“We have to stop talking about technology as if it's not our own.”

Our colleagues Gisela Grooscors, Creative Director, and Amalia Martínez, Senior Copywriter at MIG Prisma, spoke to IPMARK to discuss the state of creativity in Spain following the COVID-19 crisis.

IPMARK. We check the physical fitness of Spanish agencies. How toned is the creative muscle right now? What are the new challenges facing the creative industry? 

G/A. We feel that creativity during this period was, logically, influenced and shaped by the unique context, which was (and is): the pandemic; and by the product or service each client offers. In this context, working for an airline is not the same as working for an educational institution or a supermarket. 

In this regard, the creative muscle was challenged to respond swiftly to the change that this signified in the impact of different business models, generating new possibilities and accelerating the incorporation of digital platforms such as e-commerce, distance learning platforms; and different ways of transforming businesses with creativity, but above all, by applying innovation and combining resources. This meant a kind of triumph – if one can say so in such a context – for those who already had these resources and the right clients to implement them. In our case, we are an agency that has combined resources and works on business models associated with many sectors that have benefited. Not all of them, of course. 

And regarding the new challenges, probably a continuation – perhaps now “without the fear of innovating” – of accepting innovation as part of the business. Continuing to advance in technological integration, the use of data, and the combination of resources that enhance experiences. Closer communication with clients. What role do technology and consulting companies play, and how do they affect us or not. And whether we are going to incorporate flexibility or not in an industry that wants to surprise and be creative; and creativity requires flexibility. In fact, many people have reconnected with their creativity after a long time, regardless of our industry.  

IPMARK. Where are the creative organisations of the future heading?  

G/A. I don't know if anyone has a magic wand, but it seems clear that we are heading towards the need to periodically reinvent the business model, to work in a different way – understanding that talent requires flexibility – to work more on the ‘Inhouse-Agency’ for a better understanding of our clients' businesses, and for constant, horizontal collaboration with specialists from other disciplines. 

To all of this, we would add the increasing importance of experience-based design, the adoption of a ‘start-up’ mindset, and failure as a way of finding the right business model.  

Experiences teach us more and more how little or how much we know and how much we can learn together. Crises not only give us the opportunity (and at the same time force us) to reinvent ourselves; but also serve (and help us) to reaffirm previous decisions, paths. 

IPMARK. What real role will they play in transforming ideas into impactful actions, sustainable businesses, etc.?  

G/A. The fact that the brands let us play. They must choose whether we are the third right-back or the central midfielder. There is enormous diversity of actors converging on what was once our natural territory. If our role as generators of ideas and strategies that change inertia is trusted, we should be important again. There is too much confusion today to know how much is due to the de-positioning of our traditional role or that of the clients. 

IPMARK. New skills/abilities. Is lateral thinking no longer enough? 

This is still a necessary but no longer sufficient condition. We must incorporate new capabilities, primarily digital and technological. To coexist in a more fluid creative environment, where data and technology are fundamental for connecting ideas, channels, and people.   

IPMARK. “What if I have to team up with a bot?” Artificial Intelligence is creeping into brainstorming… How technological do creative agencies need to be – now? Have tech tools ever “saved” a campaign for them? 

All of the preceding questions would make no sense if we weren't willing to integrate the use of data intelligence as another – and fundamental – tool in our creative process. What activity nowadays can survive with its back to technology? We, at least in our agency, planners and creatives, constantly coexist with teams and software that help us to better understand the problem we have to solve and, on occasion, to find the solution precisely in technology itself, rather than in the creative idea.  

After all, creativity is not the preserve of creatives, but of all people and everything they drive and generate. Which brings us back to the essence of creativity: movement (curious, intrepid, latent, under construction…) & communicative (what is hardest for us creatives to accept is the idea that creativity today is challenged in different ways – example: data – and through different channels – example: social media) reviving the idea of sender-receiver… when we see data about what the user chose or didn't, that person is answering our message: we are communicating… that number moves as creativity and communication move. It's no longer one person in front of the television celebrating or not our creativity, now they answer us and we have to get used to that. 

IPMARK. What type of briefing is most common on a creative agency's desk right here, right now? 

AM. Lately, we've been receiving a lot of briefs from brands eager to reposition themselves. The pandemic has exacerbated this need; they've spent months on the couch and are being prescribed a new logic for the brand's relationship with its customers.  

IPMark. Do advertisers expect miracles when they knock on the door of a “very” creative agency? 

They expect us to help them find paths through the noise, to do it very quickly and for it to have a business impact. The miracle part comes when the resources we're given are scarce and the objectives impossible. Or both at the same time. And that's where another type of creativity comes in, along with a lot of passion and patience, of course.  

IPMARK. Lastly, and circling back. How does lateral thinking fit with political correctness? Have you become regulars at Autocontrol's copywriting advice sessions? Do you ever self-censor in your work? 

Advertising is a very sensitive industry to what's happening in society, and it's clear that today we're living through a stage of excessive political correctness and a very polarised society, which has a big effect on creativity. And we also have to accept that, directly or indirectly, we're a very important communication factor in society; because we also generate discourse in what we say and what we don't say. And there's a responsibility in that. We can't simply blame external factors. Advertising can't always hide behind fashionable discourse, because although fashion sells, it doesn't always do good. And we can't say that we self-censor, but we do debate more internally about the effect an idea or its development might have – among ourselves and with clients; even the words we use in proposals, we often pause and discuss them. We even consider in more detail who the protagonists of our stories are and how we can improve and offer broader spaces for consensus and diversity. We want to go further with those who dare to do so. We try every day.