Every month, OAAA’s marketing team sits down with a brand marketer to discuss creativity in OOH, the role OOH plays in the media mix, and their perspective on the future of advertising. This month, Zoe Housman, VP, Head of Marketing, Influencer & Strategic Projects, L’Oréal USA, shares how to balance creativity and data in marketing and how she sees the future of advertising evolving.
Read Zoe’s Q&A here.
What role does OOH and experiential play in your media mix?
I have always viewed OOH as a key lever with high-impact, upper-funnel channels and value it as a method to build cultural relevance, drive awareness, and signal brand authority in a way digital alone can’t always achieve. This year, Essie increased in our investment in experiential moments, both in quantity and impact – testing and learning with a variety of experiences to ensure we build real relationships, share the brand values and break through the noise.
To guarantee we resonate across a variety of consumers, we hosted and sponsored a breadth of events; ranging from bringing influencers to a suite at a WNBA Liberty game to experience our sponsorship of the team, to building experiences at red carpet events such as the Oscar’s and The Snow White and Wicked Movie Premieres, to creating a consumer and retail focused event where we built a pop-up. This pop-up was a 360 experience for influencers, consumers and our retailer partners to drive both purchase and awareness. Ultimately, these experiential moments helped us reach our key targets, build brand love, and enabled us to share our passion with those that are both loyal and new to the brand.
As we look to diversify beyond digital environments and break-through the noise, OOH and experience are both increasingly attractive for creating memorable, brand-building moments!
How do you approach creativity in real world advertising executions across formats?
Creativity these days is table stakes, as it is increasingly challenging to stop someone from scrolling or walking by a shelf in a crowded store. Real world executions mandate stopping power, emotional impact, and creative storytelling . One key method of success this year that we had was deepening our roots into culture to leverage the hero messaging of our brand. Essie launched a new nail polish formula with increased longwear claims, and to tell that story – we realized we would have to put the formula to the test to prove it in a creative way. We simultaneously wanted to build a community and grow awareness, so we partnered with the WNBA champions, the NY Liberty as their first-ever official nail polish sponsor. To announce the partnership in a creative way that would drive conversation and peak interest in the brand, we leveraged the team’s viral mascot, Ellie The Elephant, and gave an ‘elephant’ nails. Ellie the Elephant is a niche influencer in herself, with a devoted fan group that follows her every move, as she represents the hustle that is NYC – and a girl that could put this longwear formula to the test.
We leveraged this partnership across different formats, but in experiential moments as well as in media. This campaign was Essie’s most successful campaign ever by sales metrics, media impact and increased brand conversations by +260% in 24 hours – and proves that creative story telling at each touchpoint and sustained momentum is vital to the success of a campaign.
What challenges do you face in balancing creativity and data in marketing?
I like to view the balance of creativity and data as both an art and a science. At Essie, as a part of L’Oréal, we are fortunate to have extensive data, but the challenge is ensuring it guides rather than constrains our creativity. And it is vital for the teams to curate the insights that are going to resonate, as opposed to taking all data to heart. Data helps us understand audiences, cultural moments, and market dynamics, but it doesn’t replace the need for bold, imaginative ideas that build long-term equity. The balance comes from using data driven insights as a foundation, while protecting the space required for creative ambition. I also feel it is important to leverage different resources for data – ranging from market data to consumer and future forward trend forecasting to optimize insights and future campaigns.
How do you see the future of advertising evolving?
I am excited for what the future of advertising holds! I believe the future will merge physical impact, digital intelligence, and cultural relevance both online and offline. As digital becomes more fragmented, brands will rely more on high-impact, real world touchpoints supported by smarter measurement and planning. I don’t believe digital will ever replace real life experiences or replace the impact of OOH. Creativity will need to be bolder and more experiential, leveraging the growing data and targeting capabilities.
For a wide range of brands, this creates new opportunities to design multi-sensory, culturally visible moments, that will often sparked by insights from niche creator communities that cut through noise and meaningfully build brand love and grow awareness. The future will be full of potential – from new ways to leverage technology, unique ways to build experiences, and bold ideas to bring to life!
Published: November 17, 2025