Prabhakar Mundkur: Ad Agencies no longer need Creative Chiefs!

By Prabhakar Mundkur

 

Or so it seems if you want to follow in the footsteps of the oldest agency in the world, JWT, which has been in the advertising business for 154 years ever since it first started doing magazine advertising in 1864.

 

Tamara Ingram CEO, JWT sent this memo to the agency when Matt Eastwood their global Chief Creative officer resigned earlier this month.  The memo from Tamara which was released by AdWeek went as follows:

 

Everyone,

 

I’m writing to share the news that Matt Eastwood, Worldwide Chief Creative Officer, has exited J. Walter Thompson to pursue a new adventure. We thank him for his contributions and wish him continued success in his future endeavors.

 

We are reimagining the future of the agency. This is a structural decision that will allow us to be more agile, leverage our collective global bench strength and encourage the burgeoning diverse ‘maker culture’ growing within J. Walter Thompson. As such, we have no plans to replace the role.

 

Creativity remains at the very core of our business, but today it is an even more collaborative process. It is borderless. It is broadly focused. We are increasingly relying on the people who are closest to making and creating the work. And, we are re-imagining the future of how this shift will be reflected within our organization and our leadership structure.

 

The Worldwide Creative Council will evolve to better reflect the needs of the agency. It will continue to be a pivotal part of our organization internally and set standards and practices for how we improve the quality of our work. And, there will be a fluid roster of talented individuals with myriad skill sets.

 

Additional strategic changes will include the use of technology to evaluate creative concepts at a much earlier stage. This will allow us to be iterative in real time and to ensure we are evolving our work to be stronger, more innovative and have a greater impact on our clients’ business.

 

I am committed to protecting, supporting and developing the creative community and culture within JWT. I am looking forward to sharing more specific information soon. For now, it’s business as usual and we will keep the trains running as we head into Cannes.

 

Tam

 

What does this mean for the creative community as a whole?  Creatives the world over were enraged and showed their support for Matt.  In addition, JWT proved that it doesn’t really want to be a creative agency which has always been its nemesis.  Considered old, stodgy and uncreative, JWT might well have Commodore J Walter Thompson, the founder of the agency, turning in his grave.

 

Coming on the heels of Marc Pritchard saying that he would like to see three quarters of the agency resources to be creative, the move from JWT saying that they are going to eliminate the job of the Chief Creative Officer, comes as a mighty surprise.  That they might want to challenge the current status quoin the advertising industry with planners and client service.

 

Plagiarism crosses borders

Finally, plagiarism has come up in the news because it can now cross borders more easily than people do. So, when Pakistan’s beauty brand Olivia did a complete lift of a Godrej BBlunt TVC of three years ago, India stood aghast. It had implications both for the advertiser and the celebrity in this case who was Kareena Kapoor.

 

The Olivia Intence TVC

 

 

The BBlunt TVC from Godrej

 

If that were not enough, a MalaikaArora ad that had also plagiarised seems to have popped up.

I am sure that theblatant attempt to copy something across international borders must have sent the IP lawyer community into a tizzy!

 

Consumers are being manipulated not just Governments

With the governments of various countries venting their anger at Cambridge Analytica and Facebook for rigging election results in several countries around the world, everyone seems to have forgotten about the poor consumer.  Who has been secretly manipulated by these data thieves.  Some lone voices of consumers have been making these unconscious manipulative tactics from Facebook public on twitter, but I am afraid that in all the din created by the governments, consumers might lose out.  This tweet is a great testimony to how consumers are being manipulated.

 

Mobile Manufacturers seem content to be camera replacements

 

The new Vivo ad seems to have drawn a lot of attention because Aamir Khan has replaced Ranveer Singh in the advertising.  Marketing experts seem to be excited giving their opinions on how Aamir is good for the brand, others are discussing the pros and cons of using old stars versus young users.

 

 

But the real problem with the Vivo commercial is that it treats the phone as a camera. The ad was reminiscent of the old Kodak and Canon/Nikon ads.

 

And here we were busy thinking that the mobile has replaced the computer as a modern computing device that does everything from browse the web to order my Uber, pizza and more.