Stellantis’ CMO Raj Register on knowing your brand’s true north

Stellantis’ CMO Raj Register talks about building consistent storytelling across channels, what she’s learning from AI and why she’s obsessed with connecting marketing action to tangible business outcomes.  Episode Transcript Please note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio. Damian Fowler (00:00): I'm Damian Fowler. Ilyse Liffreing (00:01): And I'm Ilyse Liffreing. Damian Fowler (00:02): And welcome to this edition of The Current Podcast. Ilyse Liffreing (00:09): This week we're delighted to talk with Raj Register, the Senior Vice President and CMO for North America at Stellantis, one of the biggest names in the global auto industry. Damian Fowler (00:19): That's right. Stellantis is the powerhouse behind iconic brands like Jeep, Dodge, Ram, Chrysler, and so many more. Ilyse Liffreing (00:26): And as our North American fans may be well aware, stellantis just ran off one but two high profile spots at the Super Bowl in February, both featuring major celebs, Damian Fowler (00:37): Glenn Powell as Goldlock in the Ram Super Bowl commercial, and Harrison Ford who rarely appears in ads starring in the Jeep commercial. Ilyse Liffreing (00:45): Let's get started. Damian Fowler (00:51): The first thing I want to ask you, Raj, is how did it all come together? Raj Register (00:55): Yeah, that's a great question and not the most straightforward way that many would think. So at Stellantis we have something called a jump ball. And Jump ball basically means that we curate several agencies and we allow them to pitch and based on the pitch how we brief them and whoever comes up with the best idea pretty much wins the business. So for this past Super Bowl, we spoke to around 35 plus agencies and we were able to round them out to the best two, one for Ram, one for Jeep. So we go through several rounds of creative, we determine what's the best story, how does it really relate to our business? And from my perspective it was what's the best creative outside of that? Then what's the best thing that will help give us more runway past the Super Bowl? So outside of the creative is the business aspect and how are we going to perform and make sure that it delivers upon all of our goals. Damian Fowler (01:56): Now everyone knows, I guess at this point that the Super Bowl ad spot is one of the most coveted in the world and one of the most pricey I suppose. But wanted to ask you why was it important for Stellantis? I mean, you're the only order maker as I understand it, to have a spot during the game this year. Why was it important for you? Raj Register (02:14): There's a lot of dialogue around why were we the only one. I saw it as an incredible opportunity for us to be auto exclusive. When do you get to do that? During Super Bowl? It was really important for us to show up, not only to show that we're here, not only are we American born and we are proud of our brands, but when we think of everything we have to offer to our consumers, we wanted to leverage this as an opportunity to tell that story and give them an indication of who we are. And it was almost like a reintroduction back to America as well as supporting our UAW workers, supporting our dealers, supporting our employees. So I think it was a rally cry for us to just let everyone know that we're here and we're here to stay. Ilyse Liffreing (02:58): That's awesome. And such terrific actors in both of the commercials, Glenn Powell and Harrison Ford, and I feel like they speak to definitely different generations obviously of fans and types of moviegoers potentially. What were the main challenges of securing the talents? Raj Register (03:16): Gosh, so Glenn Powell, so we already have an established relationship with him for Ram. He did a really nice job with us for our integration that we had with Twisters. And so for him it was more of a natural fit. He has this serious nature, but he's also very funny. And so when we came up with the idea of Cody Lakson the Three Bears and using that old American fairytale to help bring to life something really cool and unique glim, I mean it was like a no-brainer, like let's extend this relationship because he's easy to work with, but then also he brings a lot to the table to help us with bringing things to life. So he was very involved with making sure that our script and how things showed up were authentic to him. But then also because he knows us as a brand, he knew certain things to lean into. (04:03): So he was a really good partner in that way. Harrison Ford was a lot more difficult for us to secure. So quite frankly, and if you've looked at any of the behind the scenes that were done, Harrison talked about his first answer was No, Olivier and a group of us went back and he started with a different script, one that paid homage to Harrison Ford, but then also related to us as a brand and the freedom of America. And so once we were able to align on the idea and have a script that Harrison actually reacted to in a positive way, he actually reviewed it with his wife and she said, now that's good. Then it was a matter of, okay, well who's the director who could work with him and make sure that this comes to life in the way that he's proud of as well as us? We tap James Mango and that was incredible. So they already have a really good relationship. Mango did four versus Ferrari, so he has this really extensive background in movies, but for commercials, this was, I believe it was his first one. And so just balancing the star power of Harrison, Mangold and Olivier, it was like the trifecta of greatness I would say. But it took a while for us to get to where we needed to be. We shot our Super Bowl at three weeks before, Ilyse Liffreing (05:24): Which that is a tight turnaround. Raj Register (05:27): It's a lot of pressure, but being on set and getting everything together, Harrison was amazing, but that one was definitely a day by day, how are we going to get this done? And just making sure that he felt comfortable with the commercial and it came out better than I could have expected. But that one definitely was a challenge, but in a good way. Damian Fowler (05:48): And it's interesting to note that Harrison rarely does commercials, so it was an amazing coup for you to get Ilyse Liffreing (05:53): Him. Totally. And yeah, it's great that it came, but it's also a great example of the brand campaign overall because it's the power of choice and why was this the right message for the moment? Raj Register (06:08): Yeah, so just to clarify, so power of choice was our Ram ad and freedom of choice was our G ad. And so the reason why we chose those bookends of power and freedom one is it's the breadth and the quilt of America being able to make a choice and be happy and stand up for whatever it is that you want or whatever you believe in. The other part was is as we think about the way the automotive business is changing, there's a lot of energy around what type of vehicle should you choose? And our stance at Stellantis is, one, we want you to love our brands and our vehicles first, and then you make a choice as far as what platform or what energy you want. In both commercials we were able to highlight our ice vehicles, which is our gas hybrid and all electric. (07:04): With that being said, it's hey, making a choice should be fun. There's a lot of negative feedback around Bev versus not, or should you have a gas vehicle versus not. And for us it's you have the freedom or power to choose the vehicle that's best for you, and we want to make sure that you make a choice with us and giving customers the education of we are a company for a person like you and we just want you to choose with us. And so that was the premise of it and we were able to do it on one end very humorously. And the other was more around the freedom and pride of being American and being able to make a decision for yourself. Damian Fowler (07:43): Now, one of the most interesting things about the Super Bowl this year was that it was also streamed on Tubi, which is Fox's fast channel. And I wanted to get into this in terms of the campaign. How did you think about and come up with a digital strategy around that that goes beyond the second quarter ad? Raj Register (08:03): Yeah, so I'll just say even for the day of, it was interesting because being at Super Bowl, I got a chance to see what was happening on the two B app and really being able to just see the integration and being able to not only see our ad live, but also our halftime show. So that was incredible to see live TV while you're on the spot because it's a different experience. What consumers see at home is not the same as what you see in the stadium. The important thing for us was leveraging all opportunities from TV to streaming to social, to tell a complete story. And we want it to be just, okay, here's the TV spot and move on. How can we leverage other avenues to make sure that our story is getting out there and then continuing the story with our consumers or those that are interested in learning more. Yeah, there's a group that are watching on TV or in a environment where they're in a sports bar or something like that, but you also have these other group of customers that are watching on their phones. And so that's why it was important for us to leverage all avenues and all media channels to make sure that our collective 360 story was getting out there. Ilyse Liffreing (09:11): Totally. Did you know that it was going to be streamed on Tubi when you first made the buy? Raj Register (09:17): No, we didn't. And so I learned when I was in the suite with Fox Sports, and so they came and said, Raj, you can see everything live and here's how everything works. And so I had everything set up and it was really nice to see. So I was trying to balance be here in the moment, but then I was enthralled by Tubi and so throughout breaks and things like that, I was very much so engaged. So it was a surprise and delight for me and something that I'll definitely continue to leverage as we look at our media buying practices in the future. Ilyse Liffreing (09:49): Totally makes sense. Curious about how those overall numbers added to the results of the Super Bowl spots. And on that note, let's get into those results with the overall takeaway. First off, what was the reaction to the campaign overall? Raj Register (10:04): That one, we did something a little bit different than we typically do. So what we have normally done is Super Bowl is the coveted day. We don't do teasers as a company. Everyone sees it at the same time and it's under lock and key. And we tried something a bit different this year. So for Ram, we created some teasers and so we went live with our teasers a week before Super Bowl, and then on the Wednesday before we had an opportunity with the Today Show to show the entire commercial and really start some of the excitement and engagement before Super Bowl. From a press standpoint, the world knew or people knew that we would have a Jeep spot and we kept up with our previous practice of everything's under embargo, so no one knew that one, we had Harrison Ford or we had a two minute spot. (10:56): And so it was a complete really surprise to most people. And so to have that go live during the Super Bowl itself, I mean that just took off from a social sentiment standpoint. Me being a former Ford employee, I got so many text messages because the last line where Harrison talks about loving his Jeep even though his name is Ford, that was quite the zinger. And so everything that we've seen so far has been overwhelmingly positive. Positive sentiment for Jeep was 99%, and for Ram it was 98%. From a global PR standpoint, over 10 billion for ram, we had over 200 million views for Jeep, over 106 million views on social channels. So many recognition and rewards. Ad blitz was one where we were number one spot for Jeep, and so they just keep coming in. And so those are the things that you know, did the right thing. Ilyse Liffreing (11:52): Yeah, those are fantastic numbers. Damian Fowler (11:54): Amazing. I guess it's fair to say you hit your metrics for success Raj Register (11:58): For game day and right after. So another thing that we did differently this time is that we have usage rights for 90 days after Super Bowl, so it wasn't just a day of and done. We're leveraging the content for some localized messaging. We leveraged our websites CRM and really doing a complete 360 after the fact. So we'll have a postmortem after the 90 days of our campaign, which is something very different for us. And having cut downs and really being able to support more product and storytelling key, why buy messaging? And it's something that I think will be pivotal for us as a company and really set the stage for how we do things in the future. Damian Fowler (12:42): I'd love to zoom out a little bit. You have many iconic brands on your watch, not just Jeep and Ram, Dodge Chrysler and also European brands too. I wanted to ask you though, how do you balance your marketing across so many different brand identities while also sort of keeping in-house that cohesive idea of strategy for the whole company? Raj Register (13:05): At a company Stellantis where you have essentially a house of brands, you have the very all American Chrysler, Dodge, Ram G brands, and then Alpha Mayo and Fiat, each brand has its own DNA. And that's how I see it is the DNA is what sets the stage for the fabric of how that vehicle or how that brand should show up. And we need to be tried and true to that. Many times we get ideas and an agency may pitch us and it might be a great idea and say for example, they pitch us for Chrysler and it comes across as Dodge. I say that's a great idea, but it's very dodge, it's very brotherhood, badass speed power for Chrysler, more of the family with Pacifica and capability and off-road with Jeep and Ram also having capability. It's the only brand that has, and basically in the world that only does pickup trucks. (14:03): And so when you think of all those things, each brand has its own identity, and so you don't have to mix and match things. As individuals, we have our own personalities and as families, we have our own DNA. That's how I see the brands. And so that part to me is fairly easy to really just understand and make sure that there's clear lines of delineation. When I think of marketing though, there's best practices and there's things as a company that we know to be true. When we think about, for me, I have things that are considered either above the line or below and just really understanding what investment, what media channels, what optimization, what tactics are necessary for us to be successful with a particular nameplate or launch. And ensuring that I have a complete cohesive plan and really establishing what are my KPIs and goals and things that I need to make sure that I'm accomplishing. (14:58): If there's something that needs to be communicated and it falls below the line where we have maybe digital only or we're doing only experiential, really understanding what are my priorities, what am I trying to deliver upon? And then holding true to that. So as a company, having marketing rigor and expertise around what it is that we really need to establish as far as a North star. And then also working with our brand heads on does this meet the brand? DNA does it meet our customer goals? Does it meet our key why buys? And then you move forward. And so a lot of things we do are collaboratively. So it's not the marketing team on our own just driving things and bringing things out the door. It's how are we establishing what's necessary for us to be successful? And at the end of the day, it is about sales and share and making sure that we have a positive sentiment in the market and people are shopping us. Ilyse Liffreing (15:54): Speaking about shopping and digital, today's consumers are really omnichannel in their approach to shopping. How has that shift really impacted marketing in the auto sector? Is AI and automation having an impact on that approach? Raj Register (16:12): So I would say I don't know if AI necessarily has an impact as a compliment. And so what AI does, and when you think of omnichannel, it allows us to do things faster, more agile, more targeted, more regional focused. And so when I think of how customers consume things many times it takes them seeing something in many different places and how are we collectively telling a story and really understanding what part of the funnel are we leveraging, what channel for and ensuring that we're doing it in the most authentic way that is not overbearing to someone that's receiving it. But to me I see it as how are we taking them down the funnel? So if on TV I'm leveraging a brand campaign for excitement and engagement, but then when a customer sees a similar ad or a version of it at the digital level where they're now as a call to action where we're saying, Hey, learn more, there's a call to action for either building price or learning more about our features and options. (17:17): And then when you get to the deal level, allowing them to be the closer of the play. And so all of these things should be, as I said, in compliment with one another. Whenever we create something, we leverage AI to help us with not only creating faster content in a way that gives us that agility, but then we also use it for our data and our forecasting for our modeling and how are we leveraging our media channels, and then also how are things performing and then helping set the stage for, well, you did this component very well, how do you go deeper in a particular audience or market to help establish what success really looks like? And so I think AI is very complimentary in a positive way to really help establish not only from a content perspective, but when you think about performance, it definitely helps guide it from a forecast standpoint what we should expect or how we should leverage certain investments. Ilyse Liffreing (18:18): Certainly, and it's hard enough obviously to differentiate the brands from each other and keep true to their own brand guidelines, but as a marketer, you have to also differentiate your brands from competitors like GM and Ford and Tesla. What shapes basically your approach to that, Raj Register (18:43): The brand, DNA, when you have that and it's rooted in everything you do, we don't have to worry about looking or sounding like someone else because we know who we are. And that when you have that as your true north is very easy to really understand who you are and where you show up. Now when I think of brand health and brand sentiment and things that we need to listen to customers on, so for example, if we have feedback that's saying our brand is beloved, but customers don't understand our features and technology or they don't understand capability or they don't understand certain components, we use that as data to help us with our storytelling, especially at the tier two and retail level, to really start leaning into things that maybe we're missing the boat on, especially if it's something that we believe is a key factor as to a why buy. But when I think of a Tesla or a Ford or a gm, they have their own brand identities as well. And so trying to chase or be them is not the answer. Many of our brands have been in place for decades. I mean, Chrysler will be coming up on its hundredth anniversary at this point. We know who we are. And holding true to that I think is the most important thing you can ever do as a brand and as a marketer. Damian Fowler (20:07): I love that answer. When you know who you are, that's what you lean on. And I think that goes for individuals too in lots of ways. Not to get too psychological about this, but it is a true, it's true. Yeah, it's true. I know that there's a question here about, and maybe that's the answer to this next question, but when things are changing, big picture, macro conditions, global economy, which has a big impact on the auto industry, how do you as a marketer stay focused? Raj Register (20:35): Yeah, and that's an interesting question because when you think of macroeconomic factors, it can be competitive actions. It could be things like tariffs. There's all these things that you need to take into consideration. And the things that we can control, the controllables, I always make sure I understand what those things are. The things that I can't control are the things that I consider noise, meaning there's disruption and people don't like Stellantis because of X, Y, and Z, or this decision was made, we had a lot of leadership change over, we can't digest all of that. And so what I try to do is make sure that whatever plan is done soundly, it's inclusive of any key stakeholders that are necessary to help us make whatever decision it is that we're going to market with. And then also having consistency. And so yes, there's external things that we need to have into consideration, but if we run our business and change day by day, fly by fly, we'll be a weather report. We won't be able to really hold true. So for me, having consistency and sticking to a plan, now you need to have some agility in there to account for things that are more major. But when I think of major versus minor, I try to keep the minors at bay plan for the majors as much as I can, but then hold true. The more you're consistent and the more you have a plan that you stick to, the better success you have. Ilyse Liffreing (22:08): So it said marketing is a balance between art and science. Do you agree? Raj Register (22:14): A thousand percent. A thousand percent. So when I think of art and science one, that's my background. So I have an engineering background, very much science. And then when you have the marketing piece, there is science there, but there's a lot of art. And when you bridge the two together and you know how to yin and yang the two, it works. While I love data, I love to make sure that things are technically sound. I also recognize that there's art in here that you can never discount. And so I think it's an important balance to respect both parts of it. And when you're able to marry the two together, that's where I think the magic happens. Damian Fowler (22:54): What are you obsessed with figuring out right now? Raj Register (22:57): I'm obsessed with figuring out modernization of marketing. And when I say that it's what are the disruptive things that are not necessarily on the map? So we have a voiceover talent that we use for G, and this is a recognizable voice, and we've used this same individual for over a decade. He got into a car accident and his vocal cords were damaged, we had a decision to make. It's going to be a different voice that we maybe don't want to necessarily use. This wasn't the decision, or could we leverage technology using AI to recreate his voice, get him into an agreement, still going to compensate and all of those things. But how do we continue with ensuring that there's a human part of this? We use the technology, but we were able to still move ourselves forward. And so that's an example for me of I'm obsessed with how do you create opportunities? And again, it goes to the art and science to create things that may be a challenge that you can fix quickly, or are there things that I'm not thinking about that are very different and disruptive that I can start grounding myself on today because it's going to be even more relevant in five years. Ilyse Liffreing (24:20): What if you had an unlimited budget? What would be your marketing dream? What would you do Raj Register (24:27): If I had an unlimited budget? Really being able to establish a true footprint that gave true indication of what things are necessary for all consumers, whether they're African-American, Hispanic women, millennials, whoever it is, being able to create very bespoke one-to-one communications for them at the stage and at the channel that they need to make a decision. I think being able to create something like that and really understanding what's necessary, what drives someone, and then being able to truly correlate a marketing action with a true business sale impact, whatever the call to action is, I think it would be huge. Right now, we guess we say, okay, there's all these things. They clicked on an ad, they did X, Y, and Z, but we don't always know, especially for a big purchase for online things, that's easier to track. But when I think of true decision making, what are the things that really triggers individuals to make a choice and be able to correlate it to business results, I think is something that I've not yet seen done. And if I were to be able to crack that code, I'd be winning. So I think that's limitless. Damian Fowler (25:50): So Eli, what were your kind of thoughts off the back of it? Ilyse Liffreing (25:54): Yeah, I really liked how she talked about consistency, especially being a brand that is so prevalent in today's culture. She said, the more you're consistent, the better for customers because customers can see if you're not. Basically, she said, if we change every day, we're just going to be like a weather reports. Damian Fowler (26:15): That was very grounding. And I think when you talk about omnichannel campaigns and you think about the consistency of the brand across all of those channels, that's got to be a huge factor. The thing that resonates with me about that too is the fact that she talked about the DNA of each brand in her portfolio, whether it be Ram or Jeep, and just knowing that that was kind of a revelation to me. You can lean back on that idea. And I thought that kind of idea of when you know who you are, things are easy at is easier. So that was something that really stuck with me. And then there was one other thing she said that clarity of thought when she said it's what now, so what? Now what? And I just thought that was a really nice way of structuring the way a marketing campaign might be planned and then how it might roll out. Ilyse Liffreing (27:03): I also liked how she talked about the balance between art and science, whether data only tells us so much, but you got to lean into things with your heart as well. Damian Fowler (27:10): Hearts and minds, right? That's the old adage. Ilyse Liffreing (27:13): That is. That's it for this edition of the current podcast. Damian Fowler (27:19): This series is produced by Molten Hart. The Current Podcast theme is by loving caliber, and The Current team includes Kat Vesce and Sydney Cairns. Raj Register (27:26): And remember the brand DNA. When you have that and it's rooted in everything you do, we don't have to worry about looking or sounding like someone else because we know who we are. Damian Fowler (27:39): I'm Ilyse, I'm Damian, and we'll see you next time.