Citizen Raj

SAN FRANCISCO As the cd and a co-founder of San Francisco-based Citizen Group, Robin Raj fights the good fight. His nearly one-year-old shop works with clients including Amnesty International, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Rock the Vote, and believes being socially responsible and generating revenue can go hand in hand.Raj, 50, has been a partner at Collaborate and worked at DAWG, Foote, Cone & Belding, Hal Riney and Chiat\Day, but says his ultimate prize was having footage from Citizen's Eyes on Darfur Web site used in a call-to-action presentation before the U.N. this past July.Q: Given your cause orientation, why do you also have commercial clients like Schlitz?A: The Citizen approach spans cause and community building. So a Citizen-brand component has to do with unique community. In the case of Schlitz, it's community building in that we're finding novel ways to build community and loyalty with men 55-years-old and older.How does the agency approach the branding of Amnesty International?The strategy is primarily to create a campaign to create global adoption [of Amnesty International as a brand]. Amnesty is very decentralized, somewhat like the United Nations. Each chapter of Amnesty operates autonomously-that's its core strength. It's trying to create an international campaign where the [brand] becomes a beacon.One of the projects you've done for Amnesty is "Instant Karma" [a CD of John Lennon songs covered by A-list artists was premiered on iTunes and in Borders bookstores and Hard Rock Cafes worldwide on the same day to raise money for Darfur]. What were the origins of the campaign?I've worked for Amnesty [on and off] for 18 years. ... In 2001, we were trying to find one big idea and it came in the form of a song. Gabriel Byrne [who was doing voice over work for Amnesty at the time] had heard "Imagine" sung by children at his child's school and [told us about it]. We made a video of the kids [for a TV spot]. ... It turned into earned media when 65 countries picked it up. It was really Amnesty's first global campaign. ... Yoko [Ono] was so happy, she gave Amnesty the rights to [songs for this campaign]. It took us two years to birth this project and build the assets and get the artists to participate. Another project for Amnesty, the Eyes on Darfur Web site [eyesondarfur.org], incorporates satellite imagery to provide evidence of violence in Sudan.How are you using that footage in other communications?It has been integrated onto the Amnesty Web site, [we've done] e-mail pushes promoting it to the membership and partners, [offered] free downloads to create awareness and push people to the Web [and more]. The site is actually helping shape policy. I didn't necessarily anticipate that. It's a different form of activism. When Amnesty got the grant to do the site, it was like [it became] a global witness.The agency talks about "citizen brands." What do you mean by this?A brand that wants to behave like a good citizen, that wants to be part of the solution. Marc Gobe wrote a book that resonated with me [Citizen Brand: 10 Commandments for Transforming Brand Culture in a Consumer Democracy] and the take of it is there's an opportunity to do well by doing good. It's not altruistic. It's what used to be called corporate image.Cause agencies seem to be moving from pro bono work to being agencies for hire. Do you think this is the way of the future?I do, otherwise I wouldn't be pursuing it. In the age of transparency it's good to put policies in place and then promote them. That takes management and agencies. When they are pro bono it's a struggle—everyone is with hat in hand. There's charity fatigue. How do you break through the threshold of indifference? You need professional show business in a way and you can't sustain it without money.Isn't associating brands with causes a double-edged sword?Yes. It depends on how appropriately, artfully you do it. You don't want to take it too far. What it requires is setting some long-term policies.Do you look for a balance between creative geared to the already converted and creative geared to convert nonbelievers?That always comes up. [For] "Instant Karma" it was, "Damn it, preach to the converted. They haven't been preached to for awhile. They are pre-galvanized." Sometimes there's a time to go for low-hanging fruit. Sometimes it's time to convert hearts and minds.What's your biggest pet peeve?Wasting time or having my time wasted.How do you get past creative block?I think you have to look beyond the myopic world of advertising or media per se. All good creative people get that you have to draw your experience from life experiences.What three words would you use to describe yourself?Restless, looking, grateful.What about three words others would use to describe you?Pain in ass, if I have to restrict myself to three. Besides your agency, what's your vote for the greatest agency out there? At the top of the list is Chiat\Day. Of all the people I've come across, Lee [Clow] does it at an incredible high and consistent level and with so much heart year after year. I admire Rich [Silverstein] and Jeff [Goodby], and Crispin [Porter + Bogusky]'s innovation. ... My focus has been outside of advertising in activism, getting into the world of organizations. I continue to look for the TED [technology-entertainment-design orientation] and add a letter to that, "A" for advocate.What's the latest book or CD that's made an impression?Paul Hawken's Blessed Unrest. It talks about a decentralized movement of energy that is creating a political force around the world. Nobody has, thankfully, labeled this movement.What are your greatest creative accomplishments?The Eyes on Darfur Web site, used as part of the body of evidence in a U.N. presentation. The [U.N.] voted to send in security troops. That's not a place where advertising can usually go. The [Amnesty] grant that gave us the money to do this asked, "How can technology and media create new forms of activism?" In the commercial world [my greatest accomplishments] are Nynex Yellow Pages for Chiat\Day and Bass Ale for Carroll Raj Stagliano, where we looked at the romance of an English beer that had one of the first registered trademarks. The tagline was, "Bass helps you get to the bottom of it all." We did everything from tap handles to bar mirrors. Then there is the "Imagine" campaign for Amnesty.How did you get into advertising?Journalism and music. The bastardization of the two skills became advertising. My girlfriend needed a jingle for a student competition by the American Ad Federation ... for Sprite. We thought advertising was a jingle. Anyway, we won a national competition. I got an internship at Benton & Bowles in L.A. There were a lot of three-martini lunch guys there; it was right down the street from the Brown Derby. I worked with the likes of Joe Toto, Marilyn Miller, Chet Lane and Larry Rood.What did you learn from them?Verbal/visual interplay—the basic concepts of juxtaposition of words and images for emotion. I have fond memories. Then I got a job at Bozell Jacobs in Newport Beach [in 1979]. I had this naive notion that advertising is the same anywhere.What was wrong with Bozell?They did real estate advertising. There was no imagination. There was a cynical vibe. It was hell on earth. But then I got my big break, at Hal Riney in San Francisco. That got me to San Francisco, where I eventually worked with Jeff [Goodby], Rich [Silverstein] and Andy Berlin at [Goodby, Berlin + Silverstein]. There were 25 people working in a small brownstone.After the Bozell disaster, how did you know Riney would be good?I didn't. But they had Weinhard [beer], Pabst beer, Gallo. ... Most importantly, you got a seat at the table with Hal.What was he like?If he really liked your work, after staring at it for at least a minute he'd say, "That might do."What was your start in nontraditional media?[I was a partner at] Carroll Raj Stagliano and one of our clients was WNET in New York. They were working in CD-ROMs and with Dorling Kindersley [the How Things Work series]. All that cool, new media was attractive—I was suddenly not constrained by 30 seconds. I started designing for new media, working on the early Internet. I went to work at Foote, Cone & Belding in San Francisco—they did Levi's first Web site. But I realized if I was going to be truly immersed, I needed to go to Ikonic Interactive, the granddaddy, in San Francisco. There I worked on Microsoft, GM-it was like being in grad school.Did you start DAWG right after you left Ikonic?I started DAWG [Digital Artists and Writers Group] in the late '90s. We worked on Discovery Channel, Virgin Records, MasterCard. Then I hooked up with Hans Ullmark and rolled my DAWG team into Collaborate. It was a single-studio environment that breaks down the divisions.What was the unifying principle?Integration. We thought it was silly to have divisions when we were looking for a unifying brand idea. Even distinctions like b-to-b versus b-to-c had to go. It lasted until late last year and we had a stable of worthy clients. Then I had a desire to have a practice dedicated to cause and I'm very happy in that space. I haven't felt this energized in a long time.Is it as simple as wanting to see your work change the world?The power of media has shown that it has the ability to do that, to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

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Citizen Raj

Gregory Solman

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Gregory Solman