B (4:55)

Sure, yeah. So we're part of a larger group called xcm. So cross channel marketing. The XEM team is responsible essentially for global brand management, developing creative campaigns more aimed at building brand strength for Amazon's retail brand and for the prime brand as well, globally working with local teams. We also consult with a bunch of Amazon brands across different categories. Whether it's Health or the Alexa team or the Devices team, whatever else it might be, it is very much a replicated like an internal agency. We've got creatives and designers and media strategists and buyers and producers and all the rest of the. And part of that is the brand planning and creative strategy team, which I lead working alongside Garrett. A lot of the activities are exactly what you'd expect. Writing creative briefs, working on customer research, developing comms frameworks with the media team, all of the functions and topics that you'd expect from a brand planning team.

A (5:58)

And are you sort of monitoring how the brand is expressed? Is that a big part of it, ensuring? And how do you do that?

B (6:06)

Yeah, monitoring might be a bit of a term. Gently guiding, strongly suggesting in some cases it's definitely part of it. We kind of split our brand identity between the design side and the strategy side. So we've got, like, a pretty incredible group of designers and creatives that do definitely help ensure there's a level of consistency. As you can imagine, Amazon, especially with its history, spins up different products and services and ideas pretty quickly. And with that can come quite distinct looks and feels and strategies. So, yeah, definitely the central team plays a role in trying to coalesce and get that compounding power of consistency in place. So, yes, it'd be the shorter answer.

A (6:59)

But I'm just curious, are there words? Are there terms? Is there a sentence that you guys use, Chris, to sort of say, this is what this brand is supposed to represent, this is the graphic representation of it, but the language of the brand and the personality of the brand is this?

B (7:16)

Yeah, absolutely. So we kind of work on this hard point, soft point sort of philosophy. So one of the hard points, for example, would be the Amazon mission. So this idea, the shorthand for the mission of making every day better. So lines like that, like, how is your team contributing to making every day better Personality. I mean, we're a brand that has a smile as a logo, which pretty much means that you're going to come across as being friendly and optimistic. There's certain elements that we do expect everyone to adhere to. Doesn't matter if you are a sub brand, if you're a service, if you're an aisle in the store. There are some definite hard points that we put in place.

A (8:00)

I remember having a conversation with Andy Nairn a number of years ago when he released his book, and we were talking about their work that they did for Amazon, the boxes work with the smile. And he told a story around how that smile wasn't actually a smile originally. It was really just saying, from A to Z shopping. He was making the connection between the A in Amazon and the Z in Amazon, A to Z. And then somebody I don't know if it was lucky, Generals was sort of like, well, it actually kind of looks like a smile.

B (8:36)

I have no idea if that's the history of it as a smile. I've always seen it as a smile. I know that part of the tweaks that we made over the last couple of years was to thicken the arrow ever so slightly. So it does have that kind of more of a smile when it shows up a little better in small spaces. So we definitely refer to it as a smile today.

C (9:03)

No, I love that.

A (9:05)

If it was not originally that, I think it's a beautiful interpretation. And then creating this whole graphic device over time, which is pretty special. You guys have been inside Amazon for a couple of years. You came in obviously from the outside. What were you searching for when you went inside Amazon?

B (9:24)

That's a good question. Yeah, this is my first kind of brand side, internal agency side. I've always been in ad agencies and in market research. Kind of before that, I knew a couple of folks that were working at Amazon. I knew Garrett from a previous life and our Chief Creative officer, Joe Shoesmith, and they'd spoken really highly of their experience. The ability to make stuff was becoming kind of hard in the agency world. It was sort of a case where I felt like I was maybe pitching or making things on spec or not actually getting anything into the world. Whereas one of the things that really drew me to Amazon was, hey, we've got a campaign, we've got a space. Someone's going to need to fill that space. So you sure as hell better develop something great because it's getting on air, it's going to be real. So, yeah, I think I've made more work in Amazon in probably a year than I might have made in two or three years in other places.

A (10:24)

How about you, Gareth?

C (10:26)

I mean, in full transparency, it was a job. Like I was freelancing.

A (10:32)

He actually said that, ladies and gentlemen.

B (10:34)

It was a job.

A (10:35)

He could have been at 7:11, but he went to Amazon.

C (10:39)

No, I was freelancing for about six months and just honestly, it was a very stressful scenario in the sense of always wondering when I need to find the next role. And then, yeah, our chief Creative officer, who Chris and I worked with in a past agency life, reached out to me and said, we might have an opportunity. I think you'd be a great fit. And honestly, when I first joined, I was like, I wasn't sure. I missed the agency. I loved the work hard, play art environment that I got from the agency world. And when I got here, I Felt like I didn't leave the agency world. Everyone. A lot of our people come from the agency world. We do though, like Chris mentioned, we do a lot of the work that we did at the agency world. We write the creative briefs, we developed the comms framework, we work with the creatives directly. So I don't feel like I lost anything. But at the same time.

A (11:30)

And the creatives are all in house also, right?

C (11:32)

The creative teams, yeah, the ones I work with, we do have a hybrid model to help with resourcing and sometimes to bring in new perspectives, but the ones I work with are all in house and yeah, just that level of. Not guarantee, but the consistency of producing work and seeing your work out there, it's just been really rewarding to know that when I start a project, I will most likely see it to fruition. It's hard to beat that. And the work we do is so big.

A (12:00)

So let's talk about what exactly you guys are. What kind of strategic problems land on your desks from time to time?

B (12:08)

Yeah, we generally focus on more the brand building side, I think so the brand strength. There's a whole team of folks, as you can imagine, in the portfolio, who look at the business situation. What are the objectives for the year? Who are we trying to reach? Where should we be playing? What are the segments? How are we going to allocate resources across different campaigns so that, thank goodness, is handled for us by another team? What we end up getting is kind of what you'd expect as an agency. Look at a particular objective, a particular set of customers in a certain context. Here are your constraints in terms of time and money. Develop a creative brief, unlock some insights, work with a research team. So that kind of creative campaign level is probably quite familiar to most people who have maybe come from the outside world, the agency world. The stuff that we get to work on that's maybe a little less obvious are some of those really deep foundational topics. So we get to stretch our kind of strategy muscles working on things like the global brand architecture of Amazon brands. Is this even a brand? So we often have teams come up with an idea and they'll be like, hey, this is the new Amazon brand. It's like, well, no, it's really amazing. That's kind of a service or that's kind of an experience and we're going to plug it in with this particular brand and this is how it going to make sense for customers. So global brand architecture influencing how we measure and what we measure across the org. Amazon's really big on like mental models and frameworks so you can put things in place, say in xcm. And then all of a sudden you're seeing this mental model, this approach being used by sub brands around the world, outside of xem. So your strategy chops can really impact. To Garrett's point, something that might have seemed kind of small can spread if it works. And just as equally, if you make something that doesn't work, it doesn't spread and it dies and then you move on to the next thing. So it very much has that mentality of recreation and reinvention.

C (14:22)

And then I'd also just to build off of that one thing that we, because we have a very robust measurement team, but we, because we're so close to the actual campaign work, we kind of of become that connective tissue between the research and the work itself. And so in doing that we were able to, you know, we can identify, because we work so closely with the research team is like new research products that we can develop to fill those gaps that get us closer to insights that will help benefit the campaign itself versus, you know, general measurement, tracking and making sure that we're staying close to the customer. You know, it kind of puts the voice of the customer on the campaign level.

B (15:03)

To Garrett's point, we have pretty robust measurement and we are looking for other category entry points or other perceptions where we might be waning. So we might develop a campaign to sort of talk about that particular outcome. It's easy to think of Amazon as being this sort of very well known and liked brand in the US but Amazon's in a bunch of different places. So it kind of gives us a opportunity to sort of still treat Amazon like a less known, in terms of what does Amazon stand for brand in another country. So you're constantly having to rethink, I guess, how you might start Amazon up in Poland compared to how do you treat Amazon in the US where we do have that widespread awareness.

A (15:51)

Before we get into the examples of creative, I'm curious about how you use research. So you mentioned this idea of looking for category entry points or trigger points. Talk to us, Garrett, about how you're using research to get at those things. And what exactly do you mean by category entry points? Because you guys are in, I mean, every goddamn category. How do you study that?

C (16:18)

Well, that was actually part of the problem. So I remember very vividly I had a brief moment of downtime and I was like, Chris, anything you need me to help out on is like category entry points. Because I think we all subscribe on the team to Ehrenberg Bass and IPA and creative effectiveness in general. So we' always, as we try and grow our expertise, we try and see how can we bring in these tools to our process and see if we can add any value to our work. And so category entry points was something that we've always kind of played around with, but we were never officially crack. And so we kind of explored category entry points on our end.

A (16:57)

And you're right, category entry points. What were you thinking, Chris? Were you thinking a specific category? Because, yeah, you're in every category.

B (17:05)

It's a good question. Yeah, exactly. Gareth's point, probably a better way to think about it for us is associations or perceptions. So it is hard to say, oh, I'm going to think of Amazon for, I don't know, shoes. To your point, everything's store. We don't need to build association with a singular category. What we do need to do is have our equivalent of that, which might be I need to think of when I need to shop somewhere, I need it tomorrow. Obviously prime speed is a big part of that. Or I want to associate Amazon with having everything I need for any occasion or for back to school shopping. So it's sort of like not taking the strict definition that Ehrenberg Bass might use, but bringing it sort of one level higher that can stretch across multiple individual categories, but stand for something as a retailer.

A (17:57)

Yeah, interesting. Garrett, tell us about that journey you guys were on.

C (18:01)

Yeah, so that's exactly. So we were trying to think of these shopping moments and events kind of filled that void. And so because we're part of an internal agency, we know the work that we're going to be doing the year ahead and the year after that. So we had that kind of groundwork in place. So we thought, okay, what is an event, a moment that will happen year after year after year in holidays? Because as Chris mentioned, it's such a big time for Amazon. So we thought, is there a place in holiday where we can start building associations, building maybe trigger or attaching ourselves to certain triggers? So as people think about the holidays, Amazon comes to mind very quickly. So that was gap one that we're trying to fill. And then the second gap was the research itself. Because we're so close to the work and we work to develop these strategies, we see what research we have available. And the research that we were having available was either the aspirational research that comes before the holidays of what people want to do and look forward to doing, or the kind of reflective research of, hey, the holidays happened. What were the big moments? How do you feel? But there weren't those in the moment research studies that we could find at least. And so that kind of framed up this research to do this three month ethnography proposal that we submitted and approved to have people journal themselves over the course of the holidays from October through December to see when do the holidays come to mind. Like what happened in their day that made them think of the holidays and show how that evolves throughout the holidays. So October holidays can mean Halloween. It doesn't have to mean Christmas or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. It can mean trunk or treat. November could be Thanksgiving holiday and it could be the aisle in your local grocery store changing from Halloween candy to thanks or Starbucks releasing the new cup. So you kind of see these little nuances that get people into the mindset of holiday and then that just becomes an opportunity for us to say, is this an association we want to attach ourselves to or is this an association that we don't really have a space to play in?

A (20:13)

And what was the objective of understanding that that you could then market to that particular moment? And what was the advantage of that from a business perspective?

C (20:22)

I think for us, because we're so focused on brand building and brand strength, it's identifying the stories we want to tell. We're not trying to sell you this specific sku, we're trying to make sure that you come top of mind when you are looking to purchase something. So Amazon is the first place throughout the holiday season. And so it's what are the most relevant and appropriate stories that people can relate to that will break through and be remembered that then all of a sudden that not only make them feel better about the brand, but also make them feel better about the holidays and get them excited about the holidays. So it's really making sure that the stories we tell really land and don't get kind of ignored.

A (21:02)

So, Chris, it's like creative inspiration.

B (21:04)

Yeah, a lot of creative inspiration. A lot of it is, to Garrett's point, those trigger points for shopping. So it doesn't matter so much that oh, they're triggered to buy a pot or to buy bedding. What we're looking for in this particular research was I need to do shopping because family's coming to dinner or someone's coming to stay. So those are the moments where Amazon being Amazon and having kind of everything, at least in the States or really globally or prime being prime, I need something quickly. Those are the moments that might trigger a shopping occasion less about the individual category and more. Just, I need to get some stuff.

A (21:45)

Yeah. And to that question you asked on our live show at Deutsch recently, Garrett, your question was. If I'm remembering it right, it was about the challenge when you're working on a brand over a long period of time, of being able to come back with fresh eyes the next season and with fresh ideas. Because this is my interpretation of my experiences with this. Sometimes it just. The first year, you're full of ideas. There's all those possibilities. The second year, it's like I'm coming back to the same basic marketing objective, but I've got to come up with new ways of fueling the creative process. And so your question was, how do you begin to keep that fresh? Am I interpreting that right? Cause that's obviously what this work would ultimately help you do.

C (22:32)

Yeah, exactly. Like, I think what's interesting is we tell three, four, five stories in a span, but this research gave us hundreds of stories. So if we're making new work, we have this arsenal of insights and learnings that we can just say, hey, this is a scenario that works. This is a scenario that works. This is a scenario that works for our customers, and we can start building associations. I think also what the response was, understanding how cultures shift again, what still works, what might not work anymore based off of how time has changed and the landscape that we're in, is also something that we try and keep aware of.

A (23:12)

So, Chris, talk about what's at the heart of an Amazon spot. I know the box is gonna be there, but my sense is, you, in your brief, you have to either. Are you suggesting or are you insisting that certain product categories are to be sprinkled throughout this or that there needs to be a certain form of storytelling? How do you brief?

B (23:42)

Yeah, we definitely believe in a lot of what the industry's probably heard from folks like Orlando wood and System 1. We believe in emotion very much so. We believe believe in high degrees of emotions. So we're not looking for something to be merely amusing. We're looking for it to be incredibly funny or incredibly warm or incredibly touching. We very much believe in characters. We very much believe in a strong sense of space and setting and inciting incidents. We very much believe that the brand or the product or the service that we're talking about, whether that's Amazon or whether that's Speed or whatever else it might be, has to be playing a role where the story couldn't otherwise happen without it. So you can't kind of describe that story to someone without mentioning the brand, we've got a pretty robust list of creative tenets that our creative team have developed. But tenants is probably the right word because you can very quickly get to a paint by numbers sort of scenario where everything starts to be. Be so same same that it stops being, to your point earlier, inspirational or different or how do you get that excitement and novelty? Very much subscribed to the idea of imaginative repetition, which I know is a term that seems to be back in fashion and I think it's a good one.

A (25:07)

What does that mean? Just for the listener who doesn't know.

B (25:10)

Yeah, imagine the repetition. So for us it means balancing, I think Tom Roach put it really well, balancing consistency in novelty. So how do you have enough consistency in the spot? Like you mentioned the box. I mean, the box is one of our most distinctive brand assets. You can show that box and people know, oh, yep, that's the stand in for Amazon. That's what this spot is about. Vans are another good one. You know, you see an Amazon van, you kind of get, okay, this is a spot Amazon. So we do love our distinctive brand assets, but we want to leave enough space for novelty as well. Well, so novelty helps us stand out, helps get attention, helps drive talkability, it helps balance that level of freshness. And we're on the path, like lots of brands, working out the right balance of consistency and novelty, the right balance of imagination and repetition. We're probably in the past under indexed on the consistent part. The last probably three or so years has been a real march towards more consistency, but we're still leaving space on novelty as well.

A (26:14)

Well, and consistency, meaning that these brand assets are clearly represented. So they anchor the story, that the way that you're telling stories is consistent. It's not that it's the same ad consistently. It's the spirit that's consistent in any Amazon ad. Right?

B (26:30)

Yeah, totally. Right. I think sometimes people hear the word consistency and think it can only mean repeating the ad. And sometimes that is what it means when you've got a really good ad, you'd be mad not to repeat it. But there's other levers to pull in the consistency sort of arsenal beyond just repeating the ad, even though that is part of the decision to make.

A (26:54)

So is this, Garrett, is this the first time that you guys have repeated a Christmas ad? Because this year Joyride is running again and running in rotation pretty heavily. But it's not the only ad. It's running amongst a bunch of other ads.

C (27:08)

Yes, exactly. And to my recollection, I think this is the first time we're repeating a holiday ad. We tend to treat it like a Super bowl moment. But I think to Chris's point, when you kind of make one of the best ads you've ever made, there's no reason that you can't rerun it.

A (27:56)

I mean, it is a, it is a wonderful spot, but it's, it's, it's more, it's a, more of a brand spot than many of your other spots. Right.

C (28:02)

Does.

A (28:03)

Do you see it that way? It's just so rich in deep emotional storytelling.

C (28:07)

Yeah. And I would say that's part of the comms framework that we develop. It's finding that balance of building mental availability, but also reinforcing purchase availability, making sure people are aware of the dates to shop and going back to those triggers of a kids table, reminding people that you're going to host a lot of people. You want to make sure you have the necessary supplies across from cookware to settings to accommodations. You know, all that kind of comes to mind when you see a setting like, you know, a table full of family and friends. So you have that balance of, you know, breaking through and building those emotional perceptions and making people feel better about the brand while also reminding people, hey, we'll have the stuff you need throughout the holiday season. So, you know, we start with old room, which is someone coming home for the holidays. We have kids table, and then we have work that continues to go throughout the season that reinforces those moments that are relevant for that time of year.

A (29:09)

You're home for the holidays. You've dreamt of this moment back in your old room.

B (29:18)

Oh.

A (29:20)

Hey, kiddo.

C (29:21)

I'll be right there.

A (29:24)

At least you can get a deal on new shorts for dad. Something with a little more coverage. It's dinner time and you find yourself on the conversational divide between the grownups. I'm saying is cats are overrated. Then the not so grown ups, you have a choice. Shop deals on toys with these hooligans or be regaled by Uncle Bobs gripping intestinal tails.

C (30:00)

So there I was in the middle of my colonoscopy.

A (30:02)

Was there ever really a choice? So the kids table come out of research, Garrett? I mean, where did that idea come from? It's a great spot.

C (30:14)

I think like all research, it acts as a jump off point and it triggers other thoughts. So we're, we're building our strategy around the traditions that come for the holidays. You know, people have their own traditions and they start thinking about what makes the holidays feel like the holiday to Them what the season wouldn't be without. And so whether that's them remembering times with a full table and everyone no longer being at the kids table. I experienced this last year where I actually was put in the kids table and I was so happy because you don't want to hear the adult talk. But at the same time, so I think we.

A (30:52)

There's always somebody right on the edge between the adults and the kids table.

C (30:56)

Exactly.

A (30:57)

Suddenly everything goes down like 6 to 8 inches.

C (31:00)

And we threw out a bunch of insights like, you know, getting stuck at the airport and having your luggage lost. You know, we threw out the having, you know, this actually came from research where someone actually reminded us that because they travel for the holidays, they had to decide either to take two big suitcases or. And they mentioned this, not us, but like Amazon's helpful because they can deliver the packages to where they're going and they don't have to like drag all that stuff and then have an empty suitcase. Drag. Like those are the kind of like nuances that you come, you hear when people are experiencing it versus, you know, after the fact when people are thinking about, oh, what'd you experience for the holidays? Like, oh, family gifts, you know, the kind of high level stuff getting to.

B (31:41)

That deeper level of color. Not just Garrett's point. Oh, it's about gift giving. I think that gives the creative team, you know, a bit more inspiration and of course the creative team to draw on their own experiences as well. To Garrett's point, like we have that jumping off point. We have a very highly strategic creative team as well, which is nice.

A (31:59)

That's always good. Yeah, for sure.

B (32:01)

They are very, very healthy, healthy respect for strategy. They push back in the best possible ways. They definitely challenge us. But that relationship is extraordinarily strong. So yeah, to Garrett's point, it's really about bringing them lots of options, getting them excited, hopefully reinvigorating that interest and that novelty just to kind of get them going sometimes.

A (32:25)

So then in the spirit of variety and consistency, where does the Benedict Cumberbatch work come from? Because I can imagine that's going to be like Marmite. People are either going to love it or they're going to hate it. Real Amazon customer reviews are formed by a real serious actor. I recently bought a pair for my mother. This was a life changing experience as they fit me as well. I wear them around the house sometimes when she's not home. Secretly makes me feel like I'm wrapped in a fur coat and don't want to be.

B (33:09)

Let Out.

A (33:10)

It does seem to come from a completely different space. I'm not even sure it's emotional. Something. Tell me, well, what role is that playing in the holiday mix this year?

B (33:21)

Yeah, so this kind of five star theater construct some of the first. This is a good example, I guess, of consistency in a different way. So last year we did a similar sort of situation with Adam Driver and those were.

A (33:36)

Oh, right, of course. Okay, my bad. I forgot about that.

B (33:39)

So. Yeah, but it's still a good question though. I think that is a good example of where, where, okay, we felt like the format, the storytelling structure still made a lot of sense. It went really, really well. Of course we had the conversation on can you rerun the atom work as is. But the decision was, okay, that's a good example where the consistency part is the five star theater and the novelty part is it's not Adam anymore. Now it's Benedict and he's going to do a bunch of different reviews. So that's kind of a good example of the balance.

A (34:11)

What's at the heart of that? Where you go, yeah, that works because it feel. Feels completely different. And is that why it works, is because it's going to attract a different audience? Yeah, I mean, appeal to a different audience.

C (34:21)

So. So I think it's two things. One, yes, I think it appeals to a different audience. You know, it's a little out there. So, you know, we know younger audiences appeal to kind of the more fringe kind of approach. But I think also too is, you know, as we're thinking about the holidays, it's also the most competitive time of the year. People are throwing everything they have at the, the creative bar is higher, the money is there. And so if you're thinking about, you know, know, the whole phasing approach, the most competitive time, that Black Friday, Saturday, Monday, where people are like really pushing their message across. How do you take it to the next level? You know, I think we. I'm a big fan of fame and, and, and talkability and, and I think, you know, when I, when I was starting a little tangent, Fame as a.

A (35:04)

Brand aspirational goal or fame as in the movie Fame.

C (35:08)

Fame has been the achievement to have someone talk about your brand for you. You know. You know, I think Jeff Dejas A brand is when people are talking about your brand when you're not in the room. And I think that's exactly what your work kind of aims to do. And I think taking that level, that heighted level and giving something that feels fresh and novel and that people would want to talk about and share on your behalf really shows that you broke through. And I think five star theater is our approach to doing that.

B (35:35)

Yeah. And the level of consistent thread between these things, whether it's five star, whether it's the work from kids room, whether it's joyride ultimately, is that when you've got these different shopping occasion trigger points throughout the season, Amazon's got stuff that you are going to want and it's going to get to you and it's going to be a good price. So those reasons to believe can be pretty consistent, even if the way that we're telling the story is distinct.

A (36:02)

So Chris, a final question. When you look ahead, because you guys are learning all the time, what do you feel you guys need to be doing more of and less of in 2026?

B (36:16)

It's a great question. I think like lots of brands, we will continue to understand the role that AI is going to play in our processes. So it's not a secret that Amazon is involved with AI. We've been pretty open about that. So how is that going to play a role? Where does it make sense for it to step in and where does it make sense for it to kind of step away? We very much believe in this idea of human and lower. So the role of AI is going to be big. We're going to continue to explore what is the right degree of consistency at every level. Whether it's at the repeating the spot level or more repeating the concept or more repeating the idea. What is the right balance of consistency? I think we continue to explore the balance between brand building and performance marketing and getting that balance right. It's an ongoing process and it needs to be. It might need to change by category, by customer segment. Those are probably three of the big ones for me.

A (37:18)

Yeah, interesting. Garrett, would you have any thoughts on more of and less of?

C (37:23)

I think we are continuing to build upon the successes of prior years. So it's really just reflecting of what's worked in the past. Inspecting our previous work, kind of seeing where the learnings could be from our measurement team. I would say also to build on the consistency. Part of me aspirationally wants to see where else we can take because we like any company, have finite resources in terms of what we can create every.

A (37:52)

Year, a lot more resources than most.

C (37:56)

That is very true. But at the end of the day we still have a limited capacity and so when we look at to rerun something, where else can we now use our efforts to build? Can we look towards maybe experiential or some form of activation? Can we expand on social? Can we reach out to partner with more creators? I think when we look to be more efficient in one capacity, it opens up the opportunities of where we can invest in other capacities that we might not have been able to prioritize in the past.

A (38:30)

Thank you both guys for being here. Really appreciate it. It's Chris Marchegiani. He is the head of brand planning, insights and creative for Amazon Worldw Wide. And Gareth Levy, a senior global brand planner for Amazon xem. It's great to have both of you here. I really enjoy this conversation. Appreciate your time and all the best for killing it over the holiday season. That's amazing work.

C (38:51)

Thank you.

B (38:52)

Thanks very much.

A (38:52)

Thank you. Cheers, guys. And we'll see everybody on the next episode.