Advertising Week: The Future Belongs To Creative

Teresa Alpert of LoweIn the continuing tug-of-war between what drives the train--creative or media--a top Unilever executive Thursday came out in favor of creative. While there is an argument that lackluster ads can still deliver a message with shrewd placement, Babs Rangaiah said if the creative does not drive demand, a strong media plan is not likely to save the day.

Rangaiah, the director of global communications planning at Unilever, said if the creative appears banal, it's time to yank the media spend and use it somewhere else.

"We have to penetrate the culture," he said.

And the way to do that is through ads that effectively jump off the page or out of the screen. Top-notch creative is even more important in a fragmented world, he said, not to mention for a packaged-goods company.

The executive's endorsement for creative was music to the ears of Teresa Alpert, global director of planning at Lowe Worldwide, which works with Unilever. Alpert cited an example where creative drove results: a Unilever antiperspirant brand had a campaign lauded by the Gunn Report, but also had $1 billion in global sales.

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She did not reveal the brand, but it appears to be Axe, which was recognized by Gunn. Alpert said Lowe seeks a "mix of logic and magic."

Both executives appeared on an Advertising Week panel.

Rangaiah did say that creative agencies and marketers have an advantage in today's digital world compared to yesteryear--they can mine blogs or engage consumers online to get their takes on brands. That can inform the creative process more than traditional focus groups, which Rangaiah said put a group of people in a room who largely say the same thing because they are influenced by one another.

Both Rangaiah and Alpert hammered home the now-clichéd message that the consumer is behind the steering wheel--and it's important to go with a pull-not-push strategy.

"Historically, Madison Avenue and Hollywood controlled the pushing out of content," Rangaiah said.

Alpert said distribution is empowering consumers. "New content distribution platforms have put the power in the consumers' hands," she said, referring to mobile devices.

Even as creative is the jumping-off point, Rangaiah said the agency model will look very different in 10 years--arguing that something akin to bundling may emerge--where creative, media, promotions, PR, gaming and other competencies are housed in one shop and further integrated. He suggests that a sort of agency Darwinism is already going on, as shops specializing in those disciplines are aggressively trying to broaden their capabilities.

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