FOR sci-fi movie fans, the opening titlesof “Alien,” Ridley Scott’s 1979 voyagethrough interstellar dread, perfectly

evoke the film’s ensuing themes. As a seriesof white rectangles gradually align to formthe movie’s title, the camera pans across theexpanse of an enormous planet floating inthe numbing, ominous, infinite void of outerspace.

For visual effects aficionados, Coca-Cola’s 1992 television commercial featuringPaula Abdul hoofing it with digitally insert-ed film clips of Groucho Marx and Gene Kel-ly presaged time-traveling lures of lateraward-winning works like the movie “For-rest Gump,” in which Tom Hanks was digi-tally transported into the Kennedy WhiteHouse.

And for contemporary digital interactionbuffs, Nike explored fresh marketing andcommunications terrain last year when itdeployed a towering electronic billboard inTimes Square that allowed shoppers to dialcommands from their cellphones to cus-tomize footwear appearing on the giantscreen above them.

The creative thread linking all these ef-forts — these kindlings of mood, persuasionand pitch — takes shape in Robert M. Green-berg, a 57-year-old with the spectacles andvisage of Benjamin Franklin; the eclectic,Renaissance interests of Leonardo da Vinci;the fashion sense of a well-turned-out ninja;the obsessive tics and serpentine conversa-tional habits of Woody Allen; and the leg-erdemain of a hands-on businessman whosefirst job was running his uncle’s mirror fac-tory in Chicago.

Nestled for almost 30 years in the Manhat-tan neighborhood called Hell’s Kitchen, Mr.Greenberg’s advertising and communica-tions agency, R/GA, makes its home in arambling, spare Bauhaus nest set far backfrom the curb on West 39th Street. Mr.Greenberg’s journey — from titlemeister of

“Alien” to Ms. Abdul’s digital choreographerto Nike’s Times Square showoff — has beena mixture of wandering curiosity and pro-fessional reinvention. He now oversees a di-verse team of about 450 people trying to weddesign and marketing in groundbreakingways.

The background music in Mr. Green-berg’s little symphony is, of course, the In-ternet and other technological leaps like thecellphone, which are upending the advertis-ing and marketing industries in much thesame way that they have begun to turn busi-nesses as varied as media, entertainment,retail and communications on their heads.

“I think technology is going to wreak hav-

oc on the agency business,” Mr. Greenbergpredicts of an industry that plans to give himits most prestigious award, a Clio for life-time achievement, in May. “Because of ad-vances in technology and communication,we’re surrounded by information we see andhear. Overload is a huge issue.

“I think things are going to get infinitelymore complex,” he adds, “and the challengeis about taking things that are infinitelycomplex and making them simpler andmore understandable.”

Consumers are so swamped by pitchesthat many simply tune them out. And themore affluent among them exercise enoughcontrol over how, where and what they shop

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2006

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the squareholes — the ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules and they have no respect for the

status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilifythem. About the only thing that you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things.

— Apple Computer ad, 1997

By TIMOTHY L. O’BRIEN

SundayBusiness

Robert M. Greenbergis redefining

advertising bymaking the delivery

of the message a two-way street

between marketersand consumers.

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

REPRINTED WITH

PERMISSION

Madison Avenue’s 30-SecondSpot Remover

for that, with the flick of their fingers, theycan bypass unwanted advertising. Mr.Greenberg, the chairman and chief execu-tive of R/GA, wants to engage them in digi-tal conversations that are so entertaining,involving and valuable that they won’t wantto ignore them.

Many in the communications industry areaware that consumers are turning theirbacks. “The old approach of marketing satu-ration has created a clutter environmentthat people are now resisting, in an era whenpeople feel they have less time in their livesfor all the things they want to do,” said J.Walker Smith, president of YankelovichInc., a marketing research firm. “People arewilling to give up sleep at night to get timeback into their lives and the question I askadvertisers is, ‘Do you think people are will-ing to give up sleep to look at your ads?’ Andthe answer is no.”

MR. GREENBERG’S response isthat in order to cut through theclutter, advertising needs to be

shaken up, and shaken up immediately. Allof the corporations, agencies and marketingprofessionals who jointly hone and fire off afusillade of messages across the commer-cial landscape each day, he says, need tooverhaul both their organizational struc-tures and how they relate to consumers —particularly the 20-something buyers called“millennials.”

“It’s not about linear communication, andthe millennials understand that; it’s aboutsymbols and icons and you click here andyou click there and you control it,” he says.“Corporations have to create products thatpeople want and customers are going to helpthem make that decision — and that means

quality, imagination and transparency.”Mr. Greenberg offers his thoughts gently,

even sweetly, giving them the care of anacademic and the deliberation of a vision-ary. But he also prides himself on being aniconoclast and a troublemaker in an indus-try that is flashy and kinetic on the outsidebut which has grown conservative and risk-averse at its core. (The language and im-agery of “Think Different,” Apple’s 1997 adcampaign, is one of Mr. Greenberg’smantras, but it is also an ad, alas, in whichhe did not have a hand.)

It has become fashionable, and maybelargely accurate, to look at advertising ofthe last several decades as an opiate to helpbrainwash Americans into becoming avid,mindless shoppers. Mr. Greenberg’s newequation offers a brighter insight: Technolo-gy has put consumers in the driver’s seat bygiving them a vast array of new choices andbetter information — and corporations andagencies that want to succeed had better geton board.

This new dawn in consumer power is con-soling, perhaps, but a nagging existentialdevil remains. Does all of the spinning andcoaxing that surrounds America’s love af-fair with buying and selling — our carnivalof consumption — really matter? Does itmake us better people?

Well, yes, Mr. Greenberg says, it does.“It’s not just that the interactivity and cre-

ativity is about commercials, TV and adver-tising,” he replies. “The development thatcomes out of it all is about how people inter-act and communicate. It’s about how theylearn.”

•

“If you’ve had a freakish education, useit. ... An artist’s only concern is to shoot for

some kind of perfection, and on his ownterms, not anyone else’s.” J. D. Salinger,

“Franny and Zooey”

In addition to working and living in Hell’sKitchen, Mr. Greenberg owns a weekendgetaway in a Fire Island community calledLonelyville. A few years ago, he consideredbuying property in Death Valley in Califor-nia. The sole purpose, he says, was so thatthe letterhead at the top of his personal sta-tionery would read: Hell’s Kitchen/Lone-lyville/Death Valley.

He never secured his Death Valley parcel,but Mr. Greenberg still considers himself tobe on the outside looking in. He clearly re-calls his high school teacher warning hismother that her son was “never going toamount to anything,” an evaluation unen-cumbered by the knowledge that Mr. Green-berg was struggling then, as now, withdyslexia.

But, he says, he doesn’t think that dyslexia

Percent of those surveyed who:

Resist being exposed to orpaying attention to marketing:

54%

A Resistant MarketCustomers are not always receptive to aggressive marketing, as a 2005survey shows.

Source: Yankelovich Marketing Receptivity Study

Based on a national telephone surveyof 600 people, conducted Feb. 2005

The New York Times

Avoid buying products that overwhelm them with marketing:

56%

Are interested in products that permitblocking, skipping or opting out ofmarketing:

69%

R/GA’s computer-generated opening titles of the 1997 movie “Alien” weregroundbreaking at the time.

A 1992 Coca-Cola commercial experi-mented in visual effects as Paula Abduldanced with Groucho Marx, whose imagewas digitally inserted.

ultimately held him back. “Dyslexia may beone of the key elements of creativity, if youovercome it, for people in art, architecture,filmmaking and other creative fields,” hesays. “I’m not an expert, but I think dyslex-ia can give you enormous powers to previsu-alize things.”

Influenced by sources as diverse as thenovelist J. D. Salinger, the pianist GlennGould and the film director Sergei M. Eisen-stein, he also eventually became an avid col-lector of “outsider art” — paintings and oth-er works by artists without formal trainingwho thrived outside the artistic establish-ment.

“The connection between becoming anartist and people who are outside the main-stream is important, particularly for peoplewho are self-taught — like me,” Mr. Green-berg says, noting that he loves outsider artbecause he feels that it is the “most individ-ual and unmediated creative response to theworld.”

His friends say he thrives on the fringe.“Bob’s always been exploring somethingnew and educating himself about whateveris ‘next,’ ” says Jon Kamen, co-owner of@radical.media, an entertainment and me-dia company, who has known Mr. Green-berg for about 30 years. “It’s a constantsense of curiosity, and his pursuit of beingon the edge is everywhere — in his work, inthe neighborhood he lives in, in the art hecollects.”

Despite his passion for the ethereal, Mr.Greenberg says he shocked his parentswhen, unable to find a job after college, hetook over the mirror factory. He first be-came acquainted with computers while run-ning the factory, and he says his experiencethere gave him a lifelong fascination withboth technology and plain-vanilla industrialand corporate processes. It also made himcomfortable navigating between corporateand creative spheres, and, unlike many cre-ative souls, comfortable in serving theneeds of corporate America.

In 1977, Mr. Greenberg’s brother,Richard, an animator, coaxed him to NewYork to start a business together: R/Green-berg Associates (later renamed R/GA).Richard was the start-up’s designer, Robertwas the cameraman and producer, and thebrothers began experimenting with comput-erized special effects when such effortswere still in their infancy. The brotherswanted to open a design shop that developednewfangled motion graphics as well asfilms and videos, and they succeeded hand-somely. A year after hanging out their shin-gle, they developed innovative, three-dimen-sional “flying titles” that rushed from thescreen toward the audience for the box-of-fice hit “Superman.” Though Richard leftthe business in the late 1980’s, Mr. Green-berg describes him as a pivotal influence,and the two remain close.

R/GA’s work on “Alien” followed shortlythereafter. Later came special effects or ti-tles wizardry on such films as “The WorldAccording to Garp,” “Zelig,” “Predator”and “Seven.” Along the way, Mr. Greenberg

and his brother scooped up an Oscar in 1986for their contributions to computer-assistedfilmmaking. As the company’s film busi-ness grew, Mr. Greenberg took R/GAthrough one of its periodic reinventions, ex-panding into feature film work, commer-cials and print campaigns.

As the nature of computer-assisted film-making changed, Mr. Greenberg eventuallyscaled back that side of his business andadopted yet another organizational modelthat he is still refining today: a “multiplat-form” agency that makes use of databasesand online interaction, as well as integrated

teams of techies, software developers,strategists and project managers, to devel-op advertising and marketing campaignslinked to new technologies and products.

Mr. Greenberg says he was a devotee ofthe Web well before the Internet rage beganaccelerating into full throttle in the mid-1990’s, and he adds that he remained a truebeliever even after the dot-com bubble burstseveral years ago. “The Web is not a one-trick pony,” he says. “The Internet is a newlanguage because it’s not linear. The novelis linear, film is linear, but the Web is not.”

Others agree that Mr. Greenberg was anearly adopter who, even after the dot-commeltdown, stayed the course. Now, they say,he is reaping the fruits of his commitment.

“He’s someone who saw the potential inthis digital space much earlier than mostother people,” said Rick Boyko, the formerchief creative officer at Ogilvy & Matherwho is now the managing director of theVCU Adcenter, a graduate program in ad-vertising at Virginia Commonwealth Uni-versity in Richmond. “He’s probably thebest versed in the country right now in thedigital space that he plays in.”

Among the companies that Mr. Green-berg has invited into his digital sandbox areSubaru, Target, Verizon and Nokia. ForTarget, R/GA developed a Web site rich inproduct details and embroidered with thecompany’s buoyant personality.

After R/GA got its hands on a Nokia Website that promoted a lineup of new cell-phones, it turned it into a pulsing exercise inmontage and product “stories.” Subaru’sWeb site lets car buyers immerse them-selves in product details and “build” a carfrom scratch after navigating panes of shiv-ering, shimmering images.

Even more traditional companies haveused R/GA. I.B.M., which operates one ofthe world’s most sprawling corporate Websites, used the agency to refine and distillsome 4.5 million separate Web pages into amore seamless encounter that R/GA says isintended to “help users help themselveswithout resorting to excessive searching or,worse yet, abandoning their online purchas-es.”

Johnson & Johnson, one of the country’slargest media buyers, criticized traditionalagencies last year for failing to explore newforms of marketing. J.& J. recently turnedto R/GA to devise some new advertising ap-proaches that it declines to discuss until itunveils them.

“The media landscape around the world,and the marketing landscape in particular,are radically changing,” said Brian D.Perkins, Johnson & Johnson’s vice presi-dent for corporate affairs. “Bob and hisgang at R/GA have helped bring a vision ofwhat the future is and what the possibilitiesare in reaching our patients and our cus-tomers.”

On Wednesday, John Stratton, the chiefmarketing officer for Verizon, anotherR/GA client, offered a withering assess-ment of traditional advertising, warningagencies that they were failing to grapple

Network television

Advertisingspending on:

Cable television

Syndicated television

National magazines

National newspapers

Internet

A Changing World for AdvertisingAdvertising spending on the Internet and cable television has been increasing, while that on network and syndicated television has fallen.

’04 $4.2’05 5.1

THROUGHNOVEMBER

FULL YEARIN BILLIONS

2005 BARS ARE THROUGH NOVEMBER

Sources: Nielsen Monitor-Plus and Nielsen / NetRatings

The New York Times

18.921.4

15.416.5

21.320.9

1.51.6

3.12.7

An electronic billboard in Times Squarelast year let shoppers dial commandsfrom their cellphones to customize theNike shoe pictured.

Copyright © 2006, by The New York Times Company. Reprinted with permission.For subscriptions to The New York Times, please call 1-800-NYTIMES. Visit us online at www.nytimes.com.

For more information about reprints contact PARS International Corp. at 212-221-9595 x210.

with the realities of alternative media.“Major money is going to be in motion in

the next decade and yet no one really under-stands exactly where it will land, or even ifit will land, or just disappear altogether,” hesaid at an Advertising Age conference inBeverly Hills, Calif. “Your clients are introuble. They are looking to you to savethem.”

BUT authentically new approachesare in short supply, Mr. Strattonadded, saying that the advertising

models that have taken shape over the last50 years “no longer work.”

Consumers would seem to agree.A Yankelovich study in 2004 of about 600

people aged 16 or older found that “clutter,competition and fragmentation have steadi-ly chipped away at the productivity of mar-keting” and have undermined the powers ofbranding. Among the study’s respondents,70 percent indicated that “they tune out ad-vertising more than they did just a fewyears ago.”

More easily said than done, Mr. Green-berg says. Too many agencies, he believes,are tethered to a “30-second TV spot” men-tality because “agencies get paid based on30-second spots and that financial incentivekeeps them from changing their model.”Whip up those spiffy Super Bowl ads andthose catchy print ads as much as you like,he says, but their impact is fossilizing andthe companies that foot advertising bills areincreasingly aware of it.

Direct mail remains the most heavilyused advertising medium because its im-pact is clearer and more response-orientedthan most print, TV and radio ads. Spendingon Internet advertising still amounts to asmall fraction of that for other media, but it

has measurable impact. And digital interac-tions can be tailored in an infinite number ofways.

Other marketing frontiers are arising,and Mr. Greenberg is happy to tick off someexamples: quick response codes embeddedon movie posters that allow trailers to bedownloaded directly onto cellphones placed

near them; billboards used by companieslike Dove that let consumers vote on themesor messages by cellphone; instant messag-ing and ads streamed through game con-soles like Xbox or online gaming networks;and wireless services like Dodgeball thathelp people find peers at bars and restau-rants within a 10-block radius after they pin-point their own location by sending a shorttext message to the service.

Mr. Greenberg ideates and germinatesthrough collaboration, and he likens R/GAto a campus where people embrace what isnew rather than feel afraid of or betrayedby change. “I think of our company as a uni-versity — people come in and go out and

they spread the knowledge,” he said.Dawn Winchester, 38, R/GA’s manager of

client services, describes herself as a“refugee” from other agencies stuck in for-mulaic approaches to problem-solving.“Bob didn’t agree to be defined by the lan-guage and the concepts already out there inthe marketing and advertising industry,and that was very attractive to me,” shesaid, an assessment shared by some of herother colleagues.

THE Interpublic Group of Companiesbought R/GA six years ago and fold-ed the company into its unwieldy sta-

ble of marketing and communications busi-nesses. Although Interpublic has beenrocked in recent years with financial andmanagerial woes, Mr. Greenberg saidR/GA had been able to steer its own coursebecause it remains “substantially prof-itable.” He declined to break out the compa-ny’s financial results. Advertising Ageranked R/GA 11th on its 2005 list of thecountry’s largest interactive agencies, withrevenue of about $112 million, up about 40percent from $80 million the year before.

As Mr. Greenberg continues to engagewith what he calls “a new world of ubiqui-tous content on demand,” he says he has nodesire to abandon Hell’s Kitchen (lest thatalso leave him too far from Lonelyville).

In the meantime, the outsider appears tohave found something of a home. He’s builthis own inner circle.

“It’s all about one thing: creative prob-lem-solving sponsored by corporations toget the story out,” Mr. Greenberg says.“What I’m doing is working with teams ofpeople who all know a lot more about cer-tain things than me. I’m there in a conduc-tor-like way.”

An agency wants theads it creates to be just too entertaining tobe ignored.

R/GA