Episode 149 / Sir Martin Sorrell / S4 Capital / Executive Chairman and Founder
Discover the Two Worlds of Advertising
As one of the major leaders in the advertising industry, Sir Martin Sorrell has been at the helm of key agencies such as Saatchi and WPP before founding his own, S4 Capital, three years ago. His goal was to focus on the new area of growth, which is digital advertising as opposed to analogue. Sir Martin’s Shiny New Object, fittingly, is the two worlds of advertising – making the distinction between digital and analogue and capitalising on the opportunities offered by the former.
Too many agencies and clients are “stuck” in the analogue era, without welcoming the digital world fully in advertising. According to Sir Martin, analogue advertising has no or very slow growth potential, whereas the digital universe is not only growing rapidly, but also has vast market opportunity.
It was through looking at growth and opportunity and where markets were going that Sir Martin Sorrell decided to found S4 Capital after he left WPP a few years ago. In his recollection of his professional life, he sees the 3 big places he’s worked as focusing on 3 big themes: Saatchi around globalisation, then WPP around a mix of globalisation and technology, and now S4 around pure tech. And that’s because tech and digital are the future of advertising.
When I asked him what brands can do to embrace digital, Sir Martin talked about the digital marketing economy as introducing us to concepts such as the metaverse, VR and unreal engine technology. It’s an agile, 24/7 “on” world, where taking control of your content is key to success. In his view, too many companies have outsourced their advertising as part of a focus on the analogue world and cost cutting. However, switching focus to digital, the best thing to do is to either adopt an embedded model with your agency, or move to in-house capabilities. This is the way to take control of advertising and be competitive in the “new world.”
To hear more about Sir Martin’s career mistakes and advice, his top marketing books and his views on analogue vs digital marketing, listen to the podcast here.
Transcript
The following gives you a good idea of what was said, but it’s not 100% accurate.
Tom Ollerton 0:00
Hello, and welcome to the Shiny New Object podcast. My name is Tom Ollerton. I'm the founder of Automated Creative and this is a weekly podcast where Marketing Leaders talk about the future of the industry and help us understand what's going to come next and every week I have the pleasure and the privilege of interviewing someone exciting special on this week is actually no different. I'm on a call with Sir Martin Sorrell, who is executive chairman and founder at S4 Capital. For anyone who's listening to this who doesn't know who you are, or what you do. Could you give them an overview of your career so far and what you do today?
Sir Martin Sorrell 1:27
Let me stick with the advertising and marketing industry. So I started at Saatchi's where as CFO for nine years, I then left to start WPP which is where I was the CEO for 33 years. And now, but well not now three years ago I started S4 where I'm, as you said, Executive Chairman, that's it.
Tom Ollerton 1:53
Fantastic. Thank you for that concise introduction. So before we get to your shiny new objects, I would like to know in that extensive and famous much talked about career, what has been your biggest work screw up that kind of facepalm moment where you were completely embarrassed, oh my god, what have I done, but in retrospect, it was the mistake that made you?
Sir Martin Sorrell 2:20
Maybe the biggest thing I would admit to was the the competitive convertible preferred very, very abstruse, convertible preferred financing of the Ogilvy takeover. The war was described by some as the hostile, Big Friendly takeover of Ogilvy in 1989. And we hit the two with a JWT, we used a mixture of debt and a rights issue a one for one rights issue for a company 13 times the size. I think Ogilvy was about double our size or something like that. And it was $125 million, the total purchase price and half of it. We paid in debt and half for the convertible preferred. The theory behind a convertible preferred is that it converts from a preferred stock into ordinary shares. So the fixed dividend becomes an ordinary dividend. Unfortunately, after we we acquired Ogilvy in 89, we had a recession in 91, and 92, and that led to a restructuring of the company using banks, JP Morgan and others. We did a rescheduling of the debt. We didn't miss a payment, we rescheduled the debt and then a year later because the economic recovery in '91-'92 had not been as strong as as we we thought it was going to be. We had to do a debt for equity swap, which which in the fullness of time proved to be extremely successful. But that was that was probably the most gut wrenching time I would say
Tom Ollerton 3:56
But that doesn't actually sound like a mistake sounds like it worked out.
Sir Martin Sorrell 3:58
It was a mistake. It was a mistake and because it when we did the roadshow for, for the convertible preferred there was a very astute investor money manager at the Prudential who said to me, threw me aside and said Martin, anything you can do with a convertible preferred you should do with ordinary stock. And he was right, because if you did the maths, what we what we had to do in the debt for equity swap. So we we swapped debt for equity. So we diluted the shareholders even further, if we had done a straight equity issue at the time of the deal, which would lead to much less pressure, a debt pressure on our financing. That would have worked out and we wouldn't be ended up probably in a better position but not far off. Where we ended up after a lot of pain in 91 or 92 in the debt for equity swap.
Tom Ollerton 4:49
So I'm gonna ask you an additional question so that you're talking about very, very big moves here that not very many people get to make, but I'm curious to know what is your advice to someone who's at the very start of their career. So they're not looking to acquire an ad agency, but they're just wanting to get into one or get into an advertising business, assuming the students smart, driven focus, doing all the right things?
Sir Martin Sorrell 5:14
On the assumption that somebody has done, you know, learned code and learned Chinese. So, you know, they've, they've left, I spoke to a bunch of entrepreneurs at one of the UK universities here yesterday, and what was it, what was interesting, they're asking about what they what they should do. And I said, immediately they think, go and spend a couple years outside the UK. But make sure that you've, you've learned Chinese remote, make sure you've learnt learn code, but in terms of, you know, I would follow my father's advice, which is completely counter to what people tell you to do. Nowadays, I would find an industry you enjoy or part of our industry that you enjoy, locate or, or identify companies within that, that that part of the industry or the industry, that you you think are good, and that you would enjoy. And then we're in a position take a position in those companies and build a build a career or build a reputation. I don't mean a reputation where Tom Ollerton asked you to come on to one of his podcasts, I mean, a reputation where where clients or people in the industry. Notice what you've done, and admire what you've done and then build, build from there. That's what I would do, I would still follow the advice of my father gave me what was it 50 or so longer years ago? In terms of relationship?
Tom Ollerton 6:53
And have you learned Chinese and how to code?
Sir Martin Sorrell 6:56
No. I know what, well, I'm too old, you know, you can't teach new tricks. And I'm just, you know, you asked me about what the mistakes or mistakes I made is not to learn Chinese and not learn code. That doesn't mean that I don't it's interesting question because I think if you don't know them, you you admire people who do know them. So you have a greater respect. For you know, what's happened, say, for example, in China, which is the second largest economy in the world, and will be the largest and lack of relationships with the US and China is going to be one of the biggest issues that we are the biggest issues that we have to deal with, along with climate change, and D and AI and inequality and impact of globalization, everything else but and the pandemic and Brexit and everything else. But it is, you know, understanding China is critical. And then understanding obviously technological development because you know, when you asked me about my history, and I went through those three things, I've had three lives in the advertising marketing services industry so far, the first one or at sashes was around globalization. You know, one of the questions you asked me was what, what marketing/ advertising books would you recommend that I would recommend? David Ogilvy his book on advertising, it's still as fresh today as was when, when when he wrote it many, many years ago, but I'd also recommend an article by Ted Levitt, she made it into a book actually, about the theory of globalization, you know, the consumers will consume everything the same way, everywhere, that was in 1919 8083. And I think, you know, having an understanding searches about globalization, and that's what we we built, they're led by the brothers and WP, it was about a continuation of globalization. And the beginnings of tech, which started in the middle of the 1990s. And then as for is purely about technology and growth. So it's a very different different model. So you know, I've gone through three iterations, globalization and mixed globalization and tech, and then what I would call pure tech.
Tom Ollerton 9:13
So you must be a busy man, you got emails...
Sir Martin Sorrell 9:17
No, I have nothing to do but sit here and talk to you.
Tom Ollerton 9:21
Well, I mean, well, and so so when you do feel overwhelmed or unfocused, I mean, you've rattled off, you know, US China relations pandemic outbreak. Like there's a lot of data to take in and process and make business leading decisions on when you do feel overwhelmed and unfocused. What do you do? Can you snap out with it?
Sir Martin Sorrell 9:44
I was actually I thought about that question. I mean, get a good night's sleep would be would be one of the things to do, obviously, but I think, you know, be honest, I was I think my dad actually. So you know, he died in 1989. So you know, whenever, whenever he wrote me a letter when he, when he died well before he died, actually about a year before died, which I found in his papers, or my mother found in his papers when he, when he died. So whenever I'm in that sort of state of mind that and we will get in that state of mind whether, you know, there's a lot going on, I take great, great sort of strength and fortitude. Sometimes look at that letter. But more I just think about him.
Tom Ollerton 10:30
What did it say?
Sir Martin Sorrell 10:34
Well, actually one of the things that said, I won't go into the detail, because they're highly personal but one of the things that started off by saying it was dated, you asked the question, you're gonna get the answer. It was dated March of 1988. And he died in 1989 on July the first 1989. And he complained of a sort of pain in his shoulder in January of 89. And the first lines of the letter was, I have noticed a change in my condition. And so I will never know whether he misdated - the letter was in March of 1989, or whether he knew in March of 1988, in which case, I'm extremely annoyed with him, because goodness knows what we we, we could have done. He died of cancer. But goodness knows what we could have done if we hadn't had a more early warning. So I felt robbed. He died at 74. He was a great student of the of the Talmud and Shakespeare despite having to leave school at 13. He referred to the Bible and said, you know, the Bible says, Good Life is threescore and 10, which is 70 years. So he felt at 74 was a good was was a good age, I thought I was cheated. The other thing that I'll tell you about the letter was, it's relevant to your question. He said, it was a phrase in there about the clouds do blot out the sun. So going back to your question about what do you do with when there are clouds blotting out the sun, as you just remember that the clouds pass? And so that was his advice to me in relation to that, too. He said, he said, don't be overwhelmed, because those clouds do pass.
Tom Ollerton 12:21
That is a lovely analogy. So So what has been the best investment of your time, energy or money in the last five years that have made?
Sir Martin Sorrell 12:34
Well, I wouldn't say the last five years. I mean, I, when I looked at the question, I thought, I went by, I mean, the best investment, people probably laugh, and they say this was my 18 months at Harvard Business School. When I was 21, I went straight from school from straight from university in the UK, and I went straight there, which was unusual, but I was part of the class that was described the most naive class that Harvard Business Schools have ever seen, because it was at the time of the, the draft. And so a lot of Americans were going straight from university to graduate school to avoid the draft. But having said, I think that's the best investment you said over the last five years, I mean, the best investment of my time and money must have been S4. Also, it was the decision three years ago, after I left WPP, to look at growth, to look at creating a new model in the advertising and marketing services industry to try and disrupt the old. So there's something Amazonian or teslin, about what we're doing that sounds very grand, but you know, that is what we are trying to do. And then having four principles around digital, only because that's where the growth is a data driven model that creates, produces, distributes advertising content, through digital media in an iterative loop, going to market as faster, better, cheaper about agility, understanding, digital ecosystem and efficiency and then finally, a unitary structure. So we have one P&L, one single CEO instead of a siloed competing set of organisations, which the holding companies are so so I would say, over the last five years, probably the best investment of my time and money has been investing in S4, trying to develop S4.
Tom Ollerton 14:28
So I'd like to know about how you got to the realization that S4 was the right thing to do.
Sir Martin Sorrell 14:34
So that was very simple. Very simple time. I was 73 years old. I haven't got a lot of time left on the earth. So I thought, where is it? I don't want to retire, play plug and play golf or cricket or whatever. If I could play cricket, I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to be in private equity. What I wanted to do was to sort of focus on something because I think when you know when you retire, you tend to vegetate So you need you need, you need stuff to keep your mind active and, you know, sort of physically physically physically active.
Tom Ollerton 15:07
What is the how? So you left WPP you like, right? I don't play golf don't play cricket, right?
Sir Martin Sorrell 15:16
I had some money I invested some money into into a cash, shell basically a private cash shell called S4 capital. It stands for the four generations of Sorrells. So that's my father myself, my kids and my grandkids. Those are the four generations that have been here because my grandparents came from the Ukraine as best as we can figure out Ukraine, Romania, and Poland. And so the answer question is, you know, put some money into thid shell into 10 institutions and said, Would they put money in? They take 20%? I had 80%. And then would they underwrite the first deal that we did? The first deal we did was a content area. And that's what, that's how it happened,
Tom Ollerton 15:58
Which is fantastic. But what I'm sorry, I think I've asked the wrong question. What I want to know is what? What was your process to come up with the idea for the business? how you did it financially? That's interesting. You were at you were kind of at zero at some point.
Sir Martin Sorrell 16:12
When I came out, I looked at I looked at the market, and I said, Where's the growth? That's as simple as that. I mean, I think you're going to ask me about what's the best advice, I'll come on to what I think the best advice is, from a marketing point of view, I don't think marketing it's the best advice generally. But But, you know, I had a very simple idea was, you know, I had wrestled in 2016 was the best year for WPP, it's 30 odd years of history. 2017 was a tough year, you know, the, the top line was flatlining. And you know, I was of the view and when we had part of our business that was analog, part of it was digital, the digital was growing, I, you know, I was too old. to, to screw around with no growth, you know, I couldn't screw around with high growth, but not no growth. And, you know, I think it's a really important point, because when you when, when a company is growing, people's attitude is totally different. as to when it's struggling, the way I put it, as people look at the sky, rather than look at their boots. And I think that's critically important, you know, everybody's demeanor, in a high growth company, or in a fast growing company is totally different to their demeanor, when they're struggling. And I just didn't want to know, my tender age, I didn't want to struggle with with that burn. What I wanted to do is just struggle with the difficulty, because but you know, when a business is growing at 50%, like we are this year organically. And then on top of that, you know, we're growing 100% because you we've added deals on top of it. That's a challenge. But it's a it's a, it's a better choice than when it's going the other way. And so that the assembly was simple, very simple. It was nothing. Didn't have to be an Einstein to figure that one out. And it was just really focusing. Wayne Gretzky, the famous ice hockey player said you skate to where the puck is going to be in up where it is
Tom Ollerton 18:24
Right, we've got to move on. So you mentioned What is your best tip asked for marketing tip. Besides, it's bigger than that? What is it?
Sir Martin Sorrell 18:32
Yeah, I think I think the best tip is to have a very simple vision for what you're you're trying to do, and then have the structure to put it in place. I mean, it you know, this very, very simple example by a motherhood. But it's amazing how people enter for example, I was on a call with a very successful guy. They also go early one morning was only yesterday morning. And what he presented was so complicated. I mean, he had to be, you literally had to be an Einstein to figure it out. So you know what Warren Buffett always says, which is, if somebody can't explain something to him in a one sheet of paper in one sort of brief conversation, he shies away from it, you know, anybody, nothing is too complicated to explain. If it's too complicated to explain, it's because the person who's who's speaking or writing doesn't really understand what they're talking about. I think, and, and I really think simplicity is really the the important thing. So a simple, simple, well articulated vision mission, whatever we call it, and then implementing that structure is really important. implement it. Yeah, there was a, there was a great debate. A few years ago, business schools as a web, their strategy was more important in structure or vice versa. And the answer is it's both ideas. You have to have a very strong simple objective. you execute that, as flawlessly as you can. So I think that that would be the advice that that I think is most important, you know whether it's formulating what we were going to do with f4 three years ago or whenever.
Tom Ollerton 20:20
This episode of the Shiny New Object podcast is brought to you in partnership with MADfest. Whether it's live in London or streamed online to the global marketing community, you can always expect the distinctive and daring blend of fast paced content, startup innovation pitches, and unconventional entertainment from MADfest events, you'll find me causing trouble on stage recording live versions of this podcast and sharing a beer with the nicest and most influential people in marketing. Check it out at www.madfestlondon.com.
So we're gonna move on now to your shiny new object, which = is called the two worlds of advertising. Sounds very grand. Can you explain why that's your shiny new object?
Sir Martin Sorrell 21:10
Well, I get continuously frustrated by journalists and analysts and observers who lump together the digital world with the analog world. And what people have to understand is there are there are two worlds, advertising and marketing really should be split into two. There's an analog world, which is no growth or slow growth. And there's a digital world, which is high growth, and bags of opportunity. And it is a tale of two cities are tailored to planets and the digital planet is getting bigger. By that by the day, it's 55% of the addressable markets that people talk about is about $1.8 trillion, that the addressable market is people talking about in media and marketing services. And in trade budgets, it will be 70% Digital will be 70% by 2024. So this is the high growth. And when you look at S4, which is a listed company, our competitors are not the holding companies, you know, they've gone down by 10, 15, 20, WPP by 25% over the last three years. The that's one, one section. When you look at the tech driven companies like our own, I think we're a royalty on the growth of the platforms. Just like Warren Buffett used to say, when I was at starches, that that an investment in Ogilvy or IPG was a royalty on the growth of globalization following the TED Levitt theory today. What As for me, the globe and and others are a royal royalty on the growth of the digital transformation economy, the digital market economy, it's on the platforms, on the hardware companies and on the software companies. And you know, when when the metaverse becomes an even more important thing, and then it is at the moment or when virtual reality becomes more important, or where when the Unreal engine technology which underpins epics fortnight games becomes even more important as it's becoming both it's understanding how those things are breaking through or understanding the relative merits of the individual platforms that we we look at all the up and comers, not many of those, but there are some the up and comers, platforms or indeed in software, or, or in our power in hardware companies. So it's really the fundamental point is that two entirely different worlds, there's a there's an old world, and there's a new world and unfortunately, they get pushed together. And that's wrong, because you can't evaluate a new world coming in and this this goes into you know, theories of what creativity I mean, I i get i despair, and how the many people in our industry look with rose tinted spectacles at the past the system, that the whole ecosystem has changed dramatically started to change in the mid 1990s. With the with the breakthrough of the Internet, and it is you know, it is now is now speeding up is now moving at hyperspeed the pandemic. It speeded up the process is nothing new, I think is a result of a pandemic. But consumers the media enterprises have had to move far faster in a in the digital transformation process than they ever did before because of the pandemic. So it's moving at hyperspeed and we have to move at hyperspeed with it and the systems and the approaches and the theories that applied to the old world. No longer apply in the new world. It's a very, very different world to operate in. It's 24/7, always on world where agility is absolutely critical, where understanding of the digital ecosystem is absolutely critical. And where being efficient is absolutely critical. And being unified, is critical. So you want to have one firm, not a collection of firms who fight against one another, you've got to have, you've got to have what others term the power of one or one Dentsu or one WPP, or whatever it happens to be, you have to create one.
Tom Ollerton 25:37
So I want to focus on two things you said. So the Warren Buffett quote that you said,
Sir Martin Sorrell 25:45
the royalty on the growth of globalization?
Tom Ollerton 25:49
To be able to explain something simple, you got to be able to do easily on one sheet of paper, okay, but then you get a you also get a spinning gold coin for being the first person to mention the metaverse on this podcast. So I'm in a, I'm what eyes wide open, and I'm learning what the metaverse is, I think I've got my head around it, but can you give me a warren buffett one page,
Sir Martin Sorrell 26:11
We're gonna, we're going to live in Unreal worlds, we're going to live in virtual worlds. And we so we, we conducted our management meeting last week, using the Oculus headsets. And you can get a super duper headset or an even greater price, more expensive price, which, which is, I think delivers a really, really excellent experience. I mean, and, and the technology and the headsets they're using at the moment, which are commonly available are much, much better. We live in
Tom Ollerton 26:46
Why is that different? That second life in VR, that's Facebook rooms, or whatever it was?
Sir Martin Sorrell 26:54
Knowledge is moved on hugely Tom and to enable us to, to exchange information to talk to one another, to to use content in a totally different way. I mean, this will be, I think, extremely important. I mean, there's a way to go in terms of developing the technology will be extremely important in the way that we operate. And the pandemic again, you know, has highlighted the opportunities for people to start to, to talk to one another not but just by playing games in virtual reality, but starting to do do things or, you know, meetings as we did last week, and events in a in a way that we never were able to do it before.
Tom Ollerton 27:40
Tell me about those meetings, what were you getting, what kind of fidelity were you receiving in terms of, but it's better than a video call, like, I'm slightly dubious, we understand what it was like,
Sir Martin Sorrell 27:53
It was where we were in, we were in a 360 degree experience, it wasn't me looking. Well, at the moment, I'm looking at just a green tea, which is a white tea on a green background. And I'm looking at ps4, the ps4 cartoon. In this experience, you know, I I and my colleagues were sitting around actually in that, in that case was sitting around the the meeting table talking to one another we could you know, wave at one another we could, we could use area blinker one another we could move our bodies, I mean, all of these things. I mean, it was a sort of real world experience but in in a virtual form. So we were you know, it was almost like Beam me down Scotty.
Tom Ollerton 28:43
Was it better? what I'd what I want to know,
Sir Martin Sorrell 28:47
It's not perfect yet, but it's getting there. So I remember, I think it was 2014 or there abouts john chambers at Cisco used to run a CEO CIO conference. So CEOs and CEOs would get together and Keeler Island. And I actually spoke to somebody at Cisco recently about this, because I thought I was dreaming this but I am sure in around 2014, when they bought WebEx, we walked into a conference room in Q or Ireland. And there was like a hologram in the middle of the room, and there was somebody in the hologram. picture of us, it looked like it was 360 degree and you could, if I remember rightly, even you could walk around it. And this was beamed down from New York or wherever it was. And I said to the guy Francisco recently was like dripping, or did I really see that? And this was like, beaming down, Scotty. So the answer to your question is, we're going to be able to communicate with one another in forms in very efficient digital forms that that will will reduce the necessity for travel, you know, in order to Meet people. And I'm not saying that, that that's not important that face to face, eye to eye contact and whatever it is not important if of course it is. I'm saying that historically we've wasted a lot of time and, and experience in doing things that we really didn't have to do that we could execute much more efficiently in a digital world, or what, which will be able to be done in a virtual world. It's enormously effective. And the technology will continue to improve so it will become more and more real. I mean, I, I got into, was it a McLaren car on Wednesday that was in 330 miles an hour, I think it was in the film, in virtual reality. You know, we stream for the NBA, I think we're now into our third season. We're streaming in virtual reality, NBA games. I think we did 16. Last year, I think we're going to do 26 this year, using Verizon network, and using the Oculus, Facebook, technology. So these things are starting to have a significant impact on what people doing or doing and how they're doing it.
Tom Ollerton 31:18
So if a marketer is listening to this, and they may be in the real world in the analog world, as you say in the in the no growth or slow growth world, hearing your description of the metaverse and these technologies available, what would you say are the steps that a marketer needs to take to make sure they're ready for something like the metaverse whether or not that old expression?
Sir Martin Sorrell 31:42
You know, if it if it is two worlds, I mean, a lot of a lot of clients operate in the old world, and are resistant to move into the new world. So their resistance to move from analog to, to digital, and the new opportunities, and a lot of them have been caught out because they move move fast now, I think in a 24, seven always on world, I think I'm using an analogy really a political analogy of using the line that Dominic Cummings used for, for Brexit, which is take back control, I think market is client market is in a 24 seven always on world have to take back control. they surrendered too much control to agencies, outside parties, consultants, after 2008. And the great financial crisis, it was very fashionable, zero based budgeting, which meant deconstructing your cost structure and then building an app again became very, very popular, was proven to be not as good as people thought it was because it reduced brand spending and more importantly, reduced innovation spending. So that's sort of become less important, but still focus on cost focus on outsourcing focus on procurement in a low growth world where there was very little inflation and very little pricing power. In a 24/7 always on world you have to have control. And so I think that's critically important, I think, following Google's decision on a cookieless world, and apples, the decision idfa the importance of first party data, and linking first party data that's client owned data, client data that where consumers have consented to its use. So getting over the privacy hurdle, using that data to hear the signals from the platform's becomes extremely important. We have three models, and s four we have or mediamax, we have a an embedded model where we actually put people into clients that are on our payroll, we have an in house model where we work with clients, almost to do ourselves out of a job. And then we have the normal outsource model. It's different horses for different courses. And it depends on the dynamics of the industry. But generally, I think people should move marketing partner should move to more of an embedded model with their agency partners. Or to do an in house model. I think the sort of outsource the classical outsourced model is past its sell by date. So taking back control, first party data, and then I would say emphasizing agility is critically important. You know, I mentioned that in the context of our, the way we go back, go to market as faster, better, cheaper, agility. There are a lot of people talk about this, and a lot of people don't deliver it. I mean, one cmo or one of the big Fang companies said to me, you know, you've got the New Model S for media monks, you've gotten the new model. And I don't have to pay for all that useless overhead that I see. Well then That that is there. So you're coming up with a new model. And then another csio of one of the big tech companies said, we're building interested in very interested in what we're doing, because we're building a network from the bottom up, meaning that we're focusing on the production side of the business, which is the core of it. You know, a lot of people dismissive historically of media man's, there's there were just a production shop, that's not what they specialize in, is producing the product that we produce, which is the creative product, that's what they produced. And what this Chief Creative Officer basically was saying was that we're, we're starting in that area and building from there. And that's what the new network is about. The old networks, you know, you get this, you get this. What I said is the siloed organizations, but on top of that, even within the silos, you have silos, you have strategic planners, you have suits or account handlers, you have to create your department. I mean, it's, it becomes overly complex. And coming back to what I said is the best advice, you have a simple vision that executed with the best possible structure. I think that's critically important. So So I think those are the issues, agility, first party data, combining that with the signals, and taking back control those three things, I think that what marketers should focus on.
Tom Ollerton 36:28
Fantastic advice, and a great way to finish the podcast. Sir Martin, thank you so much.
Sir Martin Sorrell 36:34
Thank you very much, Tom enjoyed it. Good luck, good luck with another 160, or whatever it is, you're going to do.
Subscribe to the ‘Shiny New Object’ Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube and Soundcloud.