Spikes Asia: Are you creating a content monster or are you creating purposeful content?

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Udara Withana on stage.jpgBy Udara Withana, Head of Strategy, Dentsu Singapore and Jatinder Sandhu, Creative Director, Dentsu Singapore.

Dentsu Singapore’s creative director, Jatinder Sandhu, and head of strategy, Udara Withana took to the stage on day one at Spikes Asia 2018 to deliver ‘four steps to creating purposeful content and why it matters’.  

– Most brands are guilty of feeding the content monster. As brands grow, there are different needs for content. Right from impressing investors to showcasing employees and creating content for various other occasions. Which is why we see a lot of wastage in this space.

– Purposeful Content framework is a move to optimize the use of content across the customer journey. It is about creating content across the consumer purchase journey to drive conversion using design thinking principles.

– Once you’ve done your content blueprint, there are four key elements to bringing this framework to life.  

Hard-sell vs building a brand tribe  

It is important to look beyond the façade of your audience and truly understand the key motivations and aspirations of them. Canon had a problem that people were using their phone cameras instead of purchasing new ones. Handheld cameras were becoming a little obsolete.

The insight we worked with was that people follow their passions and not products. The big idea we developed was that we worked on smaller target groups and had personal communication.

Isolation vs collaboration  

Brands can share certain brand properties by collaboration. We had to work on a campaign for ‘Land Transport Authority of Singapore’. If a train is late by a minute, people take to social media to complain. The big idea was a message by real people for the people of Singapore.

Descriptive vs entertaining  

We always remember things that entertain us. That holds true for digital ads also. For Subway, We had to sell real Aussie beef in the land of chicken-rice. 

Sandhu explained how the agency went ahead with the communication. “Singaporeans’ love for authentic flavours wasn’t associated with Subway. We had to dramatise the effect of real Aussie Beef.”  

Announcing vs telling a story  

The fourth point the duo put forward was about the importance of telling a story. Withana said, “Clients often say that they want to announce a product to the world. But, we need to tell a story instead.”

The case to support this point was what Dentsu conceptualised for CarouPay (a payment app in Singapore). Sandhu added, “The insight we worked on was about not telling them how technically great it is, but how it will make the life of people better.”