MediaCat UK Podcast

For the latest MediaCat Magazine podcast our editor, Mike Piggott, spoke to Grace Francis, Jamie Mancini and Katy Collins — co-founders of new independent creative studio, Wonderful Things. The theme of this pod mirrored the magazine's August theme of 'Doing Things Differently', where Grace, Jamie and Katie discussed why they started the agency in the first place, looking to be more nimble, and how clients are increasingly more open to working with smaller businesses these days, not just traditional agencies. They discussed creating meaningful work, with Grace saying they want to 'say yes to work that can exist and lasts longer than a heartbeat'. And that it's about 'choosing consciously to put things into the world that have value'. Jamie talked about what he defines as meaningful work, creating things that potentially resonate with a small group of people you are trying to speak to. And Katie added that meaning can also mean work (and clients) that mean something to her personally.

The conversation then moved on to longevity, and the challenge of creating work that lasts. Grace told a story of their 17-year-old self remembering a campaign from water brand Evian, that really stuck with them. 'I want to make stuff that makes the 17-year-old say, I can do that too', Grace said. They discussed which brands and groups they'd love to work with (including Grace and Jamie trying to pitch an idea that would have had them meet hip-hop group, the Beastie Boys), Jamie's lemon spritz brand and his desire to make a short film, and Katie's love of sports and wanting to work with any dog brand possible. The conversation then turned to the current state of the marketing industry, with Grace saying the industry is going through seismic change, but 'it's essential that commercial creativity gets to exist'.

This podcast is around thirty minutes long, and packed full of wisdom. We hope you enjoy.

For this podcast we had a guest host, regular contributor to the magazine, author and co-founder of Genius Steals, Faris Yakob, take control. His guest was VP of Creative at Liquid Death, Andy Pearson.

They discuss Liquid Death's creative process and how not getting bogged down in details helps creatively, as long as everyone agrees that what they're doing is a good idea and can be brought to life.

Andy talks about how the creative process often lasts all the way into the edit room, and how it's important to allow every piece of that process to develop in real time — to get the best creative product. Faris questioned Andy on the writing process, with Andy saying how he sees parallels with sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL). Andy then mentioned the mutually beneficial relationship they have with celebrities like Tony Hawk (in one stunt they put Tony's blood into limited edition skateboards), and how Liquid Death products made their way onto TV show productions and movie sets — meaning it was less of an uphill battle to work with actors, for example, as many knew the brand well from the get-go.

The conversation then moved onto their punishing production schedule and managing creative energy, with Andy saying 'ensure the creative process feels easy and fun — don't make it hard on yourselves. Don't red line all the time — find ways to sit under that.'

Faris asked Andy about how Liquid Death see themselves as a brand or business, to which Andy spoke about how a lot of what they do feels like an 'elaborate art piece', where they really make the things they put out there as products — like their collaboration with snowboard brand Burton, where they made 'Deathtrap', a snowboard so extreme you would literally die if you rode it (as their lawyers were keen to point out). The boards cost a few hundred dollars and sold out within 25 minutes of going on sale.

They also talked about their collaboration with disruptive golf apparel brand Bad Birdie, where they created the 'Uro club', a hollow golf club which you could use to relieve yourself on the golf course if you got caught short — obviously from drinking too much Liquid Death. Again, this club, at the time of writing, is available to purchase, but has also sold out.

He also talked about working with The Deep (a character played by Chace Crawford on satirical superhero TV show, The Boys) and how when creating scripts it was important that they took the world of The Boys seriously — that Liquid Death exists there, as much as The Deep exist in ours.

'One of the things we try and do is toe the line between "Is this thing real or not?" and "Oh my god, it is real"', Andy said. 'We're just a humour brand at our core', he added, and 'we cut counter to culture and marketing — ultimately we want to be an entertainment company'.

Speaking further about entertainment, Andy then touched on The Adventures of Murder Man, an animation show they're creating with Liquid Death's mascot as its main character. He was keen to point out that this wasn't to be an advert, but a proper show that they were keen would be picked up.

Editor's note: this po

In this pod our Editor Mike Piggott chats to regular MediaCat Magazine contributor, Emily Fairhead-keen, Senior Strategy Partner at Wavemaker who, in her career, has also worked at MediaCom, Vizeum and Starcom MediaVest. They talk about an award-winning paper Emily wrote in 2015 (and subsequent MediaCat article), where she made the argument that brands need to be more superhuman and godlike.

They also discuss brands and showmanship, fairies and superman, oversharing and mystery, how it's OK for brands not to jump on trends, and how Jeremy Bullmore once offered her a cup of tea.

Featured image: Roy Reyna / Pexels

AI makes things easier. It does the grunt work quicker. It’s a machine. This isn’t speculation, it’s just the way it is. It means copywriters need to focus on what makes them unique, what makes them employable beyond the grunt work. This is something direct-response copywriter and The Fix co-founder, Nick O’Connor, talks about with Glenn Fisher in this fascinating discussion.

This is the fourth in a series of episodes we are running in partnership with Fix Fest 2, a festival dedicated to copywriting, marketing and creativity. This year, the event’s theme is ‘AI or Die’, and as well as Nick, a whole host of industry experts will be speaking on the day.

It takes place on 3 July. In London. We’ll be there, along with copywriters and marketers from all over the world. You can find out how to join us here, and find out more about the event by listening to the first episode of the series with Fix Fest’s creator, Glenn Fisher.

Featured image: Darina Belonogova / Pexels

Perceptions of how AI will influence advertising and marketing are shifting on an almost daily basis and staying ahead of the curve can seem like an almost impossible task. That's especially true of small and boutique marketing agencies. Thankfully, in this podcast, copywriter and co-founder of Mac+Moore, Natalie Moores, explains how you can make sure you don't get left behind.

This is the third in a series of episodes MediaCat Magazine are doing in partnership with Fix Fest 2, a festival dedicated to copywriting, marketing and creativity. This year, the event’s theme is ‘AI or Die’, and as well as Natalie, a whole host of industry experts will be speaking on the day.

It takes place on 3 July. In London. We’ll be there, along with copywriters and marketers from all over the world. You can find out how to join us here, and find out more about the event by listening to the first episode of the series with Fix Fest’s creator, Glenn Fisher.

Featured image: Google Deepmind / Pexels

Not according to Heather Murray. In this podcast copywriter Glenn Fisher interviews AI for Non-Techies founder, Heather Murray about AI, why she’s so excited about it and what she recommends less technically-minded people do to get the most out of it.

This is the second in a series of episodes MediaCat Magazine are doing in partnership with Fix Fest 2, a festival dedicated to copywriting, marketing and creativity. This year, the event's theme is 'AI or Die', and as well as Heather, a whole host of industry experts will be speaking on the day.

It takes place on 3 July. In London. We'll be there, along with copywriters and marketers from all over the world. You can find out how to join us here, and find out more about the event by listening to the first episode of the series with Fix Fest's creator, Glenn Fisher.

Featured image: Google Deepmind / Unsplash

For this podcast Editor Mike Piggott welcomes back returning guest, Lori Meakin. Lori is author of the book No More Menemies and co-founder and CEO of The Others & Me. They discuss a recent insight report her consultancy has put together, delving into default-male design, models of conversation and feminine coded characters like Ted Lasso, how advertising is portrayed in the media (speaking on Calvin Klein and that FKA Twigs advert), social media algorithms limiting your point of view, gender norms, lad culture and '90s girl power, and more.

The Others & Me was founded by Lori Meakin, a multi-award-winning strategist, author of No More Menemies. The innovation consultancy helps companies drive growth and maximise competitive advantage by a: Developing products and services for valuable but overlooked audiences (gender being the primary focus), and b: Creating a more effective, innovation-focused leadership and culture. Their recent insight report The Power Of The Invisible Women explores how default-male design and ideas are limiting business growth, and what we can do about it. It lays out the context, challenges, and most importantly, opportunities for brands who take an innovative and business-first approach to gender equality & inclusion. Because as research shows, they’re not mutually exclusive. And there's big competitive gain for those who get there first.

Download the report. To find out more about the work they do, download this brochure. Find The Others & Me on LinkedIn and Instagram.

In this podcast MediaCat Magazine's Editor Mike Piggott chats to the founder of Studio Gilmore, Paddy Gilmore, about how and when he first began thinking of incorporating humour into his work, going into brands to do 'humour audits', the fine line between comedy and tragedy, how Sigmund Freud fits into all this, and some of the best humorous marketing and advertising work he's seen in recent times.

You can also read this written interview we did with Paddy.

In this pod our Editor Mike Piggott chats to Claire Atkin, CEO and Co-Founder of Check My Ads, the adtech watchdog. They discuss how Check My Ads has evolved from an agency to an institute, Claire's definition of brand safety, dismantling the disinformation economy, what's happening inside corporations right now, what a better advertising system might look like, as well as the possible positive and negative impact that AI might have on brand safety in the future.

They also briefly manage to talk about lemons. This podcast is half an hour long, and packed with lots of insight and wisdom from Claire. We hope you enjoy.

Sign up to Check My Ads newsletter, to stay updated on the latest developments around brand safety.

For this podcast our Editor Mike Piggott spoke to Glenn Fisher. Glenn is an author, copywriter and speaker. His book The Art Of The Click was shortlisted for a Business Book of the Year award. He also created a copywriting podcast, All Good Copy, and is co-founder of The Fix, a project by copywriters for copywriters.

They discussed the state of the marketing industry when it comes to copy, and how copywriters need to be involved earlier in the creative process, the things Glenn learned from their inaugural event Fix Fest, long copy and humour in copy, as well as briefly, somehow, touching on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!