grow, the refreshingly creative advertising and design agency based in Doha is celebrating their 1st year anniversary on October 8th. From humble beginnings, 2 men, one computer, one phone, grow has grown exponentially in only 12 months! " We now have 12 full time staff with another 12 freelancers (illustrators, copywriters, photographers, artworkers, website back end coding) around the world" says Anthony Ryman.
Al Fajer caught up with Anthony Ryman in their stunning studio, designed by them, reminiscent of a London or New York design studio on B-Ring Road.
Mr Ryman – tell us about your agency and what’s different about your offer?
We are truly a "glocal" agency, focused on developing brands for our increasingly global clients.
Being "glocal" means that we can offer insight into local culture and customs and communicate and articulate the essence of our clients' positioning and differentiation to a worldwide audience.
No other agency with their Head Office located in Qatar can combine 45 years of international award-winning creativity and strategic brand expertise working for some of the world's leading brands with local understanding and appreciation of Qatar's vision and the role it wants to play on the world stage. International agencies don’t spend the time on the ground to really dig deep into the local culture and understand what is valued and cherished and how to communicate this in a way that is acceptable and appreciated.
What is your USP in this context?
Obviously people. Our Creative Director has over 20 years experience in the USA and Japan and has won international advertising and design awards in those countries. I have worked for some of the best London agencies, and obviously as Fitch London Client Director in charge of the Doha Asian Games Brand, Image and Look Programme for two years prior to setting up my grow, I have developed a good understanding of the culture, the vision of Qatar, and most importantly, what needs to be done to articulate this in powerful communications.
And then there’s systems. We’ve developed powerful systems and processes gleaned from best practice of leading international agencies and we use these to help our clients define their brand and own their communication space.
And finally the brand. We are the only advertising agency whose focus is on brands. We live and breathe brands, we understand them and enjoy working with them – combining these two disciplines, linking strategic brand thinking and processes with powerful creativity, is how we create award-winning work and give our clients the winning edge.
According to your opinion, what are the risks, opportunities and chances for your clients when developing the Middle East in terms of marketing – and/or advertising campaigns?
This is really where thinking ‘glocal’ comes in. Everyone knows that Western advertising doesn’t necessarily work here in the Middle East. The trick is to dig deep to find a “BIG IDEA” that resonates with the target audience you are aiming at and yet still hold true to the core brand values that your product or service stands for, as these will hold true in all markets, otherwise the brand wouldn’t be global.
Do you incorporate sports and cultural-related sponsoring in your campaigns (e.g. Doha 2006)?
The short answer is yes we do. But again here it is about the power of our thinking with the ‘BIG IDEA’ which counts. It’s not just enough to link with sports because it’s the second largest sporting event in the world and is happening soon in Doha. We worked together with Doha Bank to develop a simple but powerful campaignable idea to link their values and ambitions around the values represented by sport i.e. dedication, teamwork, commitment, focus etc. both as an internal motivation tool and as a means of communicating their differentiation. In this way, you can make something like this work – thinking holistically and with the premise of ‘how can I add value’? with the filter of ‘is it campaignable? and ‘does it have longevity?’ .
According to your experience, what is the most favourable channel to be used in the Middle East? To what degree is it dependant on the clients’ industry?
A bit of a trick question. The answer is it depends totally on the who are you talking to? And then what do you want to say? And then you look at how are you going to say it? We advise our clients on the best channels to go for based on our experience of delivering targeted, focused communications. Ideally you would want to go for an integrated campaign, but in the Middle East the statistics show that the channel to market is heavily leveraged towards print and then TV.
Are ‘pure’ Internet campaigns targeting Middle East clients as auspicious as for example in central Europe?
The take up in Europe of Internet in terms of penetration is much higher than here in the Middle East. However having said that, the demographics of an extremely high youthful population, the ‘MTV’ generation, TV and internet literate, happy and comfortable with new technology and remarkably quick in the take-up of anything ‘new’ bodes well. But again, it’s how you play the tune. Viral campaigns are much more powerful and interesting than straight out web banners or pop-ups. What’s really interesting about web-based campaigns is that they are much more measurable and flexible.
In general: how do you rate marketing at the POS?
OK, POS for those who don’t know means ‘point-of-sale’. My view on this is that it is a necessary part of the communications process, but...
I say this on two counts: 1. Obviously it is the closest you are going to get to your customer, so it is imperative to be there and communicate effectively, especially when customer service is key to their loyalty and retention but… 2. Our ‘grow_futuretrends©’ research indicates that there is a real backlash among customers to being ‘sold’ to by someone who doesn’t necessarily want to be there and more importantly – it’s this element of ‘being sold’ to that customers are rebelling against. The future is more about the power of the sale resting in the hands of the customer, where they switch you on and off at will and ask for what they need, when they need it, to suit their particular and individual needs and tastes.
What is your opinion concerning event marketing and the printing business in general? Do you think there will be a shift towards electronically broadcasted media (radio, television and internet?)
Gosh, how much time do you have?
I think there’s huge scope for quantum leaps in the printing business, in terms of investment in the latest technology and print processes. You lose between 7-8% of colour quality by converting digital images to film and then to plate – we have computer to print technology –it should be the benchmark.
Of course there has been a huge shift from print to electronic – but there’s still something tangible and tactile in holding a beautifully produced brochure in your hands versus a print out from an inkjet. And statistics show that people are reading more and more books – so this will not go away in the long term.
Events and event marketing are important – again it’s a way to communicate with your customer face-to-face. I think there needs to be more trade and public exhibitions as these are cost-effective and people enjoy the one-stop shop, all-under-one roof scenario, be it trade or public.
I think launch events in this region are notoriously under-creative and prescriptive – “smoke, music…reveal!” Surely we can do better!
According to your opinion, why is there few radio advertising in the Middle East?
Yes it is a pity. I like radio, but unfortunately don’t listen to it very much, preferring to choose the music I listen to and not the ravings of some inane DJ spouting platitudes at me – perhaps I am not alone!
Also in the Middle East, listening to radio is not really part of their culture. However having said that, radio forces you to be really creative to get your message across – I like it and wish we could do more of it.
I think once the competition opens up and there’s more choice relating to people’s music tastes, you’ll see more radio advertising.
What growth are you expecting (excuse the pun) for grow until 2010 and what strategies are you implementing to achieve this forecast?
Our plans to grow are to keep servicing our clients and building on those relationships, so that we grow old together, not here today gone tomorrow. Business in the Middle East is very different to Europe or America, and you really need to understand the culture. It’s about establishing trust in relationships – this is the key to doing business in the Middle East.
grow has grown by 500% in billings in the past 6 months. We’ve picked up our first global client recently and have done major advertising campaigns in Europe and GCC. We’re doing major branding work as well, developing international corporate identities for some of the region’s leading players as well as all corresponding marketing communications collateral. We’re expanding our offer and have done corporate videos and TVC’s and very soon we are going to have event management and PR in-house. We plan to open grow offices in all the major GCC capitals and expand our offer incrementally.
Obviously it can’t be all grow, grow, grow – sometimes we need to pause for breath, check our pulse, digest and consolidate. Make sure we’re delivering for our clients and continually keep growing their brands, their market share and therefore their profits. We want to win international design and advertising awards and help raise the creative and strategic bar in this region. And train up the next generation of leading creative lights as a legacy for the future.
True to its offer of a one-stop creative brand communications agency, grow has made significant progress on the Qatar advertising and design scene, winning many major blue-chip accounts such as Qatari Diar, Commercial Bank, Doha Bank, UDC, International Bank of Qatar, Carnegie Mellon, Ritz Carlton, Marriott Hotel, Ramada Hotel, Four Seasons, Al Faisal Holding, Robert Bosch, QAFAC, Chili’s. |
