OBERLAND’s
Director of Strategy writes, "The economy-wide ‘artificial intelligence is coming for our jobs’ sentiment is forcing this discipline of professional questioners to reconsider our role in
the advertising industry.”
The strategist’s job is to ask “why” until we get to what’s interesting.
It’s no surprise that the same group of overthinking, “why” askers hit an existential crisis from time to time.
The economy-wide
“artificial intelligence is coming for our jobs” sentiment is forcing this discipline of professional questioners to reconsider our role in the advertising industry.
The evolution of AI has shifted many agencies to focus on scale, not service, yet we are, at our core, a services industry. Offering creative solutions to brands in solving their most
difficult, nuanced challenges.
The question becomes: what is the role of the strategist in this evolving agency business?
One of my
favorite strategist’s, Rob Estrenhino, believes “The strategist’s role becomes less of that of a mastermind, and more that of an emcee. We facilitate the thinking among teams, and
then funnel it into a story that makes sense.”
My answer is a bit different. I believe the strategist’s role is to be a treasure hunter.
The client brief is our map. Many have come across the treasure map and taken their own approach to finding said treasure. Internal teams, external vendors. All, of course, have been
unsuccessful. Until it reaches you.
So the client comes to the agency strategist for your interpretation.
What are we missing? How do you
read this? What direction should we take?
With our experience, insight, and creative, strategists devise plans to get from A to B. To inspire a creative team and our
clients to see and execute against an effective solution to their daunting problem.
Our way of getting to the treasure.
In treasure
hunting and in strategy, wherever your bias begins will land you on a completely different path to the treasure. Whether that’s your interests, hometown or experience, every treasure hunter
looks at the same map as a riddle and comes up with their own unique plan of attack.
Like many of my briefs, this didn’t begin with an original thought. It began
with Netflix’s Gold & Greed: The Hunt for Fenn’s Treasure. As I watched the series, what began as pity for the hunters quickly turned into empathy. I saw myself
in the mental gymnastics they had to go through, perfectly encapsulating what a strategist like myself goes through every single day.
Forest is the client, a man who
writes a book and includes a poem inside with a map to his treasure to bring more sales for that book. The poem and book overall is his client brief, but teams of hunters dig deeper, learning
everything they can about him and analyzing everything he’s ever said or written to find the answer.
Each hunter in this series has their own interpretation. Some
say it’s in one state, others say it’s in another. Some interpret one line one way, others view it entirely differently. Like strategists, over (or under) intellectualizing the map and its
clues to confirm their own bias, to keep that spark of hope. That one day they will find Fenn’s treasure.
Desperate, curious, ambitious people all looking for
millions they’d never earn otherwise. Not unlike agencies doing whatever it takes to a win a new piece of business to grow.
While it had its moral challenges, the
treasure hunt was labeled a “tremendously effective advertising campaign” given the media coverage of one man and his book.
For strategists in a changing
industry, it’s time to view ourselves as treasure hunters but ask “why” a few more times before we begin our hunt.
Why are we hunting this treasure?
How do we reach the treasure? What will we do when we find it? Is the hunt worth it or is there a different, more appealing treasure we should be going after?
That’s why the OBERLAND strategy team is constantly treasure hunting for where our clients can make a difference in the world and how we can make their purpose more
powerful.
To purposefully interrupt consumers, category and companies to lead with purpose and, ultimately, drive results.
If you’re
interested in submitting content for future editions, please reach out to our Managing Editor, Barbie Romero at Barbie@MediaPost.com.