Sally Weavers of IPG Mediabrands’s Initiative agency on thinking laterally August 3, 2014 Liam Ward-Proud talks to Sally Weavers, UK managing director of IPG Mediabrands’s Initiative agency. Initiative holds a fairly unique place among UK media agencies. It’s big, placing thirteenth in last year’s rankings, with billings of over £169m, but nowhere near the scale of the outfits owned by the industry’s behemoths. According to Sally Weavers, [...]
ITN Productions’ Mark Browning on content marketing and the challenge for brands July 27, 2014 Most people know ITN as the producer of ITV and Channel 4 news, or as the maker of heavyweight investigative shows like Dispatches. But over the last four years, creative production division ITN Productions has been busily building up a content marketing operation, grabbing a slice of brands’ fast-growing content budgets so hotly pursued by [...]
Magicians and mathematicians: Rocket Network’s Mark Girling on media agency challenges July 20, 2014 Established in 1997, Omnicom-owned Rocket Network has grown its business to include media planning and buying accounts with brands such as the Co-operative Group, Harvey Nicholls and Porsche. Mark Girling, its managing director, has now worked at a senior level in London media agencies for over 20 years. He talks to City A.M. about [...]
The in-house agency: Oliver Marketing CEO Simon Martin on the new media model July 13, 2014 Traditional ad and media agency models are under pressure – this everyone knows. But while some executives are nervously looking over their shoulders at the tech giants and consultancies, the in-house agency model is also shaking things up. According to the Association of National Advertisers, nearly 60 per cent of clients used in-house [...]
Beyond digital: What will the future look like for marketing services? July 13, 2014 WPP’S Sir Martin Sorrell released his list of the top 10 trends shaping the global advertising business last week. Alongside a shift in power to the South, East and South East of the world, and a brewing battle for talent, Sorrell discussed the continuing role of the internet in transforming marketing. While calling it [...]
Customer science: Dunnhumby CEO Simon Hay on the importance of data in online advertising July 6, 2014 Liam Ward-Proud talks to Dunnhumby chief executive Simon Hay. Before media agencies started making serious strides into consumer data and personalisation, customer insight firm Dunnhumby was busy helping Tesco (now its owner) reinvent the customer loyalty programme with Clubcard. Now, after buying German ad tech firm Sociomantic Labs this April, it’s planning on [...]
The end of event sponsorship marketing? How the World Cup lost its pull July 6, 2014 Event sponsorship is one of the oldest forms of advertising – when the Olympic games was first revived in Athens in the 1850s, it was at the behest of Albanian businessman and sponsor Evangelis Zappas. But with brands scrambling to get noticed amid the current World Cup marketing melee, there are signs that the centuries-old [...]
Beyond billboards: Kinetic’s UK CEO Stuart Taylor on the new out-of-home advertising June 23, 2014 Liam Ward-Proud talks to Kinetic’s UK chief executive Stuart Taylor Once a relative backwater of the marketing landscape (compared to high-budget TV ads at least) the digital revolution is giving out-of-home (OOH) advertising a new lease of life. Static billboards and posters are being replaced with digital screens and moving images, increasingly able to interact [...]
How London beat Germany to be Europe’s leading ad industry hub June 23, 2014 Figures from Zenith Optimedia last week forecast that, this year, the UK advertising industry will outstrip Germany’s in size for the first time. Once, this would have been unthinkable. When I started the London offshoot of German advertising agency Scholz & Friends, many in the industry said I’d lost my mind. This wasn’t [...]
The week in brief – UK agencies win big at the Cannes Lions June 23, 2014 UK agencies and creative shops were well-represented among the winners at last week’s Cannes Lions festival. Adam & Eve/DDB won big for its Harvey Nichols “sorry, I spent it on myself” Christmas work, as did OgilvyOne for its “magic of flying” campaign for British Airways. PHD won two golds for its work with Lego, and [...]