Biborg's Alex Humpage-Versavaud Tells us Why Media Matters
Alex Humpage-Versavaud is the chief media and strategy officer for Biborg in Lyon, consulting clients on video game marketing excellence and driving the agency’s integrated media growth. Throughout his career, he has worked with global entertainment brands including PlayStation, Universal Pictures, Capcom, and Ubisoft, and previously served as the digital lead for Universal Pictures at MediaCom London. Before becoming an entertainment specialist, Alex developed his skills working on Unilever, 3 Mobile, Philips and Nokia.
At Biborg, Alex works with major industry players like Capcom and Bandai Namco Entertainment as part of a specialised media and strategy hub he helped establish in 2020. His approach combines a commitment to transparency in media costs with a deep understanding of gaming culture, delivering strategies that bridge the gap between high-impact creative and data-driven performance. Before entering the advertising world, he spent six months in the Belizean rainforest conducting ecological research on tropical tree dynamics at the Las Cuevas Research Station.
LBB> What was it about the world of advertising media that pulled you in? What did you do before you got into media?
Alex> My degree was in Politics and Sociology, because I’ve always been fascinated by understanding human behaviour and why people make certain choices. Too young for a career in politics (and with one of my dissertations focusing on Facebook in its early years) advertising gave me a wonderful way of continuing to explore (and influence) how people behave and understanding their choices.
LBB> Over the course of your career, what have been the most significant changes you’ve seen in the media side of the industry?
Alex> Undoubtedly the maturation of digital media. It was the wild west when I started out, and with the arrival of Facebook as an ad platform, the widespread adoption of biddable and programmatic buying methods, the rise and fall of other social networks, the establishment and now permanence of YouTube - in much the same way the internet has revolutionised our lives in countless ways, the impact on media has been enormous. Even traditional media channels, such as TV and OOH, are now cogs in the digital media ecosystem.
LBB> What was your first job in the media industry and give us a taste of the path that your career has been on?
Alex> After an internship at M&C Saatchi my first permanent role was a digital media exec in the Mindshare UK team at the end of the 2000s. My first account was Unilever - a brilliant learning experience across hundreds of brands from Lynx body spray to Cornetto via I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter and Pot Noodle. From there I went into an international role managing Nokia and Philips, and then to Omnicom on the PlayStation account. A dream account for me, it set me on a specialisation in Gaming & Entertainment - after launching the PS4 I moved over to Mediacom to lead Digital on Universal Pictures. I then did some University lecturing in media transformations and how to market games. Then the last six years have been building the media team from the ground up here at Biborg.
LBB> In more recent years, which projects or clients have proven to be the most stimulating and satisfying to work on and why?
Alex> Client-wise it’s definitely been our two biggest retained clients at the agency, Capcom Europe and Bandai Namco Europe. Capcom are on a golden run - the Monster Hunter franchise is great to work on, so are Street Fighter and Resident Evil. One of my favourite campaigns was the work we did last year on Dragon’s Dogma. For Bandai, it’s impossible not to talk about Elden Ring. I don’t even really play Souls-like games, but working on this release has been special. It’s nice to think we played a part in the success of all of these games.
LBB> In media, an understanding of human behaviour is so important - what are some of the most interesting changes you’re seeing in terms of how we behave with and interact with media?
Alex> I think this is an interesting one as we’re constantly looking for change and innovation but actually what people are looking for has remained largely the same. Good content. And so everything that feels new in media - CTV and the rise of streaming services (and the same for audio and podcasting) - is just a slightly different package of something that’s been with us for almost 100 years - video. And most users accept some natively styled video ads as a price of entry to longer form content they want to watch. Online there’s a similar value exchange taking place on social networks.
LBB> Brand safety is more important than ever and consumers and campaign groups are increasingly holding brands to account for the media they choose to spend on - what are your thoughts on this phenomenon and how are you and your teams navigating it?
Alex> Hugely important and as long as I’ve been working in Digital it always has been. When you work with programmatic partners where you might not be sure where every single impression is served it’s essential to know that there are layers of protection. In previous jobs I’ve been on the receiving end of lawsuits because ads for my clients have appeared against the wrong type of content. At Biborg we’re laser focused both on our audiences and the environments we advertise in. Things like white lists, black lists, third-party verification software and AI powered safety studies are all things we use to ensure that we don’t show our clients products where they wouldn’t want them to be seen.
LBB> What do you think are the most pertinent debates happening in the media field right now?
Alex> An obvious and boring but necessary answer - it’s AI. Whether it’s a bubble, how it might (and already is) revolutionising what we do. I also see very little mention of how central AI has been to Digital media for many years though - Google Search is AI-powered. Building lookalikes or even just biddable media buying - it’s all done by AI and has been for years but the emergence of generative AI has really opened up a whole new debate. In Games media specifically an area I’ve found fascinating is the personalisation of advertising - most people who play games have huge amounts of digital information relating to the games they play and the achievements within them - and most of this data is public. It has an enormous potential for forms of addressable marketing - similar to how Spotify uses their ‘wrapped’ yearly updates. We’ve begun to see brands like PlayStation take advantage of this, and at Biborg we’ve done some really cool things with Ubisoft on Rainbow 6. A lot of players love knowing the stats behind their playtime so it’s a really rich area to tap into - but it does also feed into the ongoing debates about privacy!
LBB> Decoupling, recoupling, creative agencies trying to build media functions, media agencies creating content studios… what’s your take on the relationship between creative and media and where do you think it’s going?
Alex> Well at Biborg we’re right in the middle of this conversation as, for our first 10 years, we were a creative agency, and my role was to join and develop a media function. For us it works as we’re specialised towards a sector - in our case, gaming, however you can understand that with increased pressure on marketing budgets all agencies want to diversify their saleable products. We’re convinced there are huge benefits to having media and creative with a close relationship - there is more accountability, more opportunity to make nimble optimisations, and crucially the closer media and creative work together the better the ideas are that deliver both creative and media success.
LBB> The wider industry has become really obsessed with artificial intelligence, but media has been using variations of AI and algorithmic automation for some time - what’s your take on the longer term influence of AI on media? Are there any aspects of media planning that you think AI could still have a big impact on?
Alex> I think AI still has the power to have a transformative effect on many elements of the media planning process. Beyond making smarter investment choices, things like micro-managing campaign optimisations, as well as things like using generative AI to eliminate ‘obvious’ campaign strategies. Unlike Bill Gates, I don’t think AI is going to replace the majority of the workforce - in my experience so far the addition of the new, powerful possibilities that AI provides actually means more people hours are required to make sense of it all.
LBB> More attention is being paid to the environmental impact of various media types, particularly in digital - where do you think the industry is in terms of tracking that impact and minimising it?
Alex> Unfortunately we are still missing industry standards in this regard, as without a common system of measurement it’s hugely complicated to accurately measure and compare - as well as finding out what really works. Much like environmental measures at home, the onus is on everyone to do as best as they can - when what is really needed is national or even global alignment (an impossible dream) and then laws and regulations linked to the environmental impact of what we do. At Biborg we are very conscious of the carbon impact, both of our workforce and of the media space we buy, and we include it in all of our client reporting. Without genuine benchmarking though it’s much less effective than it should be.
LBB> As an industry, we’re obsessed with the new - and for good reason, it’s often where the money lies! But are there any more traditional forms of media that you think we’re sleeping on a bit or that you think still make a big impact when it comes to connecting with consumers?
Alex> I’d turn this question on its head a bit and ask at what point does a new media become traditional? YouTube isn’t very exciting or novel these days but it is almost peerless when it comes to video distribution, and people of all generations watch hours of content on there - more than most TV channels. I am enjoying the return of audio advertising - at the beginning of my career radio still had a place on a lot of media plans, and the phenomenal rise of podcasting has opened up some fascinating new opportunities in this space. And to finish, one channel of marketing that has been somewhat neglected for years is making a bit of a comeback - email! Especially in the games sector, there’s huge value in thoughtful email comms. The work Jamin Smith is doing with his Pantaloon operation in this space is a fascinating example.
LBB> Who are your media heroes and why? And what sort of media do you enjoy?
Alex> I’m a media omnivore. Books were my first love and I still love getting lost in a great story - one of my favourite authors, Steven Erikson, has just released the latest in his high fantasy epic Malazan series and I’ll be devouring that in the coming weeks. Games - obviously - and rich, story driven experiences, but also puzzles. My favourite game from last year was Animal Well and this year I’ve spent more time with Blue Prince than anything else - masterpieces both. I’m a sucker for a Marvel film and I don’t believe anything better than The Wire will be created on Television in my lifetime.
For my media heroes, I was inspired in my youth by the strong tradition of Brummie creative strategists. Dave Trott made a big impression on me when I was first starting out in media. These days I’m fond of those who cut through the noise around our industry. Mark Ritson deserves his notoriety and I’m a big fan of the content Joe Burns posts on LinkedIn.
