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“I want the communications sector and the creative industry to partner with Monstars”: Ilya Levinson – on working in communications, zoomers and ageism
Text: Katerina Bychkova Design: Violetta Shepitko
Tech companies or fashion brands cannot exist without an active media presence, social media promotion strategies, events, cool integrations with influencers, and creative special projects. These tasks are largely covered by communication agencies, where they know exactly how to solve business problems with the help of content and increase sales. We turned to the CEO of the Monstars communications agency Ilya Levinson and learned how to build a career in the creative field, how Zoomer employees differ, and when non-opportunistic marketing will appear on the market.
During my first year, I constantly interned in well-known and unknown companies and did something completely useless and depressing. I wrote blog posts and designed eyeliners for a publishing house, worked on film sets, managed to work as a real estate agent (I thought there were mountains of gold there), and even ended up in a fashion PR agency, which I quickly left thinking that I no longer wanted to work in the creative industry. And then a story happened. Like every self-respecting unemployed student, I went to a party and, out of boredom (maybe also because of alcohol), flipped through one of the 12 thousand existing Telegram channels with vacancies in communications.
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They were all equally infuriating and annoying: “You must have 20 years of work experience, you must not be older than 20, you must know 16 languages, 15 of them are dead, be a Virgo according to the zodiac sign, and we discuss salary based on the results of the interview.”
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What did I do? I opened the first vacancy that came my way and sent my resume with a cover letter (there were more grammatical and spelling mistakes than letters). And it was a big curse that all the industry workers are terrible and old, and look down on talented young people. The next morning I looked where I sent my resume… To one of the coolest boutique agencies in the tech world – Vinci Agency. Already then its clients included Skolkovo, Tochka Bank, Qiwi and many, many other interesting and well-known brands. Three weeks later, the guys called back and said that they had been laughing at the letter for a long time and invited me for an interview. During the interview I said that I would not do an internship for less than 35 thousand rubles, because I know my worth, I did not find myself in a dumpster. And if they need black PR, I can do it. By some miracle, they still hired me as an intern and in three and a half years I became a creative director.
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How did you come to Monstars?
The agency was sold by the absolutely amazing Olya Piven and Ira Efimova. The new owners were looking for someone young, daring, already relatively famous in the world of communication, and the recruiter found me. At first I said: “Are you crazy, what kind of operator and CEO am I? I am a creative and a producer.” And when we met, we caught the common vibe and decided to try it. And six months later we have a cool agency.
How did the company’s rebranding begin?
First of all, with the restructuring of all departments. We have identified separate departments (PR, SMM, creative, events, new media, design and influencer marketing), which are led by young bosses (zoomers) with extensive corporate and agency experience. And of course, we took into account that we are not interested in working simply as a tool aggregator, we want to create interesting strategic integrated campaigns. Secondly, the team and I decided to move away from the brightness and lightness of our corporate style. We took the cartoonish and 2D character as a basis and added yellow and grey colors to the identity. The rebranding of “Monstars” is made for the daring ones who are not afraid to look serious or frivolous. Our cases will speak for us and our appearance is our business.
What case are you proud of at the agency?
Unfortunately, it is under NDA (non-disclosure agreement – Ed.). But I am very proud of the way we communicated the Monstars rebranding. We are constantly trying something new on social media, now we post meme reels every day. By the way, this is a great story about showing clients the non-obvious disadvantages of popular tools using your own example. Funny videos accumulate tens of thousands of views, thousands of likes, thousands of reposts, but they do not provide an audience. And when brands come and ask to shoot a reel, we speak from experience that your content will be shared, but this does not mean that the audience will remember the product or the brand.
Don’t try to force zoomers to come into the office before 12 noon. This is a disastrous business, with my first management decree I made a schedule from 11:00 to 19:00. What kind of person would want to come to the office at 10 in the morning? As a result, everyone supported me and now… it is impossible to see anyone in the office before 12:00. Of course I am exaggerating, but not much. I do not believe in remote work, because we always have some kind of offline creative activity. This is important because when working with clients we practice a product-oriented approach and I expect 100% participation from the team. It is important for me that the team thinks not only about promotional tools, but also about how to improve the product. Our experience can help prepare the product for communications so that its effect is stronger. There is no such magic even remotely.
Distinctive features of the generation.
I noticed that Zoom users are often not ready for feedback. And not just negative, but positive as well. It is also harder for them to take responsibility not for individual projects, but for team projects. It is easier for them to do extensive work on their own than to delegate (which is very important). And you have to work hard with this.
Zoomers have a healthy responsibility. Do you want to play a console in the office? OK! For me, the most important thing in management is not to persuade a person to do his job. I will ask you to do it after the deadline you set for yourself. It’s all case by case: there may be fines, there may be reprimands, there may be dismissal.
How to ask your boss for a raise?
No one will just raise their salary. And why give a raise if the employee doesn’t ask for it? There is no charity here, some individual awards, yes. Go with the message that your responsibility has increased and the KPIs are being exceeded, and not “I haven’t had a salary increase for two years!” If a person comes to me and tells me that he really understands more, that he uses non-standard tools to implement cases, I am ready to value it in rubles. At Monstars, my team and I meet every quarter: employees give feedback to management and the agency, and management also gives feedback to them. This way we understand that we like each other, and employees are no longer afraid that management does not see (and does not appreciate) how they work. Here I not only check my feelings, but also ask all the department heads. I say: “Tell me about all your guys, how do they feel this quarter?” Again, zoomers are sensitive people, and it is important to me how they feel in a group.
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How are things going in communications?
A lot of money was returned and budgets were restored. I think BURO. as the media feels it too. The industry has also closed in on itself. Everyone who produces content (soon to be a dirty word) does it for themselves. It is difficult to capture the audience’s attention, as the abundance of advertising messages destroyed trust in advertising and caused blindness among consumers, and content authors began to devalue its quality. Yes, it is great that you use neural networks, but it is completely thoughtless. You do not feel your audience. If you remember the same David Ogilvy, who is told to all first-year advertising and PR students, he said: “If they talk about advertising, it is bad advertising. If they talk about a product, it is good advertising.” This simple thought allowed the creation of ingenious campaigns. For example, the famous Rolls-Royce: “At 60 miles per hour, the loudest sound in the car is produced by the electric clock.” And now we have moved on to the fast food marketing market. Someone came up with an idea, everyone repeated it, and then everyone forgot about it. Everything is cyclical, so I’m waiting for a wave of interesting, non-opportunistic marketing.
Sexism and age discrimination at work: what have you encountered most often?
Definitely age discrimination. I started in leadership roles at about the age of 23, and my colleagues who were 10-15 years older didn’t really understand why my ideas were trusted but theirs weren’t. And now I notice it at work too. I’ll get on a call with a client and the direct superior on the brand side is 10 years older and on his face you can read the subtitles: “Who are you anyway? Why are you telling me anything?” I understand that it’s not my problem, but people’s inability to be flexible.
I was never afraid to be stupid and make mistakes. I always tell the team: “The main thing is to do it and not waste time on long reflections. It is better to test 12 thousand hypotheses than to sit and fantasize.” There is nothing more important for communication than observation. This has always helped me when working with context. Yes, it didn’t always work, but I was not afraid to present my success to my superiors. I came and said: “Look, I did it, I did this. Me and my team,” while others sat back and thought they would be noticed.
What qualities help you to occupy high positions at a young age?
We are about to create the Monstars medium on Telegram. Caustic, bold, relevant topics and to the point, as best we can. Somehow it happened that all personal conversations with colleagues came down to the question: is there a work-life balance? Zoomers say that they live only for harmony in work and in their personal life, and millennials believe that it is impossible to earn a lot of money if you run out of the office at 7 pm. But I always add that coming to the office at 11 am is also not a guarantee of achieving anything. As they say: “You don’t have to work 12 hours a day, but with your head.” We will explore everything that can be attributed to the concept of conciliation, discuss and provoke. What is fun about office life and what is annoying? We will have topics such as “What made you cry in the office?”, “How do you know that you are in the best company for lunch?” Everyone always wants to be among that cool crowd on the first day, just like in high school. Why you shouldn’t go to events after work (you might fall asleep, proven by personal experience), what professions we consider red flags, and much more. I won’t reveal the title yet, but I think everyone will like it a lot.
I want our field and industry to be associated with Monstars and the names of the team (we have 30 employees). Well, in general, of course, I would like a collection of expensive watches (smiles). Literally for every day of the year. I am slowly moving towards this goal.
What do you dream about?
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