Ashley Rutstein: [00:00:00] As a creative, I need something to push against. I need some tension. I need some problem to solve. I wanna walk out of a brief feeling energized and excited, and already coming up with ideas. And when it's a boring brief, I'm sitting there thinking, this is gonna suck. I don't know where to even start with this.

Chris Kocek: Welcome to Any Insights Yet? the podcast that explores the intersection of strategy, inspiration, and branding. I'm Chris Kocek. My guest today is Ashley Rutstein. She's a copywriter creative director, Adweek Creative 100, and the creator of stuff about advertising, a social first channel where she analyzes cultural trends and gives a behind the scenes peek into the rough and tumble world of advertising.

I first discovered Ashley because of her weekly advertising roundup series where she covers the good, the bad, and the weird in advertising. During our conversation, Ashley shares her experiences as a content creator [00:01:00] and how those experiences have influenced her own work as a creative director, the process of making hundreds of videos on TikTok and YouTube have definitely sharpened her senses for what engages and what doesn't and she shares some great advice for any brand looking to get traction on social media. 

We also talk about blind spots, how to transform boring briefs into better briefs and some interesting realizations Ashley had when she was rock climbing while 35 weeks pregnant. 

To get us started though, I asked Ashley about one of her very first aha moments.

It happened during band class and it had to do with a particular hairstyle. 

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Chris Kocek: What's the first time you remember noticing something where you were like, doesn't anybody else notice this? 

Ashley Rutstein: I think it was actually kind of the opposite, where everyone noticed something that I didn't. Then it tuned me into some other stuff.

In junior high, I had started straightening my hair. I have naturally wavy hair and I really [00:02:00] wanted straight hair. So I started straightening it. And then a couple weeks later after straightening my hair every day, someone in band class was right behind me and said, Hey, you didn't straighten the back of your hair.

And I was like, what do you mean? She's like you, you forgot the back of your head. And. I had no idea, and it was like. How long have I been doing this without realizing that I'm just missing an entire portion of my head. And then after they said that to me, I was so aware of it and I saw it in other people.

I saw other people who like missed something in the back of their head. And it's like there's all these things that we just do as humans where we're kind of blind to something until they point it out and then you can't not see it anymore. [Laughter] 

Like, have you heard the term, uh, eyebrow blindness? No, it's becoming more and more popular with the internet because people are posting videos of themselves and it's basically you see your face so much that you become blind to how [00:03:00] your eyebrows look to other people.

So there are people who will post videos online and they have like, you know, huge eyebrows or something like girls who do their makeup and change the shape of their brows, make them so big. But to them it looks normal. But everyone in the comments is like, Hey girl. Your eyebrows are huge. And then they're like, oh my gosh, I never realized, because I look at my face every single day and it looks normal to me.

So there's just like these things that I realized that we're blind to until someone points it out, and I just find that so interesting. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. This is a, a deep metaphor, if ever there were one, because you're, you're talking about blind spots, right? Mm-hmm. We all have blind spots, brands especially have blind spots.

Were you mortified when you found that out or were you just like, huh, thanks for telling me. 

Ashley Rutstein: It was junior high. So there was definitely some mortification happening, you know, it was a really good friend and I was very appreciative that she pointed it out to me. And because of that, I tried to [00:04:00] point things out to people too, in a, in a subtle way, you know, not in public, but, 'cause I know there are just some things like that where you just don't even realize until someone points it out.

Chris Kocek: That's a good point about how do you say something gently to someone? How do you point something out? How do you give a client feedback about their brand? Have you developed any phrases, turns of phrases or softeners for how to kind of point out, like your branding right now is easily ignorable for these reasons, and I am here to try to help you make it unignorable.

Ashley Rutstein: I try to just show them what I want them to know. Like if their branding is the same as everyone else, I would show them a visual of their branding next to 15 of their competitors that look the same. So then it's, you know, I'm using facts and things that are out in the world to prove my point without me having to say, Hey, You guys are boring. [00:05:00] 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. 

Ashley Rutstein: That definitely makes it easier. But I've also, I've worked with some really interesting leadership who they were not afraid to tell clients what they really felt. And I think that's always inspired me because there is that dynamic of client versus agency and you're like, you're kind of butting heads.

But we really are in it together. We're trying to make the business better as a partnership, and so talking to them as if they're just part of the crew changes that dynamic and makes it easier to collaborate. So I've always liked the approach of brutal honesty and saying like, look, I'm gonna tell you something you don't wanna hear, but it's gonna get us to a better place in the end.

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. Very interesting. So now I first found you because of your weekly advertising roundup series, it kept showing up in my feed and that's where you deliver a wonderful recap and analysis of the week's most interesting advertising stories. What got you to start doing the weekly roundup in the first place?

Ashley Rutstein: Well, I had been covering a lot of [00:06:00] advertising related stories. I really like analyzing campaigns and explaining why they work or why they don't. I like pointing out the insights of things, and I kept finding myself with collections of things that were too small to make a whole video about. You know, it's one tweet or one little mention of something here and there, and so I just decided to put them all into one video as a little roundup of random things that I saw the previous week, and people loved it.

They were just super engaged, said that. That's where they were getting their news every week. And so as I got busier and couldn't make as many individual videos, these weekly roundups became my kind of catchall to talk about any interesting thing I saw in the previous week. So it just kind of grew from those tiny little random stories that I found.

Chris Kocek: And what are two or three discoveries that you've had about successful branding as a result of doing all those roundups? 

Ashley Rutstein: I think the main thing is. [00:07:00] Creating something that is worth talking about. There are so many things that are just throw away or drop in the bucket sort of campaigns, and it has to be worth talking about to make it into that video.

Another pattern that I've seen is a lot of partnerships either with celebrities or influencers. I feel like it's 90% of campaigns now have some sort of. Personality in them, and I find that very interesting. But there are more strategic partnerships, not just, let's throw whatever star power we can at this brand and hope it works.

I'm seeing more and more connections with the personality in the brand or the product. Like a recent one was. John Cena working with Neutrogena. 'cause John Cena has his popular, you know, you can't see me, catchphrase and Neutrogena was promoting their new sunscreen that has an invisible cast on your face.

So that's a natural [00:08:00] partnership and that makes so much sense. It's not just a random celebrity. So I'm seeing a lot of stuff like that coming through. 

Chris Kocek: Because celebrities come with potential baggage, right? Somebody's popular today and then they're canceled tomorrow because of something that happened. Is there a partnership that you've seen that's not celebrity based, that you're like, oh, I love that one.

Ashley Rutstein: Netflix recently, uh, worked with a professor on TikTok. Her name was Dr. Barlow. Her video went viral, kind of on accident. She posted a video for her intro to African American Studies class. She just thought, you know, let me reach these students through a TikTok. 'cause they're on there because she did her intro to the class where she's just telling them what they're gonna learn.

You know, here's your syllabus, we're gonna read these books. She put that on TikTok and it went crazy viral had millions and millions of views and so many people were in the comment saying, I wanna join this class. Like I wanna be part of Intro to African American Studies. And so that started this trend [00:09:00] of people doing TikTok University, putting classes online like that.

But Netflix for, uh, black History Month worked with her to create a playlist. on Netflix of, you know, prominent black centric films that she recommends to people to watch for, you know, the history or the culture. And so I was like, this is a genius partnership. I loved that she was getting more recognition for her starting this insane trend on TikTok, but yeah, I loved that one.

Chris Kocek: So speaking of social media and listening and all of that, what about some brands other than Netflix that are doing particularly effective social media activations, right? Because I think of you as a social media influencer, and if you were giving advice to a group of brands about what makes for highly effective social media content, what are two or three things you would tell them to do based on what you've learned through the roundups or just based on your own experience making the content you create.

Ashley Rutstein: The very [00:10:00] first thing I would say is make sure every single approver is on the platform because there are so many people, so many leaders who have never touched TikTok or YouTube or you know, whatever platform it is. And here they are saying, yes, you can do this idea, or no, you can't do this idea. And they don't understand what goes on in this place, and I, I just find that crazy because without a deep understanding of that platform, you're either gonna miss opportunities or you're gonna create stuff that just does not fit there. And people will tell you when your content is not a good fit for the platform. So anytime I've worked with a brand on their social, I highly encourage every single person on that team needs to have TikTok on their phone and swipe through it every once in a while. You don't have to be on it all the time, but just take a gander. You'd be surprised, like how many people on a team working just on TikTok have never [00:11:00] opened TikTok?

Chris Kocek: mm-hmm. Okay. So that's one piece of advice. 

Ashley Rutstein: Another one would be to have a core creator for the content.

Having that familiar face is. Very, very helpful, especially on a platform like TikTok, where people are just scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. They're not necessarily looking at the name of the profile that the video is coming from. They're just looking at the content itself. So if you have a familiar face that shows up in all of your videos, as they're scrolling, they see you and they're like, oh, I know what that's from. I wanna watch that. If you have this rotating cast of people and you never really see the same one over and over again, no one knows what to look for in their feed. So I've found that brands that have those, you know, even two or three main characters, so to speak, do so much better.

Like, even the Duolingo owl is a good example of that. You know, he's not a real face, but when you're scrolling and you see that big green owl [00:12:00] in there, you stop. You know what you're about to get. And then I think another one is not to rely too much on trends. Trends are are easy. I used to work on social stuff, so I know how important trends are for creating content and making sure you have an entire calendar's worth of content.

But trends are very fleeting. Every brand is doing it. So if you can create your own repeatable format or series that people can look forward to, that will do you so much better in the long run. It'll last longer. People will care. A year from now where a trend video is old in about a week. I feel like you can do any format or series or video in any style, and you will find an audience online.

There is an audience for every single niche known to man. Like you could have the worst looking video quality and still go viral. It really doesn't matter. It's just what you're talking [00:13:00] about that people care about. So there's, there's an audience for everything is what I like to tell people. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. I mean, I remember years ago finding that there was something called Goat Meat Magazine.

What is that? And it's just for people who are really into goat meat and goat related products. And that was when I was like, I had that same thought. I was like, there is an audience for everything. Mm-hmm. You know, I would stand on the subway platform in New York and I would see. I think it was High Times Magazine being sold in those little vendor shops, uh, by the subway.

But at some point, I don't remember, maybe it was in one of the subway stations I saw Goat Meat Magazine, but I, I, I don't know, I just remember hearing about it somewhere. 

Ashley Rutstein: That's wild. 

Chris Kocek: You have many different segments that you create for stuff about advertising. You do a lot more than the weekly roundups, and you have a lot of different, wonderful segments.

What are some of your other favorite things to talk about? 

Ashley Rutstein: I really like talking about concepting and giving people different techniques to use [00:14:00] and sharing examples of how those techniques have been used in in previous campaigns, because I think concepting can feel intimidating, especially for newbies who haven't done it very much.

It seems like this kind of magical process where ideas just pop onto the page, and so I like demystifying that a little bit and saying, here's a technique you can use. Here's a question you can ask yourself to go find some cool concepts. 

Chris Kocek: Well, what's one of your favorite techniques? 

Ashley Rutstein: Um, I think my favorite is you would ask yourself, who wouldn't like this product?

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. 

Ashley Rutstein: Like there's an old Burger King campaign with a guy that has really small hands, so he doesn't like. The big whopper 'cause it makes his hands look even smaller. Stuff like that. Mm-hmm. I, I love. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. I mean, one of my favorite segments of yours is, is the unhinged concepts. So that's where you're just like rattling off so many different ideas.

You've done this for Crocs and for Poppi, just for the fun of it. And judging by the comments, it looks like other [00:15:00] people love these unhinged concepts as well, because there are several people who chime in saying. You know, some of these ideas are really good. Do you ever get the attention of the brands that you're talking about?

Do they ever chime in and say Thanks for the ideas? 

Ashley Rutstein: I can't remember if it was Crocs or Poppy. One of them commented on the video, but it didn't go any further than that. When I first started doing those videos, I was like, oh, this would be a great way to do some sponsored videos. A brand can just say, Hey, we'll pay you and you do these unhinged concepts for our product.

That would be so much fun to just come up with random ideas for all these brands. It never went anywhere, but maybe it could in the future. We'll see. 

Chris Kocek: I think it's a great idea. I don't see why it couldn't go somewhere. You're mentioning them kind of over and over, right? But you're doing it in a funny and entertaining way.

I think there's something here, Ashley. I think we need to flesh this out a little bit more. Not not flush it out, but flesh it out. 

Ashley Rutstein: Flesh. Exactly.[00:16:00] 

Chris Kocek: And now some delightfully unhinged concepts for Crocs with Ashley Rutstein. 

Ashley Rutstein: Croc socks, they have holes in them. We partner with Olive Garden, and when you buy the shoes, you get an unlimited amount of Breadstick Gibbs. Oh, and also it smells like Alfredo. And then at the restaurant they use a croc as a cheese grater, A narrow shoe for Slim Jim Levi's Denim, Crocs, crock Martins.

H and R Croc choose to do your taxes in Duolingo Crocs, where the Gibbs are just UA Lippa space, you take over Google Docs as Google Crocs, and instead of a bunch of anonymous creatures at the top, it's anonymous shoes, Abercrombie and Fitch Crocs, where there's cologne injected into the soul. So every… 

Chris Kocek: Is there any pre-work that you do before doing one of these unhinged concept videos? Or do you just pick a brand and say, I'm going for a minute, a minute and a half. 

Ashley Rutstein: It's all scripted. All of my videos are scripted. I have gotten good at scripting things in the way that I just naturally talk though, and a lot of times, like for these [00:17:00] unhinged concepting, it is really just stream of consciousness.

But I wrote it down as it was happening, and then I just read through that when I'm making the video. A lot of times my husband helps me because he's also an advertising, so we have fun just kicking around stupid ideas together. Sometimes when I'm filming a video. Another thing will pop in my head and I'll add that to the list.

But I do sit down beforehand and, and come up with these. But I don't put any boundaries on what I'm coming up with. You know, typically in a real world setting, there are many boundaries and guidelines that we have to adhere to for these unhinged concepts. I just let myself go, come up with the stupidest stuff.

Sometimes a good one might be thrown in, but it's mostly pretty dumb. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. Two people in one household who work in advertising. I would imagine that on your best days it's wonderful - full of laughter and creativity and on days when things are not going well, it must be a hard place to be. 

Ashley Rutstein: [Laughter] Yeah, we can, uh, we [00:18:00] can definitely stew in some negativity for sure, but like when you're venting about work to someone and they know exactly what you're talking about. It just, it's very helpful. Uh, and we do help each other all the time. We're both creatives, so we're constantly concepting with each other. After dinner, I'll be like, Hey, can you help me concept some ideas? And I'll be like, only if you help me with my thing after that. [Laughter] So yeah, it is, it is help helpful.

But we can get. Pretty deep into discussions that people outside of our world would not care about at all. 

Chris Kocek: Now, do you look at your own data and try to find more of what gets the most engagement or do you mostly ignore the data and just pursue whatever interests you in the moment? And be honest, Ashley. 

Ashley Rutstein: I look at it. [Laughter] I don't usually do anything with it. I have a million ideas. I can't keep up with all of the ideas I have, and so I tend to just do whatever is interesting to me that day. If I have time to make a [00:19:00] video, whatever I wanna talk about that day is what I talk about, regardless of what's gonna perform well, what's gonna go viral.

Sometimes even what my audience is asking me for, like, I know you guys want this, but I really just wanna talk about this other thing right now. So that's what I'm gonna do. So, you know, I'm aware of what works and what doesn't. For the most part, algorithms are kind of hard to pin down sometimes, but I tend to just go with the flow.

Chris Kocek: That's interesting because you know, some of your content I've seen obviously has a whole bunch of views, and of course there's always gonna be some that doesn't, and there's the dopamine rush when you get all the likes and, and the comments and you're like, yay, people love this. They love me. What is the opposite of that?

Is there a phrase? There's the dopamine rush, is there the dopamine, what let down dopamine absence, and how do you get over that? 

Ashley Rutstein: Like a crash? Maybe a big wamp wamp. Yeah, it's, it's hard not to let the numbers get to you. [00:20:00] Especially lately, TikTok has had awful reach for my videos lately and it's been really hard 'cause I put a lot of effort and time into the stuff I talk about a lot of research and then for it to get a thousand views when I have over a hundred thousand followers is, is really painful. But I think I've just experienced it so much that I just know I have to keep pushing and just keep making content and eventually something will stick, but it's usually not the stuff that I think will do really well.

It's like some random thing, like actually, literally just yesterday I posted a video about Elmo posting on LinkedIn because he got laid off from PBS 'cause of the, the budget cuts. When I saw that on LinkedIn, I really wanted to talk about it, but I also knew that Elmo goes beyond the advertising audience, people who don't care at all about marketing care about Elmo.

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. 

Ashley Rutstein: So I had a feeling [00:21:00] that talking about that would perform pretty well. And it did. It was the first video in a couple weeks that's really kicked off. So like, I had a hunch, but it was also something I really wanted to talk about. So it was, it was a perfect, a perfect fit. 

Chris Kocek: So what's an example of a video that you were like, I didn't expect this to blow up like this. I was just talking about X, Y, Z. 

Ashley Rutstein: I think the videos I've done about movie marketing now I know that they do really well, but when I first started doing them, I wasn't expecting it at all. I think the first one I did was about the Blair Witch Project because I. I'm just fascinated by that marketing campaign and how they made it seem like it was so real for so long and I just wanted to talk about it.

I wanted to tell people about how marketing can do something, you know, bigger and something with movies. I think a lot of people who have no knowledge about marketing or advertising don't realize that the promotions they see for movies like that's advertising. It just, it doesn't really register to [00:22:00] them.

So I just wanted to teach people about that and it blew up. So I kept doing more movie marketing stuff, and I think one of my top videos ever is one about the Barbie movie and all the different partnerships that they've done for that movie. So anything with movies, because it, it goes beyond our world in advertising will just do so much better.

It just has a bigger, bigger audience. 

Chris Kocek: Well, it taps into that vein of pop culture. If you haven't seen Sinners yet, may I recommend it. 

Ashley Rutstein: I really want to see it. That is on my list. 

Chris Kocek: It's so good. You did some work for an Addiction recovery center called Face It Together. What was the problem you were asked to solve in the first place?

Ashley Rutstein: So Face It Together is an addiction recovery program and they were from Sioux Falls and they were opening a location in Colorado where the agency was that I was working for, and they wanted to promote it, let people know that they were coming to Colorado, but mostly explain why would someone pick this program over the other [00:23:00] addiction support programs out there. And it was also targeting both the person with addiction and their loved ones because their coaching program can help both of them. So we needed to just get the word out, tell people why they should pick them over other programs. 

Chris Kocek: And what was the insight or the aha moment in the brief that you got that helped you get to a great place creatively?

Ashley Rutstein: The piece of Face it Together that is very unique - they don't require sobriety of their members because they see that sobriety is often this metric that is the only metric that people place value in. But that is not the cause of addiction. If you really get to the root of the cause of addiction, it's probably trauma or an unstable family environment or community structure. Low self-esteem. There are so many other things. Cause addiction and sobriety should not be the one thing that you focus on because you need to treat those [00:24:00] other things. So what our strategists really honed in on was what happens if you do just focus on sobriety and if you're not treating the root cause of it, you're likely going to relapse because you're not fixing the problem, really. So they gave us the insight - the insight in the brief was a very simple sentence. It just said, sober doesn't mean better. Because there's just a lot of pressure put on to that word. If you're sober, you are successful, you did it.

But that's not really the case. And that sets up an individual for failure usually. So they were saying, you know, we really have to drive that home - that lasting wellness comes from treating these other causes of addiction and not just focusing on how many days you've been sober. 

Chris Kocek: Was there anything else in the brief or in the research that really jumped out at you or influenced the creative work or that was it, you saw that and you're like, okay, I know what we need to do.

Ashley Rutstein: I mean, that was a big piece of it [00:25:00] for sure, but the brief also sort of opened the door for a more emotional. Campaign. I think when we first heard about this company and heard about the idea that we were gonna be talking about addiction, a lot of us on the creative team just assumed we're gonna be doing those PSAs where someone is sober and frolicking through a field and super happy because they did it.

And with the nature of an insight like sober doesn't mean better. It's already cutting through that frolickng in the field sort of situation. Like you can't go there with an insight like that. It just opened the door for us to get raw and emotional and do some really impactful work, and I think that's ultimately where we got, just showing that if you do just focus on sobriety, you're gonna be in this really rough, endless cycle of having to start over every time you touch whatever substance you're struggling with. It just kind of gave us permission to go there basically. [00:26:00] 

Chris Kocek: I love the spots. I mean, they are raw and they really hold your attention because like you said, most of the time when it comes to addiction recovery, there's a kind of a motif - there's a way to go about it, and that's a really strong way that you guys were able to go with it and kudos to the client, also.

You mentioned that the issue of relapse, and I feel like a lot of clients tend to relapse when it comes to creative projects. They come to you and they say, give us something different. Push us into the uncomfortable zone, and you'll even have a great meeting where everyone's feeling inspired and then you go away for a couple days and then they relapse to this place of less imaginative thinking. Has that ever happened for you? [Laughter]

Ashley Rutstein: Oh yeah, plenty of times they just get scared. I think any excitement of a presentation, I think they let loose a little bit. And you know, they're in this environment where everyone is cheering on the idea and we're all in it together. It feels great. And then they go [00:27:00] back to their desk and then they're alone and they get a little scared.

So I totally understand why that happens. It's, it's up to the agency to keep holding their hand and telling them, you know, it's gonna be okay. We can do this. 

Chris Kocek: When that's happened for you, how have you gotten them back to be like, come on, remember just yesterday you loved this, this was great. You love us, this is what we're gonna do, right? Come on, let's do this thing. How do you cheerlead them forward when that happens? 

Ashley Rutstein: It's a lot of just asking questions. Why do you feel this way now? What changed between, you know, our presentation day and today? Is someone on your team kind of pressuring you to do something in a, in a different way?

Are you getting leadership telling you something different? Like, let's unpack this and figure out what changed. If it's nothing, if it's just, like I said, they just were kind of alone and got a little scared, what do we need to do to help you feel more comfortable? And usually we can get them back to a place where we can do the idea that we all loved initially, but [00:28:00] there might be some, you know, compromises where you gotta make the logo bigger or whatever it is to make them feel more comfortable. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. And we don't have to name names, but have you ever gotten a boring brief before? 

Ashley Rutstein: Many times. [Laughter] I would say. 50% have been boring, 40% were good or decent, and only 10% were brilliant. So many a boring brief. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. And what are the characteristics of a boring brief? Like what makes a creative brief flat or unhelpful from a creative standpoint? 

Ashley Rutstein: Either having no insight or an obvious one that I wouldn't even really consider an insight, and I'm sure you wouldn't either. I think that's why I got good at coming up with insights and finding them on my own because I've gotten so many briefs that either didn't have it or had a really bad one.

You know, what can I do with millennials value experiences over things. 

Chris Kocek: We've heard that a million times, 

Ashley Rutstein: So many [00:29:00] briefs with that quote unquote insight in it, and she's just, what am I supposed to do with that? As a creative, I need something to push against. I need some tension. I need some problem to solve.

Like that's not a problem. You're just telling me something we already know. I wanna walk out of a brief feeling energized and excited and already coming up with ideas. And when it's a boring brief, I'm sitting there thinking this is gonna suck. I don't know where to even start with this. I feel annoyed.

There's no ideas happening. You can tell when there's a boring brief, the mood in the room is down. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. 

Ashley Rutstein: It's a tangible feeling in the room and everyone knows. 

Chris Kocek: So when you're in those situations, are there certain questions that you've developed to try to like breathe some life back into the brief or give it some kind of spark?

Ashley Rutstein: I ask a lot of questions and I think that kind of hurt me early on in my career because I got a lot of bad briefs and I asked a lot of questions [00:30:00] to figure out what I could do with those briefs. And I, I did it maybe in a not so subtle way, like in kickoff meetings I would really push and like. Why does this matter?

Why do we care? Like, what does the audience even wanna hear? You know, I would ask so many questions and I, I kind of got told early on in my career that I was being a little too defensive and aggressive in my, in my questioning, but it was coming from a place of, you know, I really wanna do good work and I, I just need, you gotta gimme something to work with.

So I was really asking for that context, like, gimme something. So I ask a lot of questions of the strategist or whoever's briefing me, but if they don't have those answers. I have a lot of my own sort of techniques and things that I go do to try to find an insight on my own. This might sound weird coming in from a creative, but I really like to read long decks of focus groups research.

Any data from the company. I want all of that. So if a strategist is like, Hey, I have this here. Here's the one slide [00:31:00] takeaways. I'm like, no, gimme that 100 page deck. I wanna hear all of that stuff. I wanna read all the quotes from the focus group. I want all of that information because I can usually pull out a ton of super interesting creative fodder.

And then I do a lot of research online, like on Reddit. I watch social videos about the product or the, the category or the audience. I just really like to see and hear what people are actually talking about. 

Chris Kocek: Oh, yeah. I love verbatims. I'm a verbatim hunter. 

Ashley Rutstein: Mm-hmm. 

Chris Kocek: Because it's the color inside the verbatims or the nuance inside the turn of phrase that is like, I've never heard it said that way before.

Right? And the thing about a summary, you know, the executive summary or boiling everything down into a really short brief is it flattens everything out. You don't get the rich texture of the conversation or the context. You end up with millennials value experiences over things. And that [00:32:00] doesn't give you much of a springboard.

You've also done some work for Kiwis The Fruit. Mm-hmm. Which is interesting because most fruit isn't associated with a particular brand. I mean, outside of Chiquita bananas or Sunmade raisins. I can't think of too many fruits or vegetables that are associated with a particular brand. 

Ashley Rutstein: The only one that comes to mind is cuties for mandarin oranges.

But yeah, most of them are. Just kind of nameless. 

Chris Kocek: Yes. I mean, I've recently fallen in love with envy apples, like they're so sweet and crisp. They're just wonderful. But you had this opportunity to help zespri Kiwis get some attention in the us. So first of all, what was the challenge they were facing, and then what was the aha moment that gave you a good creative springboard for the campaign?

You don't need to call it an insight if it wasn't an insight. You can call it a glimmer of excitement, whatever you wanna call it. 

Ashley Rutstein: Yeah. It's funny you say that. I do feel like my, um, definition of an insight has been softening recently. [00:33:00] Whether I would have called it an insight before or not. If it's something that gets me excited and gets ideas firing, I'm good to go.

Zespri, they are a New Zealand company and they were bringing their yellow variety of kiwi to the us. It's called a sun gold. The problem is green kiwi is already a pretty exotic fruit that most people don't think about or buy very often. I, I don't know what the number is now, but at the time of the campaign, Kiwi was the number 20 fruit in the US.

Chris Kocek: Mm. 

Ashley Rutstein: I can't even name 19 other fruits. So it's wild that Kiwi was 20. So, you know, we're already up against some pretty tough competition in the fruit category. Let alone having this new kiwi that's yellow. It has a different flavor than green kiwi. It's sweeter. It has a more tropical flavor. The skin is different.

It's like a totally different fruit, but it happens to have the same name. So we had to [00:34:00] figure out how to get people to try this Kiwi. The good thing is once people tried it, they loved it. It is delicious. Highly recommend having one of those if you haven't, but our goal was just to get people to taste this fruit.

Our metric was kiwis in mouths for a lot of our, our tactics, but the - I guess I'll call it an insight that we worked against was that people are in a fruit rut, and when they're shopping in the produce section, they are just on autopilot because they just keep buying the same thing. And in this world it's called the ABCs, the Apples, bananas and citrus fruits.

They're on autopilot. They get those things and then they leave and keep doing their shopping. They don't do any exploration. Produce section. So we had to encourage people to break out of that fruit rut and do some exploration and try something new, which is why we likened the experience of trying this kiwi to this kind of whimsical, unknown, magical world [00:35:00] that's hidden in their supermarket in the produce section, it's this yellow kiwi world with all kinds of cute creatures and beautiful landscapes and stuff, and it just kind of. Was there to intrigue people about this new fruit. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. Getting people out of their rut into the exotic world of kiwi. Which is not that exotic, I dunno, jackfruit. I've never bought a jackfruit before. That looks like a weapon. 

Ashley Rutstein: I think it's just you have your grocery list and try a new fruit isn't on there ever. You kind of have to work at it to go get something new in the produce section. So… 

Chris Kocek: That's a great example. You recently did a workshop for New Belgium Brewing, and one of the things you guys talked about was tattoo worthy content.

So what is. Tattoo worthy content in your opinion, or that came out of that, that workshop 

Ashley Rutstein: We got there because we were trying to figure out. What's our [00:36:00] list of sort of aspirational work that we wanna make a list to look at when an idea might scare you or seem a little over budget if you can look at this list and say, Hey, this is the kind of work we all aspire to do - it's worth pursuing. And so I worked with them to create this list that they could all take and use every day. And tattoo-worthy was, was a really popular one. They all were really excited about putting that on their list, and I think it's just creating something that resonates with people so well and connects with them so well that they just want to keep it with them forever. They never want to forget it. The work is just so personal to them that they feel like they have to own it. Forever. 

Chris Kocek: Now, I think I've seen one or two tattoos on your arms. 

Ashley Rutstein: Mm-hmm. 

Chris Kocek: In your videos when you wave excitedly about something, is there one in particular that has a special story behind it? 

Ashley Rutstein: My first tattoo, it's kind of hard to see right here, but this is my very first one [00:37:00] and it says allonzy.

It's French for let's go. And it's also a catchphrase from my favorite doctor, from Dr. Who. So that's why I got that one. I'm a words person, so it makes sense that my first tattoo was just a word. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. Allonsy. And since we're talking about tattoos and tattoo worthy content, if you were to get a branded tattoo, what would it be and why?

Would it be a quote? Would it be a particular image? Would it be their logo? What branded tattoo would you get if you were gonna get one? 

Ashley Rutstein: I don't know if there's any brand that I'm obsessed with enough to get their just straight up logo on my body. But there's a commercial that I quote constantly and my husband and I laugh about it all the time, and it's a Discover card commercial.

This sounds so dumb, where it's the Frog Protection Fraud Protection commercial where a guy thinks he's calling to get protection for his literal frog, [00:38:00] FROG, and the guy on the discover side is like, yeah, we have fraud protection. F-R-A-U-D, and they're just going back and forth saying, frog protection, fraud protection, frog protection, fraud protection.

And I love it. And it makes me laugh every single time I watch that commercial. So I feel like I, I would get a frog with a hard hat or something tattooed because I just have so much love for that commercial. 

Chris Kocek: That makes sense. I mean, misunderstandings and misinterpretations are great fodder for marketing. It's something I talk about when I give workshops about comic insights, that one of the things you'll see a lot of comedians do is that they'll take situations that are full of confusion, where the comedian says, I don't know what's going on. Like Nate Bargatze talks about this right when he is ordering a iced coffee with cream and the baristas like.

Coffee with cream. And he is like coffee with cream. She puts whipped cream on top of it and he is like, this is what you thought I meant. 

Nate Bargatze (Comedy Clip): So I go into a Starbucks and I get in the [00:39:00] front and I was like, uh, I'll take an iced coffee with cream. She goes with cream. I go with cream. And then she goes, iced coffee with cream.

I go Iced coffee with cream. She goes with cream. I go with cream. And she said it one more time. She said, so iced coffee with cream. And at that point I should have said, what's going on right now?

Where are you at in your head? Because I, I feel like we're in two different places, but I was nervous and there was people behind me and I was like, cream or no cream? Honestly, I'll give you $20 if you let me leave right now, I cannot, this is the most I can talk about this. I don't even know what's happening anymore.

Chris Kocek: And so taking those opportunities, you know, that confusion can be a really good starting place for a funny concept or for an intriguing concept because our brains also want to sleuth the situation. We want to like figure out what is going on here. Alright, we're at the speed round and you're a word nerd.

So we're gonna start with this one. [00:40:00] What is your favorite word in English or any other language? 

Ashley Rutstein: I think my favorite would be “apparently.” I actually used to have a YouTube channel in college that was called apparently Ashley and. I just find myself saying that word all the time because I'm always telling someone a story like, apparently this happened, or Apparently this is actually a thing.

So I just love telling people stories like that. 

Chris Kocek: That's interesting. 'cause there's also, there's like a skeptic in that word, right? Apparently, this happened. I'm I, that's true. Can't confirm or deny, but apparently I use seams a lot. I say, it seems like this is happening. Because I don't want to come in and be like, yep, I've got the lock on the truth here.

This is what's going on. No, it just, it seems like this is what's happening. That's very interesting. Apparently. What was your favorite subject in school?

Ashley Rutstein: Band. I was a band nerd 

Chris Kocek: Instrument. What instrument did you play? 

Ashley Rutstein: Clarinet. I was [00:41:00] first chair quite a bit. Not to brag, but 

Chris Kocek: I am sorry to say, I don't even know what that means. What does first chair mean? 

Ashley Rutstein: So there, there might be like 10 to 12 clarinets in a band, and you try out to see which order you're in because not all 10 clarinets play the same part. There's like first clarinet, second clarinet, third clarinet. You're all playing different parts of the music. The first clarinet usually gets the hardest and the best piece of music to play.

If there's a solo, it's first chair that gets to play it. So you have to constantly play something for your band director to determine your order. You can also challenge people's, like the second chair can challenge the first to take their chair. It's very competitive. 

Chris Kocek: It's so cutthroat. 

Ashley Rutstein: It is 

Chris Kocek: Cutthroat clarinets. It could be a new series. Um, if you had to describe what you do to a five-year-old, how would you describe it? 

Ashley Rutstein: I make the things that interrupt your episodes of Bluey. 

Chris Kocek: [00:42:00] What's the most recent good book you've read or a movie or TV show that you've watched? 

Ashley Rutstein: Book would be the fourth wing series. It's like a dragon sort of series, which is so good. And then my most recent favorite show has been Hacks with Jean Smart. It's fantastic. She plays like a, an aging comedian who has a new young writer working with her. It's hilarious. And also emotional sometimes and dramatic. It's, it's great. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. I have been seeing that. It's in, its what, what season is that in second season, third season. I think it just 

Ashley Rutstein: started. It's. Third? Yeah. 

Chris Kocek: Mm-hmm. Very good. And what is it about the, the book series, the Fourth Wing, what is it about that that, that you love so much? 

Ashley Rutstein: It's just a page turner. Uh, I read a lot of books and sometimes it's a slog to get through a book, but that one. I, all I wanna do is read it. Like when I'm working, I'm just thinking, oh, I wanna go read that book. It's a school like a college where students learn how to ride [00:43:00] dragons. It's this world that is rife with war and different factions and it's a very cutthroat program where they're learning how to ride dragons.

Like they could die at any minute, even in just a regular old class. And it's just, there's some romance, there's fighting, there's fantasy stuff. It's got, it's got all the best, best pieces of a book I like pretty much all of that stuff. Sci-fi fantasy, uh, is like my go-to. I'll read any and all books related to that stuff. I also really love Brandon Sanderson books, which he's like a very big fantasy author. So, 

Chris Kocek: uh, Brandon, I hope you're, is it Brandon? No. What was it? Brandon? 

Ashley Rutstein: Brandon Sanderson. Yeah. 

Chris Kocek: Brandon, I hope you're listening. There's a shout out for you here. Um, what's one of the most interesting jobs you had before you got into the work you do now that has helped you do your job better?

Ashley Rutstein: I was a server in high school, lived and worked in a very, very small town in Arkansas. It was the only [00:44:00] steakhouse in town. A lot of people came to this restaurant every day, so it was very popular, very stressful, and I was very young and I was also very shy. So that job really helped me learn to talk to people.

I think it also, you know, there's a lot of rude customers. Especially in Arkansas, and it helped me speak to someone who is maybe not. Being super nice in a way that is still kind of killing 'em with kindness, and I'm getting them what they need. We're gonna get through this meal, everyone's gonna be happy.

So that kind of trained me to talk to clients who are maybe not so nice. 

Chris Kocek: Well, you don't seem nervous at all in any of your videos. Now I realize you're talking to a camera. Were you nervous at first when you started doing the TikTok videos or content like that? 

Ashley Rutstein: No, not so much because I, like I mentioned earlier, I had a YouTube channel in college and that kind of trained me to talk to a [00:45:00] camera.

I never feel nervous, but what I will say is when I'm filming my videos, my husband cannot be anywhere near me. I make him leave the room, go to another room, close the door, and ideally put on noise canceling headphones because I cannot film in front of someone. I don't know why. I just really, really struggle with that.

Chris Kocek: Is there a brand whose work you really admire or that you think to yourself? I wish I'd come up with that. 

Ashley Rutstein: I've really been liking Surreal Cereal on LinkedIn. They're a a UK serial brand and I just like them because you know what CPG brand is doing stuff on LinkedIn. They're marketing to LinkedIn people.

It's not just talking about their business, it's they're doing silly social content for LinkedIn. And I just love that it's so creative. They're very silly. 

Chris Kocek: What an interesting angle. I'll have to look up one of their ads. And finally, what's a piece of advice that you got early on in your life or in your career [00:46:00] that you still remember to this day or that you think of often?

Ashley Rutstein: It would be to always have some sort of creative outlet, whether that's at work or in your own personal life, just because work isn't always super exciting. You might be working on some boring briefs at the time, and if you don't have somewhere to throw that creativity, your creative muscles can atrophy.

Like if you're not using them constantly, it can really be a detriment to your brain. So making sure you're constantly exercising those muscles however you can is super important. 

Chris Kocek: So what's a creative outlet for you outside of all of this stuff that you do for advertising? Is it cooking? Is it basket weaving? What? What is it for you? 

Ashley Rutstein: I really like crafting stuff. I've always been a, a knitter, crochet, or cross-stitcher. I love doing stuff like that. I actually have some of my embroidery hoops on my wall behind me that I made in the past, and I also really like rock climbing, which, you [00:47:00] know, it's physical, but it also is kind of creative because you have to get creative with how you're solving the problem of the route and figuring out where to go and how to place your feet. You do have to get creative with that. 

Chris Kocek: Absolutely. Uh, I did some work for a brand that, you know, got me into the rock climbing community and, you know, we started calling it like a strategy and strength sport because you have to approach the wall from a very strategic path-finding way, but it also requires an.

Unbelievable amount of strength. Like, I mean, there's technique, but like, you know, the, just the little finger grippers that you've gotta be able to, or balance yourself on a toe to move somewhere. It's, it's unbelievable. It's, it's unbelievable. 

Ashley Rutstein: It's hard, but it's a lot of fun. 

Chris Kocek: It's a great workout and you'll feel it the next day and many days thereafter.

Ashley Rutstein: Yes. I, I still, I was rock climbing when I was pregnant, and that was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done. Try to get up the wall with a big belly. [Laughter]

Chris Kocek: Is there a special course for [00:48:00] that? Or you can just take like, I, I don't mean course like instruction course. I mean, like, you know, there's different courses on the wall, right? Mm-hmm. Is there, is there a pregnancy color-coded course? 

Ashley Rutstein: No. No. You just do the regular things. You do have to wear a different harness.

Because a regular harness kind of goes around your hips and obviously you don't really have those hips anymore. You just have a big pregnant belly. So you have to wear a full body harness, which feels very awkward, but you have to climb up. And the hardest thing for me was 'cause you look down to see where to put your feet and stuff, but I couldn't see my feet anymore because of my belly.

So that made it pretty difficult. And then at one point I had to stop around. I think I was like 35 weeks pregnant. I had to stop because my feet. Got so big from the swelling that I couldn't fit them into my climbing shoes anymore. So that's why I had to stop. [Laughter]

Chris Kocek: Was there an insight in there anywhere? Did you, did you reflect on the process of pregnant rock climbing and, and write something in your journal somewhere?

Ashley Rutstein: I did notice that in the climbing gym, [00:49:00] people don't really look at other people. But when you're a pregnant woman with a big old belly on the wall, everyone is looking at you. 

Chris Kocek: I do not mean this in the bad way at all, but you know, purple Cow from Seth Godin? 

Ashley Rutstein: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. 

Chris Kocek: Like. If you see a purple cow by the side of the road, I am in no way calling you a purple cow.

Ashley Rutstein: No, no. I totally understand. 

Chris Kocek: Okay. But that's, that's what it's like. Yeah. 

Ashley Rutstein: It's just, you seem out of place and it's like, oh, I didn't know you could climb when you were pregnant. You know, you, you start to get those kinds of questions and Yeah, it's interesting. 

Chris Kocek: It never crossed my mind that that's something you could do.

Ashley Rutstein: It didn't for me either until I got pregnant. I was like, wait, am I gonna have to stop climbing? And then did some research and said, Nope. As long as you got the right harness, you're good to go. 

Chris Kocek: I just learned something very important that I'm gonna let a lot, a lot of people know that they can still do this.

Well, Ashley, thank you so much for your time. Keep climbing. Cheesy pun, you're doing great work. I really love watching your advertising roundups and all the content that you make. So thanks for taking the time to be on the show and, and keep doing what you're doing. 

Ashley Rutstein: Thanks for having me. This was [00:50:00] great.

Chris Kocek: Thanks again to our guest, Ashley Rutstein. If you want to connect with Ashley, you can find her on LinkedIn, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, or stuffaboutadvertising.com. If you enjoyed today's episode or any of our past episodes, I'd love it if you could leave a five star review on your favorite podcast platform. It really helps more people discover the show. 

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Every Thursday, I share three aha moments that are guaranteed to help your next project, creative briefing or campaign. 

As always, special thanks to Megan Palmer for editing, sound mixing, and production support. 

Until next time, keep looking for patterns, finding contradictions, and asking [00:51:00] “what if” more often.