For the first time, Variety hosted an interview studio presented by Canva during Advertising Week featuring three days of conversations with both veteran and new marketing leaders in the industry presented by Canva. It also featured an array of thought leaders in branding, storytelling, audience engagement, innovation and more. Below are highlights from those conversations.
Full interviews from the Variety Interview Studio will be featured on Variety.com.
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Mirabelle El Baze Villanueva
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Global Head of Client Growth
Bloomberg Media“I think the idea of user-generated content and how much of a role influencing has been playing in the whole media landscape is a really big point of discussion for us. We are pinpointing editorial talent [who] can start to influence on their own… really build community around a certain topic.”
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Soukee Van Orden
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Director, Strategic Partnerships & Operations
Curated by Live Nation“Constantly having my ear to the ground and understanding what my peers are talking about, I’m constantly engaging in different conversations, whether it’s in the digital space or in real life. And that brings a unique perspective to what we do every day. Because I can go to a brand meeting or an internal meeting and say, ‘I don’t think that resonates.’”
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Alessandra Agurcia
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety VP of Sales Marketing Solutions
TelevisaUnivision“Authenticity is key… We want to be spoken to authentically so our consumer and our audience really deliver back trust and loyalty to a brand that speaks to them extremely authentically in a way that resonates with them, that listens to them, because that’s how you’re going to drive your maximum brand impact.”
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Bri Reynolds and Zach Greenberger
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Social Media Manager
Chief Business Officer
Lyft“What’s great about working for a brand like Lyft is there’s so much user generated content out, and it’s great to see people super excited about the brand. A shift that we’ve made recently is creating content that inspires other people to create off of it. We love to go out with campaigns that inspire other people to make content.” – Reynolds
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Remi Edwards
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Executive, UTA Entertainment & Culture Marketing
UTA“Being able to identify people of younger age groups in different demographics is imperative to our work. We’re working with a lot of influencers all the time, who sometimes are larger scale influencers that are a bit older or micro influencers who might be a bit younger that we’re just discovering day to day on TikTok. Because that’s what my generation does, is scroll through TikTok all the time.”
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Nidhi Bhagat
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Brand Marketing
ESPN“Everyone has their own story how they got into their sport. But I would love to see diverse influencers really affecting the game of sports, and we’re seeing more of these stories across the globe since sports brings people together.”
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Matthew Low and Kristin Clark
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety SVP, Creative Director
SVP, Creative Director
BBDO“You do have to understand that the content [in a campaign] is not going to look exactly the same. You know, it’s not going to be matching luggage throughout. So you have to be flexible a little bit. The idea is still the idea… [But] it’s super important not to just export something for TV and do it on TikTok or another platform and expect it to perform the same.” – Clark
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Lizzie Widhelm and Briana Mendez
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety SVP, Head of B2B Marketing and Ad Innovation
Senior Manager, Sales Marketing
SXM Media“The way technology has progressed, and the way content has moved to such a more authentic place, it’s not linear anymore” – Widhelm
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Jamie Power, Lexi Swift and Alex Sobrino
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety SVP, Addressable Sales
Vice President, Addressable Sales
Director, Addressable Sales
Disney“The fundamental goal…find an audience and reach them as efficiently as possible” – Power
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Susan Jurevica and Nick Elliot
Image Credit: George Chinsee for Variety Chief Brand and International Officer
Associate Director, Content Marketing
Audible“Audiences are looking for brands and companies to have a clear and authentic and genuine message that’s resonant.” – Jurevics