14340: F-Bombing Havas.

AgencySpy posted follow-up factoids featuring the fuck-ups at Havas Chicago. Fortunately, few folks bother to visit AgencySpy anymore, which will perhaps lessen the demoralizing embarrassment experienced by the drones working at the agency—especially the few of them who fucking love it.

Regardless, the sloppy post highlighted fucking hilarious points worth noting:

• Fucking Hilarious Point 1 The White advertising agency hosts something called “Havas Faces, a series of regular discussions primarily concerning matters related to diversity and inclusion.” Of course, attendance and participation is not mandatory. And discussion topics probably involve brainstorming for the next award-winning-yet-hypocritical publicity stunt.

• Fucking Hilarious Point 2 Havas CEO and Chairman Yannick Bolloré allegedly spanked Havas Creative North America CEO and Chairman Paul Marobella and Chief Creative Officer and Chairman Jason Peterson for producing the shitty video wherein they said other shops were shitty agencies. From now on, Marobella and Peterson must let Bolloré review videos before release. Given that Bolloré landed his position via nepotism—making his credibility and credentials questionable at best—the edict is like if Jeff Sessions and Kellyanne Conway were told that everything they planned to do must first be approved by Eric Trump.

• Fucking Hilarious Point 3 Chief Creative Officer and Chairman Jason Peterson appears to be an ignorant boss. This is not uncommon in adland, where people are elevated based on ego and execution versus leadership skills. So maybe Peterson warrants some compassion for lacking the basic qualities of a legitimate leader. For example, Peterson posted an Instagram message stating the need to “fight fire with fire.” As a professional courtesy, MultiCultClassics offers this simple wisdom: “When tempted to fight fire with fire, always remember the fire department fights it with water.” People like Peterson typically require a few decades to figure this out.

• Fucking Hilarious Point 4 Chief Creative Officer and Chairman Jason Peterson appears to be an arrogant douchebag. It’s bad enough that he green-lighted the insipid installation that generated more bad press for his agency—and escalated internal chaos and morale problems for his staff. But AgencySpy claimed, “He apologized if it had offended anyone before adding, ‘I’d do it again in a minute.’” Sorry, but an apology without amends demonstrates maximum insincerity and minimal integrity.

According to AgencySpy, the offending installation has been removed and will be replaced by a breast cancer campaign. In light of all the gender-related controversies in the advertising industry and society at large, let’s hope Peterson doesn’t fuck up this self-promotional exercise too.

14084: Culturally Clueless Consultant.

Adweek reported on Brad Jakeman, who is now sporting the title of senior advisor and consultant for PepsiCo. Sorry, but the man puts the con in consultant. At the annual conference of the Advertising Research Foundation, Jakeman essentially regurgitated bullshit excuses for the infamous Pepsi-Kendall Jenner video, claiming that marketers face a conundrum (another con word!) because “the vocal minority” has a lot of influence in society.

First of all, Jakeman should not use the word “minority” when discussing work that showed complete disrespect to, well, minorities. Refusing to admit to cultural cluelessness—and blaming the problem on the offended minorities—displays ignorance of the highest order. It must also be noted that, in the case of Jakeman’s Pepsi-Kendall Jenner debacle, the majority of citizens recognized the brand’s fumble. So the man is ignorant and arrogant—a potent mix that’s too common in the marketing and advertising world.

Jakeman should do everyone a favor and simply move on from his mistakes. Poorly pontificating on corporate fails doesn’t position Jakeman as a thought leader, but rather, as a thoughtless loser.

Former PepsiCo Exec Brad Jakeman on What’s Driving So Many Kendall Jenner-like Brand Faux Pas

A divided society, social media and inadequate tools

By Lisa Lacy

Brad Jakeman, senior advisor and consultant for PepsiCo and the former president of PepsiCo’s Global Beverage Group, is no stranger to controversy as the head of the in-house creative group responsible for one of the biggest brand fails of 2017.

At the Advertising Research Foundation’s annual conference on Tuesday, Jakeman sat down with ARF president Scott McDonald to talk about brand crises like Pepsi’s maligned Kendall Jenner spot, as well as other recent brand faux pas, which he attributed in part to a divided society, the mainstream media, vocal minorities, social media and inadequate tools.

Jakeman said it sucks to be a marketer today—probably more so to work in consumer insights—because of what he called “the marketer’s conundrum.”

“I call it a conundrum because particularly with younger consumers, they are expecting the brands they do business with to stand for something, whereas maybe 10 years ago, it would have been enough to feel comfortable that brands weren’t doing harm,” he said. “Now they expect not just [that brands] won’t do harm, but they’ll take a point of view and make society better.”

This in turn lets brands engage more deeply with consumers by discussing meaningful topics.

“Generally, it’s an exciting time—brands are expected to attach themselves to issues that make society in some way better,” Jakeman said.

At the same time, there are two sides to most issues, and brands must understand opposing views as well, and most tools for marketers don’t provide insights on what Jakeman called “the vocal minority.”

“Most cases of the brand faux pas, where brands have been misinterpreted in social statements or facts … came from a vocal minority empowered by broad-reaching social platforms that then feed into the mainstream media,” Jakeman said. “That’s the world we live in right now.”

Most analytics tools are focused on a target audience and how it will respond, but just because someone is not likely to buy a product doesn’t mean they won’t comment on the message.

“We are trained as insights people and marketers to look for gross positives and negatives,” Jakeman said. “We’re looking for ‘Do X percent of people like [or] dislike it; are they moved by it or not?’ when in actual fact you can find yourself in hot water as a consequence of one to two people who happen to have a Twitter following of hundreds of thousands who are a smaller group in society that has a particular issue to move forward and don’t respond positively to your work.”

And when brands don’t have the tools to see outliers and understand where the brand risks are, missteps happen.

“In the last 12 months, whether it was the H&M issue, the Dove issue, whether it was the Pepsi issue, … we have lived through big brands wandering into places they did not intend to wander into,” Jakeman said. “What amuses me is when you look and everyone jumps and calls them idiots and says they didn’t research or it was made by a rogue group … no, none of that is true. It’s just that the work that big brands publish today is under much more scrutiny by many more people in a much more divided society than it has ever been ever before.”

Jakeman’s hypothesis: The tools the industry has traditionally relied on to make sure the work is having the desired effect are not as relevant in the world in which content is now published.

“At a minimum, the tools we have today have to be augmented,” Jakeman said. “I think tools today have to be profoundly changed.”

Jakeman also advised brands to replicate the context in which consumers see creative as closely as possible because the media is in a rush to put out clickbait headlines sourced from Reddit and Twitter trends, and consumers are rushing to judge brands on that basis.

“The example I give is the Dove issue—somebody extracted three seconds of footage out of something much larger, and despite years of work, Dove has done for African-Americans and women, everyone was quick to rush to, ‘Aha!’—that is the real … darker, more devious insight, and that’s terrible that we live in that society,” he said. “There are the keyboard warriors, and all of a sudden, Unilever is dealing with a brand issue. I lived through a similar story on Pepsi, and it was very unfortunate.”

But Jakeman said caution isn’t the answer.

“Brands are now in this state of kind of paralysis—a state of, ‘Oh, my god, the worst thing that can happen is if a group rises against us,’” he said. “Get over it. It will happen at some point if you want to be a relevant brand.”

To protect a brand from long-term damage, Jakeman said, first consider whether the issue is something the brand can credibly contribute to or whether it will be accused of jumping on the bandwagon. Then, make sure the space aligns with the brand’s values and, finally, assume there will be an issue.

“And when you have the issue, don’t let the perceived wisdom of old-school thinking take over—which is, ‘Let’s hunker down and apologize and wait for the story to go away,’” Jakeman said. “If you just hunker down and apologize and say nothing, you leave the last chapter to be written by pundits.”

12306: CP+B To Conquer China…?

Little Black Book reported Crispin Porter + Bogusky elevated VP, Executive Planning Director Jason De Turris to Chief Strategy Officer; plus, the White advertising agency plans to ship him off to Hong Kong to oversee global strategy on the Infiniti account and organize the opening of CP+B’s Hong Kong office. As previously reported, CP+B won the Infiniti account in an extended shootout, despite displaying deficiencies per the original RFP. Specifically, the shop had zero presence in China and Hong Kong, priority markets for Infiniti. The client assigned Anomaly, a sister White agency of CP+B’s in the MDC Partners holding company, to cover the China and Hong Kong markets until CP+B could establish its own office in the area.

CP+B President Steve Erich gushed, “Jason is a courageous and strategic thinker who is able to combine all the necessary elements for understanding and moving a brand forward through different challenges and across multiple cultures.” De Turris added, “CP+B has always been about creating an environment for the bravest possible work to live. I’m looking forward to exporting our culture to new regions while we work to elevate Infiniti’s reputation.”

Really? Experience and history show that Erich and De Turris are full of shit—and arrogant to boot.

Erich’s contention that De Turris is qualified to “combine all the necessary elements for understanding and moving a brand forward through different challenges and across multiple cultures” is optimistically delusional. Leave it to White admen to believe they can colonize and conquer the undiscovered country.

The press release stated De Turris has “managed strategy for the global launches of game-changing brands and led brand strategy for Rolex through the global recession, helping to build their first global targeting model.” Can’t comment on the alleged “game-changing brands,” but running brand strategy globally for Rolex is hardly impressive, as the watchmaker has enjoyed a global identity—and a White Eurocentric one at that—for far longer than De Turris or Erich have been alive.

De Turris’ comments were pretty questionable too, especially when he declared, “I’m looking forward to exporting [the CP+B] culture to new regions while we work to elevate Infiniti’s reputation.” Um, the CP+B culture has been consistently culturally clueless—and exporting it is the equivalent of delivering a contagious virus. If there’s a reputation in need of elevation, it belongs to CP+B.

As adland and clients continue to grow globally, diversity will absolutely play a critical role in achieving success, ultimately requiring collaboration and cultural competency from all key players. Sorry, but White adpeople—coming from an industry that has denied diversity for decades—lack the character, comprehension and capabilities to lead the charge. Hopefully, CP+B will minimally provide De Turris with Rosetta Stone tutorials.

CP+B Names Jason De Turris Chief Strategy Officer

Jason previously held the position of VP, Executive Planning Director

CP+B announced today that it has named Jason De Turris, who until now has held the position of VP, Executive Planning Director, to Chief Strategy Officer. In his new role, De Turris will relocate to Hong Kong to oversee global strategy on the Infiniti account. He will also focus on opening CP+B’s Hong Kong office, which will be key in servicing the global leadership of Infiniti, as well as look to build the CP+B culture and brand throughout Asia and continue to provide global thought leadership across offices. In the near future a Head of North American Planning will be named who will be his counterpart in North America.

“Jason is a courageous and strategic thinker who is able to combine all the necessary elements for understanding and moving a brand forward through different challenges and across multiple cultures,” said Steve Erich, President, CP+B. “Winning Infiniti was a team effort and he played an instrumental role in making it happen. Which all together makes him a terrific person to help lead CP+B’s physical entry into Asia. This really begins a new chapter for CP+B.”

At CP+B, De Turris has worked across the agency’s leading brands including Hotels.com, Grey Poupon, Best Buy and Xbox One, and has played an key role, working closely with CP+B’s product innovation and brand experience designers to create two premium spirits brands: Angel’s Envy Bourbon and Papa’s Pilar Rum. During the course of his career, at Ogilvy & Mather, Deutsch and JWT, he’s managed strategy for the global launches of game-changing brands and led brand strategy for Rolex through the global recession, helping to build their first global targeting model. His experience ranges from the luxury category to necessity categories.

“CP+B has always been about creating an environment for the bravest possible work to live. I’m looking forward to exporting our culture to new regions while we work to elevate Infiniti’s reputation. We have a massive opportunity and adventure ahead and it’s an honor to be a part of this exciting new stage in the agency’s global growth,” said De Turris.

6485: Trust Me, The Typical Adman Is Pathetic.

The truth is, the problem with TNT series Trust Me has nothing to do with the cultural cluelessness of its creators. Or their limited imagination and subpar writing skills.

No, the core issue is the lack of inherent drama in the advertising business. Think about it. The few successful TV programs set in adland environments made the industry secondary—or even tertiary—to the main stories. Thirtysomething and Mad Men have spotlighted human conflict and emotion well ahead of hatching campaigns. Hell, Bewitched realized hocus-pocus hijinks trump commercial productions. Haven’t most of us watched focus groups that were more compelling than this dreck?

Trust Me clings to the delusional belief that audiences will be interested in our craft. It doesn’t help that the main characters are mediocre adpeople, and their agency is ordinary at best. Focusing on a dull job and hackneyed executives leads to a boring viewing experience.

Reports indicate ratings are tumbling like, well, the advertising industry. And like the advertising industry, the only hope for Trust Me involves executing radical changes. If the show’s creators hold true to their professional backgrounds—and White male arrogance—don’t bet on seeing any attempt to improve.

In the end, Trust Me remains painfully accurate on so many levels.