If you must test creative, AB testing is one of the most effective means.
Agencies frequently do their best work during the pitch pro- cess. That is because at this early stage, the pitch team typically knows very little about the brand. They are thinking objectively, more like consumers, and developing work that is intuitive.
A key role of account management is to develop strong client relationships. The modern account management team must understand the client’s business almost as well as the clients do, so they can continually steer the agency team towards the client’s goals—not just brand success, but also positive business outcomes. As the account team learns the category dynamics, it is almost impossible for them to continue to be objective.
The most important role of strategic planners is to represent the consumer (or customer) throughout the process of developing communications. They can only do so by remaining unbiased. Modern strategic planners should have strong client relationships and a firm grasp of the client’s business goals, but to maintain objectivity they typically do not spend as much time with clients as their account management partners do. To pull the voice of the consumer into strategy and advertising development as much as possible, strategic planners have always used research as a primary tool. Whether it’s working with a client’s research department or personally conducting or commissioning research on behalf of the client, consumer research offers a vital glimpse into the mind of the ultimate judge of a campaign’s efficacy.
There are literally hundreds of research methodologies out there. To name just a few: in-store mobile ethnographies, consumer neuroscience research, biometric market research (measuring a respondents physical response to stimuli using, for example, heart rate monitoring), predictive modeling, virtual shopping (virtual store simulation), user experience research (online and in-store), conjoint analysis (surveys that test different market attributes, from location, audience, and product to find which combination is most effective or influential), segmentation studies (that help you determine your best audience segments), and tracking studies (tracking brand or ad health over time).
In addition, there is a slew of newer tools available through brands like Google Analytics that help optimize campaigns and website experiences, including:
Whether it’s qualitative, for example, focus groups or individual ethnographies, or quantitative, which typically means surveys conducted online, research is most useful when it is aimed at gathering information, not evaluating creative ideas.
Decades ago, research meant one thing—focus groups: a group of eight or so people gathered in a focus group facility (or in the case of the UK, in a hostess’s living room) in a discussion led by a moderator or the planner, with agency people observing through a one-way mirror. Focus groups can be a great way to gather information about consumers and gain insight into their relationship with your category and brand.
But there is a reason why creatives call focus groups “f*ck-us groups.” When focus groups are used to test creative ideas, this type of research will often kill great work. Why? Any experienced ad person knows that great work is supposed to defy category convention, stand out, and, ultimately, claim a unique, primary position in the consumer’s brain.
If you ask a group of regular consumers to judge creative ideas—especially those in conceptual stage—most will question why an idea does not follow convention. They will kill an idea that “does not compute” or suggest changes to make the idea easier for them to understand. This makes the work generic—which sells categories, not brands.
If I asked you to create a plausible casual dining ad, you would know exactly what to do. Start with smiling wait staff, delivering trays of piping-hot food to delighted families. Add close-ups of melting butter on thick steaks, manicured hands squeezing lemon over salmon fillets and pulling apart crusty, steaming breadsticks. Essentially, what we call “food porn.” You get it.
This is the type of generic ad that is borne from a vicious cycle: an ad agency presents a bold creative idea. The client is anxious that this idea is “too creative” and persuades the agency to include more conventional work in the testing. Both the bold and conventional ideas are tested in focus groups. Respondents reject the bold work and choose the creative that fits with what they have already seen multiple times. To them, that is what a casual dining ad should look like. Anything that breaks the mold is not their idea of appealing advertising. At best, generic work like this falls into the realm of “do no harm.” At worst, it is boring and easily misattributed. What is certain is that it is never good, and it rarely works.
What it boils down to is this consumer sentiment:
I think I like it...
But I fear it.
Therefore, I reject it.
Remember the Tango ad that I mentioned in an earlier chapter? As I recollect the order of events, the team was asked to test the TV concept, and the young adult respondents rejected it in the first round of research. But the team believed that this ad was special and went for it anyway, targeting an even younger audience and succeeding beyond belief. Great concepts make you feel excited and terrified all at the same time. That’s what groundbreaking creative ideas do. And that’s how good advertising works.
Advertising works on an unconscious as well as a conscious level, especially TV/video advertising. And consumers will only view ads if they are engaging and entertaining. Remember Apple’s iconic “1984” ad? The spot is considered a masterpiece, among the most effective of the 20th century. In it, a female runner pursued by men in riot gear enters an auditorium full of blank-eyed drones and throws a hammer at the huge screen they’re watching, smashing it to pieces. On the surface, the ad is a brief and cryptic vignette followed by an Apple logo. Subconsciously, it is saying that if you are someone who likes to believe you are different than other people, if you are someone who likes to break the rules, if you seek superior brands that defy convention and raise the bar—then Apple is for you.
The consumer unconsciously understands this. When they are in the market to buy a computer, they will be predisposed towards Apple, but may not remember why. They will cite rational reasons for the purchase, such as “it was a good price” or “I loved the design.” But the real reasons for purchasing that particular brand are much more complicated, and not easily defined by consumers. Ads are supposed to make you feel something and/or do something. But you don’t really need to understand it or be able to explain it, because it is not a logical, left-brain process. That is what makes it so hard to test creative in qualitative research.
There are rare exceptions, though. One type of focus group can actually protect good work, and that is hypnosis focus groups, where the unconscious mind does most of the work. I observed hypnosis focus groups reveal the importance of branding in the telecoms category. Consciously, respondents told us that design and branding did not matter to them in the slightest. However, when put into a light hypnotic trance (yes, they all signed waivers), respondents told us that design was very important to them. In this instance, the bright colors and contemporary design of the Cingular logo (they had just been bought out and were about to endure a major AT&T rebrand) made them feel that the brand was modern and more European than other American brands, like Verizon and AT&T. To them, the design made Cingular feel young and upscale, and, therefore, more appealing.
I am not suggesting that you do hypnosis focus groups every time you want to test branding design or creative ideas; I am just trying to prove a point here. Consumers are simply not very good at judging groundbreaking creative.
If your client absolutely insists on it, or if you are testing the work for your team as a disaster check, before presenting to a client or for a pitch, test the work monadically (one concept per cell of consumers) in a quantitative online survey. You will need to expose each idea to at least five hundred-plus consumers for the results to be anywhere near more than directional.
It may not match the traditional definition of a focus group, but this sort of quantitative research gives you the ability to craft only relevant and useful questions and exclude those that force the consumer to consciously judge the work. For example, instead of “Do you like this idea?” you may ask, “Is the idea different from other ideas you have seen in this category?” or “Is this idea memorable?” It doesn’t matter if a consumer “likes” an idea or not. As long as it is not offensive to them, what’s important is that they remember the idea, see it as being different, talk about it with their family and friends, and act on it when the time comes for them to do so.
The only other type of basic concept testing that I would recommend is AB testing. AB testing (powered by platforms like Google Analytics) is a great way to test and optimize content in market, in real time. Assuming all other variants (ad design, spend, size, audience, etc.) are more or less equal, different digital ads are launched into the world, each with the same media weight behind them. The effectiveness of each is determined by the number of clicks each gets. As this is tracked, in real time, media spend is redirected to support the most successful messages, with the highest clicks or conversion rates, while the less effective messages are either changed or pulled.
If you must test creative, AB testing is one of the most effective means.
Sadly, some clients are often overdependent on creative testing. They use research as a means of trying to validate that ads will “work” when in market. They then become incapable of making a decision because they have become too dependent on the consumer’s opinion. It’s understandable. After all, it’s their neck that is on the line. But what has worked before isn’t the same as what’s possible. What worked before has no guarantee of working again, as cultural and consumer context changes constantly, and life moves on. So, why test and make the same ad over and over again?
What’s possible is daring. No guts, no glory. Yes, it’s a risk, but the reward could be so much greater.
Another reason why bold creative is important today is the significance and value of earned media. Media basically falls into three groups: paid, owned, and earned. Paid is exactly as it sounds: you pay for the space. Owned are channels that don’t cost you anything because you already own the assets, such as in-store signage, your website, storefronts, and the like. But the most successful campaigns excel in “earned” media, a consequence of share-worthy content—basically, free attention. Consumers will only share content that is exceptional, because that is what will get them lots of likes. The shareable, likeable content out there is mold-breaking, irreverent, and/or brave. Again, this proves that great work works. And great work comes from seeking out what is possible—not what has been done multiple times before.
To get to groundbreaking ideas, a smart, brave agency and client team need to understand how to disrupt a category with fresh work. The best way to find the insights necessary to do this is to gather exploratory research early on. This isn’t about testing concepts; it’s about learning as much as possible about the beliefs and behaviors of the target audience prior to writing any kind of strategy direction. A creative brief based on thorough research will be much stronger and will lead to more engaging, more relevant, more motivating work that is significantly more likely to succeed in market. The insights at the core of the work will resonate with consumers, even if the work that surrounds those insights scares them slightly.
While my department’s strategic planners and I are likely to commission quantitative research (meaning online surveys, which are faster, more accurate, more robust, and cheaper) to generate new information, nothing beats talking with consumers in person. Qualitative research, in this early stage, is one of the best ways to dig deep and find hidden consumer insight.
There is a lot of confusion in our industry about the word “insight.” An “insight” is not the same as a fact. For example, the (admittedly generalized) idea that “women tend to care more about car colors than men do” is simply a fact, based on statistics. I have seen it proven time and time again, in dozens of car focus groups (over the years I have worked with Audi, Mercedes-Benz, and Toyota) and in many national quantitative surveys. If this is an example of a fact based on data, what is an “insight”? According to dictionary.com:
insight • /ˈɪnˌsaɪt/
noun
Analyzing data can reveal a ton of useful information, but will not often lead you to insights. Data can tell you what people think or feel, or how they behave, but it cannot tell you why the consumer feels a certain way. Only qualitative research can bring you that degree of insight.
If we use the same car example as before, an example of a true insight would be: “women inherently understand that their car is a ‘second skin’ whose color is a public representation of their status or personality.”
I have heard versions of these words in many interviews with 30- to 50-something female luxury car drivers. In interviews, red was synonymous with passion and freedom, and was most commonly chosen after a divorce or a significant life change. Blue represented stability and was chosen as a calming influence by those with hectic lifestyles. While somewhat stereotypical, white was considered womanly (many female real estate agents drive white cars). This tells us that while color may seem like a trite reason for choosing a car, psychologically, color is very significant and relevant to a woman’s status, state of mind, and how she wants to be seen in the world.
For this kind of research, focus groups are still valuable, whether online or in person, but there are other useful qualitative approaches:
Social listening is the one type of research on this list that is a hybrid of qualitative and quantitative, because it provides a certain degree of national or global insight at scale. We use social listening all the time, and while it is valuable for tracking consumer sentiment and understanding what is on their minds, there are some challenges. People tend to post either very positive or very negative sentiments—rarely anything in between that might be a closer representation of their mood or attitudes. Plus, those who are the most active in social media have the loudest voices (the squeakiest wheels) and, therefore, are not necessarily representative of the audience in question, as a diverse whole.
When we conduct qualitative research, we do it across multiple states to ensure that we take regional differences into consideration. We also ensure that our recruitment is diverse, so it is more representative of the U.S. population. On any typical project covering four regions, we might conduct two focus groups per region, for example, one older and one younger, or one male and one female. Or for ethnographic interviews, at least six interviews per region. Individual focus groups last 90 minutes to 2 hours. And 1:1 ethnographies are generally less, at 1 hour per interview.
Two of my favorite qualitative research methods are worth going into in more detail: brand deprivation and ethnographies.
Hill Holliday was an early adopter of this type of research in the mid-2000s, when the agency was working with one of our most famous clients, Dunkin’ Donuts. At that time, Dunkin’ (which is 100 percent franchisee-owned) was mostly known as a Massachusetts-based brand for mostly blue-collar workers, with no time to linger. The brand’s biggest nemesis was Starbucks—the challenger and newer kid on the block whose national footprint was increasing daily and which was considered a superior brand experience, even if Dunkin’ coffee enthusiasts believed that Dunkin’ coffee tasted better.
At the time, Dunkin’ was best known for the old ads featuring “Fred the Baker” uttering that oft-repeated phrase, “Time to make the donuts.” Since Dunkin’s focus was, and still is, primarily coffee-based beverages—not to mention the fact Fred had died—the Dunkin’ marketing team wanted to reposition the brand. It was time for a new campaign direction.
Rather than conducting the usual focus groups, the team decided to conduct a deprivation exercise to understand the differences between these two highly competitive brands. A group of Dunkin’ regulars were asked to forgo their daily visits for 2 weeks and, instead, go to Starbucks. A group of Starbucks aficionados were asked to do the reverse. The agency then conducted focus groups with each cohort, to discuss their experience of the long, hard 2 weeks of cheating on their beloved coffee brand. This whole exercise was repeated more recently, with very similar results.
The Starbucks enthusiasts were appalled by Dunkin’. While some admitted that the coffee was good, they hated the way they were hurriedly shuffled in and out, and missed lingering in the comfortable Starbucks easy chairs, laptops on their knees, long after the last dregs of their coffee had been drunk. They felt out of place in the stark stores, which were furnished with basic tables and chairs, and painted builders’ white, with splashes of orange and pink (Dunkin’ did not want people to linger). They also felt the Dunkin’ clientele was a bit rough around the edges for their tastes.
The Dunkin’ enthusiasts fared no better. They were traumatized by the experience. Some had not made it to the end of the 2 weeks; those who did couldn’t get back to Dunkin’ fast enough. They felt Starbucks was a pretentious brand for pretentious people who didn’t seem to work too hard, because they seemed to have hours of free time to slowly sip on their expensive, bitter coffee, while surfing the Web and resisting actually talking to anyone else in the store. The lines were long, but no one seemed to mind waiting for their order, which was baffling to the Dunkin’ group. They felt self-conscious and awkward standing around waiting for a cup of coffee.
The research was invaluable. It was clear Dunkin’ and Starbucks were two distinct teams. They could peacefully coexist, but Dunkin’ team members would never switch their loyalty to Starbucks and vice versa. The most valuable insight was around the Dunkin’ team. The perception of Dunkin’ as a blue-collar northeastern brand (although the Dunkin’ footprint had expanded nationally) was not the typical profile of a challenger brand and user, but the agency saw a great opportunity. Instead of trying to appeal to a broader or more upscale audience—the mistake that brands often make and in the process, turning their backs on their identity and current audience—Dunkin’ decided to lean in.
The resulting campaign positioned Dunkin’ as a brand for the hardworking people who keep America running every day. People who want to get in, get out, and get on with their day. Those with blue-collar, steel-toed values, even if they wore dress shirts and wingtips. From this insight and this profile, the brand positioning, and now-famous tagline, were born: “America runs on Dunkin’.” It became much more than just a tagline, however. It became and still is the North Star of the brand—influencing not only Dunkin’s advertising campaigns, but also the store design, the food (everything must be handheld), the drive-through—in short, the entire brand experience. And it all started with a simple deprivation exercise, yet again proving that great research yields great insight, yields great creative briefs, resulting in great work.
This positioning and tagline speaks to Dunkin’ Donuts’ hardworking, die-hard users. Courtesy of Dunkin’ Donuts.
We have conducted other deprivation exercises over the years, including for Verizon Wireless, where we tried to deprive teenagers of their smartphones for a week. That didn’t go so well. No one made it past day 1, which, in itself, was valuable insight.
Several years ago, while working at Merkley Newman Harty in New York City, I conducted 1:1 ethnographic interviews with luxury car drivers in four states. Ethnography respondents are recruited just as focus group respondents are—typically, through a third-party recruitment firm, with access to databases of people who have signed up to do consumer research. The agency (or client) pays a recruitment fee, as well as an incentive fee for each respondent who participates.
I was in New Jersey on a drizzly winter evening, in the home of a 40-something male Mercedes-Benz E-Class owner’s home. The only other person in the room was the cameraperson. All of our research was recorded, and so the conversation went like this:
Me: This is a beautiful home.
Respondent: Thank you. We like it.
Me: Why is luxury so important to you?
Respondent (while standing next to a huge, high-end, flat-screen TV): Umm... it’s not, not really... I like to be comfortable, but, er... it’s not about luxury. That’s not what’s important to me.
Me: What’s most important?
Respondent: Family is the most important thing to me (points to framed photograph of family members and talks about his wife and children).
(As it is getting dark outside, respondent stands up and makes a point of flipping on outside pool lights.)
Me: So, tell me, why did you choose the Mercedes-Benz E-Class if it’s not about luxury?
Respondent: Because it’s the safest car on the road, for my family.
Me: Is safety the only reason?
Respondent: It’s not the only reason but it’s the main reason.
(Respondent slightly loosens his tie, which he has been wearing, with a pricey suit, for the duration of the interview.)
Me: Would you consider Volvos to be safe cars?
Respondent: Well, yes, they are very safe cars. I owned a Volvo a few years ago.
Me: Why didn’t you choose a Volvo this time? Why Mercedes-Benz?
Respondent: Ah, well, you have me there (laughs). Well... I did like the look of the Mercedes-Benz. It’s a beautiful car.
Me: How does driving the Mercedes-Benz make you feel?
Respondent: It makes me feel good.
Me: What do you think it makes others feel or think about you, compared to what they might think about you driving the Volvo?
Respondent: Um... well... (laughs). I guess it makes them think I am quite successful.
Me: And how does that, in turn, feel to you?
Respondent: I suppose I have to admit it feels good... because I started out in life poor... and with a single mom looking after us... who really struggled... so, yes, it makes me feel proud to be successful... um... because, I guess, I wasn’t supposed to be.
Me: So, in that regard, what role does Mercedes-Benz play in your life, beyond safety?
Respondent: I suppose it makes me feel successful. And if I’m honest, it makes me feel the same as the people in my neighborhood. Socially, that is.
(Respondent looks out of the window, at his Mercedes-Benz E-Class, which has been very recently washed and polished, sitting in the driveway, close to the road, not parked in his nearby garage. Respondent pushes up his tie knot.)
A lot was revealed in this one interview that wouldn’t have come to the surface in quantitative research. Not just from what he said, but also from how he said it. I was able to observe his home environment, with its elements of luxury, such as the pool that he (and, presumably, his spouse) had chosen, and I was able to read his body language. These are the important nuances that you only get from qualitative research, in particular, from ethnographic research in people’s homes. And those nuances lead to insight instead of mere information.
I learned an awful lot about this person and his relationship with his car. Over the course of 60 minutes, I learned that:
Each subsequent interview validated these insights and built on them. This is how it works: you use one interview to influence what you ask in the next, as you look for patterns of thought and behavior. Security was a recurring theme and, ultimately, the word “secure” became an important (single word) brief for this campaign assignment.
Whatever form of qualitative research you conduct, the quality of the insights and the honesty of the respondents depend on the quality of the questions you ask. Ask authentic questions.
Don’t waste too much time on pleasantries up front, such as, “How many cats do you have?” (For some reason, many moderators have an unnatural fixation on household pets.) The intent is to relax the respondent, but it sets up a superficial dynamic that is hard to shake off.
Don’t use old-fashioned research techniques such as, “Hey, let’s imagine a brand party” or asking people to “Draw what happiness looks like to you.” (Incidentally, if you are interested, they will almost all draw a beach or field, with blue skies and sea, and a bright yellow sun. If you can’t resist, try it and you will see this play out for yourself.)
Instead, launch into a frank discussion by asking a hard question almost immediately. They will be so taken aback, and their conscious mind will have so little time to process the question, that it will provoke a much more candid response and more useful discussion. This approach suggests to the respondent that “I want us to be straight with each other” and sets up an environment of honest exchange.
I know an anthropologist who sometimes moderates focus groups and does so in a unique style. A few years ago, my agency commissioned him to moderate focus group discussions for a blood pressure drug. The first question he asked the group, just a beat after they sat down was, “Why is life so hard these days?” He didn’t ask them if life was hard. Because we already know that life is hard. Instead, he engaged them in an instantly powerful and honest conversation about the struggles they had in life and with their medical conditions. This approach yields wonderful, useable insights.
On this occasion we learned that people—men, in particular—frequently refuse to take blood pressure medication not because they are forgetful or stubborn (a superficial fact), but because it is often the first firm evidence of aging that they experience; admitting to yourself that most of your life is behind you instead of ahead of you is difficult, as is losing control over your body and health. To cope with the harshness of that fact and return agency to themselves, many respondents chose to interpret their condition as a sign they must have abused their bodies in the past, reframing high blood pressure as the consequence they deserved. But this meant that taking the drug was essentially an admission of failure and burdened them with guilt. That’s a true insight.
This insight helped us reposition the drug as a treatment for something that is beyond human control. High blood pressure is typically hereditary and affects younger as well as older people. It is not something you “do” to yourself. We had to convince people that taking the drug was not just about health, but also about life extension—and that this was within their control. Regaining control over something that wasn’t their fault in the first place was an important insight that was discovered by digging in—and not settling for superficial responses.
As this next story also illustrates, the deeper you dig with qualitative research, the better the insight, which leads to strong brand positionings and, eventually, powerful creative ideas.
Some years ago, I worked with a well-known investment firm with ultra-high-net-worth clients. Their primary target audience is those with more than $10 million of investable assets. The secondary targets are influencers and opinion formers. The brand had recently been acquired by a bank, and the client wanted us to create a campaign to announce this fact.
We felt that a simple announcement would be a waste of good media space. This was a chance for us to redefine the positioning of the brand, which our own consumer research told us had low awareness and familiarity among consumers. This was a big issue, because it meant no trust had been built between brand and prospective clients—and ultra-high-net-worth clients would only ever put their hard-earned fortunes in the hands of a wealth management company that had been proven as trustworthy.
The marketing team agreed to tell the story of the acquisition within the framework of a campaign that targeted a new generation of middle-aged wealthy prospects who we were calling the “working wealthy.” We knew a younger version of this target from working with Smith Barney (a brand that no longer exists) in our New York office a few years previously.
The qualitative research we had done for Smith Barney told us their target was between 40 and 60 years of age, with a high net worth (between around $1 million and $10 million in investable assets), but was nowhere near retirement. In fact, this cohort told us in focus groups that they loved working so much, they had no intention of ever retiring. Work was a way for them to improve not only their net worth, but also, as they told us, their feelings of self-worth. They had typically earned their money through starting businesses from scratch. They had grown up middle class or in households where parents lived paycheck to paycheck. Now they were wealthy, but didn’t see themselves as such (though, they knew they were very comfortable). They didn’t understand what it meant to be affluent, what the rules of play were. This was something they had had to learn.
They were concerned about two key things. First, that their children grow up with more than they had, but not at the expense of building solid character and a strong work ethic. Second, they wanted to leave money to their children, but had no idea how much to leave without spoiling them. They wanted their kids to be comfortable, but they didn’t want them to just put up their feet after the reading of the will.
In stakeholder interviews with Smith Barney financial advisors, we learned that before they asked clients about investment or retirement, or offered any kind of guidance, they conducted a rigorous process of “discovery” involving many questions about the client’s employment, history, knowledge, dreams, ambitions, fears, and concerns—questions about their lives, not just their money. This was very unusual at the time.
Smith Barney had developed a genuine “culture of questions.” Respondents in our qualitative research were attracted to this idea. They had high awareness of the brand but hadn’t known anything about how the advisors worked differently. We realized the role of Smith Barney was not just to invest, but also to get to know clients, so they could offer them advice and guidance, to help them make the right decisions with a clear conscience.
We created an outdoor and print campaign that asked a series of provocative questions. These were the difficult kinds of questions that the working wealthy lost sleep over, and that Smith Barney had the expertise to help answer. To illustrate, one ad featuring a young teenager had this headline: “Will my child inherit the work ethic or the wealth ethic?” High-net-worth consumers recognized these questions and, as a result, felt that Smith Barney was a brand that understood modern wealth and the tension it created for newly wealthy people, like them. The campaign showed deep empathy and that, in turn, built trust and consideration.
Now, back to that investment brand for the ultra-high-net-worth group.
This legacy brand’s audience was that same “working wealthy” group, but a decade or so down the line. At their current life stage (typically, late 50s through 70s), relationships and trust have been built up over a long time, making it difficult to convince someone to switch investment companies and advisors. But some do indeed switch. For example, if circumstances dramatically change (moving countries or inheriting, acquiring, or selling a company), and their current advisor is not equipped to deal with these changes, or if they sense that their money is not being handled properly, or simply because they believe that their advisor is not acting in their best interest.
For these rare switchers, recommendation and reputation are key factors that affect their choice of a new institution. Awareness and familiarity of this particular brand were low, so it was important to first demonstrate empathy with the prospective audience. We needed to reposition the brand as a wealth management company that deeply understood the audience, their personal values, and what money meant to them in the past as well as today.
To do that, we needed to rise above the generic advertising that dominates the wealth management category: older couples holding hands, walking along a beach, or scooting past on their expensive boats, hair blowing in the wind. Smiling grandchildren and the ubiquitous golden lab retriever. These ads are generic, because they are written by significantly poorer and much younger creatives who have no idea what it feels like to be extremely wealthy. And their equally young and poor account planners haven’t provided them with any useful or inspiring insight, because ultra-high-net-worth people are notoriously difficult to recruit for any kind of consumer research: they do not need the one-hundred-dollar incentive, and they do not have the time or motivation to attend a focus group or ethnographic interview. Because of this, planners tend to rely on secondary research; the personal experiences of older, affluent friends or relatives; or plain assumption and unvalidated hypotheses. All far, far from ideal, as you can tell by the generic results.
Generic work advertises the category, not the brand. You can likely guess which category this image represents. dmbaker/Depositphotos.
There is a saying that account planners have used for decades: “You don’t have to be the audience to understand the audience.” But you can only understand the audience if you can talk to enough of them. We needed to engage the audience in qualitative research, so we could find an insight to drive better work. This is where having Karen Kaplan (who is now Hill Holliday’s chairman and CEO) as your boss comes in very handy.
Karen has a contact list the length of the Charles River. She made some personal calls to some influential, wealthy people, and we were able to set up about two dozen interviews with ultra-high-net-worth individuals in the northeast (NE), the west, and the south. We were against the clock, as the media had already been bought (yes, that happens all the time), so we conducted the interviews in the NE in person and the others by phone. I conducted these interviews myself, along with one of my most senior strategic planners, and was insistent on doing in-home interviews for all the reasons I outlined in my Mercedes-Benz example from before. Context is everything. Nuances, body language, and subtleties are all incredibly important, and this is often where the magic lies.
Doing in-home interviews with wealthy people is fascinating. You are met at the door by a member of “staff” (in one case, what I assumed was a butler, and in many of the others, a housekeeper), their homes are incredible, and you are offered high-end snacks and refreshments that looked like petits fours—a far cry from the peanuts and M&M’s one is offered at many focus group facilities. Unlike regular homes, where it’s difficult to squeeze in the cameraperson as well as yourself, in wealthy people’s homes, the challenge is finding an intimate corner in the vast rooms where a megaphone isn’t needed to have a chat. We did our best, settled in for the interviews, and gained insights that were absolutely fascinating.
These folks told us that aside from winning the lottery, playing the markets, or becoming a celebrity, there are three principal ways of becoming extremely wealthy:
Most of them fell into bucket number 3, and their industries ranged from chemical engineering to tech companies to video empires. As the interviews continued over a 2-week period, common traits started to emerge, such as:
Most important to us, each displayed an emblem or other reminder of their humble beginnings, whether it was on their desk, wall, or credenza. For one person, it was a picture of his immigrant mother. For another, it was a pebble from the beach near their childhood home. We saw a photograph of a man’s first apartment, and a framed copy of a woman’s first paycheck. When asked about these mementos, they replied that no matter how well they did in life, they never wanted to forget where they had come from—even if their start in life was difficult or painful.
When we returned to the office, I asked my team to research what percentage of wealth in the USA was self-made. It seemed unusual that all of these wealthy interviewees came from humble beginnings. Coming from the more rigid class system in the UK, I felt that this must have been a coincidence. My team came back with robust numbers: between 80 and 90 percent of wealthy people in the U.S. described their wealth as self-made. I made them recheck this, and, sure enough, the statistics were correct. This was mind-blowing to me—I couldn’t believe that no competitive brand out there was talking about this in any of their advertising. But, then again, as I mentioned before, few had been able to get personal audiences with these ultra-wealthy individuals.
All of this convinced us that this investment firm had a great and unique opportunity. Most of the ultra-high-net-worth folks we spoke to were extremely intimidated by and suspicious of traditional financial services companies, which illustrate “old money” and a dusty approach to wealth management. These companies and their advertising—which showed the traditional trappings of wealth and retirement, the wood-paneled walls and the luxury cars—did not speak to our audience, or their personal values, at all.
Our audience was still active in their businesses and were more motivated by their journey and their goals. They never wanted to lose touch with who they were. They really were different. And so was the brand. It worked with those more traditional consumers, but stakeholder interviews showed that it also employed many advisors with a contemporary outlook and approach who were experts in helping those with sudden or newer wealth. These advisors understood that just because someone is wealthy, doesn’t mean they are self-directed when it comes to investing. Whether their brains weren’t wired to understand how to invest or they were too busy doing what they do well—or both—they needed help.
The brand positioning we created was simple:
A different kind of investment company for a different kind of investor.
The campaign that sprung from this proposition and creative brief pushed against the category conventions. Rather than showing old wealth retiring into a sedentary lifestyle punctuated by the occasional game of golf or quick spin in the new yacht (and, of course, that walk on the beach with their loved one), our ads featured still-working ultra-high-net-worth individuals next to their prized possessions—and not one of these was the trappings of wealth. We showed the things that were important to them and that kept them grounded: the house where they were raised, their first car, the diner they loved to eat in when they were young (and still did).
The intensive qualitative research had resulted in genuine, new insights. The resulting campaign felt fresh, different, and authentic. Prospects agreed: not long after the campaign launch, lead generation increased significantly, and we received touching and appreciative letters (yes, actual letters) and e-mails from ultra-high-net-worth people who loved the campaign, because they had recognized themselves and their own stories in the ads. When very wealthy and busy people lift a pen to write a note about an ad, that ad must really have touched a nerve. This campaign serves as another reminder that good research generates powerful insights into the consumer mindset, which in turn informs the creative brief. And if the work is on brief, it will typically perform well after launch.