“Brands Should Be Compasses, Not Maps,” Says Saatchis NZ’s New Strategy Boss

Saatchi & Saatchi New Zealand’s newly-promoted executive strategy director, Tim Cullinane, said the agency is a “very big believer that brands should be compasses, not maps – it's not a predetermined path, it's a direction of travel that helps you navigate problems as you have them.”

“Obviously that only works when you've got a strategic team that will all have access to the same information,” he told LBB, speaking about his goals for the first months in the new role. 

“We've been doing it a little bit on our connected clients already, which is bringing all the strategists into the room up front and getting those processes in place so that everyone understands and has a hand in shaping that direction, and then all of us are able to apply it. So we're looking for an acceleration of that.”

Tim is tasked with shaping Saatchi & Saatchi’s strategic direction in New Zealand, and helping drive the company’s ambition to influence culture. He also brings international experience to the role, having held senior strategy, insight, and innovation positions in New Zealand, Singapore, New York, London, and China – including at Saatchi & Saatchi China.

Back in New Zealand, Tim said his team is working with “a more evidence based marketing structure than we've ever had before” – something that means “in a sense, the role has become really easy, and in another sense, the world has become so complicated, there isn't a mainstream left for brands to break into.

“The days of the small insight, 30” spot, spread it everywhere, and you're going to crack culture – that's behind us.”

In response, he’s found clients “are really looking for an integrated approach to strategy and to communications – not a 360 omnichannel ‘we managed to make everything match up’, kind of approach, but a really holistic approach, strategically breaking down the problems they're facing and then being able to bring the right in on it.”

Combined with Publicis Groupe's Lotame data platform – which Tim said is “on par with the largest streaming providers in New Zealand, but with thousands more data points than they have” – the team are “moving into a place where, I think, over the next six months to a year, we're going to be really powerfully positioned to answer consumer problems and also marketers’ problems in a way that no one else in the market can.”

Saatchi & Saatchi New Zealand’s CEO, Mark Cochrane, told LBB the “secret sauce” is “understanding Kiwi culture across New Zealand right through into all different audiences.” 

“Being connected to the psychic mindsets of New Zealanders is something that we'll do really well. I think that the magic that we're really focused on over the next couple of years is that nothing's impossible. How do we take big growth problems or big challenges that clients are going through in this next paradigm of the marketing landscape, and … go, ‘Right, this is the strategy that will guide us to the outcomes we need to get.’”

Tim agreed, adding, “It used to be quite easy to break New Zealand up into segments of culture – ‘East Auckland feels a bit like this, the North feels like that’ – we've lost so much of that. 

“Now it is really about understanding what is emerging in culture, the things people are joining, not the things that people are, and then being a participant, not a sponsor, of those things.”