A Vigorous Debate: The Balancing Act Between AI and First-Party Data

Anthony> It is definitely the dominant discussion point. People are approaching it from multiple angles, but the obvious one that everybody's discussing is generative AI. To be honest with you, I'm excited about that because it brings creativity back into the equation versus ways to save money and doing more for less. 

Anthony> It's a vigorous, vigorous debate. On one side of it, you have data privacy concerns - consumers either blocking stuff or choosing to opt out, the list goes on. So, you've got people who are basically removing themselves from our ability to understand who they are to be able to market and advertise more effectively to them. But on the other side of it, you have an inextricable link to this notion of infinite generative advertising and marketing. A brand and agency can make the perfect messaging for you, because they can make a billion different versions that will resonate with you - but you can only really do that if you have the first step. I feel sort of stuck in the middle. We can make everything, but we haven't yet earned the right and the trust for people to be able to believe that we will make the thing that's most valuable to them. That equation and balancing act definitely has to be discussed more. 

Anthony> Fantastic question. It's about less is more, at a minimum. We know that the youth of today are using ad blockers and ad filtering pretty effectively. With this burgeoning rise in people just opting out of everything, how do we earn their trust back and give them control over what they see? There's the notion of moving from ad blocking tech to ad filtering tech, where there's more opt-in optionality for consumers to control what they see. But then you have to figure out the math model behind that from an advertising, media and publisher standpoint, so they're still getting the revenue that they need, whilst probably serving a lot less clutter on the page.

Anthony> The idea of being able to step into experiences, stories and immersive environments is going to be extremely powerful and compelling. Ultimately, I think that AR is going to be nuts when it works. It's the thing I'm most excited about because we live in a highly immersive dimensional world and we're very much used to it, so layering into that information and communications that go way beyond just dynamic billboards or the attention-seeking devices that we have in our lives is going to be quite extraordinary. It will have completely different ways of telling stories and getting people engaged in brand narratives.

Anthony> We've come a long way in, I think, a reasonably short period of time. Even if you just think about what this festival was called at one point to what it's called now [festival of advertising versus creativity], to the ever-increasing sets of categories and recognising what creativity is. [It celebrates] the idea that creativity is a fluid environment that constantly adapts to new kinds of media and new technologies. I think everybody is now more open to that being a constant, it's a fundamentally different world than maybe it was 10-15 years ago. But that doesn't mean that we've got all of it right and it doesn't mean that our embrace of some of these things means that we're using it the right way for the right reasons, both in the short term and long term. But people's ability to accept it and lean into it and determine how they can use it in an advantageous way that makes things more meaningful, valuable, and bespoke - I think we're mostly there now.

Anthony> Well, failing forward fast is not an uncommon practice. So, culturally, I think that people are open to it. You have to navigate it a little bit. A lot of our clients, for example, are thinking about where to lean in and not risking everything everywhere, because a lot of complexity could plausibly lead to us not succeeding in anything. We've been observing how, when and where to encourage our clients to explore new technologies, new principles of engagement, new media models, and create little incubation environments that allow them to feel comfortable that they're getting something that's moving their business forward.

Anthony> Well, I work within Publicis Groupe, which moved from a model of a holding company to a platform company five or six years ago. That was to unlock the possibilities of and the power behind greater levels of collaboration to create bigger impacts and outcomes for our clients. The muddling can be confusing at times if it's not orchestrated properly, but I will say that it unlocked the idea that anybody can be anything. I think it's healthy, it's just sometimes difficult for clients to navigate. For an organisation like ours, we help the client navigate it. They don't have to put any effort into that because we navigate it for them and then they have access to 100,000 creative people that bring wildly different diverse skill sets and we package it up in bespoke ways that deliver the greatest value to those clients.