Latest / The Lead Creative / The Biggest Shift in Marketing is Psychological, Not Tech or AI: Tahaab Rais

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The Biggest Shift in Marketing is Psychological, Not Tech or AI: Tahaab Rais · The Lead Creative

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: There's a framework that I give to all brands, which is called the Four E's framework.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not making it up because we actually do this.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: And there are four things then.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: An ideal brand does all four for people, but at least a brand can start doing one of those for people to show its value.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Lead Creative.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: For the second year in a row, we are at the NetBank IMC conference to find out what shifts marketers are experiencing from AI to digital marketing to how the consumer is interacting and engaging with brands in times of really, really great constraints.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: This conversation is brought to you in collaboration with our production partners, Sumeto Media, as well as Africa's largest B Cop certified marketing agency, Roger Wilkins.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Enjoy the conversation.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: We're now joined by Tahab Race, the group strategy officer and film director of Publicist Group Minat.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Tahab, thank you so much.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having us.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: I want to firstly tap into your talk, which was titled The Shift Isn't Technological, it's psychological, which is interesting because we tend to think it's technological quite a lot, and we tend to talk about the tech quite a lot.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: What do you mean it's psychological?
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Can you unpack that for us?
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: I feel when we look at the pace at which AI is evolving, especially today, and the way technology is evolving today, uh, we are often tending to focus on the tools, on the technology, on the metrics, on the data, on the way the experience works, but we often tend to forget who it's all made for.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: It is made for people.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: And with every technological progress, and history has shown that, right?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: From the GPS to the ATM uh to internet uh to anything that is new and interesting.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: People also change with the technology.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of the brands that we work with today, and a lot of agencies that also work in our industry, tend to look at the technological roadmap in today's day and age, the AI roadmap, the AI strategy, but they often tend to forget the psychological roadmap behind it.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: Is how are humans changing?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Like when we think of journey maps, we don't think of the memory maps that people are creating in that journey.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: So we tend to forget that side of it.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: So today's talk was about that.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: It was also about giving a shortcut to think about solutions versus just be a talk about, hey, here's AI, we've got to be more human, which I definitely didn't want to do.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: So I wanted to give people a practical toolkit, and which is what was presented today through the lens of archetypes.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: Where we show different ways in which you can balance the technological shifts with the psychological shifts and create solutions out of both of them that can be of benefit to the people and also to the brands.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: You see a lot of work that is very varied, and I mean creative work now, right?
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Because the work from the Middle East to North to East Africa is very different, right?
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the cultures are also very different.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Now, tapping back into this technology, tapping back into this psychology, what do you find to be true across all cultures, and what do you find to not be so?
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: And how is technology creating this bridge between cultures that we don't understand as well, and enabling us to tap into them creatively?
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's a very good question, man.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: I think the one thing that holds true for anyone, no matter what part of the region or what part of the world they are from.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm from the Middle East, you know, this is Africa.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: There's there are five things that are very common and universal to every human being, which is our five needs.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we all need love, or we all want to be loved.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: We all want purpose in our life, we all want to discover new things, we all want to be successful, and we all want to belong to something.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think those five universal human needs stay universal across everybody.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: And it's important for brands to understand that.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: Where it gets interesting, how those five manifest in each market and in each culture.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's where looking at technology, looking at data, looking at why people do the things they do.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: Why are people in X market lonelier than people in Y market?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: Is it about companionship?
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: Is it about love?
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: Is it about self-anxiety?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: What is it about that makes people lonely?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: So looking at that is very interesting.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I think technology with data, with social listening, and now with AI mixed with social listening, you've got things at the palm of your hands.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's what's exciting about it, and that's the bridge that technology can create for us is to help us drill down further.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Interesting you say that because I just come out of research here in South Africa that I was doing with South African, among South African township residents, right?
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the thing that you're describing about, we all have these five needs, they just manifest differently.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to almost hit you with a question that comes for me out of the insights that we're getting, right?
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: So what we are finding is that township residents who are largely low-income earners and who really um do a lot with very little and have to stretch their money quite a lot.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things they say is that brands make life expensive for them.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: They don't make life easier or better, right?
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: And with us working in the creative industry, with us working with brands quite as much, seeing as these five needs manifest differently across cultures, how do we ensure that brands improve lives, even among people, especially in fact among people who are low-income earners who have to work really hard to tap into these brands that we engage with or help enable them to engage with.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: There's a framework that I give to all brands, which is called the four E's framework.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not making it up because we actually do this.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And there are four things, and I an ideal brand does all four for people, but at least a brand can start doing one of those for people to show its value in their life.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: To show why it's, you know, I wouldn't say expensive, but why it's charging what is charging them.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: And those four E's typically are one is how are you educating me to know more than I know today?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: What can brand do brands do as utility that teaches people something that they do not know?
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: That therefore makes their life richer.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: It can be for you as a person, it can be for your kids, it can be for your partner.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: What is a brand teaching that's upskilling you, that's improving your capability?
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: I think that is when a brand adds real value, and there are a lot of examples around the world of brands that do that and do that well.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: The second thing is, how is a brand actually empowering me to do more with my life?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: What opportunities am I getting from this brand?
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's taking money from me and my community, but what is it giving me to make myself better?
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: To make myself do more with my life.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: The third thing is how is the product of the brand actually enriching my life?
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: Why are they charging X amount more?
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: For example, what is the value to me?
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: Is it better quality?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't have issues later in life when it comes to food I eat or things I put on my skin.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: What is the real value to me?
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: How is it enriching my life?
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: And the fourth thing, which I think is often forgotten, is how is a brand entertaining?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: Is it making me have fun?
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: Is it making my life happier?
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: Is it making me enjoy my experience with the brand more?
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I think if a brand does those four, at least you start to show that I'm doing something beyond just a transaction with you.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I I suppose it comes down to understanding people.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I suppose it comes down to understanding people and serving the needs that they have, once again, which is uh really where where we started.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly, exactly.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: I know that you also engage quite a lot with the Louis, um, from I suppose submitting work and judging and all of that.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: What are you seeing that makes the work, I suppose, from a MENAT perspective to a South Africa perspective, um, what makes it different and what makes it slightly similar?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: What are you, what are some of the nuances that you pick up from work that you see there?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell I'll tell you what I'm positively jealous of.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, whenever I come to the lorries, there are two things that are observed, and one is not related to the work directly, related more to the people.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: I really love the community feel that you guys have here in South Africa and Africa, where you guys really cheer each other's work on.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: You guys really support each other's work, even on juries.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: You see the jury really, you know, not I wouldn't say fight for South Africa work or Africa work, but you see the jury really try and explain why this piece of work matters, why it was good, why it was effective.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: Or if it wasn't, there's you know an equal amount of loudness in the room.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: But there's a passion for the work from the region.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: And there's genuine passion.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: It isn't coming from animosity or hey, that ex-agency did this work, I don't work for them.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, competition, da-da-da, let me kill their work.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: No, there's genuine support and brotherhood and sisterhood, which I really like a lot, and I wish we had more of that in our industry back home when I go back.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: The second thing I observe is in the work itself.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: I really feel two things I've observed that I feel are worth us emulating and us doing more of.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: The first thing is your, when I look at the case studies at Lori's.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: I know case studies, everyone, you know, adds stuff to case studies, every agency does that kind of crap, that's fine, it's the game, right?
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: But your case studies actually show the scope and the scale of things.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: I see a lot of very smart channel thinking that goes into the case studies from South Africa, from broader Africa as well, where you really think the entire journey through.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: You think about the channel, the ones that win.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: And when I look at the stuff that wins from the Middle East, oftentimes I feel that's always missing.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: And when I write my briefs, I work with my teens and my creatives, I put the damn channel plan in.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that has to be in the brief.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: But we often don't see that in our region.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: The second thing I really like is that you guys really have fun with your work.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: You guys generally enjoy the field of creativity, and that shows in the work.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: I think there's a lot of humor that is seen in the work.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: Not just work entered in lorries, but even work that we see released in media out here.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's fun.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, all the work that wins as well, it's fun, it's enjoyable, and it's built on culture, which I think we are tending to forget in the Middle East.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's the need to be seen on a global stage and being seen as global markets and therefore as global creatives.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: Also, there's a lot of expat population in our region that comes in.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: So I feel there's a need for us to perhaps get more inspired by you guys in looking at culture and starting with culture first.
• 11:09
  unknown: Thank you very much.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: I want to tap into culture with through the lens of this expat um population.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because even there, there's culture.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's harder to pin down, it's harder to nail, but even there, there's culture.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know I've got quite a lot of friends who now live in Dubai, and there's a culture that they've kind of tapped into that they are part of, subcultures that they are part of.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: What is it, what's that golden thread of culture in a culture that is almost on to say common to itself versus a culture that is largely an expert culture that that you kind of tap into creatively because you raise, I mean, that that adds a layer of complexity, I believe.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: It does, but also if you drill it down to the basics, which are, you know.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: There's too much noise.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: Drill it down to the basics of, you know, there's a human understanding to it, but then you add another layer of passions.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: And all cultures have certain passions and passion points that are very relevant to that culture.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: So there are a lot of, there's a case study we did in the UAE with cricket.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: And with cricket and a tea brand.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that was targeted only to the Indian and Pakistani segment in the UAE.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: It did not appeal to the Emirati Arabs, it did not appeal to the local population or even other expats, like the Filipino population, the South African population.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: It spoke to the Indian and Pakistani population itself.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: It was based on a passion point.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's where brands need to start to get a little bit smarter when they appeal to the subcultures that you're talking about.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's tap into passion points and look at insights and tensions within those passion points that a brand can have a solve and an additive role for.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: So now tapping into the theme for the 2026 Um NetBank IMC conference, which is the shift.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: What is the most important shift that you're navigating in your work right now?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: And how do you believe that that will be relevant in brand building over the next five years?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: I feel it's definitely the topic that I spoke about for me, hence I spoke about it, is that the psychological shift.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: It applies to our consumers who can to take our brands, but also applies to our people.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: Like if I'm working with my strategist.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I earlier a strategy would take, let's say, one week, you know, the fastest form of proper strategy.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: Now it takes two days.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: But making our people use those technologies available to us to make them feel these are your superpowers, these are not something that's impeding your ability or impeding your value.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: Just because there's an AI strategy agent that can think of different insights doesn't mean you're not valuable enough.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: Just because an AI agent can write an effectiveness paper.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: Or write a case study script doesn't mean you're not valuable as a writer.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: You're the one using it.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: But the behavioral shift is what we need to be more conscious of and more cognizant of.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: Internally, and the same goes for consumers, like I said earlier.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: We uh ask our guests to leave a question for our next guest to pass the mic to our next guest.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: This question didn't get one of our one of our previous guests was um Okay, let me let me because there are quite a few questions actually from previous guests.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um I want to choose one that is okay, one of our guests was Bridget Harper, okay, the head of marketing for Volkswagen South Africa.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the question she left to your point a bit earlier, the question she left was, are we making work for people or for algorithms?
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a question for me.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right now we are making work for uh show.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: We are making work to show we're doing it.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: We are making work to show we are ahead of the curve.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh right now we are not even making work that's smart enough for the algorithm, to be honest.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: We're not even tapping that much in the data.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: We should be making it for people.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that is the premise of the talk that I gave is that we should focus on the human shift.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: Now it's your turn, Tahab, to uh pass the mark to our next guest by leaving them a question about marketing, creativity, their creative process, the industry, and perhaps even life.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: What can marketing do in the next ten years to be the strongest department within a brand's operations?
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Tahab, thank you so much.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate it, but that was a really great conversation.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think out of that I take away the fact that in everything that we are doing, we shouldn't leave the human behind.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: We should focus really on people and let technology enable our engagement with people rather than put technology ahead of people.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate it, brother.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: This is the lead creative.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like and subscribe.