The GRT Brief 2016:The Economist

Female Subscribers

ObjectiveIncrease the percentage of female subscribers from 29% to 40% by the end of 2017

The taskWe would like you to pitch your ideas for a new creative campaign to get more women to actively read, and ultimately subscribe to, The Economist (see Creative Brief). We need a thought provoking and disruptive campaign that increases both brand appeal and conversion, but we are looking for you to advise on whether we need to tackle this issue head on via a direct recruitment drive, or focus on a gender-neutral campaign that levels the playing fi eld.

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“The Economist is your essential guide to the forces that shape our future”

Brand Introduction

Who we areMany people think The Economist is only about economics. It’s not. It’s about pretty much everything.

From politics to business and finance, from science and technology to the arts – we bring our readers clear analysis of the issues that lie behind each week’s global news stories. We satisfy the naturally curious with a distilled view of world affairs that is intelligent, insightful and thought-provoking.

Whatever is happening across the globe, we have an opinion on it. Our positioning is:

Ever since our launch in 1843, we’ve maintained a fiercely independent editorial stance, believing in the freedom of the individual, the freedom of markets and the free exchange of knowledge and ideas. It’s no wonder that JFK and Mandela numbered amongst our readers.

In today’s world we continue to promote the same essential freedoms – and challenge wherever we see them being denied. Because of this strong, journalistic point of view, we continue to regard ourselves as a weekly newspaper, never a mere magazine (Search ‘The Economist explains itself’ on economist.com to find out more).

Our brand values• A smart guide to the forces that shape the future• A trusted filter on world affairs• An advocate for positive change• Giving a global perspective• Quality our readers are willing to pay for

Our readersOur core readers are called ‘Progressives’ who share a psychographic, not a demographic. They may come from different cultures, different parts of the world and from different professional sectors. But what they all share is an intellectual curiosity about the key issues that influence and shape our world. They are people who want to change the world, not rule it.

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We’ve defined the key characteristics of our audience as:

• Facing forward, looking outward • Independent thinkers, not tribal about political ideology• Keenly interested in events and places beyond their national boundaries • Keeping up with developments in technology • Creative, optimistic, liking a challenge • Professionally-driven and materialistic • But also ethical and happy to volunteer to help others

See the Appendix for information on customer profiles

Our marketing

In the past, The Economist has been viewed in some circles as being focused on a narrow, intellectual elite. Its title has been misread as that of a dry and rather distant journal.

Our current marketing approach sets out to shatter those misconceptions. In true Economist style, it’s a witty subversion of the familiar. It also makes our readers a vital part of our story.

In all our writing we seek to help this audience identify itself and make it clear their beliefs are the same as our beliefs. It doesn’t matter who you are professionally, when you subscribe to The Economist you’re not only satisfying your inherent desire to know more about the issues that shape our world, you’ve found your intellectual home.

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The pregnant pause.Make sure

you’re not the father.

If you want to be a CEO, grow some.

“I never readThe Economist.”

Management trainee. Aged 42.

Our challenge

The Economist has identified that a greater proportion of new subscribers are male, despite an equal split of male and female Progressives in the market. Unpicking this trend, we know from research that non-readers believe The Economist has masculine traits, which we may have unintentionally been reinforcing in some of our communications:

Yet, our core values and attitudes are absolutely gender-neutral. We have a female editor, our content is strongly pro-equality and it’s a topic we regularly cover.

So how do we address the fact that women are 10% less likely to respond to our advertising and 50% less likely to buy?

We know women want a level playing field, not special treatment, so we have to carefully consider how we engage them with our advertising. It is interesting to observe the type of advertising women typically respond to and the content they like to consume:

• Women are more likely to click on adverts with human topics and narrative hooks, and less likely to click on those with statistics and masculine references

• When commenting on content from The Economist on social media, women are more likely to reference key words such as ‘family’, ‘research’, ‘making’, ‘help’, ‘social’, ‘book’. Whereas men are more likely to comment with words such as ‘economy’, ‘crisis’, ‘major’, ‘course’, ‘end’, ‘debt’. See the Appendix for the full list.

Our own data proves that the more we can get women to engage with our content, the narrower the gender gap in our readership becomes.

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Creative brief: [Female Subscribers]

01 The challenge in a nutshell.Only 29% of The Economist’s readership are women.

Given The Economist’s commitment to progress and tackling issues of inequality and diversity, this is embarrassing. How can we hope to advocate change when we are unintentionally alienating half of the human population every time we open our mouth? We know that, if we overcome misperceptions of The Economist and get them to experience the content itself, women recognise The Economist is wholly relevant to them.

In a nutshell, we need to convince more women to read – and subscribe to – The Economist.

02 Who are we talking to?Olivia is an independent, professional woman in her early 30s. Intellectually curious, with a keen interest in not just current and global affairs, but why the world is the way it is. She will subconsciously seek out and compare alternate perspectives on key issues to reframe the problem and determine how she can help make a better world tomorrow.

She dislikes the subtext and limitations placed on her as a woman (even in today’s modern world) and being patronised by ‘perceived experts’ uninterested in her perspective. She is also disappointed the debate about feminism seems to have been hijacked by naked selfies, rather striving for positive change for women who face real injustice every day.

03 What behaviour do we want to change?From…dismissing The Economist as an arrogant, dull handbook for outdated men looking for a step up the corporate ladder

To…trying it out for themselves and seeing the rich insight as an invaluable source that will help them set their own agenda, not follow the path laid out for them.

04 What is the big revelation?Science has proven men and women are neurologically wired differently – from how we process information and make decisions, to the language we use and how we respond to news and the world around us – yet there is one mind-set that unites The Economist reader. The desire to arm themselves with truth and knowledge to cut through human ignorance.

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05 What single-minded thought will inspire our audience?

Unite against human ignorance

What makes this believable?

The battle is far from won, with unconscious bias everywhere and major issues still unresolved – from equality of pay and the persistent glass ceiling to the issue of women’s physical safety. To win it, we must join together to separate truth from fiction and understand the human cost of ignorance.

The Economist seeks to challenge and be challenged:

• Stimulating debate: a trusted filter for world affairs, providing you with distilled insight to challenge the status quo and become positive advocates for change.

• Pro-equality: fierce supporters of freedom for all individuals (we’re not afraid to shine a spotlight on gender issues and other forms of social injustice).

• Unbiased perspective: a female editor and a mix of male and female editorial staff.

06 Inspire me.

Tackling gender head on.

Directly addressing the issue of human ignorance and gender inequality in a way that unites, rather than divides the sexes. The United Colors of Benetton adopted a similar approach for tackling attitudes to race.

Reflecting gender differences without ever referencing them.

The Swedish Armed Forces took a subtler approach to recruit more women. Rather than directly confronting gender differences, it reflected them in the way it constructed its “Who Cares?” campaign.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax9kCCwTLGo

As a result, female applications rose almost 50%, without ever directly tackling the issue of gender.

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Creative brief: [Female Engagement]

What are you delivering and when?Your entry should be submitted in 2 parts.

It is important to be able to get your ideas over to the client in a succinct and clear manner. Please summarise your campaign in 200 words answering the following points.

• What is the idea?

• How do you plan to execute it?

• Why have you selected your media?

• Why do you believe it will work?

Secondly, produce an A2 board in PDF format which will illustrate all aspects of your campaign. You may include a link to a video if you think this will demonstrate aspects of your campaign better but this is not a requirement.

The closing date for submissions in midday on 28 October 2016.

A short list of entries will be drawn up w/c 3 November and teams informed.

The shortlisted teams will be given the opportunity to share their work with the client in London on the morning of 6 December before attending the Awards ceremony on the same evening.

Submission details: To submit your entry please visit http://bit.ly/28Y1C8q

Anything else?Mandatories:• You cannot change or affect the editorial content in any way and this should not be considered as part

of your response. However, you do have the flexibility to package together existing content and tailor/recommend content for specific audiences.

• To be clear, this isn’t about turning The Economist into The Economiss. We do not want a campaign that is patronising or demeaning to women in any way e.g. Labour’s ‘Pink Bus’. Equally we don’t want to discriminate or attack men in any way.

• The Economist does not want to affiliate itself with a specific cause or political body e.g. The Women’s Equality Party.

• The Economist also doesn’t want to compromise the integrity of our Editor, Zanny Minton Beddoes, so do not use her as a figurehead in your creative recommendations.

• This brief is for a UK pilot only, running from Jan 2017 to Dec 2017.

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Appendix 1

Scientific evidence of the underlying differences between the sexes.

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Appendix 2

Devices women use to access the internet.