The
e Charlie Crowe Intervview by Dr. R. L. Bhat
D
tia, Founder, World CSR Daay ______________
_________________________________________________________ 1.
A
As Chief Exe
ecutive of C C Squared th
hat is hosting the Festivaal of Mediaa, what is your personall vision for tthe Festival o
of Media? Around th
he world, abo
out $500bn is spent on placing advertisements in media m
– into
o TV ad breeaks... magazinee pages... banners on webssites and so o
on... – the Festival of Mediaa is the placce for any senior s
executivee involved in eeither the bu
uying or the sselling of this meedia. It is the place wheree media sellerrs can show theeir business plans, content, strategiess and brands to
o the global leeaders in clieent companiees and among th
he global media agenciees. It is the place where the buyers of media m
– the clients and media m
d find agencies – can meet the vendorss and try and
ways to deepen theiir business relationships.
r
. This “media buying” b
area has become a massive, global g
and techn
nologically ad
dvanced indu
ustry – wheree only six global organisatio
ons plan/buyy about 7 out of w
every 10 ads that consumers see across the world every dayy. It is amazing that before 2007, an Event did no
ot even exist for the global leadership w
within this sector. The FFestival of Me
edia in Monteeux should b
be truly globaal – global CM
MOs should b
be able to vissit the sponssored areas of o any media vendor thatt exists in thee top tier – whether w
theyy are a newspaper comp
pany in India, a TV businesss in Brazil or aa web company from Califfornia. And, because of our media focus, FOM is th
he place where new media vendors an
nd digital netw
works can come c
to join
n the conveersation: mobile compan
nies, online video playerrs... demand side platfo
orms... and so
o on... All of these “new”” companies need to enggage with clieents and agencies. They need to compete with thee established “traditional” players. FOM
M is the meltiing pot wheree it all ology radicallly changes th
he nature of tthe media traading environ
nment happeens! And, as digital techno
and the way brand
d money is sp
pent, FOM is increasingly becoming TH
HE place where these proffound business issues are
e discussed. So, th
he vision is to
o welcome all the world’ss major mediia companiess to Monteuxx in 2013 – and to doublle the numbe
er of advertiseers in attendaance (who all are realisingg that so much about markketing is, theese days, abo
out “media”). We expect also to ensu
ure that we get g over 1,50
00 entries intto the Award
ds, to ensure
e that FOM in Monteux is also the leading global celebration of media work. Mediaa’s time has come – and the FOM is tthe global home for this in
ndustry secto
or. The vision
n is to share this news with more peop
ple and to gro
ow our base. 2. In the next few years what kind of paradigms shifts do you see that will impact the Media Industry? Do you think that the paradigms will be of Global nature or different for Europe, Asia etc? One of the interesting things about global media is that local markets are different in culture, trading environment, regulatory scenarios and traditions... I don’t see this changing – even though the pressures are much the same in each market. Social media, for example, continues to challenge traditional players (often what were often monopolistic TV and print players) in every market. But the outcomes are different. In some markets, Social media is taking advertising share from TV and print, but in other territories (like India), there’s more of a co‐existence between Social and traditional. Things like e‐readers and I Pads are having a far more profound change to media plans and thinking in UK and USA than they are in India and Mexico – for the obvious reasons that the latter markets have low penetration for the mass of the population and no scale for advertisers. In some markets like these, however, the use of Twitter for brands has been much more exciting and creative than in more mature economies... But I’d say that procurement practices in media, the rise of data in marketing, the decline of creative agencies everywhere other than Brazil and the doubling of expenditure of brands using mobile technologies in advertising will be global trends, impacting all. 3. If there are 5 competencies that CMOs need, what would you envisage those competencies would be? Make a list. 1. Data. Finding it; analysing it; using it; feeding it back into business. The majority of CMOs know that this is the big emerging issue but know that they lack the skills to really harness this. From data from social networks and DSPs to data from retailers (online and physical) – the data issue is now a marketing issue and it is presenting some huge challenges and opportunities. 2. “Letting Go”. Enlightened CMOs understand that openness, honesty and transparency are the new norms. The idea of there being “corporate policies”, “no comments”... “Company announcements” and so on is very old school. New CMOs have to understand that their organizations are open to criticism from consumers and that its best to have a dialogue. 3. Social Media. Every CMO is worried about this. Is a “like” a good value or not? Is a “share” of a piece of branded content worth something or not? The new CMO has to understand these new metrics AND also relate them to the metrics of old, such as the GRP and CPM. A whole new currency is about to emerge – but we don’t quite know what this looks like yet. 4. Storytelling. Every CMO must know how to tell a story. It’s the only thing we humans really remember. When people enter memory competitions they often find it’s best to remember disconnected words by weaving them into a story. So too with brand messages. CMOs need to appreciate this – and value great story tellers. 5. Responsibility. CMOs are beginning to appreciate that brands can’t “cover up” for the sins of the corporation. CMOs need to help guide their CEOs into appreciating the values of sustainability. The marketing industry has a HUGE opportunity to show leadership in this arena. But they are not doing this as yet. 4. In designing the Festival of Media content, what are those aspects that you consider as important and why? Finding the pertinent issues. Researching the best speakers to provide illumination on them, wherever in the world they might be. Framing our agendas is a long and arduous process. We never get it 100% right, but we are getting better. Every agenda takes about 300 man‐hours of time to create, and lots of my support. We see the FOM agenda as a key part of the product. Many event organisers fully “outsource” their programmes to the industry or have companies “bid” to make presentations. We think this is wrong because we believe the industry needs an independent viewpoint. We prefer to embark on a long consultation with the industry ‐ but then try to set the agenda ourselves. We see this as our role as an independent business publisher. It is an intellectual task but really worthwhile. 5. The Festival of Media v/s Cannes: Size, The future? I’d characterise our difference really as one between ‘specialist’ and ‘generalist’ or between’ deep mining’ and ‘shallow mining’. To explain: Cannes is primarily an Awards business. And its private equity owner knows that the highest margin revenues are awards entry revenues. This is because the industry writes the awards and judges the awards. It does the labour! The cost to the centre, therefore, is primarily administrative. It is a wonderful business model. So Cannes grows as a financial concern by adding categories. So, recently, it has added “design” and “PR” and more recently “mobile” and “content”. I think there are now almost 400 individual categories across the week. Because of widening out the Awards, the delegation has therefore become a huge melting pot of the creative services industry – from copywriters and producers to designers, PR executives and web designers. It is very general. Furthermore, most of the actual Awards themselves focus on the creation of the work, less about what happens after the work has been created. As a week‐long global meeting point, it is a great event – and a fabulous brand. It supports innovation across all sectors and I am a big admirer of its success. As an Event that was created 60 years when advertising was a very different industry it has moved away from just being a celebration of creativity in traditional advertising production and creation, although this remains at its core. As it grows, it serves to actually highlight the Festival of Media’s unique point of difference. We are interested in “media”. And beneath this single term is a whole growing industry that is complex, dynamic, exciting and, ultimately, the cornerstone of the advertising industry. “Media” contains an eco‐system of thousands of vendors, technologists, researchers, agencies and marketers (and consumers!). “Media” is the trading heart of brand building. We want to dive down deep into this subject. We want to mine it. Through this total 100% focus, we also ensure that the delegation is senior, concentrated AND contains people who are relevant across the media value chain. Because of this, a media vendor is more likely to meet someone who might help grow their business. At the Festival of Media, a media vendor is five times more likely to meet a budget holder within a media agency or at a client than at any other event. 40% of our delegation do business at the Event and a further 40% have some form of transaction that began with a meeting in Montreux within a 3 month period after The Festival. We are interested in the business of advertising and to help advertising do business. We want to serve the media eco‐system as this grows and as more digital brands move into the space. So, in the way I characterise it, I disagree with the “versus” premise of the question! Cannes Lions and The Festival of Media do very different things. And I’d like to think we both do them very well. 6. Now that the Festival of Media is hugely successful, what would be different for the next year? Thank you for saying this! We have become well known for the quality of our delegation – and for the seniority of our speakers. We can now start broadening out our delegation and speakers, without losing that core idea of having serious media budget holders present. I would expect more media vendors from around the world to exhibit and we are seeing signs that more agencies and clients want to send large delegations. We will also be building‐out our “experience zone” so people can feel and touch the innovations of the future. So, April 28th – 30th 2013 will have more attendees and a much larger exhibition hall. We are also refining our Awards categories and methodology. So, in short, a bigger event more quality. But still in a fabulous location – which will now be the long term home to the Festival of Media Global.