NDA has launched a new series on NDA, Marketing the Marketers, talking to the marketing and comms leaders behind the success of our leading companies. Next up is Luc Benyon, Marketing Director, Watching That. He’s led content and marketing departments for D&AD, video intelligence, and currently Watching That.
What exactly does your job entail?
I’m the Marketing Director, so everything from content creation to PR to sales collateral falls to me. I need to be simultaneously plugged in to industry trends, the latest news, as well as client needs and product development.
At the moment we’re growing in our three core markets, so the trick is to balance branding building and product messaging at the same time. Needless to say, there’s always lots to do.
What campaign or piece of marketing/communications are you most proud of in your career and why?
Probably the video intelligence creperie takeover for Cannes Lions, created with Common Industry. We approached a local venue and asked them if we could basically take it over for the week of the festival. They were delighted because they had a guaranteed income, and we got our own venue a few seconds from the Croisette – for a fraction of the budget of a beach or yacht. We ate a lot of crepes that week, and managed to host clients, and get brand cut-through.
Who has been your biggest inspiration in your career to date and why?
Along your career there are certain senior colleagues who believe in you. They go out of the way to trust you with big projects, or elevate you to new heights. When someone sees potential in you like that it’s a great confidence boost, and also hugely inspirational. I’ve been lucky enough to encounter three or four of these people in my life, I hope they know who they are!
As a result, I’ve tried to do this to industry newcomers whenever I can.
What is the biggest challenge in your sector and how is your company helping to address it?
It’s a great irony that in CTV / Streaming viewers are always watching their devices, but often the streaming platforms themselves aren’t aware of what’s happening underneath the hood until too late. Frequently, we find that reporting doesn’t happen until hours or days afterwards
At Watching That we are always on; so platforms that use our monitoring can see granular data in near real-time. They get alerted if ads stop rendering, or if a key metric or KPI suddenly changes drastically. It allows ops teams to undertake root cause analysis and get actionable insights in a few clicks.
What is the biggest opportunity in your sector and how is your company helping to make the most of it?
Right now, the whole OTT world is looking to advertising to drive growth. That’s great, but also leads to an increase in partners, and therefore more fragmentation and complexity. In turn, the job of the operations teams who are tasked with keeping everything running becomes more demanding. Our platform is there to help those people out – with simplicity, automation and clarity on what’s really going on with their data.
How important, and why, are the following in helping your promote your own company:
The press
Everyone reads the industry press, so being featured is key. It adds credibility, reaches new audiences with your messages, and amplifies your talent and insights.
Events
Events are brilliant for branding, they enable a really close connection to the audience. The key is making sure people still remember you when they get back to the office though. To do that, you need to make sure your activation (whether it’s a talk, a booth, collateral, or a sponsorship) is interesting, creative, and speaks to your product and brand.
Your company’s owned media
If you can convince people to follow / sign up to your owned media you know you’re onto something. To keep them there you’ve got to consistently be interesting and add value. That’s the tricky part.
