ABA event took place this Wednesday (27), in So Paulo, and brought together market leaders and executives
Sync, in free translation, means to synchronize, and this was the theme that guided the conversations at the National Meeting of Advertisers (ENA), promoted by the Brazilian Association of Advertisers (ABA).
The event, which took place this Wednesday (27), at Teatro Unibes Cultural, in So Paulo, debated topics such as cross-media, the use of artificial intelligence in companies and the path that needs to be taken for the industry to become, truly inclusive and diverse. Furthermore, ENA was also marked by the official launch of the 2023 Sustainable Marketing Guide.
According to Sandra Martinelli, CEO of ABA and member of the WFA executive committee, the guide, produced by the entity’s Communication & ESG and Media Committees, was born as a way of contributing to the Decade of Action, an initiative of the Global Compact, a project linked to the UN , whose objective is to make companies align their strategies with universal principles in key areas for social development, including challenges related to the environment, and which has a deadline of 2030.
During the presentation, Marco Frade, head of media at Diageo and president of the ABA Media Committee, explained that the material was based on five themes, namely Sustainability in the first place, Radical innovation, Transformative relationships, Creativity in action and Value reset.
ENA was marked by three panels, the first which addressed the relationship and importance of cross-media audiences. The chat between Matt Green, director of global media services at WFA; Patrick Bhar, global CEO of Kantar Media and Melissa Vogel, CEO of Kantar Ibope Media in Brazil, mediated by Celia Nishio, Global Marketing Intelligence Director at Natura, discussed advertisers’ concerns about the transparency of cross-media metrics in the market and the ability to quantify audiences.
In the second, Hugo Rodrigues, chairman of McCann Worldgroup for WMcCann, Craft and Aldeiah; Daniella Brissac, vice president of ABA and VP marketing Brazil & CCX LATAM at Kenvue and Denis Onishi, senior commercial director at Pluto TV discussed the use of artificial intelligence in the market.
During the conversation, Daniella pointed out that the reality of this topic is that we are all learning. We can’t think about technology and execute it at the same time, the short term consumes us a lot. So, at Kenvue, we have established technologies that are priorities and one of them is the use of artificial intelligence for store images, which allows us to better perform products on the shelf, for example, explained the executive.
As for Onishi, the conversation about the use of artificial intelligence in short content works, but the same does not happen when it comes to long content, such as films and series. The commercial director also highlighted that the industry’s main challenge is to discover the synergy between the machine and the human and proposed the following reflection: to what extent are we leaving human talent aside?
In parallel, Hugo Rodrigues highlighted the use of technology in agencies and highlighted that those who are not working with artificial intelligence are behind. The Chairman of McCann Worldgroup for WMcCann also took advantage of his speech to bring some data such as, according to the World Economic Forum, by 2025, 85 million jobs will be replaced by technology. We have to join forces because, if this issue is not regulated, we will have problems, pointed out Rodrigues.
Despite the facts, the executives took advantage of their final speeches to convey messages of optimism to those present. According to them, the market is already experiencing a moment of transition and, in fact, the most operational jobs must be replaced, but for Daniella, human work will still have more value than robotic work. For Hugo, there is one point that will be the market’s salvation: It is our misinformation that is humanity that will save us, concluded the chairman.
Finally, the last ENA panel debated topics such as diversity and inclusion, proposing a conversation that would point the way for the industry to become, in fact, diverse and inclusive. The conversation, mediated by Veronica Hoe, senior public policy manager at Meta, was attended by Flavio Waiteman, commercial director at Tech and Soul; Patrick Sabatier, ABA advisor and director of corporate affairs and engagement at L’Oral; Daniele Godoy, project manager at Unstereotype Alliance in Brazil and Nelcina Tropardi, president of ABA and general director of legal, government relations, ESG and Compliance at Dasa.
Nelcina highlighted the importance of debating this topic which, according to her, intensified during the pandemic. The executive highlighted some Dasa projects linked to the topic, such as the Black Population Health Care Guide, which has information and specifications about this population group, and the Acolhe Trans program, which is a line of comprehensive health care within the Dasa program. Care, which has professionals to deal with specificities related to gender diversity.
When we talk about the corporate world, it is important that this discussion comes from leadership so that it can truly be incorporated into the organization. There is also an issue of reception around this topic, so, for a business like ours that is labor intensive, we have to have a strong pillar of reception because there are situations like an employee going to the laboratory to take blood from a patient and that patient asks for a whiter person to perform the procedure. This is a real case that happened two months ago. These situations hurt people and happen a lot, so we have to accept them, highlighted the executive.
Regarding ABA, Nelcina stated that this discussion is old and that the association already has six guides on the topic, from 2018 to 2022.
During the conversation, Daniele Godoy highlighted that the diversity and inclusion journey is not linear and happens in a way that requires intentionality not only from leaders, but from the entire chain involved. In addition, the executive also presented some data from the Representa survey, which is the new name of the Todes study, launched annually since 2015 and, since 2019, curated by UN Women.
The research will be officially launched in October and analyzed more than five thousand TV insert advertising pieces, more than two thousand in digital media (Facebook and Instagram) and from six different broadcasters. According to the survey, only 18% of the volume of advertising pieces feature black women as protagonists of these pieces, with this percentage rising to 28% in digital media, and, of these, the majority are represented by young, thin women with straight hair.
We are far from ideal, but it is already a time frame within the analyzes we carry out, but even so, we continue to insist on a stereotype that does not represent the Brazilian population. When I talk about intersectionality, there is nothing more than seeing all the social factors that interfere with being a woman and, when we look at all these markers, we realize that we still need to move forward, said Daniele.
Patrick Sabatier used his speech to highlight that, at Loral, the topic of diversity and inclusion is absolutely strategic. When it comes to a group like Loreal, there is no way to think about innovation without thinking about these topics and without having a diverse workforce. We have to change our companies just as we need to change society, he explained.
Flávio Waiteman used his space to discuss some initiatives focused on the topic, such as Tech and School, an agency school that offered 1800 hours of course over 12 months to its selected students and who, at the end of the project, were hired.
We are talking about the importance of human beings because, in a world of so much data, what matters are people. I see in the market a legitimate concern from companies, with programs focused on this topic, said Waiteman.
