Ogilvy PR and The Reputation Group target Melbourne and more
Melbourne, August 17, 2010: The Reputation Group is the latest agency to join forces with Ogilvy PR, with the highly regarded communications agency to become a cornerstone of Ogilvy’s Melbourne offering.
The Reputation Group will significantly extend Ogilvy’s Melbourne PR team, bringing its extensive local networks, impressive campaign successes and particularly strong social marketing capabilities into the business. Recent successes for the Victorian agency include public relations activities for the DonateLife campaign and the Melbourne and Sydney Good Food and Wine Shows.
As part of the move, The Reputation Group’s Lelde McCoy will take on the new role of Managing Director of Ogilvy PR in Melbourne.
“This is an exciting opportunity for both Ogilvy PR and The Reputation Group,” said Ogilvy PR Australia’s Group Managing Director, John Studdert.
“As the largest, most specialised agency in Australia, Ogilvy PR already offered significant expertise to our clients, not least from working closely with our partner agencies in Ogilvy Group Melbourne,” said John Studdert.
“We anticipate this combined offering will not only attract new clients and skilled industry professionals but will also become a significant value-add to our existing clients.”
“This move is a natural fit for both agencies,” said The Reputation Group’s Managing Director Lelde McCoy. “There are many synergies across the businesses. We also share a common approach to client service, delivery of award-winning work and the development and nurture of our talented creative teams.”
“By joining forces with The Reputation Group’s outstanding team, we will further consolidate Ogilvy PR’s position as the number one agency in the Asia Pacific,” added John Studdert.
Ogilvy PR is part of Ogilvy Group Melbourne and STW Group, Australia’s leading marketing content and communications services group.
Ends
For further information:
Rebecca Tilly
STW Group
0410 501 043
The Red Chair Series, an interview with Sarah Cruickshank
Go to the Ogilvy PR YouTube channel.
Ogilvy expands social media practice
Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence Recruits Three Key Hires
Sydney, 13 August, 2010: Ogilvy 360 Degree Digital Influence has further expanded its social media capability with the recruitment of three new specialists into its practice.
In response to increasing client demand, Lucille Snape and Annie Hammel join the Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence team as Digital Strategists and Koby Geddes as a Digital Analyst. Lucille previously worked at Euro RSCG, Koby at OMD Australia and Annie at Hachette Filipacchi Media in the US.
The appointments come just 12 months after award-winning strategist Brian Giesen moved from Ogilvy’s 360 Digital Influence in Washington DC to head up the Australian operation, and help manage the Asia Pacific practice.
“Since the appointment of Brian our team has quickly grown to six specialists who are full-time social media practitioners,” said Graham White, Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence’s Managing Director in Australia. “This reflects the growth, adoption and opportunity for social media in our clients’ communications programs.
“There is no doubt that Australian organisations, both public and private sector, are rushing to embrace social media,” he added.
Brian Giesen, Regional Director, Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence, said: “Social media is not just a new channel. It represents a fundamental consumer behavioural shift that requires marketers to change how they market, how they are organised and importantly how they measure success.
“Consumers get social media. But companies, by contrast, have been playing catch up,” Giesen said. “The good news is they’re learning fast that it’s not optional and that a comprehensive strategic approach to integrate social media is essential.
“For Ogilvy, it’s of critical importance to have an expert team to guide them through it. The addition of Lucille, Annie and Koby to our existing team will further strengthen Ogilvy’s social media capabilities and our ability to deliver successful, strategic campaigns for our clients,” he said.
“We anticipate further hires in the near future,” he added.
Ogilvy PR is part of STW Group, Australia’s leading marketing content and communications services group. Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence is Ogilvy’s word of mouth marketing discipline that integrates the power of social media with digital marketing.
For more information contact:
Graham White
Managing Director, 360 Digital Influence
T: 02 8281 3810 / 0404 840 533
Foursquare for Business
Social Media has changed the way businesses are operating across Australia, with consumers spending an increasing amount of their time on Twitter, Blogs, Facebook and other forms of Social Media.
Companies can no longer afford to ignore discussions online about their brand. Working in partnership with The Wall Street Journal, Ogilvy’s specialized Social Media team has created a series of tutorials to help companies take those first steps.
The latest in the series, “Foursquare for Business”, will take place on August 19 at 1PM Sydney time.
Foursquare is the hottest new social media platform that is taking Australia and APAC by storm.
Part game, part social network, Foursquare allows people to “check in” wherever they are via their mobile devices, become “Mayor” of their favourite locations, and earn fun “badges” along the way.
Foursquare presents some tremendous opportunities to brands and businesses of every size. From Microsoft’s launch of Office 2010 via a Foursquare Mayor Meetup in Australia to Dominos Pizza seeing an increase in profit through a Foursquare program, this new social media platform is proving it’s worth its weight in ROI.
Join Ogilvy’s award-winning Asia-Pacific Social Media team, including Brian Giesen and Thomas Crampton for a free 30-minute online seminar powered by Citrix GoToWebinar.
Attend this live, interactive Webinar to learn:
- What is Foursquare and why is it so addictive?
- How do you use Foursquare to achieve a communications or business objective?
- How should you assemble a strategy?
- What NOT to do with Foursquare?
Space is limited for this 30-minute Webinar* and registration is required.
Sign up here http://www.asiadigitalmap.com/2010/08/foursquare-for-busines/
The 2010 Pollute-o-Meter
The Climate Institute (a Major Climate Partner of OgilvyEarth) commissioned leading risk analysts, Climate Risk to assess the impact of the climate policies announced by each of the major parties in this election. Called the Pollute-o-Meter, this innovative and interactive online tool gives a clear picture of the differences between the major parties’ climate policies by showing Australia’s pollution pathway. The quantitative Pollute-o-Meter tool is coupled with a qualitative Five Star Rating Analysis that accounts for contributions to strengthening global agreements and supporting research and development. The tool allows for real-time tracking of each party’s ‘pollution promise balloons’.
With the Pollute-o-Meter and detailed analysis we hope to help you see through the hot air, past the phony ballast, towards a safer landing for our overly pollution-dependent economy and its climate diplomacy.
The Climate Institute
The Climate Institute is a non-partisan, independent climate change-focused research organisation that works with community, business and government in Australia and internationally to drive innovative and effective climate change solutions. OgilvyEarth is a Major Climate Partner, and participant in The Climate Institute’s Climate Partners Network, which is a new, dynamic corporate partnership focused on promoting business leadership in the area. The Climate Partners represent a cross section of the economy who are working individually and collectively to promote the innovation and investment needed for Australia to be competitive in the emerging global low-carbon world.
The Red Chair Series, an interview with Tom Beall
Go to the Ogilvy PR YouTube channel.
The Social Side of Marketing
Ogilvy PR Managing Director John Studdert set the scene and jogged a few memories with his opening remarks: “Life. Be In it; Slip, Slop, Slap; Click, clack, front and back; Arrive alive – don’t drink and drive . . . these are all memorable campaigns that raised awareness, shaped or changed opinion and impacted our behaviour.”
Studdert was speaking at the third in a continuing series of Ogilvy PR breakfast events designed to inform and stimulate a select group of guests.
This week’s topic was Ogilvy On…Profit vs Public Good with the subject being the value of social marketing.
Held in Sydney’s Establishment Ballroom, the 80 invited guests were treated to a lively panel debate, moderated in his usual entertaining, forthright style by Tony Jones, the host of ABC TV’s Q&A program.
On the panel were Peter Ritchie, the former chief executive and chairman of McDonald’s Australia, Dr Christine Bennett, the chief medical officer and director of healthcare leadership at Bupa Australia Group, Tim Gartrell, the CEO of newly launched not-for-profit group GenerationOne which aims to alleviate indigenous disadvantage, Tony Thirlwell, the CEO of the Heart Foundation of NSW, the NSW Shadow Treasurer Mike Baird, Tom Beall, the managing director of Ogilvy PR Worldwide’s global social marketing practice, and Greg Sam, the joint managing director of Parker & Partners, Australia’s leading bi-partisan public affairs company and a member of the Ogilvy group.
The discussion started with a debate about the definition of social marketing. Most thought it boiled down to promoting change for social and public good, without profit being a motive. Beall, while agreeing with that definition, recalled that 25 years ago when he was invited to join Ogilvy from the public sector to set up the social marketing practice in Washington he was assured that he would be “working on the side of the angels”. Ritchie, however, saw it as an organisation adopting a continuing positive social role within its community so that the organisation actually lived that role and came to be seen in a positive light.
Thirlwell related the concern within some parts of the Heart Foundation when they allowed McDonald’s to carry the foundation’s tick of approval on some of its products. Some were outraged at the charity being associated with a fast food outlet but Thirlwell said the reality was that an enormous number of people ate fast food on a regular basis so it made sense to try and encourage the industry to have healthy options on offer.
The talk around fast food led to a discussion of obesity levels, with Bennett, who also was chair of the Federal Government’s National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission, pointing out that 50 per cent of our health burden relates to how we live our life.
The problem, of course, is how to change people’s behaviour. Gartrell said the difficulty GenerationOne faced was that there was widespread awareness of the disadvantages faced by Australia’s indigenous population – which meant that awareness campaigns were not needed – but attitudinal change by white Australians was essential before real change could occur.
Beall said the object of most social marketing campaigns was behavioural change and cited the Heart Truth campaign which he ran in the US. The campaign started seven years ago and its aim was to raise awareness of heart disease among American women.
At the time, even though heart disease was the No 1 killer of women, it was largely seen as a man’s disease.
The campaign, which is still running strong, has been shown to have raised both the awareness of heart disease and of the symptoms and has markedly decreased the female rates of death from the disease.
And, just in case you were thinking about it, the consensus was that fear campaigns generally don’t work.
After the panel session, Beall gave his top five tips for any organisation considering engaging in social marketing.
- Be audience-centric. Know who you are talking to.
- The importance of research. Research the market, but also know what other competitive forces are out there.
- Talk to other stakeholders. Extend your reach to other interested groups in the field and get them involved early on in the planning stages.
- Don’t depend on just one communication channel. Audiences hear messages in wide variety of places and media and it is important to have a presence in all those places.
- Assess what you are doing as it goes on and be open to change if the evidence suggest it’s not working as well as you thought it would.
The Red Chair Series, an interview with John Bell
Go to the Ogilvy PR YouTube channel.
Special Off The Record – Julia Gillard Prime Minister Designate
The federal Australian Labor Party now has a new Leader and soon Australia will have a new Prime Minister – Julia Gillard. Gillard was elected unopposed when Kevin Rudd bowed to the inevitable of his Party room and elected not to run against his Deputy in a Party room ballot for the Party Leadership. Treasurer Wayne Swan will join her as Deputy Leader and soon to be Deputy Prime Minister – he was also elected unopposed.
In politics, it’s all about the numbers.
Kevin Rudd started the week by launching Sh*tstorm – the book. By the end of the week, he and his office had created a sh*tstorm of their own.
It seems just months ago that Australians were swept up in Kevin 07 fever. But then came Rudd’s back flip on emissions trading and a mining tax which put large and powerful parts of the country offside.
This, combined with Rudd’s inability to connect at a meaningful level with the voters, has seen his personal – and importantly his Party’s – polling figures freefall. A Newspoll this week suggested that In Western Sydney he is trailing both Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott as preferred Leader.
The final straw for Julia Gillard came early yesterday. Again, it was all about the numbers.
Early yesterday morning a story ran in The Sydney Morning Herald which revealed that Rudd’s chief of staff had been working his way through Labor’s caucus trying to figure out if his boss would have the numbers to survive a Leadership challenge from Gillard. The story impugned in the eyes of Gillard’s backers (inside the Labor caucus and outside of it) her unwavering loyalty.
Some describe it as the straw that broke the camel’s back but it is clear that plans were afoot and dissatisfaction simmering for some time. Four factional powerbrokers from Labor’s Right played a key role brought to a dramatic head yesterday evening: Bill Shorten, Mark Arbib, David Feeney, and Don Farrell.
It turns out these four horsemen of Rudd’s personal apocalypse had in fact been conspiring all week. Feeney and Arbib, both former Labor state secretaries (VIC and NSW respectively) were convinced Rudd didn’t have what it takes to win a campaign against Abbott in an upcoming election. Or perhaps more to the point that Labor’s chances under Gillard were significantly improved.
Their counsel to Gillard was simple (and this was certainly not the first time she had heard it from them): challenge him.
And then on that basis, instead of enjoying a quiet drink to celebrate Nick Sherry’s 20th anniversary in parliament, Gillard, Rudd and their consiglieri hunkered down in the PM’s office working out what to do next. AWU Leader Paul Howes made it known that his union had withdrawn his support for the PM the next thing we knew Rudd’s fellow Queenslander and Treasurer Wayne Swan would be running as Deputy on Gillard’s ticket.
By morning, all Rudd had left was, ironically the hard left of the Party.
Focus group research conducted by Ogilvy Illumination – Parker & Partners’ research practice – in four electorates in four states around the country last week confirms the judgement made by Labor’s factional hardheads. Conversations about the federal Government’s performance were becoming irretrievably bogged down in discussions about the performance and character of the former Prime Minister.
Abbott’s temperament and likely performance as Prime Minister also attract significant levels of concern. In fact in the Abbott to Rudd match-up on character and temperament the uncertainty over how Abbott might perform as PM was probably on balance sufficient to award the fight to Rudd (in a series of low scoring rounds with no convincing knock-out blows).
This will be important as PM Gillard seeks to define her premiership in its early days. Her skills as a communicator and the current popular take on her personality are strong assets. The assessment of her performance as Deputy PM is more nuanced: regardless of merits of the arguments the school building program is widely seen as one of the signature failures of the current Government and more broadly the Building the Education Revolution program is not seen by many as having delivered substantial results across the country.
On this basis expect to see the Liberal Party tackle the new Government on the basis of their competence and financial management skills – both areas of considerable brand strength for the previous Howard Government with which Tony Abbott is closely connected in the public mind. Abbott will also need to consider recalibrating his style – his action-man style may have been sound with Kevin Rudd as a foil but will less effective with PM Gillard.
Gillard on the other hand will do well to focus on traditional Labor strengths of being on the side of ‘the little guy’ understanding the situation that working people find themselves in and doing what they can to ensure they get a fair go. Gillard’s warmth and genuine people skills will contrast favourably with Rudd’s perceived attributes in these areas.
What will happen in the polls? Expect a (brief) honeymoon period for the new PM as the Labor vote finds its new level under new and more popular Leadership. Voter assessment of Gillard will likely correct itself from an initial high once voters reconcile their hopes for change in the way the Government is doing business with the month to month reality of a new Gillard.
When it comes to popular support there are both swings and roundabouts to holding the top job and while PM Gillard will be given many more opportunities to define herself as the incumbent (and past Deputy) there are plenty of political sh*tstorms you have to weather from the front as Leader.
Julia Gillard’s path to the Prime Ministership has been a conventional rise through the ranks of Australian left-wing politics.
Now 48, Gillard was born in Barry, Wales and migrated to Australia with her family in 1966. They settled in Adelaide and she attended the Unley High School before going on to study Arts and Law, first at The University of Adelaide and then The University of Melbourne. This is where Gillard’s involvement in organised politics began – in 1983 she served a term as National President of the Australian Union of Students and was also Secretary of left wing organisation the Socialist Forum.
Following university, Gillard worked as a solicitor with the law firm Slater and Gordon, becoming the first woman to be appointed a partner of the firm in 1990.
In May 1996, she was appointed Chief of Staff to the then Victorian Opposition Leader and current State Premier, John Brumby – a position she held for two and a half years.
Gillard was elected to Federal Parliament in 1998 for the outer metropolitan Melbourne seat of Lalor, a safe seat for the ALP.
She was first appointed to the Shadow Ministry in November 2001 where she held a range of portfolios. In December 2006, Gillard joined with Kevin Rudd to successfully challenge Kim Beazley and Jenny Macklin for the Leadership and Deputy Leadership positions. She was elected unopposed as Deputy Leader and appointed Shadow Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations and Social Inclusion.
Following the 2007 Federal Election, Julia Gillard became Australia’s first female Deputy Prime Minister after proving herself to both the Party and the electorate by handling one of the primary battlegrounds in recent political history – industrial relations.
Preferring not to take on the treasury portfolio, Gillard instead took on the “super ministry” of education, employment, workplace relations and social inclusion. Her priorities have included the implementation of several key election mandates, including disbanding of the Howard Government’s WorkChoices regime, replacing it with Fair Work Australia, and implementing the “Education Revolution”.
Gillard belongs to the ALP’s left faction and is well liked within caucus where she is regarded as an extremely hard working and politically astute. She has long been considered one of the Labor Party’s most promising talents. Critically, she is the Labor’s best parliamentary performer.
Gillard lives in the Melbourne suburb of Altona with her partner, Tim Matheson, a hairdresser.
