Megan Pritchard: Chief Operations Director
It’s 06:30am, still dark outside. By now the morning air is slightly cooler just 15 minutes before her alarm clock strikes 06:45am.
Everything feels different. Her feet fall out of bed and hit the floor with purpose By this time she is making her first cup of coffee, headed to her ‘make-shift’ office, ready to tackle just another day that matters. This has become a regular cycle in the day of an advertising exec, the ‘new normal’ if you will.
Are people finally getting time to relax, sleep in, binge on the latest Netflix series, she wonders, or are they finishing their to-do-lists that have probably been hovering since who knows when? She chuckles at how hard at work ‘Ogilvies’ have been during this period. Passionate about what they believe into making sure they see the after. Well after all she muses, ‘Crisis punishes the dithering and rewards the committed’ …
In the ‘old normal’ everything mentioned would have seemed… normal. It’s been the way we conducted business for years. However, in the advent of the corona pandemic, let’s all just be honest here fam, how many of us are “business-at-the-top and party-at-the-bottom” minded while working from home?
My experience: typical example- it’s a Tuesday morning, I’m sitted ready to start my weekly status meeting with client X on Zoom. Half way in the meeting, I impulsively attempt to stand up and grab something and quickly realise the need to sit dead still because yonder the waist line is a pair of pajama pants and the granniest of granny slippers mama bought from Ackermans. You know those boot type slippers with the ribbon dead front and centre, velvet soft… yes, those are the real real friends.
The past few weeks have been filled with extraordinary challenges. While we work relentlessly with our clients on the short-term challenges to support their businesses and the current challenges they are facing we have also been constructively forced to find daily solutions for our very own ship to ensure it docks at the lockdown harbor once this journey has passed. Whilst there is still uncertainty about how and when the virus will be contained, what we do know for sure is that the crisis will pass. There will be winners and there will be losers. We believe, and history supports this, that agile and competitively-minded brands that get it right in the tough times, can capture competitive share and be best-placed to capitalise on the eventual rebound and beyond.
At Ogilvy, we believe the best competitive advantage our clients can have over their competitors is having strong brands. That’s why Ogilvy’s philosophy is to Make Brands Matter. It’s at the forefront of everything we do for our clients, and drives every decision we make.
During this time, here are the 10 commitments we obide by on a daily basis to ensure everything we do for the brands we manage, matter. This can be applied to our business, the brands and some can even help in our private matters on the side.
Don’t wait for recovery, adapt to change and focus investment on what is profitable now.
Continuously review product/ SKU portfolio due to changed consumer behavior.
Disruption provides opportunity, revist brand value and the differentiation thereof.
Think outside the physical brand experience. Ecommerce acceleration plan: product mix, new channels, data systems, we have it all.
Identify new growth opportunities, new occasions, new services, new relevant ways of communicating.
Maximize the value and power of exisiting customers.
Use the slowdown to innovate.
Have a long-term brand/ portfolio plan centered on changed consumer behavior.
Redesign/ optimize your go to market plan: consider product mix, geography, sales channels and customer segment focus.
Be ready for the after. Agility is a must.
For now, stay safe, stay healthy, keep positive! We will see you on the other side.
Yours in all things that matter.