I recently found myself in Burleigh Heads for the first of this season’s News Australia’s annual Frontiers event.
It is admittedly hard to focus on media strategy when the Queensland surf is right outside the window, but event host and managing director of client partnerships, Lou Barrett quickly grabbed our attention with a completely refreshed format, for this, the sixth iteration of the program.
She acknowledged that operating in an overwhelming, AI-populated world requires an entirely new approach to business. As such, she introduced the core theme for the program, the ‘power of passion’, and how brands can use it to unlock exponential growth.
Barrett told the room, “When you feel passion, you don’t just feel potential in attention, you actually feel devotion”.
For the past few years, the publisher built the Frontiers program primarily for consortium and independent agencies. But this year, for the first time, News Australia brought clients into the room to sit side by side with their agency partners.
News Australia’s general manager of advertising sales for QLD, SA & WA, Kelly Healy mentioned that this strategy required some changes. The team deliberately parked some standard corporate business updates (which, let’s be honest, might prompt a quick check of the inbox) and made the thought leadership the absolute hero.
Healy explained the shift, noting that having the client in the room “enabled us to get everyone on the same page”. She observed that clients actively engaged in taking the thought leadership directly into their own product innovation.
The challenge is for marketers to figure out how their brands can act as genuine companions on a customer’s life journey.
Leigh Lavery, Kelly Healy and Lou Barrett before the Frontier session fired up. Image: supplied
Navigating the polycrisis and a $42 billion economy
General manager of The Growth Distillery Leigh Lavery echoed this sentiment. He pointed out that this tripartite model effectively ends the traditional media telephone game, ensuring that “nothing gets lost in translation”.
He also identified that, “clients are simply desperate to understand what Australians are actually thinking, feeling, and doing right now.”
Lavery unpacked exactly why passion matters so much right now. He introduced the group to the idea of the “polycrisis”. A very real environment where economic, geopolitical, and environmental pressures stack relentlessly on top of one another.
To cope with this compounding stress, Australians actively tune out the endless noise and chaotic news cycles.
They retreat into personal passions to reclaim a desperately needed sense of control. Lavery revealed that passions now sit closer to a person’s self-identity than their profession, political leanings, or religious affiliations.
And the numbers don’t lie. Australians hold an average of almost three passions each, dropping a collective $42 billion on these pursuits every single year.
Despite mounting cost-of-living pressures, consumers still classify this spending as a non-negotiable expense.
Building an objective truth engine
Mapping out this massive passion economy takes more than a quick consumer survey. Lavery shared that his team of 18 researchers spent the better part of two years building a comprehensive framework.
He also noted, with a slightly wry smile, that The Growth Distillery deliberately operates independently. Lavery explained this separation, stating, “We have to tell objective truths”. He added that if the research carried a News Australia slant, the industry would simply sees it as a sales tactic.
Back to the research on the “power of passion.” Lavery identified three distinct levels of consumer engagement: casual, committed, and obsessed. Move a consumer up that curve, and the commercial rewards multiply rapidly.
Obsessed fans spend three times more with supporting brands and gladly pay up to a 40 per cent premium for products and services.
Brands can enter this highly lucrative space by playing a direct part as a supplier, acting as an adjacent enabler, or creating a halo effect.
The secret sauce? Content.
Six in 10 consumers reported that highly relevant content from their favourite brands actually made them more passionate about the things they loved.
But the task at hand for the clients and agencies after the presentation was to find some practical ways to put this research into strategic practice.
OMD Brisbane managing director Ali Costello and chief marketing officer of Michael Hill Jo Feeney reaped the benefits of collaboration. Image: supplied
Breaking down silos for real product innovation
I saw the true value of the event surface during the interactive workshop sessions.
Chief marketing officer at Michael Hill Jo Feeney attended alongside her agency partner, OMD Brisbane managing director Ali Costello. Feeney told me the polycrisis concept resonated and felt “very familiar in terms of my own feelings at the moment. And how overwhelming the world can feel”.
On the benefits of the Frontiers sessions, Feeney pointed out that solving business challenges together in a physical space often generated far better inspiration. “Some of the best ideas come out of just people sitting around in a room and talking about the challenges”, she said.
It fostered an old-school collaboration that the remote-working era often misses.
Costello agreed, highlighting the unique power of “having that diverse perspective from all three parts of the conversation”. The client, the media agency, and the publisher are all required to get the job done.
Forcing themselves to step away from their desks unlocked much deeper, energising conversations. It reminds marketers that there is still a bit of fun to be found in what they do every day.
Through the sessions, Costello realised that even if some of the consumer passions they explored lacked a “direct connection to buying fine jewellery”, the Michael Hill brand absolutely could leverage the strategy.
Feeney added, “If we want to be a brand that empowers customers’ passions, there’s absolutely a role for us to play”.
Brands need to act as true companions
The real takeaway from Burleigh Heads goes far beyond another slide deck on consumer spending.
Healy nailed the ultimate goal, noting that people are “desperate to simplify their lives and find meaning. That provides an opening for brands to stop pushing products and start acting as true companions.”
Costello pointed out that while the industry constantly debates the looming threat of AI and automation, passion remains the distinctly human side of the equation. She said, “It reminds us why we actually do what we do, and that there is real meaning to be found behind the daily grind.”
When publishers, agencies, and clients finally step away from transactional briefs and sit in the same room, they unlock the diversity of thought required to actually make something happen.
Feature image– Leigh Lavery, general manager of The Growth Distillery. Image: file