What 16 years spent chasing the Census taught me about our industry

By Jen Sharpe, Founder and Managing Director, Think HQ

When I founded Think HQ 16 years ago, I had two things: my first client, the Scanlon Foundation, and an oddly specific ambition. I wanted to work on the Census.

It was 2010, and most people I told thought I was joking. A Census brief wasn't what a new kid on the block comms agency was supposed to chase. But I couldn't shake it. If you are building an agency that you want to speak to people in the places they live and work, and about the things that really matter to them, Census data is the way to do it. So it made perfect sense to me that the Census gig would be the ultimate client.

Fast forward sixteen years. We are still doing amazing work with the Scanlon Foundation…and we finally bagged the Census!

An industry built on assumptions

And we landed it at a time when its importance is greater than ever. Because here's the uncomfortable truth about our industry: for far too long, far too many agencies and brands have built strategies on assumptions. False assumptions. Creative platforms get built on a gut feeling, stock image libraries and whoever speaks the loudest in the brainstorm - which has statistically been a well-educated man from a higher socio-economic background. Then someone slaps the word "insight" on it and calls it a day.

And this wrongheadedness is a big part of why Think HQ and CultureVerse exist - to build work for what Australia actually looks like. To create strategies and work that reflects what is actually on the street.

The Census as national mirror

And the Census is the gold-standard dataset in our country to tell us the truth about this. Not a segment or a sample. It captures every household, every five years. It is the closest thing this country has to a national mirror - a reflection of our collective selves, imperfections and all.

The paradox of the Census is that the people who face the highest barriers to completing it - new migrants, regional communities, people with disability, or those experiencing homelessness - are the ones who need accurate representation the most. Their data directly determines funding for the services, infrastructure, and community support they rely on every day.

This is where standard marketing tactics fall flat. Telling people they have to complete the Census misses the point entirely. The real job is explaining why their answer matters to their daily lives and their local community.

Building strategy from data up

When agencies rely on mass-marketing shortcuts, these groups can end up as an afterthought instead of the starting point. But when you build from data up, inclusion isn't a token tactic. It's the strategy itself.

That's exactly how we approached it. We used the last Census to build this one - shaping community video case studies, plain-language guides, regional mailkits, media and social content around who these audiences are - their communities, the languages they speak, and the living circumstances that make completing it harder. It's genuinely full-circle: Census data helps us reach more people, reaching more people means richer data, and richer Census data improves the impact of our work.

We didn't win this brief and suddenly discover the Census. We've been building off it for a decade and a half. Every creative platform, language strategy, and audience insight we build has Census data underneath it.

Sixteen years ago, I wanted this brief because I understood that. Having finally delivered it, I'm more convinced than ever that an agency is only as good as how clearly it sees the audience it's speaking to.