Managing Marketing: Music, Movies and Media Agency Marketing

Francis_Coady

Francis Coady is the Chief Marketing Officer at Havas Media Australia, but it is his background in the music and entertainment industry that has shaped his career and his view of building and managing brands. The importance of storytelling and narrative and the strategies to create engagement and build loyalty with the audience is what he brings to brands and the agency. He shares the lessons and the challenges he has faced in applying these approaches, particularly in the B2B category.

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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 Francis Coady, Chief Marketing Officer of Havas Media, Australia. Welcome, Francis.

Francis:

Thanks so much for having me.

Darren:

Well, it’s an absolute pleasure because, for me, the idea of having a Chief Marketing Officer for an advertising agency is quite unique and quite challenging, I imagine. And the reason I say that is I always remember as a copywriter in Adland that the hardest thing was writing the credentials because everyone had an opinion.

But tell me, what’s it been like and how long have you … well, first of all, how long have you been doing this? And what’s it like?

Francis:

Yeah, thanks so much. It’s been a really interesting experience. For the last six years — I was tapped on the shoulder about six years ago by, I think you know who very well, Mike Wilson, our ex-Chairman of Havas Media.

I was running my own business for about 14 years and he came and said to me, “Listen, Francis, can you do what you did for bands and do it for brands?” And I was like, “Okay, that’s an interesting proposition. What does that mean?”

He said, “Well, we’re looking to set up Havas Sports & Entertainment in Australia and would you like to come and run it?” And I was like, “No.” And then we chatted for … I think we chatted for two years on and off. And then he put a very compelling proposition to the table, and I decided to wind down my business and joined Havas Group.

And ostensibly, I was taken out of market and dropped into the Havas Group and to set up a greenfield position with Havas Sports & Entertainment. And it was an amazing experience. So, six years, we kicked quite a few goals to say the least, no pun intended. Our first win was Bupa three months in, which was pretty amazing for a little division and we could grow that quite quickly.

The good thing with Havas was that we were able to use existing employees within the group to sort of cast a net and support the division. So, we slowly built the team-up. We then won Gillette, which was a really huge win and they’re still a client. Five years later, I still work very closely with them. And then we went into – you probably all know about the merger.

So, we bought out a company called Hyland Media about a year ago now, just over a year ago. And at the time when Virginia had arrived, she actually ostensibly asked me, “Would you like to slightly change roles and not run the HSE anymore and sort of merge into a wider role and look at the whole business of the Havas Media Group, all the services that are being rendered under the group?”

And I thought that was quite an interesting proposition, and she mentioned that Europe and America have this function and really the role, the CMO is divided into three core areas: two main areas, namely the marketing of Havas Media and what it stands for in the market, which we can talk about more. The second part is relationships with the existing clients and discussions around opportunities across services.

So, outside existing briefs, extension of briefs, and then new business. So, looking at the market more broadly and finding opportunities in the market.

Now, the third part is an area that she knows I was very passionate about, which was I come from content creation (my history in the music industry and film industry), and when large content pieces come to the fore, I tend to executive produce those.

So, you’ve probably heard of a series called the Long Road I did with Destination New South Wales which was a fantastic piece of work, which we can talk about later. So, I pop my head up now and then on the bigger pieces of work.

So, it’s quite an intense role. There’s a lot going on, but really, the two core areas are marketing the business to the market. And then new business, both internal and external.

Darren:

It’s interesting because when you said to do what you did for bands for brands, that was Mike Wilson’s big insight, was it?

Francis:

I think so. Well, he said something interesting and both Anthony and Friedman and also Virginia consequently have said this; is that really the entertainment industry, we tend to look at the band or the group or the film in the middle, and we wrap everything around it. And we’ve been doing that for 50 years in the entertainment industry.

And I think the advertising industry tries to do that and is doing that more. And we place the brand in the middle and wrap everything around it. Obviously, when there’s a single brand, there’s obviously multiple agencies who are trying to do multiple pieces of work off that. So, one of the offerings that we have where possible — not always possible, but is to have an end-to-end solution for clients.

Darren:

There’s another big similarity, but also difference. And I know from my experience with dealing with the music industry and the entertainment industry, is that they’ve out of necessity become very good at achieving a lot, with quite little in the way of financial and resources.

Francis:

Absolutely.

Darren:

And they’ve done that largely through collaboration and partnerships, haven’t they?

Francis:

Correct, yeah. People forget that … I used to manage a group called Thirsty Merc, a big pop group, very successful group, and people forget the extensions of a band are quite remarkable. So, you’ll have things like merchandising, you’ll have partnerships with brands, literally doing launch events for the likes of LG or whoever.

You’ve got the live touring circuit, so you’re earning income off that ancillary stream. You’re also earning income off radio playlists because every radio station has to pay a licensing fee. You earn synchronisation fees when your song is used in a theatre production or a TV commercial, or a movie or a short form film.

So, there’s all these ancillary forms of income that people don’t really know outside the industry which can be hugely profitable. I worked with a group for a couple of years owned by a private equity firm called Hi-5, the children’s group. And we flipped that group from being a TV only property into a live touring act who happened to have TV, very different proposition, similar to The Wiggles.

The Wiggles were actually a touring group who had TV. So, yeah, I think there were a lot of learnings from the entertainment industry. I had a film festival for 14 years, the Bondi Short Film Festival, I curated over three and a half thousand pieces of short-form content over that time. And that helped a lot when establishing and understanding narrative, I think.

And learning about narrative of how you’re selling something to the market, that’s on a sales proposition, but just content itself looking at what a good TVC can actually become or a really interesting short-form series like the Long Road, for example.

Darren:

And the other thing that’s happened particularly to the music industry, but also the entertainment industry, is the digital disruption. I know we throw those words around in marketing and advertising, but when technology fundamentally changes the way business is done — the music industry, it was about the recording and publishing companies picking our backs and basically squeezing them for as much as possible, signing them up on a contract and making as much.

But that changed because suddenly, acts themselves could become their own publishers, they’d have distributions through electronic. They were still getting screwed a bit on some of the deals that were offered by the platforms, Apple and Spotify, because they wanted to take their chunk. But the bands and the industry really adapted to that change.

Francis:

Absolutely, yeah.

Darren:

In a way I feel that a lot of brands still really struggle because they’ve gone from a pay to play mentality, except now pay to play is so broad, where do you spend your money?

Francis:

Absolutely.

Darren:

Where do you think are the insights there?

Francis:

Yeah, it’s a fascinating turn of events. The headlines, you could remember the headlines across billboard and Vanity and all the major publications that the music industry was literally dead. The MySpace era had been burnt to the ground.

But really, I think what everyone realised in the music industry is that they owned copyright and people forget that copyright is king. If you have great copyright, you have depth of connection, ultimately. So, when they decided to connect with Spotify, which is part-owned by the major record companies, which people often don’t realise, is it became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

So, they were kind of pushing their own catalog through a platform, and people also don’t realise (maybe they do) that a lot of the heritage acts — I mean, we’ve obviously seen the Joe Rogan and the Neil Young situation, but a lot of the heritage acts are hugely profitable for them on the platforms because they’re nostalgic and they’re getting remixed multiple times by modern artists, and that copyright continues to roll on.

So, once again, you’ve got this self-fulfilling play going on. And I think they were very smart to connect onto those platforms in a way that wasn’t dominant, but collaborative. That was what was the masterful stroke. You’ve obviously seen Vivendi, is our holding group which owns Havas, but they’re also a major shareholder and were the predominant owners of Universal previously and now, major shareholders.

Darren:

They’ve also got like Canal.

Francis:

Gameloft, StudioCanal, Canal Plus, big film house in Europe.

Darren:

I mean, it’s quite a diverse business. When we think of holding companies, most of them are pretty much stayed in the tram tracks or the train line of advertising and communications, but-

Francis:

It’s an entertainment behemoth, really. That’s actually what it is. And I think that-

Darren:

In the same way Dentsu is, and most people don’t realise this: Dentsu is also an entertainment behemoth in Japan.

Francis:

Correct.

Darren:

They own TV stations, film-

Francis:

Radio, I think as well. A lot of that. Yeah, the interesting thing with Vivendi is that they … I think that’s what attracted me to Havas, actually coming from the entertainment industry, is that they had that depth of their brother and sister companies. And there was an understanding that entertainment kind of beats interruption. It’s a device that can be used well in the consumer marketplace for brands.

It’s still developing, I think it’s still got a way to go for all brands, as you said. But yeah, it was far more enticing to be involved with the holding that was entertainment-focused.

Darren:

Well, for me, there’s two big differences between the music industry and brands, and the film industry and brands. And just give me a second because the first is, while the music industry will develop a brand like the band, there is an absolute necessity for them then to produce content, album songs, whatever it is, to keep that audience engaged.

On the flip side, the film industry is all about brand reinvention because in a way, apart from what Marvel have done, that they’ve taken an existing catalog and created the Marvel Cinematic Universe and DC are doing it.

But for the vast majority of film entertainment, it’s really creating a brand from scratch and getting it up to speed as quickly as possible, and then milking it on the decline because invariably, it will decline. I think when people try to mess with those brands, you get the jump the shark effect, because if you mess with it, your core audience will walk away.

Both of those things are in a way an antithesis of traditional brand management, which is about creating a brand and being the custodian and managing it over a long period of time to maximise value. They are quite different, aren’t they?

Francis:

They are. But I think probably the biggest similarity is they’re still trying to tell a story, I think, but all three, whether you’re building a video clip and to tell that narrative through that song, I think there’s a linear play to the customer.

I still think the audience — let’s not use the word customer: I still think the audience is receiving a narrative. I think that narrative’s gotta be clear and engaging and interesting. But yes, I hundred percent agree. I think there’s an openness now for brands to change.

Darren:

Sorry, Francis, I’m going to pull you up on that, because I think brands actually struggle with their brand story.

Francis:

Oh, I’m not going to disagree with that. No, I agree with that, yes, they want to do that.

Darren:

Music and film or movie entertainment, absolutely, at the very core of it, it is a storytelling creative discipline.

Francis:

But you would argue that they need to be doing that.

Darren:

Yeah. They need to-

Francis:

Yeah, need to be doing.

Darren:

But they actually don’t get the concept of story. The number of times that agencies have said to me, “We’re storytellers,” and then what I actually see is an array of facts that’s not even a story. Because you listen to a song, think of your favorite song, and there’s this sort of transformational-

Francis:

Emotive-

Darren:

Emotional connection with it. You watch a great film, it takes you on the rollercoaster ride with the transformational acts. Whereas brands, it’s more about consistency. And the thing about great storytelling is that it’s not about consistency. Consistency in storytelling, like consistent, emotional response is boring.

Francis:

Yeah.

Darren:

Predictability is boring. I don’t want a story that tells me that Bloggo will clean my clothes whiter than white for 50,000 years.

Francis:

But if you have a brand … yeah, I know, I’ve got no argument whatsoever. I think what’s important though, is what I was saying was that they have to do that. So, the narrative is at the forefront of brand development, you would argue if it’s not being done.

Now, brand development can still go back to heritage, it can still look back to the past. That’s still a story as long as there’s an arc and a development of that arc. But you’re right, film does it very well and so does music. And I think the music industry picked up a lot from the film industry.

If you look back to the Tin Pan Alley period, when that writing was coming out of the New York, very, very early on, they were ostensibly trying to write music for film that would land in film, but it’d also land on radio, so actually having a dual play because they wanted to extend their copyright.

But yeah, back to brands, I have been pushing that for seven years, that it’s critical that brands do this. I’ve always found it quite strange when a brand will say right, “We’re going to do something completely new and we want a completely new idea and not continue on with something that’s been working.”

Now, that’s another thing. Now, if you’ve got a narrative that is working with an audience, you can change the story, but not the process of the story. So, you can change the theme of it but not the actual narrative arc and continue it on: series two, series three, series four, whatever you want to do. The film and music industry do it all the time, but-

Darren:

So, mythology is great, right?

Francis:

Yes.

Darren:

Brand mythology is a great source of the story. And let’s look at KFC. They returned to Colonel Sanders and I was in a KFC store and they had black and white photos of the Colonel there all over the place. But then as an expression of that in the US, they’ve been doing celebrity Colonel Sanders, they’ve been getting actors in to do different versions of Colonel Sanders in their advertising. An interesting extension of the mythology and makes it contemporary and interesting.

Francis:

That’s right.

Darren:

But it takes discipline.

Francis:

It does.

Darren:

And I’m just wondering whether one of the problems … because absolutely, for a band and the people managing it, which you’ve been in, there is an absolute reason for being very disciplined about the way that you manage the band as a brand.

For a movie, there is absolute discipline and I’ve worked with some of the big distribution and movie houses and they have a discipline to it to create, optimise, escalate and then just ride out the wave. You know, they’re not constantly-

Francis:

Reinventing.

Darren:

Or investing in it over and over again.

Francis:

That’s right.

Darren:

They’re maximising the upfront and then riding it out through what used to be theatrical home entertainment. And now, I think it just goes-

Francis:

One day.

Darren:

Straight to streaming. But that’s what I meant before about it’s a totally different approach to brand management, isn’t it?

Francis:

It is. Yeah, look, I think there are some brands trying this at the moment. We have a couple at the moment. We’ve had a terrific relationship with Destination New South Wales. Now they are different beasts because they are a government organisation and the brand is the backdrop to the life that we live in our community, which is New South Wales in this situation. It’s not a can of Cola.

So, they had the Liberty to use so-called their product, which is the State of New South Wales as the backdrop to a fascinating story. Six stories that we rolled out for them for the Long Road using entertainment: Amy Shark, Guy Sebastian, Ocean Alley, Troy Cassar-Daley, etc. We used narrative-

Darren:

Sorry, Francis, but also, what people are buying in tourism is experience.

Francis:

Totally.

Darren:

And so, it’s a natural extension to expose people to that experience through storytelling.

Francis:

Yeah, absolutely. We did go hunting for the insights and unearthing the why, and the why was quite fascinating in that we realised that when people travel, they tend to go directly to the location. What we wanted was for people to sort of take a bit of a meandering experience on the way to their holiday. And we also understood that when you jumped in the car, the discussion or argument would prevail around what music you would listen to.

So, music was actually a common denominator across multiple segments. You know the audiences from 16-year-old indie rockers listened to Polish Club on Triple R and Triple J right through to country radio, ABC, listened to Troy Cassar-Daley, everyone was discussing music they were going to play in the car, whether it’s an argument or a fight with your loved one.

So, that became another driver for us to build out this story that would tell kind of an enticing unearthing tale of a unique location in New South Wales that people may have forgotten about that post sort of catastrophic period of the fires. So, that was a very good example of imbuing entertainment, smacking it right in the middle of a brand approach to use said customer to try and entice you to visit and build visitation across.

Darren:

And I can absolutely see that working and extending, but just to flip this back on you with your Chief Marketing Officer of Havas Media: can you take the same discipline, do you think, into a B2B marketing enterprise?

Because I often have meetings with agencies: media, creative, digital, PR, and they’ll all tell me that they’ve got a story to tell me, and then proceed to give me the PowerPoint presentation, which is just a succession of slides with facts on it. But there are very few agencies that really do articulate a story for their agency.

Francis:

Yeah, it’s a very good question. We’re about to announce some positioning shortly. But one thing we’re very focused on is probably the experience that the client, customer, and brand will have within the media environment. So, that experience is critical.

So, you’ve probably heard the work we’ve done on meaningful brands globally — what we do understand now there are 350,000 people are involved in that across multiple territories. Cynicism is incredibly high. So, looking at positioning the brand within an experience based on the customer’s passions, dare I say it, is probably our strength, I think.

But just outside that, most services rendered by agencies across the landscape are the same. They are very similar and telling a story about those functional services really won’t engage people at all, and they tend not to engage brand custodians, the brand leads.

So, I really think it often comes down to two things. What is your understanding of the experience that your brand’s going to play in that moment in time targeting you over a day, over a week, over a month?

Second, the people. Do they actually like the people in the room and do they want to continue conversing? And is there an opportunity to learn from both sides? That’s a very important thing. And is the actual company interested in the people that they’re developing? So, we’ve made a really strong mandate on everyone to talk about culture.

I think culture is quite an amorphous thing. I think culture can change and move and develop throughout the day. But if you can present to them a group of people that have a mandate to drive passion and culture within their business, and they connect to that passion and culture, they’re going to give you work. It’s not complicated.

I would argue coming back to movies and films, if you resonate and connect with the story within that film, you’re going to download it probably and watch it again and again. The similarity with choosing your agency, are you going to connect with those people? Do you like what they stand for and what are they pushing out and what are they about?

Darren:

So, absolutely, chemistry and alignment of values is so important. I would argue even more so than all those rational things. Because to the point, I often say to agencies when they’re presenting their “credentials,” what’s the purpose of this? And they go, “Oh, to explain to the client who we are.” And I go, “I think they understand the concept of a media agency.”

When you say we do media planning and media buying, you’ve pretty much covered off most of it, and then you can throw the other bits in. But beyond that, there’s a necessity, especially in the competitive world we live in, to be memorable.

And I think that’s where a lot of agencies fall down because the way to be memorable is to actually be meaningful. And to your point about meaningful brands, how do you create a brand because agencies want to be everything to everyone. And in doing that, you immediately become nothing to everyone.

Francis:

You dilute.

Darren:

So, part of this is how do you stand for something? And in a lot of ways, we’ve got some amazing global brands. Saatchi & Saatchi is the world of nothing is impossible. TBWA, the disruption company — these companies actually have something that is meaningful and built as part of their global positioning. But how do you then turn that into the story, the narrative, the hook (to use a musical term) — the hook that goes into the client’s brain, that they will remember and want to be part of?

Francis:

Well, it’s a great question because I remember, I won’t say the bank, but I got an EDM from a bank last week that I bank with. And they said, “Oh, Francis, we’ve got a discount on the wine.” I don’t drink much wine. I drink a little bit, but I prefer whiskey and I like surfing, and I like script writing.

Now, I have been banking with that business now for what? I don’t know, five years give or take. They have no true understanding of, probably what I would define as my data points, what I’m actually interested in. I’ve got my two mortgages with them, I’ve got some money with them, and they have no understanding of who I am.

Darren:

Do you have a credit card with them?

Francis:

Yes.

Darren:

Well, they know what you’re buying.

Francis:

This is another point-

Darren:

They should have seen that you are buying whiskey.

Francis:

Correct. And also, multiple surfboards at the upset of my wife-

Darren:

Or wax.

Francis:

Or wax, yeah. I think without stating the bleeding obvious, is that if you’re not connecting to the data points of your customer set or your audience that you’re targeting, which is namely their bloody passions, what are you doing? Like literally, what are you doing? And that dovetails into loyalty. That ostensibly builds out giant loyalty.

So, I think if you’re not doing that, there’s a big problem. There’s a huge problem. And you may have heard this before, but more broadly, we talk about brand positioning at Havas a lot around functional, personal and collective, and I think it’s a great troika. I think the approach to functional if it’s on the tin and it does what it says, tick, that’s a good thing.

Same with an agency, all those functional services are there. We hope that you can do them well, tick. You’d assume that being part of a holding group, you’d probably be doing that okay, tick. Personal: do you have a personal connection, and what is the relationship with those account teams to that brand and the brand leads in that?

So, and then finally, what do you stand for in society and community? What programs are you putting out to the world and to your staff and to the world that are meaningful and important? We’ve done a whole series of pieces of cultural work pushing out recently.

You’ve probably seen all the International Women’s Day work, but also letting people travel around the world and be where they want to be for four weeks and not put stress on them and to be with their loved ones and work remotely, at least three hours a day, to reconnect with their families. Because we place that at the core of a functional person’s working day. If they don’t have that connection, there’s a big problem.

Get overseas, go and see them given the fracturing anomaly of COVID. In those three areas, we apply to brands, I would say we also apply that to our approach to the agency, back to the market. And also, we would hope that this very restricted period of talent — you know about this all too well: we hope that talent sees this. We hope that talent goes, “You know what? They actually care. They’re actually interested in this. Yeah, I might choose that agency over another agency.”

So yeah, it’s probably critical that we’re treating ourselves and our approach to B2B as we are … how we treat brands.

Darren:

Yeah, it’ll be interesting to see because I’m very aware of the Havas global positioning, and the research that underpins that because the idea that so many brands and so much activity is actually wasted because-

Francis:

75% of them.

Darren:

Because people just do not care because there’s no meaning to it, right?

Francis:

I think the meaning has to be defined. I think it’s important when you are unpacking that customer set. What does meaningfulness mean to that audience? What does it actually mean? It can vary.

Darren:

And I would say that Byron Sharp identified this. It’s that mental availability. And we see this when we are talking to clients about agencies. Clients will come to us and go “I’m after a media agency.” “Okay, what do you want them to do?” “Well, I want them to do things that media agencies do.” “Well. That’s great. What don’t you want them to do?” “Well, I don’t want people that do X, Y, and Z.” “Okay. Well, here is the set available to you that doesn’t have conflicts with your business.”

Okay, so then from that point onwards, what we need to do is to then work through, which are the ones that you would consider meeting with, because that could be quite a long list and we want to get … now, the thing that we find is that marketers usually only have mental availability for three agencies, it’s that power of three.

The one they’re with, usually the one that they’ve either worked with previously and then one other. And it’s really interesting because they will have this very focused view of the marketplace. And when we are putting up agencies that they may not know, they’ll ask lots of questions to really understand how does that compare to those three that they hold in their head? How is this going to be better or different or even interesting to get their curiosity?

Because we are asking them to go from what could be a list of 12 or more down to three or four or five just to meet with. And so, it’s quite an interesting dynamic when you see them going through that decision-making, that mental availability of how many they can actually hold.

Francis:

Hold, yeah. I think also that mental availability, what I like about meaningfulness as well and placing that in the media experience moment, is it asks them to ask a question to themselves, which I think is quite good. If you can try to force the question to be asked of the individual, I think you’re probably one … not one step ahead, but you’re at least half a step ahead.

Because I think defining what meaningfulness is to the individual helps you to a position where your brand’s going to go. Because you’ll have a position on meaning and hopefully, it aligns to what your brand … as a CMO marketing person, hopefully, your approach to meaningfulness and the experiences you’re going to deliver that brand into are going to be connecting hopefully with your passion point.

So, I like the fact that we’re in a position where we’re questioning them on what it stands for, for them if that makes sense.

Darren:

Absolutely. So, how do you then turn that into a long-term conversation, a long-term narrative? Because the other trap I see for agencies is that they’ll do a repositioning or they’ll do a relaunch or a refresh or whatever they want to call it. And there’ll be a big hurray, there’ll be a big announcement. There’ll be the video, there’ll be the social media presence, and then it just all fades away.

Francis:

Well, I think you referenced the film industry. I think if the copyright’s good, it’ll be around for a while. So, there’s always a big front up the beginning part. I would always argue that the proof is in the pudding. So, the output and the work that is being done is the true reflection of any concept of a refresh or launch.

Generally, when a refresher of an agency happens or repositioning, it is based on the work that you’ve done and you’ve found some work that’s resonated with clients continually and you’re like, “You know, that’s probably quite a fertile space to play. And I think other clients might like this.” So, really the answer lies in probably the type of work that you’re doing and will continue to roll out. That’s how you sustain it.

You can talk about yourself until you’re blue in the face, but it’s kind of irrelevant. CMOs and the marketing leads don’t care. What they’re interested in is the work you’re doing. I mean the number of times we get called up going, “How did that happen? How did you make that? I mean, literally, can we do something like that?” “Well, it costs a bit more money.” But really, the work is the proof in the pudding and that will create the long tail.

And I think every agency and everyone has a right to do their launch at the front end to cut through a little bit of noise, but really, ultimately, that’s only a little flutter at the beginning. The truth is in the output and if that output’s there, and is doing well, most importantly, is there a return? Is there actually a return?

You can do a lot of highbrow work, but the classic case with DNSW, it’s got to have a return, it’s got to drive visitation and it did. It drove millions of dollars worth of visitation back to those locations. That’s what the marketer will be benchmarked against, and so is selling razors with Pat Cummings.

Darren:

So, in your role, do you think part of the value proposition that a CMO for an agency delivers is actually bringing about that discipline?

Francis:

100%.

Darren:

But beyond doing the launch, it’s in some ways you’re the band manager that keeps the band turning up on time with the right playlist in the right outfits and-

Francis:

And not too much gel.

Darren:

And just to make sure that the audience gets what they’re paying for.

Francis:

Yes, it’s a fantastic analogy. Yeah, Virg and I have been working very closely on pitch review. So, when we go for a pitch, come down very close, final two, we win a piece of work, why? Review it, let’s look at it. Is it matching up to the previous bit of work?

Now, there’s always going to be nuances for any pitch, and to your point, they’re only looking at three. The one they’re with … what was it? The one they’re with, the one that went prior and then one more. But I think it’s a terrific point around guide rails because the most successful films, the most successful bands, and I think the most successful agencies have guide rails.

They literally have an expectation of the team’s approach to a particular work or pitch or response to the brief. And being that band manager … it’s quite funny because that’s what Virg says regularly — you call him a band manager. So, it does feel like that. But I’ve just got a couple more areas of media expertise under the belt than a drummer, a bass player, a lead singer and a guitarist.

Darren:

Well, except that you’ve got to pull them together to play harmoniously.

Francis:

Harmoniously, correct, yes. A beautiful symphony of creativity. Yeah.

Darren:

Oh look, we better stop this before we make ourselves and everyone else sick.

Francis:

Hilarious.

Darren:

Look, this has been a great conversation. I really appreciate you taking the time and coming, and having a chat, thanks.

Francis:

Thank you so much, it’s been fantastic.

Darren:

Look, before you go, I’ve got a quick question for you. Obviously, deep in the music industry, let’s do the desert island: what’s the band and the film that you would take to that desert island?

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