By Sarah Sanders, SVP, Creative and Julian Pinilla, AD, Strategy
We had the privilege of attending Most Contagious 2025, a conference packed with inspiring talks from creative leaders on the latest industry topics. But among them all, one theme stood out: Meaning. In a world too focused on transactional relationships with trends and technology, it’s the brands that connect deeply with people that truly thrive, and that’s the inspiration we’re bringing into 2025.
Here's a glimpse of the best of what we learned.
Culture vs. Popularity: Why Meaning-Making Matters
In our industry, one conflated phrase gets thrown around daily: “We want to be big, popular and in culture.”
We use popularity and culture interchangeably, but they’re not the same.
As Dr. Marcus Collins, Influence Professor at University of Michigan Ross School of Business and author of the best-selling book “For the Culture,” brilliantly put it, popularity is just how well-known something is, it’s about prevalence. Culture is the system of meaning-making. It’s how we understand the world, translate experiences and ultimately… move people.
Brands that tap into culture don’t just grow, they explode. They’re six times more likely to grow and 25% more likely to outperform their competitors. Why? Because culture is the ultimate cheat code. It’s not just about chasing big cultural moments, it’s about creating meaningful ones.
Marcus elaborated on this sharing “When I tell my friends I like a brand, it’s not really about the brand, it’s about my friends.” The best creative work isn’t about winning a brand popularity contest, it’s a badge of identity, a cultural receipt of who we are. Shared meaning is the magic. It’s why we connect, why we build relationships, why we feel something.
At the end of the day, we have three choices when it comes to culture: drive it, ride shotgun, or - worst of all - suck tailpipe (aka show up way too late).
So, the mission in our everyday grind should be simple: create meaningful moments. When we do that, the work doesn’t just land, it lights up. That’s the power of culture. That’s how we move people. And in the end, that’s what really matters.
Engage, Entertain and Take Stupidity Seriously
In today’s marketing world, we hear a lot about taking risks by embracing humor.
This isn’t a case just to get a laugh but rather a shortcut to memorability and connection, and building your brand in the process.
Chris Barth, Principal Strategist at Contagious, highlighted research showing that ads capturing the most attention and emotion often appeal to the right brain and are frequently linked to humor, such as narrative scenes with progression, unusual elements and expressive body language.
The key is to make sure the brand is inextricable from the story.
You can't talk about Cera's "Michael CeraVe" or Liquid Death's ads featuring kids drinking beer-like water without directly referencing the brands, but you can forget which insurance company used a dad joke in the commercial you’ve just sat through.
Paula Vampre and André Toledo from DAVID NY exemplified just this with Clash of Clans. The gaming brand didn’t just rehash their annual Hammer Jam event, instead they turned it into a crime mystery event where the game’s iconic hammer disappears and created the first true-crime mystery podcast set in a fantasy world, Hammerless.
The event was a major success. Fan theories exploded across the community with thousands scrambling to get in on the fun, resulting in a 16% increase in daily active users and a social engagement boom of 1,220%.
At an age where grabbing attention is increasingly difficult, leveraging humor could end up being the smartest tool we could use.