There is still a long way to go to achieve true gender equality — especially when it comes to women’s health.

Sexism is still rife when it comes to the public discourse around women. Just look at how the BBC described the resignation of Jacinda Ardern as New Zealand Prime Minister — 

questioning if “women can have it all”.

In fact, whenever you see a female leader or high profile figure stepping down, the 

 focusing on their gender and how it has impacted their decision or career never seem far away. When Susan Wojcicki stepped down from YouTube, or Serena Williams retired from tennis, they were quickly tied into wider conversations about women leaving high-profile positions.

One week on from the 112th International Women’s Day, there is still a long way to go to achieve true gender equality. Especially when it comes to women’s health. Yes, there is more open discussion than in previous generations. Unfortunately, that discussion is often through a negative lens or lacks the nuance and insight that comes from better knowledge and education.

If society, and the workplace, is going to genuinely progress and champion its women for their successes then real change is needed. That means introducing policies and initiatives that help reframe the conversation around women’s health, support women in the workplace dealing with symptoms, and enable men to play their part.

 are in the workplace than ever before. That means, at one point or another, a significant proportion of your workforce will navigate menopause and ageism stereotypes. With recent studies revealing 

over one million women are considering quitting their jobs

 due to a lack of menopause support, policies must empower women and factor in the entire journey.

At mSix&Partners, we have recently introduced a menopause policy where women can request adjustments at work and are afforded greater flexibility and adjustable working patterns when they experience symptoms. The policy also grants female employees coping with anxiety the use of a wellbeing room where they can undertake relaxation or mindfulness activities. At the end of the day, women should know their employee has their back if they experience symptoms, and managers should be educated on what support the company can offer.

Women of all generations need to show up and support each other, rather than fall into the trap of competing against one another. Mentoring is a great way to connect female colleagues of different ages and seniority levels to make sure questions you might have thought were taboo can be asked in a safe space, and we can learn from each other.

Where possible, agencies should extend those opportunities beyond their employees. For example, we also host gatherings with the Brixton Finishing School where attendees can learn from inspiring women in the industry and understand more about day-to-day agency life.

Female health is an ongoing journey and women should have the tools at their disposal to navigate their path. The key is maintaining regular conversation around the topic. Not only does this normalise symptoms in the workplace, but it educates people (of both genders) on what support to offer or to seek.

This could be in the form of regular talks and workshops from experts in the field or, as we do at mSix&Partners a subscription to an app or service centred around female health. We offer our employees access to ‘Clue’ to help navigate anything from periods to fertility, through to menopause. And a partnership with Modibodi provides all women in the agency free sustainability sanitary wear.

Creating an open and trusting dialogue — encompassing everyone from those experiencing female health-related issues, to those seeking advice — comes down to senior women in the agency speaking openly and honestly.

This doesn’t mean everyone should be forced to open up on every aspect of their life. But being open to offering guidance and advice, or at least pointing people in the right direction, can be enough to make sure women across the agency don’t feel isolated or unsure about what the next step may be. Thankfully, this type of leadership is increasingly the standard when it comes to mental health. It should be the same for women’s health.

For gender equality to become a reality rather than a pipe dream, the needs of the modern workforce need to be accounted for. By doing that, we can help women of all ages and demographics thrive — and lay the foundations for the next Jacinda Arderns of the world to make their mark.

How far have we really come on gender equality?

The hype machine was already buzzing along quite loudly at the start of the year with AI predictions when 

Described by Reynolds himself as ‘mildly terrifying but compelling’, the spot underscored that the robots aren’t quite here to steal creative jobs, but that experimentation with AI tools is rife in adland and spiking interest among clients. Where Metaverse was 2022’s buzzword, so AI has leapt into the marketing vernacular and certain brands have been quick to embrace the emerging technologies.

In the interest of research, ChatGPT was of course consulted to write this introduction. According to the chatbot sensation developed by OpenAI: “Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionising the advertising industry. As AI continues to evolve, it will become an even more powerful tool for advertisers.”

It's an overwhelmingly positive synopsis – unsurprising given that the tech tool wasn’t going to underestimate its own potential impact within adland, but while there’s enthusiasm and excitement from many departments, there’s no denying that the robots are not without their challenges.

As Dickon Laws, global head of Innovation, Ogilvy states: “Like all emerging technologies, the hype around it has also created a goldrush. Brands can be guilty of foolishly chasing a headline for a ‘world’s first’ or other reputation building claim. In reality, what happens is they often think they are heading for a goldmine but wake up in a minefield. AI is incredible but also offers huge brand reputational and legal risk. Make sure you have the right motivations and risks and measures in place to navigate away from the landmines and into the gold dust.”

And while the generative capabilities of AI have driven much of the recent hype and ensuing client interest around AI, Ogilvy’s past work has explored machine learning including teaching AI to recognise facial expressions in dogs for the Petz brand. More recently, the agency used DALL-E’s outpainting feature for Nestle’s La Laitière brand, taking a Vermeer painting and giving art direction to generate new imagery in keeping with the original work.

AMV BBDO recently worked with AI tool Midjourney to create a new campaign, "Unbottling Martini", which aims to visualise the tasting notes, ingredients, processes, and flavours that come together in a bottle of Martini.

As creative director João Paulo Testa explains: “Keywords such as: botanicals, floral, petals, flowers, Artemisia, and Roman Chamomile were fed into Midjourney to generate the images of nine different cocktails made with Martini, including the Martini Non-Alcoholic Vibrante & Tonic, Martini Americano, and cocktail of the moment, the Negroni Sbagliato. The assets have been used across social and digital platforms in markets globally, and Martini was the first spirits brand to launch a creative campaign with imagery generated entirely by AI.”

But prompts aren’t always so seamless adds Oliver Feldwick, head of innovation at The&Partnership. “Write me a haiku about sunflowers is a fun prompt”, says Feldwick, but how do you prompt an AI tool to write an ad, to give it a creative task that actually improves it? “It’s actually really hard to make even a basic ad using AI end-to-end – but what is far more interesting is to use the tools to shortcut some of the more boring tasks. Write an email heading (for example) is playing perfectly to its strengths.”

Agencies are also investing in AI experimentation internally with tools such as 

 and ChatGPT to improve operational efficiencies and to prompt and fine-tune processes. And with client curiosity rising around AI, this can only be an opportunity for better collaboration believes George Strakhov, chief strategy officer of DDB EMEA.

“If these are the tools that trigger the conversations around how we come up with ideas – the guts of the creative process - and what roles humans play on both client and agency side, then, I see this as a massive moment of supercharging creativity.”

Agencies will have their own proprietary AI and digital colleagues (aka synthetics), that clients may also evaluate when considering agency partners, believes Ogilvy’s Laws. And AI could help with the rostering process, with clients using it to assess the impact of an agency relationship and agencies using predictive technologies for new business pitches.

The rapid pace of change in areas including SFX and computer animation will also result in a more fine-tuned result for AI tools which will increasingly become more plugged into workflow and processes believes The&Partnership’s Feldwick. However, he strikes a note of caution for 2023 adding that businesses may have to take a step back to overcome historic challenges.

“So many companies have been making huge strides in representation and addressing unconscious bias, in terms of the assets we show, the language we use and our casting decisions and more. All of these things have been a huge process of learning and understanding and changing but if we aren’t careful, with AI tools, all of our historic bias can accidentally be baked into that. If you use Midjourney or DALL-E to create images and without specifying, it generally generates white faces. So, if we aren’t careful about how we prompt the machine and the learning data set it uses, then algorithmic bias will occur.”

Strakhov sees the potential however for tools spotting what humans have missed in the past, stating that large teams of creatives have on occasion failed to spot bias. He explains: “We can train tools specifically on bias, on words, on how we use these as pre-screening tools, to flag either green light for fine, or flag that actually you need to look again - the machine won’t make the final call, but the machine will flag.”

Despite these reservations, there’s a palpable excitement in the industry about the advances to be made as AI tools develop and usage is refined. Strakhov cites the advent of visual and verbal intelligence coming together (art and copy) as a key beat in powering forward the creative process, arguing that real creativity happens when multiple intelligences collide – so if AI is embraced correctly, a further augmentation of this will occur.

“We need to push for multiple intelligences to now come together in terms of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, neurodiversity, and age, which is currently massively underrepresented. Why I’m excited about AI tools is not only will we see the partnership between humans and machines, we will also see that partnership to allow all the other aspects of intelligences and creativity to collide. If we do this right as an industry, there will be a massive outburst of creativity.” It's a positive outlook that is echoed by many across adland who believe that in fact, the robots are our friends.

This article was first published by Creative Salon.

The Robots Are Our Friends: How Adland Is Embracing AI

Amid the noise of the latest Westminster dramas, it would be easy to miss signs that some green shoots of pragmatic governance might be breaking through. From anti-inflation measures to progress on the Northern Ireland protocol, the government is displaying more long-term thinking than we’ve seen for years. The Labour Party, too, under the increasingly adept leadership of Sir Keir Starmer, is putting focused and practical policymaking above political showboating.

Time will tell whether Rishi Sunak’s measures will produce the goods, but that’s the inherent challenge of policymaking. Tackling entrenched problems requires commitment and resolve, a tension exacerbated when there are barely two years on the electoral clock.

Now Jeremy Hunt will try to address the challenge of setting Britain on a path to long-term growth. He must do so alongside delivering on the government’s other priorities of cutting debt while shielding us from the worst effects of the cost of living crisis.

That tension between short-term expectations and long-term goals is familiar to businesses everywhere. The parallels with chief executives, obliged to report financial results to shareholders quarterly, are obvious. However, I know as founder of The&Partnership that there’s another way. We run our business differently — as a partnership, owned and managed by a group of partners that grows alongside the business.

Partnership has been the secret of our success for more than 20 years, from early days as an advertising agency with three partners to today as a multi-disciplinary network with more than 1,500 people in 45 offices globally, led by more than 45 partners. In a market where progress has been elusive, it’s helped us to sustain average annual growth of about 17 per cent for a decade.

The biggest advantage of the model is the long-term, strategic perspective it gives us. Independence means we can set our own agenda and growth timetable, allowing us to make decisions in the long-term interests of our people, clients and business. A bit like a political term of office, at The&Partnership we do our planning in five-year phases, each with a simple goal. As we near the end of the latest phase, we can reflect on another period of consistent growth, thanks to a commitment to our clients’ digital transformation. And over the next five years we’ll focus on being a marketing commerce partner to our clients.

I’m not saying that being a partnership means a business won’t have challenges, but on balance I think the true value of partnership has been “knowingly undersold”.

Britain’s structural and economic challenges won’t be solved overnight, but we must hope the prime minister and the chancellor continue to apply a long-term perspective to policymaking that lays down strong foundations for growth. They could begin by addressing the digital skills gap, which costs the UK £63 billion annually. This is an area where we’ve taken that all-important long view, launching our The&Academy last year, the first centre of excellence for apprentices in digital and creative skills. I’d also suggest they try to provide incentives for more companies to explore partnership-oriented models — anything to encourage the eyes-on-the-horizon planning that government and business so sorely need.

Johnny Hornby is founder, global chief executive and chairman of The&Partnership

Partnership can help with that all-important long-term view

Artificial Inspiration – how AI can help when you’re stuck for ideas

As more people get hands-on experience with generative AI tools, a range of applications are coming to light. One use case, particularly close to my heart, is that it can supply an endless source of inspiration for when you are stuck for new ideas. Here are 3 ways I’ve been using AI for inspiration:

When you first receive a brief, and you are staring at that intimidating blank sheet of paper or PowerPoint template you can quickly generate some thought starters by asking questions about the brand, category and audience. At the very least it’s a quick and easy way to gain context.

One tip from Julian Cole, of the Strategy Finishing School, is to structure your request to get more useful information. Alongside the question you want answered he suggests ensuring each query includes a speaker (e.g. your audience segment, or an influencer in the category) and any requests about the form of the answer (e.g. 10 bullet points).

Act like a reality TV fan, list 10 reasons why you love 90 Day Fiancé

Crazy characters! The cast of this show is just wild, and I love it. There's always that one person who is just so out there and entertaining to watch.

’ Which could lead you to explore a responsive strand, as you identify the most entertaining characters.

Cross-cultural interactions! As someone who loves learning about different cultures, I find the cross-cultural interactions on this show fascinating.

’ Which could lead you to explore an audience cohort who are interested in learning about different cultures.

Of course, this process cannot replace traditional research, and these points should always be validated. One watch-out is to consider where bias might be creeping in – by asking the AI to behave like a reality TV fan I have asked it to adopt a stereotype, which will naturally downplay minority audience opinions.

Some briefs require you to imagine a very different mindset, which can limit your creativity. For example, you may be struggling to think about winter in the summer, or to really immerse yourself in a product’s emotional benefit. AI image generation can get you into the mood and even on your way towards ideas.

For example, if you have a brief for a Halloween launch, you can quickly explore themes with Midjourney to generate some new and visually-arresting imagery, helping you feel spookier:

By following where your inspiration takes you and generating additional imagery you can quickly put together a mood board which can also be used for brainstorms and briefings.

We tend to kick off a brainstorm with a ‘splurge’ – generating as many ideas as possible, some of which can be built up to become great ideas.

AI can replicate this, generating some starting ideas, which you can use to test your territory or strategy (does it lead to good ideas?), to give you examples to share in a brainstorm or to directly help you build a great idea.

suitable for a 35-year-old female on her car being a reflection of her personality

 generated lots of ideas, including some I quite liked:

Add a unique car fragrance that suits your personality or mood

Install a unique audio system with a personalized playlist or sound effects

Install a dashboard camera to capture her driving experiences

Add a personalized car organizer to keep her belongings tidy and organized

You can then use your research AIssistant approach to help you build. For example, with the idea of creating a car fragrance I could ask: ‘

If I was to create a car fragrance that reflected individuality and independence, what might it smell like?

A woodsy scent that evokes the outdoors, nature, and freedom. This could be a scent like pine, cedar, sandalwood, or patchouli.

 Which could, in turn build into a bigger idea about how media could be used to intensify the feeling of freedom.

Generative AI can help you research, generate stimulus, be a sounding board and can do all these things in a rapid and adaptable way. It never gets bored of a topic, or annoyed if a question is obscure or your feedback is harsh. However, while it's good at helping to assist you, you are still required to put the work in to validate, guide and build, but if you are willing to do this, you’ll likely never be intimidated by a blank sheet of paper again.

In the spirit of this article, I asked Bing Chat ‘

If I had writer's block, how might you help me?

I can help you by providing you with some writing tips and resources that can help you overcome writer’s block. For example, I can:

Suggest some writing prompts that are relevant to your genre or topic.

Recommend some books, articles, podcasts, or videos that can inspire you or teach you something new.

Generate some creative content for you, such as poems, stories, essays, etc. that you can use as examples or inspiration.

Give you some feedback on your writing and suggest some improvements or edits.

So, I asked it for feedback, and I was pretty pleased at the response:

Overall, I think you have written a very interesting and informative article that showcases some of the possibilities of using AI for inspiration. Well done!

This article was first published by WARC, click below to read the full article.

GAMING: THE MARKETER’S PRIMER – The biggest niche brands can’t afford to miss

Reconsider how we think about Social Platforms

Gen Z has become synonymous with Social Media and TikTok in particular, in fact, according to Business Insider, by far the most time is spent within TikTok for 16-25 year olds – almost triple that of Snapchat or Instagram. However, when we also consider penetration, YouTube stands out in front with 93% (versus 78% on TikTok) of the Gen Z population. As the relatively new player, these engagement metrics explain why TikTok advertising growth is still increasing exponentially in the face of marketing spend challenges as brands seek to be present where this audience is.

Interestingly for brands too however, is the contrast of how these platforms are used by 16-25 year olds. For example, over 40% of Gen Z now turn to TikTok or Instagram before Google to ask for holiday destinations, restaurant recommendations and more as their search engine of choice. With that in mind we now need to consider how an SEO strategy typically developed for Google should expand across TikTok, Instagram and beyond. Similar shifts are happening within messaging, news and shopping destinations too.

To understand when and where brands should show up across this platform mix, it’s key to note that 80%+ of Gen Z expect brands to join the conversations they care most about. For example, recent GWI analysis shows that 40.9% of Gen Z are worried about climate change and want to be present on TikTok as the sustainable educators who have been using the platform to share sustainable fashion tips, sustainable beauty product hacks and ways to curb climate change. They are turning to more sustainable brands and have become more curious as to where and how products are being made with 66% prepared to pay more for a sustainable brand. You can use hashtag trends within the platform itself as well as 

 to uncover live trends by market and audience with which to shape your content and conversation.

2.	Be prepared to think Video-first (& to sometimes break the rules):

There has been a tectonic shift in video consumption in line with the platform engagement we saw above. For brands to reach this audience, authentic, online video is critical and paying attention to platform best practices will drive the best results. For example, for this attention-short consumer group, shorter is usually better – indeed a recent Yahoo study found that Gen Z loses active attention after 1.3 seconds which explains why the dominant ad format on Snapchat is 3-15 seconds. We recommend using (and defining your own) benchmarks for video consumption and to develop native content tailored to each platform for maximum results.

However sometimes breaking the rules can pay off. Hilton’s 

 campaign recently launched, offering TikTok-ers the chance to win 10,000,000 Hilton Honors Points if they stayed for the full ad.  At 10 minutes long the ad is right at the upper limit of TikToks video ad length and 

 longer than the recommended 21 – 34 video spot length. But despite that, the ad went viral as soon as it launched and proved that with the right creativity (and reward) brands can capture the attention of the “fast scroll generation” with longer-form ad content.

Capitalise on the Commerce opportunities where Gen Z are most engaged

For many D2C brands, the added imperative of capitalising on Gen Z behaviours, is the growing Shoppable platform capabilities within the Social environments they are most active within. As this digitally native group grows in spending power and online engagement share, brands who can think Gen Z-first will stand to benefit the most.

This is particularly true now that we’ve seen TikTok become joint leaders with Facebook in the percentage of US shoppers buying on their platform. Driven mostly by their shoppable capabilities rolling out and becoming fully operational, this is a key moment for brands to capitalise on growing Gen Z TikTok usage to drive business return.

And what’s perhaps even more powerful for brands seeking to drive product discovery across this audience, is that platforms such as YouTube and TikTok invite participation. Enabling Gen Z to like, comment and share, speaks directly to their desire to create not just consume content – in fact 83% of TikTok-ers have created their own video content themselves. And this UGC content has the power to transform the traditional marketing funnel by allowing your customers to directly power your brand.

Gen Z’s buying power is growing, how should marketers be speaking to the Social Video generation?

The time is right for this challenge; the original works by Binet and Field, ‘

Marketing in the Era of Accountability’ 

 [2] are now a decade old. This work put TV at the heart of brand building, but since then the media consumption landscape has changed dramatically.

In 2013, and taking the US as an example, TV, radio, and print dominated with 53% of media consumption minutes. Within this, TV delivered 4:30 minutes per day (38%). At the same time, digital channels accounted for the 4:50 mins (40%).   But by 2022, US TV, radio, and print consumption had fallen to 34% and US mobile and desktop had grown to around 62% of consumption (although total media consumption minutes have increased by around 15%, likely due to mobile ubiquity) [3]. Most significantly, US mobile consumption has almost doubled from around two hours per day to over four. Patterns for the UK are broadly similar, with 2:26 mins on TV in 2012 failing to 1:42 in 2022 and 24:00 mins per day in Social growing to 1:17 mins by 2022 [4].

Against these tectonic shifts, Binet and Field’s 2013 argument that TV is the prerequisite brand-building channel must be challenged and, as a consequence, we need to ask, how do we build brands in digital media?

Traditionally, TV has been the place where ‘System 1’ messaging has been delivered through  emotional connections, fame and reach.  System 1 messaging is a core ingredient of fame building. This type of communication aims for high mental availability and fast effortless decision making through ubiquity - which is essentially, fame.  At the core of this thinking is reach - reaching as many of your potential audience as possible. Put in a slightly different way by the late Jeremy Bullmore, “if you want to be as famous as BMW, it’s no use being known only by the tiny percentage of the population who can afford to buy your car today”.

Until recently, digital channels have been used primarily to target these “tiny percentages'' with System 2 “buy now” messaging. But this approach severely undervalues the reach potential of digital channels.  According to IPA Touchpoints the post lockdown high reach digital media channels are social media and functional internet (commercially funded websites which are not for media, social media or communication e.g. search, shopping, researching). These channels can deliver 70% to 80% weekly all-adult reach, putting them on a par with commercial TV and way ahead of commercial radio, magazines, newsbrands and cinema.

Of course all this means moving your guardrail KPIs from performance to brand metrics like attitudinal shifts, recall, preference, purchase intent, and 

 brand growth. Measurement and monitoring techniques need to shift uplift experiments, MMM and tracking studies.

The shifts in focus that are required to build brands in digital are summarised in the table below:

By changing the way we plan, activate, measure and benchmark digital channels we unlock their ever-expanding potential to build and reinforce brand attributes and, in doing so, prove it's now  time to move beyond the long and short of it.

Marketing in the Era of Accountability’

The Long and the Short of it: Balancing Short and Long-Term Marketing Strategies’, 

‘Average time spend with media in the US’, 

Making Sense: the Commercial Media Landscape’

Why we must learn how to build brands in digital media

This article was first featured in Chamerblink Magazine. Click below to read the full article.

A new route on offer into a creative career

The array of AI based applications and models that seem to be making the mainstream are admittedly impressive - and indicate another leap here in the technology and its accessibility.

The language model that underlies Chat GPT is part of what has made it so compelling to go into the platform and see what it is capable of, usually with some incredible results. The conversational tone this chatbot strikes so as to aid in making sense of huge stores of information through text summaries are realistic, extensive, and impressively context sensitive.

On initial enquiry into this topic area, it was worthwhile exploring what Chat GPT would come back with if asked “can you explain how language models in AI will have an impact on marketing?” And unsurprisingly, it was a very solid answer:

Language models in AI can have a significant impact on marketing in a number of ways.

One way is through natural language processing (NLP) which can be used to analyze and understand consumer sentiment and preferences from social media, customer reviews, and other forms of unstructured data. This can provide valuable insights for marketers to improve their campaigns and target their messaging more effectively.

Another way is through the use of chatbots and virtual assistants, which can be used to interact with customers in a natural, human-like way. This can improve customer engagement and experience, and can also help to automate customer service tasks and free up resources for other activities.

Additionally, language models can be used to generate personalized and engaging content, such as product descriptions, email subject lines, and social media posts. This can help to improve the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and increase customer engagement.

In summary, Language models in AI can help marketers to better understand their customers, interact with them more effectively, and generate personalized and engaging content that resonates with their target audience.

If this was what this article set out to answer, it would be easy to conclude that it was a job done. However, upon reading this, it became apparent that underlying all its possibilities, there needed to be a jumping off point that could, for instance, elicit the discovery of those valuable insights that are said to be a benefit of AI in marketing.

Much like how we aim to distil the challenges we hope that the media can answer through questioning and inquiry, we also need to take care with the use of such language models and review what are the prompts that bring the most interesting answers - and encourage further creativity. And its functionality in which it constantly asks and incorporates human feedback as they interact with the chatbot.

This is reassuring - perhaps this curbs the sense that AI might not have full dominion over marketing professionals, particularly those that work within the realm of content.

Further to that, when you play with the platform, you begin to see its limitations in being seen as a replacement. Yes, there is value in this step change when it comes to interacting in preexisting places where chatbots are a regular feature. But outside of that, how much potential does it have to upend human understanding of conversation and language?

We still need that ‘human’ lens to make the most of this technology. We should therefore see Chat GPT and similar chatbots with these more impressive language models as an instrument for playing with the knowledge that it pulls from.

There are some great guides out there that detail what prompts could be used to get the output you are looking for - such as offer context, include helpful information upfront, give it examples. And how else would you get some of the very humorous examples that are currently circulating the internet at present?

As we see the emergence of these language models grow and evolve, it is for marketers to begin to see this as another (impressive) tool that can add to the process of both insight gathering and creativity.

Conversational AI is only as useful as its enquirer

Step 1 - Understanding the mindset of 2022’s holiday shoppers

Klarna (flexi-payment provider)  have released a global report on holiday shopping across the globe. It suggested that holiday shopping was still going ahead in full force, with circa 50-60% of consumers planning to spend the same amount as last year. The prospect of spending less vs spending more is then very different per market - for example in the US 40% of consumers said they plan to spend more, vs just 15% in Italy.

With general prices for goods and services increasing significantly since the start of the year, has/will this have an impact on how you shop for the holiday season?

When looking at demographics, reduced spending appears to be higher amongst older generations and women, whereas increased spending is amongst younger generations and men.

Step 2 - Early results we are seeing from around the world

Early indications in the US (via Retaildive.com) suggest that overall holiday spending in 2022 did increase from 2021 by 6.7%. This does appear to differ per holiday spending event - circa 8.4% on thanksgiving, 6.9% on black Friday and Cyber week, and 6.5% during Christmas.

This is mainly driven by inflation though, meaning thanksgiving volumes only rose 0.2%, and Black Friday and Cyber Week volumes dipped by 1.1%, while Christmas and other holiday season volumes declined by 1.6%.

https://www.retaildive.com/news/holiday-season-consumer-spend-grew-seven-percent/639598/#:~:text=Per%20GlobalData's%20report%2C%20consumer%20holiday,in%20line%20with%20GlobalData's%20findings

Early indications in the UK highlight there was a surge in shoppers on Boxing Day 2022, when footfall rose 38.8% higher than in 2021 - when shoppers were urged to stay away from the highstreets and opt for online shopping if possible.  It's worth noting though that the gap between the end of 2021 and 2022 was at its narrowest on New Year’s Eve, which impacted footfall at only 1.9% higher vs 2022.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jan/02/footfall-slumped-27-on-british-high-streets-after-christmas-data-shows

Step 3 - How this impacts our media decision making in 2023

As demand remains, brands should be confident to maintain investment with an always on approach, but look to optimise where possible for efficiency vs making drastic cuts - i.e. trimming budget from channels of lower ROI or reallocating spend to higher margin products within the portfolio based on supply and demand.

There is no one size fits all approach when it comes to consumer spending, in particular holiday and gifting moments. Identifying the behaviours and needs of the audience segments you are targeting in the market alongside wider category trends is key. Custom research may be required to fill any gaps/deliver real time intel.

Think omnichannel, understanding the role your owned channels play in a price conscious path to purchase is key for efficiency and real-world insight. It might be that consumers are visiting your instore/website to explore the range, but then head to 3rd parties to find the best deals. Incentivising owned channel engagement therefore is key to maximise profitability vs relying on promotions and discounts.

Following the flow of new shopping behaviours

Agencies are meant to simplify the complex to both ensure strategic clarity and build the confidence necessary to de-risk marketing investment decisions. From a data perspective, there is a risk that simplification may lead to reliance on out-of-date data and imprecise targeting. It may also result in value being left on the table for advertisers, in the form of inaccurate understanding of the market and of how it is moving. At worst, agencies risk straying into unethical practices.

To navigate the complexity the right way we should question the tenets that have guided agencies for decades and rethink the very idea of target audience.

From rigid cohort definitions to multiple and dynamic contexts

People change minute by minute and behave differently in different contexts. The ‘pen portrait’, by contrast, is where key facts about a single target audience are used to create a persona. This has its place in the early phase of strategic planning, but needs to be enriched as it is often derived from survey data, and so can be out of date. This poses significant limitations in all product categories. Given the economic turbulence predicted for 2023, relying solely on historic data will likely be a gamble that doesn’t pay off.

Any long-run ‘bullseye’ audience must be augmented with the plurality of data available. Comparing sources ranging from cultural context to AI-originated platform data and on-demand research can help differentiate between data anomaly and underlying human truth, and so inform businesses’ strategic priorities.

In an age of increasingly addressable media, audience targeting based on any available attribute may be misleading. Use of demographics, such as age, location or gender, can too easily turn from a sensible to an arbitrary shortcut. At its worst, blunt targeting can engender discriminatory advertising practices.

Rather than targeting input, demographic attributes should be considered descriptive outputs. They help understand, for instance, that the average age of consumers turning to brand 

 is higher than that of consumers preferring a competitor. Advertisers, however, should not fall in the trap of excluding potential customers arbitrarily. Agencies should uncover the underlying mindsets and contextual moments leading to demographic biases, to create inclusive and engaging content.

While some truths about people are unchanging, others are fleeting and conditional. It is hard to distinguish between the two by looking only at data snapshots. Drawing on and combining multiple data sources, by contrast, helps an understanding of the bedrock beliefs that unite a cohort, together with the momentary trends and collective obsessions shaping culture. In this way, agencies can not only grasp market trends, but also predict consumer behaviour more accurately, even in an unstable economic environment.

Many publishers, platforms and advertisers aim to create a 360-degree customer view for their ad trading. Insights derived from any single platform, however, are limited. Triangulating data sources from client and publisher, or agency and platform, delivers a more trusted and robust perspective on any given target cohort.

There is no such thing as a brand audience defined once and for all. Each audience segment needs to be explored and understood in its own terms. Experimenting with modelling techniques to establish the incremental contribution of every target group is key. This means that every cohort needs simple and measurable KPIs.

The red thread connecting product design, client marketing, agency activation and measurement should be as consistent as possible. When a new data model is devised, all teams need to work with the same cohort data, which must include consumers’ attitudes and motivations.

All of this is for naught if agencies act in a socially irresponsible way. Data ethics must be at the heart of agency work. Advertisers, for example, should not track data of uncertain origin but have systems in place to ensure not only legal compliance, but ethical compliance for any use of data.

 Departing from traditional audience planning and embracing a signal-led approach will empower agencies and their clients. By relying on evolving, real-world, consumer behaviour data, rather than static models, agencies can maximise the efficiency of advertising campaigns and align clients’ needs with the cultural and economic context. This will unlock a new world of opportunities powering brand growth in the challenging times ahead.

This article first apeared here: https://newdigitalage.co/agencies/moving-on-from-target-audiences-the-six-principles-of-signals-planning/

Moving on from target audiences: the six principles of signals planning

 communicates. What brands do and don’t do can send out signals for others to make sense of and when the environment in which a brand exists becomes more political, contentious, or controversial, what a brand chooses not to say can be as telling as what they do say.

Successful brands don’t have to be challengers to position themselves ‘versus’ something and creating or adding to an existing cultural movement, whether positioned explicitly as ‘doing the right thing’, or simply a show of values or ‘what we believe in’ can become a real competitive advantage for brands.

So, whilst making and taking a stand is a solid business strategy for the likes of Nike (share price +22% since their 2018 

Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything

.) and Airbnb (successful IPO and Mkt cap of $60bn since their 2017 Super Bowl Ad #WeAccept), it doesn’t mean that promoting a viewpoint on societal issues is right for every brand.

Over 13 years ago Simon Sinek compelled leaders to 

 a talk which triggered an obsession in marketing with brand purpose and whilst purpose can be an powerful way of organising and inspiring businesses when executed well (

), its ability to win over customers is only effective if the brand story is authentic and relevant. Consumers (and investors) are quick to see-through purpose that exists merely as a marketing exercise.

“The Hellmann’s brand has existed since 1913 so we would guess that by now consumers have figured out its purpose (spoiler alert – salads and sandwiches).”

– Terry Smith, Chief Executive & CIO of Fundsmith

Brands that aren’t evidently organised behind a brand purpose aren’t however exempt from knowing where they stand on matters of ESG, DE&I, human rights, or the support for LGBTQIA+ communities; these are not ‘hot topics’, they pose inherent questions to businesses that consumers increasingly demand to see action on.

The role of the CMO is therefore intrinsic to developing and deciding how a brand positions itself, where it shows up and whether it acknowledges the thing that divides opinion, what’s right for one brand may not be right for another regardless of any political leanings.

Therefore, companies increasingly need to have a strong sense of their brand's own moral code – a 

 – that guides decision making. CMOs are invaluable here, armed with a skillset that few possess, their customer expertise.

Customer obsession is the guiding light through any difficult brand decision and is vital to navigating new and changing developments that influence customer opinion and behaviour.

“The CMO is the chief representative of the customer – nobody else gives a $#@£ about customers in the organisation…We are the ones that say what the customers are doing or thinking, and bring that into the boardroom.”

– Mark Ritson, brand consultant and former marketing professor

Where once there was little of concern for marketers; be it a World Cup (don’t mention the Q word), big tech (take your pick; Meta, twitter, TikTok), supply chain issues (UK

), green credentials (advertising adds extra 32% to annual carbon footprint of every person in the UK) or a cost of living crisis (95% of marketers say economic recession will have an impact on 2023 marketing strategy), the challenge now is to get it right with customers.

Not over-reaching, or doing/saying too little, is a unique pressure that marketing departments face. A 

 of CMOs at 100 top-spending U.S. brands revealed that on average they stay in their posts for 40 months – less than half of the average of CEOs – with CMO tenure at a decade long low, the contributions to building brands can last far longer than they do.

To make better decisions, marketers must listen to, understand and develop a deep knowledge of their customers to make the right calls. Developing a strategy from what is true of the brand and find creative and engaging ways to connect with consumers, creating positive associations and making the brand easy to think of and easy to buy.

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