A summary of newsworthy client/agency relationship developments and relevant marketing or agency management trends from the past month. Volume 19 Executive Summary – Monthly Recap 2017 promises to be very intense in many ways with TALENT: securing the right talent and resources innovation as its main theme. CES didn’t disappoint with innovative concepts in connected device, There are many awards and rankings of top agencies in the self-driving, virtual assistants, OLED TVs, Spartan’s industry. AdAge always receives much attention and the results Smart Underway and more. The battle for grabbing are out for this year. Congratulations to AdAge 2017 agencies marketers’ growing digital media budgets with the of the year: Anomaly, followed by McCann, R/GA, Droga5, VML, best digital, technology, data and analytics tools is BBDO, Wieden+Kennedy, The Community, Laundry Service and well under way: WPP’s mPlatform and Omnicom Tongal. Media agency of the year: PHD. Multicultural agency of Annalect are on the offensive, trying to partner but the year: Alma. Creative agency of the year: Wieden+Kennedy Portland. B2B agency of the year: BBDO. also compete with the media and data platforms of Google, Facebook and Amazon. The Super Bowl • 2017 Ad Age Agency standouts: 360i, 180LA, MullenLowe, captured everyone’s attention in the ad world. The David Miami, Venables Bell & Partners, Momentum, Work game, which saw the Patriots make the largest & Co, Weber Shandwick, 72and Sunny and TBWA. Agen- comeback in Super Bowl history, brought in an av- cies to watch: Hearts & Science, Vayner Media, Redscout, erage audience of 111.3 million viewers for Fox. The Carrot Creative, Preacher, CP&B, iCrossing, Hill Holiday, Super Bowl remains a good indicator of the health Goodby Silverstein & Partners and We Believers. of the advertising industry and things are looking • Other AdAge categories: Comeback agency of the year: strong. Last year’s CBS Super Bowl drew 111.9 McGarryBowen. In-house agency of the year: Intel’s Agen- million viewers, making it the third-most-watched cy Inside. International agency of the year: Adam&Eve/ broadcast in U.S. TV history. Total ad spending on DDB. Production company of the year: Smuggler. commercials in the Super Bowl since 1967: $4.9 bil- lion. The average cost for a 30-second commercial • Per The Gunn Report, the most awarded agencies in the world in 2016: 1) Adam&Eve/DDB (London), 2) Colenso in Super Bowl LI is now $5.0 million. It only exceed- BBDO (Auckland), AlmapBBDO (Sao Paulo), Y&R New ed $1 million for a 30-second commercial in 1995. Zealand (Auckland) and Forsman & Bodenfors (Gothen- burg). The most awarded networks in the world: 1) BBDO, 2) McCann, 3) Leo Burnett, 4) Ogilvy & Mather and 5) DDB. Bruno Gralpois The most awarded advertisers in the world: 1) Samsung, Co-Founder & Principal 2) Burger King, 3) Volkswagen, 4) Microsoft and 5) Volvo. Agency Mania Solutions The most awarded agencies in the U.S.: 1) Wieden+Kenne- dy (Portland and NY), 2) BBDO (NY and SFO), followed by McCann (NY), The Martin Agency (Richmond), Grey (NY and SFO), Venables Bell & Partners (SFO), Deutsch (LA and NY), Droga5 (NY), Goodby, Silverstein & Partners (SFO), R/GA (NY and LA), Leo Burnett (Chicago), The Community (Miami) Newsworthy reports and recent developments and FCB (Chicago). At AMS, we approach the agency management discipline • BBDO has once again topped the 2016 Directory Big Won as four distinct but complementary practice areas, which as the world’s most awarded agency network across all is how we categorize the following developments: marketing communication disciplines. This is the 12th time Talent ............................................................................... page 1 in the 13 years since these rankings were first published. Work ................................................................................ page 4 Fifty-four BBDO agencies contributed to the network’s performance, with work for 35 clients. Twelve finished #1 Financials ....................................................................... page 5 in their markets, including Colenso BBDO in New Zealand, Performance and Value ............................................. page 6 which was ranked the #1 most awarded agency in the world. Agency Reviews and Roster Changes .................. page 6 • OMMA selected Huge as its Agency of the Year for its new Dakota-powered conversational interface. Awards criteria included vision, innovation and industry leadership. • Mercedes-Benz created a “customized” agency model • To compete with Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and to prioritize content marketing and personal interactions. attract TV ad dollars, the media app Snapchat announced Under this model, the brand works with three principal that it will let brands plan and pay for ad campaigns using partners in Europe: Antoni as its lead advertising agen- Nielsen’s digital ratings, so they can independently verify cy, Cinteo as its partner for digital solutions, and content the performance of their ads. Snapchat is teaming up with agency the Looping Studios. Oracle Data Cloud to let advertisers target its consumers with more relevant ads by using offline data, such as store • More than 25% of Havas Group’s 20,000 employees have sales and information from loyalty programs. taken a new certification program, “100% programmatic,” run through the Havas University platform. The program • WPP’s GTB agency network bought U.S. Hispanic shop includes 10 hours of courses with content including text, Zubi Advertising Services, bringing one of the last remain- video, interviews, quizzes and forums. ing significant pieces of Ford Motor Co.’s business into the holding company. • Independent agency Figliulo & Partners built its in-house me- dia department to offer services across creative, communica- • Globality offers an algorithm that connects brands with tions and media for clients including Virgin Atlantic and Macy’s. small and midsize local agencies around the world. The company only supports searches for projects budgeted • IPG Mediabrands launched a new global social media and over $100,000 and has 350 companies available on its digital content agency called Mediabrands Society. One of platform across all service industries. The company charges Society’s proprietary systems, “HEART,” identifies emotion- the winning agency a 15% fee of the total project budget. al resonance in social conversations. • Per Lindsey Slaby of Sunday Dinner, 10 agencies market- • Brand giants like Procter & Gamble, Mattel, General Mills, ers need to know in 2017 based on their business strat- PepsiCo (especially its Doritos brand), Nestle and others egy, talent and activation experience: Omelet, 2x4, Giant regularly turn to crowdsourcing platforms for creative vid- Spoon, Hugo & Marie, Imprint Projects, Wolf & Wilhelmine, eos instead of their traditional agencies. Some agencies NA Collective, Continuum, Part & Sum and Black Ops. like BBDO, which recently launched Flare Studio, incorpo- rate crowdsourcing in their offering. • Noteworthy quotes: • Digital agencies are grabbing a larger share of work from » “Flare Studio is a bold undertaking — bringing the clients: 360i, VML and R/GA were named the top lead benefits of the crowd but also injecting it with the right agencies in the U.S. last year, per Forrester Research. To amount of agency know how to make sure the work re- be considered, agencies must have delivered traditional flects an understanding of our brands and can work for and digital creative for at least 10 clients, and those rela- them within the crowd source model.” Nick Price, head tionships make up at least 30% of their client rosters. of content, AMV BBDO, and founder, Flare • Independent agency Grupo Gallegos changed its name to » “With every passing year, there is less and less trust be- Gallegos United and bought 30-person New York digital tween advertisers and agencies, and it’s been going on for agency Canvas and PR shop RL Public Relations & Market- decades” Brian Wieser, senior analyst, Pivotal Research ing, which will operate as Canvas United and ROX United. » “The businesses models of consulting and creative agen- • Paris-based Publicis Groupe, the third-largest ad company cies are converging. While consultants, who have deep in the world, named creative chief Arthur Sadoun as its background in business strategy and enterprise tech- CEO, replacing advertising legend Maurice Levy on June 1 nology, are adding creative agencies to their arsenal of after nearly three decades. Levy will become chairman. solutions, large ad agencies are expanding their offerings too.” Penry Price, VP, LinkedIn Marketing Solutions • Hispanic creative director and former president and chief » “Digital agencies are perhaps better positioned to have creative officer of Omnicom-backed LatinWorks, Sergio a broader understanding and application of the consum- Alcocer, is launching an agency called Rest of the World in er journey across all touchpoints. We’re seeing digital Austin. The agency will operate with a network of collabo- agencies getting a bigger piece of the pie.” Melissa Lea, rators and with PR/social media agency Boden, as well as managing director, R3 Worldwide a Latin American company called Bitacora Social. » “Agencies have struggled with technology and so- • The ANA reached a new milestone in December 2016, cial change, and fast-paced clients. Bureaucracy kills attaining the 1,000-member mark for the first time in its creativity. I want an agency that’s very horizontal