Mi3 Audio Edition

Marketing used to be the biggest driver of sales. Today, consumer behaviour is increasingly influenced by trust – which is corporate affairs’ turf. Meanwhile, Australian firms are realising just how far behind they have slipped to US and European headquartered competitors when it comes to environmental and social governance (ESG), and the sense of purpose employees and external stakeho...

What happens when you get a top consumer goods marketer to leap from the biggest advertiser in the world, Procter & Gamble, to lead marketing at a bank? ANZ CMO Sweta Mehre joined ANZ four years ago from P&G and has driven a raft of reforms including a marketing masters program inside the organisation designed to build marketing team capabilities and deepen the understanding of how marketi...

After years in development, the first weekly top line consolidated VOZ market reports land 22 July. On July 23, Tokyo will host the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games. For 17 days, Seven says it will reach nine in 10 Australian homes. Suncorp CMO Mim Haysom spies a huge opportunity for Olympics sponsor AAMI to test the new linear and digital TV measurement service – and bespoke creative &...

The bar at John Singleton Advertising, later Singleton Ogilvy & Mather, was renowned in its prime. State of Origin and Australian and West Indies Cricket teams were named in the agency watering hole but there was a strict no drinking policy by day - you’d be fired. In this final episode, Singleton and his inner circle, Russell Tate and Mike Connaghan, lift the lid on Sir Martin Sorrell a...

John Singleton, the troublemaking larrikin adman who’s turning 80 this year, was all but penniless when he returned to advertising in 1985. Then he and his lieutenants, Russell Tate and Mike Connaghan ultimately built a holding company worth close to $1bn. He was “impossible to follow” in a new business pitch but with Singleton’s old group now back firmly in British control...

Former adtech insider and The Irish Times innovation boss Dr Johnny Ryan gave evidence before a US Senate Judiciary Committee in 2019 about how the global digital advertising industry was blatantly breaching consumer privacy and user data protection. Ryan is now spearheading a globally significant GDPR lawsuit against the international online ad standards body, IAB Tech Lab, as the fastest wa...

The majority of 18- to 39-year-olds watch little to no TV – but while linear TV audiences are trending down, TV advertising is booming. Guy Burbidge, Managing Director of Val Morgan, says advertisers and agencies should prepare for the bigger boom that is unfolding: Cinema. “We’re heading into the best six months of content we’ve ever had, and I can’t put enough of an...

Google’s move late last week to delay by two years the end of third party cookies will likely see brand owners take their foot off the gas to end their reliance on privacy-challenged tracking. But Mi3’s panel of digital experts warn ferociously against it. First party data is king. Keep going. Here’s the complete what, why and what next on Google’s surprise move from top in...

Global CMO Aude Gandon is shaking up Nestlé’s marketing function. With change in the wind Antonia Farquhar, Head of Media, Content and Data, is swapping Sydney for Switzerland and the global media gig. She’s overseen a strategic shift in Nestle’s first party data push and launched its first retail outlets globally – and if local KitKat sales are anything to go by, By...

On average, a large Australian business can unlock $82m annual revenue from its owned media – physical and digital, according to Sonder. The biggest brands could theoretically book $500m. They won’t go that far, but banks, telcos, airlines and consumer packaged goods brands shouldn’t fear ‘tattooing the baby’ – putting other brands on their own, per the firm. Bu...

ASX-listed ‘gig economy’ platform Airtasker ramped up after selling equity to Seven West Media, “one of the best moves in our history,” says CEO Tim Fung. But that deal ended in March and now he must repeat the trick – while trying to go global – without big media budgets. Fung’s backing Airtasker Listings, its latest iteration, to drive product discovery...

Kellogg’s Australian Marketing Director Lucie Wolstenholme has never written humour into an agency brief but says it can do wonders for audience engagement – think Yellow Pages’ ‘Not Happy, Jan’ and BigPond’s ‘Too many rabbits in China’. “It’s a fine art to use humour without falling offensive or flat,” she says. Only a fifth of ads...

Publishers are getting their backsides handed to them by agency groups because the agencies have moved almost entirely away from relationship-based decision making. They may not be leading negotiations, but the data natives are calling the shots.  According to media ecologist and MediaVillage founder, Jack Myers, perhaps only “small data” that unlocks relevant insight can sav...

After three years throwing jabs at erstwhile rivals, Sir Martin Sorrell finally admits he couldn’t change WPP fast enough. He says public company structures doom the holdcos to failure, hobbling their ability to change direction at the requisite speed. Meanwhile, he blasts WPP AUNZ’s attempts to effect change, suggesting the London-controlled group will remain ‘’rudderless&...

Publishers and programmers believe audiences are more purpose-driven than ever and are pushing hard to reflect greater diversity within their slates. Yet "reach trumps morality every time" when it comes to buying TV ads, according to Innocean Australia CEO Jasmin Bedir. 10 ViacomCBS National Creative Director Michael Stanford and Eureka Productions Head of Entertainment So...

Long reluctant to fund industry metrics, advertisers are finally putting their hands in their pockets in a bid to cut out “10 per cent plus” of wasted media spend globally. They are bankrolling a single source pilot for cross-media measurement and Australia has pledged to “fast follow” the UK-US lead on what has been dubbed Project Origin.  The upshot will be “se...

Digital marketers have forever resisted the idea that premium digital content exists, due mainly to a two-decade obsession with online direct response tactics. But a groundbreaking research study shows some “premium" sites and content are 2.5x more impactful on memory for brand messages than “run of internet”. GroupM’s Claire Butterworth and Dentsu’s Patrick Darcy say...

If people don’t come back to the office, culture suffers – and Australian businesses already appear to have a major culture problem, according to Professor Karl Treacher, with nine in ten workers saying they are happier at home. Workers have had a taste of flexibility and freedom – and while some are desperate to get back to the buzz of office structures, not everybody is buying-...

City of Sydney's street furniture network will be 70% digital and boast sustainable materials and “green roof” design features to rival Amsterdam and London as global “connected city” leaders.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ad fraud is “the ultimate white collar crime” and is woefully underestimated and reported, according to NY-based digital marketer Augustine Fou. He thinks it could be more lucrative for criminals than even the international drugs racket: There is no product to move, hardly any risk of getting caught, and little punishment for the few that do. Yet marketers don’t seem to care. As...

By 2025 former Denstu ANZ CEO Simon Ryan figures two communications holding companies will be gone from the Australian market, a huge shift to “brand commerce” will be well underway - where every brand engagement with a consumer carries an opportunity to buy - and RyanCap will be aligned with either a private equity play, a public listing or another strategic equity partner. &ldqu...

The mega industry trend for consolidation, scale and efficiency in the $15bn Australian ad market is counter to consumers driving to niche and narrow content. Starcom CEO Nick Keenan dukes it out with three young indie media groups - backed by high-profile investors making headway in a tough market.    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. See omnystudio.com/listener for p...

Volvo is out of petrol and oil engines and about to launch vegan leather; The Guardian is banking on progressive-leaning audiences for ad growth from purpose-led brands and former Danone China and US CEO Lorna Davis predicts 50% of Big Four audit firm revenues will be from Environment and Social Governance (ESG) compliance. Here’s the fast update on brands and purpose.       S...

“Ditch the pitch” protagonist Mat Baxter has warned agency reviews are getting worse globally, citing P&G’s extended media payment terms as a case in point. Many companies, though, “abuse the pitch process” he says. Baxter’s comments come as Australia’s peak advertiser and media agency industry bodies roll-out of a “world first” initiative...

Here comes digital audio’s revenue J-curve. Just as BVOD for TV networks created new possibilities for advertisers in targeting and tracking compared to broadcast, local and national advertisers are awakening to the top, mid and lower marketing funnel options that a booming digital audio advertising market  is spawning - now upwards of 5 million users. Dozens of advertisers are piling i...