Driving Consumer Demand in an Evolving Industry Landscape
Carl Fremont is the CEO of leading independent full-service agency, Quigley-Simpson. An advertising industry thought leader, he has spent his 40-year career working in top roles at some of the most prestigious agencies and holding companies in the country, most notably WPP and Digitas. Carl was an early adopter of all things digital and one of the founders of the New Fronts. He has deep expertise working with top brands in a number of industries, including automotive, car rental, financial services, consumer packaged goods, retail, technology, eCommerce, and travel, among others.
Carl was highly respected in the performance marketing arena and had deep roots in DTC when he joined Quigley-Simpson in 2019. Since then, he has helped the agency set a new standard for integrated performance marketing with his “Brand-Led, Demand Driven, Impact Obsessed” philosophy. With the understanding that a brand’s resonance is the strongest demand engine clients have, the agency focuses on strategies that emphasize a brand’s equity to drive demand across every stage of the consumer journey. Carl has dedicated himself to growth and business development, steering year-over-year expansion, bringing on top talent, developing industry and tech-based partnerships, and ensuring that Quigley-Simpson has an impactful presence on both coasts, with offices in Los Angeles and New York City with talent in other markets.
Carl serves on several industry boards and is Chairman Emeritus of the Ad Club of New York. His innate curiosity and insatiable desire to learn fuels his love and participation in industry conferences and events. He recently attended the IAB Video Leadership Summit (where he sits on the board), the ANA’s AIMM Member Forum, and the invitation-only Beet Retreat.
The Continuum recently checked in with Carl to get his insights on why industry conferences are important and what is currently on the minds of marketers.
You’re a sought-after speaker at industry conferences and a highly engaged participant. Why do you participate in conferences, and what have you learned at the ones that you’ve recently attended?
Our industry changes rapidly, and we must stay curious and engaged. It’s important to continue to meet a variety of talent and be exposed to fresh perspectives. When I can, I find participating in conferences and events (and remaining even after my talk is over) is a fantastic way to do this.
Some of the most important topics right now are omni-shopper marketing, which ties into the rise of retail networks, programmatic marketing, media mix metrics, and, of course, AI. Part of our work at Quigley-Simpson is to ensure that we are listening to the challenges marketers are facing and helping to find bold solutions.
We totally agree that curiosity is important. Can you tell us more about omni-shoppers?
The omni-shopper, as the name suggests, shops in multiple ways. They shop online on their desktop, through mobile and shoppable ads, and at retail locations. Eventually, they’ll use shoppable TV, but we are not quite there yet. They want to be able to purchase on their own terms, whenever they want and wherever they are. Brands looking to reach these shoppers through omnichannel marketing need to ensure that they are wherever their customers are.
Are retail media networks driving consumer shopping habits and demand, or is it the other way around?
I believe that it’s both. Consumers want the ease of shopping when and wherever they want. In many ways, this is a learned behavior driven by Amazon. Others—like Kroger Precision Marketing, CVS Media Exchange, and Target’s Roundel—saw that there was a large opportunity and built their own retail networks. This has expanded beyond retail to other lifestyle platforms such as United Airlines’ Kinectiv Media and Uber Eats Media unit.
“Our industry changes rapidly, and we must stay curious and engaged. It’s important to continue to meet a variety of talent and be exposed to fresh perspectives.”
Advertising is absolutely everywhere. In addition to the rapid rise of retail media networks, places that were ad-free, such as subscriber-only streaming services like Netflix, now accept advertising. Do you believe there is a risk of advertising fatigue and consumer disengagement?
I don’t believe there will be advertising fatigue as long as the messaging is relevant and directly addresses consumer needs. It’s more of a question of how to integrate the advertising to make it a seamless part of the shopping experience. Amazon does this incredibly well.
There has been a significant increase in interest and media dollars in programmatic. Why do you think that is?
Programmatic is highly desirable to marketers as it is a streamlined system with the promise of automation and efficiency. Programmatic platforms have the ability to pinpoint specific audiences, optimize the moment, and shift investments in real time.
However, the most effective media strategies start at the beginning and create consumer interest, then follow it through the entire customer journey. This combination of demand generation through building a meaningful, desired brand and demand capture through integrated media and creative is the key to truly successful marketing.
On the topic of programmatic, you recently created a new affiliate company of Quigley-Simpson called Gantic, which builds private programmatic marketplaces. Can you elaborate on that?
Gantic offers large-scale programmatic marketplaces targeted to highly responsive audiences. We talked already about the appeal of programmatic especially in terms of pinpointing audiences. When I first conceived Gantic, it was to meet those needs. Gantic was founded on direct response principles, mainly that the most valued audiences are ones that respond more frequently, purchase more, and spend more over time. This fueled our resolve to establish curated programmatic marketplaces—turnkey seamless solutions that operate without reliance on cookies (who knows what will eventually happen there) and are adaptable across multiple screens, ensuring privacy and protected data.
“This combination of demand generation through building a meaningful, desired brand and demand capture through integrated media and creative is the key to truly successful marketing.”
Have you launched any private marketplaces to date?
Yes, in June, we launched CAMP (Cultural Accelerator Marketplace), a diversity and minority-crafted programmatic marketplace. CAMP is powered by first-party contextual and cognitive data applied to thousands of diverse-owned and operated publishers and networks in addition to multi-cultural publishers. It has an overlay of over 250 audience identifiers and a cross-channel reach that includes CTV, video, display, native, and contextual.
We created CAMP with The Cultural Inclusion Accelerator (CIA), whose inclusive syndicated measurement solutions enable marketers to see and act on consumer’s authenticity. Its Diverse Media Multiplier (DMM) fuels CAMP with a proprietary metric that measures the potential increase in cultural resonance, affinity, trust, and sales generated by diverse, targeted media publishers. This means that marketers are connecting with very specific DEI audiences across Asian, Black, Hispanic, People with Disabilities, and LGBTQ communities in ways that are easily accessible, efficient, brand-safe, transparent, and highly effective.
To go back to your question about programmatic, this type of marketplace—one that removes the complexities of programmatic and easily pinpoints highly responsive subsegments with specificity and scale—is the future of programmatic.
You mention that Gantic was founded on direct response principles – you got your start in the direct marketing world, and so did Quigley-Simpson. How does this inform your work?
The main principle of direct marketing is identifying real, highly responsive audiences and directing your marketing specifically to them. Technology now provides us with new ways and new platforms to reach consumers. With such a myriad of data at our fingertips and real-time optimization, marketers can refine their direction as they go.
You can’t have a conversation in our industry anymore without touching on the topic of AI. What are people getting wrong about AI?
It’s too ubiquitous, in my opinion. People don’t really understand what AI is and how it can be used. AI is an incredible tool, which, by the way, has been around for a long time.
People believe that AI can replace what humans do, but in reality, AI technology supplements what a human does. For example, AI can be an extremely helpful tool in automating the interpretation of large amounts of data. But there’s still a strategy component that comes out of all the data. You still need a human on the other end to evaluate the findings and analyze the data to drive strategy forward.
Take the idea of “test and learn.” This strategy has been around for over 100 years. Many people in advertising know department store tycoon John Wanamaker’s famous line: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half.” The way in which early department stores tried to figure out which half is a great example of test and learn.
I remember a Titanic exhibit that included a telegram exchange between Isidor Strauss and his brother Nathan, who were co-owners of Macy’s. Isidor tragically died on the Titanic with his wife, but earlier in the voyage, he and his brother exchanged messages about recent sales, and Nathan replied that he was trying out different newspapers to see which ones delivered more shoppers. Each day, Nathan was placing an ad in only one of the many NYC newspapers and seeing how it performed. That’s test and learn, and that was over 100 years ago. As I always say, we learn from the past and advance forward via new technology.
AI enables marketers to expand on simple principles like that by testing innumerable variables and adjusting strategies in real time.
“Combing brand, the emotional connection consumers have to certain companies and products, with demand, which is the data, analytics, and all the things that go into performance marketing, is what drives outsized results.”
Many of the conversations at Cannes were about the fear of AI replacing creatives. What are your thoughts on this?
Again, AI tools are great at understanding trends, facts, and data and putting it all together comprehensively. What they can’t do is infuse the human emotion. That’s a huge part of good marketing, and it’s where we still need creative talent because they look at things from both a practical and emotional side. We haven’t trained computers on the emotional side, which is why you can’t rely on AI to replace creative work.
In truth, I don’t think we’ll ever get to the point where AI infuses emotion into work and replaces the human element or the emotional aspects of storytelling. It will just shift what we do and enable us to do it more efficiently.
Your philosophy of brand and demand is really at the essence of all that we have been talking about here. Isn’t it?
Yes! Exactly right. Our Brand and Demand philosophy begins with work that resonates with consumers, which is then tied closely to media, data, and analytics in ways that are highly integrated and perform in real time. Basically, as I mentioned, using a brand’s equity to drive demand across every stage of the consumer journey.
This actually sums up our conversation nicely. Combining brand, the emotional connection consumers have to certain companies and products, with demand, which is the data, analytics, and all the things that go into performance marketing, is what drives outsized results. And that’s the ultimate outcome for marketers.
August 15, 2024
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