Lightly edited for readability. Speaker 1: Welcome to The Business of Marketing. I'm your host, John Horsley. Today we're recording live at Cannes Lions from the beautiful surroundings of the Dep Secret Garden. I have the absolute delight and pleasure to be joined by Tracey Shirtcliffe, founder and CEO at ScopeBetter. Uh, and Tracey has a, a fantastic backstory. We've just been talking about the fact that we've been knowing each other for around about 20 years. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Delighted to be here, John. Thank you. And knowing that we were in the secret garden today, I couldn't help but, uh, wear some flowers specifically for you guys.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't expect anything less. So, I normally ask this question, so as a starter for 10, it'd be great to understand what attracted you to the world of marketing, advertising, media, et cetera, in the first instance. What caught your eye? Uh, and yeah, and, and what attracted you in?
Speaker 2: That's a great question. I mean, that starts all the way back when I was at university, 'cause I ended up doing an undergraduate degree in geology and zoology, and, uh, I realized that that was not gonna be the career for me, being a paleontologist working on oil in an oil rig. I was like, "Absolutely not. What can I do? What can I change to?" So, I cross-credited to, uh, doing a master's degree in marketing and commerce, so that's when my journey began, and it's been very good to me. I spent a lot of my time client side. I started and ran my own, um, content agency before jumping over to, to software.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and, uh, this software I assume obviously came out of the agency that you were building at the time.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: It, it'd be really great if you gave our audience a little bit of a heads-up in terms of apart, part of the story, 'Cause I think it's incredible.
Speaker 2: Ah, of course. So, um, the first software business was called Sonar and the product was called Traffic, and then it developed, uh, toTraffic Live. It was one of the first, uh, platforms to go from being a, a server-based solution where we used to... We actually used to ship Mac Minis that arrived to people's offices to put the software on, um, to being something that was actually online by s- by SaaS, so software as a service. And I still remember back, you know, we launched that in 2007, and people used to ask, "Where is the stuff?" It's like we talk about the cloud. We spend most of our conversations talking to people about how infrastructure and architecture kind of worked. So yeah, um, Traffic Live as a business was very successful. It was a project management and workflow tool for agencies, and we had clients in our midst like, well, Justin, who's one of your fellow, uh, hosts for the podcast. Uh, Justin Cooke was also a client when he was at Possible, so they use Traffic Live, as did many large global agencies from WPP and other, and other networks. So, I ran that business, um, and, uh, I sold it in 2015 to Deltek, who are the people behind economy. And at that point, we had over 1,000 agencies, three offices, London, Sydney, and New York, and nearly 80 people.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I, I think that helps set the context for the, the conversation. So, you built a business around workflow resource planning, uh, and pricing. So why does scoping still go wrong in so many agencies?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, that's a great question. So I think what happened when I exited, uh, Traffic Live is it became really clear that the workflow tools, uh, didn't really do what they should do when it comes to scoping and pricing. Um, and certainly the ERP tools didn't either, so these are the large, uh, accounting type systems. So what we did is we focused in an area to kinda solve that problem. And what was in, what was there, what was being used before there's a tool to, to solve that problem, is typically an Excel spreadsheet. So what happens in the process of scope is you'll have a staff plan which is built on hours, roles, and rates in Excel, and then you'll have a statement of work, which is kind of the words, and that really starts to make up what I would call the s- the scope of work. Agencies do it, do it differently. Uh, people do it differently. Teams and businesses can do it differently. So there's kinda no, I guess, methodology or kind of best approach to do it, and I genuinely think there, there should be. Um, and what are some of the challenges? Well, what happens in, um, the whole kinda process of a scope is you've got an intersection between sales, 'cause they're trying to sell a piece of business, so new business, then you've got the intersection of creative, who just wanna win the business and do something amazing and do some fantastic award-winning, we're in Cannes, award-winning creative. And then you've gone, you've got kind of finance, which is all around making sure ... And operations. That's about making sure that the delivery and the making money and the margins is kind of, kinda in. So you've kinda got three key pieces of business coming in together, and there really hasn't been a, a good way to do that, and typically it's Excel spreadsheets and Word documents.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, often there'll be a, a meeting with a prospective client. There'll be a proposal that follows that. There might be some scope creep. Uh, there might be lack of negotiation from the, the sales individual, uh, and a statement of work that gets spat out, uh, and then chasing, sign off the statement of work, sign it off, sign it off.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: So where are people getting it wrong in, in that process?
Speaker 2: Well, ty- typically, I think it's in how you bring all of the parts together, um, and how you put kind of some structure. I call it architecture. People hate the word, um, spe- especially in, in agencies don't like the word process, but you certainly need structure. And the reason that you need kind of structure is, is around having an architecture of how you operate to make sure that that- That you don't get scope creep, that sales teams don't oversell it, that creative teams don't, uh, overcreate or over- overdeliver it by design. And then certainly then operations teams don't get overwhelmed and you don't get, uh, runaway margins and, and, and elements onto any project. So that's kind of the reason why to bring it all together to kinda get it right. And that's why people get it wrong in the first instance is if something comes out of sales, it's genuinely either... Well, it's normally normally undersold and, uh, and, and that's ch- typically because the salespeople want the sale. It happens in all t- types of businesses. So that kind of, kind of architecture to control how you work as a business is typical for any business. Just creative businesses aren't amazing at it
Speaker 1: Yeah. And what are the typical margins that a creative business or an ad business would normally run to, and, and what does it mean in terms of bad scoping on the, on the impact of those margins?
Speaker 2: Well, I'm actually gonna take this. I was at panel today which was, um, the ... Justin, the CEO of The 4As was talking, and he was talking about, um, what, uh, what, uh, what is the return for, uh, an agency business today per headcount versus a, a platform or technology business? And typically in an agency business you're talking about a return of, uh, 150K per head. In a, in a platform or technology business, take Google, it's $2 million per head. So, and if you took an Apple, it's $3 million a head. So w- what is the difference? This goes back to how it is that you're creating everything, how you're structuring everything, how the business is aligned. And I think when, when you actually look at that whole piece, you've gotta ask what is, what are we doing as good businesses, and how are we putting together the ways that we sell our services? And the margins on.... I mean, you compare the margins to a, to a technology company to a, a people-based business, and that's only gonna get worse now with the advent of AI. So-
Speaker 1: Hmm. In what way? How do you see it getting worse?
Speaker 2: Well, still today, I hate to say it but there's somewhere between 60% and 70% of agencies are still recording and billing and charging for time, which I would have thought with the advent of AI that would be the nail in the coffin for anybody doing that. But no, the stats even today when I looked at the reports that The 4As have just put out, um, I mean, people are moving to fixed fee items but there's still timers how they're, how they're building those up. Crazy. So, you know, the model needs to change. We're seeing fundamental quick speed changes in the way that you're delivering the work, um, and it absolutely needs to run through to the commercials, and the commercialization is absolutely critical. I call it the... I call the whole scoping piece the commercialization layer, and that's more critical than ever. Margins, I mean, if a head, every head is only putting on 250- u- 150K, that's crazy. That's not a sustainable business. And add scope creep and other problems that happen through, through not having the right, uh, systems or architecture in place, and you've got real problems.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So what are the smart agencies doing that have pulled away from billing for time?
Speaker 2: That's a great question. Um, well, I have to acknowledge first of all that with, uh, with contracts, with agencies of record these things aren't necessarily overnight fix- fixes, but certainly if you're pitching you should be moving away from, uh, time. It should be just not used anymore. Um, you should be using deliverables, outputs, and even out to outcomes. I mean everybody's talking about outcomes. It, as a methodology it's really difficult to, um, deliver 'cause it takes a lot of rigor, and that means that you have to have this whole kinda infrastructure and kinda architecture of how your working with your business, um, aligned. And to be honest, the reason that we've had time and materials in the way that we've been pricing for agency business and why margin is a problem now is because it's been in the too hard box. S- it's difficult. It's challenging.
Speaker 1: I know that agencies such as WPP, for instance, um, they've been on the show recently and they've talked about the fact that they're billing against outcomes.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: But what does that generally look like in, in real life?
Speaker 2: That's a great question. I mean, they talk about... They f-... They moved the model I think probably about 12 months ago. They went out and they, uh, talked about it in their kind of investor packs. Um, and they're actually talking about, um, outputs. So you're charging for a deliverable, for a thing. So within that what you're doing is you're packaging up not only what it is that you're, that you're delivering, but you're also packaging up who's doing it, how you're doing it, so it becomes to a point where you're starting to, to productize or at least m- put a methodology behind what it is that you're delivering for clients with a fee. That's exactly what it is, and it's not broken down by roles, hours, and rates.
Speaker 1: So how should leaders start thinking about the link between scope, pricing, staffing, cash, et cetera, that, that entire flow? What would best practice look like?
Speaker 2: Well, I firstly, I don't see at the moment that it's as connected as it should be, um, and I think that's one of the challenges that businesses face. Um, also that within a business that... And I talk about infrastructure. So, um, I talk about infrastructure and architecture, and both things aren't right. So the infrastructure, how do people put together a scope today? So they do it on an Excel spreadsheet, so there's no, um- I mean, it's one person who's doing it. Then they'll share that. There'll be changes in it. They redo the same scope again so there's no consistency. There's no learning. There's no, um, there's no data structure. There's no, um, sophistication as to how you would learn from that process. So that's when we talk about kind of the, the architecture for it. And then the infrastructure is how does that get through the business? So firstly scopes aren't connected to CRM systems. CRMs systems ask different questions to scopes. Scopes then ask around, um, what is the work? Uh, and then you need to put it into a workflow system which is who is doing the work? When are they doing the work? So... And then it goes out to the ERP system which is how do we bill for the work and how do we record for the work? So when I talk about the, the whole kinda connected system, that's part of the challenge. So what does a leader need to do? They need to get a, they need to get a handle on that. They need to choose to, um, lead from the front. I think pricing is absolutely critical. I mean, we've been talking about it for years and years, but I think once again with the changes that we're seeing in AI and technology, we have to be putting it in the forefront. I mean, I heard in a, in a panel that, um, agency businesses are spending... Well, everybody is spending enormous amounts of money on, on AI and technology into their businesses. How are they, how are they commercializing that with their clients? And they're like, "Well, we can't do that yet." That's insane. You have to package that as part of your service, and that needs to be part of your deliverables or, or, or outputs. And then your outputs are the things that you deliver against your outcomes.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, that, that is, that is- is madness, isn't it? It-
Speaker 2: It is madness
Speaker 1: ... extreme.
Speaker 2: And it's because it's, it's hard, right? If somebody sits down in front of an Excel spreadsheet, they've got a list of people and roles and a rate, and they just put some numbers in it and they add it up in the bottom, hey presto. But that's a, you know, like the Excel spreadsheet, that's 30 years old. It's not a model for, um, for the new world.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And I expect you're gonna give me a similar answer to this question. So I li- I love the idea of the connective process. Great. So why is it so hard to get pricing, CRM, finance, w- EIP that you touched on as well, delivery tools to work as one joined-up system?
Speaker 2: Because they're dif- Because they're currently different systems and they have different specialties. Um, people say to me, "Oh wow, how did you do a workflow and project management system and now you're doing a pricing system?" And back then people would say to me, "Why don't you just put accounting into your workflow and, and project management system?" I was like, 'Cause that's a whole other system," and the work involved in that is, is immense. And it's the same with, um, scoping and pricing. They're fundamentally different. There's so many different ways to scope and price. You have different clients, client relationships. You have different teams. You have different ways of preparing a scope of work. Um, I mean, it's, it's vast. And then it's the same with the CRM. You have different, uh, contacts, different processes, different pipelines, so then getting them to all work together is because you have different forms of data needing to talk with different ways and with different teams using them. Um, I believe in a, in an AI world it's all gonna be connected. I think you're gonna see, um, agents running across systems. Um, and it's imperative that platforms certainly like, like WeRun, um, you know, they need to be prepared for agents to, to connect the systems together.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And do you think that's gonna make systems feel more helpful rather than just admin tasks-
Speaker 2: Absolutely
Speaker 1: .... tasks that people don't, just don't wanna do?
Speaker 2: Absolutely. I mean, you know, some of the, some of the really slick tools that you can put in already, you can have your agent where you can simply anywhere on an interface ask a question and it can direct you to where in, in the product you can get additional help. Um, you know, I, I look at the whole interaction between, uh, agents and AI and software as being a kind of a conglomeration where the humans will be, I call it the kind of the commercialization or activation layer. So they'll, they'll check. They'll be doing the rigor. They'll be doing the, the, the more analysis of the data and the decision making. Because at the end of the day, that's actually what our specialty is as humans. Why do I decide that I think this price is okay for one client and that price is okay for another?
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, dare I say that you've built software for people who hate software.
Speaker 1: So, you know-
Speaker 2: I know. Figure. Go figure
Speaker 1: ... for people who are in creative agencies, "I'm a creative. Uh, I've got... I'm an ideas person. I'm something else. Ah, I, I, I don't want sit here entering stuff into, to software." So, you know, from Traffic Live to Scope, you've built tools for agency people who are, to be polite, impatient with systems.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Uh, probably not the types of people who adapt to process. Um, so what have you learnt about product design i- in that particular world?
Speaker 2: That you've gotta make it look really good. It's gotta be drag and drop. Uh, and you need to take feedback in a, in a really prompt and, and quick way. Yeah, it's absolutely critical. And actually, everybody does something slightly different. Their architecture and their, uh, and their kind of detail and data is always different, so you need to be able to, to work with multiple ways of working. I mean, that's the beauty about creative agencies. They're fun to work with, but they're also creative not only in what they do outside their business but what they do inside their business, and that, I've gotta be honest, it's a challenge. Um, yeah, it's a challenge that I've embraced, and I'm still in it every day.
Speaker 1: So, you know, I'm thinking about service businesses and software. What, what does a service business need from software that generic sales tools, you know, fairly often miss?
Speaker 2: So, so the, so the difference is, and I... And we, we talk about... We're officially, uh, it's called a CPQ
Speaker 1: Oh, there's a term now
Speaker 2: ... configure price quote. Yeah, exactly. I didn't even know this-
Speaker 1: Wow
Speaker 2: ... until I was in an interview with a, with a research organization, and they were like, "What do you think?"
Speaker 1: You invented it, so-
Speaker 2: Exa-
Speaker 1: Yeah, more bucks out for you in correct category.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Yeah, where are you gonna be on the chart of this as a CPQ? I was like, "Oh, brilliant." Um, so it's configure price quote. So a CRM really is around who do I need to follow up and when. So it's really around kinda lead generation. Very different function. So how do I get people to return to me and put them through a sales process? And then you've got kind of an engagement of that process. Whereas, um, a configure price quote system is really around once I've got them in the process, how are we gonna manage what we're charging them, and what does that look like against delivery? I'm configuring pricing and quoting for the work that-
Speaker 1: Sure
Speaker 2: ... I'm managing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Another part of, uh, of your journey, I mean, you obviously built the software to run your own business in the first place, right?
Speaker 2: Yes. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: And then I would imagine other agencies looked and thought, 'Well, holy shit, we need something like this,' 'cause we've got the same problems that need to be solved within our company.
Speaker 2: It was a little bit, it was a little bit more like, um, that's actually a really great piece of software. This is gonna be a better business than that. So it was more that one became more successful than the other and morphed into, uh, a piece of software.
Speaker 1: So that's interesting. So what happened at the point where you realized that pricing and scoping, something that's maybe not so exciting, um, and was a pain point could actually become a company?
Speaker 2: That's a really great question. Well, at the moment, pricing and scoping, there's no tool that's, that specifically focuses on that within the agency framework, and certainly within professional services. So anybody who's putting together, um, teams of people; and these teams of people can be vast. I mean, we sat here in the, The Secret Garden for Deft. I mean, what are they? Uh, 1,500 people. So you're, you're trying to mobilize your largest cost to your business is people. How do you make them work against your clients in a f- in a framework? So it goes back to architecture. And key for that is you need a way of making sure that you're monetizing your, your, your greatest asset, which is your people. So it cannot be the same system as a, as a CRM. It's fundamentally different, and it's not the same as a workflow tool.
Speaker 1: And then the question looking yourself as a founder, and the, you know, there's obviously many founders out there, and there's probably founders here today in the garden frankly. Um, but I can see one just sat there. So, you know, do founders spend too much time chasing new growth ideas and perhaps not enough time fixing the commercial basics within their business?
Speaker 2: Do you know, we all think that to solve a problem we'll just go out and find more clients. Um, and I think somehow that, you know, that is the nature of what happens. Um, we've got all of those statistics we can throw out that it's harder to win a new client than it is to save an old client. Um, and I think the key thing is making sure the commercialization of what you're doing, um, is so much more important than continuing to win new business. But actually, agencies, I think they're all very, very focused on continuing to ne- to win new business, which is when we venture out on the Corset later, you will see how many people are chasing round the unicorns of the CMOs. When actually, if you made better business, you reduced, um, your scope creep, you ensure that you had greater margins, your teams were able to build more s- more scalable. I mean, it's, you know, what is the thing that stops growth most is typically, uh, cashflow. Or not even cashflow, the, the lumpy kind of bill that you get typically.
Speaker 1: What do you think the CMOs attitude is when, okay, let's say we're on the Corset, um, agency's chasing them. They're probably hiding their badge or turning it round the other way. Um, but hey, you know, obviously many are recognizable and, and are faces within this industry as well. But, you know, whilst being approached by agencies, do you feel that the agencies are poor at differentiating themselves, um, talking to the value that they provide, uh, as opposed to, oh, we do this and this and this, which almost feels like a, you know, a features list that frankly no one really cares about?
Speaker 2: I, I, I think there's some people who do it really, really well, and there's other agencies that, that don't. So I think the agencies that do it well understand what their differentiation is. Um, I mean, I've seen a prol- proliferation of transformation agencies in the last 12 months. Um, we're certainly seeing a whole host of drivers towards technology and to building AI elements for, um, agency clients. And I also think that there's, you know, a plethora of kind of vanilla where you can have a, a name, a color, an animal. You know, you can have all sorts of defined things, even in the agency names. You're like, "Oh, I've heard that before. I've seen that before." Um, it is very much a copycat industry, but I think there are some people who are doing it really well, and that the secret is to find ... Um, and they're doing it well 'cause they've thought about the architecture, they've thought about how the agency's gonna work. They're thinking about what makes them different, and that needs to include how they're pricing for that differentiation. Yeah, it shouldn't just be a list of deliverables or assets. It's got to be what is the strategy, the methodology? How is it that you put it together? I mean, Robin Bond is a brilliant person who does, um, a whole load of, uh, work with, um, with agencies about trying to tell them not to all be the same, and I know they, they get very offended by that, but it's true. It's, it's a... In fact, he wrote a book last year, um, about it, which is a great book. I'd suggest anybody reads it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, I'm, I'm thinking there is an aspect of cobbler's shoes sometimes. Um, you know, there are, as you say, fantastic agencies that Their marketing is the, on the same par as, as their clients-
Speaker 2: But that's the cobbler's shoe-
Speaker 1: But not many-
Speaker 2: The cobbler's shoes though, exactly, is that they're normally focused on winning more business 'cause they've let it seep out the back end. So constantly winning more business without fixing the fundamentals. And you c- You have to get it right for growth and scale.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean, we would... You would do that in a normal business, wouldn't you?
Speaker 1: 120%.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was trying to avoid saying 100%, as that seems to be a bit of a word trap that people-
Speaker 2: Yeah
Speaker 1: ... in this industry are falling into.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Um, I'm just thinking about language, so the, the language that you might use to bring a team along on the journey because, you know, what you're asking people to do is, is, is transform the, the way that they're going about the pri- pricing, the scoping, yada, yada. Um, so you know, is there particular language that people should be thinking of that works better when you're trying to coerce or, or get a creative to come along, or a, a client lead, or perhaps pulling a finance person so that they're all in the same space?
Speaker 2: It's really about, um, how you communicate to the business of the, the benefits of what, um, putting the right archit- architecture and infrastructure into the business is gonna do. So creatives normally never really get involved in the scoping process, but they're the ones that are, that are down the line having to come up with ideas on a, on a shoestring. Um, so in bringing them into the process, if you've got, uh, the architecture and infrastructure to do that, then that will help along the journey. What, what also happens is at the moment everything's done in a silo, so you might start with a, with an Excel spreadsheet with some numbers on it, and sometimes that is the first thing that's done, sometimes it's the last thing that's done, but what is really clear is it's not often done with the huge amounts of rigor that it should be, taking into account all the different parts of the, the business. And that, you can't do that without having an architecture and an infrastructure in order for people to know how to do that, um, and then to work together in that, in that process to do it as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Um, changing the topic just slightly, so y- you talked about AI, I mean, there's obviously a proliferation of it. Where will that genuinely help in this part of the process and within the business? Uh, and perhaps where is it being over- overhyped or oversold at this point in time?
Speaker 2: So I mean, my view will be that agents will put together all pricing at some point, and I don't know what that will be in the future, uh, 12 months, 18 months, but certainly, certainly within the three-year timeframe. Um, and you'll... And, and with regards to how they're gonna put together pricing, fabulous, but it's still gonna take, um, the interaction of humans in order to understand the, the client and all of the human conditions that come into to pricing. So I'm looking at the whole kind of process with AI on pricing to be abound, um, humans being of compliance, um, and I guess that whole kinda layer that allows the checking, the coming back, the, the... Well, what, what, what happens at the moment? What do we get AI to do at the moment? We get it to do all of the grunt work, and then we check back and to, to make sure that we're happy with that. We tweak it, and then we, then we move on with the process. I f- I see it being exactly the same-
Speaker 1: Yeah
Speaker 2: ... in pricing and scoping.
Speaker 1: So it's, it's about creating greater efficiency.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Um, as you say, doing the, the, the work-
Speaker 2: A-
Speaker 1: ... you're paying for.
Speaker 2: And also, that efficiency, we've never had that before. So the loop that you talk around, so what would happen, um, in a scope of work at the moment is you create a scope of work for a b- for a project, and you'd create another scope of work for another project, and another scope of work for another project, and there would be no learnings. There'd be no data structures, there'd be no comparisons. So you actually now have the ability to do that. So the agents will be able to, to, to see things and to build, to build scopes better than people, but it's not going to be able to put in that whole commercialization and optimization layer that, um, a human can do, and I s- actually see that that is where it's gonna bring it to life.
Speaker 1: No doubt we've got some agency leaders listening to the show. I know that we do. Um, so what advice would you give them in terms of if they wanna go on this journey, what's the starting point? What's the first thing that they should be looking at to get their house in order?
Speaker 2: I think it goes back to their architecture, um, and how they're running at the moment. They need to get certain key people involved. Um, I mean, I know certain consultants, there's a... Tim Williams is a, is a consultant, he talks about a value council, so he gets a person together from each of the key departments to sit and talk about what this, what this would look like, uh, in putting together pricing in this agency and how that would work. I've seen, um, other people do it where they take all of the data they've got from all of their previous scopes, they analyze that, or at least a quarter of that, half of that, they build some kind of data points into some similarities t- around the methodology that they work to make sure that they're using kind of informed decisions on data within their pricing. And then once you can start that, you can then move that on, and it's a cyclic loop. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Great. Good advice. Um, few random quickfire questions. So, uh, a brand that's p- you know, inspiring you at this point in time, or perhaps an agency in terms of, um, some of the marketing that they're creating.
Speaker 2: Ooh, brand or agency? I mean-
Speaker 1: Or campaign, or something that's caught your attention, you think, "Wow, that's pretty cool."
Speaker 2: Well, I have to say Canva. Canva at the moment on the corset, it's like whatever they're doing is... I mean, their, their software is brilliantly easy to l- use. They've come from kind of behind to be ubiquitous with anybody who's currently in the whole kind of social element. Um, they've... They're very generous with what they're offering to their users. Uh, it's slick Um, yeah. Which is why on the corset and you wanted to go to their beach, the queues are 'round the, 'round the corner
Speaker 1: Wow
Speaker 2: Um, and I think the other one I think is Pinterest. I think they're doing another great job. I think it's an incredible little platform. Um, yeah, and I think it's really delivering.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, Pin- Pinterest is one that almost became legacy-
Speaker 2: Yeah
Speaker 1: ... uh, and has had a renaissance.
Speaker 2: Yeah
Speaker 1: In a fantastic way. And, you know-
Speaker 2: Well, they connected very early to AI
Speaker 1: Exactly. This is why
Speaker 2: So if you're wanting to, if you're wanting to kind of put some clever things in with visualization and AI, just go and snip some things from, from Pinterest, put it in a, put in a group, you get some design out amazingly quickly. I mean, yeah, we're in for an incredible time.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Uh, I used Pinterest 2012 when I purchased a new home and ripped the guts out of it and wanted to rebuild it, and created mood boards and storyboards and whatnot else so myself and my wife could come to agreement in terms of, uh, you know, how we wanted to fix up the blank canvas, which was great.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. And now, and now, fast-forward to now, you'll go and grab some colors, some styles, some fonts, some typefaces, and you'll put that into an AI and it'll come back with a design that's of the same style that you're wanting. I mean, amazing, right?
Speaker 1: I've done that as well
Speaker 2: Exactly. So, I mean-
Speaker 1: A non-architect, but I, I do the full project management on my new home. Architected it, designed it, everything from, from end to end.
Speaker 2: Well done.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: Um, a go-to resource. So, you know, you, you might be looking ... I don't think people look for inspiration, I think they- inspiration finds them at the right point in time. But, um, yeah, maybe a go-to resource, perhaps a book or, I dunno, it could been a visit somewhere or something that you've seen recently where you've gone, "Wow, okay, this is great," and then you've had that moment a little bit further down the line. Could have been in the, in the shower moment, as it were, where you go, "Oh yeah, I've, I've just had this idea", and perhaps they've been connected somehow.
Speaker 2: Well, I think it's always one of those things, isn't it? Um, I went to a, a seminar on the weekend, um, not this weekend, the weekend before, on manifesting, which, uh, yeah, I saw, uh, Rosie, Rosie Naboufi?, um, talked about manifesting, the seven key principles of manifesting. And I was like, "I love that." So it's if you think about something, then it start com- it comes into your consciousness. If you're thinking about somebody, they'll turn up. So just the whole kind of principles that she was talking about, I love that. It's like that often happens in business, doesn't it? When you're, when you're thinking about solving a problem, and then, oh... And it could even have happened to you, John. Oh, I might need this type of person on my podcast. And then funnily enough, the next day somebody might talk about that person, and then you think, "Oh, that would be great. Can you introduce me?"
Speaker 1: Do you know what? That stuff does-
Speaker 2: So that's flow, that's manifesting, all of these things. And I think in an AI world, that stuff is gonna become, you know, the connection of people, flow, uh, how we're working as humans is just gonna be more and more important.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. This happened four or five times in the last few days, but I would say that was coincidence. Uh, and design as well. So you talked about Canva.
Speaker 2: There's no such thing as coincidence, right?
Speaker 1: Rory, big shout out to Rory from Canva, was interviewed a little bit earlier by Justin, um, here at The, The Secret Garden.
Speaker 2: Amazing.
Speaker 1: Yeah
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: Um, and then lastly, just like to kinda end the show this way, but advice that you might provide for a younger individual, they could be at the start of their career, uh, or perhaps they are thinking they're potentially attracted by the, the media world, the marketing, the, the advertising world. What advice would you give them at this point in time?
Speaker 2: Be hungry. Uh, learn lots. Um, people would normally say, "Do what you're passionate about." I actually think you need to, to, um... I think grit is a really important thing. I think determination and grit. Say you're gonna do something and do it. Stick at it. I'm... Yeah. I always say mama didn't raise a quitter. I think that's quite important. And I think in the marketing and advertising area, it... I mean, people have been in this industry for decades, so, um, it's such a great industry to be in. But what, what has happened recently is you're not getting the longevity of people. So we've lost a lot of people, um, from, from agencies into the tech platforms, so people going to, to Google and Microsoft and all s- sorts of other things. Um, I think it's be hungry, get in, learn, and, uh, yeah, and keep some tenacity to kind of get yourself through what's a challenging industry, but fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Drive, spirit-
Speaker 2: Yeah
Speaker 1: ... tenacity-
Speaker 2: And a hard work ethic
Speaker 1: ... perseverance. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Brilliant. Thanks, Tracey. I've loved having you on the show today. Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 2: Thanks, John