‘Only stories can motivate and unify people, so have your story set and tell it with a proper lexicology’: President of Reputation Age, Philippe Lentschener’s view on brand building

“My entire professional life has been dedicated to brand and strategy. The outcome could vary, but I couldn’t care less, if the strategy is strong, there is nothing boring.”

We are experiencing a fundamental paradigm shift in our relationship to knowledge. From the "information age," we are moving towards the "reputation age," in which information will have value only if it has already been filtered, evaluated, and commented upon by others. Seen in this light, reputation has become a central pillar of collective intelligence today. In the public space, the reputation of achievement has become a prerequisite, and the significance of reputation has expanded in scope. The diffusion of feedback, ranking, and rating systems powered by digital media caught the attention of marketing and business executives, bearing the promise of an objective, user-driven, tangible form of assessment of the social value of products, brands, and services. Concomitantly with the rise of social network sites and the proliferation of metrics and analytics of all kinds, the "age of reputation" has dawned.

Building and managing your reputation in this public space is important, and that is exactly what Philippe Lentschener, Chairman and President, and his Reputation Age do. Reputation Age manages the reputation of its clients through the mastery of strategies, a brand approach that is specific to them, and digital creativity in all areas of expression. Reputation Age creates targeted communication programs through the analysis of data in order to be as close as possible to the understanding of its targets – including influencers and ambassadors. Reputation Age is a rare expert in nation branding and territorial marketing.

Philippe Lentschener, Chairman and President of Reputation Age, spoke exclusively to The Silicon Review about how he and his company provide legitimacy and authority to clients through a vision.

Interview Highlights

Q. What is your story?

My entire professional life has been dedicated to brand and strategy. The outcome could vary, but I couldn’t care less. If the strategy is strong, there is nothing boring about a speech, a logo, a TVC, an event, or whatever; pursuing a strategy and proving it stone by stone is always fascinating. I've always been content as long as I could create uniqueness, appropriate wording, tangible or intangible assets, and feel a construction. I have been lucky enough to run terrific companies, Saatchi & Saatchi, Publicis, or McCann. They were different from one another — different culture and approaches—and Saatchi & Saatchi has secured a unique position in my heart. Witnessing the evolution of the communication world has been a passionate journey for me over the years. I never thought about doing something else, and today, being free and independent is a thrill.

Q. What is your overall philosophy for leading an organization?

You lead by example; you are the first of the squad, and leaders are always in front. Leaders do create leaders. The last thing you need is a follower. I never strayed from this belief. This is a team job, and you have the strength of your weakest link. The key thing today is to gain trust in a world of defiance. As a result, you must be clear on the fundamental reasons why you invite people to join you: relational trust and contractual trust must be genuine, true, sincere, and a commitment kept. Only stories can motivate and unify people, so have your story ready and tell it with a proper lexicology. A significant step is to ensure that your employees understand why they do their jobs and, more importantly, which jobs they do. The industry is totally lost, being entangled in yesterday’s models and techniques. This is a tough problem to overcome, but even if the industry struggles, the job of brand stewardship is still second to none.

Q. As the President of Reputation Age, what are your major roles and responsibilities?

Doing a good job is a habit. Why? Because being negligent is a habit too. My belief is that my job is to convince everyone that you get the most pleasure from doing things well. I’ve had the chance to lead global, large communication groups. As a result, I can bring the knowledge that "I've been here before" to the game, which can help me avoid falling into traps, the mistakes being often very predictable. I try to provide a few catch-up years of practice to a young, enthusiastic group. We have a big opportunity; with Charles Henri d’Auvigny and Pierre Vallet my associates we can create the agency we want, freed from the old-fashioned models and this is huge.

Tell me about an accomplishment that shaped your career.

No doubt. It is the recovery of Saatchi & Saatchi as a France CEO, and EMEA Vice Chairman, in France and Europe. We doubled the size of the company. This has been made possible by a brand-new philosophy, Lovemarks. Saatchi & Saatchi was by far the hottest creative shop in Europe, and nothing ever compared to working with Kevin Roberts. I never found this feeling ever after. He was a fearless leader who was respected and revered by our clients. Everything was purpose-driven; we invented tools that are still leading edge thinking today. In every country, our leaders were bright and obsessed with in-depth culture, and we were making business fun. Paolo Ettore was an incredible Italian leader and my closest friend in business. Richard Hytner, an EMEA CEO full of subtlety and so wise, this was special, very special.

Q. What continuing learning opportunities do you have for your rank-and-file employees?

We want to be a learning company. The day you stop learning things from what you do, according to me, is the day when you start declining. As we are three senior founders, we committed ourselves to giving master classes to the team based on our experience, and we asked them in return to do the same and create a reverse mentoring program on the new initiatives of the markets. This creates a terrific result. We also do our best to have proper thinking and philosophy with proper tools.

Q. What strategies do you implement to manage your clients’ reputation?

We embark on a journey called "Strategic Sovereignty," where we want brands to play on their own field with endogenous strategies. They must be freed from the conventions. The only acceptable strategies are the ones that are lifting you up—strategies coming from inside. Too often, strategies are imposed by the times rather than being true to the companies. They are adopted joyfully, and suddenly they appear hard to bear. Based on fashion, they can’t take the race, based on externalities, they can’t catch up with domains that don't belong to them, based on overpromises, and they make you exhausted. It is strange to see how strategies don’t start from within. We have this knowledge to generate those endogenous strategies.

Q. What can you tell us about your targeted communication programs? What do you intend to achieve by implementing these programs?

We are on a demanding path regarding this, but there is no alternative. We reject pitches, but we don't reject competitive dialog, we don't want to spend time developing programs that you present to a board without knowing if the decision maker is present or if any arrangements are made as you present. Therefore, we open dialogues with a certain number of companies where we know people.

We know their demandingness, their probity, and their honesty, and we want them to know we're ready in case. Those dialogues are often fruitful. We produce a fair number of writings, books, articles, and contributions to collective books. We want to be known for the quality of our thinking. This is an artwork. We polish our stones; we are a kind of craftsman, and we think that the knack, the hand-sewn marketing, does exist. We strive to be a strategic house, like there are luxury houses.

Q. Can you introduce us to your services? What are their key features?

We are extremely different from other influence and reputation companies. We have a very efficient creative department, which gives a face to our recommendations. And this is crucial to our job. The influence and PR markets have never done this. This was reserved for advertising. We illustrate our suggestions with creative works. Dealing with crisis requests to destabilize markets and impose new standards necessitates creativity; an approach must always be a small brand that is shaped to live in people's minds indefinitely.

Q. Who do you believe are your biggest competitors? How do you, as an organization, differ from them?

I know this is hard to believe, but we don’t look at our competitors. We are so different from the market; I know this is often said, but we really are. Putting branding, strategy, and creativity at the heart of what we do is edgy in the influencer and PR world. This takes guts and total command of the marketing culture. So we don’t hunt for the first account to pass; we don’t want any account, and we can because we don’t have shareholders to tell us, "Do you grow 15% every six months? What is your new business plan? What are your plans to cut staff, freeze salaries, and get rid of trainees?" We do what we want, we play it demandingly with quality standards in the relationship, and nevertheless, we have always been profitable since day one.

Q. What do you hope to accomplish in the next five years?

It would be good if we could be seen by the market as the most intelligent company on the market and be envied for our capacity to find the cleverest ways to address problems. I know that people stare when I say so and wonder whether this is pretentious or not. To be honest, I don’t care about those who think this is pretentious, and even I am amazed by the way they think; how can key players even aim at something else? This should be a no-brainer. You want to reach the highest standards of intelligence in an idea’s company market.

Q. Is there anything you would like to add before we wrap up?

Yes, two things: 1) I am surprised by the speed with which the market is ready to trust new types of organizations. We are working on serious subjects, which a few years ago couldn’t have been run by independent companies of our size. This is fresh and enthusiastic. 2) The more the fragmentation of messages becomes enormous, the more there is a renewed need for something to bring all this together, and this something is a brand, with its sword arm, the strategy. I must admit that our generation is miles ahead on this. We are trained, we have experienced all kinds of situations in competitive markets and in subtle retail schemes, and we have reflexes that the last generations didn’t have. And they are eager to learn, just as we are eager to learn about the digital transformation. This makes the world we are living in unique and so exhilarating.

About | Philippe Lentschener

Mr. Lentschener advises CEOs, leading figures, brands, and territories on developing successful reputations and marketing strategies in a digital world. In May 2017, having repurposed around what he really liked and wanted to do next to be a better version of himself and pursue excellence, he founded Reputation Age with Pierre Vallet and Charles Henri d’Auvigny. Reputation Age has been named Strategic Agency of the Year at the Grand Prix des Agences de l’Année for the second year in a row, in 2020 and 2021.

Before, with Saatchi & Saatchi EMEA, Publicis WW, and McCANN France, he managed probably the most famous communication brands; and promoted some terrific players locally and/or globally, including LVMH, Toyota, Procter & Gamble, L’Oréal, Axa, Essilor, Nestlé, Carrefour, Société Générale, Danone, Colgate, Sanofi, Engie, or Nespresso, among many others.

He is a worldwide expert in territorial branding and works for various towns, regions, and countries. He has worked on social topics such as the transformation of the French Social Security system, the launch of generic drugs, and the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. Combining philanthropy and his job has always been a calling. He has graciously worked for NGOs such as the Association against Multiple Sclerosis, the World Water Forum, the European Council on Refugees and Exile, and others.

He is a rigorous social analyst, author, and frequent commentator in the media and at major conferences. Business being there to make the world a better place, he believes positive impact strategies will deliver better results for all.

“We embark on a journey called “Strategic Sovereignty,” where we want brands to play on their own field with endogenous strategies. They must be freed from the conventions.”