Dani Richa, the group chief executive officer of Impact BBDO in the MENA region, sat down with Executive to discuss numerous facets of transparency.
- What is the first step in advertising something responsibly or transparently?
The starting point always is consumer insight: digging into the fabric of the societies that we are working in, finding needs, aspirations and common values of the people and then trying to see if the brands that we represent and the services that we promote could really have an impact on their lives and help them improve their lives or their choices.
- Is this more ‘doable’ today than it was in the past?
For many, many years we have been shouting at people and telling them. The net and the mobile and all that, it has created a dialog. Now it is a dynamic process. We no longer wait — the next morning, we get comments. The next morning! It is live and immediate and we listen very carefully.
- How does an advertising agency make responsible use of its consumer insights?
Working regionally and locally, in any given market, we know the consumer. Our planners and creative people build on these insights by [developing] a meaningful proposition that touches people’s hearts. Once we have done that, we can engage with people with a lot more impact and in a more entertaining way. It is [about] finding the right time and right state of mind, finding the connections.
- Do you think that subliminal messages work?
It is a big question mark. If it is too subliminal you cannot even assess its impact. We don’t believe in a hard sell but we believe in transparency. Whatever we are trying to communicate is there, to the point that the consumer would want to reach out to the message but it is not embedded, it is not hidden.
- But people are afraid of being manipulated through advertising and through subliminal messages…
It depends what you define as subliminal. We make people feel things as opposed to telling them things but [the message] is right there, it is not subliminal. It is presented in a way that you give them an experience, a feeling.
David Ogilvy, one of the 20th century’s big advertising men, is credited with having said one should not write an advertisement that one wouldn’t want one’s own family to read, suggesting perhaps not to advertise any product that you wouldn’t want your family to consume? This is why I speak of transparency and responsibility. We have big responsibilities. We have a responsibility toward the community that we are part of to be transparent, to be ethical. There is a lot of ethics that is needed. You cannot have a blog written by a company, pretending that it is being written by a consumer. We would not do things like this.
- You also carry responsibility toward your shareholders. Given the competition that you face, how do you amalgamate the mandate to your shareholders with your creative commitments?
In a simple way, if the work is good, if you put the right emphasis and focus on getting the work great everything else takes care of itself. We are a public company; just like we have a responsibility to our clients’ business and to grow their business, we have a responsibility to our business. The way we do that is by having very fair, profitable relationships with our clients where we become indispensable in adding value to their business, so when we ask them to remunerate us in a fair manner which will add value to our business, they happily do it.
