00:00:00
well the arena of marketing like many
00:00:02
others has seen quite a few shifts in
00:00:04
the last few years for a variety of
00:00:06
different reasons there are the
00:00:08
expectations of consumers as well as the
00:00:11
impact of artificial intelligence and
00:00:13
many others pleasure to be joined here
00:00:15
in Studio by Dominic galello who is
00:00:17
managing director and head of digital
00:00:19
for Bridgepoint he is also the former
00:00:22
Chief marketing officer at Bumble group
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nice to meet you Dominic thanks for a
00:00:25
few moments thanks for having me I
00:00:27
mentioned those couple of areas but
00:00:29
realistically you also have to throw in
00:00:31
the pandemic and it just feels like it
00:00:34
is a time where for a lot of different
00:00:36
sectors marketing included that we have
00:00:39
seen just a lot of pressure and angst
00:00:42
and even change that's kind of come
00:00:44
about recently how do you view kind of
00:00:46
the state of marketing I think we're uh
00:00:48
on the long trajectory of a great
00:00:50
transformation in marketing which is
00:00:52
really putting the power much more in
00:00:54
the customer seat in terms of how they
00:00:57
look at and assess different brands so
00:00:59
while brands historically were able to
00:01:01
control the narratives around what they
00:01:03
wanted to be known for famous for the
00:01:05
Advent of the pandemic put more control
00:01:08
in terms of users consuming content
00:01:10
online discussing different brands
00:01:12
online and that means overall you have
00:01:14
more brands that are having to take
00:01:16
control of their message by really
00:01:17
reflecting internally not externally in
00:01:20
terms of how they Define who they are
00:01:22
how they deliver that value to customers
00:01:24
and how they keep their values
00:01:25
consistent in everything that they do so
00:01:27
it is a huge period of transformation at
00:01:29
the moment do you even even distinguish
00:01:31
between Marketing in general but also
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digital and online only marketing as as
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how these changes are taking place you
00:01:39
know brand expectations from customers
00:01:42
are constantly evolving and accelerating
00:01:44
so certainly how they want to transact
00:01:46
with you how they want to discover your
00:01:48
products or Services those are following
00:01:50
the places that the customers are really
00:01:52
hanging out which is the internet sphere
00:01:54
and more importantly many of the more
00:01:55
emergent social platforms like Tik Tok
00:01:58
and Instagram for instance where lot of
00:02:00
Brands actually still don't have mature
00:02:01
and sophisticated strategies not just
00:02:03
for how they communicate and Market but
00:02:05
also how they transact with those
00:02:07
customers so thinking about how
00:02:09
companies can really evolve to be where
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customers are where they're spending
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time and more importantly where those
00:02:16
customers are having conversations
00:02:18
around their category or around their
00:02:19
brand is a very critical need but it's
00:02:22
been slow for Brands to really transform
00:02:24
how they go to market brands are really
00:02:26
accustomed to traditional marketing
00:02:29
campaigns and agencies that create these
00:02:31
oneway push messages versus thinking
00:02:33
about how do you inspire a community to
00:02:36
participate in your brand how do you
00:02:37
give them the tools to create content on
00:02:39
your behalf and the brands that are
00:02:41
really succeeding in the social sphere
00:02:43
are those that are being community-led
00:02:45
versus being a one-way funnel of
00:02:47
messaging that no one really cares about
00:02:48
so just off of something you said a
00:02:50
moment ago when you have companies that
00:02:52
have kind of followed pattern a for such
00:02:55
a long period of time in terms of their
00:02:57
marketing but the expectation of the
00:02:59
consumer conser has now become pattern B
00:03:02
oh yes it I mean it it's it's it's a
00:03:04
make or break for a lot of companies in
00:03:06
terms of something like brand loyalty
00:03:08
where if you're not doing enough to meet
00:03:11
the expectation of the consumer the
00:03:13
consumer is going to head off to another
00:03:15
product absolutely and some companies
00:03:16
are playing catch-up in this sphere if I
00:03:18
think about the beauty space for
00:03:19
instance Estee louder for instance
00:03:21
shifted a majority of their marketing
00:03:23
away from really traditional media
00:03:25
driven Marketing in towards more
00:03:26
influencer marketing has that been
00:03:28
successful to sty their decline not
00:03:30
necessarily there's a lot of ongoing
00:03:32
effort of transformation in that
00:03:33
business but I think you do have to
00:03:35
think not only about how you're
00:03:36
communicating with customers but also
00:03:39
how are you driving value for your
00:03:41
customers and how you create your
00:03:42
product or service customers care more
00:03:44
than ever about the values of a company
00:03:47
how do they treat their employees how do
00:03:48
they treat their suppliers how do they
00:03:50
provide transparency around their
00:03:52
environmental impact or many other types
00:03:54
of impacts they may have on society and
00:03:56
so it's not just about how do you
00:03:58
communicate the bells and whistles of
00:03:59
what you do it's about that endtoend
00:04:01
customer Journey as well as the endtoend
00:04:03
value creation that you do as a business
00:04:06
that's where brand is really having to
00:04:08
play a part and that's where marketers
00:04:09
are being stretched away from just
00:04:11
thinking about what's the latest
00:04:12
campaign the latest message to how do I
00:04:14
partner with my procurement team or my
00:04:16
finance team or my operations team in
00:04:19
terms of how do we uphold the values of
00:04:21
the company that are the reason people
00:04:23
choose us the reason people stay with us
00:04:26
overall into the customer experience in
00:04:27
terms of the connection with the
00:04:29
consumer and I'll use your former life
00:04:32
at at Bumble as the example here in the
00:04:35
world or the space of dating apps yes
00:04:37
where you're trying to make that social
00:04:39
connection to begin with what are the
00:04:41
challenges that are out there right now
00:04:43
for for those companies so if you think
00:04:45
about many dating apps they historically
00:04:47
relied in some ways around the great
00:04:50
visibility that digital channels
00:04:52
provided in terms of the ability to
00:04:53
Target ability to build lookalike models
00:04:56
ability to do quite a lot of
00:04:57
sophisticated types of marketing to
00:04:59
drive high quality customers into a
00:05:01
network but the reality of how dating
00:05:03
apps grow is not outside in it is inside
00:05:06
out it is about how many high quality
00:05:09
good chats can you create in your
00:05:11
ecosystem and that requires strong
00:05:13
ecosystem balance and so how do you then
00:05:16
ensure that you're able to deliver a
00:05:18
strong ecosystem a healthy ecosystem
00:05:20
that requires a lot of hand-to-hand
00:05:22
combat what I call which is a lot of
00:05:24
community building it's about going into
00:05:26
neighborhoods it's about meeting with
00:05:28
people understanding where they exist
00:05:30
and then driving the right Partnerships
00:05:32
with ambassadors with events or with
00:05:33
anything else to really drive that
00:05:35
ecosystem there's really not a lot of
00:05:37
scale in that type of model uh when you
00:05:39
first are doing that type of
00:05:41
intervention but the net effect of you
00:05:43
driving a healthier ecosystem means more
00:05:46
good chats more dates more people
00:05:49
talking about you know Becky or Daniel
00:05:51
who they met on that dating app and
00:05:53
actually therefore more top of funnel
00:05:54
coming into the dating app and so the
00:05:56
companies that are able to do the hard
00:05:58
growth strategy which is brand building
00:06:01
community building and building a strong
00:06:03
ecosystem are more successful than the
00:06:05
lazy marketers who are using digital
00:06:08
tools as a crutch to shortcut their way
00:06:11
to success so that's that's I guess the
00:06:13
unique tonomy that you're talking about
00:06:14
here because when you're talking about
00:06:16
building all those different components
00:06:18
the the chats the dates Etc you're
00:06:21
relying on the component of the consumer
00:06:23
themselves to factor into that that
00:06:26
level of success you know the the
00:06:27
community is in many ways the most
00:06:30
important channel right why are you
00:06:31
paying for media Impressions on a
00:06:34
channel that no one's paying attention
00:06:35
to when as a dating app you've got
00:06:37
millions of people who are really
00:06:39
affixed to your platform and really
00:06:40
engaged not only on a functional basis
00:06:43
but also emotionally with your brand
00:06:45
those are the people you want to become
00:06:47
your ambassadors and really the notion
00:06:49
for any company the implication for any
00:06:51
company is that brand and marketing is
00:06:53
not so much about pouring the funnel
00:06:55
from the outside it's about how do you
00:06:57
nurture and educate your own customers
00:07:00
to be Advocates on your behalf that's
00:07:02
really where scale and unlock comes from
00:07:04
and that was certainly a recipe for
00:07:05
success for Bumble so now here we are in
00:07:08
2024 and we're getting into the time of
00:07:12
artificial intelligence and we know that
00:07:16
seemingly it feels like every sector is
00:07:18
being impacted by AI in some fashion one
00:07:22
way or the other how is it impacting
00:07:24
marketing already and where do you see
00:07:26
it going in the future you know so for
00:07:28
the world of marketing in particularly
00:07:29
for Brands you of course a lot of the
00:07:31
costs towards doing marketing are
00:07:33
significantly reduced the ability to
00:07:35
generate huge amounts of content that
00:07:37
are really required to communicate with
00:07:39
customers in a very personalized way
00:07:41
there's a lot of opportunity there but I
00:07:43
think we shouldn't forget that the
00:07:45
fundamentals of brand building which is
00:07:47
about a clear and cogent idea that
00:07:50
customers resonate with that is imbued
00:07:52
throughout your customer experience is
00:07:54
still required and my concern is that a
00:07:56
lot of the conversation around this AI
00:07:59
as a tool is shortcutting many of the
00:08:01
hard things that Brands need to do to
00:08:03
really effectively wind regardless of
00:08:06
whether or not we're in the AI age of
00:08:07
course we're capitalizing a lot of those
00:08:09
opportunities particularly within the
00:08:11
Bridgepoint portfolio in terms of how
00:08:13
we're leveraging these Technologies but
00:08:15
it doesn't undercut the need for strong
00:08:17
strategy strong foundations to succeed
00:08:19
and that's seemingly one of the
00:08:21
questions I think a lot of people are
00:08:22
asking because a lot of people assume
00:08:24
that as AI has kind of come into the mix
00:08:26
and will come into the mix even further
00:08:28
that it's going to take over for a lot
00:08:30
of that decision process but the human
00:08:32
component and and kind of the theorizing
00:08:35
is still in your mind it's going to
00:08:36
remain as important as anything as we
00:08:38
move forward I think it'll you know
00:08:40
humans will play less of a producer role
00:08:42
more of an editorial role in many
00:08:44
scenarios and and the reality from a
00:08:46
marketing standpoint in many ways is how
00:08:48
do you ensure the best resonance with
00:08:50
that customer well that Insight needs to
00:08:52
be generated in many ways from a human
00:08:54
of course you can collect that data
00:08:55
through many other tools like artificial
00:08:57
intelligence provides but creativ ity
00:09:00
still sits at the heart of how people
00:09:01
connect with Brands and that's not
00:09:03
something you can necessarily fully test
00:09:06
and automate your way to it does require
00:09:08
that human empathy and understanding
00:09:10
that is still required now that ability
00:09:11
to augment that insight and put it into
00:09:14
production huge opportunity but I
00:09:16
wouldn't totally rule out the role and
00:09:18
importance of humans in really driving
00:09:20
that connection between a brand and its
00:09:21
customer as being very critical and so a
00:09:24
platform as successful as it may be with
00:09:27
its online component is just as good as
00:09:30
the people that are working behind it
00:09:31
yeah absolutely and you still need an
00:09:33
agile team that can evolve with probably
00:09:35
the changing talent and organizational
00:09:37
requirements in an AI driven age of
00:09:40
course better cost structure the more
00:09:41
efficient you can be but nonetheless
00:09:43
what what is going to make you
00:09:44
successful is not necessarily can you
00:09:46
produce content more effectively it's
00:09:48
going to be you know can you really
00:09:50
deliver a brand that people proactively
00:09:52
choose that they are willing to
00:09:53
recommend to other adjacent audiences
00:09:56
that are like the customer you want to
00:09:57
pursue do companies though do they still
00:09:59
have to be a little bit worried maybe
00:10:02
worri is not the right word but have to
00:10:05
be aware of the component of what AI can
00:10:08
bring from a cost savings perspective in
00:10:11
regards to that overall bottom line
00:10:13
growth that the company's looking for
00:10:15
abolutely when you're talking about you
00:10:17
don't want to overdo it relying on the
00:10:19
AI and still you want to be able to to
00:10:21
make the best the best profit that you
00:10:23
can so we as Bridgepoint invested across
00:10:25
a number of different sectors and across
00:10:27
those sectors we've done a lot of work
00:10:29
to understand whether or not a company
00:10:31
is potentially at some disintermediation
00:10:33
risk which means market demand Falls
00:10:35
because AI can do the job of the company
00:10:38
and some part of its value second is it
00:10:40
changes the competitive dynamics of an
00:10:42
industry you think about software where
00:10:44
you can ship more productively than ever
00:10:46
before the market demand may R uh remain
00:10:49
but actually the way you deliver that
00:10:50
value becomes more competitively Intense
00:10:52
or you just have some pure operational
00:10:54
leverage and so we're really focused
00:10:56
across those three different categories
00:10:58
in terms of what is the stance you
00:11:00
should therefore take and within the
00:11:01
disruption potential category where
00:11:04
there may be a potential impact of
00:11:06
disintermediation by AI we're actually
00:11:08
recommending those companies become AI
00:11:10
first companies in many ways they have
00:11:12
an incumbency advantage of some
00:11:14
specialism that they've exist that has
00:11:16
existed within the business for some
00:11:18
years they probably have some
00:11:19
proprietary data it's up to them to
00:11:21
leverage and accelerate that incumbency
00:11:24
advantage with these very Democratic
00:11:26
tools with these Aid driven tools to
00:11:28
better service the customer and so it's
00:11:30
really a a period of transformation for
00:11:33
many businesses particularly on the more
00:11:35
impacted end and so what we're looking
00:11:36
for with our management teams is the
00:11:38
ability to experiment a willingness to
00:11:41
not only exploit these Technologies
00:11:43
within their existing business model but
00:11:45
also to explore new potential business
00:11:47
models within the safety of their
00:11:49
existing model so there's a lot of
00:11:50
change certainly happening at the moment
00:11:52
it touches all functions are there
00:11:53
components then of that learning and
00:11:56
that building out moving forward that
00:11:58
also to a degree tie back into what we
00:12:00
went through with the pandemic and I had
00:12:01
said because I've asked a lot of CEOs
00:12:03
this in the last three years about are
00:12:05
there elements of your operation that
00:12:08
you changed because you had to because
00:12:10
of the pandemic that ended up being
00:12:12
better for you overall longer term is it
00:12:14
the same in in some cases with marketing
00:12:16
I I I think there's going to be
00:12:18
consistent transformation of the
00:12:19
marketing organization you should see
00:12:21
and expect a significant bias towards
00:12:24
more creativity driven Talent versus
00:12:26
production driven Talent uh and those
00:12:28
that are historically in a production
00:12:30
level role through the ability to
00:12:33
manipulate content through human input
00:12:35
will be able to actually better drive in
00:12:37
many ways the consistency and quality of
00:12:39
output that they that a brand requires
00:12:41
of its content much more so I think the
00:12:43
roles of teams are going to advance very
00:12:46
very rapidly we see that within the
00:12:47
agency businesses in particular if you
00:12:49
think about how all the holding
00:12:50
companies have communicated their
00:12:53
organizational transformation plans you
00:12:55
know they're investing in these
00:12:56
underlying technologies that their
00:12:58
strategist in particular are going to be
00:13:00
able to leverage and I think we'll see
00:13:01
that transformation happen but you know
00:13:03
it is still many ways early days most
00:13:05
companies are still crawling not even
00:13:07
walking and so over the coming years I
00:13:09
think this transformation will play out
00:13:12
uh in in more of a gradual Pace in some
00:13:14
ways than the very hard disruption that
00:13:16
the pandemic uh imposed on a lot of
00:13:18
businesses so is that the next level of
00:13:20
innovation that we're going to see play
00:13:22
out in marketing I think what you should
00:13:24
expect is greater personalization uh of
00:13:26
Brands certainly um but will it be sort
00:13:29
of transformational by comparison to
00:13:31
many of the fundamentals that I think
00:13:32
are still important I don't think so I
00:13:34
think you'll see an explosion of content
00:13:36
but what ultimately wins is really high
00:13:38
quality content and that requires a
00:13:40
human sense that AI isn't necessarily
00:13:42
able to immediately deliver certainly
00:13:44
today let me finish up on this because
00:13:46
we've also talked a lot about brand sure
00:13:48
on this show and it seems like companies
00:13:50
now are more focused on their brand than
00:13:53
ever before because of the concern of
00:13:56
loss of consumer brand loyalty loss
00:13:59
everything kind of in this conversation
00:14:01
that we've had over here the last 15
00:14:03
minutes is it is it the same way for you
00:14:05
that you see companies more focused on
00:14:07
it than ever before you know as as much
00:14:08
as I'm a marketer marketer is really
00:14:10
sort of dating brand is the marriage
00:14:12
that's right and that's right it's very
00:14:14
important that a brand really considers
00:14:16
and a company really considers what is
00:14:18
its core proposition how does that
00:14:20
proposition enable them to grow as a
00:14:23
business not only in what they do today
00:14:25
but what they could do tomorrow so it's
00:14:26
an innovation map in many ways secondly
00:14:29
driving alignment of the customer
00:14:31
experience and you'd be shocked how many
00:14:32
businesses don't speak the same way
00:14:34
don't behave the same way across
00:14:36
different functions of the organization
00:14:38
or different products that customers
00:14:39
touch and so I think this radical
00:14:41
transformation of power away from the
00:14:44
brand into the customer means that the
00:14:46
brands stand naked in the eyes of their
00:14:48
customer and you've got to make sure you
00:14:50
are buttoned up in terms of how you
00:14:52
behave how you operate how you treat
00:14:54
your employees how you treat your
00:14:55
suppliers and ultimately how you treat
00:14:57
your customers that's going to go that
00:14:59
much farther because customers will then
00:15:01
recommend you to other people versus you
00:15:03
trying to leverage ineffective
00:15:05
television or digital digital media
00:15:07
channels to shout your way to success
00:15:09
that's just not an effective recipe for
00:15:11
Success anymore Dominic great to meet
00:15:12
you thanks very much absolute pleasure
00:15:14
thanks for having me thank you Dominic
00:15:15
gello who is managing director head of
00:15:17
digital at Bridgepoint
