#AOTYAwards spills: Mashwire's silver bullet for the future

Mashwire is a Singapore-grown independent agency made up of strategic thinkers who unearth insights to help clients build relationships with their desired consumers. From conceptualisation to creating and amplifying effective executions, the team prides itself on delivering across three key pillars:

1. Campaigns – It has an integrative approach in creation and curation.
2. Creatives – Its core strategic tool in communication.
3. Digital - The thread in unifying brand experience.

Mashwire prides itself on not just selling ideas. It designs bespoke solutions to answer every client’s need. This year the agency bagged the silver awards to content marketing agency of the year and CRM & Loyalty marketing agency of the year. It also made a strong showing as a finalist for Full Service agency of the year and Integrated marketing agency of the year.

More here on the agency's story with co-founders Hon Wui Teo and Jeff Ng.

This interview is done as part of MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s winners and finalists’ interview series. To find out more about the awards, click here.

What are some of the expectations your clients now have for your agency?

Teo/Ng: With our core belief in integration and a consumer-first approach, our agency is poised to deliver works in the ever-changing landscape. As consumer behaviour changes, we’ll need to find the best way to communicate with them, to deliver messages across. Likewise, with our clients facing the same challenges with their consumers, we have to continue being in the journey with them, helping them to take pulse on the changing consumer habits, strategize the campaigns to achieve their objectives. 

How has your clients marketing plans shifted this year? 

Teo/Ng: The pandamic has brought about a significant change in consumer behaviour, from the way media is consumed to making purchase decisions. No doubt that brands are looking at strengthening their digital efforts, the challenge remains on what more can be done to just e-commerce sales online.

The use of amplification channels and engagement mediums has risen, where partnering KOLs and influencers are no longer a press release and media kit drop. PR events are now brought online, ensuring the same, or even better, experience is delivered. The usage of social platforms and their functions has also risen and evolved, where LIVE sessions “replicates” on-ground activations.

With our 3 pillars in marketing, creative & digital, we continue to bring integration to our clients in meeting their business objectives. 

What are some of the trends you see carrying on post-pandemic, and how are you readying your workforce to be ready with these trends? 

Teo/Ng: Be proactively reactive. The road to recovery will be long and uncertain. Consumer behaviours will again change along the way and agencies must be ready to tackle these changes as and when it happens. Stay on the ground, experience what consumers are experiencing, be proactive in providing alternative solutions backed by sound research and data. The use of digital will continue to grow, from gen z to baby boomers. Technology will continue to play an important role, affecting everyone’s daily lives and consumption of information. But remember that humans still need forms of connections, be it in the online world or face to face, it’s how we integrate and send across of messages effectively that makes every consumer an influencer of their own. 

What do you think makes for great marketing these days? 

Teo/Ng: Being consumer-first. Understanding your consumers thoroughly and objectively, knowing what they want and how they behave, then customized and curate a single-minded message to reach out to them. 

How are you planning for 2021?

Teo/Ng: It’s important to take a step back at times to see how we’ve performed. Be ready in the ever-changing landscape. As they say, the only time you look back, is to see how far you’ve come.