Creative Director with 1000+ Industry Recognitions (Singapore)
Hall AAA | Saturday | 11:50AM
When you look up Eugene Cheong, the first thing you notice on his website is the sentence: “I Hate Advertising.” We were immediately in love. And you will be too. Eugene Cheong is amongst a handful of creative pioneers who, in late 1980, set in motion what is known in the industry as the Asian Creative Revolution, which began in the iconic Ogilvy Singapore agency, before spreading north to Hong Kong, Thailand and India.
Cheong’s 30-year career includes stints in Ogilvy Singapore, Ogilvy London and Batey Singapore with over 1000 industry recognitions to his credit, making him statistically Asia’s most-awarded writer. How did he manage to stay so successful for three decades? By sticking to his mantra: “If you have nothing worthwhile, delightful, uplifting, encouraging, beautiful, thoughtful, edifying, funny, entertaining, useful, revelatory, provocative, inspiring, shocking, perspective-altering, eye-popping, molar-shaking, heart-wrenching or just plain amazing to say, then, please do all of us a favour and shut the hell up.”
The mantra seemed to work like a charm. He is a winner of tens of prestigious Cannes Lions, which got him the huge opportunity to be one of the Cannes Lions 2022 jury presidents. Steve Hayden, the former Vice-Chair and Chief Creative Officer of Ogilvy Worldwide, said that Eugene is perhaps the most brilliant communicator within Ogilvy since David Ogilvy himself. Neil French, Former Worldwide Chief Creative Officer of WPP, exclaimed that Eugene won more awards, more consistently for far longer than anybody else in Asia. He should be declared a national treasure. Perhaps, even a regional one. And that is why you listen to Cheong when you get the chance.
Eugene Cheong: Ten Things
Cheong knows that our job as advertisers is to make people feel something. Our job is to make people give a damn. Our job is to do something for people, and not, God forbid, expect people to do something for us. Only after a brand has generously served and given to people, will people ever consider listening to a single thing it says. And perchance, even come to not loathe its advertising. Summarised in a mathematical formula 10L x 30Y = >1000A, this talk will give you ten lessons Cheong has learned over 30 years that have helped him win over a thousand awards.