Amsterdam, August 11th, 2020

With offices in Los Angeles and Amsterdam, Active Theory is a creative digital production studio, building award-winning websites, apps and VR experiences that work across multiple devices.

The company has a team with a deep understanding of UX and technical solutions that use the latest in web technologies.

Eddie Benson is a strategist at Active Theory, a position he has hold for over two years after working in other agencies in Australia and London.

In an interview with TIA, he described the challenges and opportunities brought in by the pandemic and gave an inside look to the daily work at the company, highlighting some of its recent projects.

Why is your city a great place to work?

Working between London and Amsterdam while collaborating with a team based in LA means I spend a lot of time in cafe and coworking spaces. This means I get to try a lot of coffee and take a lot of aesthetic Instagram stories. That’s the millennial dream, right?

How’s the team holding together since the epidemic started in China?

Actually really well. Being in the digital production space during this time has left us with ample project opportunities. Our internal processes also already gave people lots of autonomy, meaning the transition to fully remote teams was fairly straightforward.

What challenges were you facing before the spread of the virus and how are you dealing with them right now?

At Active Theory we make creative digital experiences with web technology. A key challenge for us has always been working to educate potential clients and creatives on what’s possible in a web context.

Concepts that seem every day to us (like optimizing performance of 3D effects in the browser) are completely foreign to our clients. This has become even more pronounced during this COVID era as many marketeers are dabbling in digital production with little to none experience. This is an opportunity for us, really, as we can help others understand the capabilities of creative tech on the web.

When at the office, what’s a regular day like on your shoes?

Arrive 8am. Coffee and Emails. Deep Work. Coffee #2 and Chat to Coworkers. Deep Work. Lunch. Client Calls. Check in with our LA team. Switch the playlist from lofi beats to EDM. Grab a beer (optional).

What upcoming initiatives do you find particularly exciting?

The Center for Humane Technology founded by Tristan Harris is particularly interesting to me. Marketing and advertising are quite tied to psychology and can easily manipulate human behaviour and emotions resulting in dangerous outcomes (e.g. how Facebook ads can manipulate political campaigns). The movement shares resources about how we can manage this sort of thing moving forward, definitely worth checking out.

Which metrics do you track on a daily basis and how do you evaluate results?

Let’s split this into internal and external metrics. Internally, we have a team of extremely passionate and skilled designers and developers who dedicate a lot of time and energy into their work. From my position of a strategist, I love finding ways to help them bring to life their creative passions in the form of end-to-end projects, so it’s always rewarding to help them uncover these opportunities.

For external, or project, metrics, we track the success on a case-by-case basis depending on campaign objectives – engagement, conversion, sales etc.

Of all the projects the agency has produced, which one are you most proud of?

This question has come up a bit internally. My personal favorite is Corazon: Give Your Heart. Our creative director, Andy, came up with the idea of holding a phone to your heart to measure your heartbeat as an input into a creative experience. This evolved into a massive multi-channel marketing campaign focused on encouraging New Yorkers to become heart donors.

We had people holding their phone to their heart at the Tribeca Film Festival, in Times Square, and all over the world as a web experience. It was an awesome demonstration of the capabilities of creative web technology, and even won a coveted Grand Prix award at Cannes Lions.

In your opinion, what ingredients are key to create a successful project?

Creating a project team dynamic full of experts who are willing to push the project from different angles. At Active Theory, we try to focus on creative technical solutions that are grounded in a strong business case and deliver a great experience for the end user. Having great relationships between these creative, technological and strategic stakeholders is critical to ensure a balanced and successful campaign.

How would you describe Active Theory’s creative culture?

Curious and open. Our company structure is fairly flat in terms of both management and innovation. If someone has an idea they want to get off the ground, there’s a lot of room and resources to develop that. It’s also this backlog of ideas that can be tapped into when we are proposing solutions during pitch to give us an edge when it comes to creative ideation.

Three things I wish I knew when I left school:

Shorten your emails. Listen, like really listen. Read Atomic Habits by James Clear.

Thanks Eddie!

Learn more about Active Theory

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