We recently had the opportunity to speak with Ed Low who recently joined as Chief Marketing Officer for We Are Group. We wanted to hear more about his vision, his career journey, and how he plans to bring his own unique experiences to elevate the Group’s marketing strategy.
So Ed, tell us a bit about your background and what led you to this career?
In a word, people. I love storytelling, creative writing, and positioning statements that genuinely differentiate something. But most of all, I really like figuring out what makes people tick. I adore that special feeling of working with others to identify a problem, craft a response, and work up a cohesive plan of action to address it.
Same in my career, I’ve always loved in-person experiences and exchanges (whether that’s IRL or IVL) and the process of simplifying complexity. Perhaps I didn’t quite recognise how to label it back when I was 20, but now at the tender age of 50, I realise I had a pretty high EQ. I was always good with people, so my path led from customer service, through conference delegate sales to content and project development, then to sponsorship and commercial development, and finally bringing it all together in Marketing. Marketing touches every bit of a business, so it is a fascinating discipline
What were the key milestones that shaped your approach?
I got shown the ropes in the hard-knock world of global conferencing and business intelligence. It was basically a boot camp in business fundamentals. It taught me the importance of knowing your audience and addressing their needs; the power of people, storycraft, creativity, human experiences, measurement, sales, interdisciplinary relationships, strategy, tactics and just plain old hard work.
I would strongly advise anyone starting out to identify an industry they are interested in, and then join a conferencing business in that sector. That said, throughout my career, it took me a while to understand that a leader is not someone who stands at the front shouting at everyone, but who proves to be effective by leading from within.
Who has been your biggest inspiration or mentor in your professional journey?
I can’t name one person, and I could probably do with a mentor more now than at any point in my career. Still, one of the biggest inspirations came from not a person, but a coaching diploma I undertook just before lockdown. That process helped me become a more effective and valuable contributor and opened the door to a significant amount of learning.
More generally, I know it sounds glib, but I really do feel like I learn from everyone around me. One of the things I love about working at Collider and We Are Group is I get to be surrounded by people who are better than me. It’s so important to me to be challenged, and I find the best results often come out of that conceptual tension or friction.
What attracted you to the role and what are you most excited about?
What’s not to love? I’m a huge fan of the power of captivating ideas and clever strategy, there is nowhere else that has all of this in one like We Are Group.
Think about it. Seven Communications is a creative communications agency getting brands noticed in extremely clever ways. We Are Collider is a creative experience agency at the very top of its game, designing human experiences that blow people’s minds. And Arq is a pioneer in Immersive Media Marketing in the many virtual realms. Put that all together and it’s a pretty exciting space to be in. I pretty much pestered Anton and Tracy to give me the job.
Can you share your vision for We Are Group’s marketing strategy?
I can. Quite simply actually. What we’re doing isn’t rocket science (a strategy that’s that complicated is never going to work), and boils down to three clear things:
1) Getting closer to both clients and audiences to understand their needs;
2) Once we’ve understood those needs, provide services that address the needs in ways that people can’t get anywhere else;
3) Keep all the parts of the group close because everything is changing all the time.
We are doing that with a big investment in our own IP. For WeAreCollider it’s MARVELS, the behavioural science research behind our experience design processes. For Arq, it’s STAGE, the same principle but for Immersive Media Marketing. And finally, for SEVEN, it’s their Cultural Intelligence model that helps brands be more culturally intelligent and relevant. Every client in our Group has access to this IP regardless of the agency they entered with meaning we can then coordinate resources to provide even better services.
How do you plan to unify the various agencies under the We Are Group to create a cohesive marketing strategy?
To me, the agencies lead the group, not the other way around. Each business offers clients different ways to engage with their audiences, yet all three agencies are unified by their belief that decision-making and creativity should always be rooted in insight and evidence-based thinking. This is why each agency has its own proprietary research into how behavioural science and cultural intelligence can inform clients’ strategies, and each of the brands has access to the others’ IP. To echo my previous point, our clients have access to the lot regardless of which agency they came in through. That membership model is the basis of our cohesive marketing strategy.
What do you see as the biggest challenges and opportunities for the Group?
Ed: Same thing. Change. Change is both a challenge and an opportunity, and shifts in buying behaviours, content consumption behaviours, culture, trends, technology, geopolitical, socio-economic change are constant. Our clients rely on us to navigate these shifts and only through behavioural science do we have the framework to help us focus our approach. In terms of actually doing it, there are many ways to skin a cat, but the fundamentals boil down to two principles: being close to your customers and working with them to understand and identify the challenges that need solving; then delivering absolute quality and being proud of the work. There is no better road to growth than doing a great job.
In the end, my goal is simple: make each member agency even more successful than they already are. I want to leverage our strengths to develop new solutions and serve clients in ways they can’t find anywhere else. By looking at our competencies across each of our three agencies, I see huge potential to develop new services if we coordinate our resources effectively. That’s what really excites me.
Ed’s vision for We Are Group is as ambitious as it is clear. With a commitment to quality, innovation, and behavioural insights, he’s set to drive the group forward in ways that will benefit clients and redefine the landscape of experiential marketing.
