We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Kerry Stranman a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Kerry , appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
I’m extremely proud of repositioning U by Kotex as a challenger brand on a mission to “bring truth and transparency to all things vagina”. It was a strategy that saved a brand while removing the stigma and shame of periods. It was the first of many dream projects that demonstrated the lasting commercial potential of positive purpose. Yes, imagine that. Bringing truth and transparency to all things vagina was an unmitigated commercial success, saving a brand whose users were aging out of the category due to menopause.
What’s the positive impact, you ask? We did extensive research with girls and young women in their homes, dorm rooms, over a series of salon dinners as well as online cultural anthropology. What we found was that speaking of the V was verboten. vaginas and periods were among the last cultural taboos. Millennial women were talking about hooking up, but not about what was going on “down there”, even though 1 in 4 had an STI. Our creative team made a hysterical super cut video of all the euphemisms for the vagina that would have made an OBGYN blush, and it made an impact on our clients at Kimberly-Clark.
Our historical advertising analysis brought to life how the coded language and conventions of the category (feminine hygiene, blue goo) created a dangerous stigma that was inconsistent with the frank talk that young women embraced about every other topic. Everyone rallied behind this mission of doing our part to shift this category out of the dark ages of euphemism. They created a new product with packaging that was more Sephora, less hospital. No more need to do the old hiding the tampon up the sleeve trick on the way to the bathroom! The launch ad for the new brand was called “Apology ” and it mocked stereotypical images from Kotex’s own advertising history – the blue goo, the women in white pants dancing – as well as a strange era when Kotex represented periods with red rhythmic gymnastics balls. The dancers would wield the ball so that it looked like a period. In a sentence. But it was red. It was bad.
Every brand strategist dreams of the opportunity to sink their teeth into a total overhaul or launch positioning, but this project was especially important to me as it fulfilled my intention to shift my energies. Seven years into my advertising career, I had a crisis of conscience while working at the advertising agency that did the Army recruitment campaign during the run-up to the Iraq War. My own father was drafted in the Vietnam war and thus, I understood the horrific impact of war even as a young girl. At that moment in our American history, I felt a deep calling to use what I had learned about persuasion – moving hearts and minds, shaping habits and behaviors, selling ideas – for positive impact.
From the U by Kotex project forward, I picked off projects and jobs based on personal values alignment, taking me to work in a premiere progressive political firm in DC called GMMB who had done the Obama campaign, and eventually to an agency in Santa Monica called Enso Collaborative that solely focused on aligning business and social impact where I worked on more dream projects supporting women and girls for the Barbie brand and the Equal Rights Amendment.
Kerry , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I’m an independent Brand Strategist, researcher and facilitator with a deep agency background. For almost 3 decades, I’ve identified the truths that move people for some of the world’s leading brands like Barbie, Google, Uber, Sundance Institute and nonprofits like Khan Academy, The Gates Foundation and The Nature Conservancy. Our business can be pretty shallow so you gotta list your brand creds up front. Getting that out of the way, I’m also a Comedian on a mission to lighten hearts. I’m debuting a new solo storytelling show in June at the Hollywood Fringe Festival: “Now What? Cosmic Fairy Tales of Midlife in Los Angeles”. It’s a storybook comedy about following your dreams. Literally. I’ll be sharing stories of some unconventional life choices made on the soul line versus the goal line of life. (I have a very Californian Masters Degree in something called Spiritual Psychology so like a great brand, you could say I’m following my WHY. )
Brand strategy and my comedy endeavors are united by my core expertise in human and cultural insights. I’m a research nerd and a student of human nature at heart. I love studying and interviewing people and I’m honored to do it. From consumers to company stakeholders and thought leaders, I have over 10,000 hours conducting qualitative research and over 10,000 hours facilitating team collaboration – all feeding 28 years of developing potent brand and communications strategies. Brands are awash in data, but they are often missing basic human understanding. That’s why the one-on-one interview and the group discussion will never be made redundant by AI technology. I was recently conducting interviews about gastroenterology conditions for a Health Tech brand, a topic that is personal and uncomfortable to say the least. Everybody poops. But not everyone talks about their popping problems. A woman I was interviewing kept stopping to say, “I like your vibe. I do a lot of these and you are different” and she went on to share some things she hadn’t even shared with her family. Honoring and respecting your research “subject” is paramount to facilitate authentic sharing and my years of developing that muscle is recognized, especially when one is talking about a typically taboo topic. I just enjoy hearing people’s stories and learning about humanity, even pooping!
When you work with me, you work with a veteran strategist who solves brand problems and has fun doing it. Over my 28 years in the advertising and marketing biz, I’ve seen mental models and brand theories come and go. Frankly, I find the urge for endless theorizing and mystification of basic brand principles in the name of thought leadership tedious. I focus on solving the brand problem vs selling clients on a secret sauce. I help brands find positioning clarity and the most potent cultural entry points to move people.
Beside repositioning U by Kotex under the mission of “bringing truth and transparency to all things vagina, another meaningful project was working with the Barbie brand to identify and develop their social mission, “The Dream Gap Project” under the insight “representation sparks imagination.” Our global expert research revealed that between ages 5-8, girls begin to receive an unconscious memo that boys are the brilliant ones and the leaders. This is the Dream Gap. At this exact age range when this limiting social conditioning happens, Barbie can inspire girls to imagine their limitless potential by showing a wide variety of Barbies as capable in a wide variety of roles and interests. It was a Dream project in every sense of the word!
I was lucky to receive extensive training back in the 90s at agencies like Euro RSCG (now Havas), J Walter Thompson and Leo Burnett (remember the 20th century?) so I’m like an Indiana basketball coach. I focus on excellence in the fundamentals –solid research, laser sharp positioning, crafting compelling creative briefs and campaign plans, and collaborating with creative teams. I abide by the “don’t be an asshole” rule and seek to be joyfully professional. This work is fun. We’re lucky to do it.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
For me, the best thing about working in a creative industry is the fun of collaborating with talented teams of interesting folks. These are my people! I’d like to say that the most rewarding part of being a creative professional is making an impact on culture, but the calculus of those impacts can be complicated. I’ve had quite a few rewarding projects that I think made a positive impact or just came out cool, but many many more that just don’t go anywhere for a variety of reasons. You need a lot of at bats to hit those home runs. What is undeniable is your everyday experience and I can’t imagine a more fun, imaginative, intuitive tribe of people to work with than “creatives.” These can feel like the dark days of doom scrolling. For me, surrounding myself with creative people with the imagination to see possibilities is crucial.
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
Um, now? The worst part of working in agency business can be the endless intensity. I definitely hit an intensity wall in my late perimenopause era and “aged out” of the ad agency game. I went bonk, but I did what former ad agency people do. I became a consultant. As a midlifer, even though you have the experience, you can feel like the old lady at the proverbial marketing club. It’s pretty clear that you have to stay relevant and keep reinventing yourself. You might as well make it fun.
In 2019, I hurled myself into the world of comedy on a wing and prayer, landing on major stages like The Comedy Store. I’m pretty sure the bookers thought I had more experience than I did, but I simply did not correct them. Being an experienced ad woman, you could also say I have my 10,000 hours in standing up and delivering some bullshit. So I just took the stage with all the swagger of Don Draper, which if you’ve seen John Hamm’s pants, is substantial. I lost all my momentum when the clubs closed for the pandemic – and the 1-2 punch of it along with the transition to menopause took me out of the comedy game for a while. But I stayed true to my comedy intention, which is to lighten hearts, starting with my own. Let me tell you, menopause has been hilarious so I started writing stories about it and my other midlife adventures. Nora Ephron said, “When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you. But when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it’s your laugh.” Please come and laugh with me at my storytelling show “Now What? Cosmic Fairy Tales of Midlife in Los Angeles” at the Hollywood Fringe Festival this June!
Because two hyphens is not enough in this multi hyphenate world, I’m also excited to share a new kind of professional development offering, Source Code. The goal is to strengthen your team’s professional EQ and soft skills to enhance creativity, engagement, and output. Too many (young) people in today’s workplace are lacking core soft skills, one of the only skills you can’t outsource to AI. This is the kind of training that I’ve received over the decades that too many are not getting, yet crave. Source Code workshops take your teams through a fun, shared experience with proven training to develop your team’s communication, collaboration and presentation skills.
Why call it Source Code? We believe that in the era of AI, Humanness is your most valuable resource.These powerful tools amplify the value of original creativity. We are the source code. AI copies us. It also elevates the importance of human judgment as we all navigate this new era.
I tell you this much, I don’t think AI could have ever possibly invented the semi-unbelievables tales I’ll be telling in my storybook comedy show. Thanks so much for the opportunity to share my story here.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.kerrystranman.com/
- Instagram: @kerryelise777
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kerry-stranman-597929/
- Other: https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/10535?tab=details