Planonymous: A Call to Arms
For the entirety of its existence, the advertising industry - and everyone in it - was focused on achieving competitive advantage for brands. Not any more.
Instead, the focus of most people on both sides of the aisle is now on achieving ‘value’ in all its guises: lower CPMs, fewer FTEs, reduced commissions, lower margins, etc. etc.
Holding companies trim their operating margins every year (for margins, read people) in a seemingly endless quest to deliver the same work for less money in an inflationary environment.
The annual reports of each of the large holdco’s trumpet their investments in AI: IPG are investing $100m. Publicis are planning €300m. WPP think it’s too early to tell if their £250m investment will mean job losses. I reckon I know. Accenture estimates over 40% of the roles in the Communications and Media industry are ripe for augmentation or automation via AI.
They’re doing this at the behest of large advertisers, many of whom are already leaders in their category, who believe that it’s safer to prioritise value first, and brilliance second; easier to minimise exposure to risk in their advertising investment than attempt to maximise their return.
The ‘laws of growth’ have created a playbook for high-spending, low-margin advertising stasis in many categories, and algorithms have perfected the art of hoovering up category demand that already exists.
No space for thinking. Or ambition. Everything safe. Everything the same. Nothing capable of changing the status quo. No wonder we’re seeing so little economic growth. “The memorable never emerged from a formula,” to quote Bill Bernbach.
But in an industry consistently chasing value, is what’s low risk for your client or your business actually high risk for your career?
What’s stopping you from being traded in for someone (or something) cheaper in next year’s quest for efficiency? If the work coming out of the other end of the planning process is designed to obey the same set of rules every time then what’s the job of the agency planner? Or the marketer? Omnicom’s AI tool can build media plans and target ad audiences. Isn’t that your job?
Marketing professionals create competitive advantage for themselves by making work that creates competitive advantage for their clients.
Competitive advantage in advertising is the product of brilliant planning and strategy: finding a novel route to growth, properly understanding the nuances of a particular brand or category, getting under the skin of the unique, irrational complexities of the customer, or forging a distinctive place in culture.
Planning is a rarer skill than it used to be, and less recognised by industry awards than it deserves to be, but it’s still the best way to create work that achieves what advertising was always meant to: get a brand noticed, make sure it’s remembered positively and create outsized sales growth with the ability to command a price premium.
And it’s only this sort of work - work underpinned by great planning - that can guarantee you as a marketer to get noticed, be remembered positively and command a price premium of your own.
But it’s tough to hone your skills when your personal development goals are out of sync with the goals of the organisation you work for. So we want to help.
Selfishly, because the next generation of great planners and strategists are the future of our business, but also because we love what we do, and believe in it, and want to fly the flag for the enormous power great work has to deliver growth for businesses and economies.
So today we launch PLANONYMOUS: a training course, delivered free-of-charge, to help ambitious planners be the best they can be, but aren’t quite sure how to get better or who to ask for help.
If you are - or want to be - a planner or a strategist, we’ll help you understand what great planning work looks like and how to set about making it.
We know for some of you it might be a little embarrassing or frowned upon to take up the offer of training from a competitor agency, or an agency not on your roster, so you’re welcome to attend anonymously. We’ll need an email address to share the details but we’ll deliver the courses virtually and you’re welcome to keep your camera off and change your name on screen.
It will take an hour and a half of your time, late on a Friday afternoon (don’t worry, we won’t tell), and we guarantee it will pay back a hundredfold in your quest to make work which will help you stand out in an industry preoccupied with sameness.
If you would like to sign up to our first session, this will be on 30th May. If you’re interested, sign up at planonymous@craftmedia.london.
