Singapore Business Awards 2021

10 APAC / Singapore Awards 2021 , Founded in 2015, Societal is a boutique creative advertising and brand development agency. It started life as a one-man operation, but soon began to grow at an exponential rate - even more so as key clients would tell others about their experience of working with the agency. Societal’s motto is the foundation on which all its work is built: ‘be short, be simple, be human’. Societal has worked with many prestigious brands and developed work across many different channels in order to speak to their target audience in a way that generates a response. Some of these brands have included Comfort, Cif, Clear and Hellmann’s for Unilever, Toyota and Lexus for Borneo Motors, Fair Price and many more. Societal has been deliberately set up to bring together a mix of age ranges and experience levels, all working together in a flat structure to ensure greater speed to market. The wealth and breadth of experience within the team means they can effectively deliver an idea across many different channels. So despite being a small agency, they can cover every aspect a client would find at a larger firm; creative and strategic planning, account management, studio facility management, and film or print production. Societal also has the ability to direct and produce complete film projects in-house. So, why “Short, Simple and Human”? Well, as we now live in a world of constant stimulation, with media moving towards short-form and high energy content, it makes sense to keep messages as short as possible. Secondly, Societal has always believed in the power of simplicity, as the best ideas often come from a very simple unifying thought. That’s truer today than ever - we’re all dealing with limited messaging timeframes, so the simpler the message, the more memorable it’s likely to be. And finally, Societal always seeks to create work that’s ‘human’, something that people can easily relate to. That’s why so much of Societal’s work feature real people and their stories. Within the agency, there’s a firm belief that everyone is part of the creative department. Everyone is encouraged to have a say in every brief, as a great idea can come from many difference perspectives - even though it may lead to people stepping out of their comfort zones from time to time. Societal’s clients benefit from the fresh thinking that comes from this culture. The last year has created challenges for Societal, as it has for many other agencies. As a ‘people’ business, where the interaction between staff is key to ideation, working from home has made things difficult. While the industry as a whole (even before COVID) had The Fresh Voice in Boutique Advertising Societal Pte is a boutique creative advertising agency powered by a simple mantra: be short, be simple, be human. Three tenets that have helped themdevelopmemorable, effective work for their clients. Feb21001 Company: Societal Pte Ltd Contact: Kevin Geeves Website: societal.com.sg also been suffering from the commoditisation of the creative product. With platforms such as Fiverr giving clients the option to seek out people offering production services for as little as $5 in some cases, companies like Societal recognise that this has the potential to impact the entire creative industry. However, Societal has always viewed challenges such as these as opportunities. They’ve found ways to work together remotely, and the commoditisation of creative work means that their own work simply has to be more distinctive and relevant. The agency is also currently in the middle of building its own production unit so that it can more effectively create the content it needs and respond faster to client requests by handling more of its operations in-house. Because the turnaround times for some of its clients can be extremely fast, its aim is to enhance its ability to deliver within those timeframes. In tandem with this, it will be continuing to work on its social media presence to better carve out its identity in those spaces. Societal Pte Ltd