Disruption by Design – R/GA

Key take outs – disruption is based on taking a risk.  

And this needs to happen when business is good, not when it desperately needs a change.

R/GA have evolved to cover *Communication * Products / Services * Business Transformation Belief that what’s next is that as we are in a connected environment now, there will be an intelligence layer attached to everything that we use and do. Computer based image recognition is now more accurate than the human eye…..

 

Sex, Lies and Advertising. Maddona Badger.

Take out. Emotional roller coaster.

Her first public keynote. Her birthday. Her story from Chief Creative Officer at Calvin Klien to starting her own agency and having 3 amazing kids and a house in Long Island. Then – house fire. 3 kids and parents die.

The entire audience was in shock.

So she spent a few years in the wilderness as you’d expect and can back into the business to honour her daughters and initiated the #istandup campaign which is about removing the sexualisation of women in advertising and the impact those public images have on children.

The entire room stood up. She cried. Standing ovation. Amazing speech.

 

Airbnb founder and CEO.

Fascinating. Restarted the business 4 times. Wanted $100k for 10% of the company. No one was interested as it was the GFC. Company now worth $25 billion.

Great campaign about people using Airbnb to live in places not spaces. Bought to life by a program with Chicago Art Institute. They recreated Van Gogh bedroom from the famous painting. Put it on Airbnb for$10. A month sold out in 2 minutes. Ran another month. The Van Gogh exhibition was over subscribed by 250%.

 

The Hidden Stories Behind the Internet of Things – presented by Chiel Worldwide

Take-out: The 4th Revolution – where physical and virtual connect.

Where products become services. Example of a blind swimmers rubber cap being able to vibrate as the swimmer approaches the wall to turn so they don’t hit the wall where previously a stick tapped them on the shoulder to trigger the turn.

 

The Art of Curating – Mike McCue – CEO of Flipboard and Adam Weinberg – Director of Whitney Museum of American Art

Take-out: Curating by algorithms makes content popularity led – no shades of grey.

Algorithms can’t identify cool, beautiful or intriguing. Museums want the initial reaction of people is to not like something as it makes them reconsider values / tastes / favourites / routines….

 

What if Everyone is Doing it Wrong – Mark Pytlik – CEO Stink Digital and Professor Byron Sharp – Head of Ehrenberg Bass Institute of Marketing Science (Adelaide)

Take-out: Reach and Creativity are not options – must align to make brands grow.

A consumer of Coke who has 3+ serves per year is a heavy user, so business growth comes from infrequent users buying again – not loyal users buying more….

Empirical data shows that volume should be the foundation in all activity (TV people loved this…) Target marketing is wrong as it doesn’t provide a brand with the breadth it needs. Fragmentation causes challenges for volume. (Food for thought).

 

How Purpose can get your Mojo back – Hosted by BBD Perfect Storm Jamie Fuller – Chairman of Skins (Australian sport compression company) and Ben Johnson – disgraced Olympic 100m champion from 1988 Seoul Olympics.

Take out: Brands need to stand for something and have a purpose.

The founder / CEO of Skins agitated a change in UCI (cycling) due to rampant drugs in sport – then they focussed on IOC after the cover ups of positive drug tests in 2012 Olympics. Ben Johnson was used as the anti-hero being used to say “25 years on, nothing has changed” – evidently 6 of the 8 in that 1988 final all tested positive to PED’s…

Skins are now targeting FIFA corruption by going after the sponsors and questioning why they would associate with the corrupt leadership…

Would’ve been useful!

 

(source LinkedIn Troy Swindells-Grose)