What’s your name and position within the organisation?
Ben Treadaway, Vice President EMEA at Wasserman.
What are the main areas of focus for your business?
Wasserman was founded in 2002, and, back then, our roots were in sports. We’ve evolved considerably since then; now, we’re a full-suite marketing services and representation agency, delivering work across the worlds of music, art, entertainment, social, tech, content, and beyond. Our teams are built with capabilities across strategy, execution, amplification and measurement.
Wasserman’s role is to solve the strategic marketing challenges for our clients and this means approaching challenges through the eyes of the consumer. This helps us understand what brands and properties need to do to become relevant within people’s day-to-day lives.
We balance the interdependence between the science of showing up (the who when and where) with the art of being appreciated, to make sure that we’re behaving and interacting in the right way with our clients’ target audiences.
Ultimately, our role is to delight customers, disrupt categories and develop culture.
Obviously Wasserman is a global organisation, but could you tell us a little bit about the background of the agency in Europe?
Wasserman has been on a rapid growth path internationally since first entering the UK with the acquisition of the SFX talent agency in 2006.
We’re headquartered in London and have offices across continental Europe and the Middle East. Our 200 staff serve the world’s leading talent, brands and properties – our clients include American Express, UEFA, Bacardi, NFL, BMW, ATP, Microsoft and GOLFTV, to name but a few.
What challenges do you see for the industry over the next few years?
We’re living in an age of disruption across all sectors and those that don’t embrace change risk becoming the next ‘Blockbusters.’
The challenge for all the key stakeholders is to work out how to be thoughtful and authentic with consumers. The worlds of sport, entertainment and music are meaningful, and they can be pivotal in unlocking valuable one-to-one and one-to-few relationships between brands and consumers.
As we rush headlong into the data economy, our industry has the chance to take a leading role and truly maximise its potential. The question is: are we ready to grab it?
How is the drive towards data economy affecting your day-to-day?
We’re living in a time when data has never been more valuable, yet also when consumers have never been savvier about who they are giving their information to. If brands and properties want people to share their information, then they’d better offer something engaging and worthwhile in return.
A case in point is the user-generated mascot campaign we’ve worked on with UEFA, where we’re leveraging the growing interest in freestyle football to drive global awareness, engagement and data capture ahead of EURO 2020.
It’s a multi-platform, multi-phased campaign featuring the tournament’s mascot ‘Skillzy’ – a lively, cartoonesque figure that has provided UEFA with an opportunity to engage and excite young fans, a year before the games even begin.
A live stadium launch, combined with a content-led UGC contest and high energy social content, have delivered the data-capture opportunities that UEFA are seeking, as they look to future-proof their value proposition.
What’s your take on the industry’s move towards sustainability?
There is growing consumer demand, across many sectors, for more environmentally-conscious behaviour from brands and properties, so it’s easy to see why brands are becoming increasingly conscious about their impact on the environment – across all activities.
There is a common misconception that impressive activations require the use of materials which are highly damaging for the environment. This is simply not the case.
This summer, Wasserman is activating a partnership between BMW i and the National Trust, called the ‘Create with Nature’ roadshow. It’s a series of workshops which shows visitors to National Trust places how they can make use of natural materials. It’s to promote awareness of the BMW i3, a fully electric vehicle that is 85% recyclable at the end of its life.
This focus on sustainable materials transferred to our workshop structure: a refitted shipping container. We worked closely with our key suppliers to ensure all parts of our production process and materials used aligned with the sustainable focus of the BMW i3.
The activation has been a great success with visitors so far, and it shows how you can be sustainable without sacrificing on spectacle.
Contact Alex Reese
e: areese@teamwass.com
w: https://wassermanx.com/
