Latest / ContraMinds Podcast - Unlocking Personal Growth and Professional Excellence / Thomas Kolster on The Unmarketing Code for Meaningful Brands (#015)

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Thomas Kolster on The Unmarketing Code for Meaningful Brands (#015) · ContraMinds Podcast - Unlocking Personal Growth and Professional Excellence

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: I think way too often, um, and I think this again is probably a good advice to my younger self.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: I think way too often you get captivated by things like money and status, and you run faster and you get blinded by some of these uh things rather than actually understanding that the most privileged life the most privileged thing you can have in life is balance.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to another edition of ContraMind.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: In this episode, I am in conversation with Thomas Colster.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: Thomas is the founder and creative director of Goodvertising Agency, one of the pioneers in turning environmental, societal, and health care into market opportunities for brands, where growing the bottom line goes hand in hand with creating better communities and a better planet.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: He's advised numerous fortune factor companies, startups, government agencies, and NGOs.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Thomas is also the author of two books, Goodvertising and most recently The Hero Trap.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: We discussed key moments and ideas from his life and work over the course of our discussion.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: So without much further ado, here is my conversation with Thomas Colster.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: I really wanted to start off, Thomas, with uh uh when I look back at your career, uh, you started off uh with advertising way back in the 90s.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: And uh how did you discover the world of advertising and marketing and uh how did you get in there?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think everybody kind of got their own little path into advertising.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: And mine was so much of a coincidence, in fact, because I was starting at university and I think I started humanities at the time, international humanities.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I, you know, I was one of the kids that, you know, I got easily bored.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_02: I thought university was way too easy, and it wasn't really challenging.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: And so at the time I dated this girl whose mother worked as a copywriter.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: I knew nothing about the world of advertising, and I loved writing, and and so I was bored of university, and she was like, why don't you try and kind of go into advertising?
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_02: And I didn't really know anything about it, and then I picked up this book, um, Ogilvy on advertising.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: And I still to this day remember that there was this one page in the book, and and Ogilvy was like, it was outside his like castle in in in in um in UK somewhere.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the the the the little you know the little copy underneath the picture said something like, Yes, and if you're in doubt, that's my helicopter.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_02: And and and then I was like, why the heck am I studying international humanities where I can write for advertising and get a helicopter?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: And and and that that was that was my early beginning, uh, a hunt for the ability to write and and maybe a bit of greed in there as well.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, uh one of the things that uh that I read about your story really is the fact that uh uh somewhere in 2004 uh you had an awakening of sorts saying, what shit are we doing selling brands to consumers?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And that was a moment where I think you went back to reflecting the work that you've been doing, and there was a big shift in the direction that you took.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so what really happened and what is the belief that drove you to this change?
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_02: I yeah, I think you know it's it's it's almost like you, as we have as creatives, I think you get light bulb moments, or you get um sometimes a door that opens or something in your life.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: And and and my my thing was it's probably like 10 years into my career, uh, I was working, or actually uh I was heading up my own uh medium-sized agency at the time.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_02: And um and we were hosting the climate summit in Copenhagen.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure that uh all of you are listening know what the climate summit is about, all these uh elected government leaders at the time.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: We had uh Barack Obama, Tony Blair, Angela Merkel, to all the big guns came to Copenhagen.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: And I had obviously, since we were hosting, you know, you always have this sort of national pride going on, like now with the Japanese and the Olympics, you know, people are proud about event global events like these.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_02: So I really had a high expectation of our elected government leaders standing up to the what is today definitely a climate emergency.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: And and obviously, we know nothing, nothing, nothing came out of it, absolutely nothing really came out of that.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so for me it was sort of an epiphany.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_02: There's two things that kind of did it.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, one thing was just the inaction of our elected government leaders.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_02: The second thing was there was the first time I saw brands around the city of Copenhagen advertise things that they didn't usually talk about.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: Fiat suddenly talking about them uh transporting their cars by train to Copenhagen, you know, all these sort of weird statements that I never heard before.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and so I thought to myself, what can I do in my professional capacity to do something about this?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_02: And and then, you know, if you think about it, I mean, Coca-Cola taught 1.5 billion people on a daily basis.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_02: What if a brand like Coca Cola did something about it?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_02: What if a lot of these brands that we were working for did something?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_02: So I think I was in this sort of weird um value, you know, internal value war within my own, you know, my own mind.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas like, wait, I I came into the industry because I love creativity, a bit of the greed, and suddenly I didn't really feel value aligned because I was like, why am I selling cars in cities that are way too congested?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you can't squeeze more cars into Mumbai or anything like that, or you know, even in Copenhagen.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I'm selling cheeseburgers to people who are way too fat already.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: Something's ought to happen.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: And and the brand side of that was obviously, you know, the perception of brands at the time was changing.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: So I wrote this book called Goodvertising, which was basically just a rallying cry for me as a creative to the industry and say, we ought to change our tracks.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_02: We ought to understand that if we are to preserve and make the brands prosper that we work for today, we really need to deal with some of these things.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_02: Because different from, I mean, my parents' generation, they saw brands as some, you know, as those that brought prosperity and and and wealth uh to the middle class and in general in society.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas young people growing up today, most of them look at brands as somebody who is to blame for social inequality, um, ecological degradation.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: So there's a really like a immediate change of mindset.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: So that was my um that was my shift and and and my my early mission.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: And and remember back then I was I was 30, I still, I was still I still I was still a young creative at the time.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: And and and sometimes when looking back at that piece of work, it's crazy that somehow it's still extremely relevant, but I also feel that there's uh a sort of um uh kind of strong value-driven aspect uh to the book that that comes from that anger you can sometimes have when you are when you're 30.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: So that's an interesting take, uh Thomas, because uh uh when you really talk about advertising and uh you know brands are seen as aspirational uh assets and aspirational uh value for uh by uh by consumers, uh your thought of saying, hey, how do I build value and sustainability proposition in brands is a very, very uh you know different thought.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, how did you go about uh uh you know then building your business?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because uh you know, even today you have the nestles of the world, the uh you know the Pepsi's of the world having these issues, and uh clearly uh there is a momentum towards I would call uh you know wellness, uh better nutrition, organic uh you know, farming thinking, uh ecology being protected.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: There's a whole movement which is there.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but there is a big contradiction between the intention and the action, right?
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because uh I still buy Pepsi, I still buy Coke, I still buy uh Nestle, but clearly uh you know a percentage of that revenue that they make if it goes back to social causes doesn't mean that sustainability uh uh is maintained, right?
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, uh is the problem of sustainability in brands a storytelling problem, or is it uh a good to have, yet I will do something for business problem?
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: How do you see it?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think what what what kind of back then at least happened was that I I feel that this sort of brand Fermegana that was very aspirational suddenly kind of changed the notion from only being the tip of the story and suddenly everything underneath, like if you compare it to an iceberg, everything underneath water level were all these big concerns that suddenly you know came out in the open.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, what are some of the ingredients in the burger that you eat daily?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, how those workers treated?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, wait a moment, um, you're a fossil fuel polluting company.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_02: And the early days, again, 10, 12 years ago, was not a lot of companies understood this.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_02: And and you know, in the book, it was difficult to find good examples.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, at the time it was like Anita Roddick for Body Shop.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_02: You had, you know, early days of Ben and Jerry's, uh, Unilever just launched their sustainable uh living plan back then.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_02: Um so so the examples were were far between.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: I think what's what's sort of happening right now is you know a new reckoning in a way that it's not niche anymore.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, when the book came out, and I remember this, that it was definitely not a conversation we had in the world of advertising or marketing.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: It it just wasn't.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it wasn't there in Cannes, it wasn't in any of the shows.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, in the beginning, I didn't really get invited into the world of marketing.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: But the people who absolutely loved me were the people who'd been working with sustainability for quite some time because they were like, hey, wait a moment, this guy got a different perspective on how we can solve some of these things.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: And and today I think the the key challenge um is in fact that, and and obviously this really differs from where we view the world.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, obviously, I'm calling in from Copenhagen Denmark today.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_02: Uh Scandinavia is you know extremely fixated on sustainability.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's a hygiene factor.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's uh if if you know you that's that's just what you need to live up to.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_02: And every retailer here talks about limiting food waste or having more organic produce.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think we still uh hold the world record of uh most organic uh products uh of any country when you go into a retail space.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: So so that has changed, and that pressure I think is a really key challenge towards brands, and especially if we look at the big brands.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: I think a lot of the big brands are losing market shares to challenge the brands that get this new mindset, that get the young consumers, that know that, you know, in fact, a lot of those products they've been pushing for years are really not living up to the standard of what people are expecting today.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and I think that's a key challenge for a lot of these big FMCT brands.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, one of the guys I interviewed for my for my latest book, um, and we can come back to that, but was Mark Pritchett, uh, the global CMO of of um of uh of uh Proct on Gamble.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_02: And and he shared something interesting because he said, you know, PNG has been in the business for 180 years.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: We've got some of the best scientists, research, and developers employed, and yet uh people don't trust us.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: They tend to trust an 18-year-old guy who makes soap out of his mom's basement.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: So so it it really does show this tremendous power shift and this challenge that I think uh should scare everyone working in advertising and be a wake-up moment for all of us to take these things seriously.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so clearly, uh while the global call for sustainability is huge, the brands trying to shift into this momentum is a big problem, right?
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because uh large part of the revenue comes from these uh you know monolithic brands, right?
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore, uh uh the ch the challenge of them trying to shift gears into a thinking like this is a real issue, right?
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, therefore, how do you see this challenge being addressed by these large brands?
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because clearly, if I was uh you know head and shoulders, if I was Gillette, uh if I was Coke, if I was Domino's, these are monolith brands with billions of dollars and market cap.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost like uh, you know, uh Ronaldo, you know, uh, you know, uh moving away his Coke uh can, and clearly, you know, there was a market uh capitalization drop for the brand.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: So clearly there is a momentum uh that's actually there with consumers.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: But the real challenge is how do you see these brands moving out of this challenge?
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because at the end of the day, huge revenues seem to be coming from these monol monolith brands, and there's a certain amount of quality, trust, believability that these brands bring in because of you know uh centuries of value that advertising created.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: So, how do you see this shift happening?
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's it's incredible to see the marketing and brand investments that have gone into some of these uh you know brand properties.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, I think we've witnessed it, you know, with you know uh Shillette, with Pambers, with a lot of these household names that that suddenly the growth that we've seen from a lot of these brands aren't delivering.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and um and and it really does show this shift is is bigger um and and more important than just the sustainability issues.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_02: And for me, I think it it also comes down to the sort of leadership or the way that you manage these brands.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_02: And and so for me, having been such a big advocate for purpose and sustainability with my first book, Goodvertising, I had um three years ago uh a sort of second wake-up moment in the sense that um I think it got provoked by a couple of things, but I think the key thing that provoked me was in fact how difficult it was to create change in my own life and across the business.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it's something that most of us uh probably can recognize from our yearly New Year's pledges or whatever we try and promise ourselves, you know, I'm gonna be a better boyfriend or husband next year, and you know, I'm gonna, you know, lose weight or whatever it might be.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_02: And so I started thinking about that quite a bit because ultimately this is about creating change, organizational change, societal change.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's what you know this movement was about.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: And and and the second thing was again and again I observed these big brands um standing up for you know equality, um climate change, uh and yet they failed.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_02: They got criticized.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, look at Volkswagen, right?
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_02: I mean Volkswagen was one of the car companies that I had as a case in my first book, Goodvertising.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, we all know about Dieselgate today, we all know about the failures in leadership.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_02: Even some of them their management have gone to jail.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_02: You know, if we take C Potley, they've been on an up and down, like a yo-yo type thing.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: We another case from my first book.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_02: So I realized a lot of these brands did this wrong because they pitched themselves as the heroes and said, believe in us, we're gonna take care of this, we're gonna fix everything for you.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_02: Just lean back, trust us.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_02: We are big brands, we can do this.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_02: And yet they failed.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_02: And so in my my latest book, The Hero Trap, I really said, beware of this.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_02: We need a new type of leadership if we want to deal with this really precocious situation right now.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_02: And and it's it's it's it's really about fundamentally looking at a different way of shaping brands uh that looks at not the brand as the agent of change, but I actually respect you and you and I because I think that's the key challenge for these big brands, that they they they don't connect with us on a human level.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_02: They don't understand our aspirations and deliver on those.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um so the key question I'm asking in the book uh and ask leaders and brands um to uh to ask themselves is not going on the value-driven Simon Seneca Y crusade and ask, why am I in the world?
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_02: Why, you know, why, you know, sitting on the bench and being philosophical about it.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_02: But instead ask a different question, which is who can you help people become?
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_02: How can you actually help you and I with some of the challenges that we face in our daily lives?
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_02: Whether those are uh you you mentioned the challenge of um of healthy, healthy eating habits, of nutritious food, uh, or um maybe it's it's about um um uh feeling safe in the community.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_02: There's so many things that that really does matter.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think that's a shift that that needs to happen is in fact that that brands need to avoid pitching themselves as the heroes, but really try to understand how they can help people become heroes in their own lives.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so tell me, Thomas, it's a very interesting perspective, and uh, you're really talking about uh you know, me is the new mass.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're talking about unma unmass marketing, right?
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: So these are the concepts that you talk about.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: And let's take the example of a brand like Nike.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think the fact that me as a consumer want to be more fit.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, I buy my running shoes, I buy my sneakers, I use I want to use them.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: But what you're really telling me is how do I change Swami the person and how does Nike build the change, right?
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh at one end it's the leadership in the company, at the other end, it's the various sustainability production processes that you run.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh finally, it's about me buying the brand and ensuring that I live a better, healthy life.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: If I were to take these three different tracks, how will your branding strategy need to undergo a shift?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: And how would you approach it from the framework that uh you talk about?
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and you're absolutely right.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_02: I think the the the the one of the key challenges is that it's uh uh a much more holistic challenge than we sometimes have been used to dealing with in marketing, in fact.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um because we we've been incredibly brand focused and haven't dealt with you know the whole company uh and and and really kind of trying to understand that.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I think today you have to.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_02: You you really have to.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: And for me, the first step is as I mentioned, um, really to look at the sort of leadership and how you build a meaningful brand.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_02: And and for me, uh one of the things I mentioned the who question, uh, which is part of uh a process I call the arrow, which was basically developed by psychotherapy and coaching, really trying to understand.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: We know that there is this intention-action gap between people saying they want to buy purpose from purposeful companies, but very few people follow true.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: There's uh there's uh um a global survey um um from uh sustainable brands that that looks at this and they put 65% of people globally want to buy um uh from a purposeful brand, but only uh 26% follow true.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_02: So there's a gap of 39%.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: What I wanted to do with this sort of era methodology was in fact to create brands that supported my personal journey that pushed me to action.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not creating a brand that's a preacher, but that's a coach helping us.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's the first step.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_02: And and I call these brands not purposeful brands because I think they're they're they're too self important, uh, too self glorifying, they're the sort of like Mother Teresa's and Gandhi's and you know how how many how many Gandhi's can they exist in this world?
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I wish there were more, but you know, if you look at the supermarket shelves, there's just way too many that are pitching themselves as Gandhi.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_02: And and so it's not a believable positioning.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um so that's sort of the first step.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um the the second step is is is obviously to understand how you can shift uh your organization, how you can um how from a sustainability perspective you can either limit the negative impact you have, or maybe a lot of the dialogues today go around actually uh being um net positive, so developing uh a positive outcome or even a regenerative outcome.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_02: And a regenerative outcome is in fact that you actually clean up all the mess that you've done already.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_02: So if you take, for example, a big company as as Microsoft, they came out not too long ago and said in 2050 they're actually going to succeed to offset all the damage that they've done in terms of carbon through all the years in business.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_02: So it's a sort of new mindset that's picking up in business.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_02: So that's that's uh that's the second thing.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_02: The third thing is obviously how do you how do you en masse yourself?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: How how do you how do you deal with these uh young people that grew up in a world that's fundamentally different from what you and I grew up in?
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, when I went to ad school, I had you know I had a course in print advertising, uh TVCs, radio, outdoor.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_02: That you know, that those were the media, you know, honestly.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_02: And and and it makes me sound really old, but but today, obviously, um young people grow up in a world where they can create anything by the push of the button, and and and that's how they feel it.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_02: And and I remember this, I remember I did this uh talk at a university, and I had four big brands in the room.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and typically, if you're at a business school, all the business students, you know, they want to go and work for these big corporates.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: And all those four corporates had a burning purpose, and and uh, and so they did this presentation.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: I did my presentation about my latest book, and and then in the end, I just asked the the students in the room, I think there were three, four hundred students, and I said, How many of you want to go and work for four of those well-renowned, purposeful companies?
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_02: And only 20 to 30 people raised their hands.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_02: And I was absolutely shocked because it was the lowest number I've ever seen.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: This is two years ago.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because of the pandemic, I haven't been doing too much of lecturing at universities, but uh, but but it an incredibly shocker, even from an employment and recruiting point of view, that if only 10% of students in a business school want to go and work for these corporates, it's a it's it's it's uh gigantrium challenge.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and I asked them, so what is it that you guys want to do?
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_02: The the ones who didn't raise your hand, I mean what's your thing?
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_02: Tell me.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_02: And they were like, Yeah, but you know, I I'm thinking about kind of creating this own little business.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: And others were like, Yeah, I don't want to work for these big and you call them unlith brands, you know, I rather want to go and work for a startup.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_02: So their mentality is completely different.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that mindset is in fact incredibly important when we look at how do we create and and activate um these transformative brands.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_02: And that that made me create a uh a second tool, which which I call the wheel.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_02: So it's like a steering wheel.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_02: And and and the further out you go, the more control you give to you and I.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_02: Because typically it was a company would launch everything, they would do everything, they would say where to distribute it, they would determine the price, the taste, all that stuff by based on market research, which is an incredibly heavy and time-consuming process.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_02: Today it almost feels like before that process is ended, that that thing is not a trend anymore.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_02: People have block thorn is definitely not the thing you want to put in an ice cream anymore.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's too late, the train has moved on.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_02: And so for me, it's really kind of moving from a we do everything mindset to actually understanding how can you enable you and I, which I think is is really what's needed.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_02: And also in terms of when we sometimes say, why are people not why are people not you know engaging with our marketing?
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: Because you're not you're not engaging with them.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_02: Because, you know, if you want to engage somebody, you don't want to be the boss that comes and says, here, do this, or I've done everything, you know.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: But really saying, you know, here we have this challenge, help us out.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_02: We know you're passionate about it, so I said, come on, let's do this together.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: And let me give you one good campaign example, and we talk about um things like products and services and pricing.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_02: But one of the campaigns we looked into was um uh was um I.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's a cooperative out of the US.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's it's kind of like um they they sell outdoor clothing like Patagonia and and and other brands like that.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_02: So it's speaks to people who are passionate about the outdoors.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: And on Black Friday, you know, this humongous commercial uh uh uh endeavor, uh they said we're gonna close our stores and we're gonna encourage everyone in the US to opt outside.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_02: Go outside, enjoy nature, which which really talks to this who can you help people become mindset.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I'm I'm the kind of crazy guy that if I come to Mumbai, if I go to New York, I always try to find a park, a little kind of green space where I can just like zoom out a little bit from all the hustle and bustle of the city.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so they really tapped into that.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: But the interesting thing was they made people part of this campaign.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: So it wasn't like they were campaigning people, they're saying, like, you know, opt outside, share your own, share your moments, uh, be part of this movement.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_02: And in just four years, it grew from 1.2 million people who participate to 15 million people.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_02: So it really does show what happens when you open up for people's passion, creativity, and turn them into a powerful um resource in the marketing mix.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's that's the shift we're seeing.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_02: So those are kind of the three fundamental steps.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: Get your leadership in order, not by your navel gazing, Simon Seneca, why, but by asking who you can help people become.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_02: Secondly, take a wholehearted look at your company to understand the challenges, the opportunities from the broad spectrum of social challenges, uh, environmental challenges, governance challenges.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_02: And thirdly, how do you really open up for people's passions and creativities and make it a fun brand to engage with?
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_02: Because why should I engage with a brand that not that doesn't behave like the brands that I'm usually engaging with?
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, think about it, it's the Instagram generation, they're sitting there, they're talking with the peers.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's one of the peers who created this new fashionable clothing brand.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_02: If they're not happy about the cap or the food that they're producing, they'll write them and then tell them, and maybe they'll launch a new taste.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_02: That's the sort of mentality that that brick brands uh need to get uh to be relevant.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_02: And it's really about speed, it's really about openness, it's really about being human, and it's most of all really about understanding what it is that drives people, motivates people, and try and support them on that journey.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting that you say this, and I read one terminology that you used.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_00: You said give the marketing mix in the hands of the you know consumer.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's really what you were talking about.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: So literally, a brand manager has a marketing mix element and then he says, Let me now control all the marketing mix elements.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you are talking about saying, you know what, empower the people with the marketing mix and let them be engaged in this uh process.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, can you tell me some examples of places or brands where you believed this methodology could have been applied?
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: And you saw this as you as you saw them do their campaigns or uh, you know, as they did their marketing, you said, hey, imagine if this marketing mix was empowered in the hands of the consumer, this brand could have actually uh you know had a 10x impact.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: And uh can you give me some examples of where they missed a trick or two there?
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, I think there's there's there's um I think there's plenty plenty of examples of brands who by applying this kind of complete to disrupt the way that we usually look at these things.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, let me give you a good example, and it's interesting because I actually already wrote about it in in my first book, Goodvertising, but I never really saw it from that perspective at the time.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_02: But I thought it was an interesting thing.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_02: And uh at one point BMW uh created this uh program where they would um they would uh have these new they they launched the BMW i3, which was their you know first iteration of of an electric vehicle.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_02: And and they started putting those in big cities like Hamburg and Berlin.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_02: But the crazy thing was you could go over there and you can open the car with your phone and you can drive it around and you can leave it wherever you want it.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: So this is an example of where you open up your distribution for me to decide.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_02: Because think about the the Avis model, the Hertz model, the classical car rental companies, how dumb that model is.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: I have to go to the Avis office to pick up my car, to wait in line for quite some time, to deal with whatever is in that thing.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_02: I drive around with the car, I have to put fuel on it, I have to drive back, leave it there, go back to where I live.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not on my terms.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's on Avis's terms because they have their office there.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_02: What do I care?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: So that's really an example of a platform.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and and and and and it's I mean, if I just look here in and and and and they're expanding across the world, that's extremely successful.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I don't have a car in Copenhagen mostly because I bicycloil walk, but when I want to use a car, that's the car I use.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_02: Because they're readily available wherever I'm at.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: So that's a really good example of a brand that does distribution differently.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I can I can give you a pricing example, in fact, which is from sometimes obviously you need to uh do what you preach yourself.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, obviously on the back of the pandemic, uh I was always in an airplane, always uh touring around the world and doing keynotes and workshops, and and and suddenly that stopped in the month of March.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I was like, how can I get the message out there?
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: And obviously, like everybody else, we started doing webinars and we had these discount codes and stuff like that.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_02: And then I realized that you know, why am I charging a fixed price for a webinar when I encourage readers of my book to open up the pricing strategy?
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: So what we did was in fact, we said, you determine the price, and then we explained people, you know, at zero euros, we're gonna go bankrupt at some point.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_02: It's not it's not a viable business model for us.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_02: At 29 euros, we break even.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: At 39, we're starting to make a profit.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_02: And at at 49 or 59, this is becoming, you know, a fairly good business for us.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_02: And the interesting thing was when we shifted the model, we earned more money.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_02: And even from the people who in the beginning, when they signed up for the webinar, decided to pay zero, we did a follow-up email and converted 10 to 15 percent of those to buy something, whether that was an audiobook or a book, or sign up for our next webinar.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_02: So it really kind of does show this exciting, um, exciting shift.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, you mentioned Nike before, and I think you know, they they they ought to get recognition for it.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_02: I know they have had that, but but for the Nike ID program, if you think about how forward-thinking that was, obviously it was you know in the back of this whole co-creation thing that was going on at the time, but but but but really how uh how great they were at understanding that these you know young consumers don't want to just sit around and get a pair of sneakers like it is.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: No, they want to they want to have a say, they want to design it, they want they want to have fun with it.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: And even today, if you go to the to the the Nike store in Soho in New York, it doesn't feel like a retail space, it's more like a a um creative uh space where you can meet uh some of the legends that you look up to, you can meet some of the exciting creators of street art that can help you kind of customize some of the gear that you bought, etc.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's a playground for people who want to express themselves, who's part of street culture.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think that's also the fundamental shift that that needs to happen when we look at at what's happening in retail, because retail right now is failing.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I also read a very interesting uh point in the book, uh, which is really uh this whole uh you know, a young consumer who was absolutely uh you know angry that phones were mobile phones were uh you know being changed so frequently.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: And uh you know uh he came up with this idea of uh replacing the parts that he did not like almost like a Lego brick.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore, there is a product design idea in the marketing idea, right?
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: So, therefore, it's not just about the marketing campaign, but it's also the product design that you need to look at.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore, I think there are some great ideas there.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: Can you explain that uh, you know, uh what you wrote about there?
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought it was a great example of picking up the Lego Bricks idea and applying it back into the mobile phone.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I think that's that's one of the things that I wanted to do with uh with this new book, The Hero Trap, was to talk about to talk with the with the big guys, the big brands like uh PNG, IKEA, etc.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: But I also wanted to talk with the smaller guys, those that were challenging the business as usual, those that were understanding this sort of transformative mindset, and that understood that it's really important to put people first in on mass marketing.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_02: And um, so Dave Harkins was this young Dutch design student.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and as you said, he was uh he was just tired that uh you had to throw out a mobile phone if the battery wasn't working or the screen broke or the uh camera wasn't working.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_02: And so we created this thing where he said, why don't we design a phone where you can put all these things together?
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_02: You can customize your phone like it's phone blocks.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_02: And the project was called phone blocks.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: And the idea was also to say, why do we have Apple producing the camera?
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_02: Why don't we get the world's best camera producer to do that little block and we can adapt that?
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_02: And so what he did was this was an idea.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, he was 25 at the time.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_02: I met him at a couple of times.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I even had him talk at a conference in covenant.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: I love the guy, and and and uh so what he did was he put this video up.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: It was basically just an idea, got 20 million views in a very short amount of time, and caught the attention of um lots of big businesses out there.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_02: And uh Mocherola was one of the brands that picked him up and and did trials and they played around with the concept.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_02: And and so that's just one example, I think, of this power of enabling people.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_02: And everybody wanted to kind of take part, everybody wanted to help the guy.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_02: But I can also share another example uh which I think is quite interesting.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so this was uh a young Swedish woman called Marie Delacroix, and I came across her um a number of years back, and and she she's probably the you know the best example of like a millennial or something.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_02: So she really had a passion for purpose and sustainability and stuff.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_02: So she wanted to go and work for Starbucks because she believed in what Howard Schultz was saying, you know, let's you know fix uh every community one cup of coffee at a time or whatever you know their purpose is.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: And and so she believed in that.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_02: She didn't get the job because her hair was green, so apparently that didn't really fall into the um the the guidelines.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_02: But anyways, we should be happy about that because then she decided to create her own business and and really a business on her and on everybody's terms, and it was called Wheelies, and the whole idea was that why should Starbucks dictate everything?
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_02: How should why should they dictate how things should be done?
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_02: So she created a micro-franchise, and it was basically bicycles that you could buy that was equipped with uh coffee machines, etc.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_02: So you could start your own little coffee shop and you can drive around in cities.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_02: And and it was really, you know, for people themselves to to do their businesses.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh obviously, I mean in in in in some instances it's a bit of a joke, right?
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's in in in most in most countries.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if you look at India, that's how business is.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, that's how you start a business.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_02: But but but but obviously if if if if if if you're in the world of of of big uh franchises like Starbucks, that's definitely not the way, right?
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_02: If you want to start a Starbucks franchise, it's$500,000.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_02: But but it was really like a really successful, scalable business.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_02: And they, I think, in in in in in in four years, managed to be in 70 countries.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that took Starbucks probably 15 years.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_02: So yet another example of a brand that that understood that you need to do people, you need to do business on people's terms and open up for their creative and inspiration.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_02: That was it was so interesting because I spoke with some of their, they call them wheelers, some of their macro franchises.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_02: And and the ones I spoke with in Copenhagen, they were passionate about coffee.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, they love you know grinding the coffee, tasting the beans, all that stuff, you know, you know, the real kind of coffee lovers.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then I spoke with um a wheeler in in um in Lebanon, in Beirut.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_02: And the only thing he wanted to do was he wanted to work really long hours to provide for his family.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_02: Because most of the time when he had to go and work for a regular coffee chain, he could only get eight to ten hours.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_02: And he wanted to push, he he was, he wanted to make make the best he could do for his family.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_02: So he he really just wanted to work hard, and that's why he loved this concept and had saved up for buying one of those bicycles.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that's for me is is really two quite inspiring cases of what's happening uh with some of these challenges brands and how fast they're moving.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_00: Great, fantastic examples, uh Thomas.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so one of the learnings that I'm having out of this conversation is so if you are in marketing, the traditional method of building a marketing strategy, you know, looking at working with an advertising agency, uh, is really how the last hundred years uh went by.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_00: So if you look at the next hundred years, you need to embed probably a product design thinking in your in marketing.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: You need to have a technology thinking in how you build a brand because imagine uh you know you have mobile apps today which actually keep nudging you saying, hey, you have not done your fitness uh regimen today, therefore, which means that if I'm really buying a brand for the mean, uh the goal that I uh you know I really want to achieve, and the brand then therefore needs to actually envelop service around the product, right?
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: And when you really want to envelop service around the product, uh you really have to rethink the configuration of how a brand is really being built.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: So, how do you really uh you know, therefore redesign the marketing departments of the future?
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's a really good question.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_02: And I think you know, a lot of this comes back to one of the primary questions I asked myself uh when writing this book.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_02: And and it was in fact, you know, what leader organization of brand have really created change in my life?
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I'll encourage uh your listeners to to think about that question as well.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, what what brand leader organization have really created change, positive change in your life?
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_02: And and and my list was uh disappointingly short.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_02: And especially when we talk about a world that's now full of all these brands that talk about purpose and societal change.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: Then it's shocking that I can't mention that many.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_02: And um and so I think where we're heading really kind of takes a much more open approach.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's really about understanding how you can reach out, how you can be in a a conversation with people, how it's about reciprocity.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and for me, that's probably the key thing.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's that it comes down to actually respecting people and where they're heading and trying to understand that how can you how you can help them on that journey.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's what the marketing uh departments of the future need to understand.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_02: It is really that it's about unmarketing everything, it's about opening up things, it's about opening up the brands for people to play with, have fun with.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um I definitely see a shift because the thing is when everybody can buy anything, there's not a lot of status in flashing yet another, you know, cab with a Gucci logo on it.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_02: And the only thing that actually is high status because you can't buy it is is effort, it's time, it's self-development, it's all these things.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_02: And if you if you look at the world's rich uh used to be one of the world's richest guys, Mark Zuckerberg, he used to have these yearly challenges, right?
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: Where he wanted to learn how to speak Chinese, learn how to code AI, because you can't buy that for money.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm really seeing this um across the board from changing consumption overall.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's not about just bigger, better products, but it's really about a better me.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_02: And you see this shift in, for example, the the the travel industry, uh, you know, the the percentage of like experienced economy, etc.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, it used to be just cool to go in and you check in at a Hilton or like a four-season, and and that would be the thing.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you'd share that on Instagram.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_02: But today, what's much more high status is in fact to go to like an Italian mama and learn how to make ravioli, or you go and you challenge yourself and you go diving in the Maldives or whatever it might be.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that's a really, really important point of this as well, is how that is changing and how that consumption is changing.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and and I think brands quite frankly need to adapt to that as well.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_02: So it's really not just about um changing the marketing departments, but but it's really kind of creating this shift towards where we're entering.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_02: And and as you said, I mean, uh all these tech-enabled gadgets that's popping up everywhere.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of those are in fact transformative brands by essence.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_02: Because they want to help us, and they're really successful at scaling incredibly fast.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_02: Even even, I mean, take take take the company Blinkist.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_02: I think they started in Germany.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_02: Basically, the inside is just that a lot of us don't have the time to read books, unfortunately.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_02: So, but we want to still seem smart, intelligent, uh, part of the conversation.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_02: So, what they've done is that they've taken uh famous business books and they've done a 15-minute summary, an audio summary.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody have time for those 15 minutes.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_02: So you can get tipping point, you can get all of these books in 15 minutes, and it's really about understanding who can help people become again.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I want to be seen as a smart, savvy business guy who are up to date with the latest reading, and they're just incredibly good at delivering that.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_02: So, so so for me, I in the book I talk about it's almost like a blue ocean strategy, but understanding how can you unlock meaningful roles in people's lives.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I call it Who Words.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_02: And and a really good example is is a company I spoke to that's called Respect Your Universe.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_02: And and it's it's a sports retailer like a Nike or an Edidas.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_02: But if you think about it, most of the time when you go into a sports retailer, the challenge is in fact that I don't, I mean, you you meet this guy and he's like a tennis pro, and I already feel like a little bit intimidated when I go into the store because I feel like you know, I'm you know, I'm left hand, right hand, I don't have the catcher, all this stuff, all the record, you know.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: And so what they realized was that isn't it interesting that there's no sports retailer out there for the for the for the average guy, you know, for for the couch potato, for those who might just want to go for a walk, for those who might want to play tennis, but they're never really aspiring to become a pro.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's a thing they do every second month because they go to this little thing with their friends.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_02: So basically, the insight is there that no matter what your goals are in life or in sport, we're here for you.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_02: We respect your universe.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_02: And even in the way that they recruit, it's the same thing.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_02: You don't go in there and you find you're the usual sort of fit-like muscular type guy.
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_02: You can go in there and you can find the card's potato behind the behind the counter that that understands you.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I think this is a really clever way as a brand to find a sort of blue ocean in the meaningful role one can play.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_02: So um so the so so there's a lot of shifts happening, um, which for me uh is incredibly exciting.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_02: There's never been a more exciting time to work in marketing, that's for sure.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_00: I totally agree.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I I really love the word that you use, which is called unmarketing.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because to me, that's really the key, because uh, there is too much of marketing that's happening to me.
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, there must be more and more unmarketing to me, right?
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's really what I think is very, very critical.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, how do you think uh uh leadership should drive this?
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh this thinking uh in brands, because uh it's a mindset shit, right?
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because you're almost like this hero who thinks I found a found the best positioning, I found the best campaign, uh, you know, I'm doing the most innovative distribution strategy.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost like I'm the Superman of marketing, right?
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, I come up with all these big ideas.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh therefore, how do you drive this change in leadership style for this kind of marketing?
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think it's it's it's obviously it's it's it's it's not it's not an easy shift.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_02: It's really not an easy shift because it's it's really it's really going up against a lot of the things we've learned in marketing over the last many, many years.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_02: But but at the same time, what I love about it is that it's actually incredibly human.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's really about uh lives, it's about understanding uh human insights, motivation.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's always been the key to powerful marketing.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if you go back to Bill Birnbach, he always talked about how you know um how an insight uh into people's minds and behaviors are really what drives and builds uh long-lasting, meaningful, strong brands.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_02: But I think the shift, um, and I think this is where I spend most of my time these days, is in fact that I I I try to shift these, uh I try to shift the thinking.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_02: I try to uh in the book give people some tools that they can apply in their daily work and marketing to kind of adapt some of these uh models.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um because I mean just just if you look at um the uh just if you look at how many organizations that still have you know really difficulties in understanding the sustainability challenges.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I spent 10 years touring, doing workshops, you know, trying to get that uh front and center.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the same thing is happening right now with the thing, these things we talk about right now.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um I mean I I I absolutely love uh you know opening up, uh being being fast in market, being playful.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and we even see the big guys doing this.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you know, uh if if you look at um if you look at IKEA, for example, one of the things they've done is that they've done a massive study of households in the UK to understand how they can help people live more sustainably at home.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_02: You know, PG today is mimicking a lot of these startups, as a lot of other brands are doing these days, with with sort of like startup incubators.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_02: So instead of having this three, four, five years uh RD faces, uh they do them quick, they do sprints, they create something fast, they put it out there, they test it.
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um so we I think we as an industry need to we need to um we need to deal with a lot of new thinking.
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_02: And and as I said, that makes it probably the most exciting time to live in marketing, but also makes it one of the most difficult.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_02: Because what is it really that that that you want?
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_02: And um and and and I think that's why specialization today in marketing is is so is so crucial.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_02: That you go, you know, who needs the kind of full uh full advertising shop?
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you rather want to have the best specialist reach out to the best specialist on a certain topic and get that advice than you want to go to the full service agency because they're not able to kind of cover every need from A to Z.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_02: They're not.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_02: And yet again, the most disappointing about all this stuff we talk about is that the more we know that we need to en masse and on-market marketing, we go in the opposite direction.
• 54:50
  SPEAKER_02: Because what am I seeing?
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_02: I'm seeing automation, I'm seeing marketing departments being cut down now during the pandemic, so fewer people.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_02: And and the worst thing about I I you know, I absolutely hate all this idea about automation.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's honestly, it goes contrary to what I talk about.
• 55:08
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, think about it.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_02: If if if if you uh on your anniversary, um your whatever year day with a girlfriend or boyfriend, uh send them an automated anniversary message.
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, hey wife, I love you, and it's automated.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't really show a lot of effort, and I think that's what you feel when you get these targeted, retargeted messages.
• 55:36
  SPEAKER_02: You just know that it's marketing, it just smells of marketing.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, the only thing that's just slightly changed is that maybe they got my name right.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes they don't.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, it's it's it's it's so so we need we need, I think we need to, I think we need to adapt new tricks and tools.
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I I won't even use the word tricks.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think uh you need to be more authentic, yeah, and uh you need to build uh soulful automation.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, let me put it that way, right?
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's a very good way of saying it, yeah.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_02: Soulful automation or yeah, authenticity.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 56:14
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, if you build soulful automation, then you bring in the capability of technology, but you build the emotion, okay, uh, into the automation, then you build scale.
• 56:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think the ability of the technology guys to think creatively and the creative guys to think uh technology process is really, I think, the way I see the future, and I see some ideas that uh you know you seem to be talking about really taking shape.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_00: But tell me the sustainability seems to be more you know wannabe kind of campaigns, right?
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I saved the ocean and you know, I saved the uh nature, and I just look at it and then I just say, here is one humbug campaign that's there.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_00: So is uh you know, is sustainability having a storytelling problem?
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_02: I definitely think so.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_02: I I completely agree so and I think that's you know, naming a book like naming a child is never easy, and and and that was exactly why I wanted to call the new book The Hero Trap.
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_02: Also to warn people that it was something that was fundamentally different than my first book, Goodvertising.
• 57:21
  SPEAKER_02: Because in some aspects, I think, you know, I had an naive way of looking at purpose, I had an EV way of building brands for good.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_02: Because again, as I jokingly said before, and I actually mean this.
• 57:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if you go into the supermarket and you look at the at the shelves, I mean, how many, you know, Gandhi's, T Cs's, Mother Teresa's can you have?
• 57:45
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I I might know in my life, I might know, and I know a lot of really passionate change makers, but but you know, a handful, two handful, three handfuls of people max, that really truly does something.
• 58:01
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's the real danger.
• 58:03
  SPEAKER_02: That when you put on that hero cape as a brand, I mean, you're gonna fall down as a can of soup because it's not trustworthy.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I'm I'm not a hero.
• 58:13
  SPEAKER_02: I fail on a daily basis to live up to some of the most basic things.
• 58:18
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, when I travel, I love flying in business class and it's not good for the environment.
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_02: I know it and I fail.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_02: I do lots of things that are not good.
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_02: I do, I think all of us do.
• 58:30
  SPEAKER_02: The danger is when you big brand, build brands that seems to be perfect, that seems to be saints, they're gonna fail.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_02: Obviously, they're gonna fail.
• 58:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so I don't think that people really want brands that are saints.
• 58:43
  SPEAKER_02: But I think what I portray in the book is in fact uh people want brands, like they want friends that understand them and they want to help them on their journey towards wherever they might be.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's a friend that wants to go there for fun time.
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_02: That's the friend you call when you have technical issues, the friend you call uh when when um when when you want to learn to live a little bit more planet-friendly or whatever it might be.
• 59:10
  SPEAKER_02: I think those are the sort of changes that's happening.
• 59:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, so so um um so sustainability for me is definitely facing a storytelling problem.
• 59:28
  SPEAKER_02: And and secondly, it's also uh really faced with a we're acting too slow problem.
• 59:37
  SPEAKER_02: We're acting way too slow.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_02: Big brands are these big oil tankers, and and they're really, really slow at changing course.
• 59:44
  SPEAKER_02: And that's a danger because just behind them, there are tons of challenges brands waiting to pick up to eat chunks away of their market shares.
• 59:54
  SPEAKER_02: And and as you see right now with acquisitions and stuff like that, a lot of these big FCMG companies buying up brands all the time.
• 1:00:02
  SPEAKER_02: Unilever, PNG, buy up all of these challenger brands because they know it's a crucial part of their the future proofing of their portfolios.
• 1:00:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um so um so so it's it's kind of key to understand that that change needs to happen.
• 1:00:18
  SPEAKER_02: And that's that's actually another beef of mine.
• 1:00:21
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I I see I I only mention this because it's it's a classic hero trap again.
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_02: You know, all these corporates that go out and then they say, you know, in 2030, 2040, 2050, we're gonna do this X, Y, Z, you know?
• 1:00:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, what what a nonsense.
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, in essence, if you think about it.
• 1:00:40
  SPEAKER_02: Let's say after we've done this podcast recording, I come home and I take my girlfriend being unfaithful.
• 1:00:46
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, what are you doing?
• 1:00:48
  SPEAKER_02: And and she looks at me and she's like, Yeah, Thomas, sorry about that.
• 1:00:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm I'm seeing this other guy.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_02: But you know what?
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna promise you that each day towards 2030, I'm gonna be a little bit less unfaithful until 2030 we're back together.
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_02: And basically that's what these big brands are asking of me, right?
• 1:01:08
  SPEAKER_02: It's ludicrous because it's like, it's like again, they don't recognize that I have a choice.
• 1:01:15
  SPEAKER_02: Do I need to wait for brand XYZ to change their course?
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_02: I have tons of other options.
• 1:01:22
  SPEAKER_02: And I think especially now, the speed of these things are going to pick up because of the pandemic, because I think people realize that, wait a moment, I actually do like online shopping.
• 1:01:33
  SPEAKER_02: It's actually easy.
• 1:01:35
  SPEAKER_02: I have a much bigger scope of things I can choose from, rather than going into the big uh the big old brick and mortar stores where somebody's taking the choices for me.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_02: I think it really does show this um uh uh fundamental shift that needs to happen is in fact that you know the people marketing don't understand the people and the planet sustainability and it clashes all the time.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_02: But with those those those two departments could come more fully together, or even better, just don't have those departments, you know, just don't but but but in fact those those two those two worlds operate on a on a completely different uh on a completely different set of rules.
• 1:02:15
  SPEAKER_02: So the in the world of sustainability you want everything to be you know measurable, um you want it to be very rational.
• 1:02:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um you you want um you you you want things to not that you want things to be complex, but the world is complex.
• 1:02:39
  SPEAKER_02: The world of sustainability is incredibly complex, you know.
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_02: You can't just say a plastic bag is bad and this reusable cotton bag is good, because in fact you need to use the reusable cotton bag, I don't know how many times, I think it's like uh 300 times before it's actually better than the plastic bag.
• 1:02:59
  SPEAKER_02: So you can't just put it up like that.
• 1:03:01
  SPEAKER_02: So the world is extremely complex in the world of sustainability.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_02: But the planet marketing works under almost the opposite way, uh operate under almost the opposite rules in the sense that if you want to be successful in marketing, it needs to be emotional, it needs to be simple, and it needs to be actionable.
• 1:03:22
  SPEAKER_02: So obviously, when you kind of have these two worlds coming together, it clashes all the time.
• 1:03:28
  SPEAKER_02: Because sometimes you simplify a key sustainability message too much.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes you rationalize a sustainability message too much, so it becomes boring and completely uninvolving.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_02: Like when you have uh, you know, that's my beef, right?
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_02: When you see these um, when you see these brands kind of showing your the carbon emissions of a product, I'm like, what the hell do I know?
• 1:03:56
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, like 25 kilos per, I don't even know what it is.
• 1:04:01
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, come on, help me out.
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_02: What what is that?
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so so you're putting out something that's rational, that's scientific, and all that stuff, but I just don't get it.
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't, it doesn't work in the world of marketing.
• 1:04:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um so so those are some of the dilemmas that I I tend to work uh on with companies and trying to get them to understand how we find the middle way, how we understand doing these hero traps again and again.
• 1:04:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and um and and and usually it's it's it's it's quite uh quite fun, playful uh conversations that that comes out of these sessions.
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_00: So so clearly, uh Thomas, one of the things that I see is if you go back to the 1830s, uh, you know, uh you had commodity, therefore, people had distrust with the quality that they were getting.
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_00: So brands got made, right?
• 1:04:53
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, it's almost like uh uh you know easy, uh, you know, easy to pick up because I know this brand is trustworthy.
• 1:05:01
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, commodity became brands, yeah, right?
• 1:05:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and therefore then quality just got ingrained into those brands.
• 1:05:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think now with the 2030s coming in, brands have become commodities, right?
• 1:05:18
  SPEAKER_00: So so therefore the fact that you have to now add a new layer of marketing or a new layer of uh you know promise to brands is very critical.
• 1:05:30
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the faster we do it, the better it is.
• 1:05:33
  SPEAKER_00: And do you believe this area of being uh authentic, being you know, appealing to me as a person, unmasking the marketing, or uh you know, me being the mass uh you know marketing idea?
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_00: Is that something that is going to be very critical to how you really envelop this brand becoming commodities?
• 1:05:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because now I know every brand is uh you know the quality is the same.
• 1:05:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so therefore I really don't care to.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_00: Day.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know, therefore, you have private label brands.
• 1:06:03
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:06:03
  SPEAKER_00: So, therefore, I think the 1830s to the 2030s, if you see, there's a big shift.
• 1:06:09
  SPEAKER_00: And but the marketing has not changed, right?
• 1:06:12
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore, I think that's a big shift that you're talking about.
• 1:06:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I believe that it requires new framework, new codes, new methods of doing it.
• 1:06:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I just don't see uh the frameworks being there for that.
• 1:06:25
  SPEAKER_00: Would you agree with me on that?
• 1:06:27
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely, Swami.
• 1:06:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think I think the development I try and portray in the book is is um is is really from kind of the functional benefits, the emotional benefits, to sort of brands being built around um societal benefits, like when I talked about it in the book advertising, so it tries to promote the company on its higher um uh societal effort towards purpose to really being about the transformative benefits that we're really kind of getting closer to what I would call a transformation economy.
• 1:07:02
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and and and why that is, is in fact that what brands are claiming doesn't really carry a lot of weight in itself anymore because everybody is just screaming everything from every rooftop, as you say.
• 1:07:17
  SPEAKER_02: Brands are in essence being commoditized.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_02: Then there's all this talk about story doing or actions, etc.
• 1:07:26
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, that is true.
• 1:07:27
  SPEAKER_02: You can come home to your wife and you can give her red roses, and that's a that's an action.
• 1:07:32
  SPEAKER_02: But by the end of the day, the real key to change is in fact when I can feel it on my own body.
• 1:07:40
  SPEAKER_02: That this brand has helped me do things differently.
• 1:07:44
  SPEAKER_02: It made me smarter, it made me more connected, it made me greener, it made me healthier.
• 1:07:51
  SPEAKER_02: That's essentially what I'm buying.
• 1:07:53
  SPEAKER_02: And that's why I do believe in transformative brands.
• 1:07:57
  SPEAKER_02: And and and when I asked the question earlier, you know, what brand, organization, and leader have in fact changed your life positively.
• 1:08:05
  SPEAKER_02: One of the brands that changed my life was in fact uh a Danish brand uh called uh Ostilner, which means Seasons and Danis, and basically what they do, they they they deliver to my doorstep uh uh a box of farm fresh produce, but it also comes with recipes.
• 1:08:26
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the things I wanted to to um to understand better was how to uh cook.
• 1:08:34
  SPEAKER_02: I love cooking, but how to cook better vegetarian vegan food.
• 1:08:38
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, remember, I I'm not lucky coming from a country like India, where you have tons of uh delicious, uh delicious plant-based-based dishes.
• 1:08:49
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, my what I grew up with was like uh pork meat, overboiled potatoes, fat gravy.
• 1:08:56
  SPEAKER_02: That's what I was served, meatballs, stuff like that.
• 1:09:00
  SPEAKER_02: So for me to have a brand that helped me on that uh journey uh towards embracing plant-based cooking is something that I'm obviously incredibly grateful for.
• 1:09:11
  SPEAKER_02: And the interesting thing in the book, when we did some research and compared uh these different strategies, so for example, purposeful campaigns versus uh transformative campaigns.
• 1:09:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so campaigns that take a uh uh we're the agents of change, we're gonna change the world, compared to you're the agent of change, you can change the world mindset.
• 1:09:33
  SPEAKER_02: It was interesting to see that people were on average 29.4% more motivated by the transformational campaigns, and people were um were on average 29.6% uh more um uh willing to pay a premium price.
• 1:09:50
  SPEAKER_02: And for me, that's the key in branding, right?
• 1:09:52
  SPEAKER_02: You build a meaningful relationship, and also going back to that point uh we raised in the beginning, this gap between intent and action.
• 1:10:02
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the 29%, you know, we're almost there by having brands that support our journey, that's there uh saying, you know, Swami, we believe in you.
• 1:10:13
  SPEAKER_02: If you wanna, you know, if you want to go on that run, we're we're the one, we're the company that that got your back.
• 1:10:20
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and Nike is actually, in fact, even though they they sometimes fail, but but but in essence, Nike is also an example of a transformative brand, and and have done amazing things like Nike Plus, like Fuel Band, to keep you on your tracks, to keep you motivated, to keep keep uh your you know keep keep or help you move further and faster, right?
• 1:10:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's that's the key today in marketing is is really to understand that we're heading towards this kind of transformation economy, um, which which um will resonate across everything from again the the the marketing you do, the marketing mix, the your retail spaces, uh uh your internal organization, all these things uh I I believe have to change in in the near future.
• 1:11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 1:11:14
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, uh thanks, Thomas.
• 1:11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh here are some closing questions that I have for you.
• 1:11:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um what are some of your favorite books?
• 1:11:22
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, you know what?
• 1:11:24
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm you know, I I I jokingly mentioned this example earlier from Blinkist about not having time to read.
• 1:11:32
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely shocking.
• 1:11:33
  SPEAKER_02: I my my uh night table is like packed with books from peers that I love in this business, and I'm just so behind at the moment.
• 1:11:43
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's uh it's it's astonishing, but but um um I'm um yeah uh I'll I'll have a hard time right now to pick one up.
• 1:11:55
  SPEAKER_02: Sorry, uh sorry about that.
• 1:11:56
  SPEAKER_02: But um in general, I love books about change, I love books about nudging, I love books uh about um understanding human psychology better.
• 1:12:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh those are some of the books that that that you'll definitely find on on my my my night table.
• 1:12:09
  SPEAKER_00: What would be the three pieces of advice you would give to your younger self?
• 1:12:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um definitely I I have a I have a couple there.
• 1:12:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I think uh be generous.
• 1:12:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I think um I think in the beginning as a young creative, you you you you and I think the advertising industry to is to blame for this, but because you you grow up and and you're like, oh my idea is fantastic, I'm not gonna share it with anybody, you know, this is mine, you know, almost like uh a bad scene from Lord of the Rings with my precious right, this is my idea, nobody's gonna touch it.
• 1:12:49
  SPEAKER_02: And so for me, I wish I'd been more generous with that.
• 1:12:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, because when you're generous, you get so much back, feedback that makes your ideas uh much better.
• 1:12:58
  SPEAKER_02: So I think generosity was probably one of the things that that I should have embraced uh even more.
• 1:13:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um stubbornness, I'm really, really stubborn.
• 1:13:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it's it's it's it's sometimes a good thing because obviously it's produced a couple of books and lots of other things.
• 1:13:14
  SPEAKER_02: But I think sometimes you also need to recognize when uh when you're too stubborn and and when you're young, uh that's that's harder sometimes to recognize.
• 1:13:24
  SPEAKER_02: And and and the third thing, and I think this is something that um I think all of us deal with throughout life, is really to follow your passion.
• 1:13:35
  SPEAKER_02: And and and it sounds easy, but it really never is.
• 1:13:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I I felt that that little light bulb moment I had around the age of 30.
• 1:13:44
  SPEAKER_02: For some people, that happens at an age of 50.
• 1:13:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um, sometimes it people are lucky and get it at the age of 12.
• 1:13:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but but but this this idea that that you really kind of align yourself with the things that make you tick is just incredibly important because especially in our industry, that is a tough industry to work in, that's stressful, that costs people a lot, people sacrifice a lot for to work in our industry.
• 1:14:13
  SPEAKER_02: And and so I think if if you forget the passion sometimes, we see burnouts, we see stress.
• 1:14:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that's that's a key thing that that even back then um I I uh I should have uh been better at embracing.
• 1:14:28
  SPEAKER_02: But a good but a good question, always see that's exactly why I love those types of books, because it they they make you think it's always good.
• 1:14:36
  SPEAKER_02: Human psychology is interesting.
• 1:14:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you were to invite four guests for your for a dream dinner, who would they be and why?
• 1:14:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think one one guy that definitely would be there is is uh is is Nelson Mandela and uh I I normally I don't have a lot of heroes, but I think this guy in so many aspects uh uh was such a healer and bridge builder.
• 1:15:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I think especially today, uh we need more bridge builders in such a divisive, uh toxic environment uh across the world, in fact.
• 1:15:09
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so I think Nelson Mandela would be good to bring to the dinner table.
• 1:15:15
  SPEAKER_02: Definitely.
• 1:15:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um who else would I have at that dinner table?
• 1:15:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um I would definitely I would definitely need someone fun who could light up the mood, not not to say that Nelson Mandela wasn't funny.
• 1:15:26
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you know, I I'd probably so this is probably a bit of an oddball, but but I would probably invite uh a comedian called Bill Burr.
• 1:15:34
  SPEAKER_02: He's an American US comedian, but but he's he's uh he's just a very no BS kind of guy.
• 1:15:41
  SPEAKER_02: And and and he makes it funny because he shows how he's vulnerable, he he's very open about some of uh some of his flaws, and and and and for me at least that's that's that's that's great comedy.
• 1:15:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I'd be excited to see how Nelson Mandela and Bill Burr would get along.
• 1:15:57
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think they ever met each other.
• 1:16:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um a third one, um you know, I probably would invite um, you know, I probably would invite um a business um a business person.
• 1:16:13
  SPEAKER_02: Uh at the moment I'm I'm I'm I'm quite split uh in terms of uh whom I'm actually um uh uh looking up to.
• 1:16:24
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, yeah, one guy I probably would invite is is is um so that's an open invitation uh to you.
• 1:16:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh Emanuel Faber's the exe of Danan, because I thought that you know he he tried, you know, he he tried to take this French uh FMCG and and and and and and push it towards uh purpose, turn it into a B Corp.
• 1:16:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I I would love to have a conversation with him about uh some of those challenges and obviously why he got ousted and all that stuff.
• 1:16:57
  SPEAKER_02: So he could probably be an interesting guy to throw into the mix.
• 1:17:01
  SPEAKER_02: And then lastly, I mean uh I probably would invite Dave Hackins just because David, this young Dutch designer, just to make it a mix bag of people, uh, he is he's he's fun to hang around with.
• 1:17:15
  SPEAKER_02: He always got exciting projects going for him.
• 1:17:17
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, one of the other projects he's doing right now is called uh Precious Plastics, where he built these do-it-yourself machines that can crunch the plastic into small um small um granulates, and then you can create amazing product uh products out of it.
• 1:17:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that's just up to your own imagination what you want to create.
• 1:17:36
  SPEAKER_02: So those would probably be my four uh four four dinner guests.
• 1:17:41
  SPEAKER_02: And and obviously, obviously, Swami would have to bring you into the mix somehow.
• 1:17:45
  SPEAKER_02: So let's let's let's let's have an honorary guest at the end of the table.
• 1:17:50
  SPEAKER_02: So great.
• 1:17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, great, great.
• 1:17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for inviting me.
• 1:17:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that's quite uh, you know, uh, I would say uh you know it's a privilege to be there.
• 1:17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Let's see.
• 1:18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, what does the word successful mean to you?
• 1:18:04
  SPEAKER_02: For me, it's um I I define success uh probably quite differently from most people.
• 1:18:10
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I did actually have the other day a conversation uh with a couple of my friends about it.
• 1:18:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think for me, success is being able to align uh your work life uh with your private life and your passions.
• 1:18:23
  SPEAKER_02: I think way too often, um, and I think this again is probably a good advice to my younger self, I think way too often you get captivated by things like money and status, and you run faster and you get blinded by some of these uh things, rather than actually understanding that the most privileged life, the most privileged thing you can have in life is balance.
• 1:18:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's not it's it's it's not too much, it's not too little.
• 1:18:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um I mean in in Swedish they have a word for that which is called lakum, which means you know just just enough.
• 1:18:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh um in in in in in in in in um I know in So what is it called?
• 1:19:04
  SPEAKER_00: What is it called?
• 1:19:04
  SPEAKER_02: Lagum, L-A-G-O-M.
• 1:19:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um I know that in in in in in um in Thailand they have this thing that they call uh sufficiency economy that was taught by the old Thai King, and which is sort of the same thing.
• 1:19:19
  SPEAKER_02: That let's let's not let's let's not go crazy in the one direction or the other direction.
• 1:19:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I I think in fact when I look at my life right now, I feel I have the world's best job because I I I still I still have time to create passion projects.
• 1:19:35
  SPEAKER_02: I still have uh uh I'm fortunate to be able to used to be able uh to travel around the world and and and meet uh tons of inspiring people and and having conversations uh with people like you.
• 1:19:48
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's you know privileged and and that's that's what I define as a success.
• 1:19:55
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 1:19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh what are the three or four pieces of advice you would give to an 18-year-old studying in a university now?
• 1:20:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um drop out.
• 1:20:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh no.
• 1:20:12
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, you know, uh I shouldn't say that because in fact my my my my my both my parents have have been um in the educational space uh for for through my life, and in some ways I'm in the educational space as well.
• 1:20:28
  SPEAKER_02: You know, be critical.
• 1:20:29
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's the primary thing.
• 1:20:30
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's the primary thing any uh good institution today uh needs to teach young people is critical thinking.
• 1:20:38
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's question everything, question what you learn, how you learn it, that's incredibly important.
• 1:20:45
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the second thing um is and I know that you know um I know that a lot of young people obviously have a lot of confidence, but I think confidence is really key.
• 1:20:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um and and and really aiming aiming for what it is that you want.
• 1:21:04
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, a really good example early on in my career was when I when I um did the research to my first book advertising, and and again at the time I was probably 29, 28, no, 29, I was 29 time.
• 1:21:18
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and and I remember I I asked this really esteemed creative colleague of mine that I had a lot of respect for, and I told him about the book that I wanted to write and why I wanted to write it.
• 1:21:30
  SPEAKER_02: And he looked at me with those kind of kind of that critical glance, like, you know, what makes you capable of doing that?
• 1:21:37
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, uh, what's your work experience that can at all um, you know, rectify that?
• 1:21:44
  SPEAKER_02: And and I just looked him in his eyes and I said, uh, because I'm doing it.
• 1:21:49
  SPEAKER_02: And he kind of shook his head and walked off.
• 1:21:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think that's probably a second thing for an 18-year-old uh student to understand that just have that tenacity and and and go get him uh um um mindset.
• 1:22:05
  SPEAKER_02: And and and the last thing would would uh for me um probably be empathy, because I think there's just in general a lack of empathy, of understanding differences, understanding culture, understanding those who aren't like us.
• 1:22:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think if you want to survive in the world of business going forward in a in a in a global global business world that's becoming more and more intertwined, I think you need to have that as a key factor.
• 1:22:40
  SPEAKER_02: You need to be empathetic towards the people that you meet and and and curious about the way they live and and and understanding of their situation.
• 1:22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 1:22:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh what is something you believe that nobody else agrees with you on?
• 1:22:58
  SPEAKER_02: Good good good question.
• 1:23:02
  SPEAKER_02: Uh uh what do I um um what would that be?
• 1:23:12
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm just I'm just trying to think what what the most what are the most nagging I get from my girlfriend at the moment.
• 1:23:19
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I'm just trying to think about that.
• 1:23:21
  SPEAKER_02: Uh what what do I besides obviously you you know the the kind of toilet seat thing, I get a lot of nagging from that.
• 1:23:28
  SPEAKER_02: I would probably claim that I'm good at it and she's still nagging me about it, but but but that's almost too small a thing.
• 1:23:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um you know there's one you know there's there's one thing that I mean I I don't know if anybody would would but but but I'm I'm I'm I'm really not into brand activism.
• 1:23:48
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I know that everybody is like applauding you know Nike and all these guys in Patagonia when they go out and they're like uh uh put this little label in the jerseys that said swallow the assholes out of it as in a reference to Trump when he was still in the uh in the administration, uh and and things like that.
• 1:24:10
  SPEAKER_02: So when when brands go all Nike with a like uh believe in something even if it means sacrificing everything.
• 1:24:17
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's the sort of uh rhetoric uh that's uh that's almost kind of running high speed into the hero trap.
• 1:24:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it and it's the sort of rhetoric that's creating a more um uh separated, a more disenfranchised, a more um uh dysfunctional society because it's pitching us against them, uh climate believers, again people who don't believe, uh people who believe in diversity and people who don't.
• 1:24:51
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the ones who have the the ones who are on the high road and who gets these things, if you're good at math, you don't tease the people, cheat, uh tease the people or provoke the people who are bad at math.
• 1:25:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's why I don't like brand activism.
• 1:25:07
  SPEAKER_02: So that could probably be one thing besides the the the the toilet uh toilet seat.
• 1:25:13
  SPEAKER_02: I'm good at putting the toilet seat down.
• 1:25:15
  SPEAKER_02: I I hope she'll I'll send her this podcast afterwards just to kind of name and shame her on this.
• 1:25:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so the final question is what's the best piece of advice anyone has ever given you?
• 1:25:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think this goes back all the way to um to uh secondary school.
• 1:25:34
  SPEAKER_02: And um and I had this uh math teacher, uh very traditional school teacher.
• 1:25:42
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you know, remember I grew up in a Danish school system, and and back then you weren't allowed at all to hit the children anything, and he was still the guy who would maybe like do a little um thing or two, but but um I remember he I might have been not uh always the best uh student in class.
• 1:26:03
  SPEAKER_02: I I was I was good in in school, but I was easily bored.
• 1:26:06
  SPEAKER_02: So sometimes I got into trouble.
• 1:26:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I I remember I remember he one day took me out of class and we walked down to the library, and and he's he put me in this stool and I was sitting there for quite some time while he walked around the library, picked up a dictionary, and he sat in front of me, and I was terrified.
• 1:26:25
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, he's gonna kill me now, he's gonna hit me.
• 1:26:27
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know what's gonna happen.
• 1:26:28
  SPEAKER_02: And he sat like flipping the pages, and he found this word, um, which is Danish, which is distanza plena.
• 1:26:37
  SPEAKER_02: And the word really, and I never heard the word even in Danish, and and really what it means is somebody who um who gets blinded by the short term, who only runs the short mile, who doesn't look, who doesn't take the marathon.
• 1:26:56
  SPEAKER_02: And and and for me, it's it's really uh something that I think he spotted very early on.
• 1:27:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I think a lot of creatives deal with this thing that we always want to move on to the next project.
• 1:27:12
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm I have a often have a very hard time saying no, so I want to be engaged in lots of different things.
• 1:27:18
  SPEAKER_02: And so in that way, he quite early on actually really kind of gave me a label um that uh I have then thought about and tried to work on uh through a lot of those years.
• 1:27:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um unfortunately, I don't think uh that he's he's alive anymore.
• 1:27:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I tried to find him a couple of years back because I wanted to actually uh give him give him a call and you know say thank you for you know uh being so precise about understanding uh some of my challenges.
• 1:27:49
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 1:27:49
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Thomas.
• 1:27:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I really enjoyed this conversation.
• 1:27:52
  SPEAKER_00: It was absolutely brilliant.
• 1:27:54
  SPEAKER_00: Your thoughts on how we need to do on marketing for brands, uh how the consumer behavior today is changing with the young people uh who are around.
• 1:28:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh was really fantastic.
• 1:28:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh thanks a lot for your time.
• 1:28:10
  SPEAKER_00: And thanks again for being a guest in my podcast.
• 1:28:14
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, Swame, and and and and really big, big, big thank you to you because uh I I think without uh people like you who help spread this message, um you know I don't I don't think we're gonna be successful.
• 1:28:30
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm really happy that you that you lent a bit of airtime uh to this message and and and thank you uh to all the listeners uh for listening in on this.
• 1:28:39
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and um and do remember all of you to to be the change that you want to see out there.
• 1:28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening to this episode.
• 1:28:50
  SPEAKER_00: For selected links and detailed show notes, visit www.contramines.com slash blog.
• 1:28:58
  SPEAKER_00: Follow Contraminds on social media and let us know who you would like to see next on the podcast.
• 1:29:04
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• 1:29:10
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• 1:29:12
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• 1:29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening and stay safe.