francine: in 1971, wire and plastic products, plc, made shopping baskets.

in 2022, wpp, as it is now known, is the biggest advertising firm on the planet. sometime between then and now, specifically in 1989, mark read walked through the doors and played a starring role in that transformation. in 2018, read became chief executive of a firm in crisis. the man who had made the giant, martin sorrell, had stepped down. today, we speak to mark read about a new age of advertising and how to run a business fit for the 21st century. ♪ mark, thank you so much for joining us on "leaders with lacqua." what does it mean being an ads man, ad leader in 2022? mark: [laughs] well, i mean, our industry is at such an interesting phase, isn't it? we've been through the pandemic, we have come out in some ways ever more relevant. but we have faced a whole period of continued innovation with new advertising formats, new digital companies being launched,

e-commerce taking off. our industry is changing and changes all the time. but it is changing now more than ever. francine: but if you look at the pace of change over the last 10 years, it has been incredible. mark: yeah. francine: can you go through the same pace of change in the next 10 years? mark: i think so. i mean, look, we are a big company. we have 100,000 people around the world. we also try to have the heart of a small company. to be very responsive. we have people working day-to-day on individual clients, working on client briefs. it is that trick, isn't it? how we get the scale of a big company, but also how we operate quickly and nimbly. francine: other rivals are very focused on spending in tech. what is the future for wpp? mark: i think what makes wpp special is creativity. it is ideas. you know, without ideas, there is nothing on these tech platforms. what would there be on facebook or instagram or youtube without creative work, creative ideas, and all of the things that creative people make? i think that creativity is what makes wpp distinctive and where we want to invest. now, of course, with technology, how we bring those ideas to

life, where they live, where they exist, that is changing very quickly. so it is really about, sort of, building out what we could call the traditional skills of the past, but blending them with a real understanding of data and technology you need in the future. francine: your role is changing, i guess. is it still just pure advertising, or is it more advising clients and navigating these uncertain times? mark: well, wpp is much more an advertising company today than we used to be. now, clearly, advertising is important to what we do. when you start with that, and the customer says what do you do, we are much more than an advertising company. we are as likely to be asked by a client, how do i succeed on amazon as we are, what do you think of this television ad? so, we have had to learn a tremendous number of new skills over the last 10 years. francine: what happens over the next five years? is it going to be amazon? is it going to be twitter? is there something else that will be the hot new thing? mark: we do not need to make those decisions. consumers will decide and we

need to be where the consumers are. it is our job, i think, to understand all of those platforms and help our clients understand what is most relevant, where can they reach their consumers most effectively, what is going to deliver the high return on investment? we are data and technology and fact-driven today. so, it is both the creative ideas but also the financial returns that are important. francine: and, how did you end up in advertising? mark: sort of by mistake, really. [laughter] francine: a good mistake or a bad mistake? mark: well, i left university. i did not know what i wanted to do. i wrote to a few business leaders and companies. i ended up working at wpp in the very early days. and, i think, when i started i never thought i would end up sitting in this seat, if you like, at all. no. francine: what do you like most about your job? mark: i think, the people. i mean ultimately we are a people business. we have clients who are people, we have creatives who are people, we have technologies who are people. and a lot of what my job is as ceo of the company is to give those people motivation to tell

them where we are going, to encourage them to come up and do their best work, to encourage them to collaborate. but ultimately the job is as much, sometimes you think you are a psychologist as as you are a business leader i think sometimes. francine: what is your best piece of advice? i don't know if it is psychological, but if there is an account you need to get that you are worried will go to a rival, what is your pep talk like? mark: my pep talk? well, i love pitches. i love leading from the front and spending times with teams. i love to see the work we are doing. when we pitch a new business is often when we come together. so, i try to put myself in the seat of the client. you know, what is the client going to think when they see this work? are they going to be excited? is it going to turn their brand around? how is it going to resonate with their consumers? so as much as possible, i try to play that role. francine: how have clients changed over the years you have been in advertising? do they ask for different services now, because the challenges are so much bigger? mark: i think clients have a

tough time, don't they? we've never lived through a period of so many crises. they're trying to manage enormous budgets. vast, global enterprises. they need trusted advisors and i think that is, in a sense, why they are looking to wpp and to our agencies and people to bring. a real sense of, if we do this, what will the impact be? uh, from packaging through to advertising, through to public relations, through to design. and there are many, many new skills. you know, the days of old, if you like, a lot of this was a matter of judgment. now we are more data-driven than we used to be. we look at market research, we measure the return on investment. we use digital media in that way as well. so, they have become much more analytically-driven than they used to be. francine: what is the biggest challenge going forward? is it, if you look at some of the technology companies -- twitter, facebook -- is that still where the future lies? mark: it was interesting. in the first six months of the year, if you look at wpp, we have actually grown more quickly than the average of the four

tech companies. google, meta, snap, and twitter. so, in a funny way, the challenges they face are somewhat different from the challenges that we face. you know, we tend to have bigger, more global clients. we are not so reliant on venture capital-funded startups. so we are coming into the future in quite a good position. and actually there are going to be a lot of opportunities for us. francine: who do you see as your biggest rival? mark: you know, we compete with our traditional rivals, we compete with the consulting companies. we compete with some clients that try to do some of this work in-house. the great thing is it has always been competitive. two people in a garage could start up an agency and they have done over many years. but i think for the major clients that we service today, we are in a really, we are in a really good position. you know, we just came off the back, about a year ago, winning the global mandate for the coca-cola company. and they looked at and tested every element of what we do as a business, from coming to develop great creative work in china or india or south africa, to can we embrace, you know, the media

revolution? can we show them how to partner with facebook and google and how to embrace tiktok, and every part of our business? and selected us as their partner. and that talks to the power we have and the scale that we have. francine: is it more difficult now because of the cost-of-living crisis, because of the, you know, economic downturn? do you start feeling it already? mark: look, as i speak to you today, i think clients spend is amazingly resilient, actually. and we can look at next year and we can worry about next year. you know, and it is easy -- i've sort of learned not to worry about things i can't control. i can't control the economic environment. all i can do is put wpp and our clients in the best position to navigate it. and when i look at it like that i think, actually what we do is super relevant. clients have got to demonstrate to consumers what they are doing. we are working with supermarkets to demonstrate how they can help

customers save money. clients have got to innovate. they have got to, in many cases, put price increases through. so i think the need for marketing is not going to go away. and there is no doubt in the next 12 months will be challenging, but i think we will come out of it as we have done before, in a stronger position. francine: up next, client and consumer. the ad man must speak to both. with people asking ever more from brands, we look at the balance between profit and values. ♪

francine: leadership is key for any firm's success. particularly in a creative industry. with more than 100,000 employees globally, how do you run a small city as a coherent business? we continue the conversation with wpp chief executive mark read. so, as we look forward to 2023, what do clients ask you the most? mark: you know, we talk to clients about, how much are you

going to spend next year, what is the economic outlook going to be? i think, that really is the period of great uncertainty. i think what we say to clients is, those who have done well continue to support their brands. because that is ultimately what they need to do. as we saw even during the pandemic, those companies that sort of cut their marketing quickly found it hard to reinstate. we say to clients, don't be fiscally irresponsible, if you like, but do continue investing behind your business, invest behind your brands. that is what they are coming to us to ask is how to do that. how do you do that in 2023 means different things. how do i do that on tiktok? how do i succeed on amazon? how do i manage my reputation? you know, how important are these influences we are talking about? they are very different questions from five or 10 years ago. francine: let's say i had a $10 million budget. mark: yeah. francine: i want to talk to the u.s. consumer, not alienate china, and keep my reputation intact. how do i deploy that money? mark: well, you start -- [laughter] what products are you in,

francine? what is the product? francine: what should i be in? [laughter] let's say an energy drink. mark: look, so we are working with a number of soft drink companies. you have to have a great idea. you have to start with, what does the product stand for and what does it mean to consumers? i still think you got to look across the media mix. it's interesting, people talk about the death of television, but in some ways television is being reinvented, isn't it? you know, netflix is taking tv ads. disney+ is going to accept advertising. so those channels remain super relevant. i think you've got to understand creativity today in a very different way than before. you know, we are trying to embrace different creative disciplines, from partnering with people in hollywood, and the partnership between the coca-cola company and marshmallo on a new drink. understanding what is going on in the worlds of fashion or sport. those are also very interesting to do. then you answer how are you going to reach the consumer? are you going to go through walmart or amazon, or build your own distribution channels? so i think these are all

questions that wpp can help you answer. francine: do i have to have a chief executive political point of view? so, do i have to call out things that are morally wrong in my eyes? mark: no, i do not think brands have to have a political point of view. but i think brands have to understand what is going on in society, what consumers care about, and how what they do is relevant to them. and we did a study, our media agency did a study. it said 82% of consumers care about how brands treat people, treat social issues, take a position on those. so you have to think about, you know, energy consumption. what is your policy on sustainability? what is your packaging policy? how do you treat your people? where are you going to sell your product and who are you going to sell it through? so i think those issues are important. i rather think of them about purpose rather than being political. francine: are those real changes?

mark: absolutely, they are real changes. francine: and ceo's mean it? mark: i think ceos do mean it. certainly, i mean it. the thing about wpp, we have 100,000 people that are passionate about these topics. they want to know where we stand on so many of these social or political or societal issues. i think societal is probably a good definition of them, rather than political. francine: how will the qatar world cup actually change advertisers and the relationship with some of the big sporting events? mark: well, i think, you know, our advice to clients is to think about the world cup as a football celebration, and to get behind football and get behind fans. now, clearly the controversies around the host nation are problematic. but i think our advice would be, really, as far as they can, just to focus on the football and the support for football. and it is difficult, i agree. francine: how do you navigate china? mark: you know, we have a big business in china. we also have a big business in

taiwan. again, i was reassured by some of the moves in the biden meeting recently with president xi in bali. i think that is positive. but, again, it is difficult. francine: mark, there is something that struck me that you said, which is, of course you would advise client not to spend less in advertising because it has been difficult to ramp it up. is it like slots? like when you go to heathrow, if you lose a slot, then you do not get it back? is it if you rein in too much, then it is difficult to get the eyeballs needed to sell more? mark: there is an old adage. i know half my advertising works. i do not know which half. francine: [laughs] mark: increasingly, we know much more about what works and what does not work for clients. so, i think we can look at, certainly in much of digital media, what the impact is. do clients buy things, do consumers buy things or do they not buy things? so, i think a lot of the uncertainty in our industry has been taken away by the use of data to measure results. francine: and this is online? mark: online, but also off-line. you know, off-line media, we

know that we have very many rules of thumb to understand how to use off-line media. francine: i know i get pop-ups for stuff when i talk. is my phone spying on me, mark? because i talk about something and then i have advertising. is that the way technology is going to go? not necessarily the spying bit, but actually being able to tell me what i want to buy? mark: i think we have been very clear. i think that consumers expect a right to privacy, and i think that is a sort of nonnegotiable. and i think certainly something that we try to push through all of our work and everything that we do with clients. i think at the same time, you know, advertising needs to be relevant. and if it is more relevant, it is more useful to you. and so we can use data in a way to make advertising more relevant. but we have to do it in a way that is transparent to consumers, that doesn't misuse their data. i think all of these things are possible in what we are doing, really. francine: so, so what is the model for the future? i know there is also -- and we did a piece on this on bloomberg -- when you go into a shop and i think, the mannequin is

basically scanning your eyes. if you're looking at the shoes for an extra three seconds, that is what pops up in the ipad you're going around with. mark: i would not advise anyone to do that. [laughter] look, i think the cookie was invented for many reasons. but it became this kind of universal way of, in a way as you say, of tracking or spying on consumers. and i think that moving away from the cookie is a good thing in terms of online privacy. you know, there's only so much targeting you can do. you know, most of the world buy products from the coca-cola company. there is only so much targeting they need to do to be effective. and so, i think, sort of ultra-targeting has become sort of spooky. it is not helpful. it is not helpful to our clients, and i would not advise them to do it. francine: but if it's coca-cola, everyone knows it. what about smaller brands, my energy drink that i want to sell that no one knows about? mark: there are many ways that you can build a relationship with consumers. it has to be a value exchange. doesn't it? do they follow you on instagram? do they follow you on twitter? what is the value exchange? and i think that if there is a value exchange, then consumers will give you and let you use their data. francine: up next, with recession universally forecast,

how does the ad industry weather the storm? mark read on selling in the age of inflation. ♪

francine: it has been the age of the black swan. a global pandemic, war in europe, rampant inflation. how is the world's biggest ad firm positioning for a slowdown?

is there -- i don't know whether there is an interesting client that you would like to do more of, or even a client, is there someone you would love to have on the books that you don't have yet? mark: oh, i'm sure there is. i mean, look, we do fantastic work. i love all of our clients equally. [laughter] francine: of course, like your children. no favorite. mark: look, tesla is an interesting company. you know, so far, they have not spent money on advertising. i am sure one day, they will. i mean, i think jeff bezos said back in 2009, you know, advertising is what companies do when they have nothing to differentiate themselves. and amazon, today, is one of the world's top five advertisers. so i think that companies develop and come to a point of view where they need to talk to consumers about what they do, why they are relevant, what they have to sell. i think all of those things make what we do valuable. francine: i mean, it is interesting. if you look at the lifecycle of a business. mark: yeah. francine: and, i guess, the ability for that business to be disrupted, when is peak

advertising moment? when is the right time to really go for it? mark: well, just look at the technology companies. you know, google, amazon, apple are some of the world's biggest advertisers and they certainly didn't start that way. so, i think we have learned in a modern world that differentiation is increasingly difficult. it is increasingly difficult to do just based on technology or product feature alone. actually, brands, what people think of a company, what they stand for, what they do, that really matters. and i think that is what we are trying to do through advertising. francine: what was the most difficult day in your job? do you remember that day? mark: probably the first day. [laughter] i mean, nothing prepares you to be ceo of a public company. you know, i had worked for wpp for a long time. as i say, it was not a position that i expected to come into. and, you know, if we face it, the company had a few challenges when i started. we had not grown. our debt was probably too high. we were quite complicated as an organization. and so, if i look back now on that time, you know, just over four years ago, i am pretty

proud of what we have all done collectively as a team. and it really has been, you know, a collective effort. it is quite an interesting thing, i think. francine: yeah, and your predecessor was sir martin sorrell, so that was also, i guess, a challenge. mark: he had been at the company a long time, but when you take on a role, you do it in a different way. don't you? you do it in a way that is right for you. and i looked at where we were. and i think that one of the challenges was, how do we integrate analog and digital? right? because that is sort of something that had become quite complex. so we brought together two agencies, two big integrated agencies that could help clients across the full range of markets, analog and digital. that was the first thing that was important. i think secondly, we wanted to expand what we did beyond advertising. we were just in the advertising box. we weren't going to grow. so, we expanded off into

e-commerce, into commerce, into building experience for clients, and much more deeply into technology. and we have been on the journey really of reinvention of our traditional businesses, but also expansion into new areas, so the company can grow its topline. francine: is it better being bigger, because you service your clients in more industries and you have more of that data? or does it not make much of a difference? mark: i think what is most interesting is the definition of scale and the competitive advantage that scale has changed. it used to be buying power and buying muscle. we would buy $60 billion of media around the world, that would give us leverage with media owners we use on behalf of our clients to get better prices. today's scale comes from data and technology and leveraging that technology investment and data and that insight over multiple clients. so, i think scale helps, but coming back to a point i made earlier, you have also got to be nimble, smart, and quick, because our business is day-to-day interaction with individual clients. so, that is the challenge, how we create that scale without becoming, you know, dare i say, bureaucratic organization, which is the last thing i want to run.

francine: mark, how does advertising spending look next year? so, in the u.s., and again, is there really anything to rival the u.s. in terms of consumer spending or advertising spending? mark: advertising, well, the u.s. is the biggest market, together the u.s. and china are about 50%-plus of the global advertising market. heading in different directions. you know, the u.s. expected to be relatively resilient next year. china, we are not sure. maybe another tough year. you know, global ad spend should be up 6% or 7%. expectations next year are up 5% to 6%, so slightly slower. but don't forget, inflation is now 6%. so, you know, we are used to looking at things in nominal terms, but we forget to take off inflation, which is, sadly, a little bit higher than it used to be. so, i think it is a relatively, you know, relatively challenging year next year, but things have proven a lot more resilient than people expect. so we will have to see how the year, how the year unfolds. francine: do you think 2023 is the hardest year, or 2024 could be even harder if there is a lag effect in some of these inflation numbers?

mark: i don't know, i mean, look, 2020 was a pretty difficult year. [laughter] so, we have been going through difficult years. there are many reasons to be optimistic, i think, about the future for our industry. it comes back to the types of questions clients are asking us. they are much more significant, they are much more important. you know, the secret success of any company is to grow. and i think that we, wpp, and our industry more broadly, can can be really at the heart of our clients' growth. you know, how do they succeed with consumers? how do they reach them in new areas? how do they innovate? how do they create new brands? those questions are going to be just as relevant next year. you know, this whole digital transformation is going to continue. francine: yeah, yeah. mark: so these things are not going to go away. francine: so what is the secret sauce of being a great chief executive? do you, do you empower? do you micromanage? what are you like as a chief executive? mark: i like to empower. i mean, i can't do it all on my own. and, as i say, i need to get the best out of the people that i work for. so, i like to lead a little bit from the front, spending time with clients, spending time in pitches. you know, we are a competitive industry. you know, we are in pitches

day-to-day. we win or lose. business. so, i think, you have to do that. but i also have to create a company which is collaborative. i think there is a tension between people that want to win, people that want to collaborate. but that is what we are trying to do, you know? the desire to do great work, to really push the boundaries for clients, but also desire to work together, because sometimes no one person has a monopoly on the ideas. francine: where will you be in five years? mark: i think that in five years we might, we will look different, and the same. things will be the same. our belief in creativity, you know, investments in data and technology, but we will probably be a slightly bigger business. you know, today we are 11,000 people in india, 6000 people in brazil, 7000 people in china. i think those numbers will increase. they will probably increase faster than the number of people we have here in the u.k. or u.s. i mean, we are a u.k. company in a sense, but we are really a global company that is headquartered in the u.k. and the u.k. today is only 12%

of our business. you know, i don't know that will be wildly different. but i think we will be bigger in other parts of the world. francine: mark, thank you so much for your time today. mark: thanks, francine. thank you. ♪ (announcer) enough with the calorie counting, carb cutting, diet fatigue, and stress. just taking one golo release capsule with three balanced meals a day has been clinically proven to repair metabolism, optimize insulin levels, and balance the hormones that make weight loss easy. release works with your body, not against it, so you can put dieting behind you and go live your life. head to golo.com now to join the over 2 million people who have found the right way to lose weight and get healthier with golo.