- Speaker #0
This is Ad Infinitum. Ad Infinitum is the award-winning podcast solely focused on audio ads, the creatives who make them, and or the latest thinking that informs them, how the space is evolving, and, my favorite part, a roundup of recent audio ads with analysis by yours truly, Stu Redwine, and each episode's guest. This is season three, episode nine of Ad Infinitum, titled, Put a Little English on It. There's this idea I've been chewing on lately that strategy in advertising is the UK's greatest export. And when you dig into the roots, it tracks because strategy didn't start in a boardroom. And I mean that in the sense of strategy as an aspect of advertising. It started on the battlefield. The British military, especially during the World Wars, had this obsession with designing the right strategy before engaging. Many times when the World Wars are reflected upon, when the Americans joined, it's ready, fire, then aim. It's the British who fought long and hard and took a very planful approach. In fact, there's a famous part of their martial history known as redundancy and that they would plan to make sure they had two of everything that they needed. So very planful approach. And I've come to really respect and understand with people like Stephen King and Stanley Pollitt that what we know of as planning, and we'll get into this planning and strategy and what the difference is, came out of the UK and has a massive impact on your advertising if you choose to apply it. So today, with two of the sharpest minds I know... Stephen Abraham and Giles Martin, we're going to talk about what that legacy means for audio advertising, how the best audio ads and the best ads start with a plan, believe it or not, and why if you want to win with your ads, you better think like a strategist. So to you strategists and thinkers behind the ads out there, the people who ask, what are we trying to do here? This episode is for you. And who better to talk planning or strategy? We'll get into that with Stephen. Then to UK. natives, Oxford Roads-owned Stephen Abraham, president of International, and Giles Martin, EVP strategy. Together, we're diving into British planning culture, Unilever's podcast ad spend, and what separates a decent brief from a proper battle plan. You look at American ad history, it's showmanship, it's PT Barnum, it's jingles and jello and razzle-dazzle. But in the UK, it's cerebral. Planning wasn't about the pitch, it was about the purpose. Stephen King described to count planning as the... a conscience of the agency that's very British, deeply principled, quietly fierce, always armed with a laminated chart. And today we need more of that, fewer slogans, more clarity of aim, and really, especially with AI, just supercharging what humans have already achieved, making only 16% of advertising memorable and able to be attributed to the brand. Now you've supercharged that with AI and activate human laziness. It's only going to get worse. So Steve and Giles, where did... planning or strategy really begin for you guys?
- Speaker #1
Firstly, thanks for having us. Thanks for having us,
- Speaker #2
Governor.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Thanks for coming on. This is fun.
- Speaker #2
Thanks for using the word proper. Is that a British word? Do Americans use the word proper?
- Speaker #0
I've learned to. That one, cheers. Cheers is another British word.
- Speaker #1
Did anyone put the kettle on you?
- Speaker #2
Weak to bring us here and not offer us a cup of tea. I mean, I'm not coming back.
- Speaker #0
What do you think of all this, though? Were you so steeped in it when you came up in advertising in the UK that you did? Did you even appreciate that like thinking strategically is different and then like your exposure to the United States? Like, do you see that dichotomy, what I'm setting up here?
- Speaker #1
To a degree. Firstly, I don't want to get pulled into any conversation about saying the UK is better or worse than the US. I think that would be irresponsible and not true. But what I would sort of say is I think there's a difference in the UK. market whereby we discern very clearly between what the role of strategy is versus planning. And I think sometimes it can get perhaps a little bit mixed up here. And for me, if I can, you know, obviously I've been on chat GPT all morning trying to make sure I get the answers right.
- Speaker #0
Okay, good. That makes my point.
- Speaker #1
No, but joking apart, you know, I mean, strategy is about really determining what you're going to go and do and why you're doing it. Okay. And to put that into perspective, it's about, you know, direction and purpose. the choices that are going to be made and those priorities in a campaign, whereas planning is about, I think, how you execute on that strategy and the detail. So to summarise it, it's, you know, strategy is kind of like a sort of advertising compass and the planning piece is the map that gets you there. So that's sort of where I think we have a very clear distinction. And I think the best plans fall out of a lot of thoughtful time spent on decoding a client's brief to get the strategy right. And then when you deliver on it, the execution falls out.
- Speaker #0
I think that's right. I mean, that's what I've seen you apply since you joined because
- Speaker #1
You joined Oxford Road in November 2020.
- Speaker #0
And Giles, you joined
- Speaker #2
May 2018.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. And you've seen me grow in my appreciation of this, haven't you, Giles?
- Speaker #2
For sure.
- Speaker #0
I know you both have. Because I've been full speed ahead. So I do have a plan. Plan of attack.
- Speaker #2
The American plan.
- Speaker #0
Right. So what are you coming up in it? Or did you even come up in advertising in the UK? I guess I don't know.
- Speaker #1
I did too.
- Speaker #2
I just wanted to say something about the difference in advertising culture between the UK and the US. Yes,
- Speaker #0
that's what I'm after. Because that's what you were talking about. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah.
- Speaker #2
But this is not so much from an internal agency like planning perspective. And I did not really grow up in planning. And, you know, Stephen, I think it's probably a better place to speak to some of this stuff. But this has come up for me in the context of attribution recently, because I work a lot with attribution and we're doing a lot of expansion into international markets. And so I'm starting to have conversations with brands about the... differences in people's expectations for advertising in different cultures. Will people use a vanity URL in Germany? Will people use a promo code in Spain? And when I first came to the US, and I'd be really interested to hear what your experience was, but the river of advertising is kind of overwhelming. It's a deluge. Just the amount of billboards and the amount of TV commercials, the amount of radio commercials, it feels like it's sort of 15, 20 minutes an hour. And then the amount of 800. numbers and sort of direct response commercials. I've sort of forgotten all that now, but it's only recently as I was having these conversations with clients looking at other countries, I was starting to think back to, what is the US like and how is it different? And that culture of oh, 800 numbers and next 20 callers get a free set of Marvin Gaye CDs. That's all very, very different. And I think it does support your sort of general notion that the US is more sort of Yell and Sell. and sort of push it out there and sort of attack the market and like can we get a response here whereas the uk as steve is saying it's like got these nuanced distinctions between you know let's really put a strategy together and let's have a supporting plan that really allows us to pay off and i definitely think that there's something meaningful to the distinction well i think i wouldn't have even wanted to do this episode four years ago i
- Speaker #0
thought the plan of attack his attack was a superior plan and so what i'm trying to do with this episode is give to other people how my eyes have been opened and I really have seen it through you guys and what I do see is a UK approach because I read up a little bit I'm a fan of advertising history I'm not an advertising historian of like taking that thoughtful approach because it's the big gaps I see in the work not going to mention specific clients but like from both of you but particularly you Steve and like talking about the comm system and seeing like how do we go up to make sure we're taking a strategic approach to this.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. And I think what we tend to spend a lot of time doing in the UK as well is, we're talking about audio planning, right?
- Speaker #0
Sure. We can keep that audio planning. Yeah.
- Speaker #1
Well, what I'm saying is we're all audio. Yeah. But in the world of audio.
- Speaker #0
Completely.
- Speaker #1
But if we take a step back and we sort of say, well, audio is essentially one single platform.
- Speaker #2
So you could argue is a tactic that falls out of a strategy,
- Speaker #1
right? So if a client comes to us and says, I want Oxford Road to put together an informed and thoughtful audio plan. for me. They've essentially done a strategy before because audio is coming out of that strategy as a tactic, as a platform to use. And what I think we've managed to do successfully at Oxford is take a step back and say, look, okay, we know we're one component part of a communication system. Let's think about what this brand is also doing elsewhere so that when we then apply our logic and thinking on what's happening in audio, it's going to be augmenting that and additive to an overarching, for want of a better term, and I hate using industry jargon, communication ecosystem, Right. So therefore, we add audio to it. We make sure it's complementing what they're doing in other media. So the whole becomes greater than the sum of the parts. Rather than just thinking about audio as a silo. And what I think that's managed to allow us to do, or certainly with a lot of our clients, is get further up that totem pole of the strategy. Because we can now also comment on what they're doing in other ways and talk about whether it's the right amount of money to be spending if it's going to complement those other media. So it's understanding media as a system, even if we're only really focused on one aspect of it. Does that make sense?
- Speaker #0
It does make sense. And I want to ask you guys, because I've watched this happen. How do you guys help? You both helped me bridge the gap going from tactics to strategy. But, you know, this is for chief audio officers. So there's these calls where, you know, we know the chief audio officers listening are dealing with their teams as well. where you're dealing with an individual that even when you're saying like, well, we need to talk about the strategy. We need to talk about the plan. We need to take a step. Can you give me some strategic ideas? They give all tactical ideas. How do you get a mind to begin to understand? difference between the two.
- Speaker #1
Understanding the fundamental goal of the brief, right? Before you start falling into, we should be buying this show, we should be buying that. Really, truly understand the audience better than... target better than the client themselves. Understand that audience intimately before deciding on which tactic you're going to apply. Because if you don't really know the audience brilliantly, then everything else is just guesswork.
- Speaker #2
That's good advice. I think also, like so much of it starts at the brand level. And, you know, if we think about our earlier careers working probably, you know, in UK agencies or big agencies, you know, working on bigger brands, there may have been a lot of strategic thought put into how the brand is positioned you know at a very high level maybe that's you know could even work across international markets for example and if that strategy is clearly in place and there are sort of individual communication requirements you know at a given specific time or any given specific channel you can make you know those executions and tactical ideas you know they flow out of that bigger picture framework that sort of sets guidelines for guard rails for like what the brand and the company wants to communicate and the tone it wants to set. And I think, you know, some of the brands we work with are more, they're younger in their life cycle. And so that type of sort of, you know, I don't want to say some term like brand architecture, but like there's some legitimacy to some of that sort of big picture brand thinking where you really are trying to steer in a certain direction and there's a real strategy set. And then there's also quite a lot of BS, if I can use that, where.
- Speaker #0
Okay. But that's where I've seen my initial, I'm like, this is the tale of two stews. Like I'm seeing my initial resistance to it, but it's kind of, I also think that's kind of a, not a real argument because the truth is if you can align on a vision, if you can align on a goal, like that's how you motivate people. That's how you run a company. Like without a vision, the people perish. That stuff is actually, it's weird. It's like, it can sound disingenuous or eye rolly. And I suppose it is if it's not thoughtful, but it actually is like, you have to have the highest and best aim. You have to have clarity on the highest and best aim. And for me, at least, it's like we're in tactics land, we're in audio and we're talking about how to do that. And you start to interrogate it back up the chain and there isn't a highest investing.
- Speaker #2
Yeah, that's often the case.
- Speaker #1
That's often when ads begin to meander as well, right?
- Speaker #0
Yeah.
- Speaker #1
You know, truly strategic audio begins long before the mic goes live.
- Speaker #0
And what do you guys think about something else I think about a lot is the difference in audio between the UK and the United States. A decision point was made in the two countries in the early days where... American radio became commercialized and radio in the United Kingdom did not.
- Speaker #1
Well, because before it was the British Broadcasting Corporation who basically had all of the licenses for the airwave.
- Speaker #2
It was that movie. It was a working title movie.
- Speaker #1
I think it was called based on the story of Radio Caroline, which was the start of commercial radio, where they would go out into the waters of the British Channel and be just outside the airwave zones and could actually play that terrible rock and roll music that nobody wanted to listen to, you know. and it was all pomp and ceremony on the BBC and it was all sort of core blimey and as your father on Radio Caroline, which is fantastic.
- Speaker #2
I'm not sure that answers your question.
- Speaker #0
No, it does a little. I mean, I just think, you know, two countries separated by common language that we can draw conclusions between advertising in the United States.
- Speaker #1
and the united kingdom but they're also different like the experience of radio is different and podcasts let's just make it audio the experience of audio is different in the two countries yeah but i think that i don't want to get drawn into a history lesson because i do no this is the show to get into it mine will be vaguely winston churchill-esque in his perception of history versus the true perception of history no history of the english-speaking peoples but you know after the war. After the war? It was...
- Speaker #2
Sounds like I've read that, actually.
- Speaker #1
I mean, the two countries were in very different positions, right? Yes. It was incredibly wealthy, and there was a huge amount of sort of commercial activity.
- Speaker #0
Unbelievable.
- Speaker #1
The UK was on its knees post the war, and so everything was run through the state, and the BBC would have control over the media and all that kind of stuff, and commercial radio was just not necessarily... People didn't have the money to actually get the equipment to actually do it.
- Speaker #2
Or to buy the stuff they wanted to sell.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, so we were rebuilding a country, or London, whatever, you know, southeast of England that had been bombed to shit. I mean, this is an important aspect. In the 80s, the Conservatives came to power in England, and I was always a staunch sort of red wedge sort of person on the left wing. But, you know, Thatcher's Britain really, really changed. She privatised British gas, British nuclear fuels, everything became privatised and floated, which caused a huge economic uptick in the country. And it was 80s yuppies, it was mobile phones and all that kind of stuff. And that had a massive impact, primarily driven by Reagan's America, obviously, but it's interesting. But the Central Office of Information, which was essentially the communications arm of the British government, started to float all of the public institutions in England completely. And that had just such a massive economic injection into commerce and advertising as a consequence. I mean, I remember working on British gas flotation, hundreds and hundreds of millions in the UK.
- Speaker #2
It ties into it, for sure.
- Speaker #0
So we may be discovering something, because in the land of plenty... I haven't ever really said this, but sometimes I think like with the Mad Men era, anybody on Madison Avenue that was decently talented and intelligent would have had a hard time screwing that up. Because from 1945 to the 80s, you're riding a rocket ship that the entire world is on its knees.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
You've nuked them into submission. You're the only one still standing. So you advertise all your stuff and you make big ideas about how great it is. And it's going to make everybody happy because they did this thing on Jack Welch. You know, Jack Welch was from the gut. When you actually analyze his company's performance against the S&P 500 when he was in charge of it.
- Speaker #2
Right on par.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. So that's actually my... private theory i've yet to say on the record is that the americans with all of the ideas and stuff and like the hierarchy of effects of this idea you know a hundred years ago is we're going to get people to think a certain way so that they feel a certain way and then they do what we want them to do that then inverted in the 60s we're going to get them to feel a certain way so they think a certain way so then they do what we want them to do i personally think it's if you can get people to do something you can get them to feel good and then you can get them to think whatever Yeah. Anyway, my point is this. They couldn't have screwed it up, but I've never quite thought about the UK being on its knees. Advertising isn't super charged on Coke and cash. So you actually have to be more intentional with your ads.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, I think that's fair. I mean, if you just look at that gap from sort of 1945, 46, when did we start talking about swinging? London was in the 60s. So you had a good 16 or 17 years of rebuild. Yeah. And we were still on, you know, luncheon vouchers and stamps, rationing stamps all the way through that period. and so it wasn't until there was, you know, the baby boom in the 60s where there became more wealth and people became more affluent and could begin to suddenly start letting their hair down, literally.
- Speaker #0
I've never quite thought of that before, that it's like you've got less inventory and less people that are just throwing money around. So you better be really smart about the sales message you're putting out there.
- Speaker #2
Less advertising opportunities as well, right? Less inventory, the BBC so like there's scarcity all round And so that scarcity is maybe a forcing function of this. Both the planning that you're talking about, I mean, when it really kicked off, what, 60s, mid-60s?
- Speaker #1
The early 70s.
- Speaker #2
Just as the industry's starting to sort of gain momentum, then somebody comes in and goes, yeah, we need to apply some more brainpower.
- Speaker #1
David Ogilvie, John Hagerty, those kind of guys who started in O&M.
- Speaker #0
We're rewriting advertising history.
- Speaker #1
on this podcast i mean i think the early days of sarchies and charlotte street in the uk which was the real sort of explosion for us the equivalent of madison avenue i think those kind of guys really set in place some sort of benchmarks and barometers of what great advertising is going to be and giles and i were kind of talking about it before you know we were still in well he's in short trousers now but we're in short trousers when we were you know in those sort of days and talking about the playground banter when a new tv ad we have because you have to understand in television terms i know we're shifting from audio to television. one commercial TV station, one independent television network, right? That was it. So the ads that appeared on there were reaching massive audiences because it was the only commercial TV station. And they were, I'm just going to be very blasé and stoic about this. Fuck, brilliant.
- Speaker #2
And so the point is, like, it's a conversation in the playground because everyone's seen them because the reach is so massive and there's only one station. Shit. You go to school the next day. And you're talking about, like, did you see that new Carling Black Label commercial? It was. And there were some brilliant ones. Yeah. And, you know, the creativity is genuinely there. And, you know, I think one of the great, amazing realisations that the planning community has had over the years is that if you haven't got a great idea or a great strategy, you can at least just be entertaining. Oh. You know, you've done nine tenths of the work. Like, that's enough for people.
- Speaker #1
A gentleman who just rang me while I was on this, Neil Lucey, our esteemed colleague, I want to quote him. He often says, you know, you can have the best media plan in the world. but if the creative shit doesn't matter yeah you can have a very mediocre media plan but if you're creative nails it people are gonna remember it so bringing it back to what i think the fundamentals are at the end of the day it's in in your experience and it's making that creative brilliant but you know i remember tv commercials when i was younger and you know pg tips and all that kind of stuff you got some jingles well we were talking a little bit about that beforehand there's for mash get smash all white cinnamon is
- Speaker #2
pharmacy So that's what I would do. I still remember that because he started singing it when I was maybe last in the country. And I just joined in right there. And I've not thought of that for probably 40 years. And it just came right back.
- Speaker #0
What's the brand?
- Speaker #2
R. White's Lemonade. I don't know if they still exist.
- Speaker #1
And he wakes up in the middle of the night and he's grooving and he comes down the stairs and he opens up his fridge. Yeah, middle of the night. And he's a secret lemonade drinker. And he drinks this bottle of pop or whatever it is.
- Speaker #2
The other thing about the Smash audio logo, I just think it's maybe worth a mention. because I remember hearing maybe the creative director or somebody like going to a studio or to a musician's house and saying, I need this logo, you know, the idea is for MASH to get smashed, something like that. And so the guy sort of was, I think, thinking I'll go play him some chords or play him what this song might look like. And he was like, well, you know, I just need four words, you know, like on the piano with one finger, he just went like that. He was like, yeah. and then he started going on he's like stop right there that's all i need like do not overcopy traceless i do not like i don't need a whole bunch of you know different versions or sounds like he took those four notes like the simplest possible thing this musician guy could think of and that became the audio logo and again it sticks in the mind 40 years later how's it going again guys can you sing it again for me for mush get smash you know it right oh yeah i'm just not gonna he's not not going to sing it because he's got more dignity than that.
- Speaker #3
things in this country quietly with dignity.
- Speaker #1
Well, the one that always sticks out to me, you couldn't get away with the commercials that they used to do in the 70s in England. Now you'd be put in jail. I mean, you know, animal cruelty and stuff like that.
- Speaker #0
Oh, I'm sure.
- Speaker #1
The PG Tips was a tea that Charles and I drink. You know, they would dress up chimpanzees and have them do sort of human type stuff. Yeah,
- Speaker #0
sure.
- Speaker #1
And it was always, you know, very, very comedic. Yeah, these are very, very memorable commercials. And the thing is, there was such limited inventory on television and radio. We could only have seven minutes of advertising an hour.
- Speaker #0
So that's what I've never connected before to this idea of strategy, is that that forces you to think. It just is like a market force where you go into an environment where everything is growing like this for 30 years.
- Speaker #2
And there's as much advertising space as you want.
- Speaker #0
You can just blast. Like, yeah. Yeah.
- Speaker #1
And also the audio. the radio and television structure in the UK was regionalized. So from a commercial perspective, if you wanted to get national reach, you literally had to buy networks together.
- Speaker #0
You couldn't get, there wasn't a national.
- Speaker #1
No, London was actually split into two networks and that sounds weird, but it was split into two networks across the week. So you would have on television from, and this was also for radio as well, it was from Monday to Friday, Thames television. And then the weekend was called London Weekend Television. And on Friday night at 5.30, you'd literally say,
- Speaker #4
and that would be past. It's in the colleagues, it's in London, LWT,
- Speaker #0
right?
- Speaker #1
And they'll change. It was peculiar and it was very strange. So to build national reach, both from an audio perspective and a TV perspective, you had to know the individual component parts of the country.
- Speaker #0
This is amazing. I didn't know we'd go on such a journey. Okay, so theorem practicum. So let's bring this into the real world. According to Magellan.ai, Unilever was one of the top podcast ad spenders in May 2025. Legacy, CPG brand, tons of sub-brands, serious spend. But did it work? Did they think before they bought? We're going to review four of their recent podcast ads, and we're going to run them through the audio lytics lens and hear what Stephen and Giles have to say. as well. Before we move on, let's zoom out for a second because Unilever isn't just another advertiser. They're a global giant market cap over 120 billion billion portfolio, 400 plus brands in 190 countries. And here's the kicker. Unlike many U.S. conglomerates, Unilever does most of its advertising in-house. They're what's called a holding company that holds the work. That means they own the brands and manage much of the strategy and creative internally or through bespoke agency relationships. Why does that matter? Because it means the same people who fund the media are often the ones driving the brief. And when it's done right, that can create real cohesion between spin and strategy. But when it's not, it's just money in, noise out. So as we grade these ads today, we're not just critiquing individual executions. We're looking at what happens when one of the biggest advertisers in the world tries to make audio work. Stephen, Giles, how rare is it to see a company of this size actually think through their podcast creative?
- Speaker #1
I think it's pretty rare, to be honest.
- Speaker #0
What makes it rare?
- Speaker #1
Well, I mean, when you're Unilever sized, the temptation is just to spend your way to relevance, right? Because that's just how they're going to operate as a business. But they seem to genuinely care about keeping strategy connected to execution. So I think it's quite rare. A lot of companies don't necessarily do that. They just throw money at it because they've got a lot. I think you can see it when a brief... you know, really does sort of shine through and actually survives the process without being diluted to a big bowl of generic sort of brand soup. And I think Unilever has managed to do that with some of these distinct brands, especially Dove. So I think they're a rare beast. I mean, you can see I'm genuinely still trying to steer their business away from them using it in the holding company and come to us. But no, I think they've actually nailed it. My wife used to work on Unilever business. So maybe that's the reason.
- Speaker #0
You know, that comes with some weight. That audiolytic subcomponent has quite a bit of weight to it which one uh spouse
- Speaker #1
Yeah, I mean, the stakes are high, right? Because at that scale, any sloppy thinking is going to get broadcast to millions because they're just known by millions. So they've got to get it right. And you can't polish an idea free to us. It's got to be good, you know, no matter how big your budget. If you haven't got that creative nugget then. And they've had the collective wisdom over many, many years of working with lots of agencies. And they've mined that and brought it in-house. and now hopefully connected the dots. I mean, I'm doing a great job of taking away work for agencies, but it's actually true in the instance of Unilever. I think they're a rare beast that does it well.
- Speaker #2
Well, I'm keen to hear their ads now.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, let's take a listen. This is from Magellan's top spenders for May 2025. You can get a free demo of Magellan at magellan.ai slash ad infinitum. But here we go. We're jumping right in. This first one is for Degree on Club Che Che.
- Speaker #5
So we all made mistakes, right? But on and up to them, it's the right thing to do. But we all know Degree Cool Rush deodorant. Well, last year, they changed the formula, and it did not go over well with the fans. Degree's whole thing, it turns up sweat and odor protection when you turn up the effort. And good thing it does, because Cool Rush fans really turned up the effort to bring back the OG formula. One guy even started an online petition. And Degree listened. They admitted, they effed up. And they're bringing back the OG Cool Rush scent back. And it's exactly how you remember it. Cool, crisp, and fresh. It's back at Walmart. Target and other stores for under four dollars there's a reason why it's been the number one men's antiperspirant for the last decade it's the same reason why people are not happy when the recipe was changed so listen if you've never tried it might be a good time to try see what the fuss is about head to your local Walmart or Target and try the OG degree cool rush for yourself the
- Speaker #1
game is afoot I like the lo-fi aspect of it actually okay it's lo-fi yeah I think The insight there is being recorded and structured based on the guy's voice. He's talking to a very specific audience. It's a relatively low cost purchase product.
- Speaker #0
Yeah.
- Speaker #1
And he's using vernacular that's very in tune with the audience that he's talking to. So I think they've taken a really interesting insight there and applied it into audio advertising, which is not always easy to do.
- Speaker #2
What about the sort of cutaway at the end to the CTA? Because that's maybe the most lo-fi part of the whole thing.
- Speaker #0
Head to your local Walmart or Target and try the OG degree.
- Speaker #2
You like that too?
- Speaker #1
I did,
- Speaker #2
actually, because it was the juxtaposition of something that's usually really slick. Actually, it was very lo-fi, which kind of resonated.
- Speaker #0
You ready to give it a score on a scale of one to ten? Ten being the most persuasive?
- Speaker #2
I'm a hard scorer on this kind of stuff, but I'd say it's probably a good seven and a half.
- Speaker #0
Half points. We're doing half points today, guys. Okay, that's okay. Seven and a half for Steve.
- Speaker #2
I was just going to say, you know, that obviously, like that. part at the end like the cda cutaway is quite noticeable i mean it may be less noticeable for your average listener possibly so like take this with a pinch of salt but like my first reaction is you know it's unprofessional and it's not smooth and you know for a brand this big like you would not have that expectation but you know part of i think what you know all the clever strategists have learned over the years is you know the value of distinctiveness and like having some type of cut through and delight and surprise. Yeah, I mean, this doesn't delight so much, but it does surprise. And, you know, there's some, you maybe get some cut through from some unusual sort of ending like that, that could add some value to the ad. Maybe somewhat ironically, but.
- Speaker #0
Yeah,
- Speaker #1
it's interesting, isn't it?
- Speaker #0
Let me ask you this. Two questions. Giles.
- Speaker #2
Yes, Stu.
- Speaker #0
What do you give it on a scale of one to ten?
- Speaker #2
Six.
- Speaker #0
Okay.
- Speaker #2
But on what target audience, I don't think.
- Speaker #0
Okay, listen. Neither of you talked about the substance of the message, which I'm curious what you think of that. One, do you remember what he said?
- Speaker #2
The authenticity was very interesting. What did he say? He said, we screwed up.
- Speaker #0
Right.
- Speaker #2
And that's nice to hear. It's refreshing to hear, I think, from any corporation. It resonates, I think, with people, at least it resonates with me.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, I mean, I think he actually said, we effed up. So, you know, I remembered it. So, yeah, I mean, that degree of honesty always cuts through everything.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, that they had their formula and they changed it back. Okay. All right. I just wanted to see if you remember, because sometimes on this show it's... Well,
- Speaker #2
the substance did change, literally.
- Speaker #0
what's crazy is we'll do this and like it'll be about as long as it took both of you to answer and then it's like do you remember what it was about and the people are like uh because a lot of the ads are so but this had a very interesting i think if they hadn't said that it would be forgettable
- Speaker #2
very i think so yeah possibly but they didn't they said it i liked what he said at the end where he's like now could be a good time to try it see what all the fuss is about yeah that felt like quite a natural way to kind of link it in introduce some skills yeah it felt quite natural and like okay there is a bit of fuss and okay maybe all right so we started and just so you know audiolytics came out at a 77 here's
- Speaker #3
the next one liquid iv on growth mindset psychology the growth mindset is sponsored by liquid iv this summer i am planning a two-week bike trip and one thing very worth packing is Liquid IV. Their sugar-free solution delivers smart hydration, ideal for days when you travel or do sports, or if you simply need to concentrate. Because it's more hydrating than water, it's also great for recovery and can keep you hydrated at night without having to drink a ton of water and then get up to pee all night. Which, if you're anything like me, is a plus. They also have lots of fancy flavours, white peach, lemon and lime, arctic raspberry just for summer. And these provide an optimized ratio of electrolytes, essential vitamins, and clinically tested nutrients. All sugar-free with no artificial sweeteners. No GMO. It's vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and soy-free. So, no matter what summer brings, you can tear, pour, and live more. If you go to liquidiv.com, you can get 20% off your first order with code GROWTH at checkout. That's 20% off first order with code GROWTH. growth at liquid IV.
- Speaker #2
Oh, sorry. Let me wake up.
- Speaker #1
I love it when an Australian does an ad.
- Speaker #2
I don't think I could hear anything other than the music. You asked me what the ad was about and I was like, where am I? You were just keyed in on that soundtrack. I guess it's smooth jazz or slow jazz or easy listening. What is it doing here? But maybe it helped to create some cut through. Maybe it helped to create some interest. I don't know. This is still an unusual thing, right?
- Speaker #0
Yes.
- Speaker #1
It felt very meandering to me. It felt that it wasn't, it was a little bit all over the place. I mean, you know, I mean, obviously we picked up straight away the fact that it was a British accent, but it was still not necessarily delivered with the, I don't know.
- Speaker #0
Okay. All right. Hey, what do you give it?
- Speaker #1
Three and a half. Didn't work for me. And I need that product.
- Speaker #2
Yeah, that's even worse. Yeah, that's true. You know, I could use the product, but again, it's like, I felt like I barely...
- Speaker #1
Didn't convince me.
- Speaker #2
I barely could sort of take in the messaging, but I think... Yeah, I was just very distracted by the music. I felt like the call to action was good.
- Speaker #1
The music sort of cut off at the end. It almost like, oh, the tape's running.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. Giles, what did you give it? What was your score?
- Speaker #2
I think another six. Six? Another six?
- Speaker #0
Yeah. Okay. Well, let's just plow ahead here. Let's get the next two done and then we'll have a conversation about Unilever in general. This one's for Ollie on Fox News Sunday.
- Speaker #6
PMS, pregnancy, menopause. Being a woman is a lot. Oli supports you and yours with expert solutions for every age and life stage. They just launched two new products exclusively at Walmart. Period Hero combats blow, mood swings, and more during PMS. And Balance Perimeno to support hormonal balance, mood, and metabolism during perimenopause. Grab yours at oli.com. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
- Speaker #0
Okay. Giles, let's start with you. We've been starting with Steve.
- Speaker #2
Is that Oli? That's an audio logo, is it?
- Speaker #0
Sounds like it is to me. I don't think I've heard it before, but it sounded very much like a group of people, like gang vocals going, aye, like all together.
- Speaker #2
Yeah. I mean, as you know, we're such big advocates of audio logos and I guess that could work. It just felt a bit confusing. Like, is it part of the read? Is it sort of part of the copy? Is it somebody talking? Like, oh no, it's sort of crowd of voices. I don't know, to me, I love the use of an audio logo, but I guess I'm just not familiar with that one, maybe? No,
- Speaker #0
I think you're right. I think you're on the money. What I've come to land on with that is, like, the best ones, Netflix, Intel Inside, which is dated now, NBC, all were very purposely designed. This feels to me like I could probably see the brief behind it. Like, I don't know if you guys have ever heard of the book The Painted Word, but this guy got to this conclusion of, like, pretty soon painters won't even paint. They'll just put their artist statement on the wall. And that's kind of what this feels like to me. Like I bet it's got a brilliant, or maybe not brilliant, but a well-worded document behind why that makes so much sense. But this is one where I think it's a miss, right? It just, it's not landing.
- Speaker #2
Yeah. I mean, I just feel like a Sonic logo like that, it needs to have that crispness, that clarity, like it's supposed to play the audio, you know, equivalent of like that visual stimulus that is so
- Speaker #1
instantly identifiable it's so distinctive like that's the whole point of it and so if it doesn't have that distinctiveness where it just sounds like another voice kind of coming out the background of like a couple of people well and i just thought like ollie like maybe for kids vitamins that's what i'm saying i felt again to use the word juxtaposed what the product was in a way or way but i thought the voice was right and motivating and positive and then suddenly this weird sort maybe it could work better at the very end you know it has a bit of distance from the regular copy but
- Speaker #2
But sort of just inserting it into the flow of the script there felt a bit strange to me.
- Speaker #0
What do you guys score that ad?
- Speaker #2
I mean, it just felt like a very average ad to me, like friendly tone, you know, sort of upbeat. Like, hey, you know, this is a great product, but sort of pretty unremarkable. So maybe a seven.
- Speaker #0
It's higher than the other two.
- Speaker #2
I know it is. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Okay. Steve?
- Speaker #1
Maybe about six, I think.
- Speaker #0
Okay. Audiolytics gives it a 66%. So we're right in there. Now, what's weird is the last one, which you guys gave. With 3.5. Oh,
- Speaker #1
I did.
- Speaker #0
And a six. And a six. Yeah. Audiolux gave that an 84%, guys.
- Speaker #2
Well, look, call to action was good. The offer was good. They repeated the website name again at the very end.
- Speaker #0
It had a lot of information in it.
- Speaker #1
Well, I think Audiolux was just seduced by the British accent.
- Speaker #2
Yeah, it could be. Do you get extra points for British? I think you probably should.
- Speaker #0
I think you do.
- Speaker #1
You see, for us, it's not. The rest is second.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, because you're like, that's my move.
- Speaker #2
That's my move. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
All right, let's go to the next one.
- Speaker #1
Interesting that they measured it that way, yeah.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, well, I think that's...
- Speaker #1
It was long.
- Speaker #0
It was long. And, you know, the more you tell, the more you sell. And I think there's also, there's this, and I've talked about this, there's, you know, making the most planful, creative, inspired work is very rewarding. And it's awesome. also is like being very direct being very clear being information driven works when looking at certain metrics and the one i like to talk about is zip recruiters needle in a haystack which when we did the episode a couple episodes back with wayne brady we had him turn it into a musical number which is great you have a needle in a haste you have a needle in a haystack needle in a haystack so much fun we're not going that's right this ad's been running for a decade zip recruiter's still running it trying to find the right hire is like trying to find a needle in the haystack You know, and you listen to it and anybody that would rate it would go, oh, audiolytics, you can guess it scores very well. So there's that dichotomy that's always at work. And it's like, I don't want to use it to justify making lame work, but I also don't want to cover my like ignore that something like that does work. Like, how do you guys rationalize that?
- Speaker #1
They're using it to make sure the service. is used so as long as it's getting i mean they're making creative because they know it works in that sense clearly it's working so they're not it's not broken it's doing what it needs to do it's obviously driving their business sometimes i think we can get a little bit lost in just wanting to make great creative because it's great creative that's what i'm getting yes yeah and i think you know if it's proving its worth and it still hasn't been worn out yet and it's delivering on the imperative of the brand then it's justified to be put into the marketplace yeah i mean And
- Speaker #2
Audiolytics is designed to generate creative itself. And... What sells isn't always, you know, necessarily a script that is pretty or, you know, regarded, as Steve said, as great creative. And I think one of the things that is perhaps interesting about the history of advertising, it certainly felt like there was a time where maybe more in the 90s or early 2000s that it sort of lost a bit of lost sight of, you know, that core goal of selling. And then we came a bit more, is the creative great, you know, and are we going on a great shoot and are we going to Cannes? and you know are we getting some awards right but the bottom line is like ogilvy came way back into fashion and people say mate we sell or else because that's ultimately what advertising is supposed to do so you know audioletics keeps us honest in that way but it's not necessarily a formula for creating ads that people are necessarily going to listen to and go oh that's a great ad i'm going to give that a nine out of ten well i think it's also interesting i read a recent article that talked about
- Speaker #1
the number of can awards that have been given to ads that when you actually distilled them down to did they deliver on the client's needs in terms of sales they didn't but it was just a beautiful piece of art so it got awarded and yet there's thousands of ads made each year that are delivering on their clients needs yet don't get considered so it's interesting so maybe there should be award for well this ad worked because it managed to sell against this kpi and the gold line goes to zip recruiters well you know it's true i mean we understand that some awards are given out there Perfect.
- Speaker #0
creative excellence and that's fine but creative excellence without distilling it down to an actual bottom line number that a client wants to deliver is just a vanity project isn't it it can be i think it's the the older i get things can be simultaneously true two truths yeah yeah all right let's listen to the next one the last one this is from dove men care games with names when
- Speaker #4
you're comfortable with the uncomfortable you're ready for just about anything that comes your way, especially stress, sweat, and Dove Men Plus Care antiperspirants.
- Speaker #7
Make sure you stay comfortable because we've all had those cringe moments, the ones that make you break into stress, sweat, like when you're delivering a best man speech and someone spills a drink on your notes, when you're standing over a 10 foot putt with bragging rights on the line, or when the boss reschedules a performance review for right now,
- Speaker #4
all you can do is turn on the charm and wing the speech. Breathe deep and drain the putt. and march into that review like the rock star that you are. As for stress sweat, leave that up to Dove Men Plus Care.
- Speaker #7
When emotions are running high and stress is mounting, Dove Men Plus Care antiperspirants help tackle stress sweat and odor-causing bacteria, all while adding Dove skincare agents that help to keep your underarms feeling fresh.
- Speaker #4
Get comfortable with uncomfortable. Fight back against stress sweat with Dove Men Plus Care.
- Speaker #2
antiperspirants available at walmart target and amazon i personally this could be a hot take it's totally wrong phil that was a horrifically bad ad they started off by talking about like you're uncomfortable or being uncomfortable it's like why are you talking to me about that and then you know it's just for me stress sweat is not i've always called it just sweat yeah it's just sweat it's like it's to me that's not really a concept that i have so But to me, it's jarring. Like, why are they talking about that? And then they just kept saying, stress, stress, stress, stress, stress. And like, if you think about the mind, it's just an associative matching machine, which it really is. Like, you're just hearing dove and stress, dove and stress, dove and stress. Like, it could work, possibly, but there's a lot of negatives about that ad.
- Speaker #0
You know what I thought was, they started, like, we've all been there, and then they talk about golfing. And having a performance review. And to me, I was like, I do have... Happen to belong in the group that I think they're talking to. College educated knowledge worker. That's a subset of every man who's got an armpit.
- Speaker #2
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
So you just like sliced your audience down to guys that golf and do have white collar jobs.
- Speaker #2
That really struck me as well.
- Speaker #0
I'm like, you just any other guy out there swinging a hammer goes, it's not even going to.
- Speaker #1
And interestingly enough, if we think about the first ad that we listened to, which was also about deodorant, they managed to speak to a target audience without alienating that audience. They just used cues of vernacular and tone of voice and accent. It was an African-American, but it was, you know what I mean? It was more.
- Speaker #0
Yes.
- Speaker #1
More real. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
He was just being himself. This is like, let me connect. Like, this is one of the, I've talked about this before. It's like, this to me sounds like a brief for an ad. Like, hey guys, we want to talk about stress sweat. we're not those aren't words we're going to use in the ad but what we mean by that is like you know when you're about to do some sort of athletic event and you're worried about the outcome or you're going into a meeting and you start to feel uncomfortable those are some of the images i don't want you to use any of that but that's like to help guide you we really want to push the fact that dove's now available with this new formula and make it generally you know we really want to make sure all men anybody with an armpit feels like they could that's a man could use this where this to me is like this like feels like what you would use to get to a good ad yeah
- Speaker #2
Maybe. I mean, it feels like more like a brief than a finished copy.
- Speaker #0
You get what I'm saying?
- Speaker #2
I don't know. Just to me, it feels like a bad brief then. We all know what happens with them.
- Speaker #0
That's too good. So what do you guys give them?
- Speaker #2
I think I'd be comfortable giving this a three, maybe lower. How about a, how about a? Steve?
- Speaker #1
Yeah, probably a four.
- Speaker #0
Okay. Here's what's interesting.
- Speaker #1
Audiolytics gave it a 10. 95.
- Speaker #0
60. So the only one that was like, if we chart these together at... It happened what happens most of the time, because I do believe that audiolytics is like, we hold these truths to be self-evident. Like, this is the way you persuade a person, particularly if you're having to walk up to a doorbell, ring the doorbell, and get them to buy knives right now. You'd want to hit all these points as hard as you could.
- Speaker #2
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Okay, fine. A priori, that's what's in it. Every once in a while, there's a little bit of dissonance. So Liquid IV is the only one where there was a little bit of dissonance, but the rest of them, we charted right along. Where audiolytics said Liquid IV was number one, Steve and Giles did not. But then we all agreed the first degree ad had the highest score, then Ollie, and then this Dove Mencare had the worst. And I think it's understandable. That's the breakdown. So when you listen to all these, you know what's behind it. Unilever, a hundred and however many billion dollars and all the teams and all the people involved. What do you as professionals in this channel in particular, what do you hear and what are your recommendations for the chief audio officers that are listening?
- Speaker #2
I mean, I don't know about recommendations, but the first thought that comes to mind for me thinking about, you know, Dove and then taking it in-house and, you know, us trying to sort of focus on audio as a channel. I mean, to me, these all sort of smack of audio being an afterthought, which is something we talk about a lot.
- Speaker #1
I couldn't have said it better myself.
- Speaker #2
And it's such a large piece of people's day and such a big amount of media time. And yet it just does not get the love and attention and consideration as a channel that it deserves. and you see that media budget, I think you also see that in the briefs that, you know, we've talked about here, but speculatively, but also, you know, these executions, like I feel they're okay. I mean, but it just feels like there's not a lot of passion put into it.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, they've been spending a lot of time on television. They've been spending a lot of time on their digital and then, oh, got to do an audio ad as well. You've got 15 minutes, knock something up. Maybe that's a lot of truth in that.
- Speaker #0
I will say, if I'm looking at this right, Games with Names was host read. Growth Mindset was host read. Liquid IV was host read. degree with host red so i do want to say because what i've been noticing happen over time is more and more of them are just produced spots which is basically what the ollie spot sounded like a radio spot ported over to podcast i do have to say it's interesting they're doing host red creative still i acknowledge that and respect that but again it sounds like they just sent a shopping list of things to the guy to say personalization shoehorn this into the 60 seconds or whatever you've got shoehorn it in make sure you get this point get those beats so why don't you tell us about a time me was sweating.
- Speaker #2
or that you might think this or it's an social issue,
- Speaker #1
right?
- Speaker #2
It feels like a pretty disconnected podcasting approach because I thank you for calling that out about the host reads. Like three out of those four ads are host reads. That's a very important, relevant point. And yet it feels like the hosts, you know, are just reading scripts for the most part, like the Liquid IV one. Okay, maybe it hit the best copy points in terms of audiolytics, but I mean, it's just a guy reading through the talking points. Maybe doing a little bit of like, oh, I travel a lot and I use this, you know, because I don't want to get up at night. But like felt like they could get a lot more out of these three.
- Speaker #0
Well, he did back it with that easy listening jazz.
- Speaker #1
And that now explains a lot.
- Speaker #2
That just produced the Jesus out of me.
- Speaker #0
That's all you were hearing.
- Speaker #1
But you can hear the perspective I'm coming at. If you had said these are for host. leads that Unilever had done, I would cut them a little bit more sort of slack because, you know, at the end of the day, it's down to the host. Clearly, it was not onboarded well in a couple of instances.
- Speaker #0
Your final thoughts for the chief audio officers, those who are responsible to make their dollars work in audio, is there anything they could learn from today's ads or wisdom you would give them in taking a planful approach to audio?
- Speaker #1
To follow on from what Giles said before, the onboarding is so, so important.
- Speaker #2
really making sure the host understands what it is they're going to be talking about and to give it that sort of importance and intimacy the host read we know can have because it's either excellent or it's flat so that's an important point yeah i don't know i mean i do feel like i just said that the host reads it doesn't feel like they're squeezing that much juice out of them and they probably could get more if you're paying you know for a host read like maybe you can get a little bit more out of that but generally i mean i don't know we talk a lot about theatre of the mind. at Oxford Road. And, you know, there's a lot of, there's a way to tell stories in audio and sort of bring a listener sort of, you know, into a situation or into a narrative or, you know, to lead them in in some way and try and involve them in the product or somebody's story or, you know, the story of the company, even if it has to be that. But like, I just feel there's so much more scope for, you know, using audio to tell stories and get people really engaged and, you know, connect with them. you know, more of those subconscious ways. And, you know, we've talked about how audiolytics is a system that appeals, you know, primarily to sort of the rational, very logical approach to doing it. But there's also this huge subconscious component where people are persuaded in all those ways that they're not even aware of, like, do I relate to the guy who plays golf or who's giving a wedding speech? Or do I resonate with this music or, you know, all those other ways? And I feel like audio can do a really good job of creating those resonances.
- Speaker #0
I think you're right because it is like the subconscious response and dimensional listening, like storytelling, getting people to enter into the image and just like talk about the liquid IV packaging or the guy's pouring it into his drink on the table right there.
- Speaker #1
It's as easy as just sound like you care.
- Speaker #0
Thank you. Okay. Actually, I think that's a great note to end on. CAOs that are listening, make sure your ads that the host reading them sound like they care. I think taking a step back that anyone hearing it. It sounds like you care. Sounds like you care about what you're putting out there into audio, taking a planful approach. We learned something new. None of us knew about advertising history in the United Kingdom. I want to thank you guys both so much for being on the show. This was a masterclass on how to think before you hit record. Where can people follow your work and connect?
- Speaker #2
Well, you know, I do have a podcast and my running joke about my podcast is that I have one listener and I address that listener in the podcast in the singular. So. It would spoil my joke if more people listened to it. So I don't know if I want people to check that out. It's called Rants for Peace, by the way. And I also have a website, gilesmartin.com, where I occasionally pontificate on philosophical, psychological and spiritual topics. So you can follow me there. And if you're interested in my professional life, you can follow me on LinkedIn, but I never post anything there.
- Speaker #1
I'm not following that.
- Speaker #2
I was hoping we could end with some like English silly expressions or something.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, why don't we rapid fire? Go ahead. English phrase for English phrase.
- Speaker #1
Almost. Gaffner?
- Speaker #2
I haven't actually got any plans, so... What was it? Figures of speech that your grandmothers used.
- Speaker #1
This is pretty boring, but whenever anything of any minor drama or major drama happened in my house, it would just be, let's put the kettle on and talk about it. That was it.
- Speaker #2
There's a book called The Anglo Files, and it's by an American woman from New York, I think, who moved in with a... husband they moved to the uk and it's about her acclimatizing to uk culture and at the start and it's a really good book by the way but the start that she's got a list of 10 things about how i know i've sort of become british or got used to you know being in england and you know stuff like well when the world cup's on like i always cheer madly for england even though i know they're gonna lose whatever and then at the end it's like number 10 is like no matter what happens you know there's a tube strike, traffic jams, bad day at work.
- Speaker #1
nuclear war breaks out you know when i get home just put the kettle on have a cup of tea and just to finish up on that my grandmother always used to say when she'd made something in fact you say and put that in your pipe and smoke it like some sort of middle earthian kind of what northern
- Speaker #0
woman you know that's a wrap on another episode of ad infinitum a long time coming so grateful that steven abraham and giles martin were able to join and put a little english on it The origin of that phrase is when... Growing up, I played ping pong with my friend, John Miles. And when we would put spin on a ball, that would be put a little English on it.
- Speaker #2
Any particular reason?
- Speaker #0
I don't know. John said it and he would say it with a bad accent. He got put a little English on it and you'd go boom. And that's how, you know, you put some spin on the ball.
- Speaker #2
Nice.
- Speaker #0
And I used to think you guys were all spin.
- Speaker #2
Oh, right.
- Speaker #0
But you're all there's substance. I do think the accent comes with some. you know, whatever, there's the allure of the accent, but what's been revelatory over the last seven years, five years of working with you is learning to stop and think and plan and ask those questions. Like even today we experienced in making the episode and it gets to better work. It's just, I'm reminded of the Martin Luther King Jr. speech, which is nothing pains some men so much as to think. And it's like a physical workout to be like, have I thought this through? And it's like, okay, stop and think, let's ask the questions. And that's how we get to the good work.
- Speaker #1
There's a balance, right? You can overthink stuff as well, but I think it's getting that nice sort of healthy balance between intuition, thought, rational logic, and, you know, a little bit of bravery.
- Speaker #0
Well, hopefully we can meet in the middle. I know Steve's come out for my annual paintball birthday bash, Giles, and we'll have to have you come out and it won't be time to think.
- Speaker #2
Yeah, that's the beauty of it.
- Speaker #0
All right. Thank you for listening to Ad Infinitum. Thank you guys for coming on the show and check out... the top spenders and get a free demo at Magellan.ai slash ad infinitum. And until next time, keep calm, carry on and have fun making the ads work.
