DAY 4
MORNING
Cake and Havas Sport + Entertainment
It’s day 4 here at Content Fest and to begin today’s slew of sessions, we had a talk from Jim Downing, the Managing Partner of Cake and Dan Connolly, the Head of Communications and Content at Havas Sport + Entertainment.
A bit about the agencies:
Havas Sport + Entertainment are the global brand engagement network of Havas whose aim is to create meaningful relationships between brands and people through their passions using creativity, media and technology. Cake is also a part of the Havas network, and they call themselves an ‘ideas company’, which aims to help brands become part of peoples’ lives (also known as ‘ideas incorporated’- their tagline).
The talk was all about ‘Measurements’, and Dan from Cake started us off with a couple of case studies which addressed four keys factors. We were told to put ourselves in the position of the client and ask ourselves, ‘why should I bother’ with content? Addressing this question, Cake’s factors were:
1- Showcase a product
2- You can save money
3- You can increase awareness and engagement
4- You can extend experientiality
Some very successful campaigns that Cake churned out that are great examples of these four key factors were on the new fragrance by One Direction- called ‘Our moment’-, the British Airways BA2013 Olympic talent campaign and the Honda Live Studio at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. All three were very successful in creating massive amounts of hype and caused exceptional amounts of interaction whilst saving the clients some money in the long run- all the content is extremely good value.
Dan from HSE then walked us through the concept of brand engagement that is so integral to the operations over with his team. He emphasized that emotion is a huge part of a successful content-based project as that is how the strongest relationships between brands and communities are formed. To break it down for us, he broke up the target audience for any content project into the following four categories- emotion level very high to moderate: fanatics, passionate, engaged and interested. The content in question has to appeal to all four of these audiences, and the interesting thing is that you can create content for the fanatics that will also mildly appeal to those at the other end of the spectrum- the interested audience.
Overall, the message was that content is the centre of everything- (of course it is! Woo Content Fest!) and that strategy insights into the content production and distribution process should lead to engaging platforms, to campaign activation and finally research and measurement of the success at the final hurdle. And that’s how you build a successful campaign, folks. Thanks Dan and Jim!
AFTERNOON
The Headliner!
AIS
Our last speaker session of Content Fest (a sad, sad moment) was the wonderful Neil Kleiner from our cousin/sister agency (or so Areil put it!), AIS, who are also part of the Havas Network. Their clients include some big names, such as Betfair, VW, EDF, Skoda, Vodaphone and ARM (who control 90% of the world’s microprocessors) to name a few. So, according to Neil, the very important components that make up the creative innovation that people actually VALUE are technology and social media. Over the years, there has been an evolution from social media marketing to content marketing and in the words of wise, old Howard Gossage* (aka Neil’s role model in life),:
“The real fact of the matter is that nobody reads ads. People read what interests them. And sometimes it’d an ad”.
*Howard Gossage, otherwise known as ‘The Socrates of San Fransisco’, was a big player in the advertising world and was way ahead of his time with his method of ‘conversational content’- a topic that Neil covered in detail during the session.
Going back to social marketing: up until now, it has been all about building communities- the prime example being Facebook. Neil used an analogy of a campfire to convey what he meant by this. People all huddle around the fire as a common thing, for warmth and community and a common purpose- just like Facebook. Nowadays, the trend is swinging towards social broadcast and media accelerated brand messages. In other words, things are getting FASTER and content has to work harder due to the amount of noise and competition that already exists. In fact, there are 1.2 billion Facebook users in the world and 82% ONLY access by mobile. This platform change means content must work harder to adapt and appeal accordingly so that they can optimize engagement of the mindset of the consumer when they receive it.
Neil mentioned a little word that was of key interest to us: ‘Interstices’, which are the ‘moments in between’ things that happen in our lives, such as waiting at a bus stop, falling asleep or even being on the loo. These interstices are when we engage with content the most!
There are a few primordial issues that we should be looking to address. The first is the real-time, reactive content. This has to be fast and it has to react to what the public are saying at the time, or content will get left behind and become irrelevant and social media and conversation runs on relentlessly. In order to do this in an organised way, AIS use conversation calendars, which plan loosely what this conversational content will be made up over the next month, although it does change according to circumstance. It also produces as-near-as-possible-to real time feedback that will satisfy content consumers.
Overall, being fast is the KEY, and the future of social media marketing and content. We don’t want to be sold to, we don’t want to be advertised to, but we do want to enjoy a bunch of creative content that will entertain us whilst raising our awareness and engagement in specific brands- it’s less offensive that way.
Let’s make content disruptive.