5 Minutes With… Ben Grossman

Ben> Let’s face it – it’s a much more complex marketing landscape than when I started out. Technology plays a bigger part. Fragmentation in channel, audience and attention is everywhere. Data is limitless in potential and endless in volume. Greater transparency and tracking encourages less risk taking. And craft - the skills required to make brilliant things to drive our clients’ businesses - has changed. 

But at the same time, nothing has changed about strategy. Our highest calling is still finding clarity through complexity, and people who can navigate it all are in more demand than ever.

As a CSO, I get excited about the chance to bring in a broader and more diverse set of perspectives than ever before. At Doner, we say we build brands at the intersection of Modern + Main Street. I love that, because it acknowledges all the modern marketing muscle it takes to help brands perform in today’s world. But it also doesn’t lose sight of the fact that we’re still communicating to everyday people who don’t care too much about our marketing technology. 

Ben> I’m fascinated by Private GPTs right now. In the broader world of Generative AI, I think they resolve a lot of the initial adoption challenges, both in terms of human behaviour and corporate governance. They curb concerns around data privacy. They boast a delightful conversational user interface. They’re more task-oriented, which should allow more natural adoption by users. And they are often more specialised, which should allow training that delivers more predictable and higher quality outputs. 

When I think about what Private GPTs can do in terms of synthesis of unstructured research data, I’m excited about not having to force inherently qualitative exercises into quantitative methodologies. This should reduce unnecessary research bias. I’m also excited by Private GPTs’ ability to save a ton of time when it comes to analysis, data visualisation and best practice delivery for clients – they can be a boon to analysts.

Ben> I see strategy as creative’s best friend. Research has shown us that, harnessed properly, creativity can be one of the most powerful forces in business. But if creative is ill-informed, uninspired or misdirected, it can also go unnoticed or do a lot of damage. Strategy can be the difference between a brand’s creative triumph and tribulation. 

Supporting creative ideas comes in three major forms in my mind. Strategy ensures creativity is used to solve the right business problem, so it will have an impact. Strategy unearths inspiring insights – notions that are obviously true, but previously weren’t obvious. And strategy protects the idea’s potency, by proving its worth, protecting its integrity and deploying it optimally. This inextricable link between strategy and creative is also why a lot of my closest friends in the industry are creatives!

Ben> Going back a bit, a definite career highlight was Michelob ULTRA Courtside, an effort with Microsoft to save the NBA season by bringing fans to the stands through the world premier of Together Mode on Teams. That was a technological feat in the midst of a global pandemic that delivered a 32% sales increase across 2 billion impressions. I get just as excited about breakthrough B2B efforts from my past like Eaton’s My IT Empire, which was inspired by the dawn of modern marketing automation and a nadir of data quality. We used a clever personalised poster builder to extract tons of accurate data from IT professionals and delivered a 1,028% return on investment. 

Ben> That sweet spot between novelty and broad accessibility is the key when it comes to cutting edge anything in my mind. Through that lens, I’m really excited about our recent work at Doner to bring The UPS Store to Roblox via Main Street Moguls, which is all about educating youth on entrepreneurship. That has the potential to impact 66 million users daily – an amazing new audience well beyond the brand’s current reach. We’re also in the midst of putting Generative AI to work for a client’s new brand world, which will feature a lot of animals. I love that tools like Firefly can help us reduce the need to disrupt wildlife, while still getting the perfect smile from a red panda.  

Ben>The biggest thing I took away was our collective responsibility to navigate advances in Generative AI, while also continuing to invest in, inspire and uphold human creativity. There is no DALLE without Dalí. 

We’re exploring that very insight in recent work from our team at DonerNorth for stationery brand Staedtler. In the mini documentary “The Brilliance of the Human Hand,” we pit the talent of Leah Probst, an artist who specialises in hyperrealism, against Generative AI. They are both given the same prompt: draw “two people holding hands.” The results capture the essence of the conversation at Cannes: AI as a mere tool – and not a substitute – for human imagination, intuition and artistic prowess.

Ben> You heard right! I spend a lot of my time outside work getting away from screens and finding new inspiration. 

Recently, I taught myself Amigurumi (the Japanese art of small crocheted creatures) and have been churning them out for the kids in my life. I also designed and produced a capsule collection of athleisure garments inspired by our rescue cat, Otis. My partner and I love to travel and recently took a two-week trip to Egypt. I’m also a fan of Broadway shows, local drag performers and music, so I’m frequently taking in live entertainment. 

Add in a dash of modern art museums, staying active at the gym, and a heavy dose of arcade games… and you have what I’m realising now is a very long list of hobbies and interests outside the office! I do think that might be strategic – engaging very broadly in the world keeps me seeing new perspectives and brewing new ideas.