The new roles: What are Makers, Evaluators, Testers, Curators
Whether he admits it or not, for an industry “old-timer”, connecting with the younger generation is by far the biggest challenge. It’s the classic generation gap, with a twist.
How it started? With the rise of the new digital culture, which favours the consumption of short video content. Video content platforms – whether TikTok, Insta Reels or YouTube Shorts – look similar, but serve a younger generation with multiple, very different consumption patterns and interests. It’s hard to target them precisely, it’s hard to fit them into a classic typology or profile. This has led to a disconnect between brands and the young consumer.
How it’s going? Most companies and agencies are still in the mindset that a campaign is a concept that is translated into a TV spot and KV and then multiplied identically across all channels. They overlook the fact that the young audience (soon to be the main audience) is very mobile & video driven.
The result: forced formats per channel, irrelevant messaging, seems very advertising & cringe-worthy for the younger generation. Therefore, they have low interest indicators for this type of campaigns and they skip them.
And yet, is the younger generation – Gen Z, to be precise – a tough crowd for marketers? Let’s see (through the eyes of a millennial).
They’re unconvinced by traditional advertising campaigns, I admit. On the other hand, they want to see authentic content and feel a need for the brands they consume to represent them, to be a natural part of their lives. Outside of their relationship with brands, they are interested in causes, they are veeery busy and have a lot of side gigs. Even though they have a pronounced tendency to drama kings & queens and sometimes declare they’re going crazy because of the job (it never happens), they’re very professional and get it done.
Oh, and they’re proud of themselves, their achievements and ideas, they talk about them at every opportunity – it’s one of the defining traits compared to the very fashionable millennials.
So they express themselves loud and clear on the above-mentioned platforms. They’re not just consumers, they’re content creators.
To engage with them effectively, we need to change the way we generate campaigns. And that means first and foremost restructuring the classic agency model and conventional roles.
With Maker Studio, we decentralize the traditional agency structure by launching a new business model that generates snackable video content campaigns co-created with a collective of young people for young consumers, proofed by data. It’s an agile structure based on testing and validating the idea before implementation, similar to the product development process in IT & Tech.
What are the new roles in this process?
In the first stage, the briefs go to our youth collective. We encourage them to come up with as many ideas as their imagination allows – without restrictions, limitations or mandatories. We call these young consumers Makers – they are the creatives. Basically, we are replacing the classic creative teams (Art & Copy) with our very own Makers. Which gives us access to fresh insights every time – because our Makers are also consumers of the brands they work for and incorporate personal experiences into their proposals.
Then the ideas go to the Creative Director, right? Wrong! The next role in the process is the Tester. Yes, that’s right, it’s kind of like in the gaming industry, except our testers are evaluating the quality of the ideas submitted by Makers. A panel of Gen Z Testers will vote on the best idea, in a peer evaluation system. This is not an elimination process, the purpose of this stage is to analyse the ideas received “hot off the press” by the campaign target and to have a first indication of their effectiveness.
Pre-tested ideas then go to Creative Curators. They are the equivalent of a Creative Director, people with agency experience who know the brands Maker Studio generates campaigns for and young consumers equally well. The background is different – they can be creative people, but also from social media management, client service, PR & reputation. We want as much of an eclectic mix of perspectives as possible to ensure the most accurate curation of ideas coming from Makers. The role of the Curators is therefore to filter and select the final idea to be executed in the campaign.
Further, the selected idea arrives as a relaxed brief to the content creators. Yes, we’re talking about influencers on the rise, with large communities on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. Only we aim to use them actively in the process, not just as campaign execs. In our process, their role is that of content consultants, they will come with their input on the chosen idea and tips & tricks on how the campaign videos should look at the end. And they’ll do this in the way most familiar to them – a campaign video demo for the client. In short, that’s what content creator engagement would be all about. Further, if the client approves the idea, they can support the campaign from the influencer position.
Before the client, we have one last “hurdle”: that of the Evaluators. The campaign video demo is reviewed by a representative panel of Gen Z in an online test with biometric technologies (Affectiva and Imotions) to validate the campaign. If necessary, depending on the feedback from the panel of Evaluators, the video is reworked before being sent to the client.
So, there you have it. A new process, with new roles, that decentralises the creative process and allows brands to connect very directly with the youth target. Co-created with Gen Z, proven by data.
