7 Takeaways From the ANA’s Masters of Marketing Conference

Nic Chidiac, Leo Burnett’s EVP, head of planning, breaks it down for you

I just had the pleasure of attending the ANA’s Masters of Marketing Conference with our clients. Below are some of the common themes that I found of value.

Purpose still matters
Brand purpose has recently taken a hit, being labeled lofty, distracting and an illusion that serves marketers’ desire to do irresponsible work. A study by Trinity Mirror outlined how consumers have grown cynical as brands overreach with lofty purposes. That’s not the takeaway if you’re sitting in on most of the ANA sessions; here, purpose is alive and well as a conduit to delivering brand growth.

Walmart cited a Kantar study that showed that 72% of people prefer brands that take a stand. Samsung’s Pio Shunker, SVP, global head integrated marketing, outlined how its purpose helped the brand stay the course and navigate through a tumultuous Galaxy Note7 recall. For Clorox, purpose helped resolve what CMO Eric Reynolds labeled “short-term-itis” that helped drive both long-term brand affinity as well as short-term sales. In short, when employed through the organization, thoughtfully and credibly, purpose has the power to transform a business, navigate change, avoid distraction and drive both long- and short-term growth.

Purpose isn’t a pretty ad campaign
For a brand purpose to really have impact, it needs to be rooted at the core of everything an organization does. Purpose has become tainted, often being employed as an advertising/marketing ploy. Speakers instead reinforced that purpose is a guiding force for all organizations operations and not just part of the advertising/marketing mix.

Shunker spoke about how Samsung’s brand purpose informed its innovation and products and was fiercely advocated by leadership. Lili Tomovich, chief experience officer/CMO at MGM Resorts International, told the story of building the brand from the inside out, taking 18 month to really think through what it stood for and then trained and outlined the role of 77,000 employees in operationalizing it and understanding their role within it. Cadillac CMO Uwe Ellinghaus outlined how at the core of the car maker’s success story was a repositioning exercise that informed the core DNA of the brand. Purpose can be transformative when adopted across the organization.

Using your origin story to remember your identity
One common theme at the ANA involved how brands had lost their identities due to external pressure to change, only to rediscover them by recalling their origin story, their DNA, their history. For MGM, the role of Las Vegas’s origin as a city constructed around entertaining the men building the Hoover Dam was a major component of its own DNA. KFC U.S. CMO Kevin Hochman and Wieden & Kennedy’s Eric Baldwin cited how they dug into the brand’s archive to rediscover what made KFC special: “What would the colonel think?” is a pretty cool litmus test, they determined. When reexamining your brand’s identity, the archive might be a pretty decent place to start.

Balancing short and long term-ism
One of the most prominent points made across speakers was how the digital landscape was leading brands to focus on short-terms goals at the expense of longer-term goals. Clorox’s Reynolds drove home how more brands are focused on near-term goals against a backdrop of industry-wide declining marketing effectiveness. He mentioned that digital and programmatic may have increased sales but did so at the expense of long-term brand growth. The Chicago Cubs told their incredible turnaround story that involved management conceding short-term results to focus on long-term goals. As KFC’s Hochman beautifully articulated: “Sales overnight, brand over time.”

“Crisis is a terrible thing to waste”
Perhaps the most illuminating point of the conference was how crisis and distress were framed up as opportunities for change. The Chicago Cubs eloquently argued that headwinds mask issues and, on the flip side, crisis forces organizations to really inspect business and people. Samsung’s Shunker outlined how he “took ownership of crisis.” The difference between brands that fall and rise is simply if they view crisis as an opportunity to act or something to take cover from.

Innovation need not be perfected
Innovation, or the perception of it, appears to be a driver across categories. Walmart SVP, CMO Tony Rogers outlined the importance of not waiting until innovation is perfect before communicating it. Shunker mentioned that after the Samsung’s Galaxy Note7 recall, consumers framed and excused the issue as simply “the price one pays for innovation.” Clorox’s Reynolds mentioned the importance of killing a crisis quickly to limit the impact of failure, which ultimately limits the downside of innovation. As clichés go, better done than perfect appears to be there for a reason.

Expanding products to services
In “The 2017 Future of Advertising Report,” the IPA highlighted client-driven shifts from the desire to move from delivering products to building services. Cadillac is exploring the possibility of reinventing its entire business through a subscription model “book” service to enable subscribers to rent a range of Cadillac’s for a flat fee. Google mentioned auditing the consumer journey to smoothen out pain points. Customer experience and service design will help brands drive growth, value and differentiation in the future.

Nicolas Chidiac is EVP, head of planning for Leo Burnett USA.