Learning to live in cultures, not categories: The future of brand planning

The changing political and economic landscape will require brands and planners to adopt new roles. In the next two decades cultural insight will become brands' most valuably traded currency, reflecting governments' and consumers' increased pressure on corporations to take on more socially beneficial roles.

A cultural revolution

Dayna DionOgilvy & Mather

Learning to live in cultures, not categories: The future of brand planning

Planners will be reborn as cultural strategists, moving from being the voice of the consumer to the voice of human nature, gathering cultural insight and building a brand's cultural currency.

Sev D'Souza, of the London-based agency once known as Still Price Court Twivy D'Souza, attempted an official definition of account planning in 1986. "When asked at a party what he or she does in an advertising agency, the account planner would probably say, 'I'm the consumer's representative'," D'Souza wrote. I...

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