January 15, 2020 • 9 mins
James Kotecki of C Space Studio speaks with Christian Juhl , Global CEO, GroupM.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, I'm James co Techie. You're listening to the C
Space Studio podcast interviews with technology, media and marketing leaders
from c ES. Hi. I am James K Techy. You're
here in the C Space studio with me at CS.
Here with us is Christian Jewelry, Global CEO of Group M.
(00:22):
Thank you so much, thanks for having me for being here.
So can you please first contextualized for us what Group
M is and how that fits into the broader ecosystem. Sure, so,
Group M is the media investment firm for w PP.
So we're the largest met investment group in the world. Uh,
it's just last year I went over fifty billion dollars
in media investment UM SPACE. So that means our clients
(00:43):
trust us with their investment dollars to figure out where
they should spend their next dollar to find the right
impression to match brands and consumers. And then when you're
saying investment, you mean purchasing advertising, right does it? Does
investment mean something kind of long term? Are you talking
about specific advice? I like to think about media investment.
When you consider investment, generally, you think out what's the
return on my investment? So we think about return in
terms of either building your brand or completing a sale
(01:05):
or any of those types of things. So we work
really hard to make sure that we're measuring each one
of these impressions we put out there, whether it's a
TV AD or a digital ad or a search term,
in terms of what the overall impact can be when
you're building your brand, So you have all this data
about what you're putting out into the world, what you're
investing in, what's working, what's not, what's getting a return,
what are some of the trends you're seeing on what's working.
As we head into well, I think you have to
(01:26):
think about all the media that's out there. You know,
it's a lot of people talk about fragmentation and the
complexity ecosystem, but really, you know, we have to think
about what's working. It's about all those different interactions and
how they ladder together to understand what the complete picture
looks like for a consumer. So if you're in the
market for our sneakers or a car, you think about
all the different brand experiences you have in totality, what
(01:46):
we want to do is give the right attribution to
each one of those particular moments so you can understand
which ones you want to buy more of, which ones
you want to buy less of when you've actually completed
the sale, so you trail well off. Actually in the
media impressions, all of that's about the investment strategy, so
you can figure out what to buy next. And I
know you're dealing with so many clients, so many dollars.
Are there specific trends or just data points that you've
(02:07):
seen recently that have may be surprised you. Well, hopefully
I don't get surprised too often, or I wouldn't be
good at my job. I think you know the basic
trends around privacy, certainly government intervention. I think obviously you
know the rise of the big tech players and what's
going to happen with that, UM, the new entrance of
new players and the O T T services UM. I
think we have to really take a good look at
(02:28):
the upfronts and television and you're saying, you know, declining
viewership but increasing pricings. I think we have to think
about that's kind of an odd economic model and what
happens there a long term UM. But generally I'm pretty
optimistic about our our our place. So the upfronts for
people who don't know, is this TV event every year
where all the major the kind of the legacy. I
suppose TV networks show what they're gonna be putting on
for the new season and told advertisers please buy ads
(02:50):
on this stuff, right and um, so what what what
is your prediction for for that and how that economic
model is going to go? Do you think legacy I
think they might take issue with that. Um. But definitely
on the television side, you know, I think the upfronts
are obviously an important establishment. I think you're talking about scarcity,
and so when you have scarcity, you can look at
people take up front positions. Um. But I think it's
(03:11):
going to change. I think you know, you're seeing a
lot of our folks. It's here at CS. In fact,
we've met a lot of different partners who are changing
the way they're going to market and they're thinking about
and how do we put everything into addressable channels? And
we talk about addressable or programmatic. What's important about that
is just that you know, we really want to be
able to do is think about frequency, um viewability, being
able to really manage the flow of media impressions that
(03:33):
are much more discrete level We're not able to do
that when you buy in a traditional television format. So
as much as we can move into those formats allows
us to actually manage the shape of the media interactions
that you're going to have is to the advantage of markets.
Everything is going addressable. As you say, what do you
think is the future of traditional linear TV? One of
the themes that we've seen are just so you can
(03:53):
react to it from other people that I have interviewed
here in the C space studio is linear is not
as dead or not going away as fast as well
might think? What's your take on them? So linear? And
let's just talk about video? So video is really important. Um,
definitely the number one area where consumers interacting with brands.
I think what you might see is video becoming more
addressable in traditional formats. So just because it goes through
(04:14):
a screen doesn't mean it's a traditional TV. It can
be delivered in a dynamic way, and then the dynamic
nature of it allows you to do dynamic consertion to
create ads that are more specific for the particular person
of that audience. UM, that's what I hope to see happen.
That's certainly the weight the group downs bring to the
market to try and shape the future. Thinking about how
people used to purchase advertising and even what the upfronts
(04:35):
maybe used to represent. Is this idea that if I
can show marketers content that they personally like and they
kind of intuitively have a good feeling about it, then
they'll buy it, right And that might have been in
an era before we had all this data. Now we
do have all this data and you're obviously using that.
Are there times when intuition still comes into play and
maybe that it even clashes with data that you're getting. Well,
I think the beauty is we don't have to worry
(04:56):
about intuition and you can put you can go all
go a gut instinct for creative ads, put three amount,
test them, understand which one. In real time you can
start to understand what's resonating, what's not, and isolate and
move your with media weight behind that particular unit. And
we're seeing most of our best customers are doing that already.
Speaking with Christian Jewel, the global CEO of Group M,
you became CEO like three months ago, right, Yeah. They
(05:18):
announced it right after can in the summer and then
gave me a three month listening to her and then
announced it on October one. Well, that's great that you
got to start with a listening to her, which is
perfect for my next question, which is what have you
learned in this time? UM, We've learned a lot, you know,
I guess I would talk about the strengths of Group
M or really about our global scale. So we're in
hundred twenty offices and eighty different countries, over fifty billion dollars.
(05:39):
It's it's an impressive group of folks. UM. We've got
three of the top five brands in the world right
now in terms of act my ratings. UM our clients
are unbelievable. Every one of them, whether they're you know,
traditional companies or you know new D t C type brands,
they're all struggling with you know, the same types of
challenges fragmentation, digitization, how do they upgrade their own marketing organizations? UM.
(06:01):
And then our partners. I mean when you look at
our media partners who are working with every one of
them is rooting for change and how do we help
And it's just an amazing group of people that really
want to make this industry much much better than it
is today. Is there a technology we're here at c S,
which is a tech company and a tech tech conference,
and there's so many kind of potential game changing technologies.
Some of them won't go anywhere, some of them might
change the world. Is there a technology that makes you nervous? Well,
(06:26):
I grew up in the technology space, so I love technology,
so it doesn't really make me nervous. Um. I think
the thing that I'm most excited about in terms of
technology right now, I actually like that idea. He's worried
about privacy and what's happening with data and gus C,
c P A and GDP are. I think we're going
to be able to get to a spot where personalization
is much more about the context of what you're interacting
(06:46):
with on the content side than you are about your
own personal identification. And I think that would be a
good thing for folks, and I think it will actually
kind of leap froad a lot of legislation we're seeing
right now and what's happening, and so as much as
we can understand how to actually look at how people
interacting with brands or variances or personalities, um, and how
to then create your advertising experience from that, I think
that will be an exciting technology for us. So do
(07:08):
you mean by that that you're going to need less
of my personally identifiable data and you're just gonna be
able to use the data about how I interact with
the brand that kind of subset to then create new
experiences for me, whether it's on the fly or kind
of be in the future. Is that what you mean
by that? That's what I hope. Yeah. Um, you have
thirty five thousand people that work in Group eight thousand
people that work in Group m What are some ways
(07:29):
that technology is changing the way that you work internally? Well,
I mean we were blasted at essence of the company
that I started with. It came into Group m UM
with great collaboration tools understanding you know that we don't
always have to get on an airplane. We can use
video chats, we can use g suite, UM, and I
hope to you know, bring all those types of collaboration
tools into Group m UM. You know, we're trying to
(07:52):
do everything like everybody else. We're looking at different ways
of collaborating, different types of communication tools, different types of
video conference saying um. But you know it's a big company,
so we're working through it. Absolutely. Uh. Five G. Does
it matter to you? Are you thinking about it? Yeah?
It matters to me a lot because one of my
best clients is Tea Mobile, So yes, absolutely. I mean
I think you look at the speed of collaboration, how
(08:12):
it actually managed to connect the devices, the pace of
which change is going to happen to that, the way
to take disconnected cities and making connected. Um it's a huge, huge,
game shifting technology for us. Another buzzword we're hearing a lot,
and it's not even a buzzword. It's a concept that's
been around for a while and certainly a theme it seat. Yes,
for the last several years, Artificial intelligence increasingly ensconced into
people's real lives, real workplaces, real practices, moving beyond the hype.
(08:35):
Is that a big factor for you? Do you think
in terms of AI or do you just think in
terms of like good data science? How do you contextualize it? Now?
We're using AI every day. I mean, we use a
ad optimized campaigns. The combination of the AI and the
cloud based computing capabilities really changes things. When you talk
about what we're talking about earlier with data and privacy,
you can take small data sets and make a large
scale understandings about them through AI in the Cloud. Um.
(09:00):
Last question, as we looked to as a fill in
the blank, will be the Year of Democrats. All right
there it is Christian Jewel Global CEO Group M. Thank
you so much. Cheers. This podcast is in partnership with
the iHeart Podcast Networks
Hi, I'm James co Techie. You're listening to the C
Space Studio podcast interviews with technology, media and marketing leaders
from c ES. Hi. I am James K Techy. You're
here in the C Space studio with me at CS.
Here with us is Christian Jewelry, Global CEO of Group M.
(00:22):
Thank you so much, thanks for having me for being here.
So can you please first contextualized for us what Group
M is and how that fits into the broader ecosystem. Sure, so,
Group M is the media investment firm for w PP.
So we're the largest met investment group in the world. Uh,
it's just last year I went over fifty billion dollars
in media investment UM SPACE. So that means our clients
(00:43):
trust us with their investment dollars to figure out where
they should spend their next dollar to find the right
impression to match brands and consumers. And then when you're
saying investment, you mean purchasing advertising, right does it? Does
investment mean something kind of long term? Are you talking
about specific advice? I like to think about media investment.
When you consider investment, generally, you think out what's the
return on my investment? So we think about return in
terms of either building your brand or completing a sale
(01:05):
or any of those types of things. So we work
really hard to make sure that we're measuring each one
of these impressions we put out there, whether it's a
TV AD or a digital ad or a search term,
in terms of what the overall impact can be when
you're building your brand, So you have all this data
about what you're putting out into the world, what you're
investing in, what's working, what's not, what's getting a return,
what are some of the trends you're seeing on what's working.
As we head into well, I think you have to
(01:26):
think about all the media that's out there. You know,
it's a lot of people talk about fragmentation and the
complexity ecosystem, but really, you know, we have to think
about what's working. It's about all those different interactions and
how they ladder together to understand what the complete picture
looks like for a consumer. So if you're in the
market for our sneakers or a car, you think about
all the different brand experiences you have in totality, what
(01:46):
we want to do is give the right attribution to
each one of those particular moments so you can understand
which ones you want to buy more of, which ones
you want to buy less of when you've actually completed
the sale, so you trail well off. Actually in the
media impressions, all of that's about the investment strategy, so
you can figure out what to buy next. And I
know you're dealing with so many clients, so many dollars.
Are there specific trends or just data points that you've
(02:07):
seen recently that have may be surprised you. Well, hopefully
I don't get surprised too often, or I wouldn't be
good at my job. I think you know the basic
trends around privacy, certainly government intervention. I think obviously you
know the rise of the big tech players and what's
going to happen with that, UM, the new entrance of
new players and the O T T services UM. I
think we have to really take a good look at
(02:28):
the upfronts and television and you're saying, you know, declining
viewership but increasing pricings. I think we have to think
about that's kind of an odd economic model and what
happens there a long term UM. But generally I'm pretty
optimistic about our our our place. So the upfronts for
people who don't know, is this TV event every year
where all the major the kind of the legacy. I
suppose TV networks show what they're gonna be putting on
for the new season and told advertisers please buy ads
(02:50):
on this stuff, right and um, so what what what
is your prediction for for that and how that economic
model is going to go? Do you think legacy I
think they might take issue with that. Um. But definitely
on the television side, you know, I think the upfronts
are obviously an important establishment. I think you're talking about scarcity,
and so when you have scarcity, you can look at
people take up front positions. Um. But I think it's
(03:11):
going to change. I think you know, you're seeing a
lot of our folks. It's here at CS. In fact,
we've met a lot of different partners who are changing
the way they're going to market and they're thinking about
and how do we put everything into addressable channels? And
we talk about addressable or programmatic. What's important about that
is just that you know, we really want to be
able to do is think about frequency, um viewability, being
able to really manage the flow of media impressions that
(03:33):
are much more discrete level We're not able to do
that when you buy in a traditional television format. So
as much as we can move into those formats allows
us to actually manage the shape of the media interactions
that you're going to have is to the advantage of markets.
Everything is going addressable. As you say, what do you
think is the future of traditional linear TV? One of
the themes that we've seen are just so you can
(03:53):
react to it from other people that I have interviewed
here in the C space studio is linear is not
as dead or not going away as fast as well
might think? What's your take on them? So linear? And
let's just talk about video? So video is really important. Um,
definitely the number one area where consumers interacting with brands.
I think what you might see is video becoming more
addressable in traditional formats. So just because it goes through
(04:14):
a screen doesn't mean it's a traditional TV. It can
be delivered in a dynamic way, and then the dynamic
nature of it allows you to do dynamic consertion to
create ads that are more specific for the particular person
of that audience. UM, that's what I hope to see happen.
That's certainly the weight the group downs bring to the
market to try and shape the future. Thinking about how
people used to purchase advertising and even what the upfronts
(04:35):
maybe used to represent. Is this idea that if I
can show marketers content that they personally like and they
kind of intuitively have a good feeling about it, then
they'll buy it, right And that might have been in
an era before we had all this data. Now we
do have all this data and you're obviously using that.
Are there times when intuition still comes into play and
maybe that it even clashes with data that you're getting. Well,
I think the beauty is we don't have to worry
(04:56):
about intuition and you can put you can go all
go a gut instinct for creative ads, put three amount,
test them, understand which one. In real time you can
start to understand what's resonating, what's not, and isolate and
move your with media weight behind that particular unit. And
we're seeing most of our best customers are doing that already.
Speaking with Christian Jewel, the global CEO of Group M,
you became CEO like three months ago, right, Yeah. They
(05:18):
announced it right after can in the summer and then
gave me a three month listening to her and then
announced it on October one. Well, that's great that you
got to start with a listening to her, which is
perfect for my next question, which is what have you
learned in this time? UM, We've learned a lot, you know,
I guess I would talk about the strengths of Group
M or really about our global scale. So we're in
hundred twenty offices and eighty different countries, over fifty billion dollars.
(05:39):
It's it's an impressive group of folks. UM. We've got
three of the top five brands in the world right
now in terms of act my ratings. UM our clients
are unbelievable. Every one of them, whether they're you know,
traditional companies or you know new D t C type brands,
they're all struggling with you know, the same types of
challenges fragmentation, digitization, how do they upgrade their own marketing organizations? UM.
(06:01):
And then our partners. I mean when you look at
our media partners who are working with every one of
them is rooting for change and how do we help
And it's just an amazing group of people that really
want to make this industry much much better than it
is today. Is there a technology we're here at c S,
which is a tech company and a tech tech conference,
and there's so many kind of potential game changing technologies.
Some of them won't go anywhere, some of them might
change the world. Is there a technology that makes you nervous? Well,
(06:26):
I grew up in the technology space, so I love technology,
so it doesn't really make me nervous. Um. I think
the thing that I'm most excited about in terms of
technology right now, I actually like that idea. He's worried
about privacy and what's happening with data and gus C,
c P A and GDP are. I think we're going
to be able to get to a spot where personalization
is much more about the context of what you're interacting
(06:46):
with on the content side than you are about your
own personal identification. And I think that would be a
good thing for folks, and I think it will actually
kind of leap froad a lot of legislation we're seeing
right now and what's happening, and so as much as
we can understand how to actually look at how people
interacting with brands or variances or personalities, um, and how
to then create your advertising experience from that, I think
that will be an exciting technology for us. So do
(07:08):
you mean by that that you're going to need less
of my personally identifiable data and you're just gonna be
able to use the data about how I interact with
the brand that kind of subset to then create new
experiences for me, whether it's on the fly or kind
of be in the future. Is that what you mean
by that? That's what I hope. Yeah. Um, you have
thirty five thousand people that work in Group eight thousand
people that work in Group m What are some ways
(07:29):
that technology is changing the way that you work internally? Well,
I mean we were blasted at essence of the company
that I started with. It came into Group m UM
with great collaboration tools understanding you know that we don't
always have to get on an airplane. We can use
video chats, we can use g suite, UM, and I
hope to you know, bring all those types of collaboration
tools into Group m UM. You know, we're trying to
(07:52):
do everything like everybody else. We're looking at different ways
of collaborating, different types of communication tools, different types of
video conference saying um. But you know it's a big company,
so we're working through it. Absolutely. Uh. Five G. Does
it matter to you? Are you thinking about it? Yeah?
It matters to me a lot because one of my
best clients is Tea Mobile, So yes, absolutely. I mean
I think you look at the speed of collaboration, how
(08:12):
it actually managed to connect the devices, the pace of
which change is going to happen to that, the way
to take disconnected cities and making connected. Um it's a huge, huge,
game shifting technology for us. Another buzzword we're hearing a lot,
and it's not even a buzzword. It's a concept that's
been around for a while and certainly a theme it seat. Yes,
for the last several years, Artificial intelligence increasingly ensconced into
people's real lives, real workplaces, real practices, moving beyond the hype.
(08:35):
Is that a big factor for you? Do you think
in terms of AI or do you just think in
terms of like good data science? How do you contextualize it? Now?
We're using AI every day. I mean, we use a
ad optimized campaigns. The combination of the AI and the
cloud based computing capabilities really changes things. When you talk
about what we're talking about earlier with data and privacy,
you can take small data sets and make a large
scale understandings about them through AI in the Cloud. Um.
(09:00):
Last question, as we looked to as a fill in
the blank, will be the Year of Democrats. All right
there it is Christian Jewel Global CEO Group M. Thank
you so much. Cheers. This podcast is in partnership with
the iHeart Podcast Networks
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