Creative Disruption

A Visual Résumé
 Introduction
Disruption is a peculiar word. Some perceive it as rather
negative in the traditional dictionary definition of ‘throwing
into confusion or disorder’, in marketing reality it’s often
confused with plain ‘interruption’, Silicon Valley labels almost
every innovation as ‘disruptive’, and futurists proclaim a
whole new ‘age of disruption’ for us to come.

The following presentation highlights a few interesting aspects and is rather

meant to be a ‘tango with the terminology’ than a complete discourse on the
topic. As a former copywriter, creative director and entrepreneur in Germany,
Austria and in South Africa, I want to kick off a conversation with you around
creative disruption, change, giants, misfits, implications for advertising, and how I
fit into the big picture to serve and benefit your business. Enjoy the ride!
 iv ew
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 Creative Disruption

1. Definition & Evolution

2. Implications for Advertising

3. Disruptions in my professional life

4. What I bring to the table

 Definition
Creative Disruption is a phrase that has been used in the marketing world for more
than a decade to describe the desired break in existing patterns of behavior of the
target audience in response to a highly creative product and/or message.
 Evolution
Today we are facing a massive increase in disruptive brands, products and services -
turning frequent patterns of behavior into new habits and lifestyles.

Constantly challenging and changing established industries and markets.

 Permanent Beta

First there were millions, thousands, hundreds of years for adaption to change.

Today we are talking about months, weeks, days.

 Evolution 2.0
Disruptive innovations are accelerating at the fastest pace in history.
 Implications for
Advertising
“So do you feel that the speed at which
our modern digital age operates is beneficial
to the people in the David position?”

“I do. If you think about the original story of David and

Goliath, David has audacity, speed, the element of surprise,
expertise, and an unusual weapon. All of those are—in an
economy that moves virtually—huge advantages, much
bigger than they would have been otherwise. So I do think
maybe we are entering a sort of golden age of the David.” *

* Malcom Gladwell in an interview on his book “David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants”
In other words:
Wait a minute...

Does that mean we have to rethink EVERYTHING?

Few mega-trends show a larger gap between consumer
desire and business reality: Despite clear and consistent
evidence that consumers crave HUMAN BRANDS (by
lavishing love and attention on brands that ‘get it’), in
2014 too many brands will continue to fail to be on the
right side of the epic shift towards a more open,
authentic, ‘human’ business environment.
When asked about ‘meaningful brands’, most people said
they wouldn’t care if 73% of brands ceased to exist.
(Havas, June 2013)*
* Trend Report 2014, trendwatching.com
25+ Mind Blowing Stats About Business Today - CTRL ALT Delete
So, where are our
new role models?
Leaders? Icons?
Humans trust humans.
Not superhumans.
“All too often, disruption is portrayed as a
mysterious process that requires almost
superhuman abilities. We look to people like
Henry Ford, Steve Jobs and Elon Musk to lead
us or, alternatively, seek out softheaded
theories of influence to explain it.
Make no mistake - it’s not the nodes, but the
network that creates disruption.”*

*forbes.com - How Disruption Happens

The crowd has changed
business forever.
Any ideas on monetization?
businessinsider.com - The Future of Digital
“Man, that’s crazy!
Now even disruptions are being
disrupted by disruptions?”

“Get over it.

It’s just screen fragmentation.”
1. The good news:
There’s one thing that will never
change:

*
* The fine print:
The distinction, the one that people constantly
miss, is that real disruption is almost impossible to
see until it’s too late, because the technology or
business is so different from what already exists.

It's usually not some spectacular new technique.

It's often a small and underpowered alternative.
That's what makes it so dangerous and fascinating.
 So how do we disrupt
the ad industry?
“Blow up your creative department.
Literally. Tear walls down, orient
your space around collaboration,
and introduce new thinkers. Build a
culture of creative misfits.

The definition of the word “creative”

in advertising is way too narrow for
the times. Technologists or internet
creatives are creatives.

Make room for idea people of all

types, even if they don’t write copy
or art direct.”

Winston Binch, Partner/Chief Digital Officer

at Deutsch LA - www.deutschinc.com
is already #incubating...
“Wieden+Kennedy aspires to be more than
just an ad agency. As proof, several distinctly
different experiments created by W+K allow
us to build new relationships with the
communities we reside in as well as help
transform our ever-evolving industry.

Our incubators create environments for

entrepreneurial partnership and mentorship
that drive culture and innovation. There is no
blueprint for building a W+K incubator; each
has evolved out of a need to adapt in a
dynamic world and to engage with people at
the forefront of technology, arts and
commerce.”

www.wk.com/incubator
Early digital marketing evangelist, Joseph Jaffe, has
built a whole new agency model around this:
www.startupsforbrands.com
 Growth Hacking?
Growth Hackers are a hybrid of marketer and coder.
They have a mindset of data, creativity, and curiosity.
Growth hackers build the
product's potential growth,
including user acquisition,
on-boarding, monetization,
retention, and virality, into
the product itself.
 “Are the foundations of
the ad industry being dis-
rupted the same way that
the start-up world was?
I think the answer is
clearly “yes.”

Let’s face it.

They will beat us.
So it’s time to join ‘em.”
Ryan Holiday, former director of marketing at
American Apparel (at the age of 25), today a best-
selling author and adviser to many brands focusing
on the untraditional tactics behind a new class of
thinkers who disrupted the marketing industry.
So
Where are you in this game?

Where
is your
team?

And what can I do to contribute to your success?

 Disruptions in my
professional life
[ You can’t preach Disruption unless you’re willing to live by it. - Lee Clow, TBWA ]
Disruption #1: Instead of going to university after school
I moved from Hamburg to the city that should become
the world capital of urban chill sounds in the 90s.*
*Image: Kruder & Dorfmeister World Domination

Trained as an advertising merchant during the recession,

I worked 4 years as a copywriter at Saatchi & Saatchi in
the industry’s heydays towards the end of the decade.

Sounds pretty linear? Well, ...

Memories of a time when mobile
phones and the internet were just
starting to become our new darlings.

Until then, we had insane

love affairs with cars...

This print ad twisted a quote by

Confucius, which is best translated
into “The way is the goal”. By leaving
out the article, the message turns into
“Away is the goal”, implying that you
forget about your destination while
you’re in the TT driving experience.
By the end of the 90s the internet had significantly disrupted our
economy, so I decided to move from traditional advertising to
Germany’s most renowned digital media agency at that time...
 I started in 2000 as e7’s youngest creative
director with my first six figure salary - yay!

Greenpeace: The ABC of Resistance. Deutsche Post: Love letter buildings.

A new navigation concept to help activists and One in Berlin, one in New York. A massive online
users dive deeper into the Greenpeace world. staging around two buildings covered with love.
 After the internet bubble burst in 2001,
I had the honor of working on a number
of projects with Germany’s copywriting
legend, Gerald Heinemann, in Hamburg.

Heinemann
Episode with Gerald
Flagship Store Opening

Besides a lot of intensive work on new business and pitches,

we created a very successful grand opening of René Lezard’s
new flagship store at Hamburg’s prestigious Jungfernstieg.
Probably the most striking disruption wave in my life.
Starting out as an experiment at the end of 2002,
South Africa turned into a rich source of experience
over the course of a decade.
Freelancer
In the first 2 years, I have worked as a freelancer for ad agencies in Europe, developing
various ideas, concepts and copy for brands such as Saturn, Mercedes-Benz, Escada
Sport, Hugo Boss, Lufthansa, Davidoff, Philips, Thomas Cook, and Procter & Gamble.
 Firestarter

In 2005, my business partner and I had a disruptive moment of enlightenment: There were
no advertising matches in the country yet! So we founded our first South African start-up
and provided the hospitality industry with branded matchboxes and bookmatches...
After 3 years of igniting restaurants, bars and
hotels one by one, we had a decent list of some
of the most renowned clients in SA to show off.

Despite new smoking regulations, tobacco

advertising bans, and tough import restrictions
for dangerous goods, Smatch Media became soon
SA’s most creative supplier for branded matches.

In winter 2008, we launched an online campaign

based on a massive energy crisis in South Africa...
Animated banners and online PR on South Africa’s leading digital platform for the marketing industry
encouraged brands to support people who were suffering from power outages in their cold and dark
homes. A great opportunity to rekindle the passion for brands with a warm message at the right time.
Another 3 years into the financial
crisis, we’ve lost our major clients
and the business was simply not
viable anymore. We signed off.
“In today’s economy, you will not only have
different jobs, but different careers.”
Mitch Joel, Twist Image
Standing On The Shoulders Of Giants

After I’d digested the meltdown of our business, I chose to go

back to school. The idea was to learn from “the earth’s most
customer-centric company” in becoming. So I started working
for Amazon, Cape Town, in 2011, specialising in customer
service for Kindle and Digital Contents. A versatile experience.
 Standing On The Shoulders Of Giants

In 2012, the squiggly road towards valuable insights from

giants led me to a Google Certified Partner in Hamburg.
As a “Google Marketing Evangelist”, my mission was to
convince lawyers all over Germany of their benefits from
using Google marketing tools to generate more business.
Disruption Management

Next
 Adapt or die.

The following images are from Jimmy Nelson’s photographic journey on endangered tribes: “Before they pass away” - www.beforetheypass.com
It’s not just a threat!
Take the opportunity to invent the unexpected.
Refine your competitive
Constantly challenge your status quo and create a

edge.
captivating narrative for your tribe.
 No gurus required.
A disruptive mindset needs to be internalized by all members of
your business ecosystem, not only by a Chief Disruption Officer.
So what do you expect
of your creatives today?
 Big ideas, engaging
crossmedia orchestration,
relevant content, successful
conversion strategies,
and the like?
 Expect more.
We need a broader understanding of creativity in today’s economy.

Creative Entrepreneurial
Expertise Spirit

Disruptive
Mindset
 And keep in mind:

“We are still very much in the ideas business. Despite how much
more sophisticated the algorithms get at search, contextual and
behavioral ad serving, advertising still has to move you.”
Alan Schulman,Vice President and CCO of North America’s largest digital agency,
SapientNitro, NY. Harvard Business Review Insight Center: “The Future of Advertising”
 Thank you.
Find me on:

Xing, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Google+

Or contact me directly via email or phone:

fiehn.thomas@gmail.com

+49 (0) 157 - 804 91 233