Ep 10: Why Marketing Needs to be Intersectional with Andy Thornton
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In this episode. Joyann discusses intersectionality in marketing with Andy Thornton. They cover a variety of topics including Hubspot automation, the difference between diversity and inclusion and inclusive recruitment.
Andy is a senior digital marketing executive at Noisy Little Monkey.
Shownotes
https://www.noisylittlemonkey.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYehD-VniBE&ab_channel=Co-op
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcSP1r9eCWw&ab_channel=StarbucksUK
You can find Andy here:
https://twitter.com/humansatsuma
https://www.instagram.com/humansatsuma/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-thornton/
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rebekahs-Secret-Grandpa-Andy-Thornton/dp/1521068895
Transcript
[00:00:00] Joyann Boyce: Welcome to the Marketing Made Inclusive Podcast. I am your host, Joyann Boyce. On this podcast, we're gonna discuss all things inclusive marketing, from persona creation, campaigns, and even some of the mishaps we see in the media. Tune in and let me know your thoughts on how we can make inclusive marketing the industry.
[00:00:23] Welcome and welcome back to the Marketing Made Inclusive Podcast. I've got an amazing guest on this episode, Andy, who I absolutely adore. I know Andy through the Bristol networking marketing scene, and Andy works for the really amazing company. , but Andy, why don't you tell us about yourselves and what you do in the marketing spear of the world.
[00:00:48] Andy Thornton: How exciting. Hi, Joyann, I'm so thrilled to be here. Um, you're one of my favourite people in the world, so, which is great. Uh, yeah, we met, um, through Noisy Little Monkey so I'm a, I think it's something like Senior Digital Marketing Executive. What else? Do you know what? Tell me about yourself, as a question, is terrifying, right? Because you're like, okay, do I talk about like, I don't know, I'm obsessed with the colour yellow and I,
[00:01:17] I really like marmite. Like or do I say I'm uh, Christian, I'm trans, I'm autistic, blah, blah, blah, blah. Nice little laundry sheet of identities or I don't know. I think, um, both because we're talking about market, I can tell you about, I'm, I work in marketing automation and I, I'm a real nerd about it. I think we have some good, good starting points.
[00:01:38] Joyann Boyce: I wanna give the opportunity before I talk about what I've Googled, the one thing you didn't mention, which I am so fascinated about, is that you did marketing around sex ed in games.
[00:01:52] Andy Thornton: Oh yeah. So I, I used to work for, honestly, one of the best charities you will ever find. Um, everyone who works there is exceptional.
[00:02:02] It's led by, um, the firms of colour now and one of, one of the other land leaders stuff, but School of Sexuality Education. They're amazing. School of Sexuality Education and they do sex and relationships education schools. And so I, I did marketing for them when I was, a wee squirt starting out. Um, and then also did some like facilitation in the, in schools.
[00:02:27] And I talked at a conference for them about, um, sex ed and video games and like how video games kind of form part of sexual education in a weird way and like whether we should be afraid of video games or like embrace the possibilities and all of that stuff. Yeah, they're amazing.
[00:02:47] Joyann Boyce: It's so fascinating cause I read it and I had to go back and I was just like, hold on, wait.
[00:02:53] Andy Thornton: What?
[00:02:53] Joyann Boyce: I know, I've, I've worked with video games clients and I'm like, everything I know about video games is where women are uber sexualized in the content.
[00:03:03] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:03:03] Joyann Boyce: I never thought, but it makes sense because that is where a lot of young people now are getting there like, oh, this is what a woman should look like.
[00:03:11] I'm like, no, no. The waist cannot be thinner than your leg. That's not how that works.
[00:03:15] Andy Thornton: That's not physically possible. And it's funny because, uh, one of the things I talked about was like a whole bunch of video game creators who are doing, like using the, the format of video games to create sex ed content that's really good.
[00:03:30] But also like, as you said, like it's a form of education. What are they seeing when they see, when they play video games? What are they learning about sex? What are they learning about their bodies? Will they learning about identities? Like all of that stuff is, you know, if it's, if it's such a consuming part of young people's kind of sphere of knowledge, then we need to be thinking about it
[00:03:50] Joyann Boyce: And we need to be aware that that's influencing.
[00:03:54] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:03:54] Joyann Boyce: So that brings onto to the question I ask all my guests. Inclusive marketing is kind of somewhat, relatively new in terms of the relation of the term in marketing. So it's still, I find, adapting its own solid meaning is not the case. Like when people say SEO every marketer's like, yes, we know what that means.
[00:04:13] Andy Thornton: Absolutely. ,
[00:04:14] Joyann Boyce: What does inclusive marketing mean to you?
[00:04:16] Andy Thornton: Hmm. Okay. I was thinking about this. I actually, and this is definitely not my own thought. I've read this in a tweet and I can't remember who tweeted it, so please forgive me. Whenever we talk about inclusion, the kind of semantics of that word is, there are people outside who we need to
[00:04:36] bring in. The, the thing about being inclusive is you're saying, ah, the white cis able-bodied majority is the centre and we need to bring more people into that space.
[00:04:49] Joyann Boyce: Mm.
[00:04:50] Andy Thornton: And so like, uh, and that's the best term that we've got right now. I think diversify is, is good as well, diverse marketing. But like when we talk about inclusion, what we are actually talking about is how do we take, what is a fundamentally, structurally not protected characteristic space and how do we, uh, shift it a little bit so that other people can come in, instead of how do we redo the space that centres
[00:05:23] marginalised people, that centres people who are oppressed. And then, you know, if some other, if some white people are there, then that's great. So I feel like, yeah, inclusive marketing is, is really good. It's really important and I think a lot of the time it's people doing their best.
[00:05:41] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:42] Andy Thornton: And I think there's kind of two things happening.
[00:05:44] There's like, the, the frontiers of thought. So for instance, like I've seen another, again, again, this is from a tweet. This is not mine and I can't remember who said it. So really sorry. Um, of calling, instead of calling people BIPOC calling them people of the global maturity. Obsessed with that. Love it. I'm not gonna expect Sainsbury's next ad campaign to use the terms people of the global majority.
[00:06:09] You know? And, and I'm not gonna hold to that standard. So there's two things. What's the ideal, what's the, the inclusive marketing that we are kind of like trying to work towards? How do we understand like the, the top level of academic thought in this? And then there's what can we reasonably expect from the people around us, from brands, from campaigns, and what level do we need to hold them to.
[00:06:33] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm. That was fascinating because for me, I've become allergic to the word diversity.
[00:06:42] Andy Thornton: Oh gosh, yeah.
[00:06:44] Joyann Boyce: And I've seen some agencies out there that are like, we are the diverse marketers. We will get you to diverse people. And I'm just like, what?
[00:06:53] Andy Thornton: Well, I'm not diverse as a person. I'm a, I'm a person, honey.
[00:06:58] Joyann Boyce: But, and then in the marketing sense as well. So it's interesting what you're saying cause I think the reason I lean on inclusive marketing cause it emphasized that there's exclusion.
[00:07:06] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:07:07] Joyann Boyce: And when I'm working with clients, every marketeer. Has the mentality that they understand their audience or they're learning their audience. They know all of their, they, they have some kind of confidence.
[00:07:18] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:07:19] Joyann Boyce: So when I go in and say, oh, but is it inclusive? They're like hold on, wait, what?
[00:07:22] Andy Thornton: Yeah, absolutely. And you're right because a panel of five, um, I don't know Black women, that's not a diverse panel. It's meant you might consider it an inclusive panel because it goes against what is, I don't know, the normal
[00:07:39] or kind of the, they're un marginalised, but it, that's not a diverse panel. Uh, but people will say, oh, we're doing the diverse event, so we've got, you know?
[00:07:47] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:07:48] Andy Thornton: So, yeah.
[00:07:48] Joyann Boyce: But, um, you, you also sparked another thought for me on if inclusive marketing is, say, stage one of reimagining what marketing is and kind of going back.
[00:08:01] Because I always say the definition of marketing is that as a marketeer, you should understand your audience no matter who they are. They have an interest in your thing.
[00:08:08] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:08:08] Joyann Boyce: We lost our lines along the way and it became skinny models and white women and da, da, da. If stage one is inclusive marketing, what would stage two?
[00:08:20] Andy Thornton: Hmm.
[00:08:21] Joyann Boyce: Feel like intersectional marketing, but it feels very wordy.
[00:08:25] Andy Thornton: Yeah. I think, and this is what I mean about like what can we expand? I think it's much better to, when you're talking to people or when you're like, for instance, your company and like branding your company, of course you're gonna talk about
[00:08:38] inclusive marketing, you're gonna use the term BIPOC. You're gonna, you're gonna be at a level that is understandable to the kind of people who need your services. And that's actually more important than doing what is kind of like most academically correct. Do you see what I mean?
[00:08:55] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:08:56] Andy Thornton: I think that's okay. I think we all need to kind of calm down a bit about that.
[00:09:00] Joyann Boyce: And that's a separation cause marketing is still what it is. One of the phrases, when I have worked with academics that they use in their research, that just felt like, it felt icky. They, they continued quoting, saying Black bodies.
[00:09:13] Andy Thornton: Ooh. Okay.
[00:09:15] Joyann Boyce: I was just like, no, no. Every bone in, I was just like, how could you refer to people like that? And then apparently it was all over academia and I'm like, this is where things like diversity and inclusion can't be carbon copied to other industries.
[00:09:31] Andy Thornton: Yeah. Yeah. Because have you ever had the phrase white bodies, like that's not, do you know what I mean? What or no, absolutely not.
[00:09:40] Joyann Boyce: It's just like, ugh.
[00:09:41] Andy Thornton: It's that thing of you have to, you have, everything is contextual. You have to, you have to take everything contextually.
[00:09:48] Joyann Boyce: Okay. So what does that look like in terms of your day-to-day? So we spoke a little bit about the games and sex ed. What are you doing day to day in your job now?
[00:09:59] Andy Thornton: It's funny cause I do, I, I do marketing information, um, which is a really, uh, such a nerd about it. And it is, it's really cool. So basically, we'll, a team will come in and they will say, we use HubSpot, and we like, we're inefficient. Or often they won't even know how inefficient they are.
[00:10:19] And then we'll talk like, oh, what's your day-to-day like, what do you do? And they're like, oh, somebody send these emails. And I'm like, oh, so do you use a template for that. And they're like, no. And I'm like, oh, so is this the automation? And they're like no. And then we map out that whole, the whole sales of marketing teams process, and then we use HubSpot Automation to kind of make it all happen like magic.
[00:10:40] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:10:41] Andy Thornton: And it's really cool because it, there's this, uh, company we worked with recently. Um, the project was massive and when we finished it, they were like, this will save every single person on our team three hours a day. Three hours. Three hours. And I was like, that, that's gonna help me sleep at night.
[00:10:59] That's good. Like, I'm okay. I'm not changing lives. But also, but yeah, I think it's interesting because I, I sort of do something that is not about inclusivity and it's not about being trans. I do a lot of talks.
[00:11:14] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:11:14] Andy Thornton: Um, I'm doing a talk at, shout out Kirsty Halls incredible woman. Um, she's got a conference called Confidence Live coming up in March, I'm doing a talk. Um, but I make a lot of noise about, about like intersectionality and about diversity and also I think like Noisy little monkey. One of the reasons I love working there is we very much have a policy of calling out our clients on stuff like inclusivity and intersectionality, so.
[00:11:43] Joyann Boyce: So, quick synopsis story. I, I had a talk I was doing and talking about inclusive marketing. Someone came up to me and said, we tried to put a Black woman in this campaign, our client said it's not gonna sell. They didn't push back.
[00:11:59] Andy Thornton: Oh, wow.
[00:12:00] Joyann Boyce: And that was the, that was the end of, like. She did ask for advice, but she was like, that was the end of the scenario in the, the situation.
[00:12:06] Yeah. How does that look like? Cause the clients are paying you guys big bucks and HubSpot is not a cheap platform.
[00:12:12] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm.
[00:12:13] Joyann Boyce: I'm a huge HubSpot fan by the way. If, if you.
[00:12:15] Andy Thornton: Yes. But it's, but it's so good. It's not cheap, you know, like Yeah. It's very complicated. It can do so much. So it's not cheap. I think.
[00:12:22] Um, well first of all, we have an incredible veto system, where, um, if John's mum wouldn't approve of them, we don't work with them. Um.
[00:12:35] Joyann Boyce: John as in the founder.
[00:12:36] Andy Thornton: As in the founder, I keep hoping he was like, if, if my mother wouldn't be pleased that we were working with them. We're not working with them. And Katie, uh, um, like head of sales, she is really good at vetoing anybody who is not a decent person. So we don't only work with charities, we work with those B2B companies and you know, whatever. But we work with companies who are making a really good thing. You know, uh, and who are good, nice people who are trying to do their best. And so we very rarely get into situations where we have that level of like problem.
[00:13:14] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:13:15] Andy Thornton: You know, because we don't even start working with people. We had this amazing offer from a, um, right-wing Christian network for a lot of money and John was like, no, we're not doing it. And that was really cool cause I was like, if you're doing it, I'm out. But I didn't tell 'em that.
[00:13:33] Cause I'm, I'm a Christian so whenever Christians are transphobic I get so angry about it. But yeah. But then when we are there talking to the clients, you are very polite about it.
[00:13:42] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:13:43] Andy Thornton: But yeah, we're just like, look, could you not? Or actually we think that it's better to be inclusive, here's why. Um, or we really think that this is important.
[00:13:52] We have had pushback before, but I don't think we've ever, it's certainly in my experience, had enough pushback that we've kind of had to leave it.
[00:14:03] Joyann Boyce: Okay.
[00:14:04] Andy Thornton: It's more interpersonal stuff. Um, it's, we, we also have a test, which is, I will come on sales calls and we'll see how much they misgender me.
[00:14:12] Joyann Boyce: Oh, hold on, hold on. So, one that is a, that's, a lot. Is that your idea? That's a lot.
[00:14:19] Andy Thornton: No. Well, it's not official. It's not official, but it's something that I look for. And so when we, when I come on sales calls, cause often, we'll, we'll get delivery team from the sales course. Me and Felia both do it. If they get my pronouns right the whole time, I'm like, yeah, okay, great. It's never happened. But if somebody went to not several times, I would probably say to Katie, I'm not convinced by that. And she'd be like, okay, don't mind about it.
[00:14:44] Joyann Boyce: It's actually funny you say that. Cause I have a similar-ish scale.
[00:14:48] Andy Thornton: Oh yeah.
[00:14:48] Joyann Boyce: Where depending on how much the person stutters on saying the Black, would the word Black.
[00:14:53] Like, I know why they're coming to me. I know what they want. But if they're stuttering before they're saying it, I'm just like, mm.
[00:15:01] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm
[00:15:01] Joyann Boyce: It can be one of, it could lean either way. Cause sometimes people are too comfortable saying some words and you're just like, um.
[00:15:07] Andy Thornton: Yeah, sorry.
[00:15:09] Joyann Boyce: But then the, or they skirt around the subject matter or they're with waiting for me to give them permission to say so.
[00:15:17] Andy Thornton: That's really interesting.
[00:15:19] Joyann Boyce: And I notice it, one of the for fun things that you could, I could do in my job, which is, might not sound fun, but I avoid talking about race for like the first 20 minutes of the call.
[00:15:29] Andy Thornton: Of course. Yeah. Well.
[00:15:30] Joyann Boyce: Because if they come to me, that's what they come for. So I'm just like, okay, so we're gonna talk, what's your gender representation like, what's your disabled representation like and trans representation like, and they're just waiting. They're like uhhuh. But, um, you, uh, you.
[00:15:43] Andy Thornton: But your, uh, your, but. So good. That's so good. Yeah.
[00:15:51] Joyann Boyce: Really interesting.
[00:15:52] Andy Thornton: I have kind of the opposite thing, which is whenever I'm doing well, it's similar in that I'm so, I get so bored when I get invited well, so bored is the wrong word. I like talking about trans stuff. I find it easy and I, I know that a lot of people don't, so I'm happy to do the work, but also like, I'm autistic. I am, I, I have a lot more to me than just that.
[00:16:15] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:16:16] Andy Thornton: Both in terms of like a viewpoint, a specific viewpoint, but also in terms of like, I am a person who is interested in things, but I, I also, whenever I go and do talks, um, for companies or like kind of when I used to do like more citation stuff and I'd be like, oh yeah, this is really great.
[00:16:35] This is really great. I'm like, look, I am extremely RP, well-spoken white, relatively thin, like masc. presenting person.
[00:16:46] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:16:47] Andy Thornton: You are listening to me because I am making this easy for you. I am being polite. I am being calm, like you are used to hearing from people like me. I have a very situated viewpoint. I cannot speak for Black trans people. I cannot speak for disabled trans people, like who will have a very different viewpoint. And the fact that you've brought me in here to talk about this instead of somebody else, like be aware of the fact that there are people who are very angry and they have a right to be angry.
[00:17:17] And the fact that I am not shouting at you is because you'll listen to me more, not because I in any way disagree with the people who would come in here and shout.
[00:17:27] Joyann Boyce: Yeah.
[00:17:28] Andy Thornton: So I think it's very, yeah, it's very important to kind of, to be constantly intersectional and I think especially with disability, because I've found it's one that people don't even bring up. Like they don't even fit it on the list.
[00:17:42] Joyann Boyce: That makes me think, you mentioned about automation aspect and how you do that with clients.
[00:17:47] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:17:48] Joyann Boyce: I can see that being beneficial a lot for any disabled marketers or anyone who's not able to recall the process. How, has that ever arise with a client where it's like you can spot something, they're not spotting, but make an automation?
[00:18:05] Andy Thornton: Yeah. I mean, I think, uh, like from a very, like this is not, um, kind of your kind of sexy, uh, diversity moment but like from a very practical sense, neurodivergent people are really bad at admin.
[00:18:21] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:18:22] Andy Thornton: And like, you know, a lot like if you have ADHD up and it can be really hard to fill out forms or to like send emails or to keep on on top of stuff.
[00:18:29] So like that can really support people, which is such like a classic like, you know, you, you wouldn't run a campaign about how you are, uh, really inclusive because you're helping people do this happen, you know? But like, that's really big.
[00:18:42] Joyann Boyce: It's true. Like even with the whole stuff now, um, with chat GBT, everyone's going all nuts and I'm just like, you know how amazing chat GPT is someone, for someone with dyslexia?
[00:18:53] Yeah. I talk about it and it comes up my dyslexia and I'm just like, but they're not, no one's making content. About how much it's helping the dyslexic? I'm using this all the time just to check context of sentences and as a marketer who has to write copy all the time.
[00:19:06] Andy Thornton: Oh, goodness gracious. Yeah.
[00:19:08] Joyann Boyce: I love AI. Everyone's like, it's gonna do my jobs. I'm like, no, it's not.
[00:19:13] Andy Thornton: No, it's not. Also, take my job. I'm like, you know, I'll, I'll you pay me. I'll step back and I'll watch the computer do it. Great. Fine. Yeah. I, I, I'm dyslexic as well, and I, I have Grammarly on my computer and it's a lifesaver. And I, I think it is that thing of like, it's all of the stuff under that that we don't think of.
[00:19:32] So I talk a lot about how inclusive Noisy Little Monkey. Wow. Noisy Little Monkey. See, you're talk about dyslexia and it comes out, it comes up. Uh, I talk about, all the time about how inclusive they are for me being trans, but like, they're really inclusive for me being autistic. And there's quite a few things in the workplace where, so for instance, I'll be, Katie calls it accidentally savage Andy, where I will forget to add tone.
[00:20:01] Um, so she'll be like, oh yeah, I got my haircut yesterday. And I'll be like, oh, that's great. And she'll be like, do you not? Uh, but because she knows I'm autistic, she's like, oh, he means it. He just has a, you know.
[00:20:14] Joyann Boyce: Has that ever, uh, I guess you're not really writing much copy. Cause I wonder how that would come across with copy.
[00:20:21] Andy Thornton: Oh, but this is the thing. I'm, I'm the king of marketing. Right?
[00:20:25] Joyann Boyce: Okay.
[00:20:25] Andy Thornton: So I, yeah, I, I used to write a lot of copy before I'm, I've moved into marketing automation. I used to be a kind of a general, I even did some, started some social, started all sorts. So I'm very, I know what you're supposed to do. Ah, I just sometimes forget.
[00:20:41] So when I first realised that I was autistic, some of my friends were like, no you're not cause you're really good in social situations. I'm like, yeah, I know I'm really good in social situations cause I have a script in my head that I follow to the letter. Cause I've seen what people who are good in such situations do, and I copy that.
[00:20:55] So of course I. But yeah, you asked me a question that was good and I don't think I've answered it. What was the question? Oh, monitoring automation and how it helps people. I did find, we had a client who, a client who's blind recently, and one of the big parts of our process is that we map out everything in beautiful coloured boxes, uh, because that really helps my brain.
[00:21:17] And then I'm like, great, you are not gonna be able to see any of this. So then we, you know, wrote it up in text and it could be read through a screen reader. That was nice.
[00:21:25] Joyann Boyce: So, so it's interesting cause at the start you've said that you don't feel that there's a lot of inclusion involved in what you do day to day.
[00:21:32] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:21:32] Joyann Boyce: I am hearing so many inclusive processes that have been implemented that other companies might not think of. A lot of people will do those, um, maps and those layouts just simply in their brand colours, even if their brand colours are just like black and white. Rather than thinking of how people absorb content.
[00:21:51] Andy Thornton: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's, it comes back to why it's really important to have, uh, I'm gonna say diverse teams, because I mean, teams where you have people from a lot of different perspectives and identities, and especially marginalised identities, because they will think of things that you just won't think of because how could you think of them because you've never had to. Go on, challenge me.
[00:22:22] Joyann Boyce: But my aversion to the diverse team line that and how, not necessarily how you've just used it, but how it generally gets used. It generally gets used as a cop-out to take any action. And the reason I say I like the term inclusive marketing is cause it emphasised as a marketeer, even if you are, oh, I'll just use your boss in this case, John.
[00:22:47] Andy Thornton: Bless him.
[00:22:48] Joyann Boyce: Bless him. He's so amazing. I love him a lot. Um, John, who's a bald white man in his over, older than me.
[00:22:55] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:22:56] Joyann Boyce: And even if you're doing marketing on your own and you do not have a team, or even if you have a team of Johns. You should still be able to implement inclusive marketing.
[00:23:05] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:23:05] Joyann Boyce: You should still be able to step into the mindset. Of your target audience.
[00:23:10] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:23:10] Joyann Boyce: And have a moment of thinking, what, what is not happening? What don't I know? Mapping out, um, a process colour theory has existed years. We learn to make.
[00:23:22] Andy Thornton: You have Google.
[00:23:24] Joyann Boyce: So these things exist and we know, and we, and you will talk to marketers and they will say a thousand words about why they used red as the call to action button and why it was so important.
[00:23:35] But then you are just like, but why don't you think about using red to make it accessible as well?
[00:23:39] Andy Thornton: Yeah. You didn't think about that, did you? Yeah. And also like there's enough people like you doing amazing work. There's enough blog articles you can read on the internet. Like it's not hard. And I really love that sharing that's a really good point. You don't have to have a diverse team to be inclusive. It's easier for you.
[00:23:57] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:23:57] Andy Thornton: And you'll probably be overall more inclusive if you have a diverse team. But yes.
[00:24:04] Joyann Boyce: You'd make better content. That's the.
[00:24:06] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:24:06] Joyann Boyce: My caveat, I feel like you could make inclusive, inclusive content and inclusive marketing. It's not necessarily good marketing.
[00:24:12] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm. Well, we've had this conversation recently because obviously one of the things that we've been talking about for ages and always address with our clients is making sure that there's diversity in their imagery.
[00:24:24] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:24:25] Andy Thornton: Um, of all kinds. And then we were like, ah, but if, if we make sure that the company has lots of, I don't know, like images of Black people, but everyone at the company is white. Does that, is that better? Is that worth, I don't know.
[00:24:43] Joyann Boyce: This is an ongoing challenge I have had for years. So a lot of the clients that approach me want to make their recruitment and their employer brand diverse.
[00:24:53] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:24:54] Joyann Boyce: And for years I've opposed it. I'm just like, no, I'm going to stick to B2C because that is clear. The general public is diverse end of. They're buying a product that's almost the end of the relationship. But B2B or, or recruitment marketing. I know personally if I saw a company that had a whole bunch of advertisements and I stepped in and it was nothing but mountain tops of grey, I would feel away.
[00:25:20] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:25:21] Joyann Boyce: There's an element of, I feel like we have to give a little bit more credit to people looking for jobs.
[00:25:27] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:25:27] Joyann Boyce: Because I know one of the processes I take. Yes. I'll look at a company's website. Mind you, I have watched on a job for five years, so I might not be the.
[00:25:35] Andy Thornton: Well you are working that job, but yeah, I know what you mean.
[00:25:38] Joyann Boyce: For someone else.
[00:25:39] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:25:41] Joyann Boyce: Um, I would look at their, their stuff and you know how they advertise, but I will also go and click on the team.
[00:25:47] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:25:48] Joyann Boyce: So yeah, clicking on the team should give you the balance of it.
[00:25:51] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:25:51] Joyann Boyce: But I, it's, it's hard as a, I feel like as marketers we’re removed, cause I can spot a stock photo from a mile off.
[00:25:58] Andy Thornton: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know the um, like the classic Pexels ones, now I know them. And they chose to go around the internet. I'm like, oh yeah, that's that one. I, when I was looking for a job, especially when I was looking at agencies, I was both seeing so many agencies of. I don't know, 10 white cis straight men and like two women.
[00:26:20] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:26:20] Andy Thornton: And so I was like, right, I'm not gonna work anywhere that doesn't have a person of colour employed. Now obviously you can't necessarily spot a person of colour that's problematic. So like, you know, a caveat on that. But then I, when I went to Noisy Little Monkey, I mean obviously a child, they talk about that inclusivity and they were doing loads of stuff, but also there was somebody working there who was a person of colour.
[00:26:39] I was like, okay, great. Turns out I was replacing their job, so. And I'm like, oh crap. Um.
[00:26:47] Joyann Boyce: It's a terrible place to fucking, but that's a whole other thing. Not saying Noisy Little Monkey did this, but it does happen sometimes where it's the one in one out policy.
[00:26:58] Andy Thornton: Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's swap the, uh, the Black woman for the trans kid. Great. Sorted. Oh, oh gosh. God bless them.
[00:27:10] On
[00:27:10] Joyann Boyce: the stock photos and job recruitment aspect, I feel like along with my recommendations of inclusive stock versus, I always say have the statements and the policies where you specifically mentioned you are pro-diversity inclusion now.
[00:27:25] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:27:25] Joyann Boyce: And make them public so people could click on it. Not necessarily, because I think the companies that publish those statements are actually following those things. I think they're chatting shit a lot of time.
[00:27:34] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:27:34] Joyann Boyce: But I think once you make it public and part of your marketing, someone who is going to interview can question you about it.
[00:27:43] Andy Thornton: You give them permission to ask
[00:27:46] Joyann Boyce: Because you put it out there.
[00:27:47] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:27:48] Joyann Boyce: But if you don't have to thing to back it up, that's your problem. I don't do HR, I just.
[00:27:53] Andy Thornton: Yeah. And I think this is, this is the thing. We're doing a lot of internal processes, which has been really cool actually, in terms of inclusivity. I did a session for them on gender. Um, we've done a whole bunch of racism stuff.
[00:28:04] Nick went on the course and everything, which is cool. But I like the wording that we've got on our recruitment cause we're recruiting at the moment, by the way. Little plug there. Social media exec and a marketing automation, uh, exec. Come and work with me, love it. Um, but we're, yeah, we've, we've kind of put this thing on about like, we are always striving to increase, um, the diversity of our team of all the, in all of these ways. And I think it's that kind of thing of like, we are committed to this and, and that is different from the, it, it's, it's not, we're aware we've got a problem, but it's like, you know, we know this could be better and we're working on it.
[00:28:44] Joyann Boyce: I did joke with John many, many years ago that because of the name of the company.
[00:28:52] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:28:52] Joyann Boyce: It may be me difficult to get a, some.
[00:28:54] Andy Thornton: Oh my goodness.
[00:28:55] Joyann Boyce: Like a darker skin tone.
[00:28:55] Andy Thornton: No. I literally had this conversation. I literally had this conversation with them because we call ourselves the monkeys.
[00:29:01] Joyann Boyce: Yeah.
[00:29:02] Andy Thornton: And I was like, is this an issue? Because we say, oh, this monkey. And I'm like, honey, this is, this is a, a fuck a fucking social disaster waiting to happen. I have talked to him about that.
[00:29:16] Joyann Boyce: But then I understand in that sense that that has literally been the brand name for years.
[00:29:21] Andy Thornton: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:29:22] Joyann Boyce: So.
[00:29:22] Andy Thornton: And I think it's just about having sensitivity around that.
[00:29:26] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:29:27] Andy Thornton: And, and being aware of, uh, being very careful about that.
[00:29:33] Joyann Boyce: So, yeah. That, that was the one thing I, I remember mentioning to Lisa, John many years ago, I was just like, Noisy Little Monkeys. I'm guessing you don't have a lot of dark-skinned Black people working here.
[00:29:46] Andy Thornton: I mean, we did before I left, so I wonder, I wonder how she experienced that. I dunno if she thought about it ever or not.
[00:29:54] Joyann Boyce: It's just like, I just work at an agency.
[00:29:56] Andy Thornton: Like I don't know what you mean, don't worry about it.
[00:29:58] Joyann Boyce: Sorry, we're laughing. I always have to caveat because I've worked in this industry for a long time. I find a lot of very terrible things hilarious.
[00:30:04] Andy Thornton: Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the way of coping. That's a good coping mechanism.
[00:30:09] Joyann Boyce: So in thinking of campaigns.
[00:30:11] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:30:12] Joyann Boyce: And things you've seen in the wider world, stepping away from what you do. Has there been any marketing campaigns that you've seen that you're like, whoa, I loved it. It was super inclusive, or no, that was, they should have never tried.
[00:30:25] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:30:25] Joyann Boyce: The one that I normally mention, I dunno if you saw it, was Womb Stories, and it was a Body Form ad and it was like one of the first, it was about 2018 it came out and it's an ad where they truly showed the pain, the agony and the various stories of different women or people who have wombs and their journeys.
[00:30:45] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:30:46] Joyann Boyce: And I was just like, Ooh.
[00:30:47] Andy Thornton: That's good. Yeah. That's good stuff. Yeah. I think, uh, because there're a couple. I, I Wuka period pants, W U K A were great and they did an email campaign recently where they just, it was like a message from the founder and it was all about her journey from, I think from like being a refugee and kind of what then led her to, to start the company and create the company. And I thought that was very powerful and very cool. But, and I got this actually from, um, Jardine Miles, Jamie Miles on LinkedIn, who's a good friend of mine and absolute, uh, Bristol icon. Um, and they did this roundup of all the Christmas ads, which was brilliant on LinkedIn.
[00:31:30] Have a look at it. But they were saying, oh, you know, Aldi, did this. Um, John Lewis did this and talked about like care and that was really cool and, you know, Sainsburys did this this and Co-Op didn't do a Christmas ad and instead donated this exceptionally huge amount of money that they did not spend on the Christmas ad to charity, which they do every year.
[00:31:52] And I was like, no one knows about that.
[00:31:54] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:31:55] Andy Thornton: No one thinks about the fact that the Co Op doesn't have a Christmas ad. They don't run any campaigns about the fact that they don't have a Christmas ad. They just get on with it and give money to charity. And I thought that was really cool. It's terrible marketing, don't get me wrong.
[00:32:09] Terrible work.
[00:32:09] Joyann Boyce: That was...
[00:32:11] Andy Thornton: I would not suggest, would not encourage, they should absolutely be capitalising on that. Like just run a capital of billboards and then do a digital campaign. Oh, don't even bother running them in real life. Use, uh, open AI. Create a fake billboard. Stick, uh, we haven't done a Christmas ad for five years because we've donated this much to charity.
[00:32:36] Run a digital campaign, I don't know, chuck 20 quid behind it, honey, come on.
[00:32:42] Joyann Boyce: But no, so on the Co Op one, they did run ads, but...
[00:32:47] Andy Thornton: mm-hmm.
[00:32:47] Joyann Boyce: They weren't Christmas theme ads. They were, you can get stuff from food bank over Christmas.
[00:32:52] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:32:53] Joyann Boyce: We've supported these food banks. I have two minds about just donating the money and not advertising it because we live in an industry where everyone copies each other.
[00:33:05] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:33:07] Joyann Boyce: And I would love, a campaign idea if Co Op was to do a campaign idea. They could just be like whatever charity they donate to, run the ad for that charity.
[00:33:16] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:33:17] Joyann Boyce: Be like, this ad was sponsored by our Christmas campaign.
[00:33:20] Andy Thornton: Oh, it's such a deeply missed opportunity and it's a terrible business moment from them.
[00:33:24] Like, no, no, no, not that about that. Um, and I think this comes into that whole thing of like shouting about it and there's all this whole debate of like, do we do good things just to advertise about them? Um, does it matter if we, like, should we not talk about stuff? Should we, like John Lewis doing this whole campaign about like, oh, we've donated this much.
[00:33:47] Like, is that good or bad? And I'm like, just that extent. Similar but different with pinkwashing. It's better than nothing. Hey, like as much as pinkwashing, which is like, um, for the month of June, suddenly everything's gay. Or when something, when companies like appear to look inclusive but aren't actually inclusive.
[00:34:10] So they'll put out a couple of statements and whatever, but not really do much. But sure, that's, that's bad. I don't wanna encourage that, but I'd rather that when they put out nothing, you know.
[00:34:20] Joyann Boyce: I might wanna encourage it though.
[00:34:22] Andy Thornton: Ooh.
[00:34:23] Joyann Boyce: Because I have this current theory that. That pinkwashing that's happened with pride and LGBT.
[00:34:30] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:34:31] Joyann Boyce: Has benefited the awareness and the whole, just normalisation of all of it.
[00:34:36] Andy Thornton: Uh, now. This is really interesting because I would say as a trans person, it's awareness is worse.
[00:34:42] Joyann Boyce: Huh.
[00:34:43] Andy Thornton: For me, over the last three years.
[00:34:48] Joyann Boyce: Mmhmm.
[00:34:49] Andy Thornton: It has gone from, I've been able to kind of carry on in the world and no one understands what's going on, but just call me he or sir and then be like, oh, sorry, I meant ma'am.
[00:34:59] And I've been like, no, no, you got it right the first time. Don't worry about it Now, um, I go to buy a, a bracelet in a tent at a festival for my girlfriend, but use they pronouns and suddenly I'm having a huge in-depth conversation about gender with someone I've never met because they've read an article on the Daily Mail and they've heard about these trans people.
[00:35:21] The amount of, uh, the attacks on trans people are going up. The amount of like, um, abuse, et cetera that we are receiving. Like, it, it, it's getting worse. And the reason it's getting worse is because suddenly people think they know what's going on and they care about it and they hate it. So I think for queerness that's completely true.
[00:35:43] Like a lot of the rainbow washing and the kind of like, oh yeah, it's fine if you're gay like that works quite well. People are like, oh yeah, that's actually kind of normal now. Great.
[00:35:54] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:35:55] Andy Thornton: But in my experience, again, this might be very different for other people. On the one hand, I think in terms of like in the workplace, it's a bit better.
[00:36:05] Although partly, I think that's cause I'm working at bad places. But in terms of like my daily life, it's worse. The awareness is worse.
[00:36:14] Joyann Boyce: That is such an interesting perspective. The assumption I have, and I'm, it's probably because I'm looking at all of these in a broad brush in terms of the representation of disabled people in media, the representation of Black and Brown people, quite broad brushes.
[00:36:30] And the trend that I repeatedly see is either Hollywood or marketing first. That takes time.
[00:36:37] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:36:37] Joyann Boyce: And then we start hearing and seeing a lot more people get opportunities. And then eventually it's not that much of a thing. They just kind of chuck the person in. I think Channel 4 is a really good example of when they first started putting disabled, physically disabled people in their ads, it was this huge thing.
[00:36:55] Andy Thornton: Thing. Yeah.
[00:36:57] Joyann Boyce: And then they started having ads where it was just like a disabled person tell a story about her date. And it was just like, oh, okay.
[00:37:03] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:37:04] Joyann Boyce: So that's the kind of wave. And.
[00:37:07] Andy Thornton: And I think with disability, that's really good because, as I said, disability gets so left off the list, that right now what they really need is awareness.
[00:37:16] People can actually flipping think about it cause they always just forget to think about it. And I think with queerness, we're now at the point where it's like, the more we see the better. Like, don't get me wrong, I'd love to have a whole TV show about a trans person, but also I'd love to have a Trans person in TV that's not an AFAB uh, assigned female at birth, white androgynous person, that would be cool. Hey, because 90% of them that we see are.
[00:37:46] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:37:47] Andy Thornton: Why is that? Let's think about that. But yeah, like I'm not, again, like, I'm not saying don't support trans people. That's great. Like the Starbucks ad, I loved that. One of the first times someone called me, Andy, was in Starbucks when I ordered a coffee, so that was really, really cool. Um, which is what, for people who have not seen it, is what happens in the ad they have a trans person and they, they say their, their proper name. But um, yeah, I think it, it's just kind of like a difficult balancing act. And I think with, I think maybe part of the problem is with transness is the awareness is coming from the wrong places.
[00:38:24] Joyann Boyce: Yeah.
[00:38:25] Andy Thornton: The awareness is not coming from really nice adverts and TV shows, the awareness is coming from moral panic.
[00:38:33] Joyann Boyce: Yeah.
[00:38:34] Andy Thornton: And that's the problem.
[00:38:35] Joyann Boyce: And I think going back to what we said at the very start, maybe that is the next section of marketing, that intersectional perspective.
[00:38:44] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:38:45] Joyann Boyce: Cause right now. When they are doing quote-unquote LGBT ads, they are mainly focusing on the G, let's be honest.
[00:38:53] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:38:54] Joyann Boyce: And a lot of it is not, it needs its own moment.
[00:39:01] Andy Thornton: Yeah.
[00:39:02] Joyann Boyce: But in positive light.
[00:39:04] Andy Thornton: Yes. Because there are loads of LGB people who don't believe trans people like the Alliance, et cetera. So that's a whole, it's, it's a lot more fractured than people think it is. But yeah, it's, it is really interesting. It's a really interesting, and I, yeah, and I think that representation must not be in any way underestimated.
[00:39:28] Like I thought I was crazy until Ruby Rose said they were not binary when I was like 18 and suddenly I was like, oh, you can be that. I'm that. I'm okay. So like , you know, representation, don't me wrong, really important. Really, really great. But there's a difference between represent positive representation and awareness.
[00:39:49] Joyann Boyce: Mm-hmm.
[00:39:49] Andy Thornton: People are aware of trans people. I don't need anyone else to be aware of trans people. They need to be aware of disability more, but they need to understand trans people more that.
[00:40:02] Joyann Boyce: Quick campaign brief on the spot.
[00:40:06] Andy Thornton: Yeah, go on.
[00:40:07] Joyann Boyce: If you can create, money no, money, no problems. Like budget to the kazu. Um, is that a word? Anyways.
[00:40:15] Andy Thornton: I don't know. Let's go with it. Is now.
[00:40:17] Joyann Boyce: Marks and sparks ad.
[00:40:20] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:40:21] Joyann Boyce: Based around the theme of understanding trans, we can, we can even based on underwear.
[00:40:25] Andy Thornton: Lush. Yeah, sure.
[00:40:26] Joyann Boyce: How would you, how would I do it?
[00:40:28] Andy Thornton: I think the, the problem with transness, uh, is like, if, if you're trying to unpack racism, you can be like, okay, you have grown up in the system of oppression, so you think a certain way that is fundamentally white and oppressive, you need to work on that.
[00:40:44] That involves mainly including other people. Fine. The problem with transness is it affects you if gender isn't real. Everything you've thought about yourself, you have to rethink. And I think that that's why people don't like it. So I think my campaign for Marks and Sparks, there's only so much you can do in a in a three-minute ad. So I don't think I'm gonna tackle the binary gender.
[00:41:09] Joyann Boyce: No, you could just, not even the bi. Like what would be a, what would get, what would have a nice warm. Because I think that, I think you mentioned it, the ad where they did around, I think he was a comedian, he's learning how to skateboard cause he's fostering a, a, a young person to skateboard and it was just like nice and wholesome.
[00:41:26] Andy Thornton: There was a whiskey one recently, that's going around on TikTok where it's an old, uh, masc. person. So masc. masculine presenting, um, we presume assignment at birth person. So then they start putting on makeup secretly and, and you're like, oh, are they trans? And then their family comes for Christmas and the kid is trans.
[00:41:49] And so the, the grandpa has been practising makeup so that they can do makeup on the kid. And then, and then the kid comes out and it's, oh my gosh. And I wept. I wept like a baby. And it was incredible. So I think, I think for me, the, a Marks and Sparks Trans ad the importance. There's so. There's so much emphasis on like, I was born this way and it's so awful, uh, being trans but I have to do it.
[00:42:20] and you have to understand that. I would do a whole ad onto the euphoria and a whole ad on like the first time I wore boxers and I was like, look how hot I am. You know?
[00:42:32] Joyann Boyce: Yes.
[00:42:32] Andy Thornton: Like being trans is such a joy. I can't say it enough. I love being trans. It's a joy to be trans. It's a blessing. I, I think that trans people have so much to give to the people around them because it, we are fundamentally honest and we are saying, you can be whatever you want, and everyone needs to hear that.
[00:42:53] So I think my marks and sparks ad would be various, um, either like home decor or like underwear or like clothes, like you could have one of, uh, somebody in a beard wearing Marks and Sparks dress in a dressing room and I don't know, sending, uh, pictures to their girlfriend about how hot they are and feeling really good about it and having a little cry,
[00:43:16] you know, like there's so much joy in it. And I think that that is what I want people to see because all people see at the moment is the suffering and how hard it is and all the suicide rates and, and therefore we have to do something. It's like all the, the flipping countries of Africa charity ads.
[00:43:34] Joyann Boyce: Yep.
[00:43:35] Andy Thornton: Oh, it's so hard being Black. It's like, no, this is not good.
[00:43:41] Joyann Boyce: Those ads are terrible, but I, I just wanna stick on that. The joy of being trans.
[00:43:46] Andy Thornton: The joy of being trans. That's got to be something to see.
[00:43:50] Joyann Boyce: Somebody, anybody, get Andy to do this campaign. I love it. I freaking love it.
[00:43:56] Andy Thornton: I would really like that. And you'd be able to use real trans people. Right. And, and for them to share their stories.
[00:44:02] And I think that, you know, we are, we are here. Listen to us, I think is the, is the big thing. Like it, yeah, it's not hard.
[00:44:13] Joyann Boyce: Uh, I, I'm so warm inside and this is the bits that I love cause it's like so much of the talk around inclusive marketers focuses on the sad stories and like.
[00:44:24] Andy Thornton: Mm-hmm.
[00:44:25] Joyann Boyce: Still, we still get to be creative. We get to be marketing like a little campaign, on that is a fricking Eva. And it's a good campaign.
[00:44:33] Andy Thornton: Yeah. And like sure. That's gonna, that's, that's so much more. I think that's why people like the John Lewis ad, because it was, it was something joyful than was something kind. But I, yeah, I think that happiness can be a really strong emotion. I think that we should use it more.
[00:44:51] Joyann Boyce: Tap into it a lot more. And you would still sell underwear, so it's still.
[00:44:55] Andy Thornton: Yeah. I mean, you'd still, surely you'd want to go to Marks and Sparks and you'd be like, I wanna have a gender euphoria moment. Thank you. I'm there.
[00:45:02] Joyann Boyce: I want my ass to look as good as that.
[00:45:04] Andy Thornton: I want my ass to look that good. Because everyone can have gender euphoria. Like when a cis woman gets breast implants and she's like, ah, I look incredible. Gender euphoria. Go get it.
[00:45:12] Joyann Boyce: Okay. So not only, you've mentioned a ton of amazing ads. I'm looking at this Wuka site as well, and already the representation of the women.
[00:45:22] Andy Thornton: Yeah, and they're really good.
[00:45:23] Joyann Boyce: It's, it's good. I'm, I'm seeing skin tones, I'm seeing body shapes. I'm loving it. This has been absolutely amazing. Let our listeners know where they can find you on the internet.
[00:45:35] Andy Thornton: Oh, god bless. Okay. Uh, I am human satsuma on Twitter. I don't tweet that much. Um, I'm also a human satsuma on Instagram, but my Instagram is not particularly professional.
[00:45:46] But feel free to go there. Um, Noisy Little Monkey .com is, um, our agency come and work with me. We also have loads of like inclusivity, webinar stuff, which you can see the incredible Joyann Boyce in as well. So check that out. I'm on LinkedIn as Andy Thornton. I have a children's book on Amazon called Rebekah's Secret grandpa. Rebekah with a K, um, which is great fun. It's trans and delightful. Uh, yeah, that's me.
[00:46:15] Joyann Boyce: I did not know about the book. Okay. We're gonna pop links in the description, so check out the description area for all the links. And thank you so much for listening to the Marketing Made Inclusive Podcast. Tell everyone, share with everyone we wanna go, I'm ready to go on to intersectional marketing now.
[00:46:33] Andy Thornton: Yeah. Let's do it.
[00:46:35] Joyann Boyce: But, let's do it. Have a lovely day, and thank you so much for listening.
