Artificial Intelligence has fundamentally reshaped the advertising landscape, touching every phase of a campaign from initial conception to final optimization. In this interview, Sergio Lopez Ferrero, global CEO, Omnicom Production, tells Kartikay Kashyap how production houses are working to become strategic partners to brands as AI speeds up the entire ad creation process. Edited excerpts.
What do brands need to do to connect with consumers in an AI-tech- and data-driven era?
It is becoming increasingly difficult for brands to connect with consumers. If you see the trend in the last few years, the notion at work has been ‘more is better’. The practice of performance marketing is still very new. It has only been about a decade since brands have leaned into it. And the best part of it is that the outcomes can be calculated and measured. But the challenging part is that brands have been overdoing it a lot which leads to consumers being bombarded with ads and content wherever they go.
We now know that the notion of ‘more is better’ is not the way forward. In fact, as per our internal data in 80% of the cases, showing no ad to a consumer is better than showing a bad ad. The recent trend of personalisation can be the answer to connect with consumers. People today want personalised experiences when they are shopping, listening to music or watching content. The other thing that brands can focus on is delivering experience — creating event properties where brands can connect with the audiences in an organic way.
That makes events one more platform to deal with… How can agencies that have cut their teeth in a broadcast media ecosystem juggle all these in a meaningful way?
Production sits at a very privileged point. It is the common denominator for everybody. We sit at a place where we have all the creative DNA and where all the data can be connected and optimised. That scaled and optimised data needs a specialised space. That’s how we can bring out the wildest ideas that can be scaled, measured and optimised. This how we can create ad campaigns for a brand with a single voice optimised for different platforms. So the voice of the brand will remain the same across platforms but content for television ad campaign will be different from the website.
What skills must creators and producers possess to stay relevant in that scenario?
What artificial intelligence has done is that it has made the logistics of creating something a lot simpler. For instance, if we are shooting for a commercial which involves traveling to a remote location, or which includes explosions, that can be done with AI. It saves time, money and there is no risk of anyone getting hurt. This free ups the producers to add to the creative side of things for the client. Now it is not just about making a TV commercial. We need to think about the creative collaterals, how it will look on other platforms and mediums. So the producer becomes a partner for the client to handle the content experience. On the creative side, I see that individual AI creators are moving much faster than the production industry. Production houses still fall behind on having a point of view around the use of AI in the production process.
Speed used to be the measure of a production shop in a pre-AI era. What is the new currency?
Production used to be a playful industry and continues to be one. But being playful is not the only requirement anymore. The industry has matured from being someone who would make or create things for other people to activating change for clients. So it is a journey of being strategic. The production industry has moved beyond being an executional arm to a more strategic partner.