In an interview with PROPMARK, the executive takes stock of the time he has been in charge of the agency
In front of WMcCann since July 2021, Andr França says that without diversity there is no innovation in the communication market. According to him, this is the agency’s number one agenda, whose objective is to hire more and more professionals from minority groups.
And I’m not just talking about sex, race and religion, but also ageism and disability, trying to look at all fronts, he says. In this interview, the executive also talks about the agency’s latest achievements, the transformations in advertising and the acceleration of the use of data for clients.
What is your assessment of a year of WMcCann under your management?
It is a gesture of continuity, in which we already had the philosophy since the arrival of Hugo (Rodrigues), who has still been my mentor, that our best result is the result of our customers. With this philosophy, the agency managed to end last year very well positioned, with the trust of clients and as the first in media investment (according to the Cenp-Meios ranking). We have many positive things, with good results for customers, such as Banco do Brasil, which became the largest bank in the market. And we, as suppliers, who take care of the brand image, somehow have a part in it. GM is also very well positioned, as the automaker that sells the most cars in the country. The agency made Americanas a company with an increasingly solid base. We have Seara conquering the leadership in several segments and product categories. When customers are doing well, we believe they are doing well too. And this has happened because we are increasingly investing in technology, data and a business vision without letting go of creativity.
Do you and Hugo make a co-gestation?
No, Hugo is the chairman, he has three companies under him, WMcCann, Aldeiah and Craft. What happens is that when I need advice I ask him for directions. Hugo comes from an eight-year tenure as president of two major agencies (Rodrigues joined WMcCann in 2017, but before he ran Publicis), he managed to do a turnaround, so for me it is very precious to be able to call him in case of doubts. Obviously, he is close to the business, especially with some clients, such as GM, where he has worked for over 20 years. And he has now just won Francis’ account for WMcCann, thanks to his relationship with the market. Of course, Hugo interferes in the agency, but much less on a day-to-day basis than it was a year ago.
What were the advances and accounts conquered in the last year?
At Banco do Brasil, we won over the entire business table, as before, part of the performance table was with LewLara\TBWA. Today we have all the bank’s always on digital. In Rio de Janeiro, we now have the entire social media part of Americanas, which was at Mutato, integrating all the brand’s 360 communication. WMcCann also became the only 360 agency in the world of GM, because all the digital part that was in Isobar came. And now we’ve just conquered Francis, as I mentioned.
How is accelerating the use of data and technology, combined with creativity?
There is a structuring project, investing in a data lake, and this speeds up some things. For example, we can create a dashboard of investments in Ibope Monitor so that the client can consult it, if he needs quick information. For social media, we also plug the data into a dashboard to quickly find out together with the customer how the brand is performing, if there is a crisis, what are the most talked about topics, for example. In other words, we are increasingly trying to automate the entire process so that it serves not only the areas of activity, such as social and media, but also the business and creative teams, so that they can consult this information. Even the data area is linked directly to me. I knew that the data area could not be an island within an area, it had to, in fact, have the autonomy to act in front of any area of the agency. In the data area, we currently have around 42 people. We believe that this brings a clearer path to creativity. If we can quickly understand what’s working and what’s not, it’s easier than anyone these days trying to understand everything. We have many sources, inputs and outputs, so a dashboard that can see all dimensions helps to have a better consumer thermometer.
How does your training help to keep up with the changes in data?
I’m an electronics technician and I studied advertising. But talking to my friends and family at home about engineering. I think, actually, I’ve always been very lucky. I started as a media in agencies, I was a customer from 2004 to 2012 at Nestl, taking care of communication; from 2012 to 2015 I was COO of LOV; and in 2015 I joined WMcCann, returning to my original training, as media director, focusing on BI. In 2018, Hugo calls me to be VP of Media. Today we live in a world that needs data. Before, there were few sources of information. Nowadays it is very complex, we know how difficult it has been to evaluate and capture all the signals, just look at the bubbles that exist in our country. I think what I have helped to do is to structure technology to be able to read all the realities and monitor the client’s results, which is also increasingly complex. The client himself has a lot of difficulty, because there are several sources of information and we try to help build a unique reality.
But not all customers are confident in opening their data to agencies. How’s that at WMcCann?
What we have been realizing is that, over time, customers have become increasingly confident in having us as a strategic partner. That is, a partner who can help to interpret and have a more holistic view of the information. And this we have been proving by showing possibilities for the use of data. I think it’s a natural part of learning.
Does the agency work with a squad model?
Squads are a reality. Almost all teams are dedicated to customers. What lies behind this is a agile methodology so that everything happens in a coordinated manner, with faster approval stages, for example, but a model that requires a partnership, a great deal of complicity. The client is increasingly demanding this, he wants to be part of the process, but not everyone is willing to work with squads. We can see here that the most modern brands have behaved in a very intrinsic way with the agency.
And are there teams allocated to the clients?
Yes, especially in performance squads, because it’s almost a necessity for teams to be close to information. It is obvious that the pandemic has brought another reality, not everyone is physically allocated to advertisers, but even if they are not inside, they are much more activated by customers than by us who coordinate the cells. Today, we provide more training and review with the client to see if he is satisfied with the group’s performance.
What is your opinion on the movement of independent agencies in the Brazilian market? How to compete with more agile structures?
Our perception is always difficult, but it is a reality. Today there is an offer of thoughts, structures, that the market did not observe before. There are structures with three people, 20 or like ours, with 450 professionals. So, the customer can choose the configuration that best suits their needs. What drives us to want to do better. We need to be attentive to understand how they try to overcome it, to know what is happening in the market, which has a different way of doing it, and to bring it into the agency. I think this is one of my biggest functions, to map out what’s new and have an offer that goes hand in hand with what’s new in the market.
What is the most important agenda in the communication market today? innovation? diversity? What has WMcCann done to move forward?
The agenda that the agency has been most dedicated to is diversity, on how we can bring a plural vision of what happens in the world and within communication, and that is where innovation comes from. Without diversity, there is no innovation. And I’m not just talking about sex, race and religion. I’m talking about ageism, disability too, trying to look at all fronts. Obviously we have more clarity on some of them. For example, today WMcCann has 57% women in the agency and leadership. In other words, it is already more an agency for women than for men. But in creation, we still have 34%. In other words, we need to improve. It is obvious that historically this is an area where there have always been more men and we are trying to break that. The goal of women in this year’s creation is 40%. In the case of blacks, today we have 49% at the gateway and we want to reach 60% in recruitment. In the agency, we have 28% black people in general and 14% in the leadership. We are not satisfied with these numbers, we think they are not enough, we need to hire more and more. We have three projects for minority groups and also career acceleration programs for them. And finally, we’ve been talking about having a welcoming environment and space for these groups, ensuring that WMcCann has the right philosophy so they don’t feel oppressed, including mentoring so that people from minority groups can bring their projects and from there innovation often arises.
Is business hot? What to expect from this end of the year with Black Friday and the World Cup?
The communication market is hot, yes. I see this in the media spaces and in conversations with advertisers. There is a concentration. I do not believe, however, that the market is bullish. He’s warm. Brands are investing now to try to bring the result that most customers have suffered throughout the year. There is optimism in the sense that at least there is no budget cut. Customers are taking advantage of these events to try to make their holiday number one.
