A new chapter begins for Creative Pattern. The agency chose Alejandro Corona to lead the company, after the CEO’s chair was vacant for three months due to the death of its founder and director Alfredo Gandur on April 24.
Corona did not hesitate to accept the position. For him, this opportunity means returning to the world of agencies. In his career as a publicist, he launched José Cuervo to the Hispanic market and created Cuervo Tradicional Congelado. He worked for the agencies Ogilvy , Young & Rubican , Publicis , and Thompson , where he was CEO of Glue.
The last 10 years he was in Grupo Carso as director of marketing for Aspel , a software company that serves more than 1 million companies. In this position, he worked together with group companies such as Telmex, Telcel, Claro, América Móvil and Inbursa, as well as with business partners such as Apple, Microsoft and Amazon.
Corona has a master’s degree in Innovation and is a professor at the University of California and San Diego. He is the winner of awards at festivals such as the FIP, IAB, CÃrculo Creativo and Cannes Lions and has been a judge for 10 consecutive years at the Effie Awards and Victoria de la AMAPRO.
Expansión (E): What does directing Creative Pattern represent for you now?
Alejandro Corona (AC): Pauta Creativa is a company that has been in the market for 30 years, it has become a beloved brand recognized by its customers, as well as a benchmark in integrated marketing . It always caught my attention for being an agency that is in trend.
Alfredo Gandur, on the other hand, was a well-known visionary entrepreneur in the industry. My job is to respect and continue with his legacy, but to communicate the next step, which is to transform the agency according to market requirements, because companies today cannot sit still.
For me, it is not only executing what clients ask for, but also giving them recommendations based on our experience and with added value. One strength is that we do it comprehensively, we have all marketing communication areas (promotions, shopper , retail , activations, events, CRM), including the digital part that is vital today, data driven . So we don’t have to outsource anything, that makes me very excited.
E: As the new CEO, what are your short and medium term goals?
AC: Strengthen what already exists, because I am coming to a company that is very well established, but something very important for me is to continue with the transformation to stay up to date and be totally flexible to be able to face the changes that arise in the market every day.
In the short and medium term I want to contribute to innovation, incorporate design thinking into creative processes. It is something that I am passionate about and yes, I am going to make a strong case for Pauta Creativa to be at the forefront of innovation to offer fresh and new ideas, as well as innovative business models and strategies.
E: What challenges do you face in this new direction?
AC: The main challenge is to deliver results. Where we are going to engage the most with our clients is to offer metrics. Customers are looking for that and need to increase their sales, grow their market share because that translates into higher profits for them. What I want is to deliver measurable results.
E: How do you plan to gain the trust of all the agency’s stakeholders ?
AC: With results. I have understood for many years that the main value of work is the results. At Aspel my main contribution was to offer measurable results, month after month, for 10 years. But these results were of growth, of an ever higher brand recall.
E: What is the growth expectation for Pauta Creativa at the end of this year?
AC: The main objective is to maintain double-digit growth, and we are already focused on creating a work plan for the next five years, where 2022 is the most immediate, with much shorter metrics. It is complex to do it for five years due to the dynamics of the market; however, we trust that this plan will be one of sustained growth.
I: In addition to integrated marketing , what is the differentiating value that you see in Pauta Creativa?
AC: We go hand in hand with the growth expectations and strategic requirements of the brands. Today, clients require digital strategies that are guided by data, the consumer’s mindset , the social listening that prevails over the wishes of the audience. We implement this in the different points of contact with the consumer of the brands. I believe that 360 plans do not exist, each one must have the necessary points of contact and Pauta Creativa can be accurately throughout that consumer journey , issuing the correct communication and putting the product in the consumer’s shopping cart.
E: In the current inflationary context and considering the conflicts between countries like Ukraine and Russia and the US and China, what will the agency’s strategy be to become an ally of brands?
AC: It is a complex moment, but I think that in times of crisis and problems is where great solutions are born. Here Pauta Creativa is going to play a transcendental role so that its clients obtain the results they have planned. We’re going to focus on that.
