STORY TIME
Communications consultancy, The Story Mob, recently launched a new brand identity and website. Matt Broughton got the low down from Managing Director, Karen Low
M
att: Tell us all about the rebrand. Karen: The rebrand is really a clarification of who we have already become. I founded
The Story Mob because esports needed a different kind of communications agency, one that understood the industry and spoke to fans rather than at them. Eight years later, our work is broader and the old brand was underselling us. Publishers now compete not just with other games, but with creators,
sport, music and entertainment for players’ attention. Those worlds increasingly overlap. We call that Player Culture, and our job is to help companies earn a credible place within it.
M: Why now? K: Because we had outgrown the story we were telling about ourselves. There was no dramatic “we need a rebrand” moment. The Mob people
saw from the outside simply no longer reflected the Mob our clients were working with or our people were operating within. The market changed, our clients changed, and the problems we solve
became broader. At some point, your positioning either evolves with your business or starts holding it back.
M: How has the industry changed since The Story Mob first came into existence, and how have you had to adapt? K: In 2018, much of our job was still translation: explaining esports, the audience and why any of it mattered. Gaming no longer needs that validation. The harder challenge now is earning attention within it. The media landscape has contracted significantly, while creators,
communities, social platforms and direct-to-player channels have become far more influential. Players are also much more sophisticated consumers of marketing. That pushed us from primarily media relations into broader strategic
communications. Earned media still matters enormously, but it has to work alongside social, creators, community, executive visibility, and owned storytelling in a world increasingly shaped by algorithms.
M: Can you also tell us about Play Makers? K: Play Makers came from seeing the same problem repeatedly: smart brands, publishers and developers with strong products, but gaps between what they want to achieve and what will actually resonate with players.
26 | MCV/DEVELOP September/October 2026 It is a strategic pressure test. We interrogate the
audience, positioning, messaging, channels and existing plans, then identify what is missing. The point is not another strategy deck but for the client to leave with clear priorities, specific actions and a stronger KPI-driven plan.
M: How has 2026 been for The Story Mob? K: We are on track for our best year yet, and the Esports World Cup has been a huge part of that. With only eight weeks left on the clock, the event moved from Riyadh to Paris and we rebuilt the global PR strategy around an entirely new host city and market. It will be the most covered EWC yet, with every major mainstream media box ticked. I am incredibly proud of the team that led global PR for what is now
the largest and hottest property in esports. The scale, pressure and ambition were enormous, and they delivered.
M: What are you focused on right now? K: How player discovery and attention are changing. Media everywhere is under pressure, creator ecosystems keep growing, and AI is changing how people search, discover, and form opinions about brands and products. That makes AI discoverability and GEO a communications issue, not
just a technical one. Stakeholders need to understand which sources are shaping AI-generated answers, whether their key narratives are being surfaced, and how earned, owned, social and creator content work together to influence that picture. For me, that is one of the most interesting new frontiers in communications.
M: What can we expect from you for the rest of 2026 and beyond? K: More of the work the rebrand was designed to unlock. We already operate upstream with many of our clients. The ambition now is simply to do more of that, in more places. We’ve launched Play Makers, growing our social, influencer and
editorial capabilities, and building strategic partnerships that extend our expertise and reach in key markets. The next phase is about deeper strategic relationships with clients,
broader capabilities and further geo expansion, while protecting what makes The Mob valuable in the first place: specialist counsel, global execution and deep audience understanding.
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