Jonathan Deeb's 'social influencer marketing' judging panel insights

The One Club for Creativity's Creative Week is just around the corner, taking place in New York City from 6 to 10 May 2019. Here, SA's own Jonathan Deeb shares his experiences as an online juror on this year's One Show social influencer marketing panel.
Leigh AndrewsBy Leigh Andrews
3 May 2019

While he didn’t take part in the main judging experience in the Dominican Republic, and won’t be attending Creative Week as he has too much on the go at the moment, in terms of ‘work to make, pitches to win’, Jonathan Deeb - chief creative officer of FCB Africa - did assess the social influencer marketing category of the One Show Awards remotely, as an online judge.

He says One Club’s Creative Week 2019 looks like a really inspiring line-up of workshops and talks – he knows what he’s talking about, having been a mentor for Creative Bootcamp Mumbai 2018, and a speaker for the One Club’s recent ZeeMelt Marketing conference in India last year.

Here, Deeb shares insights into this year’s One Show judging experience as well as what to expect from The One Club for Creativity’s Creative Week 2019…

BizcommunityWhat did you most enjoy about this year’s One Show judging experience?
This year I judged "social influencer marketing”.
These days, a good measure of how creative or iconic an idea is, is if you admire it so much that you would share it on your social media timelines.
Conversations started by brands that consumers actively and excitedly engage with.

I was excited to be judging this modern category that relies on harnessing the power of creativity to activate people to participate, to want to be a part of the conversation or help drive a cause.

It’s really powerful when you see a brand becoming a catalyst to allowing people to express their own views to become part of the greater story.

This is marketing of the “right now” and I loved analysing every one of the entries!

BizcommunityThat’s good to hear! Describe your personal judging process and how you stuck to the brief.
Some years back, successfully utilising an influencer as part of a social campaign for a brand, often looked very different. It might merely have involved finding an influencer whose personal brand and values align with the brand, an influencer with a decent social reach.

The chosen influencer would “broadcast” post or share information about the brand they were being paid to promote, and voila… the association was sufficient to be successful.

Luckily for everyone, this type of meaningless association is not the case today. My personal guide was to look for entries where:

  1. The brand storytelling was incredibly compelling; and
  2. That story could not have been told without the influencer playing a major role in bringing the story to life.

Where the cases got really exciting is where the influencers were not just used for their fame and reach, but also as an integral character in the unfolding of the campaign, with the rest of the world invited in.

BizcommunityIntriguing! Without giving too much away, talk us through the quantity and overall calibre of entries you judged and any stand-out trends.
This year, we saw an incredibly high standard of entries. Multiple judging rounds were used, to ensure that the top work sifted to the top and was acknowledged.

This category had entries from across vastly different brands and industries, some with huge budgets and well-known influencers and others with tiny budgets and “influencers” that might not be traditionally classified as such – on account of not even being on social media!

We continue to see good social cause marketing playing a big role.

Brands using their power and sponsorship to influence positive social awareness and change in the world. It was equally refreshing to see powerful and entertaining storytelling utilised by brands to achieve their objectives, without having to pull on any moral or social compass.

Results in terms of likes and views are less and less of a focus in these sorts of cases today, with more emphasis on the power of the social campaign to be truly noticed by breaking into the mainstream media.

We are also seeing more of a shift towards utilisation of multiple, lesser known influencers that form strong, genre-based communities than relying on the celebrity status influencer of old. This allows for wider social community engagement.

Really interesting insights into who really holds the marketing influence today. Fingers crossed for all our finalists!

Keep an eye on our One Show Awards special section, where roving reporter Ann Nurock will be sharing insights and interviews on all her One Show Creative Week experiences. Also be sure to follow Nurock as well as the SA Creative Circle, Bizcommunity and The One Club for Creativity on Twitter for the latest updates.

About Leigh Andrews

Leigh Andrews AKA the #MilkshakeQueen, is former Editor-in-Chief: Marketing & Media at Bizcommunity.com, with a passion for issues of inclusion, belonging, and of course, gourmet food and drinks! Now follow her travel adventures on YouTube @MidlifeMeander.
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