Why ambitious storytelling and creativity can invigorate the ‘boring and rational’

IAG’s CMO has thrown out the B2B marketing rule book, instead relying on ambitious storytelling and creativity to invigorate the ‘boring and rational’ category.

Behind the scenes: The puppet masters at work

The latest work from insurance brand CGU that aired during last week’s 60-minutes had many wondering if Channel 9 pushed the wrong button. The five-minute fever dream with puppets created by the famed Jim Henson Company was a bold move, more so as it came from a business to business (B2B) company.

With the aim of personifying ambition and how Australians can often feel threatened by it, the story involves stamping out tall poppies, with the brand’s top marketer saying it couldn’t make an ad about ambition without pushing the boundaries itself.

“If you’re a brand that’s all about ambition, you need to do ambitious things creatively,” chief marketing officer at CGU parent company, IAG, Brent Smart, told The Growth Agenda.

“We didn’t just want to create an ad, we wanted to create a character called Tall Poppy. That’s why Henson were the perfect partners. And it was brave to tackle tall poppy syndrome head-on with the central character of our story.”

The work taps into the insight that 60 per cent of people believe Australians like to cut down ambitious people, with CGU aiming to challenge the collective thinking around Tall Poppy Syndrome and how more big thinking is needed to help small businesses thrive.

Behind the scenes: character sketches

Mr Smart explained the B2B brand wanted to start a conversation and he knew that cutting the work down to fit the usual television model would dilute the story and the message.

“We wanted to create a moment in culture,” Mr Smart said.

“A five-minute film in the middle of 60 Minutes does that, another 60-second spot wouldn’t have the same impact, no matter how great the spot – we see them all the time.”

Nine’s 60 Minutes saw a metro audience of 581,000 on the night, making it the sixth most-watched program that evening.

Big brand work is typically reserved for top consumer-facing businesses, with B2B brands usually favouring a more targeted approach without the wastage of an expensive prime time buy. However Mr Smart says that we need to remember that B2B decision-makers “are humans too and humans are moved by stories, not graphs”.

“Who says B2B work targeting insurance brokers needs to be boring and rational?” he said. “It’s easy to think that B2B brands require a rational and serious approach but we recognise that at the end of the day we’re talking to humans and humans are drawn to storytelling. In a cluttered market where everything looks the same, making an ambitious statement was a way for CGU Insurance to push the boundaries of traditional media to capture the attention of brokers and SMEs.”

Research by Ehrenberg-Bass Institute’s Professor John Dawes for the LinkedIn B2B Institute shows that up to 95 per cent of businesses are not in the market for most goods and services at any one time - only the 5 per cent who are in the market care about rational product details. Mr Smart said this means the most effective way to engage the larger 95 per cent who aren’t in the market today, is through emotion and brand building.

Alongside the Jim Henson Company, CGU worked with its creative agency Thinkerbell and media agency Initiative on the film and wider launch strategy – with the full-length version being nine minutes long. Dozens of puppets, and nearly 150 visual effects shots, were needed to complete the work.

Behind the scenes: handmade puppets and sketches

Lead puppet Poppy and wider brand positioning of ‘Insuring Ambition’ will be an ongoing theme for the business, with more to come from the colourful character including a first-to-market digital out-of-home execution which is currently under wraps. Mr Smart said he was confident the collaboration would result in “the best of the best in terms of emotive storytelling and craftsmanship”.

So was the launch a success?

CGU added that 98 per cent of people watched the ad in its entirety, according to OzTam’s minute-by-minute ratings.

“Tall Poppy was about talkability and starting a cultural conversation, so from that standpoint it’s already working,” Mr Smart said.

Early character sketches

Behind the scenes: storyboard

The detail

Handmade puppets

Puppet masters at work