Showing how Media works

The anticipation tinged with trepidation made it feel like a new university term and as the first day progressed it became clear that an Apprentice-like challenge was to unfold. For 96 executives from the regional media and agency fraternity, it was the closest they came to attending a media university, but with one crucial difference: the approach was more practical than academic.

The industry's first extensive media training initiative -- MediaWorks -- brought together media owners, mentors and an advertiser with a genuine brief to pitch during four very intense days at the Sukothai Hotel in Bangkok in mid-March. Organisers Media and Branded simulated as much of the frenzied pre-pitch atmosphere they could for the training course. And for good measure, a couple of curve balls -- in the form of repeated changes to the brief -- were thrown in, this being a training workshop that was also seeking to challenge attendees. The impetus for this initiative was the often-heard complaint that the industry lacked a proper training programme to develop young talent. Indeed, human resources companies have often cited the lack of training as a key reason for the difficulties faced by the industry in both attracting and retaining fresh blood. This at a time when issues ranging from intense media fragmentation, shrinking prime-time audiences, rising ad fatigue levels and growing affluence have conspired to make the media landscape a truly complex one for young talent to navigate, let alone master. "Mediaworks was designed as a regional training initiative to bring young stars from all walks of advertising across Asia together under one roof to work on a competitive pitch with two key objectives; to learn and to make new friends." said Branded CEO Jasper Donat.

During the course, participants were divided into teams of around 10 for a total of 10 groups. Leading industry executives from across the region acted as mentors for each team. Greg Paull, principal of remuneration and review consultancy R3, chaired the workshop.

Coming from 14 markets in the region, participants were understandably hesitant at first. But the reticence evaporated soon after the task at hand was announced: a competitive pitch 18 hours later.

The brief generously provided by Bacardi Thailand required participants to design a media solution from scratch for the shootout on the third day.

Mahesh Madhaven, Bacardi Thailand managing director, selected Dewars Special Reserve, a premium Scotch whisky, for the challenge. "We ultimately decided on Dewars because it is a new brand in an extremely competitive category," said Madhavan. "We thought it would be good to see the groups give it a shot and we knew it wasn't going to be easy." The teams were asked to create a communications strategy to launch Dewars into a make-believe market called 'AdverThaiSing' and ensure it achieved a five per cent market share within six months. A budget of US$6 million for 12 months, from July 2005 to end July 2006, was allocated for the task. Participants also had to ensure that the brand positioning -- 'Dewars Special Reserve enhances your moments of enjoyment' -- would be communicated effectively to the target segment: young, sophisticated, male scotch drinker aged 26 to 36, who is worldly, well educated, intelligent and socially connected.

Keeping it real, participants were also tasked with developing a team and compensation proposal for the review. So intense was the competition and the scale of the challenge, most participants chose to forgo an evening at a bar, which Bacardi had planned to sponsor. And with the clock ticking, teams also chose to go without sleep to crack the brief. "The commitment and standard of the delegates has been impressive," observed Paull. "About 80 per cent of teams stayed up throughout the night to work on new business ideas. They were also completely unflappable as we threw in 10 unexpected changes to the brief." To help participants along, they were provided with brief background information on the marketplace, availability and distribution, cost, competition, perception, usage and attitudes, issues including legal, social, environmental, political, ethical and economical, consumer insights and product insights. Consumer and market data for AdverThaiSing was based on a fusion of real data for the Asian region, which was put together by ACNielsen and presented to delegates by Nielsen Media Research's Forrest Didier, the managing director for Asia-Pacific, and Alexandre Callay, director of client service. Key media owners cum sponsors "pitched" their offerings to teams on the second day to inform participants of the inventory and media possibilities available. Among them were Toby Hayward, executive vice-president for advertising sales of MTV, speaking on the television medium; Shirley Dirkin, CEO of Texon Media in Hong Kong, on the potential of outdoor; MSN's head of regional sales Asia, Jonathan Baron and market insights mananger Europe Anita Turvey on online; Lesley Kelly, managing director of sales for Southeast Asia and Australasia for the Asian Wall Street Journal, on launch possibilities in print; and Branded's Donat on below-the-line support. Throughout the second day, inspiration and practical tips were also dished out in equal measure.

Chris Jaques, CEO of Y&R and Wunderman, had participants standing on their chairs while he talked about 'Reaching the big idea', underlining what it really takes to create a powerful and innovative media solution.

From a veteran of a string of successful media shootouts, Genelle Sharples, regional training and development director for MindShare, came practical tips on how to win the pitch. "Address your clients' business needs and focus on building an enduring relationship, specifically stop talking about yourself or your agency and demonstrate how you can build their business; no client will ever say 'I wish you had presented for longer' so avoid 'death by powerpoint' and create the opportunity to have a dialogue."

She added: "Test the strength of your ideas by expressing your entire presentation in three to five slides and lastly motivate your team by deciding what you want to learn from the experience of pitching."

Through all this seemingly frenetic activity, the mentors guided their charges on their mission.

"Most of the time, the role was as a facilitator, an independently positioned person who could keep them on track, ask pertinant questions and help guide them along. At times I deliberately played the role of difficult client asking tricky questions to help them seek other alternatives and/or to defend their own point of view," said MindShare North Asia CEO, Mark Patterson, a mentor.

On pitch day, despite the significant lack of sleep among delegates and the mentors, possibly for slightly different reasons, the excitement in the ballroom was palpable. Participants finetuned their presentation, rehearsed the drill and anxiously waited their turn. "It's been an amazing experience, quite mind-boggling," said Sanjeet Saha, a media planner with MindShare India. "The challenges faced at MediaWorks are utterly true to real life and we brought to the table a range of different perspectives, media tools and software to meet a common objective."

Long hours spent brainstorming and working as a team also stripped away the hesitancy of the first day.

"There were hugs and tears and mobile phone numbers being exchanged on the last morning during the group photos," said Patterson, whose team made it through to the final three. "It was a very heartening and heartwarming experience to see a multitude of cultures and experience levels thrown together and getting on so well."

Participants agreed, saying the key thing they would take away from MediaWorks was the invaluable new experience gained from working with different cultures as well as greater confidence in their newly-honed presentation skills. Pitches were carried out in the afternoon of the third day. Team were given 35 minutes to present thier case to a selection of mentors and clients including the Bacardi Thailand marketing executives and also Johnson & Johnson Indochina managing director Philip Lynch. An intensive 10-minute Q&A session followed the presentations.

In the end, the Blue Sky team emerged as winners of the inaugural event. The judges cited the team's clear, strong and creative central idea in driving all that followed. It was also felt that the team's belief in their idea was clearly communicated by the confident manner in which they conducted their presentation. Each member of Blue Sky received MediaWorks-branded iPod Shuffles and will be awarded their trophy in Hong Kong at the 2005 Media Agency of the Year Awards in December.

Blue Sky wasn't the only team that came in for praise. Initiative Tokyo's president and head of North Asia, Rob Fitzgerald, who mentored Blue Sky, was quick to add: "There wasn't one team pitch that I saw which didn't contain at least one or two strong communication ideas which could be put in front of a client in a real pitch." The client in this case was equally impressed. "I was truly amazed to see some of the recommendations by the teams," said Madhavan.

"Given that they did have just around 18 hours to prepare, what was surprising was that some of the solutions recommended were being used in the marketplace by competitors and some of it was even being used by us. It just goes to show that a creative group of young minds can literally break down competitive barriers."