The eclectic range of presentations at Frontify\u2019s brand experience conference covered everything from Marcus Aurelius\u2019 wisdom to surrealist Italian brainrot memes.<\/p>\n
Nike was the conference\u2019s recurring cautionary tale. Several speakers showed its precipitous share price decline since 2021 \u2013 the parable of the brand who forgot who it was.<\/p>\n
(For the record, Builders Club<\/a> co-founder Jonas Hegi shared a succession of innovative Nike projects in his talk, suggesting reports of the brand\u2019s creative demise were perhaps overblown).<\/p>\n It was hard to see one major theme across the two days. But having let the dust settle, perhaps the lesson lies in how we talk about design, rather than what was said.<\/p>\n Tom Beckman, Weber Shandwick\u2019s<\/a> global chief creative officer, shared perhaps my favourite stat of the conference \u2013 that 66% of people believe brands try too hard.<\/p>\n You can see why. When Taylor Swift launched her new album with an orange-forward visual campaign, brands rushed to embrace the colour across their social feeds. This led to a rash of posts that looked incredibly similar, and an outpouring of ennui from everyone else.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s very important for both sides to deliver their expertise to the table.\u201d<\/p>\n Beckman was the PR jury president for this year\u2019s Cannes Lions, and he shared an interesting insight into that judging process. Every idea they analysed, he said, had to work in the jungle, not just the zoo.<\/p>\n Zoos are safe. Controlled. Predictable. Animals are fed at regular intervals and kept away from predators. But jungles are a free-for-all.<\/p>\n His point was that we need to set our creative ideas free and see how they get on in the real world. Only the best ideas thrive in this messy, risky, sometimes frustratingly disengaged environment.<\/p>\n So we need to break out of our echo chambers, to be honest about the role design plays in the wider world, and to measure brands\u2019 success using real impact metrics, rather than being seduced by slick case studies.<\/p>\n Tom Beckman on stage at Paradigms<\/p>\n To live up to that, I think the whole industry needs to shift the way we discuss design. While there will always be a place for craft, by focusing too intently on the creative details, we risk judging it by the \u201czoo\u201d standard.<\/p>\n Rather, we need to better understand, and share, how design work gets made, gets implemented, and gets measured in the real world.<\/p>\n A good start would be to bring more client voices into our media, onto our stages and podcasts and magazines.<\/p>\n It was refreshing that several talks at Paradigms brought the design agency and the client on stage together to talk about their work. This seemingly simple thing actually felt really significant.<\/p>\n Too often, we only get half the story.<\/p>\n Every aspect of design work can be better understood when it\u2019s presented by the client and the studio together \u2013 from the context, to the strategy, to the delivery, to the reception.<\/p>\n Apparently this set-up is more common at marketing conferences, but I still think it\u2019s the exception rather than the rule in the design world. And it shouldn\u2019t be.<\/p>\n Mutabor\u2019s work for Kleinanzeigen<\/p>\n Iskra Velichkova, senior director of marketing at Paypal, joined Mutabor\u2019s<\/a> chief design officer Burkhard M\u00fcller on stage to discuss their work on both Paypal and German classifieds site, Kleinanzeigen.<\/p>\n Speaking afterwards, Velichkova pointed out that any big rebrand project has to be a genuine collaboration.<\/p>\n \u201cThese projects are massively complex, and so it\u2019s super-important that both sides work as one,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n To ensure the right kind of partnership, you need to select an agency that will work in this way, rather than \u201ctwo entities working in parallel.\u201d<\/p>\n Some of that comes down to discussing how the process will work, but Velichkova and her team also keenly observe the dynamics within the agency team.<\/p>\n \u201cObserving how the people in the room interact with each other and how they interact with you is very important,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Iskra Velichkova and Burkhard M\u00fcller on stage at Paradigms<\/p>\n For the Kleinanzeigen project, which involved 164 million pages of content, and tens of thousands of digital assets, they needed a design team with a flat structure, where decision-making is decentralised.<\/p>\n \u201cSo when we were doing the pitch, we were actually observing how the people in the room were behaving \u2013 who gets what airtime, and who gets what say,\u201d she says. Did one person dominate and interrupt others? And might that cause problems down the line?<\/p>\n \u201cIn the Mutabor case, you couldn\u2019t tell who was the trainee and who was the general manager. Everyone had something smart to say.\u201d<\/p>\n Given this incredibly collaborative nature, it wouldn\u2019t make sense for the work to be presented only by the designers \u2013 or only by the client for that matter.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s very important for both sides to deliver their expertise to the table,\u201d she says. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t be a good person to talk about the specifics of the design and how they were developed.<\/p>\n \u201cBut to tell the complete story, we need to talk about the context, the business case, the go-to market and the results.\u201d<\/p>\n And telling stories in this way benefits everyone, Velichkova believes.<\/p>\n Tom Gilbert and Jamie Lillywhite on stage at Paradigms<\/p>\n Design Bridge and Partners<\/a>\u2019 Tom Gilbert agrees. He was joined on stage by their client, HSBC\u2019s group brand design lead, Jamie Lillywhite.<\/p>\n \u201cMost design presentations are still very agency centric,\u201d Gilbert says. \u201cWe talk about the work in isolation. Yet the truth, the best brands are built in partnership.<\/p>\n In their talk, Gilbert and Lilywhite shared some detailed nuts and bolts around how the HSBC brand lives in real life. This, Gilbert says, helps bring to life how brand building is an \u201citerative\u201d process where things are constantly being refined.<\/p>\n But this way of presenting work also shifts the focus.<\/p>\n \u201cMany presentations lean into the why and the what. But when clients and agencies share a stage, the conversation often becomes about the how. That is what really seems to resonate with audiences. It is the part people are most curious about, the part they can learn from and apply themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n Velichkova says something very similar \u2013 that these talks can provide rich insights which those on both sides of the table can learn from.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me, co-presenting is about showing the partnership, the process, and the progress,\u201d Gilbert explains. \u201cIt reflects how brands are really built, and as a brand design industry, we should be doing much more of it.\u201d<\/p>\n