"We like to get global ideas": Behind Advertising Week APAC 2023

This week sees Advertising Week APAC take over Sydney's Luna Park for 2023, bringing brands, marketers, agencies, creatives, media owners, and tech enthusiasts together for two massive days of networking and learning.

Ahead of the event kicking off on August 1st, Mediaweek caught up with Clive Prosser, director, Advertising Week APAC.

Behind the scenes, there’s been a shake-up of the Advertising Week Advisory Council this year.

“The support of our partners is really important, they've invested in it a lot,” says Prosser. “The Advisory Council is superb – we narrowed it down this year, we probably were too big in years gone by. We've got a core team of 12 who really do help us, that includes the IAB and AANA and ThinkTV.  They steer us in the right direction, if we come up with an idea, they're quite brutally honest with us.”

For those on the ground,  Prosser says that “there's a concerted effort to make a lot of what we do locally relevant, but global as well.”

“We like to get global ideas – not from a point that it's preachy, but to take the global view, and see what's coming. 

“At this point, we’re down to the operational side of it. The speakers are set, the program is set, the schedule is all together. It’s now about making sure everything is on time for the actual event itself.”

One of the biggest drawcards to Advertising Week 2023 is the appearance of William Shatner via a hologram. Prosser says that Shatner’s appearance offers more than just the visual thrills, and that the session is “the best way to showcase the tech.”

See Also: Beam me in, Scotty: William Shatner to speak at Advertising Week via life size hologram

“With tech being a big focus, he's literally going to be beaming in from his living room. But he's actually incredibly knowledgeable on technology, and he's got an amazing insight into that kind of thing.

“He's also got a big opinion on the planet, and sustainability is going to be something that we talk about this year. He's been to space, he's literally seen it! 

“He's a great get, but not just because of the fun element, he's genuinely a very knowledgeable man.”

Outside of Shatner, Prosser says that choosing his most anticipated session would be like choosing a favourite child, however, there are a few highlights that he puts forward as ones he is particularly excited about. 

“We're opening the whole event with a debate by the AANA, which is all about, whether or not the advertising industry caused the climate crisis – there’s for and against, we're going to do a proper debate on stage. 

“There’s another debate from IAB, asking whether or not AI will be the cause of human mistrust in advertising.

“From The Trade Desk, Jeff Green appeared on the stage with us in 2018 and he made some predictions, we’ll be looking back and seeing how many of them the true. That's an interesting one as well. 

“Alex Hayes is having a conversation with Brett Armstrong from TikTok, John McNerny from Yahoo, Andrea Martens from ADMA, and Carolyn Bollaci from Meta. That's going to be interesting, because the speed that the industry is moving is incredible.”

For both brands and punters heading to Advertising Week, Prosser is very clear about what he hopes people leave the event with.

“Every time people come we want them to leave knowing something they didn't before – whether that's in the industry they're in or learning something new about something else outside of what they normally work with. 

“We like to do it in a fun way, that’s why we do it at Luna Park, but it's the thought leadership and the networking that I think are the two things that we really want to give people. We want them to walk away and think ‘you know what, I'm glad I went and I'm going to come back next year’.”

Advertising Week APAC 2023 will be held at Sydney's Luna Park on August 1st and 2nd

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Top Image: Clive Prosser