Companies in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) region are entering a new age… the ‘Purposeful Age’, an age when the strongest companies will align their business and strategies around a purpose. A purpose that is defined as the reason a company exists beyond making money and that defines your value to culture and society and your responsibility to both.
In this new age, a traditional business plan and brand strategy may no longer be enough. In the ‘Purposeful Age,’ companies and institutions have the opportunity to join a meaningful conversation around things that matter, take their place in culture and demonstrate their responsibility to society.
Companies operating in the ‘Purposeful Age’ have the ability to not just be affected by the accelerating world, and the disruption that surrounds them, but to affect the world around them for the better.
In this new era, creativity has become a strategic fundamental to creating real change and impact for companies. A recent report by the ‘Holmes Report’, in partnership with H+K Strategies, demonstrated that creativity is increasingly being viewed as a central element in an organisational culture. (The report is based on a survey of around 500 agencies and client respondents from more than 35 countries across the world.)
In the age of disruption and an accelerating world, more resources are being devoted to creativity, with plenty of businesses not just talking about it, but training staff and paying attention to developing a create culture. Creative ideas are becoming more effective, allowing companies and institutions to join a meaningful conversation around things that matter.
The relationship between strategy and creativity is becoming increasingly interdependent. What is driving this change? There are three areas or trends that are making this possible.
• Blurred audiences – we can be a different and yet connected audience simultaneously
The lines between our professional and personal lives continue to blur; we can move from the latest Netflix series to a white paper on government policy by clicking a tab on our computer, from Facebook to Fast Company with a swipe on our mobile, and from the BBC iPlayer to Skype at the press of a button on our TV.
Content is on demand and we can choose to consume it when and where we choose. The one things that remains contact in both our professional and personal life is that we are human.
• Audience Investigators – Transparency of the internet is demanding authenticity in communications and a need to communicate a clearly defined purpose. It is no longer only investigative journalists that are finding out the truth about a brand or company. Anyone with access to the internet is now an investigator of your story.
• Changing Influence – Everyone is an influencer. Campaigns, such as the one for Volvo Trucks, demonstrate that purchasing decisions around trucks, and this is the case for any product, is as much driven by friends and family as the dealer. The impact of tapping into a wider influencer group was proven with surveys showing that almost half of truck drivers who had seen the ‘Live Test Film’ indicated that they were more likely to buy a Volvo next time they buy a truck.
This is the purposeful age, and the age of business-to-human communications.
What does this mean for communications? We believe the types of services that are needed have changed. To meet these demands we have focused our communications around a model we call the 3Ps – Performance + Purpose = Preference.
We believe companies operating in the ‘Purposeful Age’ have the ability not just be affected by the accelerating world and the disruption that surrounds them but to affect the world around them for the better.
The writer is Chief Creative Officer, H+K Strategies.
