John Broome is the CEO of the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) and shares his perspective on the challenges facing marketers and the advertising industry in 2020 and the opportunities available in the year ahead. He talks about the achievements of the past 12 months, including greater engagement with members and the industry, maintaining the membership level during COVID and an opportunity to reset the annual conference RESET with great success.
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Transcription:
Darren:
Welcome to Managing Marketing, a weekly podcast where we discuss the issues and opportunities facing marketing, media, and advertising, with industry thought leaders and practitioners.
Today, I’m sitting down with John Broome, CEO of the Australian Association of National Advertisers, also known as the AANA. Welcome, John.
John:
Thank you very much, good to be here.
Darren:
John, it’s been, I think for anyone, an interesting year would be to put it mildly. In your role as CEO of the AANA, you must have a phenomenal view across the marketplace. What’s your take on 2020?
John:
Well, I exited 2020 with mixed feelings, to be honest. Yes, on the one hand, it was the year from hell and many people just want to put it behind them.
But also, I thought that in that hell, it posed many challenges for us. And I think whether it was the AANA or indeed the organisation of people who are listening here today — we went through some revolutions and I think some tremendous courage has been shown and there are some learnings that we’ve all benefited from.
So, I think with the passing of time, I’ll look back on 2020 with increasing fondness.
Darren:
Because we all talk about the disruption, but you’re right; in disruption is opportunity to reflect and perhaps create things that are new that you may not have even been considered before.
John:
Yeah, and I think one of the first questions I had to ask myself as we entered March and it was quite clear that it was going to be a very unusual year was, you either lose control or you take control. And it’s a real simple choice. The actions in front of you are distinct depending on which of those options you take.
And I think you have to take control and that’s what everyone either seized straightaway or they got to that outcome in time. For the AANA, no less than anybody else, we had to take control, and that’s what we did.
Darren:
And I think it’s interesting as well because we talk about 2020 as if the same thing happened to everyone. But across marketing and advertising, across business, there were some people that had upsides and there were other people that had really significant downsides. Obviously, anyone in airlines and travel hospitality.
But then the supermarkets, for instance, it was almost a boom season. It must’ve been interesting from the point of view of managing a membership.
John:
And look, broadly speaking, I looked at our membership base and you’re right. There were a number of different reactions going on. I mean, take the FMCG sector, one of the best years they’ve ever had. Not many FMCGs have benefited from high single digit or double-digit growth for many, many years. So, although it was hard work and they were facing unprecedented supply chain issues and so forth, the FMCGs and the supermarkets I think had a great year.
The banking and insurance and financial services industry members, I thought that was a great year where they demonstrated clarity of their purpose and a much greater degree of compassion, an opportunity to really show empathy for their customer base.
And you saw some great examples of that throughout the year. Not only driven by COVID, but of course, coming out of the bush fires at the beginning of the year. The way in which brands stepped up and responded in a proactive way was quite heartening in many respects.
And then of course, as you mentioned, tourism, the sporting codes, and of course, some of our industry members particularly in the outdoor area, in the cinema media area, demonstrated amazing resilience, given the headwinds they were facing, and the courage to stick at it.
And in many ways, I’m very pleased to see the media market come back and those industry members come back into the market, which is great.
Darren:
Yeah, what are they calling it? The third quarter comeback? That sounds like a sporting match. Suddenly, media expenditure bounced back, the economy had a 3% plus growth.
John:
I think we’ve got to be careful. I think we’ve got to be very careful. Let’s put it this way; optimism is good. But to what degree, a lot of the driving factors are short-term versus long-term. I think we just got to be careful about that and distinguish the long-term challenges that are still very clear.
I’m much more interested in macro-economic indicators like consumer sentiment, GDP growth, and so forth. Because all the empirical studies (and I love the empirical studies) point to a very strong correlation between for example, media market growth and GDP growth as an index of 1.5 at play there both ways.
So, I think yes, of course, the economy is going to bounce back from what hit it in the April quarter. But to what degree that is then sustained growth over a two or three-year period, that’s where the real upside lies.
Darren:
And I think to your point around optimism’s good, I’ve seen two reports; one person said, of course, it’s going to be a bumpy road to recovery. And the other one called out the dead cat bounce, which I just thought was the worst possible metaphor that you could use, because it just had this sense of finality.
John:
Yeah, and look, I think now that we’re into the early month of/or the early start of 2021, and we look back to that last quarter in 2020, we saw a lot of optimism there. But I did sense that there was a lot of liquidity amongst advertisers because at the end of the day, they’d most probably been postponing media spend throughout the year.
And for those that certainly are operating on a calendar year or even a hard half year, they’ve got to get that money away before the end of the year. Plenty of reasons to invest as well and all the sporting finals got pushed back. And so, there might’ve been quite a bit of short-term money chasing relatively limited inventory.
I think more indicative now is what does the first half of this year look like? Are we going to see sustained growth in advertising spend because that’s when we can really say, “No, it’s not a dead cat bounce, it’s actually a bumpy ride to recovery.”
Darren:
Yeah. Now, just to go back a step, which is the challenges that you faced as obviously a leader at the AANA. You’ve got staff that were traditionally working in office. I’m sure you went through all those logistical steps and things to get people working safely.
John:
Absolutely. And it’s certainly, for us, it’s changed forever. We sat down as a team just before Christmas and we said, okay, let’s assume that we are getting back to some form of normality, how do we want to approach it? And what we agreed is that ultimately, our ultimate test is really about service to our members, and what is the best way of doing that?
Now, we’ve been doing a pretty good job during COVID. Our engagement levels as we measure them have been fantastic, if anything. They were dramatically improved as a result of COVID. And so, therefore, we decided that we don’t need to come back to the office on a permanent basis.
We’ve agreed a drumbeat of face-to-face interactions and the use of the office. And then we had another interesting challenge, which is you’ll be aware that we kind of launched a capability program last year. And of course, we were used to using members boardrooms and venues to deliver that training, they’re very reluctant at the moment to have externals coming back into their business.
We said to ourselves, well, we don’t actually need an office in the way that we used to, but we do need a training centre now. So, we’ve turned our office into a training centre and we will only use the office for office purposes on a very infrequent basis. So, it’s kind of like a 180-degree flip. And that is a great outcome because my Capability Director Gaye Steel is now extremely happy she solved a problem.
And the team are happy in the knowledge that they can continue to get the best of both worlds; face-to-face and continued virtual working.
Darren:
It’s interesting, isn’t it? From a marketing perspective, let’s say, because the AANA office was a place of work, but I’m not sure how many of you members would be turning up at the office. Most of my interactions are email or phone in the past, I very occasionally come to the office. But now, it’s actually going to become a place where people visit. It’s the AANA training center.
John:
Yes, absolutely. And we might have to put some better pictures on the wall and tidy it up a little bit. We did have it renovated in 2019, so it’s not that bad. But you’re absolutely right. It actually gives us a physical presence ironically in the way that we never had with the majority of members.
Darren:
It’s interesting as well, because I know that I’ve been on the record as saying, I think there’s way too many industry bodies. There’s so many, but it seems to me that the AANA over the last, what? Three years? How long have you been CEO?
John:
Yeah, just over three years into fourth year now, yeah.
Darren:
There feels to be a real drive towards defining a very clear purpose, especially with one of the big things that you’ve done in the past 12 months, is bring the industry — not accreditation, what’s it called? Standards, advertising standards in with the AANA.
John:
That’s right. And look, I think one of the insights and I didn’t know this when I signed on the dotted line just over three years ago, was the AANA had been around since 1928. So, kind of like if anyone deserves to stick around as long as we maintain our relevancy, of course, it’s the AANA.
So, I am actually following in the footsteps of some very distinguished worthy folks from the past. And therefore, I want to make sure that when I hand the baton on, that the relevancy of the AANA is absolutely in line with what members want. But yeah, I think so what does this mean for the future?
Darren:
Well, so in that, it feels like the world’s changed, hasn’t it? Marketing and advertising have changed. Certainly, the digital world has made things different. Advertising was in 1928. Advertising was newspapers, radio, may be some out of home, and it wasn’t called out of home, there would have been billboards.
Whereas today, advertising takes on so many different shapes and forms. It’d be interesting like even within the last 12 months, what do you see as the significant steps that you’ve managed to navigate that takes the AANA and sets it up for the next 10 years, at least?
John:
Well, look, I think one of the legacies of the past that can appear confusing for potential members is the word “advertising” itself. And we’ve often debated whether we should actually change our name because a lot of people I talk to say, “Well, John, we don’t do advertising,” because their definition of advertising is traditional forms of advertising.
And I think our approach to the industry now, is much more for a more holistic marketing approach because as somebody who spent his whole career in marketing, and I know that the average marketer, true marketer, only spends 15, 20% of their time at most in “advertising.” The rest of the time is actually around business growth through brands and all the other levers that you can pull to achieve that.
So, I think there is an opportunity for the AANA to have a broader remit around the whole marketing 360 offer. And we’re certainly now fulfilling that through the capability that we’re bringing to members and we don’t see it purely as an advertising capability program. It’s very holistic marketing.
Darren:
Is it because advertising to your point, a minute ago, members think of traditional advertising? Whereas in actual fact, marketing communications and promotions has never been bigger.
John:
That’s right.
Darren:
I mean, there’s more money being spent today on the various platforms that brands communicate especially through digital channels and you’d have to put content in there. It would seem to me that without even going to the most holistic view of marketing, the role of marketing communications could not be more important, could it?
John:
I agree with that. The other dimension of that for you, is that marketing and advertising has always been treated as a variable cost in the P&L. But interestingly, now, as companies and brands invest in tech stacks and things like that, there’s a capital cost component in there. In some instances, multiple millions of dollars.
And the broader business wants to understand what’s the return on the investment, why am I doing it? Why is that a good use of shareholder funds? So, it does add a different interesting dimension to the whole conversation. And it does go to show that the whole marketing communications industry and process is becoming far more complex and fragmented as we know already.
Darren:
So, where do you see this as opening up the opportunities in 2021 for the AANA?
John:
Well, first of all, we exited 2020 with as many members as we started 2020. And that was a nice surprise because we felt that during, as we entered into COVID, that we were going to lose a significant number of members. Because quite clearly, things like membership fees, they’re discretionary expense items, very easy to put the red pen through, particularly in times of crisis.
But the pleasing thing was, is that by having a relevant value proposition, by investing in that capability program, for example, members stuck with us. The vast majority did anyway. And we managed to top up those that left us with new members throughout the year. So, that was good and that’s giving us a good base in which to then accelerate through into 2021.
And part of that is to continue with our existing strategy around offering capability as part of our membership, but also, we’ve decided to actually open up our membership to small to medium enterprises. And this is not necessarily a financial play because it will take an awful lot of small businesses to be the equivalent revenue, to say one large businesses as a member.
This is much more around our strategic purpose of wanting to be that representative voice for brands. And as you know, Australia is an economy with a very large bias towards small business. And if we want to be a credible representative voice for brands, then we need to actually speak on behalf of that sector of the market as well. So, you’ll see a lot of activity going into that during this year.
Darren:
I think it’s really important as well, because it’s the growth that is actually coming from those small brands. We hadn’t touched on this, but at RESET last year, there was a terrific presentation from the Who Gives a Crap. Now, this is literally a startup, isn’t it?
And for those that don’t know, they provide recycled toilet paper or environmentally sustainable toilet paper. Terrific presentation, but probably would not see themselves as traditional members of an organisation like the AANA.
John:
Correct, and what made that presentation from Chris very interesting for me was two things; one, the organisation, the brand has a very, very clear purpose. I can’t remember the exact figure — it was something like 50% of all profits go into investing in providing hygienic toilets in developing countries.
So, a very, very clear, easy to understand purpose. And then the second thing was Chris, he’s not a CEO by trade, he’s not a marketer. He was an engineer who came up with a great idea and was very passionate and motivated by the purpose of his company.
In some ways, he made marketing come across as very uncomplicated to the audience. Of course, the audience was made up of worthies from across the industry on both the demand and the supply side, yet he broke it down into 10 simple lessons. And it doesn’t have to be complicated. And I think that was a great lesson to the audience on the day.
Darren:
I thought it was interesting because everyone loves puppies. And one of his competitors had traditionally used, I think their little puppy Labradors or Golden Retrievers as the sort of animal’s cimbalom of softness. So, it was quite a cheeky (if he knew it) go at his competitors. But yeah, you’re right, his 10 points were absolutely spot on as far as things that he’d learned.
The other thing I really got from his presentation/and look, I have to congratulate you, I thought … and the circumstances to pull together such a terrific day of speakers and get the audience engaged was fantastic.
But back to the point was, he said that his very first product launch, he messed up the perforations of the toilet paper. And I was sitting there thinking, what would you do if you’re a big corporate? You’d have corporate affairs saying, “Don’t say anything, it’ll go away” and legal saying “Don’t admit anything.” And he just said, “I screwed up and I’m going to fix it.”
John:
Yeah, the value of honesty.
Darren:
Exactly.
John:
Which is great.
No, thank you for calling out RESET. That was one of the other highlights, I think, of 2020. And literally the week before RESET, we had the South Australian State situation where they were going into lockdown again. And of course, Julia Gillard, our keynote speaker was due to fly in from Adelaide. So, literally, a week before, we didn’t have a keynote speaker.
But I think that that was just another example of what lots of marketers have faced throughout last year, crises at the last minute. And it’s not so much, well, you didn’t predict that. It’s more a case of what do you do in the moment. And we had just like everyone else, we had plan A, plan B, plan C plan D, etc.
But it all came good in the end and it was a good opportunity to actually reset RESET. And we’ll take those learnings forward into this year’s Reset as well.
Darren:
Well, you ended up not having your chair there on the day because he woke up feeling unwell and felt that he should-
John:
Well, I told him not to come. Exactly, no, literally I was driving to Randwick at 6:30 in the morning and he rang through, he said, John … and he sounded as crook as a dog. And I said, “Mate, you’ve got to go and get tested. You can’t come. But don’t worry, I will appoint a deputy chair.”
Darren:
Exactly, who stood up on the day and did an excellent job.
John:
Absolutely, yeah.
Darren:
So, one of the things that you mentioned earlier was the banks, and especially financial services and how they almost demonstrated a humanity as organisations and brands, that is often touched upon in advertising, but feels it’s like rarely delivered in reality. Have you also noticed the same across all of business?
John:
No, I haven’t. I think, look, there was some genuine desire across the industry right at the beginning of the crisis. And you will remember the “we’re in this together” ads that came across and they all kind of like blended into each other and there was that famous YouTube video.
But I think that was the first reaction. And I think all the benefit of hindsight, there wasn’t a lot of kind of like deep, deep thinking going on at the time around, well, what is the insight that’s relevant to our proposition that is meaningful to our marketplace that we know will have a strong level of connection, particularly at the emotional level. Because ultimately, that’s where brands are built.
And I think only a handful, actually successfully did that throughout and maintained that throughout the year, and will most probably be remembered for it by that customer base over the long term.
Darren:
Yeah, because I mean, in many ways, everyone’s suffering in some way. Your point before about even the categories like FMCG and supermarkets are absolutely struggling just to keep supply chains going. Poor old Australia Post has got millions more packages that need to be delivered. Then there’s others like the airlines and they’re suffering for the other reason. They’re barely keeping things together.
John:
That’s right. And look, we went from the standard ad with the empty streets and the piano music playing gently in the background to a lot of ads featuring people living through Zoom meetings. Quite frankly, you could put five or six of those ads up, take the brands out, and I couldn’t tell you which brand goes with which ad and that’s the issue.
There wasn’t a really relevant human truth that belonged to each of those brands that was being explored in any meaningful way. And I think perhaps, that in hindsight, that’s an opportunity that particularly the creative side of our industry perhaps missed. But not to worry, those opportunities are with us always, and they’re just a question of waiting to be discovered and taken advantage of.
Darren:
Something about the new normal, isn’t it? Isn’t everyone trying to define the new normal?
John:
You will not find me using that expression because normal for me just means status quo, usual, expected. That’s not the way to grow businesses. Actually, you kind of, you want to strive for change, to seek competitive advantage, to upset the competitor. So, we should be avoiding the new normal.
Darren:
Yes. In fact, defining the way that we want the future normal to be.
John:
And it simply goes back to the point I said at the beginning about being in control.
Darren:
Now, there’s some big challenges facing advertising and marketing globally, and we’ve seen them. Some of them have been addressed last year with — the WFA have launched in the US and the UK around multi-channel measurement.
We’ve got ongoing issues around the programmatic supply chain. There’s issues with privacy laws that continue to go on within Australia, the ACCC and the Senate seem to have hearing after hearing and inquiry after inquiry around media in this country. I mean, this must set up a fairly full dance card for the AANA.
John:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think the first two that you mentioned are certainly either continue to be or are now at the top of our list going forward. So, we are leaning into what we call all channel audience measurement. I love my acronyms, so that’s ACAM for short — much easier to say than cross-media channel, whatever.
And there will be some news on that in February, next month to share with the industry. But we are very pleased that we have a very strong relationship particularly not just with the WFA, but with ISBA in the UK. And I’ve been kept up to speed with the UK origin project, which is the first pilot project for all channel audience measurement built off the back of the WFA principles, which were shared a few months ago.
John:
And I think some of the fundamental shifts here are that we are looking for audience measurement that obviously delivers unduplicated reach and frequency, but it covers off all the aspects of planning, buying, and reporting. It’s an advertiser-led initiative as opposed to necessarily something that a particular channel provides to the industry. So, supply side-led.
And there’s some big questions there for around, well, what is the governance structure you put behind that? Who funds it? Does the advertiser fund it, for example? So, potentially, some quite radical differences compared to how the current audience measurement systems have worked in the past, all to be worked out.
And look, there’s no escaping the fact this is a humongous, audacious, project. And it will take, I estimate two to three years to get right. But I think some of the bigger markets, they’re already taking those first steps with those pilots. And as an optimist, I like to believe that there’s an opportunity for an agile market like Australia to be a fast follower.
Stay in tune with the Brits and the Americans, with all graciousness allow them to make the mistakes and correct them. Hopefully, we can then just pick up the best practice model and do something here. But it will lead to an industry conversation because I think this has to be a collaborative solution at the end of the day. We can’t do this on our own.
Darren:
Well, otherwise, it becomes impossible. I mean, my concern is picking big markets like the US and like the UK while there is obvious huge upsides getting it right. There are also huge vested interests that are also in the way. And I just wonder whether sometimes the idea that marketers used to have smaller test markets and whether Australia could again be one of those places where you can implement and test these concepts relatively quickly.
I do understand that media markets vary a lot. I own businesses in different markets, there’s nuances in every market. There’s different ways of doing things, but I still think there’s something about the Australian market that is similar enough to the main Western markets for advertising.
John:
And look, as much as I want to be an optimist, I’m also a realist. And to be frank, it all starts with mindset; where there’s a will, there’s a way.
Darren:
I heard where there’s a will, there’s relatives.
John:
Maybe, maybe. But the point is that I can understand why there could be a great deal of skepticism and worry from certain courses of the industry around change; “How will this impact me in my channel?” And nobody wants to lose what they’ve got.
So, therefore, first step is really to suspend judgment, to suspend that question for a while and actually just understand, well, what is it we’re actually trying to achieve here? At the end of the day, it is an advertiser voice promoting this message. So, it’s a demand-led initiative.
And then say, well, okay, how can we do this in a way that actually builds a better outcome for the industry as a whole and not worry too much in the first instance around how I might gain or how I might lose.
I mean, just going back to your point around local versus global, absolutely, it’s the best of both. That’s what ideally we want. But the reason why we have to think global as well is because clearly, there are some global participants involved in this and we need all those global participants to be inside the tent.
So, the platforms, for example, have to be part of the solution. Also, some of our members are global advertisers. And both sets of constituents don’t want 30 or 40 different designs of the wheel. They want one version of the wheel. And so, therefore, we have to find the best of both worlds.
But I don’t believe in the first instance that we’re just going to wait until the UK Origin project achieves what it’s designed to do, and then say, okay, fine, we’ll pick that up and put it here. I suspect what good would look like is if we could say, alright, 65 to 70 or 80% of what Origin has done is totally replicable and relevant here in Australia. But we need to add in our own 20, 25% or whatever to make sure it’s optimised for the Australian market.
Darren:
John, it sounds like 2021 is shaping up for a year of you bringing all of the players to the table.
John:
Yeah, look, and I think that’s the philosophical approach we take at the AANA. We are relatively unique for industry associations in the sense that we have both the demand and the supply side represented within our membership. And that’s under the belief that when we do have issues between those two sides, it’s better to have a conversation and nut it out. Even if it’s a free and frank conversation, it’s better to do that as opposed to chucking grenades at each other, through the trade press or whatever (nobody wins with that).
And the other thing as well, is that as much as we like to think the Australian marketplace is the bee’s knees, we’re kind of like most probably number 12, number 13, or number 14 on the global scale. So, there’s a level of pragmatism that has to come into any solution.
Darren:
Look, I think if you’re going to collaborate and work out solutions, that’s great as long as progress gets made. And of course, be completely transparent in the process. That’s all anyone wants, is to actually see change happen.
John:
And look, one little Maxim that I always write down in my notebooks and I refer to it at the most dire moments in meetings, which seem to be heading south at a rapid rate and that is dismiss the impossible.
And I think sometimes, this is not going to be an easy project. And when we hit those roadblocks, you just don’t give up, you kind of like find ways to resolve things and keep moving on, on the belief that there is an outcome that can be achieved. And it’s just a question of how do you get there.
Darren:
So, I’ve just noticed the time, but I’m going to put you on the spot and say, looking back on last year on 2020, what would be the three things that you’re happiest about?
John:
Look, I think one was a kind of human one, which is increasing our relevance and going deeper into our members’ teams. One of the criticisms of the AANA, I would say is that we’ve tended to operate at the senior marketing level. The whole COVID experience by moving all our engagement online in the space of weeks meant that we were reaching brand managers, marketing managers and various different departments within the CMO’s team.
And we saw our engagement shoot through the roof into the thousands, which is great. And we ran programs like the peer group program, for example, we had 15 volunteer CMOs who gave up their time through a curated program over six weeks.
We had young marketers … well, actually, not just young marketers – we actually had some fairly senior marketers as well, join those peer groups from different companies, different categories, sharing their experiences around what they were going through both in the job and as individuals.
And that was very powerful, that was a different side of the AANA that we saw. And the demand from the membership is they want to continue with that this year as well, which is great. I think-
Darren:
The second one.
John:
The second one, I would say is really about membership. And the point I made earlier around exiting last year with the same number of members that we entered the year, that was a pleasant surprise. And again, a testament to my team for making sure that our value proposition was changed and relevant to go through that last year.
And then I think the third one was resetting Reset, which has given us a model to work towards for this year and next year. And we’ll keep pushing that as well.
Darren:
And in some ways, I can see how the first one actually led to the second one. By deepening the engagement within the organisation, you actually then get people to stick because they see the value on a deep level and a broad level within the organisation, not just with one or two people at the top.
On that basis, if we’re sitting here in a year’s time and I’m not asking for a prediction, what would you want to be the measure of the success of the AANA in the next 12 months? If we’re sitting here in the start of 2022, and we’re having this conversation, you would include it as one of the things that you’ve achieved.
John:
So, look, I want a stronger membership base. Part of that will be delivered through the work that we’re going to do through SMEs. And the other half of it will be delivered through a broadening capability program, which we’re getting great feedback from members on.
We’re now going from a stage of where we were delivering programs to say, 20 individuals from across different companies and brands, we’ll still do that, but we’re now getting members saying, “Can you run that program bespoke for us in-house for my entire team?”
So, that’s demonstration that what Gaye is designing is really the rubber’s hitting the road. So, that’s great. And I see that as a core part of our proposition.
So, I think increasing major corporate membership, starting to build penetration in small to medium sized enterprises, those are two great metrics. But I would also say that amongst those people who are engaging with the AANA as members, a high degree of satisfaction. And we, like any other organisation, we have an NPS score and we wanted to continue to see that build.
Darren:
It’s interesting when you say SME, people should be aware that we’re not talking about micro businesses, we’re not even talking about very small businesses.
One of the things that was driven home to me is that the top 5,000 private companies are medium to large enterprises, but they’re private companies that largely fly under the radar because they’re not on the ASX or some other listed entity — and they contribute billions and billions of dollars to GDP.
So, when you talk about SMEs, I’m sure you’re not necessarily talking about the one or two-person business, you’re talking about major businesses that are adding value to the economy.
John:
And look, yeah, I think let’s look at it through a different lens. Most people will understand the Nielsen top 200 advertiser list, which has gone through, by the way, massive transformation in the last 10 years as we all know.
Brands that were up there in the top 20 are now kind of like down at 151, 152 and quite a surprise. But it’s really about, to your point, advertiser number 201 to most probably advertiser 1,000, 500 or whatever.
Darren:
Because we did the analysis. There is 1,300 advertisers spending over a million dollars in the 200 to 1,500.
John:
Yeah, and look, I think the AANA can help those other 1,300 advertisers primarily through helping them extract more value out of their brands. Whether that’s through capability best practices, guidelines, advocacy, or even maintaining a self-regulatory system that allows them their freedoms and rights to advertise in a socially responsible way, providing the right conditions for them to grow their brands. That’s what the AANA can provide.
So yeah, we look forward to that; Herculean task, but let’s do it.
Darren:
I’m sure you’re up to it. Hey, John, thank you very much for making the time and sitting down to have the conversation. Before you go, I’m just really interested in, well, you’re a man of metrics; how many members do you want to have in a years’ time?
Ideal for marketers, advertisers, media, and commercial communications professionals, Managing Marketing is a podcast hosted by Darren Woolley and special guests. Find all the episodes here