Report by Stuart Smith, global chief executive officer and Christopher Graves, chairman
Stuart Smith, global chief executive officer
The PR industry continues to experience radical change. The winners in this new world will meet the increasing demands of CMOs for earned media campaigns that are integrated, newsworthy and activated with creative, real-time social content. As part of the Ogilvy & Mather network, we are uniquely placed to help corporate and product brands navigate the ever-shifting landscape of paid, owned and earned media in search of influencing the choices of consumers and corporate stakeholders.
2014 was the year that saw us mature our global real-time content offering. For our largest clients, our content hubs generate daily content across multiple countries and in many languages. All of our offices now boast content teams in various stages of development.
It was also the year we started to develop our new five-year global strategy, investing in talent and demonstrating industry leadership in creativity, digital and social. The Holmes Report, PR’s only global commentator, put us at the top of their Global Creativity Index, named us the Best Global Digital Consultancy – both for the second year running – and awarded us pan-EAME Agency of the Year for the first time in our history.
Ogilvy PR veteran Scott Kronick, served his first full year as Asia Pacific’s new CEO, running the largest of the region’s international PR agencies. We performed well creatively, with a notable win of the Most Creative Global Campaign from The Holmes Report (for Goodyear).
Christopher Graves, chairman
Under Rob Mathias’ leadership we navigated changes in our North American portfolio well and diversified our government work to include FEMA and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. We communicated complex issues including Obamacare and Ebola and launched the new $100 note globally. We led the industry with ground-breaking creative campaigns for clients American Express, Pfizer, and Darden’s Specialty Restaurant Group.
We grew our geographic footprint, adding the Middle East and North Africa to our resurgent EAME region. In South Africa, Kenya and Turkey we went from strength-to-strength. Ogilvy PR UK was named Large Agency of the Year (PRCA) for the second year running. We launched new offers in the UK: paid social, employee engagement and sports marketing.
We continued to structure ourselves for profitable growth, hiring fresh talent to lead our operations, world-class people in the specialist area of social change and across several offices we put new creative talent in place.
2015 is about re-setting expectations of what public relations can achieve in an integrated environment. Ogilvy PR is transforming. Our new role is to help companies and brands optimise their campaign platforms for earned media, building reputation, generating advocacy and ultimately driving sales. Our proposition is simple: we exist to create value through earned influence.