#tenthwave

What will change: Content will become essential to win the hearts and minds of consumers as they will become more conscious of public health issues and more informed as to their options. This will make it essential for food brands to have a social “point a view and personality” that people want to be a part of. In some cases, this will translate into a true commitment to Social Corporate Responsibility issues important to their consumers (Chipotle), while for others it will simply be through defining themselves into a lifestyle consumers wear as a badge (Kashi). Regardless of approach or levers, the natural and organic social communication of these brand beliefs will become an increasingly important consideration for brands. What won’t change: tech will still fuel the evolution of Social CRM becoming a mainstream discipline for Food Brands, driven by evolution of data analytics tools that continue to close the loop from profile to purchase. This provides a host of new opportunities for savvy AdTech marketers who get how social content, mobile enablement, contextual advertising and shopper data work together.

Strategy is a creative product, and our job as strategists is to create new worlds. How that comes to life is really a creative expression of the strategic platform. The two are interdependent — cannot really live without each other. Or if they do, the campaign usually fails to drive a movement, which is really what we are trying to do here in this world, move people. For all intents and purposes, strategy is a fairly new thing. And often it's not well defined, as far as its role in the creative process. The best campaigns come from deep strategy-creative partnerships. It's my belief lead strategists and ECDs should sit together, not apart (but I know that's not a shared vision always).

Best of Branded Content Marketing: 10th Anniversary Edition Special Preview: Case Studies Part Two

Brands need to create content that’s shareworthy, that resonates – it’s a human behaviour thing. People don’t feel, act, share unless you touch their emotions somehow. If you don’t then your marketing dollar is wasted. If it’s cultural and we can find an audience for it then we want to be part of it. I think opportunities to marry lifestyle activities, events and their participants with branded content will pop up everywhere.” Whatever it is that’s culturally relevant, that’s a touchpoint for the people involved, that’s what we want to attack as marketers, we want to bring that authenticity and relevance to all the brands we work with.