Well by now the consultants are all becoming slightly weary
– after three days of non stop agency visits, 15 hours of working each day including
late evening presentations. But we are all up and ready once again early
on Thursday morning for another full day.
Big excitement was a visit to Geometry Global – the new
shopper marketing/precision activation agency formed by Ogilvy from a
number of subsidiary agencies that have been in place. The preparation
that the Geometry people demonstrated through their presentation was inspiring
for us all as we looked at case studies from Latin America, Asia, Europe,
Africa and North America – these were “live” case studies so we also had the
experience. And a delicious breakfast.
The people of Geometry are hard-working and humble – a
pleasure to be around and I am delighted that they have also opened up In
Johannesburg – I am absolutely certain that they will be highly successful.
We then moved on to Havas – to their new offices at 200
Hudson and learned about their “Change Faster” mantra along with their
commitment to social media and digital as well as Social responsibility and
business.
They have put creative, media and digital all in one place –
starting in Paris, and now in New York – this philosophy will be rolled out
everywhere in the Havas world. As always a highly creative and
collaborative experience with a fascinating lunch preceded by a number of speed
dating sessions around the agency. Havas’s open policy really
works.
We then met with Michael Roth of IPG. He is always
good news in terms of his overview of the industry and his agencies and
believes that while there is confusion in the market place due to the economic
conditions still not being completely recovered, along with the mega merger of
Omnicom and Publicis, there is opportunity for IPG.
He summarised the state of his agency networks very
succinctly – commenting on how great two of the IPG agencies in Africa are –
along with the various successes in other parts of the world.
We then met with Jack Morton agency – a shopper marketing
agency owned by IPG since 1998 but started in 1939. This is a very stable
agency network which has only had three CEO’s since it opened its doors all
those years ago. A very refreshing presentation and an interesting
business that would certainly be very welcome in South Africa.
The final agency of the day was iCrossing who we met last
year. A digital agency of 900 people – they identify themselves as moment
makers who build connected brands one moment at a time.
We learned a lot today about the consumer purchase decisions
and the consumer purchase journey. The consumer data that is now
available in this area is making it much easier for agencies to be precise in
their communication – and we see this as a growing area of business for all
client companies where consumer behaviour measurement is critical.
The iCrossing team showed us case studies for PNC bank - the
virtual wallet and Hampton Inns – a moment that was videoed with a 3,5 minute
clip which is now on line and is watched – to the end – each time.
And so the day ended with all of the agencies we have met
this week joining the Ad Forum consultants for dinner at a New York
restaurant. Very social and lots of fun to have everyone together.
Day 5 will see a very quiet bunch of consultants on the
coach at 8.00 tomorrow morning and our day looks like this:
Friday 11
October
9.00
- 10.30 am Andrew Robertson, CEO, BBDO
Worldwide (Breakfast)
1285 Avenue of the Americas (51st St)
10.30 – 10.45
am
Maurice Levy on Publicis Omnicom Group (Video)
10.45 – 11.45
pm
Consultants roundtable : Mega Merger Consequences
@ BBDO Offices
12.15 –
1.15
pm Sebastian Jespersen,CEO &
founder, Vertic
LinkedIn Agency Relations Services (Lunch)
Empire State Building, 350 5th Ave
1.30 – 2.30 pm Global Agency Consultant Association Initiative
@ LinkedIn OfficesTBC
2.30 – 3.15 pm Wrap-up
Looks like another great day!!
#adforumsummit
Best
Johanna
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