and wrinkly one you’re thinking of. Or the other one. I’m talking about your gut. (No doubt there are quite a few of those amongst the esteemed members of the C#D Club.)

Because that’s what I believe it takes to be a great CD. A great gut.

So, dear die-hard reader, with the caveat that there is no truly correct way to creatively direct, here are a few suggestions that may help you develop a six-pack of your own:

To be the best, learn from the best. The closer you get to the epicentre of creativity, the faster you grow. I was lucky enough to learn from brilliant creative leaders at TBWA\Hunt Lascaris, Net#work BBDO and Ogilvy. John Hunt taught me that nothing is more valuable than an idea; Schalit helped me figure out how to actually have an idea, and Robyn Putter initiated me in the art of gut-trusting.
Build a virtuous circle, not a vicious cycle. The best people always want to be where the action is. Make great work that millions of people love and talk about, and talent will flock to you like ants to a picnic. Use your well-honed gut and pick the right ones; they will feed off each other’s energy and talent, as well as yours. Don’t build a team of yes-men/women. The work will get boring and so will you.
Don’t take credit; give it away. As in any leadership position, it’s your job to help others look good. Not yourself. Resist the urge to point out how clever you are.
Spend time reviewing ideas, not spreadsheets. Don’t get caught up in admin. There are lots of people in the agency who are paid to do that stuff. You will make the biggest difference to the bottom line if you spend your time reviewing, wrangling and discussing how to make creative work better. And it’s more fun than arguing about the dismal state of the third-quarter revenue forecast.
Learn to be dumb. It is crucial to have a thorough understanding of your client’s business. Repeat: crucial. Paradoxically, it also helps to be naive. Because you always need to look at things afresh. Don’t waste too much time analysing, navel-gazing and seeking strategic perfection. To make a great sculpture, all you need is a block of stone. Creativity by its nature is original; it takes people by surprise. How can you do anything new if everything is prescribed at the outset?

There, I’ve just saved you 5 000 hours. Just do it.

God is in the detail. Mies van der Rohe is probably turning in his grave but I reckon advertising is a bit like architecture. If you get one piece wrong, the whole thing falls apart. Months, and sometimes years, are spent planning and testing ideas, so it’s easy to lose sight of the important bit. Which is obviously the stage when you’re making stuff. Obsess over detail. If the whole is more than the sum of its parts, the parts had better be pretty damn good.

Do not roll over and die. At Ogilvy Joburg, I was affectionately known as the Roach, apparently because I refused to die. Charming, eh? You don’t have to fight for everything, but it’s important to stand up for what you believe in. Ironically, really good ideas are hardest to sell, because people don’t always know what they like, but they like what they know.

If you haven’t yet developed a cast-iron gut feeling, an unbreakable exoskeleton is handy.

Mike Schalit: Major achievements at Net#work and thereafter?
Gerry Human: Winning the Virgin Atlantic account was a highlight. It was in the mid-90s, but I remember the pitch like it was yesterday. We just had a lot of fun and the clients loved it. Fun is infectious. Bankable, even.

MS: Best piece(s) of work at Net#work that made you proudest?
GS: Virgin Atlantic “Gorilla Lock” print
Castrol “Doubles” TV
Fiat Uno “Icons” print

MS: Most spectacular failure at Net#work?
GS: Attempting to take on Deon Hug at vodka shots.

MS: Most-significant work/achievement post Net#work?
GS: Exclusive Books “Zimbabwe” (HarrisonHuman)
Coke “Brrr” TV/integrated (O&M Joburg)
Topsy Foundation “Selinah” TV (O&M Joburg)
Dove “Ad Makeover” social media (O&M London)
Dove “Camera Shy” TV (O&M London)
Expedia “Luggage Tags” print (O&M London)
Expedia “Travel Yourself Interesting” TV/integrated (O&M London)
28 Too Many “Flags” print (O&M London)
Kronenbourg1664 “Farmers, Le Big Swim” film/integrated (O&M London)
Philips “Breathless Choir” film/integrated (O&M London)

MS: Crazy idea that we as a C#D collective could collaborate on to make a dent in the universe?
GS: Give young people easy access to the phenomenally talented C#D Club. Host a C#D creative Instagram page. Allow a different group of learners to take over the page every month (give them the password, etc). Ask them to upload three great ideas. Ask/remind CDs to post simple comments (or even just hearts). Promote the event every month.

MS: A final provocation?
GS: It so happens that the Rugby World Cup took place in the UK in 2015. On the morning of the semi-final between South Africa and New Zealand, a South African colleague told me that a group of ex World-Cup-winning Boks would be taking an early morning jog, starting from Trafalgar Square, and that anyone was welcome to join. I’m no die-hard fan but I thought it sounded like a laugh, so I showed up (in the rain) at dawn and, together with about 300 people, followed Francois Pienaar and a pack of veterans as they trotted down The Mall, straight towards Buckingham Palace. It was pretty random. No security. No roadblocks. No organisers. Just a ragbag of fans running amok through one of the most-gentrified boulevards in the world. People were smiling, singing and waving South African flags. Afterwards, we gathered around and Pienaar made an off-the-cuff speech about the forthcoming match. Out of nowhere, the crowd, decked out in green and gold, spontaneously belted-out “Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika”.That rainy morning in October was a potent and emotionally charged scene that, to me, embodied a uniquely SA blend of characteristics: spontaneity, passion, imagination and irreverence (mixed together with a healthy ability to laugh at ourselves). I think it’s this lively cultural mélange that makes South Africans such exceptional creative leaders. Long may it live.

MS: A final provocation?
NM: “One who sows the seed will not enjoy the shade. The one generation sows the seed, another waters the seed, another prunes, another enjoys the shade. It is an intergenerational sacrifice.” —Unknown.

Ogilvy Cape Town aligns with new global integrated model

Ogilvy & Mather Cape Town. Source: Facebook.

by Herman Manson (@marklives) Ogilvy & Mather Cape Town has set about a major internal restructuring process that aims to reorientate the agency and the way it operates. The new structure does away with the siloed approach to specialist skills and accounts management as it merges creative studios and account teams across its various specialist agencies and departments, including PR and digital.

When the agency set out to build out its specialist skills in 2014, explains managing director Luca Gallarelli, it actively pursued a level of independence in the specialist teams in a bid to attract both talent and clients.

Clients were shopping for agencies by specialisation, and talent wanted to own a stake in the business units they were building. Each unit had its own identity, management team, client roster and KPIs, even as they sat inside Ogilvy & Mather Cape Town.

The result? Three profit and loss (P&L) centres, 22 departments and multiple management teams. Different systems and processes developed inside each unit, adding an additional layer of complexity to the business.

“Clarify, Simplify, Unify”

When John Seifert, Ogilvy worldwide CEO, made a call to “Clarify, Simplify, Unify” — a call for all disciplines and Ogilvy brands to unify under a single Ogilvy umbrella — it immediately resonated with Gallarelli and his team in Cape Town. “What I have personally always loved about our best campaigns was the fact that they were difficult to define by discipline or category,” says Gallarelli. “We fundamentally believed that our future would lie in a structure that deployed this kind of thinking across more, more often, faster, and with greater ease for agency staff and clients alike.”

According to Gallarelli, his team had seen dramatic shifts in client behaviour since attention has moved from seeking specialist skills to efficiencies as procurements departments have become more involved in the agency/client relationship. A steering team to drive a unified agency offering was assembled, and it designed a new structure that has lead to a single P&L and management team, anchored by four quadrants (client interface, delivery, strategy and creative) and four support functions (finance, marketing, IT and HR).

Client interface sees 30 clients clustered and led by six teams, each headed up by a managing partner partnered with a creative lead. “Clients are now organised into portfolios that make the most sense for them and their requirements of us,” explains Gallarelli. “Existing specialist unit MDs (PR and digital) [will] assume the role of portfolio leads on two of those six portfolios, each containing their former ‘pure-play’ clients plus more who naturally orientate themselves to these disciplines, and populated with staffers who are better cast to deliver against our and our clients ambitions.” Managing partners may access anybody in the agency as per client requirements.

Combined studio

Creative sees a combined studio under the leadership of executive creative director, Tseliso Rangaka, supported by Nic Wittenberg in the newly created role of associate executive creative director. The studio is configured into teams reflecting the client mix, with Melissa Attree, head of content and PR creative director, leading a portfolio of PR-orientated clients alongside Carlos Carrasco, who leads the digital and UX team.

Strategy, under the leadership of Kristel van der Vliet, has seen a single, integrated team established, including numerous specialists (such as data and insights) who now have access to a broader resource. Delivery focuses on production, which has seen a new systems backbone deployed in Workbook. Previously, Chase had been deployed — agency management software which, Gallarelli says, no longer suited the restructured work model. Workbook has been customised for the agency and is designed to support its operations; it becomes an enabler but sits in the background. Management software is no longer a hurdle holding back operations.

“We needed to find a system that would seamlessly connect all our disciplines and departments, allowing them to behave in an agile and collaborative manner,” says Gallarelli, “a system that would facilitate, not impede, communication. Critical in achieving this is the reduction of admin time, with focus on shifting time, energy and focus significantly towards our work and clients; this [has been] be our highest priority. In addition, we wanted a system that would deliver a state-of-the-art user experience for our employees. In other words, a system built for tomorrow and not over-reliant on yesterday’s thinking.

Workbook

“After a global search, Workbook presented such a solution: a product created by a company headquartered in Denmark from where they serve and service many other global clients. We have worked with the team from Workbook over the last 18 months to tailor the system to our specific context and requirements, resulting in a truly bespoke system.”

Workbook, continues Gallarelli, comes with a long list of features, facilitating an efficient flow of jobs and work through the agency, including job creation and management; project management tools tailored to its project management methodologies; in-depth resource management capability; easy-to-use financial control tools with real-time tracking of job progress, resources deployed and time spent to date; and modern and easy-to-use features that enable better and more efficient communication (eg chats, document share, etc).

Workbook lives in the cloud, which allows staff to access it from anywhere, either via the site or its mobile app. “This allows us to remain fully connected, all of the time.”

Delivery a priority

Delivery is a priority for Ogilvy Cape Town; clients are taking issue with agencies’ inability “to get stuff done on time and on budget,” according to Gallarelli. The industry often lacks proper oversight and control, and the notion of traffic has become archaic. “With responsibilities for delivering complex integrated projects effectively shared by account management, traffic, and specialist producers, it often falls on the shoulder of account management to hold it all together; this often sets them up as the enemies of both internal and external stakeholders. The answer was to completely reframe what we meant when we spoke of delivery. Delivery in our world [has] become an ‘end-to-end’ process that include[s] anything that happen[s], from the moment a brief lands to when work is produced and deployed. Under the leadership of Daniel Menges as our newly appointed head of delivery [formerly MD of OgilvyOne Cape Town], we have built a professional ‘project management office’ that includes all project managers, resourcing (formerly traffic), specialist producers and any internal production capability that exists.”

Gallarelli talks of an agnostic delivery team that sits inside client account teams. with traffic becoming a resourcing function that looks at organisational and account capacity.

The agency has reconfigured its building to reflect its new structure and do away with what Gallarelli refers to as ‘tribalist departments’. Management has moved down to the third floor, alongside the creative department, to force greater movement between the different floors.

Resolving organisational anxiety

The previous, complicated structure had been impacting on operational complexity, he says. “With P&L complexity come a matrix of reporting lines and with it, at times, conflicting agendas.” The new model resolves a lot of this organisational anxiety.

While the agency has been relatively quick to implement the new model, for Gallarelli, this is a multi-year project that will see the agency continue to evolve over the next five years. Ultimately, its aim is to create an agency nimble enough to respond quickly and efficiently to client needs, to inspire greater creativity inside the agency, and more opportunities for people to collaborate. Traffic as gatekeeper disappears, and a more-direct relationship is established with clients.

Rangaka says the new model creates a balance between the need for efficiency and the required chaos needed in an agency to produce creative work. Inside the studio, he ensures team members are the right fit for client work, with teams clustered around brands. Senior people have the opportunity to guide juniors, and junior team members have the opportunity to engage more regularly with clients. Team members are up-skilling as team expertise now bridge media. He and other creative leaders also have greater access to financial information inside the agency; they know how much revenue an account generates and what their budgets are for placing personnel inside the different teams.

Truly modern

“This is the largest structural undertaking by the agency in well over a decade,” says Gallarelli, done in an effort to meet Ogilvy’s own ambition to be a truly modern agency, configured in a thoroughly reimagined way, underpinned by new systems, processes and personnel to deliver against what the agency has determined are the fundamentals of modern marketing. “With this move, we have made a significant step towards achieving the stated ambition of ourselves, our people and, most importantly, our clients.”

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

— Sign up now for the MarkLives email newsletter every Monday and Thursday, now including headlines from the Ramify.biz company newsroom service!

The customer age

CMO to join forces

Owning the change

References

Further reading

Replicating success

Change the mobile game

Truly remarkable feature

Strategic advantage

Uncharted territory

FM radio waves

Ham radio

Simple and basic

Credits

Exciting

Clever thinking

Inspiring South Africa

For the love of stories

Profit with purpose

More about the survey

2017’s survey results

What this means for us

Losing overseas clients

Our industry’s future

Umpetha Award

All the winners

Category

Title

Award

Language

Gerry Human Global ECD, Ogilvy & Mather London Years at Net#work BBDO: 3.5

See also

“Clarify, Simplify, Unify”

Combined studio

Workbook

Delivery a priority

Resolving organisational anxiety

Truly modern

Gerry Human
Global ECD, Ogilvy & Mather London
Years at Net#work BBDO: 3.5