Prudential Financial's lead marketer says taste will win out over 'generic AI'

Prudential's recent campaign for its asset management arm, PGIM, broke conventional advertising norms, according to Richard Parkinson, the company's chief brand and marketing officer.

Called "Keep Asking," it features a claymation world where people ask questions about various topics, including investments. Parkinson said they came up with the idea for the campaign after research found that PGIM's customers are problem solvers. That insight led to the "keep asking" theme and the prominent hand raise in the campaign — the universal sign for asking a question.

Internally, Parkinson said, people were a bit scared to do such a campaign because it was different. "Everybody's a bit, 'Gosh, this is different. Can we be that different?' And yes, of course we can be different," he said. "We have the right to be different."

Parkinson told Business Insider about the strategy behind the campaign, its reception, and how he's thinking about marketing in the age of AI.

The following transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

About a month ago, we launched a new campaign for PGIM, our asset management arm, which broke conventional norms in terms of advertising because it was based in an animated claymation world.

It was designed to stand out in a marketplace that loves windmills, roads, and skyscrapers. You've only got four seconds to make an impact with a brand that not many people know about. So we decided to go down that route to give it an edge and make it differentiated in the marketplace.

The strategy behind the creative actually was around getting into the minds of our customers and what really enabled them to think about us. And what we discovered was that they are problem solvers. They are people who like the puzzle, who like the challenge, which led to our campaign around "keep asking."

We noticed in the process that one of our competitors came out with a campaign that was going to look very similar to ours. So we did a pivot. We actually thought, "Well, what is the universal symbol for asking a question?" That is the hand raise — so we use that in our animated claymation world, and you will now see that goes across all of our campaigns for PGIM and around "keep asking."

It's interesting in terms of impact. I think actually, internally, everybody's a bit scared. Everybody's a bit, "Gosh, this is different. Can we be that different?" And yes, of course, we can be different. We have the right to be different. And so I think there's a bit of nervousness in terms of the impact internally. And that's OK.

Externally, we're starting to see that people are noticing it across our social channels. We've got a bit of a way to go to find out what the impact is in broadcast, but certainly on socials, it's getting noticed. We are seeing the difference, and people are engaging with it more than our previous campaigns.

Younger marketers don't need AI training; they need to hone critical thinking skills

Artificial intelligence is really changing the game of what we do and how we do it. It gets us to about 70-80% of the work we need to do, and that's great. And like every company, we are using it in all stages of the workflow.

What really concerns me is how we train our young people coming into the organization, because a lot of the work that AI is doing used to be the work that we used to train people on. I'm really optimistic because young people coming into the company and into any organization can probably train us — and particularly me — a lot quicker than before. I think they'll be experts in the tools.

We need to train our younger people on critical thinking, on judgment, on decision-making, most importantly, because AI could produce a lot of sameness in terms of advertising. And there could be a lot of junk out there if we're not careful.

Actually, we need to train our people on taste. How do we go about that? I'm not entirely sure yet, but we're having a good go at it because taste is going to win out over generic AI marketing.

Leading marketing today is exhilarating and exhausting

The toughest part of being a CMO right now is the pace of change, not only within marketing, but actually within business. Generally, businesses are trying to navigate the political, the social, and the economic environment. Marketing has to respond to that and sometimes lead the charge.

To be leading the charge on a lot of these issues, I think it is sometimes exhilarating but also exhausting. And I think that to help the businesses along, that's what's really interesting, but also challenging at the same time.