Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Selling to Ad Agencies, with Undnyable
198 Plays1 year ago
Meet Justin Hooper and Steve Williams, partners at Undnyable, an advertising agency with a reputation of turning heads with their funny, creative and sometimes outrageous client campaigns. In this episode we hear about their creative approach to client work, their criteria for choosing production partners, and how production companies should sell to agencies.
Recommended
Transcript
Podcast Introduction
00:00:06
Speaker
You're listening to Crossing the Axis, the podcast that explores the commercial side of film production with your host, James Kebles.
00:00:25
Speaker
Welcome listeners and thank you for tuning into the show.
Episode Excitement
00:00:29
Speaker
I'm excited about this episode, not only because of the talented and funny guest I get to talk to, but also because they are veterans in the advertising business who I think are going to bring some good insights into the agency and production company relationship, particularly when it comes to making spots for clients.
00:00:47
Speaker
I think most production company owners would agree that it's nice having a mix of clients between brands and agencies. I think it kind of exercises different muscles. I think it offers a different skill base. It probably deals with a lot of ADD issues if you're like me and have that.
00:01:07
Speaker
You can take your attention one way or the other. But more than anything else, what I've enjoyed about working with agencies as a production company more than anything else is it's just so nice when an agency does all of that client development work.
Role of Client Development
00:01:23
Speaker
When an agency is, particularly if they're trying to sell through bold ideas or some risky campaigns and
00:01:32
Speaker
You have to bring the client along, whatever it might be, your CMO or whoever. And you have to convince them that this is a good idea. The ones you convince them, then you have to empower them and convince their peers and their bosses that it's a good idea. You have to end up working with strategists to make sure that the idea is connected to the outcomes and the goals of the business. And there's so many opportunities for it to fall apart. There's so many opportunities for it just to die. And when it gets all the way through and it actually gets going,
00:02:02
Speaker
it's a really tremendous amount of work. And I always have tipped my hat to the agencies that do that so well. And hopefully, they've explained to the client that the true cost of doing the campaign, right, that they, you know, convinced the client that, you know, it's worth the money to spend it and do it right or not to do it at all. And so when that kind of
00:02:25
Speaker
Client development work is done the budget is right and then they just bring this you know nice thing all together to the production companies that the treatment to get the script to get plans the fears everything it's all planned out and all the production company has to do is make sure the vision comes alive as promised right pressure anything like that.
00:02:45
Speaker
But I always really like that. And I think that that's what I'm hoping to unpack in this conversation and a whole bunch more.
Meet Justin and Steve
00:02:54
Speaker
So it gives me great honor to be joined today by Justin Hooper and Steve Williams from the agency Undeniable.
00:03:02
Speaker
I am a big fan of their work because I think first and foremost, if you haven't been to the website, you should go because they are masters of comedic advertising and do a great job making spots that I think are both entertaining and memorable. I find a lot of little Easter eggs and their stuff that kind of keep my attention
00:03:22
Speaker
It's very, very effective. So I'm excited for this conversation for that. I'm curious to hear how they describe themselves. But if I were to take a stab at it, I would, I landed on the idea of strategically subversive was how I coined it. I say that because I, you don't, when I look at your spots,
00:03:45
Speaker
I don't think they're cliche they're not formulaic in fact they take cliches and formulas and throw them on their heads and that makes them unpredictable and that's what i love about it works for me it makes me think. The bold and i think that the clients that go for that.
00:04:03
Speaker
are going to be bold. And so they're going to make products that are bold. So there's a better product than their competitors. I mean, that's kind of the logic train that goes through my head and why I think it's probably good for business too. So there you go, guys, that's your one sample size of data. These things work. You can put this in your case study. But I want to hear about you guys. And I'm curious, Justin, I'm going to start with you. Did I sum up undeniable very well? How would you describe
Undeniable's Creative Philosophy
00:04:30
Speaker
it?
00:04:30
Speaker
Well, thank you, James, for having us here. And would you like to be our new business person? Because that was awesome. I think, yeah, you did an excellent job summarizing probably what Steve and I have spent years trying to figure out how to summarize what we do. So I think we really enjoy doing exactly what you've said, which is this idea of hacking the bland world of advertising. Because in our opinion, there's no real ROI on boring. And that's something that
00:04:58
Speaker
over time, I think Steve and I have a little bit of a cynics, you know, like we have a cynic eye on the whole just industry, just looking at it and having lived in it almost by the way, every creative does every single creative is like, okay, this is this is advertising, right? I think the difference is we, we kind of
00:05:15
Speaker
In addition to having that cynical eye, we have a very optimistic heart. And so we try to see the best in the clients that we're working with and find the crazy, fun human truth that we can flip on its head a little bit and get people to notice what we're doing. Because at the end of the day, you spoke a little bit about joining forces with a production company. That's the fun part for us, too. It's like we all want to go and make something great together and getting it to that point.
00:05:44
Speaker
can be very difficult at times. And when you know the thing you're going to make is going to be really fun and resonate in the world, then we just have a blast.
Cynicism in Advertising
00:05:53
Speaker
Yeah, I want to get into that deeply.
00:05:58
Speaker
When I hear this cynical approach, I go to the spot of thinking that's healthy because there's a detachment from the product or the brand that you're working with. There's a detachment that actually gives you the ability to see more of what's going on than they can see themselves, the whole context. I don't know. Is that just me projecting? I think that's totally true.
00:06:23
Speaker
That's why a smart client brings in an outside partner like an agency to have that honest, sometimes requires some cynicism but like that honest eye and objective lens on their business and kind of help them get out of their bubble and step out on the sidewalk as a consumer and look back at that brand or that product or that service and say, okay, how does it really live out in the world?
00:06:47
Speaker
What do people really think of it? How do people talk about it? All that, honestly, I think is super important. I would also say that Steve and I talk about this a lot. There's these internal lexicons that are built within these organizations. So you work for a brand, whether that be the StubHub, or SoFi, or Carl's Jr., or any brand we've worked on in the past. And you all have a certain way of speaking and thinking about your brand.
00:07:14
Speaker
And to you, when you're in that organization, it's great because you're an expert at it. But a lot of times it can kind of muddy the waters and you need someone to be able to elevate above that and say, well, wait a minute. Even though you think this is a good reason to believe or an RTB, as they're called, do consumers actually care about that? Do they care about that thing? And is it a true human truth? Because if anything, we know that
00:07:40
Speaker
Like the greatest comedians in the world are the ones who take something that's just everyone's thinking, but say it in a way that is new and different and makes you really flips it on its head a bit.
00:07:53
Speaker
It made me think of, I've never been a fan of if you're trying to get new business and you're trying to sell yourself by saying, Hey, I love your product or I'm, you know, a big fan of this thing and kind of approaching it with this affinity toward the actual client that you're trying to get because I think it actually
00:08:11
Speaker
tarnishes your objectivity. I think that being able to not love it is actually a feature. Being able to look at it and look at it honestly in a marketplace point of view and thinking about from objectively what sets it apart from its competition or what unique thing that this has or offers is easier to say and to define and to articulate
00:08:34
Speaker
in whatever kind of way, funny or emotional. If you have that detachment, if you have that, were you like, I don't care if I love it or not? Was that true or no? I think there's an element of
00:08:46
Speaker
At least for me, almost every client that we work on, I didn't say every client we work on, I find something that I just effing love about him. Like, I'm just like, this is the thing that to me is the coolest part of this piece of business and this, what you guys are doing.
Balancing Objectivity and Affection
00:09:02
Speaker
And it's true that I love it. And I'm not just being a fanboy. I actually do like, love that object or that thing or service.
00:09:10
Speaker
I probably am expressing in a way that's more human than they would ever expected you know it's more real and relatable so they would say they love it for these reasons you know it provides us amazing service or does this amazing thing and i'm like no actually it's just because. It does this it's really simple and i can digest that easily and i can communicate that easily so it's i think it's okay to be big fans of about.
00:09:32
Speaker
a brand, but you're right. You have to also be able to at the same time see the opportunity that they may not be seeing to see themselves in a new way. Right. Right. Well, I want to continue talking about this, but I want to hear more about how you two
00:09:49
Speaker
arrived to be working together and kind of your path and journey here.
Steve's Creative Journey
00:09:52
Speaker
And I want to start with you, Steve, because I actually know you best. And we've we've worked together. You've been a client of mine at a production company, a film studio when you're at DNA and all as well. We've competed against each other. And, you know, so I've seen you on many levels. I've mad respect for you. And frankly, I got actually a little bit scared when I heard that you were joining Undeniable. I was like, oh, shit, that's too much concentration of creativity in one spot. And it actually
00:10:19
Speaker
And I was like, Oh, I got to work harder in order to compete against the great work that you guys are doing in the town that you both have. Um, but I don't actually know your full story. Um, well, how did you get started in this business and what led you to the point of joining undeniable? Sure. Yeah. Well, let me back up and also thank you for having us on the podcast. So this is great. I'd love to just chat, chop it up about this business. So, um,
00:10:45
Speaker
Thank you for having me. Yeah, I'm a writer by trade, copywriter by trade. So that's how I got started in the business. I'm from LA originally. Didn't have a whole lot of formal training in this business. I think back, there's a lot of finishing graduate schools now.
00:11:00
Speaker
fully dedicated. I think I came up in the business when it was more about misfits kind of stumbling into this business because maybe they thought they wanted to go to law or medicine and then they realized they have a creative spirit in them and they don't really fit in a normal sort of office structure and so they wanted to find a way to get paid.
00:11:20
Speaker
what their with the brain and imagination so that was me i hear i hear you say not hire both anywhere else people back into this i got into it you know you can i fell into it. So yeah so i came i was working at kind of right in the season l.a. as a copy writer and i started to.
00:11:40
Speaker
move up the food chain and i was sort of a writer working writer slash creator director. That's actually you know just and i work together back then in l.a. which that's kind of back story to how and i will at least in its current format is today. But we were partners did a lot of fun we're crazy work but we're really great partners and we didn't have to worry about a lot of the other.
00:12:06
Speaker
Jump that goes on in an agency in terms of being leaders and all that stuff. So we were really truly working Creatives then, you know, we continued kind of individually in our own career paths. I ended up moving up to Seattle was working at a big agency called publicist and running a lot of big work on T-Mobile and a bunch of other things in Seattle and Kraft Heinz and
00:12:29
Speaker
I'm but definitely starting to move more of the food chain i eventually became an executive director at an agency here in town in seattle call dna. Did you make it was you mostly doing writing that you know then you made the jump over to.
00:12:46
Speaker
Yeah again and this is like the journey that every creative goes on and sometimes you transition well sometimes you don't but going from an individual you know creative contributor to now you're maybe making work but also steering to work.
00:13:01
Speaker
And then eventually I got to this position I had at DNA where I was, I'd say maybe a slightly less often, slightly less often working at creative as an ECD. I still was definitely making work. And in fact, that's part of why I probably were talking today is because Justin was a big part of a lot of that.
00:13:20
Speaker
but definitely i was in a much more helping the agency run its day to day operations, leading clients trying to keep my hands in the work as much as possible but that's easier said than done as you as you move up the agency food chain but learned a ton and you know,
00:13:41
Speaker
My big goal at my last stop at DNA before I joined Undeniable was to really raise the creative profile of that agency. And I think we did a pretty good job over three or four years. And then at that point, you know, coming into, I guess it was last year, I started getting the itch to do some different stuff. And, you know, Justin and I had worked pretty well together on and off for 20 years and kind of thought, you know, he's got something good going brewing with Undeniable.
00:14:10
Speaker
And we decided let's figure out, let's take all the things we've learned individually and collectively both as working creatives and also sort of GCD, ECD people, leaders who can run projects and deal directly with C-suite level clients. Let's put all that together and make it go of it and kind of take what he's already built with Undeniable and sort of double down and make it even bigger and better. That's great.
Justin's Advertising Evolution
00:14:37
Speaker
And that's where we are today.
00:14:39
Speaker
Justin, I imagine that you got your start like making an ad when you were like five years old for something. I don't know why that's the situation. You're like a soothsayer. You're a mine reader. Yes, actually I did. So the crazy thing was I was very super into technology when I was a little kid. And this is when I'm talking about technology, these are like stupid like Betamax.
00:15:07
Speaker
My dad always had like cameras and stuff and I would make, I'd have all these Hot Wheels and I used to film these like stupid, like Cal Worthington, you know? So in California, there's this guy named Cal Worthington. And his dog Spot.
00:15:20
Speaker
Dude, there were that like Bandini Mountain, like all these crazy things. There's like the low level advertising that was somehow super influential to like an eight year old. And then there was like the Cliff Freeman's of the world with like the where's the beefs and stuff. And I just used to think, man, that's the funniest shit I've ever seen. I would just like, this is awesome. I want to do that. Like, I just want to make funny things. And so I would take my hot wheels cars and line them up.
00:15:46
Speaker
and do these stupid commercials. Like, we got red cards, blue cards, green cards. And so I try to mimic these commercials all the time. And then eventually, I got into design by way of forgery, because I was just really into computers. And I used to make fake IDs and stuff. And then my dad at the time was like, he had a company. And he's like, hey, listen.
00:16:08
Speaker
Maybe rather than forging a driver's license and potentially going to jail, I have a company and I'm paying these people like $3,000 a month to make these print ads for me for my company. Would you want to do them? And I was like, yes, absolutely. And so I started doing that at like age 16 or 17 and I was making like a ton of money doing. And the crazy thing is like.
00:16:29
Speaker
My first idea was, this is in LA times at the time, like every single ad, the only ad space you could buy is a square ad space. And I was like, we're going to make our ad round. So I just for, so I literally, it's just for like a year and a half, just made these round ads and square spaces.
00:16:45
Speaker
And like instantly, his business like took off because no joke, it was like he became, everybody saw all these ads and purely from just changing the shape of an ad. And I thought, wow, this is pretty, this is fun. And my dad's company was Thomas Hooper, French doors, windows, and his tagline, which he came up with was be French by the best. And so I was like, okay. So this basically explains my entire career in advertising.
00:17:13
Speaker
But, you know, I ended up going to school for design. I went back to school and I taught design and I taught advertising for a while at Cal State Long Beach typography. And then unlike Steve, in some ways I was a victim of the, like I went into the bookshop, which was like a, I mean, the path to advertising was what I was supposed to go do and become.
00:17:36
Speaker
Took the bookshop for many years and I highly recommend that class if anybody's ever interested in just upping their creative level game. And then I taught it for many years afterwards. And by teaching it, I built this crazy network. First of all, it taught me how to be a good creative director because you'd have like 30 plus ideas on the board and 28 of them were horrible and two of them were awesome. And you had to somehow make the other 28 good. And so I learned very quickly like how to find the best in something and then kind of exploded.
00:18:06
Speaker
And then also just mentoring those people. It was just a blast, all the students. It was great. And so then I joined a small agency in Newport Beach called DGWB Advertising at the time. And they did like Wiener Schnitzel and they did really funny, cool stuff. It was near impossible to get a job there. So I fortunately was also a designer and I was able to sneak in the design door and help them build their design department first. But I didn't really want to do that. And I met some very interesting people along the way.
00:18:34
Speaker
Can I ask you a quick question about design? Because you said design earlier, and then you brought up computers. And that kind of threw me off a little bit. When you say in design, what do you mean? So when I worked in design at that time, I was a graphic designer. So I was building typography, doing like posters. And actually, I sold packaging design and all that kind of world. So that's where I started. But what I didn't love about design was it was highly subjective.
00:19:02
Speaker
If the client, you can work forever on something and if the client just doesn't like the color purple, you're totally effed. You can't go bad at it. You're like, well, the purple's a great color. You gotta just go with what they're gonna go with. In advertising, you have that brief and you have the strategy and you have all this backing to support your idea. And so I was really drawn to it. And plus, you get to go on shoots. I mean, it's the best thing in the world. You get to create stuff that other people see and where the ego gets driven by seeing your work out in the world. It's just, it's awesome.
00:19:32
Speaker
So anyhow, so I quickly, I'll speed this up. I'm sorry, I'm taking so long. But I ran through, you know, DGWB through their design department, worked every single day and just started throwing in ideas for anything I could do. I literally did what they said in all the books you read is like, walk the hallways, ask what people are working on, and just come up with ideas for it and give them away. Just give away every idea you can give. And I did that for long enough that I converted over and became an art director there.
00:19:59
Speaker
And then I moved up to OV because I was like, I got to get to LA if I'm going to be an ad guy for real. And I was working there with a partner for a while and it was working great. And then that partner left.
00:20:10
Speaker
And they were like, hey, this guy, Steve Williams, is going to come on board. He's been working around LA and this whole thing. I was like, OK, let's see how this goes. And Steve was awesome. Steve had already had more experience than I had. So when we started working together, he was a total knucklehead like myself. And so the two of us got along really, really well. We're both very cynical. We're very
00:20:32
Speaker
You know, just we enjoyed the humor that is advertising when it's flipped on its head. And so we worked at Ogilvy for many years and then we partnered with Steve, moved up to Pacific Northwest, abandoned me and then I, and then randomly one of my former students called me one day and said, hey, listen, I'm working at this agency. You're not going to know the name of this agency at all, but you're going to know the client. And they're looking for a creative director here. Would you want to join? I was like, what is it? And she's like, well,
00:21:02
Speaker
It's Carl's Jr. And I was like, Oh, okay. I've heard of that. And so then I went there and I spent the next probably six years working on Carl's there and growing to the point where I was built a very good relationship with the client.
00:21:17
Speaker
So much so that they kind of handed my partner and I the business and we own the business for multiple years. It was a great run of spots too. I mean, just incredible series. Yeah. It was crazy. It was a crazy world and it taught me a lot about, you know, ignoring the haters and really knowing who your target audience is and diving into that space.
00:21:39
Speaker
And then also just fame. I mean, it instantly skyrocketed the work I did into like national infamy and fame at the same time. So people eat it or they love it. And then I got approached by 72 and Sunny while we were there because they had the digital business. And over the course of a couple of years, we ended up transitioning over. We thought, hey, we're going to win this business. It's going to be amazing and easy and simple. And why wouldn't it come to us? And then it didn't come to us. And it was kind of a bit of a shock.
00:22:07
Speaker
When I joined 72, there was probably 60 people or so in the 60s to 70 people. And then through the course of time, Carl's client came back to us just without even a picture review and just said, hey, would you like the business?
00:22:22
Speaker
And then we ran it there for six years, plus we ran some of Activision, General Mills, and then Truth Initiative, which was one of my favorite clients of all time as well. That's the anti-smoking for Truth. I love that. And they've just historically done amazing work, and we knew we had to do some amazing work to match it.
00:22:43
Speaker
And so then I, and I swear to God, I'm getting these into the story soon. I swear. It's actually fascinating. It's going to be a little bit longer of an episode.
Undeniable's Signature Approach
00:22:52
Speaker
So basically we did this whole thing. It was crazy. And we, we won the business and I worked there. So there were 70 people when I started. By the time I had left, I had about 120 just in my group alone. So I was overseeing that group and it was insane. And the growth of 72 was amazing.
00:23:09
Speaker
But my father had passed away recently and I had a couple little kids and I thought, you know, I need a change of lifestyle. And the thing I saw that really made Undeniable become a reality for me was
00:23:21
Speaker
You know, we would be in meetings with, and I swear every creative probably has felt this. I'm sitting in a meeting. There's probably 30 something people all under the laptops. It looks like a like NORAD. Everybody's like checking the systems. And I probably really only needed like four of those people, three of those people in the room for real. And it was great to have everybody there because they would
00:23:42
Speaker
that they would throw in ideas, but the client was paying for all that. And we thought, you know, that's maybe not the most efficient use of resources. It also is slower. There's meeting upon meeting upon meeting. And so I started working, I started at a reliable left and I started working client side where I learned a lot just going client side and being a part of like an agency pitch from the other side and seeing what wins and what comes down to when it's a tie and what they talk about.
00:24:09
Speaker
And then over the years, I had just different clients come to me and say, hey, would you do our advertising? I'm paying this agency a ton of money, and I don't feel like I'm getting much for it. Could you do it? And I was like, sure. And as Steve mentioned, that's when Steve and I rejoined, where he had a lot of projects that were going on up there, where he's like, hey, it'd be fun to work together on something like this, and you and I could tackle it. And he was craving that, because that is something that happens. No creative goes to school.
00:24:36
Speaker
ever to learn how to become a manager. That's not on our list of things we can't wait to do. But if you don't do it, you don't succeed. And so he and I got to build some really fun work for those guys. And then when he decided to leave and make the shift, it was amazing.
00:24:58
Speaker
It was amazing for me because I knew we have this amazing shorthand way of working together. And I knew it would be hyper-efficient and hugely successful. And so far, it's been a blast.
00:25:09
Speaker
That's great. Well, um, as somebody who's lost a job to you, it was an honor. Like if you're going to lose, you want to lose to you. So there you go. Um, well, I, I love that story and I love hearing about your journey and I think you've done a good job of talking about what undeniable does. Do you have a type? I mean, when I look you, I think, Oh, you,
00:25:31
Speaker
You have a type comedy, you know, there's definitely a comedic approach is the majority of your work. Is that intentional or do you, is that a strategy? Is that something that you can look at the data and go comedies, the emotion that sells X or whatever. Is there, is that, am I even not onto something with that? I mean, it's, it's, I said, you could call it a sweet spot. That's for sure. Wheelhouse, whatever other, uh, cliche you want to use, but
00:25:59
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's, we think, well, first of all, in a broader sense, it's about unboring and packing the blam world of advertising. So often humor is a very disarming tool to do that. So yeah, we definitely find that. There's obviously a million flavors of comedy and some of it is more about being charming and smart and insightful that really lands. Some of it is just about visual craziness that makes you laugh and react.
00:26:28
Speaker
But comedy is sort of one of the tools. It's definitely the biggest I'd say for us, but there's other ways to be provocative, to turn heads and to kind of get people's attention. It's all in the service of getting that brand noticed and busting through the category conventions, the crutches that most companies use to
00:26:52
Speaker
or the jargon they rely on that doesn't mean shit to real people. A lot of that is what we try to bust up. And it usually requires making somebody laugh because that is how you kind of get them to maybe put the guard down and let you into the tent for them. Yeah, I think I think the humor is probably the most digestible solution for for if you want to really kind of unboring something. It's the thing that most people
00:27:19
Speaker
won't argue with, like a client won't be like, Oh, well, I don't know if I really want anyone to smile when they see my commercial. So there is, it's hard to argue with that. However, I think, as Steve was saying, like the unboring factor, I think there's a bravery factor to it. I think when we look at clients, we're like, are you willing to do something that maybe like truth, for example, was there wasn't a lot of humor, per se, but there was a lot of like, brave stances that you're able to take, even with Carl's, it's like,
00:27:47
Speaker
We knew we were just, I mean, the reality of Carl's and those spots, those kind of brand rocket spots where we knew what we were doing, like everyone knew what we were doing. And the only people who got mad about it were people who didn't know what we were doing or who thought we were genuinely trying to say, you know, people eat these, these people eat these burgers or whatever. And so there was always a smile to it. And so I think bravery
00:28:12
Speaker
bravery and slightly provocative and like all of that is what we hope for. But Steve and I, I mean, it's very difficult for us to go to start concepting and not try to do something that's like, wouldn't it be funny if we did this? Yeah, because that is, I mean, it's, we're fans of comedy, comics, comedic people, because it is disarming. I mean, the crazy thing is I can remember multiple examples where I've had you going into show a rough cut.
00:28:41
Speaker
You've shot this amazing spot. It's hilarious. It hit all the beats you wanted to hit. It landed the point about the brand or the product. You go and show the client and they criticize the part that it's too funny. They're like, I'm worried that there's going to be so much laughter in this one moment that then they're not going to pay attention to the voiceover or the logo that comes up.
00:29:07
Speaker
Am I insane? Like who's on drugs here? Is it me or the client? Because man, that is an amazingly good problem that people are laughing so hard and reacting that strongly to your commercial or whatever. It's nuts. Nuts. Yeah. And James, you mentioned rewatchable. Sorry, this idea of like Easter eggs.
00:29:28
Speaker
We're always working like, what's the idea to make this rewatchable? The worst thing is seeing an ad 30 times and you're like, by the 30th time. But if you see an ad five or six times, you start to notice things in it. Skittles always did a great job of that. All those ads, you always see something happening in the background and then like, holy crap, it's always interesting.
00:29:50
Speaker
Yeah, I thought you did a good you've done a good job historically to have the stuff that I've seen where you have your kind of anthem spot and all that kind of stuff. Then you have your whatever your maybe your social cuts or your other things that you that you do that are ripping off of the anthem. And even in those I found a original story. It wasn't just a smaller version of the big ad. It was
00:30:11
Speaker
It took, definitely borrowed from it, but it went, it added some new elements that kept like, oh, okay, that was, that is a, it felt like an independent additive itself. So I thought that was kind of- Yeah, you know, that's an interesting, that's a little bit of a paradigm shift, I think, because when we were back in the old movie days, it was truly like, we are going to do a 15 second cut down of this 30 second commercial, because we want the exact same messaging, but in half the time.
00:30:34
Speaker
And now I think with the advent of these six second ads and shorter timeframe, these not just ads, but like pieces, films.
00:30:44
Speaker
The idea for building original moments in those is like, I mean, we champion that every time. Yes, there's the efficiencies of shooting at the same time during the shoot, which you absolutely have to build into it. But as long as you do enough pre-planning for it, you can totally pull that off. And you get so much more of a robust story if you can do that, if you can do some really funny, interesting six seconds that are not exactly the same as what the 15 is supposed to be.
00:31:10
Speaker
Getting a 30 second message into six seconds is total bullshit. This is not possible. Right. Right. Exactly. Yeah. And sometimes that means you have to get, get your hands
Production Strategies and Collaboration
00:31:19
Speaker
dirty. Like we did a big campaign called rewild the rain ears, which was a,
00:31:24
Speaker
Sort of like for people in this part of the country, Rainier Beer is this really well-known, regional, beloved beer. And they had these amazing commercials back in the 70s and 80s about the wild Rainiers, which were basically gigantic beer cans with legs that like they roamed the wilderness like elk or something, mysterious creatures, wild creatures. And we had this great project to kind of write the next chapter.
00:31:49
Speaker
And we got out and kind of landed this crazy idea about telling the next chapter and the fact that these majestic creatures are now much like the rest of us sitting in cubicles. They've moved to the city. They're working in tech. They're riding segues with corporate lanyards. They've lost all their wildness. And so we hatched this campaign that was all about getting them back into nature. But when we were filming everything,
00:32:16
Speaker
We were shooting the main spot, 16.9 with the big fancy camera, but then at the same time, we're with our own phones, smaller devices, GoPros, shooting smaller content on the side, 9x16 stuff over here that's going to go on Instagram. And that wasn't just like, hey, let's wing it. It was there was thoughtfulness that had to go into planning out a one big integrated shoot so that when you come home, you don't just have the footage you need for a 30 and you hope you can
00:32:46
Speaker
Do a cut down it's like we came home with all kinds of crazy stuff that was purpose built for you know instagram versus you know pre-roll youtube pre-roll or we did a cinema ad that was big and crazy and so a little bit of planning helps but that's kind of table stakes now that's just how you have to approach these kinds of jobs.
00:33:07
Speaker
Yeah. Well, you're talking production. I imagine there's listeners here going, how do I get there? Probably already gone to your website. They're looking at these ads and like, I want to work for them. Yeah. I want to, I want in on this because the spots are, they're visually bright and stunning. They sound great. This high level of production quality. You know, you talked about pre-pro and that's clear in them and getting everything you want. So, um,
00:33:34
Speaker
Let's dive into that because I really want production company owners that are listening to this to understand how best to engage you. What do you look for in a production partner? What are some production partners that you've worked with in the past that you've really had good success with? Yeah, that's interesting. We've worked with all levels, right? Yeah. Because of the Ogilvy days, we've worked in the giant Joe Piccas of the world, and you're shooting around the globe, or you're going with Errol Morris to do crazy stuff. They have their own planes and stuff.
00:34:05
Speaker
all the way down to, you know, we're shooting this thing and we're going to do it on a Saturday and we're going to, we're going to stop traffic and we're going to hopefully get this thing done, you know, like running total run and gun stuff. And, um, and the beauty of that. And I also have a background in directing. So I, I was, um,
00:34:21
Speaker
commercial film director and the DGA, and I've shot a lot of stuff as well. And so I, and I get really dangerous for a production company to be a partner with. And actually I, the funny thing about that is you'd think I'd be a pain in the ass about it, but I'm, I try to be the opposite of that, which is like super empathetic and like, okay, what do we need to get done? And Hey guys, we got to remember they can't shoot all this stuff. There's no way we're asking for too much and things like that. And, and being realistic about it also,
00:34:49
Speaker
I think for us, we do a couple different things. Sometimes we do the production ourselves, where we have to take it on ourselves, and that's primarily a budgetary thing. It has nothing to do with like, oh, I can't wait to go shoot something. It's like, if our clients do not have the
00:35:04
Speaker
the bandwidth or the spin in order to pull off the thing that we think that we need to be pulled off, we will do it because we can just undercut ourselves, right? So we'll go do it, and we have to- So you have executive producer then puts the team together and starts right at it. That's exactly it. And so we'll do that sometimes. That is not our favorite thing to do by any means. Our favorite thing to do is to find a partner who is really good at the thing that we need to get done.
00:35:30
Speaker
and just rely on them and help them and collaborate with them to get it done. A lot of what I look for in that is like people who know their shit, like who are just really, really good at like,
00:35:44
Speaker
like detail oriented when it comes to like the DP and like all of the whole component of it. Like every aspect of it, like they really are figuring out and I don't feel like there's any murky areas. They haven't like, they haven't really discussed like they're, they're on it. The fact that they're on everything is really important to me.
00:36:01
Speaker
Is that confidence or trust or is it something different than that? Well, it's because we've been on so many shoots where something can fall through the cracks and we're always, as creatives, we're so focused on making sure the work aligns with what we're trying to get done and the clients' concerns that the technical and all the other side of it on production
00:36:25
Speaker
We really have to know that they're so buttoned up that they're going to get their stuff done. Like we're not going to end up on a situation where they can't shut the street down or they're not going to end up in a situation where they haven't thought about like, well, yeah, this thing's supposed to fall over. This couch is supposed to flip over every single time exactly the same way. Have they tested that? Have they tried it like 20 times? Do they have examples? Are they showing examples of that to us? I would even say is going as far as like for me personally,
00:36:51
Speaker
the cost of having two cameras on set and capturing things in two different angles is so minimal that I love that backup component because it allows us some creative liberties sometimes to be capturing more. And then also as Steve points out, sometimes you work with production companies when you mention social, they're just like,
00:37:13
Speaker
So we got to do the nine by 16 by nine. We got to do some social content too. And I get it. It's another task and it's another friggin deliverable and they have to take it seriously. So it takes a lot of work to do that.
00:37:28
Speaker
kind of want a partner who's already like excited at that excited it like oh it's gonna be i had a really cool idea for this because it could be really fun if we did this and so um and we're not precious about ideas in that way either we're like we love high levels of collaboration so that's what we do we also try to push our push back on our clients we were talking about this the other day like we'll get a lot of assignments where
00:37:51
Speaker
they'll already have this deliverables list. And it's just the number of shapes and versions and lengths is overwhelming for what is really maybe supposed to be a simple campaign. So we often, before we even get into credit development, push them and say, why do you need all these? Do you really need that? Do you need a 90 second thing that you have no media for?
00:38:13
Speaker
do you need seven different versions of a nine-by-sixteen six-second video? Help us understand the business case for that. And that often helps curate and shave it down a bit, which hopefully then helps our collaboration with a production company to say, guys, these are the things we need. We know we need them. We have a use for them. They have an important role. So let's make them as awesome as they can be. But it isn't just we need to flip the camera and do it again.
00:38:42
Speaker
in a half the time or something. There's always hopefully a role for it. And the value of that role, like that object, like, okay, well, how often is this, you know, you want this, you're saying you want a 90 second spot to run on your webpage. Like, how many people are going to see that for real? Like, let's, let's have a conversation about your media and then what's, what's, you know, what spin you actually have against this and all. Which is kind of crazy, because I'd say, old Justin and Steve back in the day would be like,
00:39:09
Speaker
90? Screw it. How about four minutes? Like we would want to make like everything and the longest thing and the biggest, most expensive thing because we weren't really, I don't know, probably aware and or worried about where it was going to go. It was going to go on our portfolio. And that's all we cared about. But now that we're, you know, we've been around the block a few times, and we see a little bit of a higher higher elevation view of our role on our careers and the business, we kind of start to ask maybe harder questions, which ultimately will help
Choosing Production Partners
00:39:39
Speaker
put the most dollars in the best places on the screen, which is really what we all want, right? So have you ever hired a production company where you had a proper budget and you could actually do that that you didn't already know?
00:39:54
Speaker
Oh, many times. Many, many, many times. What's typical? Someone that you've worked with in the past, you just trust or, um, hey, there's someone new, they seem hot. Let's give it a shot. What direction? Well, I think there's two things that happen there. One, there are some brands that, uh, and some agencies that have a roster of, of editorial and post facilities and pre and production facilities that they just like, we're only going to tool in North America. We're only going to go to the, you know, we're only going to these places.
00:40:24
Speaker
We're only going to these editors. And then there's certain clients, like, yes, there's a shorthand for it. Like when we were doing food for Carl's, it was really difficult to find editors who could understand the right style of cutting that creates the most appetite appeal and things like that. And so there's some specialists. But typically, like, I would say most creatives, including ourselves, are very open to who's the right person for this style of work that we're about to go execute. And that's the hardest part for us, I gotta tell you, is like,
00:40:55
Speaker
It's a lot of work to identify and find those new people that are really good at this thing. And so we have found them, but we typically find them through our producers that we hire, EPs who will hire, who kind of keep a little bit more of a pulse on what's being done out there in the world. The other way we find them is
00:41:18
Speaker
Hey, we saw this really interesting, funny spot. I wonder who shot that. I wonder who directed that. I wonder where that came from. We see him sometimes in award shows. We don't track award shows like we used to probably as much because we were a little more focused on not doing that. And so, but I think
00:41:37
Speaker
That has always been the biggest challenge, at least for us, is having a pulse on who's the new person who's really good at this cool thing. And the tricky part is we get a lot of those emails all the time. So it's like, hey, I have this production company. I'm really good. And I will look at them, and I'll look at all the links.
00:41:55
Speaker
but it's hard for me. If I'm not working on a project that fits that right now, it's just like us. It's like if we reach out to a brand and they're not looking for advertising, they're not really gonna think about us. So we have to kind of keep reaching out or we have to kind of do other stuff. Yeah, timing is everything I think. Because stylistically, they might share something that you think is amazing, but it's not really right for what you're doing. It's really finding the best.
00:42:19
Speaker
Fit and Justin I used to back in our when we were just young idiot working creatives and this is probably gonna eat just a little bit like
00:42:29
Speaker
There used to be a thing called a director's library in the agency. And so we would not have a million things to do like we do today. We would be working on one focus project where we would have, call it creative, creative playtime, which is super important, by the way. And I think that's a problem for this industry for two scattered, but we had time to like go and sit in, it was literally a room.
00:42:53
Speaker
dedicated to director's reels. And there was like one big ass screen and there was just like walls of like director's reels and production companies, montage reels, animation, VFX, everything. And we would sit there and just plow through that looking A for inspiration, but for sure looking for like, whoa, who is this director? I've never heard of him or her. We have to use them on something.
00:43:17
Speaker
And that goes into the mental role of DEX and hopefully down the road you have some project where like, oh my gosh, we have to use that director we were looking at a couple months ago. So that element of agency, creative life, I don't think exists anymore. And so how creatives find and stay current is a lot trickier because it's just everywhere. I have two questions there. One is,
00:43:42
Speaker
Justin you're saying that you know by just by seeing other people's working that's interesting for whatever reason and who shot that or who made it produced it where do you find work though i mean is it just. Instagram or is it are you do you actually subscribe to the industry. X and follow what's being put out there.
00:44:03
Speaker
I wish I could tell all the listeners that I subscribed to this one thing and you should all get on this amazing thing and all that. But no, it's super haphazard. It's just like I saw this really fucking funny commercial for whatever it was. And I would love to. We got to figure out who shot that. That was really funny. But we also do, I mean, because we are old dogs in this industry, we have a lot of friends who are connected in that world as well. So we have folks that
00:44:30
Speaker
kind of work within different organizations. So we, a lot of times, we'll just reach out to people we know. In fact, like you would be one of them, we'd say, hey, listen, James, like, who do you know that might do something funny like this, or might be really good at this, or... So we just reach out to folks that we know, or other, a lot of producers, typically, is where it comes from. There did used to be, and I'm not sure they, I stopped going to them, because once you, again, once you, once you level up in creative, and you get, unfortunately, you get out of the day-to-day stuff, you don't get to do the,
00:44:59
Speaker
you have too much other shit to do so but they used to have the you know the reps would come through and they'd be like hey we brought lunch from whatever it is we're gonna show you the reels and like eighty percent of that is just people showing up to get whatever the lunches and like suffering through it.
00:45:14
Speaker
Ten percent of it are usually like people who are like cinephiles who are like this guy we know ed Koenig who's rad who like would go to every single one of these things and sit down and watch them and like just fucking love eat it up and and then like the other ten percent are like creatives who are like we need to find somebody for this for this thing we're working on but.
00:45:36
Speaker
The Cinephile folks, those are the ones that we reach out to nowadays. And we're like, hey, dude, we know you know everything right now. What's going on? What's cool? What's interesting? And a lot of times, we'll go to finishing houses that we know and just ask those questions too, because editorial places, they work with all the editors. They work with all the directors and all the production companies. And so they have a good pulse on, oh, we just finished this job for this. It might be really cool if you're doing it for this.
00:46:06
Speaker
We probably should be better at this, basically. That's what I'm saying. That's the takeaway. I think that's relatively common, though. It's influencers, who do you know, that kind of stuff. I think the idea of this particular
Agency-Production Dynamics
00:46:22
Speaker
uh archetype of a you know someone who's really into it paying attention cares about the spots that are being made in a cinematic you know auteur kind of a way i think is an interesting thing to look at and try to get work in front of tell me about
00:46:38
Speaker
decision-making when kind of picking a partner on a couple different kinds of production companies. So you have a production company that represents, you know, a handful of directors and you're going and looking at their work based on the director, right? This kind of identity kind of decision versus a
00:46:59
Speaker
all inclusive in-house company that their creative directors and the directors are the same people, the writers are the same people, and everyone, the editor, producers all in-house, there is no like, kind of, I don't know, I always think that I'm a little skeptical of the representation stuff. Do you have a preference on one or the other? Well, there's, it's, I think for us, because we do a lot of work in the QSR space and like in food, just through the years, and
00:47:26
Speaker
So occasionally we'll go to a production company independent of the director, because we know that production company is well versed in that specific kind of vertical, right? So like they're really good at food. So that means they know all the best stylists, then that means they know how to manage, you know, like the food orders and doing all the kind of crazy weird nuances behind it. Same thing with like cars. Like if you go to, if you're shooting cars, you're shooting any kind of very specific industry thing.
00:47:53
Speaker
There are production companies that just specialize in that. So those specialists, sometimes we'll go to that independent director, but I think more often than not, we'll go to a place that has at least a director or two that we think is interesting. And if that one director is not available, then a lot of times it'll offer up other people. And then you're like, okay, well, maybe that could work. And we actually found really cool people that way too through some of those production companies. Yeah, that was a thing that I experienced with
00:48:24
Speaker
I used to do a lot of work with a company called Imperial Woodpecker. It was founded by a director and a producer, but Stacy Wall, who was actually a former agency creative at Wyden, did a lot of work on Nike and then did the jump and became a director. Really, really successful. Did a ton of work with him, but he has such a stylistic confidence and a specific style that
00:48:53
Speaker
You knew that if you couldn't, if he wasn't available, the roster of people that he was curating, because he was essentially a director slash owner of the company. So he really had a hand in the directors that were around him on the roster. And they all just had us not necessarily the same style, but they all had this elevated
00:49:14
Speaker
Aesthetic that you knew that if you couldn't work with Stacy you could get someone who could bring something just as elevated and special and that's that's really important because sometimes you You have all your eggs in one director's basket because you love that particular director But if they're not available, then you look down the line at the company and go hmm Maybe then you start getting into like, okay. I
00:49:39
Speaker
either because of budget or whatever, now you're taking the creative chance, right? You're rolling the dice maybe with a director that isn't maybe an expert at what you are trying to do or the style. Maybe they've been more of a visual director and they're trying to get into storytelling or they do more comedy, but they want to do something more artistic.
00:49:58
Speaker
That's always a creative leap that everybody has to eventually lock arms and do it. And that a lot of that comes from the trust that maybe you have because you have a past relationship with the EP or the owner of the company and it's less about the director. But I think, yeah, to add to that one important note that most production companies maybe don't think about is that agencies also have to sell the clients on who the person is. They're just going to go direct the spot.
00:50:25
Speaker
And so if you don't get your first and you're trying to find that second or third. And they matters at that point, right? Because in the main matters, they're like, Hey, we thought we were getting joiner to do this thing, or we thought we were getting somebody else to do this thing. And you don't have that person.
00:50:40
Speaker
You do still have to sell it. You still have to sell it through somehow. And so it is really important. It's not just like up to the creatives all the time to say, oh, well, we love this guy. We want to work with him. There are other decision makers sometimes. The good news for us and our agency, that doesn't happen. Like our clients implicitly trust us to get the work done so they don't really care. They don't care. They know we're going to get it done. So they very rarely do we ever have to show a director real. In fact, I don't think we have in the whole time.
00:51:08
Speaker
kind of been doing this, which has been great. We'll do it sometimes just because we want to show this is the style of work we're going to be going to get, and it gets them excited for it, obviously. Right. But yeah. What about this business? It's changing, and roles are kind of all blending together.
00:51:31
Speaker
What about, um, production companies that are, you know, doing creative development and going direct to brands, right? They're, they're actually stealing some of your business, but they still want to work with agencies, you know, so they want to have a foot in both worlds. Is that a red flag for you? Like, would you, would you say, nah, man, that's just stay away from that. They're, they're, they're getting in our world too much. Or does that not matter?
00:51:56
Speaker
I think there's two, there's two ways to think about it. So the way I think we typically approach it is both Steve and I have worked as hired guns many times. You know, we've worked as these brains that can kind of come in and just be freelancers and understand the client nuances and manage client relationships and create work and all that. And so we have actually partnered with, with those types of production companies in the past where they have the aspiration, they have like a client relationship, they have the client relationship already, or they
00:52:23
Speaker
or they've been approached and they're like, hey, we need some additional creative muscle and we need someone who understands how to speak to these clients. And so we've done that and we actually see it as a huge opportunity a lot of times when you see a production company that's aspiring to do that. On the flip side, we have been in situations like with you where we're competing against a production company that has a creative arm to it. And after we won that piece of business,
00:52:51
Speaker
I think, you know, we would not go to you to then go execute that work. We would not. I noticed we want to know. I don't think it would be a smart thing to do because it's like they already said no to that brand. So why would we then bring that brand on board? And so we expected that. Yeah. And which is it's a little bit of a bummer because then, you know, if you partner together and stuff, then there's other ways to to win together. I would. The one thing with the production company model that so I've been a part of that before I was when I first left 72, I was
00:53:21
Speaker
jumping around trying to figure out what I wanted to do and I joined as an ECD at a place called woodshop.tv and they were a big food group and we were trying to, they had a great relationship with Taco Bell and some other brands and they were like, hey, is there a way we could steal some of that creative or just the creative development of that. And I think sometimes production companies, maybe they hire the creatives thinking that the creatives or the missing piece
00:53:48
Speaker
And they hire maybe a brand person thinking the brand person might be one of the missing pieces. But they don't realize that to properly manage and develop and foster a client relationship like that, it's actually, you have to have skill sets beyond creative and you have to have this, you really do have to understand what the client is.
00:54:10
Speaker
what they need, what they need at the end of the day. And that's a lot to manage, especially when in the backend you're managing all the production too. And that's, that is actually why we do not enjoy doing all the production ourselves because, because it is too much to handle a lot of times to do both of those things. And so I admire them for bringing that on, but I think they may not be bringing the correct bodies.
00:54:33
Speaker
And what I'm also saying is we're the correct body. So if you want to bring that on, you need to bring us on. Yes. We've definitely like white labeled ourselves inside because it, I mean, to be honest, like.
00:54:44
Speaker
I see, it's the Wild West, so let's just put that out there. It's the Wild West. Everybody's kind of showing up in a lot of different ways, saying they do a lot of things that they may or may not do, and that's fine, because sometimes you've got to fake it until you make it. But there's a lot of production companies that are trying to basically work directly with brands, and I think depending on certain projects, that's totally viable and appropriate, because really maybe either the client has a specific idea of something they want,
00:55:12
Speaker
and they need executional help or production muscle, but it's the parts where it's foggier and there's a lot more work that needs to go in upfront where I would say it's pretty hard to fake the experience of being on the inside of an agency and knowing how agencies and clients collaborate during creative development. The other piece I've seen also that's a challenge for production companies is they don't know how to charge for it.
00:55:38
Speaker
Right. And I've seen this more than one company where they're getting, there's no agency involved. So they're already like, oh, this is awesome. We're kind of working directly with a big company. But the brief is 10 pages and they've got some half ass script that's like 14 minutes long and they really need like two thirties and a six.
00:56:00
Speaker
And that production company doesn't know how to capture the value because frankly, that's what Justin and I, that's what we get paid a lot of money to do is that part of that early chapter of the credit development, there's a huge value to that and there's people should be getting paid for that.
Financial Value of Creativity
00:56:16
Speaker
And I think I think a lot of production companies have struggled to figure out how to monetize that part of it because you're leaving a lot of money on the table and you're
00:56:25
Speaker
You're not showing value to that when you're only focused on the production money because that's a separate part of money. And in fact, between the two, that's the in the long run for sure is the least amount of money, you know, like the real money. And it's one of my missions of the show is to get people to understand that the real money is in the creative and in the strategy and in the value of the outcomes of the client.
00:56:51
Speaker
But you need the right people and the right roles and the subject matter experts to own that stuff so that you're not finding yourself. I'm like, wait, all of a sudden I'm running an ad agency and I really just want to be a production company. And I think that companies have to figure that out. And also, and that's why I was saying with, you know, you look at an agency and you think, well, I know the creatives. The creatives are great. We work with them all the time. We'll bring them on board. They're going to come help us and they'll help us with the client. And then now we have everything. But the
00:57:17
Speaker
a lot. Not all creatives are created equal in that way. And I think the challenge is creatives are creative and they can come up with amazing ideas, but are they really helping build the brand and help build the business? And are they concerned with the needs of that specific client? And I think when those production companies are
00:57:38
Speaker
not making the money it's because they're selling assets they're selling we will make the following assets for you we versus we will solve the following business issues that you need and that's where we come in is we solve the business issues they and they produce the assets and so that's their their lives like that's like disconnect there and part of the this whole conversation is
00:58:00
Speaker
you have to decide what you're good at and you have to be honest with yourself about what you're not good at right select and undeniable we don't bring us a website project like we we love we are consumers of websites we are visitors to websites but we don't make websites when i'm good at it we don't like it. You need to call some we can probably turn you on to some friends that might be able to do it but we are perfectly happy saying there are things that we are not
00:58:29
Speaker
not great at that are not in our wheelhouse, but here's the things that we really do focus on, building brands, video creative, like all that great stuff. And this is the danger of, this is the flip side of the Wild West of like, you can find yourself in meetings like dancing and telling clients you can do all this stuff and bring this full agency muscle, which, you know, just be careful what you wish for, because the calls will be coming from all angles. And suddenly you're like, wait, but I,
00:58:58
Speaker
I really just want to turn the cameras on and make some cool stuff." It's like, okay, cool. Yeah, I started off the show talking about my appreciation for what agencies do. I mean, I've worked in agencies, worked in brands, and I've worked in production. I find my sweet spot in production, but my experience even in production going direct to brands is just gave me a very insightful appreciation for how much work goes into client development.
00:59:22
Speaker
It is a lot of work and it's so fragile. And if you're not good at that, you're, you're, you're in it for the short term.
Long-term Client Relationships
00:59:30
Speaker
Yeah. And I think maybe sometimes production companies, not that they fail to realize, but there's, it's just not on the radar. They're working, let's say on a five week, eight week cycle, one, this project, we brought them this cool commercial. We're going to pre-production. We're going to shoot it. We're going to do the post-production.
00:59:46
Speaker
There may have been months, six months, nine months in the agency client development to get to that point. So it's almost like a wave that's like slowly growing as it's getting closer to shore and the production company is just seeing it as it.
01:00:00
Speaker
curls over and hits the shore. I mean, Justin and I worked on projects which is insane. They've gone on for a year before we finally got green lit to go then produce the campaign because they're doing research or there's do overs or the brief changes. There's a lot of work that goes into that.
01:00:22
Speaker
If you want to be an agency, quote unquote, which we don't even know, we're not even sure we want to be an agency. We're certainly not an agency. You have to be signed up for that stuff and figure out how to charge for it.
01:00:33
Speaker
Yeah, you guys have been a wealth of knowledge. I really appreciate how transparent you are. I have questions I haven't even touched yet, but I fear the show going on. Maybe we'll have to do a part two or something like that. Two part? Yeah, two part or episodic in podcast series. So I want to just end it on one last question. And so inevitably, listeners are going to be wanting to work for you. And they're going to reach out to you.
01:01:02
Speaker
And whether this is, I'm going to use you as the case study here, but I think it could be applied to anyone they want to work with.
Pitching to Undeniable
01:01:09
Speaker
What do you want them to say to you? They're going to send you, they're going to go to your website. They're going to hit, you know, they're going to find you on LinkedIn. And what do you want them, do you want them to send you a bunch of stuff? One thing that speaks to who, why, and what? Or do you want them to introduce themselves? Do you want them to say a funny joke? What's, you know, like what's the way to approach you?
01:01:32
Speaker
I think, and this is how we go try to approach clients is just before you send anything, try to figure out who it is you're talking to. So whether that's us or some other agency or whatnot.
01:01:45
Speaker
If it's us specifically, we've spent a good hour telling you what we're like and what we're about and what we do. And so if you have work that actually does that, that is funny and disruptive or bold or does those things, we'd love to see it. Just send it. Just say, hey, look, check out our reel. I think this aligns with who you guys are as a brand because blank and playback. Why? You think it aligns with us? And then it connects.
01:02:14
Speaker
where we get off put is when it's like, hey, check out our latest reel. Our spring reel is available. Let me show you our spring reel. It's like, I don't even open that link because I got to tell you, there's no thought. I'm sure that's sent to a million people.
01:02:30
Speaker
And they don't understand my brand. And I'm not going to take the time to dig through your reel to figure out if there's anything in there that I like. And so I can't imagine a client's going to do that either. So that's why with a lot of help and guidance, and James, you've helped us with this as well, is how can we be the most relevant in that conversation and make it as easy for that person to
01:02:52
Speaker
make believe the connection is going to be a good connection. So again, if you have something that's funny and awesome, that you think fits our style, look at our stuff, like look at our real and say, Hey, this is you guys do this, we do something like that to take a look at it. And then also if you ever if you do have client relationships need help, we're around, we can always help too. Yeah.
Final Thoughts and Encouragement
01:03:12
Speaker
Listeners, you've been hearing the wise words of Justin Hooper and Steve Williams from the ad agency undeniable. I hope you've enjoyed this conversation and you feel inspired to introduce yourselves to them or any other talented ad agencies like them. Justin and Steve, thank you both very much for coming on the show. All right. Thanks James. Thanks James.
01:03:36
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Crossing the Axis with James Keblis. If you're interested in joining the conversation or have a topic you'd like covered, please drop a note at keblis.com. That's K-E-B-L-A-S dot com.