'Gamer' Label Is Outdated, Says Electronic Arts' VP of Brand

With more brands trying to enter the gaming world and reach "gamers," Elle McCarthy, the vice president of brand at Electronic Arts (EA) shares that the "gamer" label has become an outdated term. With fewer users identifying as gamers, brands should shift their targeting approach and focus more on how gaming serves as interactive. But that's not all, Elle also boasts an incredible array of accomplishments in the UK, Virgin Media, Omnicom and more. And, outside of her professional field, she's become a true advocate against sexual discrimination and harassment—even running the #WomenCannes campaign to speak out against these issues. Discover her work, involvement and journey below. How did you get to where you are today? Any noteworthy aha-moments along the way? The start of my career was a series of happy and unhappy accidents because I had to leave agencies more than once due to discrimination and sexual harassment. It’s important to let young people know that when this happens, you can leave. Our careers aren’t as tidy as they might look unless we are honest about this. That said, I am passionate about driving greater inclusion and equity in entertainment and media. I truly got to do this at the rebranding of Radio 1 and 1Xtra, the radio station for young Black and brown people in the UK. It was an opportunity to change a brand that could affect so many peoples’ lives. Since then, I’ve chosen roles where people are trying to solve big, unsolvable problems: centering Virgin Media on entertainment, taking the biggest pitch in advertising history for Omnicom—Ford—and winning it and now bringing the Electronic Arts brand back to life after nearly 40 years. I’ve also done a lot of work in a more activist space, launching #WomenCannes during advertising’s #MeToo moment in 2018—given the lack of women representation and a culture that normalized men attending with escorts and agencies sending young women to accompany older, powerful men. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Women Cannes (@womencannes) What's the most innovative thing you're currently working on? My current remit is the reinvention and re-invigoration of a 40-year-old brand: Electronic Arts. When a company hasn’t been tending to its brand on the inside for so long, it requires a huge amount of innovative thinking and works to revive it. Electronic Arts’ premise is that gaming wakes up your brain and it’s the most connective entertainment medium on earth. Our company has grown through incredible innovation, bringing this purpose back to the center of the company. This is brand innovation in action. I’m currently working on the brand purpose strategy to spread positivity through our products and give back through social impact. What new or up-and-coming innovation(s) are you most excited about and how do you think it will change the future of marketing? The convergence of gaming and everything in culture. Gaming is no longer a medium or an industry, it is simply ‘interactive’. You can now interact with almost everything through play—from an interest area like interior design to a movement like Black Lives Matter or exploring your sexual identity. The recent rise in more lo-fi live service games allows faster integration of culture than ever before. This is a huge opportunity for marketing and forces a more audience-first and fluid approach for brands looking to engage authentically. I often get asked about how brands can partner with gaming or talk to gamers—but there’s really no such thing as gamers at all and understanding that will be crucial. Did you know that only 14% of players self-identify as gamers and that is as low as 6% for women? It might be the safety someone finds in playing with people like them, free from the shackles of identity politics that can factor less in positive gaming spaces than they do in the world. There are no best practice rules for how to engage with these niche, multifaceted and passionate communities. Trying to target gamers is like saying you’re targeting people who like music or people who breathe in air. What’s one piece of work from your career that you’re the proudest of? My keynote talk, Choose Your Words; What if Language is the Patriarchy? I did primary research into the effect of binary pronouns in unconscious bias training and showed how the classic riddle of the surgeon is problematic. This is the original riddle: A father and son are in a horrible car crash that kills the dad. The son is rushed to the hospital; just as he’s about to go under the knife, the surgeon says, 'I can’t operate—that boy is my son!' People are asked: ‘How can that be’ and statistically, most people don’t realize that the surgeon can be a woman and can’t crack it. I changed the riddle, adding in more female pronouns: A father and daughter are in a horrible car crash that kills the dad. The daughter is rushed to the hospital; just as she’s about to go under the knife, the surgeon says, 'I can’t operate—that girl is my daughter!' When the riddle is changed, 24% more people get it right; pronouns prime your brain to think male or female before you’re even presented with a challenge. I’ve been using this work and thinking to pioneer greater female representation and the use of non-binary pronouns in my work in marketing ever since. Was there ever a time where you questioned your career path? How did you handle that? Whenever I was in an agency where I or someone else experienced harassment, bullying or even assault, I questioned whether this was the right career path. Zoe Scaman’s brilliant piece ‘Mad Men, Furious Women’ has brought this conversation to the fore again in the last couple of weeks but it’s always there bubbling under the surface. It was hard to continue working in an industry where this abuse was so regularly and openly allowed to happen. In 2019, when the Times Up movement got traction, I ran the #WomenCannes [campaign] and left the industry. I had to run it anonymously so that it wasn’t affiliated with an agency. I felt like a double agent and needed to be able to show up as my uncensored, authentic self. Adweek Podcast: Mad Men. Furious Women. What's a way that you predict marketing will change as more people begin traveling/going out again? There is a lot of generic copywriting around togetherness to transition out of. I’d love to be a fly on the wall in rooms where teams are debating what to do after their “Be apart together” campaign. “Be together, together” or “Be outside alone” perhaps? Some of the things that were accelerated in the pandemic are here to stay: the tech platforms, ways of communicating with each other and relating to each other on a global scale. Marketing departments would probably do well to wait and see before pre-empting a lot of outdoor advertising buys. What’s the first post to come to mind when you hear “best-in-class social”? I’m aging myself but the Jay-Z launch of Decoded is my all-time favorite social campaign and post because it set up engaging, immersive real-world discovery and allowed the community to essentially run the social campaign for them. I love that work and always will. It’s also not dated, an idea like that would work just as well today and carry to any platform. What’s the best advice you’ve ever received? My mentor at BBH, founding partner Nigel Bogle once said, “cut off your weaknesses and play to your strengths.” We teach young people to identify their weaknesses and double down there from an early age. In the workplace, there are few roles that truly value a jack-of-all-trades, especially as you become senior. We should focus on discovering what we love. El Pollo Loco's VP of Digital Takes The Brand (And Its Food) To New Heights

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'Gamer' Label Is Outdated, Says Electronic Arts' VP of Brand

Elle McCarthy also talks identity politics in gaming spaces and fighting industry discrimination

Julian Gamboa

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Julian Gamboa