Michael Conrad: Can advertising still be saved?
Michael Conrad was Chief Creative Officer at Leo Burnett Worldwide, President of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, and a businessman. How does he view today’s communications industry? And what needs to change for it to remain viable?
m&k: Michael Conrad, let's begin this conversation with a question that echoes the title of a bestseller by Howard Luck Gossage: Can advertising still be saved?
That's a bold statement. Could you elaborate on that?
When I look at how the agency business works today—and how many specialists advertising companies often have to work with these days; how much coordination that requires—I ask myself: Where has the primacy of the simple idea gone, the one that directs and drives all the elements? You know, one of my most effective approaches for establishing companies, brands, and then their products has been a one-word strategy. A single word that describes a company’s focus or sums up what it aims to achieve. This could be a phrase like «Vorsprung durch Technik,» which my friend John Hegarty used back then to help Audi redefine itself—or «Safe,» which still symbolizes the Volvo brand. Once you’ve distilled your mission down to that essence, you have a solid foundation … rather than the unnecessary fragmentation so common today.
Was everything really better in the advertising industry a few years or decades ago, or is there a bit of nostalgia at play here?
No, this isn’t nostalgia. Take a look at the structures we had back then in leading agencies around the world: Almost everywhere, strong creative minds were at the helm—people who also thought like entrepreneurs. And on the other side were clients who were willing to pay a fair price for exceptional work. We were able to generate very impressive revenue, but we didn’t pocket it (laughs)—instead, we used to reinvest it in the agency and our clients to boost our competitiveness. Incidentally, many creatives at the helm of agencies also followed a one-word strategy when it came to their personal branding: Hegarty’s guiding principle was usually «Irreverence»—a healthy dose of «disrespect» with which he rejuvenated brands. Bogusky’s «Baked-In» brought clients« products to life in their communications. And mine: »Thought-provoking.”.
Are such top-tier creative professionals a dying breed?
As I said, the question is really more about who is willing to pay for their work today. Is outstanding creativity—and the time it takes—still valued, even in a prosperous country like Switzerland? I’ve been thinking about what I liked in Swiss advertising over the past year, and I brought the ADC book with me (points to a stack of papers). It’s so thin—it’s never been this thin before! By the way—what wasn’t included, and that surprised me, was the film by Wirz for «My Switzerland.».
You mean the campaign with Roger Federer and Robert De Niro?
Yeah. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. You can watch that thing over and over and over again. How many times has that YouTube video been viewed? Over 50 million times!
The most successful campaign Maestro Federer has ever done as a brand ambassador …
Brilliantly written, down to the last detail. Just look at De Niro standing at the window in his underwear, gazing out at the skyline! And then there’s that one-word strategy again: In the clip, Switzerland is positioned as «boring»! It takes courage to label something like that. That’s exactly what creativity is all about—the courage to go beyond the norm. I have to take a risk here. I can’t back all of this up with research beforehand.
How can the advertising industry—including in Switzerland—encourage clients to allocate larger budgets again, which can then be used to support outstanding creativity?
There are examples that work and point the way forward. Take R/GA in New York, for instance—they combine consulting and design and are highly sought-after as service providers, especially among startups. That’s a clever idea anyway: Consulting firms have become a real problem for the advertising industry—consultants with access to the CEO come in and say they’ll handle communications directly. They’re then given a mandate, but what do they really know about communication? (laughs) Advertising agencies shouldn’t let this business be taken away from them.
I’d now like to talk a little about your own path into the industry. You entered the world of advertising more by chance and out of curiosity—after an eventful youth marked by experiences of fleeing your home country and economic hardship. Did this real-life experience later make you a better advertising professional?
Nope.
Not a good question?
Well, that’s a good question. It’s something to think about. But I’ve actually been set up for success my whole life, and here and there—often without even realizing it—I’ve scored a goal. For example: I once asked my mother why we left Leipzig in 1952. She replied that, as a child, I had told her how we’d learned the phrase «Bow your heads, think of Stalin» at school. And then she said, «We have to get out of here.» If she hadn’t left—and many people did stay in the GDR—how would my life have turned out? Maybe I would have done advertising for Honecker; I have no idea. (laughs)
«What would my life have been like in the GDR? Maybe I would have done advertising for Honecker.»
Are advertisers, by their very nature, suited to be propagandists?
Of course. Propaganda is our business. I wouldn’t even distinguish between the two. Advertising means promoting something or someone. What’s the difference between that and propaganda? That said, after the «Lürzer, Conrad» European campaign for the German FDP in the 1970s, we stopped doing political advertising—and we later established that policy globally at Burnett as well. Communication with the party leadership—and especially with then-Secretary General Verheugen—wasn’t of the quality we would have liked. Strategically, we found him lacking, a point that Count Lambsdorff later confirmed to me—rather angrily—over lunch in Chicago. In 1979, we had proposed a set of principles to the FDP that, two years later, led to the formation of the Green Party—as you can see, the two parties are now engaged in coalition talks (laughs).
It's interesting that you say that. Because one might think that advertising exerts a very real influence in the political sphere—and that that can be fascinating?
But then populism also plays a role … and we’ve seen what happened with Trump. It’s truly appalling how people can be manipulated.
As Burnett’s global creative director, you lived in Chicago for a long time. When you look at the U.S. today, do you still recognize the country? Is this still «your» United States?
The two camps—Republicans on one side, Democrats on the other—have actually always existed. But it wasn’t as confrontational. The whole Trump affair really irritated me. I could never have imagined that something like that was even possible. It was, after all, a level of thuggery unlike anything else. When the pandemic started, the guy told the country, «Don’t take this so seriously!» And in the same breath, he advised his friends on Wall Street to pull out of the stock market before it crashed because of the pandemic. That this politically incompetent person, who tried to apply his business practices to an entire nation, was able to stay in office for so long…
Would you say that populism works so well because populists are able to convey simpler messages?
Absolutely. We’re sitting here together in Zurich now, but you only need to look at the AfD in Germany. Take a look at how they operate, and how they’re allowed to operate: In 2020, nearly 17 billion euros were spent on integration in Germany, but how was that communicated to the public? How much was spent on integration communication? Very little to nothing, I think. This gives the populists of the AfD the opportunity to claim, virtually unchallenged, that migrants are endangering the common good.
From a campaign strategy perspective, should right-wing populism be countered with left-wing populism?
In any case, you have to be competitive. How to achieve that isn’t so easy to answer. To be a little more specific: Would I have a problem calling an opposing policy “anti-social” if I’ve branded my own policy as “social”? No—under certain circumstances, that might even be a good idea. At the very least, it gets people thinking. Because it gives them something to take issue with.
Can advertising use humor to make people think—without veering into the infamous «Sauglattism»?
Jokes are good, but they must always serve to convey a message—to point toward a deeper insight.
What advice would you give to young people who are interested in a career in advertising today?
I would recommend to them exactly what Walter Lürzer advised me back then: reading three books. Howard Luck Gossage’s *Can Advertising Be Saved?*, Ogilvy’s *Confessions of an Advertising Man*, and Rosser Reeves’s *Advertising Without Myths*, which established the concept of the Unique Selling Proposition. And then maybe you should do what I did back then—and try out different things with a real enthusiasm for the new. Also, as mundane as it may sound: you should try to have fun.
«I never went into advertising with the goal of becoming a creative director one day.»
And how can agencies tell if potential employees have real potential?
I once had a very interesting conversation about this with Gene Kranz, who led the Apollo 13 mission. They had that problem in space, of course. And Kranz’s team recreated the situation down on the ground in a capsule, overcame the challenge, and then told the crew in space what the solution was. I asked Gene Kranz: How do you go about selecting people? What are your criteria?’ He said, «Look, I’m presented with people who’ve been screened—they’re all technically capable of doing the job. But then I want to know: Does this person want to do something, or does this person want to be something? And then I make my decision.»
For people who want to make a difference.
Yes. And that’s what I’d tell the young people. If you’re excited about advertising, what exactly excites you about it? The company you’re applying to—what excites you about it? Why do you want to work there? Do you know exactly what they do, and do you have any idea why? I never went into advertising with the goal of becoming a creative director one day. I was just happy if I could even finish the jobs I was given. (laughs) And then I just happened to end up doing some crazy stuff—working outside the norm.
Which campaigns have particularly excited you?
I had a lot of fun right at the start of my career when I was involved in a campaign for Haig whiskey. First, we asked ourselves: How do Germans actually drink their whiskey? Well, they like to dilute it with water. Okay, but how good is that water? People use tap water, after all. So we ran a campaign that highlighted how Haig has been around for over 300 years—that a lot of passion goes into it—and we didn’t want Germans to ruin all that hard work with bad tap water: «A Haig must stay just the way it is. So send us samples; we’ll taste the water and let you know whether you can use it or not.»
So what happened then?
About 600 samples came in. And I also got a call from ZDF. They asked, «Are you the water taster?» Of course, I said yes. Then they wanted to film me—I agreed to that idea as well. They didn’t realize at all that we were just pursuing an advertising concept; they thought we were completely serious about it.
And then the TV crew came by?
Yeah, I hung up and my first thought was: «Shit, what do I do now?» (laughs) We then went with the TV crew to Walter Lürzer’s penthouse—he was on vacation at the time—where there was a really bizarre tower clock, and there was a long table that we’d set with glasses. I tested a water sample from Heidelberg very thoroughly—including a control test and lengthy explanations of what I was doing and why. At the end of the ZDF news broadcast in which this segment aired, anchorman Hajo Friedrichs said: «Isn’t it great that we still have people on Earth who look after our daily well-being? We’re now switching over to Houston, Texas, to cover the moon landing.»
«The opportunity to make a difference in the industry is still there—even from Switzerland.»
If there was ever a prime example of «earned media» …
We hadn't planned on it at all, but that's how things sometimes turn out when you take a path beyond the ordinary.
You were really «fired up» about this campaign, weren't you?
We often went to the train station at night to pick up the newspapers in which our ads were published. Mind you, we’d spent three weeks working on them—the typography, the images, everything that went into them. We couldn’t wait to see them in front of us—just like the first TV commercial. Today, print media has pretty much fallen by the wayside. But there are still many people who read the newspaper every day. That’s a powerful psychographic target audience. Ignoring them is advertising nonsense.
If you were to start an agency all over again, how would you go about it?
In 1978, a survey was conducted to identify the best agencies in Germany, and we—as «Lürzer, Conrad,» before our merger with Leo Burnett—took first place in three categories. We were recognized for having the most creative solutions and the most dynamic management… and we’d only been in the market for three years! That’s when we realized: Many other agencies in the German-speaking world at that time were structured in a more commercial, more standardized way. And that’s still the case today. That means the opportunity to really make a difference in the industry—it’s always there. Even if you want to launch a business from Switzerland. If I were to start something today, it would be an interdisciplinary venture. I’d have brilliant leaders in a team of eight or ten who really know how media planning works today, who understand consulting, and who can handle data. And among them would be excellent creatives. It would have to be a group of exceptional people who can solve any problem over a weekend. Just like our Burnett agency back then, led by Spillmann and Felser. That was something else.
Michael Conrad was born in Leipzig in 1944 and fled to the West with his mother in 1952. After completing an apprenticeship as an industrial clerk and holding various positions, the self-taught professional joined Young & Rubicam in 1968, later moving to Ogilvy Mather. In 1972, he helped found TBWA in Frankfurt; this was followed in 1975 by the founding of Lürzer, Conrad. In 1980, the company merged with Leo Burnett, where he rose to the position of Global Chief Creative Officer. Michael Conrad is married, has three children, and has lived in Zurich since 2000. He is a co-founder of the Berlin School of Creative Leadership, an Executive MBA program for creative executives.
