The Big Impression

Major League Soccer’s VP of Brand Marketing, Jesse Perl, joins The Current Podcast to discuss how young people are growing more interested in soccer, the league’s deal with Apple TV+, and the importance of building local support for MLS teams.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

TTD_S8_E10_MLS//JESSE PERLMAN

Ilyse Liffrieng: (00:01)

I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian Fowler: (00:02)

And I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse Lieffring: (00:03)

And welcome to this edition of the current podcast.

Damian Fowler: (00:10)

This week we're delighted to speak with Jesse Pearl, the VP of Brand Marketing at Major League Soccer 

Ilyse Lieffring: (00:16)

For Millennials and Gen Zers. It almost feels like the MLS has been around forever, but actually the league wasn't founded until the USA's successful bid to host the 1994 FIFA World Cup. Before then, the US just wasn't a serious contender in the soccer game or football as it's commonly called across the world.

Damian Fowler: (00:34)

Times have certainly changed, but the league still has to compete with the likes of sports juggernauts like the NFL, which has long reaped higher viewership and fandom in the US. Jesse talks to us about the unique challenges the MLS faces compared to other sports leagues and how he's prepping for the upcoming 2026 FIFA World Cup and how he envisions MLS as a brand.

Jesse Perlman: (00:57)

I feel really kind of privileged to, you know, be in the role that I am because I think brand really guides how we think about what MLS is and, and what we stand for in the world. And I think there's no real separation, no real daylight between the MLS brand and and MLS. And I think it's really, it's kind of the, the DNA and and the heartbeat of who we are. And I think one of the first things about the MLS brand that's really important is that we are proudly North American. There's a lot of stuff in the world, there's a lot of sports in the world, there's a lot of soccer in the world. And being North American, being kind of uniquely North American, this idea of creating our own North American version of what soccer means is actually really powerful. And I think if, if we look at all these different places across North America, the US and Canada, where MLS is thriving, I think it is about being able to tap into something that really represents, you know, what those cities are.

Jesse Perlman: (01:49)

There's a kind of an attitude and a spirit of North America that is really kind of transcendent in culture, right? I think North American culture itself is, is an export. And for us it's this idea of being really positive and confident, but in a really sort of positive way. So this kind of infectious positive North American spirit and attitude where we're kind of getting to remix the best of international soccer as well as the best of North American sports traditions and kind of make our own thing out of it. We've got playoffs, right? That's not something that happens in soccer, but I think we just kind of witnessed why it's, why it's great. And all of that sort of creates this idea of, of another part of our brand, which is this idea that, you know, without overstating it, it's a soccer movement here that's happening in, in North America that's kind of sweeping North America. So how we get to all that really is through our supporter groups, our supporter culture, the TFOs, the chance, the Kapos, all the things that they kind of bring to the party is, um, it's really kind of the secret sauce of all of this.

Damian Fowler: (02:45)

And what's fascinating about this as well is the fast evolution of this. I want to sort of date myself and say I arrived in this country just after college in 1994, and that was when the US last time the US hosted the World Cup and now we we're seeing it's gonna be hosting it again with Canada and Mexico in 2026. So that's basically three decades, you know, and you've seen this tremendous growth of professional soccer. Could you talk a little bit about those bookends and you know, how you've seen the trajectory of the sport, how quickly the sport has grown in those three decades?

Jesse Perlman: (03:16)

It's pretty staggering, and I think even the biggest optimist, I don't think would've bet that we'd get to where we are as quickly as we did. The 2026 World Cup is such a great kind of marker to, to kind of measure these things because you know, our story, the story of MLS starts with the 1994 World Cup for sure, right? We fulfilled what the hope and the potential, you know, was, you know, we launched in 96, you know, on the heels of the 94 World Cup. And by the way, that's in no way to say that we're declaring victory in its job done for us. I think to be in 29 cities, to have the amount of soccer specific stadiums we have to have the support that we have in these MLS communities that are, you know, settin record attendance to look at media partnerships like Apple that I think are rewriting the scripts in sports media to have the current reigning ballon d’or World Cup champion greatest player of all time messy here in our league, you know, to look at the young up and coming players, homegrown players, stars from, you know, some of the most storied teams in in South America and players that'll also, you know, will sell for record fees that go on to win Champions league games.

Jesse Perlman: (04:26)

And, and so I think it's really, I think the complete picture of everything that we could have hoped to set out to do. But for sure, you know, the the best is still yet to come.

Ilyse Lieffring: (04:35)

But you know, North America, particularly the US I would say, aren't known for being big soccer fans. So what would you say are like the challenges and then the opportunities of marketing soccer in this context?

Jesse Perlman: (04:49)

You know, I do think it's changing when you look at youth, when you look at Gen Z, when you look at six to 14 and 14 to 18, and these critical ages of where fandom is really, you know, set and takes root, soccer's a top sport of interest, that's been the trend and that trend is continuing and it's really favorable for us as a sport. You know, millennials, right? Are, are now parents of young kids and, and we know the influence that parents have on the interest of, of their children. And there are some kind of studies came out, uh, recently naming MLS as a top 10 fastest growing brand along among millennials right there alongside our, our great partner, you know, apple tv. So especially as marketers means that we've just gotta constantly think about how do we infiltrate culture in all kinds of creative and, and unexpected ways that are, that are true to us.

Jesse Perlman: (05:36)

We've got nothing but respect and admiration for the other North American sports leagues, whether that's the NFL or NBA or I think what we've got all is respect and admiration. I think we're also able to kind of look at, you know, some of those traditional North American leagues as traditional. We really feel like we get the permission to to be the enemy of tradition sometimes. And, and, and we love that. So I think kind of being able to stand for the things that differentiate us is ultimately how I think we'll continue to, to win over time.

Ilyse Lieffring: (06:03)

Are there any numbers you can point to that show the growth of the MLS over these past three decades?

Jesse Perlman: (06:09)

Big picture. There's, you know, there's probably a few things that are, that do really kind of stand out and I think kind of signal the continued kind of really explosive growth. Um, you know, one of the most important in sports is attendance. And we're continuing to set record attendance year over year. We just had another record year. That's a huge indicator. You know, ultimately there's um, we're in entertainment, right? And we're competing against, you know, sitting at home on your couch and binge watch and Netflix and you know, going to the latest restaurant and whatever else you can do. And I think for people to be motivated to go out there, go to the stadiums in record numbers kind of says it all. And I think in addition to that, we can look at things like valuation of an MLS franchise. You know, I believe LAFC was reported in Forbes as just crossing the, uh, the billion dollar threshold for franchise valuation.

Jesse Perlman: (06:56)

I could tell you when I joined in 2007, 2008, that was not the value of an MLS franchise. And all those kind of economic indicators I think are, are really healthy. And um, even if it's not necessarily an exact quantified metric, you know, the ability to go out there and, and have a, you know, media partnership like Apple again, right, or Adidas partnership in these best in in category global brands, I think again is another indicator. And I think the last one that's worth mentioning is the brick and mortar kind of growth. Here again, I think when I started we had, you know, a handful of soccer specific stadiums and now virtually all of our teams are, if they're not already playing in a soccer specific stadium, they're in the process of open the doors on one.

Damian Fowler: (07:35)

One other thing that stands out to me is as to go back to that nineties thing, I remember when I came here, I could, it was hard to actually find, you know, international games on the dial, on cable channels. Obviously in the last few years we've seen this sort of flourishing of the game across many streaming channels. I mean, you can watch the Premier League on Peacock, you can watch Champions League on Paramount Plus and media and the presence of media is such an important driver of fandom. Is that one of the big factors for the MLS?

Jesse Perlman: (08:07)

No doubt. Similarly, right? Like growing up, you know, in the nineties being a huge soccer fan, right? You had to work so hard to seek it out. I remember running to the Barnes and Nobles to get my monthly magazine of 442 or World Soccer and um, that was how you stayed current. Now there's so much access, right? Ultimately I think that's a good thing for us, more people watching more soccer. I think it just, you know, increases the amount of interest and curiosity and, and conversation. And there's certainly a lot of, you know, competition for eyeballs. And you know, what we're trying to win more than anything is as hearts and minds. And, um, it's great for you to be a fan of other soccer teams and clubs and leagues and we really do embrace that. But if you're here in the US and Canada, you really can't get up close to that, right? And so being a fan of MLS just means something different. That's where we really feel like it's a huge differentiator that access, you know, to kind of be a part of an MLS community.

Damian Fowler: (09:00)

Can you talk a little bit about the significance of the Apple TV season pass?

Jesse Perlman: (09:05)

It's a game changer. It really is in so many ways. I mean, I think the first thing for me is as a marketer, as a, as a kind of brand leader, there's probably no brand that's more recognized and admired than Apple on the planet, the ability for us to become an Apple brand, which I think is what's happened, right? It changes the perception, the reach of Apple, the scale, the reach, the deep love and admiration for their brand that people have. All those are really just kind of the starting points. But when you get inside the sort of Apple world and you kind of realize and learn like how many incredible layers there are to their growing and expanding ecosystem of products and services and ways for MLS to show up and, and be a part of that, you know, we just officially wrapped our first season together.

Jesse Perlman: (09:50)

When we kind of think about all the things we were able to do as co marketers, even year one, it's been a really fantastic starting point and we had some incredible activations around Messi, his game here in New York. We were able to work with our friends and partner with them at New York, Red Bulls and Apple to have this, you know, kind of takeover in Times Square of a live viewin party that sort of traveled around the world. That moment of people gather in Times Square to to watch Messi on a giant Times Square billboard. And I think some of the real sort of inside culture things that we did with Apple Music, you know again, partnering with great club like Nashville had a kit inspired by a Johnny Cash, the Man in black kit working with the Johnny Cash Estate and Apple Music. We all kind of came together working with some incredible music artists and talents to cover Johnny Cash songs. And so these really kind of integrated kind of campaigns that we were able to to do. Um. 

Damian Fowler: (10:42)

I wanted to ask you, uh, Jesse, about the kind of cross-fertilization with international leagues. You know, I'm a big fan of Liverpool, I watch the Premier League every weekend and you know, obviously there's La Liga and then, you know, la bundesliga, all of those things, you know, and football from south of the border. How does that work? How is that an important factor in driving fandom and is it a sort of cross fertilization or is it like a separate kind of group of fans?

Jesse Perlman: (11:07)

No, I think, I think it's really additive are clubs that are really succeeding and have these, the thriving kind of fan bases that they do. Those fans are also fans of other international soccer teams and, and we love that it's part of the, the thing that we love about soccer as a sport for anybody that truly loves it, it's the kind of international dimension is like what makes it different than other sports, right? For me personally, it's been a lens to kind of learn about the world and learn about other cultures and it really kind of expands people. We're never shying away from that. I think we want everybody who's a fan and has a team in, whether it's in, you know, the Premier League or the Bundesliga or Serie A or anywhere else around the world, or Argentina or Mexico, Liga MX, you know, we want them to know that they're invited to still be loyal fans of, of those teams, whether it's passed down from generation to generation or something they discovered on their own. 'cause all that is complimentary, right? I think, you know, that's part of what being a soccer fan, you know, looks like. So we, we embrace it.

Ilyse Lieffring: (12:05)

As much as it's a global game. It's very much made up of very localized fans at the same time, how important are local efforts in each city? For instance, building stadiums or the infrastructure, how is that key to driving that local support or community supports?

Jesse Perlman: (12:25)

Really as important as anything. And I think it's been what's defined this incredible growth period for MLS. We were kind of chatting earlier about like what it means to be North American and the importance of this kind of brick and mortar investment and building these like incredible cathedrals to soccer. And I think not just building stadiums, but building 'em in the right places, right? Building these in the kind of heart of the downtowns. I think it's made all the difference and, and continues to, and it's really timely. I mean, we just had MLS cup in [email protected] field, brand new state-of-the-art best in sports anywhere in the world placed to watch live sports. That stadium was rocking, you know, it was completely electric fan, 28, 30,000 strong in the rain, right? Singing enchanting for 90 minutes and the streets were alive, the city was alive. And you don't have to go back that far to just kind of be reminded of how this franchise went through like one of the most traumatic things you could go through in sports, right?

Jesse Perlman: (13:20)

There was ownership change, there was concern about what the crew still be around. It's an emphatic like not only are they here, but they just won MLS cup again. On and off the field I think it's so important that it's so local. You know, I think what Columbus represents to crew fans is, you know, is so different than the team that, that came to play them in Columbus. These clubs, they represent really different ideas and communities and, and fan bases, but the common thread is that what they really represent is their cities and, and the idea of their cities in this moment in 2023, I don't think there are brands that better represent Columbus and you know, how it sees itself. I think it being local and localized and really kind of deeply rooted in these, you know, local communities and cultures has been the difference maker.

Damian Fowler: (14:07)

As I mentioned, I'm a Liverpool fan, and Anfield is, you know, very much a Liverpudlian tradition and they have the traditions there. And at the same time, if you look at the field, it's absolutely international. And so it's that beautiful kind of conjunction of the local and the global. Wanted to ask you about that international presence, you know, the, the MLS of course has been drawing headlines. How do you see the star power playing into your marketing efforts?

Jesse Perlman: (14:31)

It's another part of what makes sports sports, right? Star players. It's another part of why people tune into sports, why they care about sports and love sports. And you know, certainly people are fans of teams and clubs and, but people also really care about players, right? And some of them will become fans of a team because they're fans of a player. The other thing that's so special about sports, and I think even more so with soccer is who's gonna be the next star? The idea of like the emerging stars, especially we think about these homegrowns the future of the US men's and for the US and Canada national teams. And you know, I think as we look at, you know, Messi, right? We're equally excited about Benjamin Cremaschi learning from a guy like Lionel Messi every day, right? These kind of, you know, future world beaters that are coming through MLS and we're really spending a lot of time and, and energy and focus on how do we continue to hype up all the right players, but especially these, these up and commerce, these emerging stars and really sort of build their brands on and off the field and help more people kind of, you know, fall in love with them because they have incredible stories and we're gonna be hearing about them for years to come.

Damian Fowler: (15:35)

I heard that the Messi shirt in that iconic pink sold out instantly, impossible to get.

Jesse Perlman: (15:41)

It is, uh, I can tell you firsthand, I, uh, I failed as an uncle on, uh, on Hanukkah to come up with the goods for my nephews. So it is truly, it is a scarce product.

Ilyse Lieffring: (15:51)

You know, along with more like just sports documentaries out there on streaming channels, there's also like the rise of live sports at the same time. How would you say the rise in like live sports and streaming contribute to the rise of soccer overall in the us?

Jesse Perlman: (16:06)

Well, I think it's only increased the amount of soccer that's available for sure. I think we've got more access to more soccer here in the US than just about anywhere in the world. You know, there's probably a lot of people that'd be surprised to learn that, but you know, as a Liverpool fan, I'm sure you'd agree, there's a lot of people in the UK that like, man, that is a pain point in life is just how hard it can be to, to kind of watch the, so you wanna watch and the amount of blackouts and how you kind of just gotta jump through hoops to, uh, be able to watch games sometimes. And so we're spoiled for choice here, and I think streaming has only increased that to me it's an indicator of this is the sport for the future, right? Gen Z and, and younger fans, linear TV is not where they're spending their time, right? They're spending their time on devices and streaming and places like YouTube and, and places like Apple tv. And so I think it's great for us that we're ahead of the curve on that respect as far as kind of live games, and I think we're just so well positioned for that.

Ilyse Lieffring: (16:59)

The US also gets to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup along, of course with Canada and Mexico. How are you planning to ladder up your marketing to this massive global event,

Jesse Perlman: (17:13)

I guess can't reveal all the secrets, but No, it's very much in focus for us and to really be thinking multi-year about not just how does the marketing kind of ramp up to the World's Cup, but how does all of our activity as a business really deliberately think about what that's gonna mean for us. I think what's really interesting is during the World's Cup is gonna be the noisiest loudest, most crowded for anybody else marketer. I think everybody's gonna be trying to find a way to talk about the World Cup and soccer, whether, whether they've got the official, you know, FIFA rights to do that or not. And I, and I think all that noise is gonna be, is gonna be good, good, right? I think soccer is just gonna really bleed into the mainstream conversation, uh, in a way that'll kind of eclipse, um, you know, anything before it.

Jesse Perlman: (17:59)

But I think as, as you know, as marketers here at MLS I, I think the most critical moment for us is actually gonna be what do we do the day the World Cup ends? You know? And I think that's really the incredible opportunity for us to seize because, you know, that kind of World Cup Fever that everybody's gonna catch, the World Cup's gonna be incredible, but it's gonna, it's gonna come and go. There's gonna be a lot of people here that aren't gonna be able to make it to World Cup games that maybe wanted to or maybe wanted to take their kids to it, or it got priced out, or there's only so many seats in so many games. And for MLS to really make sure everybody knows where they can find us, how they can find us, again, I think meet that, meet that moment is, is gonna be, uh, I think it's really gonna be the, the big unlock for us.

Damian Fowler: (18:46)

And that's it for season eight of the current podcast. Stay tuned for our next season of interviews with the industry's top marketing leaders.

Ilyse Lieffring: (18:54)

The current is produced by Wonder Media Network. Our theme is by love and caliber. The Trade Desk team includes Chris Brooklier and Kat Vesce

Damian Fowler: (19:02)

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report, our weekly digest of what's making news across the open internet. And remember,

Jesse Perlman: (19:14)

Especially as marketers, means that we've just gotta constantly think about how do we infiltrate culture in all kinds of creative and, and unexpected ways that are, that are true to us.

Damian Fowler: (19:25)

I'm Damian,

Ilyse Lieffring: (19:26)

And I'm Ilyse. 

Damian Fowler: (19:27)

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Now firmly entrenched in Americans’ shopping habits, Instacart is eyeing the growing retail media space. Laura Jones, CMO of Instacart, joins The Current Podcast to share the strategy behind the company’s tie-ups with Peacock and Roku and how she’s reaching shoppers by framing them as the COOs of their households.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian: (00:01)

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse: (00:02)

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing And

Damian: (00:04)

Welcome to this edition of the current podcast.

Ilyse: (00:10)

This week we're delighted to talk with Laura Jones, the chief marketing Officer of Instacart.

Damian: (00:16)

Laura has been on a rampage at Instacart since she left Uber and joined the company. In June, 2021, Laura launched the brand's first integrated brand campaign, built an internal creative studio and performance media function, and scaled the marketing department five times to more than 150 people. What

Ilyse: (00:35)

Started as a grocery delivery service quickly boomed during the pandemic to the point where Instacart now has over 7 million monthly active orders and works with 1400 retailers growing into areas like retail media, on and off its platform.

Laura: (00:55)

So Instacart started just over a decade ago and started out as a grocery delivery company. And then when you fast forward to today, the business looks a lot different, the world has changed a lot, there's been a global pandemic and we've come out the other side and Instacart has really evolved over the course of this journey. So we've transformed from being just grocery, just delivery to now a service that has many more retailers on the platform. Of course, uh, most of America's top grocers, but other verticals that we serve like beauty with Sephoras, um, home improvement with Lowe's, as well as of course different modalities. So there's delivery, there's pickup, and we've extended into, uh, B2B offerings as well. So we have a retail enablement platform that our retailers use to power some of their online grocery services and pickups and really continuing to innovate now even getting into in-store.

Laura: (01:54)

So really thinking about how, you know, in a post pandemic world, customers are really shopping in a more omnichannel way. It's not just delivery, it's not just in-store, it's much more of a hybrid. So we've developed technologies like caper carts or carrot tags, other in-store tools that help bring some of the magic of online shopping into that in-store experience. So you can see that the company has really evolved and as a result, you know, the way that we're thinking about our brand and the future of innovation at the company has to evolve and keep pace as well.

Ilyse: (02:30)

On that note, from a brand perspective, how have you really worked to evolve the identity of Instacart from that delivery service to a major media platform? Now

Laura: (02:40)

We really wanted to build across all four sides of the marketplace and make sure that we were building a brand that would mirror the dynamism is of the business. So really wanted to root ourselves in, in our heritage and in our core equity, which of course is the carrot, and really stretch that, um, into a new design system that would enable us to show up and in a really seamless way in all these new different touchpoints that that we have. And so a lot of what my journey has been has been really trying to build out that marketing team across the four sides of the marketplace and build out all the different functions. So of course, continuing to double down on our performance marketing strength, but also building out functions like product marketing, brand marketing, making sure we have great co-marketing teams to partner with both our retailers and our advertisers so that we can go to market in partnership with all of them. And what that enables for us is not just to be a marketing team, but also to help enable other marketing teams. From a co-marketing standpoint, we have, uh, 5,500 brands on our platform from category leaders to emerging brands. And this next chapter of marketing is really about partnering with those brands as well as with our retail partners to make sure that we are going to market using all of our channels together and really helping provide insights to help each of their business grow.

Ilyse: (04:12)

How do you feel all these additives have really helped differentiate the brand, not only from a consumer standpoint, but perhaps to advertisers as

Laura: (04:23)

Well? One of the things that this has unlocked for us is the ability to do true full funnel marketing. So instead of just capturing inbound demand through, um, those classical performance channels, we've also been able to really start to generate more demand by going out there and reaching a broader audience and telling a more robust story across channels. So we see that by showing up in both upper and lower funnel and doing so in a coordinated way, we're able to really grow the category and deepen the use cases for existing users as well. So it's been a really critical, uh, business driver that we can go out with a full funnel program. Then from a advertiser standpoint, because of this depth that we have and the level of sophistication that we have when it comes to our own consumer marketing, I think that gives us a, a really thoughtful edge when it comes to thinking about how we're building tools for our advertisers.

Laura: (05:23)

So of course, I think the reason that most advertisers come to Instacart in the beginning is just because we are so close to the point of purchase, we are quite literally at the point of purchase. So what we find is that our ads on average deliver more than a 15% incremental sales lift and in some cases twice that for our brand partners. So it's a really valuable service to, to our partners, but again, inspired by our own journey, we've thought a lot about creating more spaces in the upper funnel for our advertisers. So of course, sponsored product listings and pricing and promotional discounts are, are wonderful, but once you've tapped out that kind of low hanging fruit from a demand standpoint, you need to generate more demand. What I was talking about, you know, from our own first party experience and the way that we do that is through introducing new formats that help drive more consideration for consumers that might be a bit higher up in that purchase funnel.

Laura: (06:19)

And so what that looks like for us are shoppable video ads, shoppable display ads in ways to help introduce customers to new categories or products that they might not have been actively considering before that shopping session, but we can actually really make that case to get them focused on it, get their attention, and then help drive that purchase and really be able to measure again, the impact of, of those different formats. The final frontier, which I think will bring the two together and that we've started on this year is that co-marketing I was mentioning. So we can move up the funnel within our own platform, but I think the, the really exciting piece for me is what does it look like when we move off platform and go to market together with a brand partner and really make their existing multi-channel campaigns shoppable regardless of what channel they're occurring on. Um, the co-marketing campaign we did earlier this year with AB InBev, um, in the NFL playoffs, um, making their TV campaign shoppable and integrating it with our CRM system so that we could deliver push notifications timed to hit folks as they're viewing TV ads. And we've done a ton of that over the past year and we're really excited to see the momentum that this program has in addition to our on-platform ads.

Damian: (07:37)

Could you talk a little bit more about how you use customer data to kind of close that gap between the top and the bottom of the funnel?

Laura: (07:46)

We take data protection and privacy very seriously. We don't tell consumer data to our retail partners, nor do we share competitive data across retailers or brands. Uh, what we do do is leverage anonymized, aggregated insights. And I think that's especially powerful in this world where our industry is grappling with signal loss and looming third party cookie deprecation. And so that's why this data is really valuable and can be provide a lot of insights to our partners as we think about, you know, how can we more effectively target folks at different stages in the funnel. From our standpoint, we have an incredibly deep understanding of online purchase behavior. Our customers are building large baskets, they're spending a lot of time to engage. They're doing their primary weekly grocery shop on the platform. And so we have a lot of insights about the, the purchase behavior that underlies that.

Laura: (08:44)

We can also surface insights about complimentary or adjacent purchasing behavior. So for example, if someone's buying peanut butter, it's pretty likely that they might also be buying jelly. And and some of those are obvious, like the ones I just described, but some of them are maybe not as obvious. So cat and dog food customers are more likely to purchase coffee on Instacart than the average Instacart consumer, that that is not as obvious as peanut butter and jelly or customers who buy diapers are more likely to also purchase jerky and trail mix. So if you imagine, you know, being a marketer and having access to this data, it really helps you, number one with the targeting. And number two, just getting those kind of deeper insights that help you have those aha moments that might help you think about your consumer in a whole new way.

Ilyse: (09:28)

Now in 2022, you introduced display ads onto your platform. How important are these units really to those big CPG companies? And then how do these display units actually help the smaller brands compete with the larger ones?

Laura: (09:43)

Yeah, so display ads are a great way for brands looking to bring engaging, targeted creative content to consumers. And this really helps with driving brand awareness, new product introductions and inspiration while people are browsing those digital aisles. And so these kinds of top of funnel units, um, can be especially useful I think for emerging brands that might be less familiar to consumers or for new or emerging categories where there might be more education required. And then for larger brands, shoppable display units are a great way to showcase complimentary products across the portfolio and really help with that regimen building. And it does so all within one shoppable ad unit. And of course that's a adjacent to all of the other kinds of ad units that A CPG can purchase, like a sponsored product listing or pricing and promotional discount. So you can really tell a story and then provide incentives for consumers to convert and get that full closed loop measurement all at once.

Ilyse: (10:44)

This past advertising week, New York Instacart announced it would begin to work with brands to reach customers off platform for brands this can turn their Instacart approach into more of an omni-channel strategy, basically allowing them to reach Instacart's customers across channels like CTV and display. Can you describe the value in this arrangement for advertisers?

Laura: (11:08)

What we're really trying to do here is provide a way for our CPG advertisers to leverage our data across all their media buys. You know, it really helps us realize this vision of leveraging data to help our partners grow their businesses and doing so in a way that is even more flexible for them. And so they're able to layer their programmatic campaigns with exclusive Instacart data to build category based segments. Like for example, somebody who's bought their category but not their brand, somebody who's bought their brand lapsed brand purchasers or someone who's never purchased with their brand. And this kind of targeting as a marketer is of course so valuable. Um, and we're really excited to have this pilot live and to start looking at how we can continue to lean into this capability and really enable our partners to grow their businesses.

Damian: (12:04)

Now you recently announced that you'd be bundling, uh, NBCU streaming service peacock for Instacart plus subscribers. You've also partnered with Roku. So I'm wondering if you could talk about the natural synergies between Instacart and streaming platforms like that.

Laura: (12:19)

The customer we serve, we like to think of as the COO of their household. They're often someone who might be a, a busy parent or a busy individual who's got a lot going on. And oftentimes, you know, there are folks that really do enjoy, um, in that limited spare time they have. They can be streaming their favorite shows and getting their grocery shopping done at once. So it's a real win-win. And and it's also, you know, I think from an advertiser standpoint, exciting because again, with Roku, if you have somebody who's watching an ad and shopping on Instacart, again, you have that ability to really start to close the loop in terms of the incremental impact of those ads as, as evidenced through Instacart purchase data.

Damian: (13:01)

Could you say a little bit more about how that gap between CTV and shoppable ads is closing? I know we touched on that earlier in the conversation, but how has Instacart as a media platform really enabled this kind of connection?

Laura: (13:14)

You know, I think brands often struggle with attribution from top of funnel, and this is something of course, you know, even when we're going out with top of funnel, it's hard. It's, it's a harder measurement journey than, you know, click-based ads. Um, and so our closed loop measurement is able to offer that higher confidence in media buys. And so being able to actually measure the impact of off platform ads and see that born out in, in the data from Instacart and showing the incrementality of those ads has been really huge for our advertisers.

Damian: (13:53)

What would you say will be a good example of how that discovery at the top of a funnel and performance with shoppable ads kind of merged?

Laura: (14:00)

A great example of that was our partnership with AB InBev this year, um, in the lead up to the Super Bowl. And so we were able to partner with Michelob Ultra and they were the first partner to create an Instacart co-marketing campaign that leveraged this shoppable capability via a QR code. We were able to really support them in this full funnel campaign that was running across linear social C-T-V-O-T-T and making sure that for every time they were out there with a brand message, there was a clear path to conversion for that consumer. What is so exciting about that is that for us, we get to show up with a brand that people absolutely love and really have a, a strong use case for of course, um, beer and, and football as we all know, go very well together. Um, and for them there was the ability to drive consumers to purchase and to really, you know, go from watching an ad to being able to have that product delivered in as fast as 30 minutes.

Laura: (15:06)

That's actually really game changing and I'm so excited when I think about what we could do with that. And especially when you start to layer in other channels like CRM and social and the ability for that kind of concurrent consumption connected to an entertainment event, I think could be really game changing. And we're seeing this really starting to pay off. So in Q3, our advertising and other revenue was up 19% year over year, and this is really driven by stronger than anticipated advertiser spending. And when we think about next year, we're really excited to continue to show up in these key seasonal moments, whether that's cold and flu, football, spring cleaning, or Mother's Day.

Damian: (15:44)

That's interesting. Do you have any brand campaigns coming up in 2024 that you are able to talk about?

Laura: (15:51)

We are currently shooting a really great set of spots against the cold and flu season. Uh, it's funny because it's not the most glamorous time of year, so, you know, when we were initially talking about showing up with a campaign, I was a little bit like, oh, is this really how we wanna show up as a brand? But then when I thought about our value proposition, which is really taking care of that COO of the household, and these people are caregivers and we help them take care of themselves and their families. So we're excited to lean into that moment and hopefully tell some stories that really resonate with consumers and and with our brand partners.

Ilyse: (16:30)

How do you think about the evolving Instacart brand looking towards the future

Laura: (16:37)

From a brand identity standpoint? We've got an amazing foundation to build equity with from a brand storytelling standpoint. We've got an endless trove of stories to tell because every day in the life of a, of a busy household conductor is is full of those moments of trials and tribulations and moments where Instacart can really come in and, and help offer that care for that head of household. So I think that in the year ahead, we've got a great year ahead of us and a ton of momentum from a brand standpoint and only made stronger by the strength of our retailer and CPG brands when we show up together in the market.

Damian: (17:19)

And that's it for this edition of the current podcast. We'll be back next week. So stay tuned.

Ilyse: (17:25)

The current podcast is produced by Wonder Media Network. Our theme is by love and caliber. The current team includes Chris Ley and Cat Festi.

Damian: (17:34)

And remember, the

Laura: (17:35)

Really exciting piece for me is what does it look like when we move off platform and go to market together with a brand partner and really make their existing multi-channel campaigns shoppable regardless of what channel they're occurring on.

Damian: (17:50)

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave as a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report, our weekly roundup of what's making news in digital media. I'm eis and I'm Damien and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

BBDO created the iconic Snickers “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” campaign. The agency’s President and CEO, Andrew Robertson, breaks down the power of humor.

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian: (00:01)

I'm Damian Fowler.

Ilyse: (00:02)

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

Damian: (00:04)

And welcome to this edition of the current podcast.

Ilyse: (00:10)

This week we sit down with Andrew Robertson, who has been the president and CEO of BBDO Worldwide since 2004.

Damian: (00:19)

No doubt over his career, he's had a bird's eye view of creative trends in the ad industry. And last year he gave a keynote presentation in the Palai at Cannes Lions and why humor is one of the most effective tools in advertising.

Ilyse: (00:32)

And yet he pointed out that funny ads have been on the decline for 20 years. He reminded the crowd that having a laugh is also good for business.

Damian: (00:42)

Since that talk, Cannes Lions has added a humor category to its awards for 2024. Maybe we have Andrew Robertson to thank for that.

Ilyse: (00:58)

Before we start, we thought it might be a good idea to take a listen to some recent funny ads, starting with this one from T-Mobile starring Bradley Cooper. And of course his mom

Ad: (01:10)

Does T-Mobile really have a 5G

Ad: (01:12)

America's largest 5G network. Try it again. Oh

Ad: (01:15)

My God, you look like a flamingo in

Ad: (01:17)

This. Okay. The America's largest, largest five network network. How can I help you? Hi, how are you? , can I help you? You're

Ad: (01:26)

Making me crazy.

Damian: (01:27)

And here's a bit from Workday's. Big game spot titled Rockstar featuring. You guessed it. Real rock stars like Kiss Front man, Paul Stanley, Joan Jet, Billy Idol, and Ozzy Osborne.

Ad: (01:39)

Hey, corporate types. Well, you stop calling each other rock stars. You're

Ad: (01:42)

A rockstar. You are a rockstar.

Ad: (01:44)

Rock stars, please.

Ad: (01:46)

You know what it takes to be a rockstar. I've trashed. I rums in 43 countries. I was on the road since I was 16.

Ad: (01:53)

I've done my share of bad things. Also your share of bad things.

Damian: (01:57)

And finally, we are big fans of Liquid Death here at the current. Their latest dad takes a bold and unconventional approach to raise awareness about plastic waste on the planet. And it does this while making a smile and cringe all at the same time.

Ad: (02:12)

Thanks to our proprietary and somewhat pain-free surgical method, a sexier planet begins with a sexier you.

Ad: (02:22)

Now I'm practically oozing with beauty.

Damian: (02:26)

Thanks. Liquid death.

Ad: (02:28)

Now we can use old plastic bottles to enhance anything. And I mean anything.

Ilyse: (02:34)

Oh my gosh. Ouch. , that's a good one. Well, the good news is there's plenty more funny where that came from, but let's hear from Anju first.

Andrew: (02:44)

I gotta be honest. When I made the proposal in the presentation that there should be a line for humor, it was really only to get another joke into the presentation. Um, but that was really the only reason I did, did it. However, I'm really thrilled that they have gone ahead and done it. That was a turning point. I think it was a turning point in terms of the work that was getting awarded at Cannes. I think it was a turning point at, in terms of the work that was being entered. Um, and I think my, I think my presentation was just, you know, the right thing at the right time. It was something I wanted to get off my chest. And judging by the response from the audience and the feedback I got subsequently, it was something a lot of people wanted to hear at that moment.

Damian: (03:30)

Let's go back to your presentation a little bit. I I loved it. You kicked it off with this fantastic story about when you first learned that humor sells. I, I wonder if you wouldn't mind recapping a bit of that story.

Andrew: (03:43)

When I was, uh, a student, I had a number of kind of part-time gigs. And one of them was selling vax vacuum cleaners door to door. And for those who don't know, it was a very powerful vacuum cleaner developed by a dairy farmer who adapted one of his milking machines. And it was by far the best suction you could get out of a, out of a vacuum cleaner. But they were bright orange and they weighed like 90 pounds and cost 300. It was a difficult thing to sell. It was a difficult thing to carry, frankly, from door to door. But I learned, I learned a couple of things. One was that sometimes, um, when people believe that what they've got is good enough, you have to find a way to dramatize the fact that it isn't. And in the case of the vax vacuum cleaner, the thing that worked, the thing that could convert people was if I could show them that something they thought was really clean was in fact full of dirt and that vaxx could solve that for them.

Andrew: (04:38)

And by far the most compelling demo of that was to vacuum their bed, their mattress. 'cause everybody likes to think their mattress is really clean, but it, but with a vax vacuum, the mattress, and you just get all sorts of terrible stuff coming out of it. And if I could get to that demo nine times outta 10 people would spend the 300 pounds and, and buy the bright orange machine. So I used to like, I'd ring the doorbell and nine times outta 10, the door would be open by a woman. And I was standing on the doorstep and I would say, my name's Andrew Robertson. I'm presenting the Vxx Vacuum Company. Can we go up to your bedroom? And most of the time they laughed. Most of the time they laughed. And then once they'd laughed, we could then have a conversation where I'd say, well, I really do want to go up to your bedroom because I want to show you just how powerful this vacuum cleaner is. And, and most of the time it worked. But the point I learned was that, um, overcoming resistance to your cell is, is really important. And the best way to do that, the best way to disarm people and to make them like you, is to make them laugh.

Damian: (05:45)

You had some kantar research that showed a steady decline in the use of humor, not just the last five years, but over the last 20 years. What does the data show about why humor declined? I suppose?

Andrew: (05:56)

I mean, there could be a load of things. I think one of the, one of the big trends across that period has been the emergence of the importance of purpose, brand purpose. Um, and I think that that along with that has come, um, a belief and I, but it's a belief that I don't share that, uh, if you have a serious purpose, you should find a way of bringing it to life in a serious way. Um, and, and I think that may account for some of it. Uh, there's certainly, if you look at the data drops in the use of humor in advertising according to that Kantar data during the, um, global recession in 2008, 2009, and then again during the pandemic. And I, I think that is a result of people believing, you know, these are difficult times and people are having a really rough and we need to make sure we're not tone deaf and we need to, uh, we shouldn't do anything funny because it's, it's not appropriate. It's a logical thought process. It's just not true. And I think what happens is when you have those step changes like we had in 2008, 2009, the level drops and then it, and then it doesn't come back up again. Those I would say are the two most significant moments.

Ilyse: (07:15)

But do you see it coming back now?

Andrew: (07:17)

There's actually some pretty good data about what's happened in the last six months and how many more humorous ads are being tested. I'm hopeful that it can be revived.

Ilyse: (07:27)

That's great. I mean, I think everybody is down for a laugh these days. Um, but would you say it's also good for business?

Andrew: (07:34)

90% of people will say that, um, they're more likely to remember an ad that is funny. 80% of people say they're more likely to recommend a brand that is funny. 91% of people say they want brands to be funny. And 72% say they would choose a humorous brand over the competition. And that's all kind of claimed behavior. And it's not surprising if you think about the way we are as human beings, if you make people feel good and attach that feeling to your brand, that's an experience that're going to remember. And when your brand is next presented to them, that's what they're gonna draw on.

Ilyse: (08:12)

One of the reasons you say that people have an inhibition around humor is that it's not compatible with purpose-driven messaging. But you found that not to be the case.

Andrew: (08:23)

It's important for brands to have a meaningful and relevant purpose. The flaw in the logic in my view, is that necessarily that means that when you try to bring that purpose to life or talk about it or dramatize it, uh, you have to do so in a very serious way. You can have a really serious or really important cause or purpose. That doesn't mean you can't talk about it in a way that's going to, people are gonna find amusing. I I showed an example of, of President Obama. He was the president of the United States, pretty big job. Uh, his signature legislative achievement was the Affordable Care Act. And there was a, a website that was built by the government so that people could take advantage of this and it didn't work. And his way of dealing with it was not to do an earn speech about it. His way of dealing with it was to do a funny or die video. That was really, really funny. That's a great way to apologize. It's a great way to say I'm sorry. And when he did that, it was watched by, I think it was 40 or 50 million people. But, but the more important fact is that the number of people who went on the site went up by 40%.

Damian: (09:31)

I'm wondering, can we make the case that humor builds engagement no matter which channel it's on?

Andrew: (09:36)

You know, this fundamental point that if you can use creativity in whatever medium you're working in, whatever form you are working in to make people feel good and attach that feeling to your brand, you will sell more. A few years ago I was in LA and I was due to come back to New York and I got a text message from American Airlines. It's one of the best things I've ever seen, which is not a sentence I expected to say about a text message from American Airlines. But the text message said, you may want to pack an umbrella. We're expecting storms tomorrow. Flights will be delayed and some may be canceled. If you can, you should probably travel on another day. And all of the technology and data that's necessary to ensure that that bit of information, very, very relevant information got to me in the palm of my hand at the right time, right message, right time, all of that technology is great. But if it hadn't been written the way it was, instead of smiling and feeling good, I would probably have been angry. 'cause if it, if the same information was, you know, all caps, weather alert, uh, storms expected on East Coast delays, likely my reaction would've been completely different. I would've been angry instead of which I was smiling. I did get delayed. I then got diverted. I was sitting on the runway in, um, Dulles for, for three hours and I didn't get mad.

Ilyse: (11:07)

There's really an arc to it.

Andrew: (11:09)

Yeah, I mean, I, I would, I would challenge that assumption. I don't think it matters what medium you are consuming or probably what situation you are in. Maybe with a couple of extreme examples, if you can get somebody to laugh and feel good, they are going to thank you for it. That old expression of laughter being the best medicine there is, is true. That's true. If you can make people laugh, they will feel better and they will thank you for it. By, in our case, buying your brand, how you make people laugh, the topic, the content, the idea that you bring to life that creates this feeling, what you build that around is, has to be handled very sensitively. What I'm arguing is that no matter what state of mind people are in, if you can find a way to make them smile and laugh and feel good, they're gonna thank you for it with their business.

Ilyse: (12:06)

What would you say is the funniest campaigns that you've worked on?

Andrew: (12:10)

You are not you and you're hungry for. Snickers is a campaign that's that's rooted in making people laugh. Um, it's, you know, running in 83 countries, it's in its 13th year, it's been outrageously successful for the brand.

Damian: (12:24)

Is that a negotiation between, you know, you as the creative and, and the the client? Do you talk about the style, the content and whether it should be funny? Does that come up or is that sort of an organic process?

Andrew: (12:36)

The key to making something funny is you have to under, you have to understand the premise. And there are cases where that humor is generated around premises that people might understand, but just not like the fundamental point of if you can, if you can create a premise that people understand you have the launching pad for something that could be humorous. That's true everywhere. It's an organic process, it's an organic process. And if you have something that makes the client laugh, the client will laugh. Usually the same way as the audience will laugh if something's funny. It's funny. And getting people to recognize the value of it is sometimes a function of getting them to experience it. The bit that gets complicated is when people are arguing about whether something is funny or not, it takes ingenuity and creativity. And sometimes I think the bigger problem is, is not that people don't want to do something that is funny, it's that what they do isn't actually that funny.

Damian: (13:41)

Do you ever get to a point where , you know, you've got the final asset there and it's like, Hmm, it's just not that funny? Or does, does that ever happen? Or does it get that far?

Andrew: (13:49)

Yeah, it does. It, it does happen. And when you're testing the work, you're not testing, is it funny or not, you're testing whether the audience is going to engage with it, find it memorable, and it's going to make them feel something that makes them wanna buy your brand. The humor is the means to the end. It's not an end in itself, but yeah, it does, it does happen where somebody's like, ah, it's just not funny. Uh, or it's not funny enough. You know, there are writers' rooms working on, on Seth Meyer's jokes every night. I mean, there's 10 people sitting around a table trying to come up with something funny for him to say, 'cause he's gotta be funny for an hour. And that's a lot of jokes that you need. So it takes a lot of creative minds to come up with them. Fortunately, we don't have to fill an hour usually, but it's still, it's still harder than, it's still harder than anybody imagines. And if you doubt that for a second, just try and write something funny yourself. Just try and write even when you know the format, try and write a Snickers commercial. Try and try and write something funny for Snickers. It's, it's harder than anybody imagines.

Ilyse: (14:52)

Would you say there are some categories that lend themselves to humor more than others?

Andrew: (14:57)

I don't want to accept the principle that, that there are any categories in which it couldn't be used. I think companies and individuals may choose not to, but I, but I, I find it hard to believe that it, that it really couldn't be used.

Damian: (15:22)

And that's it for the current podcast. We'll be back next week with Jesse Poll, the head of brand and marketing for Major League Soccer.

Ilyse: (15:29)

The current podcast is produced by Wonder Media Network. Our theme is by love and caliber. The current team includes Chris Berkley and Cat

Damian: (15:37)

Fessy. And remember,

Andrew: (15:39)

If you can use creativity in whatever medium you're working in, whatever form you are working in to make people feel good and attach that feeling to your brand, you will sell more.

Damian: (15:53)

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report as we round up the week's biggest marketing headlines from across the open internet. I'm Damien and

Ilyse: (16:05)

I'm Elise.

Damian: (16:06)

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As the presidential race picks up momentum, The Current Podcast explores what a political campaigner and a CPG brand marketer can learn from each other. Kyle Yadon-Smith, (the head of digital for the National Republican Senatorial Committee), and Vinny Rinaldi, (the head of media and analytics for The Hershey Company), get candid about marketing politics and chocolate. 

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian Fowler: (00:01)

I'm Damian Fowler. Welcome to this edition of the current podcast.

Damian Fowler: (00:10)

This week we are queuing up a great conversation between two advertisers who may not on first glance seem to have that much in common. We're joined by Vinnie Ranaldi, the head of media and analytics at the Hershey Company, and Kyle Yadon-Smith, the head of digital for the National Republican Senatorial Committee. That said, we thought it would be fascinating to hear what a big CPG brand like Hershey can learn from a major political advertiser like the NRSC. And since this is an election year, what better time to host this conversation. It's been said that every great political campaign rewrites the rules at the same time, CPG brands can now supercharge campaigns with retail data. With all that in mind, let's get to it. Both of you, of course, are focused on reaching those respective audiences, whether you call 'em consumers or voters. I'd love to hear from both of you, you know, on what you think you may have in common.

Kyle Smith: (01:09)

I was gonna joke, the uh, the biggest thing is, uh, we're both targeting, so we're women I think is our key marketplace. the cycle . Um, obviously that's not the only, uh, demographic that's gonna be key on the political landscape, but, uh, we're gonna be running ads in October and so we're gonna screw up your Halloween marketing. Thankfully you guys do not have a, uh, Georgia runoff this year, so it should be okay by Christmas. And uh, yeah, I think we're gonna be targeting a lot of the same consumers slash uh, voter demographics. So it's kind of, it's, it's interesting how that kind of plays out. Yeah,

Vinny Rinaldi: (01:36)

I would agree. I think there's more correlation. I think, you know, we're looking at the same content areas to show up in as a brand to sell chocolate as you guys are, to show up and influence somebody to devote one way or the other in those big environments. You know, a lot of how we look to show up is how do we drive seasonality in local markets at a certain store? So you're right in October, believe me, it's probably hot topic number one of like the lead up to our Super Bowl October 31st. There's a serious presidential election happening a week later. Yeah. So how much will that play a role when we're buying, you know, market-based ads? So it is an area, I wouldn't say of concern, but an area that we're certainly focused on of like how do we make sure we're showing up in the right markets during our most precious time of year, but being cognizant of some of the headwinds we might face based on what's happening in real time.

Damian Fowler: (02:28)

It's interesting, you know, you're sort of talking in a way about competition between say chocolate and political campaigns, but on the other hand there's a sort,

Kyle Smith: (02:35)

I think we would lose that one if you had to vote on one or the other. .

Damian Fowler: (02:39)

I mean, of course there's an alignment too. I mean maybe you guys can, you know, get together and cross-reference here.

Vinny Rinaldi: (02:45)

I mean, I joke as we look at all of the debates leading up to it and one of our products is popcorn. How do we show up and say, get your popcorn ready for all these new events that are happening. So can you bridge that gap and kind of work together? There's a lot of areas of, of

Kyle Smith: (02:58)

Interest. Politics is pop culture now, right? Yeah. Like I'll never forget, one of the funniest ads I saw was, I think it was Advil, they bought the promoted tweet on the first day of the debate in 2016 and it said, do you have a headache from this debate, you know, by Advil? And I thought that was kind of a fun way to play into it.

Damian Fowler: (03:12)

What's interesting to me is, you know, in looking at say any given political campaign, how the importance of being reactive in the moment kind of real time is so crucial, you know, for getting those swing voters out to either vote or just to nudge the needle a little bit. And I'm wondering, you know, if that idea of the sped up data-driven campaign is obviously influencing the way CPG brands like Hershey think about campaigns,

Vinny Rinaldi: (03:38)

I think we certainly use data-driven tactics in a very similar way. And you think back to the last, I guess it's 16 years since the 2008 election, which is crazy during that election when, when President Obama won, you know, it goes a little unnoticed of how he won the tactics he used, which were way ahead of his time in a lot of this, using the data, focusing on different demographic urban environments, getting those people to the polling centers, like we're trying to do the same thing during, whether it's a big season or to dry everyday occurrences, like how do you find those pockets of incremental opportunities to grow from the beast that's already there is very correlated to from when President Obama did it to President Trump doing it in 2016 and really becoming a more data-driven tactic on how you show up in those moments.

Kyle Smith: (04:26)

I mean, it's kind of funny, both Obama in 2012 and uh, president Trump in uh, 2016 both had a actually almost similar data strategy. They're both very digital heavy in from a percentage perspective for their time. And then of course nowadays we actually can't use that data on quite a few platforms. So data's extremely important in the political space. Obviously there's, uh, 60% of Americans over the age of 18 are gonna vote this cycle and a lot of those folks are gonna vote for the same party they've always voted for. And identifying people that, you know, swing back and forth is the key to winning, obviously. And that coalition changes every cycle. For us, it's leveraging the data to inform what that audience looks like so that we can make tactical data-driven decisions, even on platforms that don't let us use it directly of which, you know, is the bulk of the ecosystem at this point. It's

Vinny Rinaldi: (05:08)

An interesting point. Like we as a big massive consumer packaged goods brand that sells chocolate, has no first party data. We have to talk to everybody. Literally 98% of the um, US population eats candy mint or gum. So for us it's like how do you balance, you want scalability no matter what, but what are the right insights and data points that you utilize when you go to activation? Because if you're trying to find one-to-one in any second and or third party data partnerships in some platforms, not all, you're losing the findability due to some of the privacy regulations that are coming up. So if you don't own the data asset itself in a first party ecosystem, it's a lot harder to deliver that experience. And it's also a lot harder to collect first party data when you're a brand that everyone else sells your product. You're just driving demand through advertising and awareness and driving people to the store. But from a D two C perspective where a lot of that collection can happen, it's a little bit more of a challenge on our end to be able to sell chocolate and collect a data 0.0 for those people.

Damian Fowler: (06:08)

What's interesting to me about this is according to a study by the Trade Desk with Morning Consult during the 2022 midterms, 75% of all Americans surveyed who say they might vote in the midterms, say they know who they're gonna vote for. So I don't know from a political standpoint, do you market to those people or is marketing always at the margins? You know, are you always trying to reach out to that undecided voter? And I wonder if that carries over into CPG thinking as well.

Kyle Smith: (06:33)

I actually think this may be a space where things are more similar than they are different. You know, if you've bought Hershey Kisses every year for Christmas and you, your family's always done that and you always, you know, put that in the stalking, you're probably gonna continue to do it until something shifts or something changes. There's pretty high retention, right? In terms of Republicans from 2016 are very likely to be Republicans again, 2024. But things do change, you know, the people will always tell you, they say they know who they're gonna vote for today, but then there could be a new story that drops at some point next year that scrambles everything. You know, it changes people's opinions on issues, it changes how people think about things and we have to react very, very quickly to that and make sure that, you know, if the story's good for us, that everyone knows about it or if the story's bad for us, that we have our point of view out there to, to kind of counter what the information is. It's kind of hard to expect who those people are gonna be or what's gonna trigger that. So I think that kind of leads to the importance of talking to everyone and making sure that you kind of have a broad message out there. But we also know our folks that are, you know, Republican donors donate or vote in every single election that are probably on our team. So it's kind of just, uh, doing a little bit of both.

Vinny Rinaldi: (07:30)

Yeah, you look at Reese's Peanut butter cups, they have a 64% household penetration. I'm not sure there's any single brand out there that comes as close. So if you think about it, you, you're almost everywhere. So you're constantly speaking to everybody and hoping, you know, in those moments you're getting that incremental gain for a new household conversion and or, or repeat purchaser. So you do want to talk to both. You're also looking at probably one of the more impulsive categories in the world. Chocolate is a grab and go. You're at the counters, you're just grabbing, you don't plan it. So you always have to be, broadly speaking, making everyone aware of subtly nudging that reminder message to almost everybody.

Damian Fowler: (08:08)

Given that then, you know, does that mean a lot of your campaigns tend to be about, you know, just brand awareness kind of up there at the top of the funnel? And then how do you use channels to nudge the consumer? How, how does that work? ,

Vinny Rinaldi: (08:22)

In very basic theory, yes, we are a very big awareness brand messaging strategy to have fun. You know, we lean heavily on the voice of Will Arnett, which is the voice behind the Reese's commercials. So like, it is that probably where, but then you have, whether it's a limited edition or a seasonal environment or some other area where you wanna be a little bit more focused, where you would lean into some sort of targeting capability, whether it's a retail based target, third party, purchase based target. How do you use all those levers to take some of the spend and be focused while the majority of your base spend is reaching that broad awareness of the entire population?

Kyle Smith: (09:00)

Yeah, I think that's where, you know, I'm a little bit jealous of Hershey's and you have all this institutional brand ID and I'm, we're jealous of the starting point, especially, you know, I'm working on the, I'm working on senate campaigns this cycle. The NRC, we only have really two incumbents, meaning like people that are already senators running for reelection, again, Ted Cruz and uh, Rick Scott in Florida, they kind of have a really strong starting point they can focus on more, just reminding folks that kinda like you, I feel like you guys do every site or every year we're Hershey's, we're Reese's also. I'm jealous you get will learn that, but we're we're, we're Reese's what we are, et cetera. But then on our side we have a separate project of a lot of new candidates that no one's ever heard of that frankly haven't held elected office. And you have a year and you know, three or four months to make their name Id as close to a hundred percent with the voter base as you can. If uh, Trump were president it was 2020 and everyone kind of knows who these guys are. It is kind of more similar I think to the annual, uh, yeah, candy marketing. But this, this year it's uh, we have to start from scratch. It's like you guys introducing a new brand, I feel like, or a new skew of, uh, of, you know, Hershey's, Reese's, et cetera.

Vinny Rinaldi: (10:00)

We just launched uh, Reese's Caramel Cups and it is like launching a completely new thing even though it's part of the Reese's family. Yes, you're gonna have those loyalists try your new product, but can you attract new consumers into an already built brand because of a new introduction of caramel into a peanut butter cup? You have to find those new pockets of opportunity to not lose your base or not have them switch completely and keep that cycle growing with new consumers.

Damian Fowler: (10:26)

One of the things that's happened, uh, in the last couple of years, we talked about, you know, what happened in the last four years is the kind of rise of, there's much more inventory out there for streaming platforms, connected television, and that connecting the dots up with, you know, other channels. I wonder if you could both sort of talk me through a little bit of how that, the maturing as it were of CTV has changed the way you go to market and think about connecting up big awareness plays on CTV to, you know, lower down the funnel to more performance driven tactics.

Vinny Rinaldi: (10:56)

You know, as I go back to what I said earlier, the proliferation of content everywhere has certainly opened up the purview of how to show up, how to be everywhere. You know, for me, when I think about the connected TV landscape, what I love about it is the ability to buy prime time at any time. When you sit down at eight o'clock or nine o'clock or 12 o'clock or 3:00 PM it doesn't matter. You're accessing whatever content you wanna watch in that moment. So in my opinion, when you buy this way, you've got primetime moments at all times. That person is decided they're gonna sit down, they're gonna, you know, watch whatever it is that they wanna watch at that given moment.

Vinny Rinaldi: (11:47)

And that's your moment as a brand to show up and that's how we look at it. And then when you take that holistic approach to those primetime moments, how do you then use the controllability of technology to control, reach and frequency? So if I know that I'm talking to this person in 12 different platforms, well I don't want my frequency to be a 40 on one of 'em. I want to control that and keep extending reach. If I get enough reach, my household penetration should go up. If that goes up, my sales are going up, we're winning share, we're reaching more consumers, like that's our end goal. So being in as many homes as possible is actually impossible if you're buying on 40 different IOs or platforms. So then when you think about consolidation and the value of bringing somebody from an awareness building tactic and streaming or on the big screen all the way through a funnel and having that control allows me to unlock more business outcomes than any media measurement can give me.

Damian Fowler: (12:42)

I'm wondering if what the equivalent of business outcomes are in the political ad marketplace.

Kyle Smith: (12:48)

Um, well if we win.

Damian Fowler: (12:51)

I thought you were gonna say that. 

Kyle Smith: (12:52)

Yeah, I, I , I think, uh, I actually think this is where also uh, you know, the candy and CPG world in general is, it's pretty similar to political land is um, our outcomes also a little bit impulsive. I remember standing in line, you know, to vote for the DC City Council with a few of my coworkers before and we were all talking like, who are these people? , you know, it's like we don't know who anyone we're voting for. It's kind of funny. And then you kind of re look at 'em real quick. You remember like stuff you've heard or mailers you've gotten and you make a decision that you have one day to do that or one month to do that. And that's our moment. That's when you get your conversion. That's kind of how I'd compare the two there. I think from a high level perspective, we have the exact same problem in politics, especially with linear, where we have very high frequencies against some audiences sometimes.

Kyle Smith: (13:28)

And when you're talking to one group of people 70 times, you're, you have less money then to talk to the rest of the folks who may not be very heavy media consumers. So having an ever-present point of view across not just linear but also digital, I think that's something that our party especially is gonna try to get a lot better at this cycle. It, it's interesting to me that 20 12, 20 16, I think, and Vinny told me if this is wrong, I think the corporate world almost looked at politics and was like, wow, they're doing some really cool stuff. We have to figure out what they're doing. I think that's kind of taken a step back a little bit now that we've gotten into the, you know, we have to target older Americans 'cause older Americans are more likely to vote. And I think now as older Americans, habits have changed quite a bit from 2020 to 2024, it's forced both political parties to kind of adapt a little bit after frankly the corporate world has uh, to what the new landscape looks like.

Damian Fowler: (14:11)

You know, speaking of different audiences, are there different channels for different audiences? Kyle, when you said, you know, reaching older Americans or all older voters, I'm wondering if that's still like a linear play now or if that's completely, am I just stereotyping a whole demographic?

Kyle Smith: (14:26)

Yeah, well I watch Wheel of Fortune every other night, so I, I maybe I, maybe I'm breaking the demographic there. . Yeah, I, I think linear is still the utmost effective mass reach, uh, mechanism for folks 55 plus, especially broadcast. It's pretty easy to get over 75% reach across that audience, uh, with a couple of weeks of linear buys. What I will say though is even older users are starting to shift pretty substantially. Especially, you know, in the last couple of years when I used to do my YouTube pitches, I always told, told the story of my father-in-Law who is a huge Elon Musk fan and watches a lot of documentaries about him on YouTube. And I would walk down one day and he's like an hour or two of this documentary that some college kid put together about, about how he's making rockets or whatever. They do a penetration across all the different age groups. And I do think that we're gonna continue to see a shift away, especially from cable time spent on cable and towards the streaming services, whether it's YouTube or or more of the down funnel services

Vinny Rinaldi: (15:15)

As I stated earlier. You know, we reach everybody with a mouth. So every demographic needs to play a role in our media, both strategy spend, investment strategy, that's everything. Kyle, you kinda hit the nail on the head. It's what's happening between those environments is what's the shift what we're seeing. And I think the industry's seeing more and more, if you remove live news and sports from linear consumption, you're gonna see a drastic drop off in actual consumption habits. But you know, when you think about the purchase power right now, it shifted a little bit into the millennial group who are the bigger purchases, which is 71 million US people. We talk about Gen Z a lot. It's like, oh, they're the up and comers, they're people we have to talk to, but they're, you know, the people we don't have to spend that much time on, they're 68 million of them. So they're almost equivalent to a millennial generation. So we're gonna just wait for them to become purchasers. And I think that's a miss. So you've gotta show up in the moments or platforms that those consumption habits are happening by demo and then show up authentically to that audience so it's not, forget about one versus the other. It's how do you repeat the holistic picture across every platform and then deliver a communication strategy that resonates with those different audience groups. That's how we're working towards showing up across every platform.

Kyle Smith: (16:34)

And that's what's, that's so interesting to me. It's like the purchasing power in our world is a little bit different. You know, like in terms of voter people that actually vote, well one kids under the age of 18 cannot vote. So there's zero purchasing power. And I, I know that, I mean at least when I was in marketing school they, they taught us about how kids do have purchasing power, uh, when it comes to telling their parents

Vinny Rinaldi: (16:51)

They have influencing purchasing power

Kyle Smith: (16:54)

But in our world, you know, the, if you look at the millennial generation, you have a much higher voting percentage than it was 10 years ago. But it's still not anything close to 55 plus glad that we have the purchasing power in the millennial generation now though.

Vinny Rinaldi: (17:06)

I think it's that 13 to 18 group that's so key for us. As I said, the influencing power, everything, especially in our category, has become on demand. So I have the ability at 13 to use mom and dad's credit card tied to a DoorDash account and I'm gonna gain for the next five hours and I'm gonna order a bunch of things from seven 11 as we move into the future, five to 10 years from now, most of that generation will become now the voters but they don't wanna leave their house or they don't wanna go outta their way to go do something 'cause everything has come so easy to them by using a phone. How does the voter landscape change from either written ballots or in person to a truly secure ability to vote and get more buy-in into voting for a generation that is very used to just opening something up and hitting a button

Damian Fowler: (17:59)

We're throwing to the future here. Yeah, I mean Kyle, I dunno, what do you think, uh, do you think we're gonna get to that point?

Kyle Smith: (18:04)

I think Covid kind of changed the voting rules in a lot of states that make it easier to vote. I don't know if we'll ever get to the instant gratification level until, you know, maybe 50, a hundred years from now when we're voting on a blockchain and you get a vote coin and you spend it somewhere or something like that. So the convenience factor matters a lot and then it changes by state and almost by locality, right? If you live in a rural area and it's hard for you to get to the polling place 'cause it's a 10 mile drive versus it being half a mile down the street when you're dropping off your kids to school, that could make a difference as well. So it really just depends.

Vinny Rinaldi: (18:35)

I think that's really interesting because each state is adopting their own voter rules sounds very similar to each state adopting their own data privacy rules instead of thinking of a national basis and actually simplifying the ease for everyday people to utilize something. It's fascinating that we all continue to live by state, by state governed rules that are drastically different than just a national governing body to allow us to have a centralized ruling system to use, whether it's data privacy or voter rights. It's just, it's funny to watch that correlation between our two worlds.

Kyle Smith: (19:09)

Even sugar taxes, you know, some of the cities, I don't think it's gone after candy quite yet. True. But the uh, you know the Bloomberg rules around like the taxing soda and stuff and I think Philadelphia did it and then the sales increased outside of the Philadelphia like urban area like substantially for all those stores because you're able to get cheaper stuff. But that's interesting.

Damian Fowler: (19:26)

Kyle, you mentioned harder to reach audiences and I want to ask both of you, you know about that and how the programmatic marketplace makes it possible to reach those harder to reach audiences. I know at the top we joked about suburban housewives but you know, how granular can you get,

Kyle Smith: (19:43)

What is it 95% of people watch video whether it's linear or digital. So that does get you to a pretty high threshold the way I approach it. Like we have to deliver messages very quickly, right? So that's why I think you see political really lean into linear a lot 'cause you could get that mass reach in a day if you're buying the football games. Like if you're buying, you know, primetime on across all the all four networks and you have a presence there, you're gonna get to 50% reach pretty quickly. I think the hard part is honestly the other 50% on CTV and making sure that you're distributing that message to the person the one day a week they happen to be watching ad supported Hulu and they're not watching Netflix for example. That's where it gets more difficult. Having the centralized approach, making sure that you're maxing out the non-linear household reach if you're already buying a lot of linear is, is the hardest and most important thing that we have to do. We'll have maybe eight to 10 messages per candidate that we run and we want all eight to 10 of those messages to be seen by as many people as possible and we don't have as much time. I wish I had, you know, one or two month long campaigns that I could run behind these things to get that reach number, the incremental reach as high as we possibly can. But in reality it's, it's seven to 10 days. We just have to maximize that

Vinny Rinaldi: (20:46)

For Reeces. Again, reach everybody, everybody with a mouth, everybody wants to buy a Reeces, great. But then I go again down the portfolio, you've got variety brands in York peppermint patties, almond Joy, mounds. And so like how do you take those with much less spending power and find those pockets of opportunity? You know, for your, give you an example for York, one of the really cool unlocks we found was the snowbird effect sales actually increased 'cause York leans very heavily 55 plus really 65 plus and you see Northeast sales in the summer skew higher and then southeast sales skew higher in the winter and you're seeing the people as they move the consumer habits follow with them. So how do you heavy up in those markets during the seasons? So when you don't have a large bucket of money to go spend as a brand, you use data and insights in that way to be like really targeted hyper-focused on winning those key occasions for that consumer. Because again, at the end of the day you can only stretch a budget so far if you want to grow a business.

Damian Fowler: (21:51)

Fascinating that. So just to wrap it up, I guess I wanna ask each of you one question, you know the same question Kyle, what do you wish you could take from CPG land and Vinny, what do you wish you could take from political?

Kyle Smith: (22:03)

For me it'd be like two things. Like I think the permanence of the institutions. You know, you have the same kind of folks that'll work in marketing, the same agencies that run things for years, if not decades. Sometimes that makes it so that you have a lot of like earned experience and a lot of, you've gone through all this several times, you know what works, what, what doesn't. And I think kind of an informed approach every time politics is, you know, you have to start from the bottom and you build something up and then election day happens and that institution basically doesn't exist anymore and you have to start all over again for the next two years. So that'd be the first thing. And I think with that comes the advantages of being able to have more predictability. We don't have a ton of predictability in politics.

Kyle Smith: (22:37)

It's tough to know what my budget's gonna be. It's really tough for me to know what the news cycles are gonna look like next year without kind of that knowledge going in without knowing how much money you have, it makes it harder to do long-term planning. That's where I'm a little bit jealous of CPG land kind of wish, you know, knowing what your budget is a year and a half out I think would be awesome in our world if we were able to say that with certainty. But you know, it makes us scrappy and it makes it so that sometimes it's better than you expect and you get to have fun with it and sometimes it's a little bit worse and you just have to be smarter than the other guy.

Vinny Rinaldi: (23:02)

I would say almost the opposite in a way because I feel the marriage of branding and performance is so important to not separate the two, but to bring them together and the agility that the political landscape moves with is actually a blessing in disguise. Pricing aside the hyper target ability, the ability to show value really quickly is something that we lack because we don't own the end game. So like there, there's a part of that that's like, okay, well if you can be that hyper-focused and get a really quick outcome, how do you build that into a small percentage of your spending in the overall portfolio to be super agile, super hyper targeted, really focused on market analysis and then correlated to sales or in your case outcomes from an election. That to me is super exciting. It's something that we sometimes strive to do. You know, we used to have this motto that we're still trying to build out, but like, act like a CPG, think like a D to C, we don't own the end game, but how do you think really agile but come with the power of being a CPG. So I think what you bring to the table from a political landscape gives us just a little bit there to think about of like being super fast, nimble, and agile in a marketplace that changes so fast.

Damian Fowler: (24:17)

And that's it for this edition of the current podcast. We'll be back next week. The current podcast is produced by Wonder Media Network. Our theme is by loving caliber. The current podcast team includes Chris Brooklier and Kat Vesce. And remember,

Kyle Smith: (24:30)

If you're talking to one group of people 70 times, you have less money than to talk to the rest of the folks who may not be very heavy media consumers.

Vinny Rinaldi: (24:37)

Act like a CPG, think like a D to C.

Damian Fowler: (24:40)

And if you like what you hear, subscribe and leave a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report as we round up the week's biggest marketing headlines from across the open internet. I'm Damian and we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Barbara Shipley, senior VP of brand integration at AARP, discusses on The Current Podcast the risk of perpetuating myths associated with older generations.  

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

DAMIAN (00:01):

I'm Damian Fowler.

ILYSE (00:02):

And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.

DAMIAN (00:04):

And welcome to this edition of the current podcast.

ILYSE (00:10):

This week we sit down with Barbara Shipley, the senior Vice President of Brand integration at A A RP. The

DAMIAN (00:17):

A A RP is the nation's largest non-profit nonpartisan organization, which is in its own words, dedicated to empowering Americans 50 and older to live their best lives. It's taken great pains to assure people that it's not about silver haired grannies and granddads

ILYSE (00:33):

To be sure it's building on a tremendous legacy that started back in 1958. But as the perception of aging has changed in that time, so has the organization and its messaging. The A A RP is on a mission to debunk the myths about growing old. One of the ways it's doing this is by investing heavily in digital marketing in a world focused on youth. Barbara talks to us about what's unique about the A A RP demographic,

BARBARA SHIPLEY (01:04):

So we totally understand why people have a focus on Gen Z millennials. Um, let's be honest, there's definitely an obsession with youth, not just in this country, but all around the world. I think what's important for people to remember is not to put generations against each other, but to recognize where the customer base could be and potentially take age out of the equation for just a second, think about what your brand is, what your marketing, what your bottom line is, and then who makes the most sense? And in most cases, your marketing team, your brand team, your strategy team is going to zero in on people, 50 plus, they don't know it now, but if they open their mind to see where their customer is, I can almost guarantee it will include a huge proportion of the 50 plus because that's where the money is being spent. That's where the population growth is. Aging, is fueling growth in almost every market and segment.

ILYSE (02:22):

Just how big is that spending power, I guess, of that demographic? And then basically, how should brands think about this audience?

BARBARA SHIPLEY (02:30):

In the US alone, you've got 110 million people over 50, and the fastest growing audience is people over 85. So that is something to celebrate. Now, in a youth, and you could say youth obsessed, but in a youth focused environment, it's hard to pull people's attention over to the power of the 50 plus audience. But when we talk to brands and marketers in the industry and say, $8.6 trillion, they stop and listen, that's a lot, that contribution that the 50 plus in the US alone makes to the US economy each year.

ILYSE (03:15):

Now, the A A RP was founded 65 years ago in 1958. How has your organization changed to reflect the values and the needs of the demographic that you now serve?

BARBARA SHIPLEY (03:27):

The biggest way a A RP has changed is we are still extremely proud and focused of the, on the work that we do to help retired senior citizens, but that is not all we do. So if you think about an organization that is focused primarily on the 50 plus their families and their communities, how many 50-year-old people do you know that are retired right now or even thinking about retirement, they may be planning for it. I have to say I hope they are, because if you're not planning for it by the time you're 50, that's gonna be a challenge. But retirement could be 20 years away. And so A A RP has adapted it's content, it's programs, it's services, it's products, it's community outreach, it's volunteers to really address the way people are aging today, not just the way they aged when their parents or grandparents were going through their lives.

DAMIAN (04:26):

In addition to changing the programming that you have, um, how has the narrative changed in terms of your marketing, in terms of your campaigns? Now, I know you work with BBDO to create this new narrative. Could you address that a little bit? So

BARBARA SHIPLEY (04:39):

This longevity message that I was just talking about is really important and it, and it really became one of the big insights to this new narrative, as you say. So if you could spend or live half your life after 50, you want to make sure that your money, your health, and your happiness live as long as you do. It starts to capture in a really concrete way. Our role, the AARP's role, is as a wise friend and a fierce defender, we are uniquely equipped to help you make sure your money, health and happiness live as long as you do. And the reason why it works so well as a marketing campaign is because of what I call the rug pull at the end, which is in fact, the younger you are, the more you need A A RP. And that has stopping power and gets people's attention because it is not easy to make sure your money, health and happiness live as long as you do. But we are here to help you do that.

DAMIAN (05:44):

It's interesting here, you talk about this because that line in the sand of retirement, sort of mid sixties, uh, has always been there and as sort of as a sort of psychological threshold. And, and that's clearly changing, you know, not just in the United States, but everywhere around the world. And I know that one of the important focuses for you has been around the importance of work and not just work for people, you know, under 65. It's not about retirement anymore, is it?

BARBARA SHIPLEY (06:09):

So you're right, it's not about the traditional old book of retirement. So work has become one of the biggest areas for A A RP. And it, it, it's interesting when you see it at first, people can be a little bit surprised. Wait a minute, I thought you were about retirement. And very quickly they get to that moment where of course you're not just going to help me in my retirement years, you are going to help me in my working years as well. And we do have to be honest here, there's a lot of ageism in the workplace. There's age discrimination, which is even a more deeper legal issue. If you're over 50 and you need to work and you're outta work, it's a daunting task just to get an interview. So what we do is work with the environment that you're trying to succeed in, not just help you with your resume, which we do provide you a network, which we do connect you to a job board, which we do. But we are also communicating to the HR industry, hiring managers sectors, the creative industry to push and help people understand the power of the multi-generational workforce. There is so much power in the multi-generational workforce. The work is better, the experience is better, the culture is stronger, the learnings never end and it goes every which way. And that's why I'm so passionate about the multi-generational workforce, specifically in the creative industry and how powerful that can be for business outcomes for your clients and for the culture of your agency.

ILYSE (07:50):

Yeah, and definitely there is an ageism issue in America and not even to mention the marketing industry. Could you describe some of those like stereotypes and misperceptions that do show up in media and we, we still see,

BARBARA SHIPLEY (08:05):

On the one hand, if you're thinking about hiring an older person, a little bit different than you just asked, but if you're thinking about hiring an older person, the myth associated with that is they can't use technology. They're slow, they're always gonna call in sick. They're not really looking to work here for a long time. They're just marking time until they retire. False, false, false and false. This is a group of people who largely have accumulated so much experience and so much wisdom that they are going to right the ship when there is some kind of a crisis in the workplace, they are going to be the steady hand. They can be, um, a receptacle for learning, for teaching, for sharing. There are lots of things that people learn how to do. So there are some opportunities for learning, but let's create those opportunities so that we can get the benefits of people in the workplace.

BARBARA SHIPLEY (09:05):

In marketing. We still see brands, brands are really starting to get it right. I think there's a lot of reasons for that. We're gonna take some credit for that, but we won't take all that credit. I think part of it is because a lot of creative directors at your agencies, they're turning 50 and they want to be relevant. They know their life experience and their talent is relevant. And I think that's part of where the new narrative in a lot of these ads is coming from. They're also, I think, looking at the realities of aging. They're looking at the research, the data, and they're seeing that people are developing their own stories, their own timelines. pe half of people in America that are 65 to today are still working. So to tell a story in an ad of people in their sixties with sort of blank stares, fumbling around technology, doddering fools only vulnerable, wearing beige does not tell the story of how people are actually living their lives today.

BARBARA SHIPLEY (10:09):

Now watch an ad for a restaurant, the older people, I bet you are background, that's not how it actually is, but that's how the ad portrays it because the younger hipper people are in the front, they are your OCPs. So let's get it actually the way it is because the danger of perpetuating these myths is twofold. One, your prime audience that has all the spending power is feeling ignored or insulted by your brand. And two younger people who come in contact with your work fear aging, that's a societal problem. And I would ask you and all of your listeners to answer the question, what's the alternative to aging? Everybody wants to age their way, which is why our mission is to empower people to choose how they live as they age.

ILYSE (11:10):

Now, are there any specific tools that A A RP turns to, um, to kind of bust some of those myths around those stereotypes?

BARBARA SHIPLEY (11:19):

So that's a great question because the tools and the concrete, um, opportunities are the best way to educate and change the environment. And I am so proud of the work that we launched about five years ago in a very special partnership with Getty Images. We have introduced a signature collection on Getty images that has grown to tens of thousands of images called Disrupt Aging. And the goal of disrupt aging is to, through imagery tell the more current contemporary real and varied stories associated with how people age. You see multi-generational images, you see images of people at work, you see images of people at play. They are not overly photoshopped, they are not overly beautiful. They are very real and it makes a huge difference. And to me, one of the most exciting things that I didn't even anticipate when we built this is the search techniques that we have introduced.

BARBARA SHIPLEY (12:22):

Instead of agencies searching for old people on the beach, we now are shifting the, the search, which means the input is changing. And the models are also really shifting how we think about the imagery that captures today's realities of aging. So the Getty images work is pretty radical. And then we also have all of the data from the usage that shows us what people are gravitating to and what they need. So it can be a very responsive tool, but it isn't enough. We need more tools in our industry and I recognize that I grew up in this industry, I grew up in the agency world. I know what it's like. The big problem I have with where our industry is right now is stop making assumptions about me because you know one thing about me, which is my age, nobody wants that. So this is what we need to break ourselves out of and stop putting everything through an age lens, which may it sound funny coming from an organization that is about aging, but it's about the freedom to choose how you live as you age and not be put into a box or a category or segment because of one data point.

ILYSE (13:41):

Now there's no doubt a lot of brands are getting it wrong still, but are there any brands that are doing it right?

BARBARA SHIPLEY (13:48):

Yeah, absolutely. So I'll give you one example, which is Hyundai. And the story is taking the daughter to college and they're driving. So the Hyundai is the vehicle, and by the end of the ad you realize the daughter is dropping the father off at college, and you just have you, you're seized in this moment. I would say there's another narrative coming out of an interesting brand, which is indeed and uh, you see a story of, you know, the the sort of quintessential man carrying the box with stuff in it, which your mo your brain says to you, he's leaving the job, he's been fired, he's retiring. But what you realize by the end of the ad is he's a new hire and he's in his fifties and people couldn't be happier that he's there and he's happy that he's there and it's the new beginning instead of an ending. And that just captures everything about what this audience is actually going through. They aren't just nice stories, they're real

DAMIAN (14:49):

Speaking of perception. And I know that you have the A A RP magazine, which I understand is the world's largest circulation magazine, which has more than 47 million readers and across a broad age range, it goes back to that multi-generational approach that you've been talking about. You know, how does the magazine as it were, fit into the whole, you know, tapestry of everything that you're doing in terms of your marketing efforts and the perception

BARBARA SHIPLEY (15:13):

A A RP the magazine is one of the most exciting things we have. It's a lifestyle magazine uniquely focused on interests, needs, topics that the 50 plus, now that's a huge group of people, right? There is almost no such thing as a 50 plus segment. So we have a lot of elasticity in the A A RP magazine, you'll see a lot of health topics, you'll see a lot of sex topics, you'll see a lot of travel topics, friends, um, empty nest. There's so much that we are able to cover, but we do it with a really deaf hand. There's so much soul in the way we cover these topics and the way we do interviews with the a a-listers that really wanna be on the cover of the magazine. Um, over the years, uh, we've had actors, actresses, uh, musicians, uh, Michael J. Fox, lady Gaga, Henry Winkler was on the last issue. People don't throw it away, it's a keeper.

DAMIAN (16:16):

That is an interesting way of kind of gauging one's own aging in a way, in relation to these pop culture people that you've grown up with

BARBARA SHIPLEY (16:25):

Because these people are still relevant. That makes me still relevant. That makes you still relevant, not some memory of who we once were. This isn't just a group that likes nostalgia either. This is a group of taste makers. You are probably a taste maker. I'm gonna bet. And so you like new music, you like exploring new artists and a A RP sponsors a lot of music. We do a lot of virtual concerts. We do a lot of in-person concerts. We were a huge part of celebrating the 50th anniversary of hip hop. And I think that's why people recognize what we are bringing to the table. We don't just want to sit around and remember, but it's about where are we going

ILYSE (17:06):

Now, speaking about being like taste makers, A lot of people might be surprised to hear that you guys are so into social media. So curious about your approach there and and why it's an important platform to be on. Yeah,

BARBARA SHIPLEY (17:22):

We're very big on Facebook. Facebook is important to us, but so is TikTok. So is Instagram. I don't know anybody that really only lives on one social media platform. They go to different social media platforms for different things. And so we show up differently depending on where their mindset may be, their needs are. Our presence on TikTok is a little bit of an alter ego for a a RP. It's an opportunity for us to bring a, a different part of our personality to bear because that's what the users of TikTok are doing. Same thing with Instagram. We have really dedicated our presence on Instagram to capturing and telling and celebrating the story of Gen X in all its glory. It's all its craziness, all its forgottenness. You know, we used to call this the sandwich generation, right? You used to hear that phrase about people who are caring for aging parents and raising their young children, and they're sort of sandwiched in between.

BARBARA SHIPLEY (18:15):

We are concert goers and we are restaurant goers and we are travelers and we are caregivers. The average age of a caregiver is not a boomer or a Gen X, it's a millennial. And this is, this is a very big deal that people really need to recognize. And we are doing things that we never thought we would need to know how to do. And in many cases we need help. So there's, that's what I mean when I say that these are soulful stories. There is this isn't one dimensional or two dimensional. It's so multi-dimensional. And if people, marketers would just recognize that this 50 plus audience is basically giving everybody else a roadmap. Because what we are blazing, this is a trail, people will be going down basically if there's one message to leave here in terms of how our creative industry writ large reflects older segments, don't do it because it's charitable. Do it because it's good business. And oh, by the way, it's also a better way to engage with your audience and tell the truth versus be stuck in an old stereotype. This is a bottom line opportunity for agencies, brand managers to recognize who their audience is and engage them with their brand.

DAMIAN (19:44):

And that's it for the current podcast. We'll be back next week. So stay tuned and if you like what you hear, subscribe and leave us a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report as we round up the week's biggest marketing headlines from across the open internet.

ILYSE (19:59):

The current podcast is produced by Wonder Media Network. Our theme is by love and caliber. The current team includes Chris Brooklier and Kat Vesce.

DAMIAN (20:07):

And remember,

BARBARA SHIPLEY (20:08):

They don't know it now, but if they open their mind to see where their customer is, I can almost guarantee it will include a huge proportion of the 50 plus because that's where the money is being spent. That's where the population growth is. Aging is fueling growth in almost every market and segment.

DAMIAN (20:32):

I'm Damian.

ILYSE (20:32):

And I'm Ilyse,

DAMIAN (20:33):

And we'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Booking.com’s Chief Marketing Officer, Arjan Dijk, joins The Current Podcast to  touch on the post-pandemic travel boom and how data supports the company’s omnichannel strategy, saying that 30 percent of his marketing team are “hardcore data scientists.”

Episode Transcript

Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.

Damian: (00:01)

I'm Damian Fowler. Welcome to this edition of the current podcast. My co-host Ilyse Liffreing is away.

Damian: (00:10)

This week. I sit down with Arian, the senior Vice President and chief marketing officer for booking.com. Since it was founded in 1996 in Amsterdam, booking.com has grown from a small Dutch startup to one of the world's leading digital travel companies. The company's stated mission is to make it easier for everyone to experience the world. Part of Booking Holdings inc. booking.com is a truly global company available in 43 languages. And with more than 28 million accommodations listed, Arian joined the company in 2019 and overseas marketing efforts worldwide. As such, he's responsible for all initiatives across the marketing funnel from brand social performance and innovation. We started by talking about this omnichannel approach.

Arjan: (01:03)

The role of marketing is to accelerate momentum. Uh, so you have to be very, very, very thoughtful where you invest and when you invest, because if there is no momentum in the market, it doesn't really make sense to really spend a lot of money and and convincing people to, to spend money. We look at more than 200 countries in the, in the world and we're really looking like, okay, what's going on in that country? Are we really sure we should weigh in or not? And especially during the pandemic, you can imagine this was kind of a daily, uh, monitoring, uh, because things moved very rapidly and you had, you had to deal with lockdowns and then suddenly demand would drop, uh, completely. And booking.com with my team, we've been able to manage through that in a very flexible mindset. And I think that flexible mindset is still helping us right now.

Arjan: (01:51)

'cause we're really looking very carefully like, oh, does this work? Oh, yes, it works. Let's invest a bit more. Invest a bit more. Okay, now it's enough. Now we go into other channels and I talk a lot about the role of different channels. So I personally always hate the difference between brand marketing, performance marketing. Uh, one of the key things when I started at the company almost five years ago is that, is that we would report separately on our performance marketing spend versus brand marketing spend. I'm like, you know what? Let's not do that anymore. Uh, it's the same money it should perform. And clearly when you work in what we call low intent channels, you have different objectives. Yeah. So low intent, our channels like pr, social media, general, TV advertising, all those kind of good things, but they drive awareness and consideration. They don't necessarily drive an immediate booking where we also work in other channels where it's more about immediate booking.

Damian: (02:44)

It's very interesting to hear you talk about looking at that data from all these different markets you are in. I mean, how do you stay on top of that? It sounds quite strategic and quite data-driven.

Arjan: (02:55)

We are very data-driven. I do think that anyone in marketing now nowadays needs to be data driven. And you know, you can imagine that I have a, a big marketing team, but I can assure you that probably 30% of them are kind of hardcore data scientists. And these are people who are day in, day out will look at effectiveness of our campaigns and then report back and say, Hey, we expect that actually this to happen. But it didn't. And sometimes results are very intuitive and sometimes results are not very intuitive. And I think being honest about that is very important.

Damian: (03:25)

In 2023, we had a little bit of a resurgence of optimism in the economy after 2022, and it seems that business travel is back in popularity. The summer of 2023 saw record numbers even from even before the pandemic. I'm wondering from your perspective, how has booking.com experienced this post pandemic travel surge? Is that predicted to continue?

Arjan: (03:47)

Yeah, so one of the great learnings I think from the pandemic is that people have just this amazing desire to travel. That's exactly what it is about. You know, like each of us, you know, you probably will agree, is that when it's holiday time, you're like, oh my God, this is amazing. I'm, I'm going away in a different environment. I'm experiencing different food, different people, uh, different weather, et cetera, et cetera. So the Pandemic was a huge confirmation of travel just being an enormous part of people's life. And of all the things that you experience in your, in your life, supposedly only 12% you actively remember. Uh, so, uh, from everything that you experience in your life. And the reality is that probably those trips you've made, those special trips, that wonderful Weekend to Paris or that amazing time in in Wyoming, those are the things that you remember. And I think travel plays really a, a big role. You could argue that the experiences almost are more valued than material, uh, possessions, uh, because what is better than a, a wonderful experience. So that was a huge confirmation of what we probably intrinsically already knew. But you see that especially after the pandemic, there was a thing, uh, called revenge Travel. You might remember that term. Other people were like, you know what? I don't care. I'm getting out of here.

Damian: (05:03)

I'm curious to get your perspective on how you're using that data. We've just talked about Antech, you know, to personalize that user experience and, and the way you kind of focus on the different types of travelers within your marketing efforts.

Arjan: (05:16)

What we try to do is make it easy for people to book, uh, with us, but then also book again. And we have a program called a Genius program that really makes it more interesting also for the more casual traveler to book with us. You know, when you stay with us a little bit more, you go up a level and there are actually three levels that you can, uh, can achieve. And that means you can get a little bit more benefit. I do think that the mindset around business travel has changed significantly after the pandemic. Uh, I look at myself before the pandemic, I would jump in a plane for a meeting of two, three hours. Now Aari will say, can I do this on a Zoom call

Damian: (05:49)

From the US perspective, I know you're the official partner of the Major League Baseball League here and um, latest campaign features Ken Griffey Jr. And last year the Brand Somewhere, anywhere campaign featured Melissa McCarthy, which debuted during the Super Bowl, which of course is nearly already sold out for 2024. I'm wondering, you know, how does booking.com pair sports lovers with what your overall strategy is? What do you, how do you think about that?

Arjan: (06:16)

I do think as a brand, it's incredibly important that you're part of the zeitgeist. Uh, and if you look at where people are spending their time and where their passions lie, sports play a huge role. I think the top 10, you know, most viewed television programs will all be sports. That's kind of the reality of today. And so that, that if you want to reach a mass audience that is engaged in an area that is very much in the zeitgeist, you cannot ignore sports anymore. Mass reach has become actually quite, quite difficult. And we really believe by being part of tournaments where people are really passionate about their sports will really show up. Well. The key aim in the US is also that people know us as, uh, a brand that's very good for outbound travel. Yeah. So if you want to travel outside of the us but we also want to really reiterate, hey, we're a brand that's also fantastic for domestic travel, and we have a little tag line is that says where, where there's how I said where, where there's baseball, there's booking has gone.

Damian: (07:13)

And then I guess, you know, you are align with different sports in different markets. Obviously Europe must be, we have to say the word soccer, but Europe is soccer, right?

Arjan: (07:21)

Yeah. So, uh, we're proud sponsors and we have been of ufa, which is a big deal, you know, live stops in Europe. Uh, so when, when the major games are on, you know, you can probably, uh, skate on, on, on a highway because you know, there is no traffic. But we also have done ICC crickets, which if you're not into cricket, you're like, what is this? But I can assure you there are more than a billion people passionately care about, uh, a cricket, especially in India, Australia, uh, South Africa, uh, the uk. Uh, so those are markets where cricket is immensely popular. We're also, were proud sponsors of the FIFA Women's World Cup. So I I was very happy with that. 'cause you see also that that sport is really increasing so dramatically and wonderful to be part of that.

Damian: (08:06)

And you mentioned how sports are being fragmented across streaming platforms. Does that complicate your efforts when it comes to marketing, or do you just have to be more tuned into that omni-channel approach that we were talking about?

Arjan: (08:19)

We really care also about the kind of communal moments. Yeah. So what are the times that you're sitting with your friends or family and you are watching together? And when you show up in those moments, we think it's really powerful. The strategy of showing up in more individual channels is more kind of a one-on-one approach, uh, where you are on your phone or you're on your computer or you're on your iPad watching something that interests specifically you. But being part of those kind of communal moments, we really care about that.

Damian: (08:50)

Booking.com is owned by Booking Holdings, which owns a host of other, uh, websites including priceline.com, a goda.com, kayak, cheap Flights, rental Cars, and OpenTable amongst others. I'm wondering, you know, what's the synergy like between the companies when it comes to marketing? Is, is the same data applied across all brands? We

Arjan: (09:11)

Operate quite independently, and that's on purpose. Uh, I'm a, I'm a strong believer in kind of healthy competition. Uh, so, so really keeping each other honest, being very focused on our very specific segments of the market. And with a goda price line have, we're addressing a more specific price conscious, uh, segment in the market. Booking at com is a little bit more for everyone. Kayak is clearly in a very specific industry. And the same for OpenTable. We meet every month. So I meet with the heads of marketing of, of every brand once a month, and we really talk through our marketing strategies and really, of course, try to learn from each other.

Damian: (09:45)

Are there any specific challenges or obstacles you, you've encountered when it comes to implementing this omnichannel strategy? What, what are your kind of main challenges?

Arjan: (09:55)

We have a slightly different model probably than most companies is that, uh, we have very strong relationships with a couple of key ad platforms and we do that direct. Uh, so we don't really have an intermediary, we don't have an agency, so we work directly with Meta, Facebook, Instagram, we work directly with YouTube and, and, and Google. And that approach has, in my perspective, big advantages. It also has clearly disadvantages that you have to staff up and you have to really understand, you know, how things work and you need to be able to manage the technology.

Damian: (10:27)

Booking.com operates in over 208 countries and you know, you're talking about strategies across all those different languages, cultures, regional preferences, and presumably, you know, economies are different as well in different parts of the world. How do you sort of manage all of that?

Arjan: (10:43)

The key thing to, to realize is that there's also a lot of commonality. And so, so you shouldn't underestimate that wherever you are in the world. We're kind of all human beings and we kind of all do the same things. And the joke I often make is that if you think of a romantic dinner, so imagine you are in Japan or you are in Columbia or you're in North America, romantic dinner is a romantic dinner. It generally involves two people. It generally involves some nice food and and drinks. And it generally involves a nice table with people seated. Uh, there, it generally doesn't involve loud music, it has kind of soft music. You could argue that of course a romantic dinner in Japan. It's very different to Columbia. But there are also lots of commonalities. And what we are trying to do is really focus on the kind of commonalities that were set up in our campaigns in the right way, from a measurement point of view, from a data point of view, from the way we go to market.

Arjan: (11:39)

And then suddenly we're, we're actually very effective in tailoring our language, our messages to someone in Japan versus Columbia. But the fundamentals are intrinsically the same. One key thing I really care about is truth telling that as a brand, you tell the truth about yourself. And I think a lot of brands actually go wrong there, that they claim to be something that they aren't. And it doesn't mean you need to be boring or non engaging, but you should be very clear about the position you have in people's lives. And the position we have in people's lives is, you know, what we're the best at just getting it out of the way. Book that kind of great place and 1, 2, 3, you are done. And that's the reason we're also using booking.com booking. Yeah. 'cause yeah, it's that kind of positive feeling of, hey, it's out of the way.

Damian: (12:22)

I read an interview with CEO Glenn Fogel in the FT actually talking about AI and how the company's preparing for the AI era. And he said something along the lines of AI can take the friction out of holiday planning. I'm wondering if that's a focus for you from the marketing seat that you are in.

Arjan: (12:40)

Generative AI clearly has many aspects. Uh, so, and Glenn is really talking about the traveler experience, really making sure we take the friction out of everything and that we more or less are able to predict much better what your next step would be based on, you know, on those models. I do think that in marketing specifically, there is probably also a huge productivity opportunity by using generative ai, be it in how we do our performance marketing, but also how we develop, uh, creatives. Uh, we're experimenting with AI generated videos that we're putting out on, on, on YouTube that are very tailored to very specific searches that people are doing on, on YouTube. I really focus with my team also on that kind of productivity side of it. Uh, can we really make, again, every dollar work a little bit harder using smart technology?

Damian: (13:32)

Are there any other emerging technologies or trends? Uh, I mean, one thought was the focus on sustainability, for instance, that will have an impact on future omnichannel marketing efforts.

Arjan: (13:43)

The interesting thing is that as any company in the world and especially a company in travel, sustainability is clearly something you have to just obsess about. It's something that is really important and I talk a lot about purpose. Uh, what is the purpose of, of our company? What is the purpose in in our marketing? And I really see sustainability as kind of, kind of foundational you would expect from any reputable company to really care about this and that we each contribute to, uh, helping improve sustainability in, in the world.

Damian: (14:19)

And that's it for the current podcast. We'll be back next week with Barbara Shipley, senior Vice President of Brand integration at A A RP. The current podcast is produced by Wonder Media Network. A theme is by loving caliber. The current podcast team includes Chris Ley and Cat Bessie. And remember,

Arjan: (14:37)

One key thing I really care about is truth telling at that as a brand, you tell the truth about yourself. And I think a lot of brands actually go wrong there, that they claim to be something that they aren't. And it doesn't mean you need to be boring or non engaging, but you should be very clear about the position you have in people's lives.

Damian: (14:54)

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave as a review. Also tune into our other podcast, the current report as we round up the week's biggest marketing headlines from across the open internet. I'm Damien and I'll see you next time.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.