M+C Saatchi has taken decisive steps to future-proof its media offering with the expansion of its Performance offering, media-neural proposition and the sunset of the Bohemia Brand.
Bobbie Gersbach, M+C Saatchi Performance’s global planning director, told Mediaweek: “We have had a lot of changes at a Group level globally, which always tends to have a knock-on effect throughout the different regions and Australia is included in that.
“There is a lot of change happening within M+C Saatchi internally, but I think that’s also a reflection of the changes that we’re seeing in the market with our clients and what they’re looking for as well.”
She explained that globally the Group have chosen to be “more integrated” and that there is a push to deliver on overall growth, whether that’s from creative services, consulting, PR or media.
“Our media services are now really focused on consulting, planning and strategy more so than the buying side of things.
“The move that we’ve made in terms of media has been to become more consolidated to become more consistent across markets by integrating performance with the rest of our business, rather than so much on some of the aspects of buying.”
Sunsets over Bohemia
M+C Saatchi sunsetting Bohemia marks the end of the offline media buying brand, which was only present in Australia since it was acquired in 2017.
Gersbach said that while the headcount was still in discussion, some staff would be affected by the end of Bohemia.
She noted that most of her team is based throughout the APAC region because of the M+C Saatchi global model.
Locally, she said there are only a few M+C Saatchi Performance team members but noted that will change as the Bohemia brand transitions out and grows, as and when they need to make hires in the future.
The retiring of Bohemia will also allow the Group to focus on delivering strategic value, differentiated client propositions, and long-term growth.
She explained that it strategically made sense for M+C Saatchi Performance to take the lead and that the priority would be to retain Bohemia’s capabilities and values.
“Essentially, we were already very much collaborating and partnering with Bohemia. We weren’t necessarily operating in our own individual silos between M+C Saatchi performance and Bohemia”
Immediate priorities and conversations at M+C Saatchi Performance
Gersbach noted that M+C Saatchi Performance is on a journey of becoming less siloed and more integrated with all parts of the M+C Saatchi.
“The group have allowed M+C Saatchi Performance, over time, to flourish under its own steam and carve out an area of capability that’s been quite different to what the group’s been able to deliver in the past.”
She explained that having more conversations with creative clients in Sydney and different regions on applying digital performance buying capabilities, growth thinking and tech products in development to add value to its clients.
“For me, the priority is being part of those conversations with our broader clients and educating all of our agency, internally and externally, the capabilities that we have on the media and growth planning side of things.”
The media-neutral model
Alongside M+C Saatchi Performance’s strategic media planning capabilities is its media-neutral model.
The new partner-led model will enable fast, high-quality deployment of consistent planning solutions in line with client expectations and the Group’s broader growth strategy.
Gersbach explained the model speaks to the lines between offline and online media blurring. She noted that while there has been a move away from traditional media, it’s not something M+C Saatchi Performance is looking to do.
“It still plays a part in the media ecosystem, but I think what we want to focus on is growing our capabilities from a strategy and planning perspective and helping clients to answer questions like when and how much I should be investing in traditional media rather than necessarily prioritizing, TV buying teams.”
“When we need that traditional media buying, execution resource will work on an agency village model basis.
“We want to prioritise the strategic data-driven planning angle and capability rather than necessarily traditional media buying, and we suspect that in the five years what we are calling offline or traditional media will be bought digitally anyway.”
Bridging global and local perspectives
Being in a global role and overseeing the Australian and New Zealand markets puts Gersbach in the position of seeing trends coming from Southeast Asia, the US and growth areas such as the Middle East.
She said there are similarities and differences in terms of what’s currently happening in the Australian media landscape.
“For example, in Southeast Asia, mobile behaviour is even stronger in terms of mobile commerce and app usage. That’s been our bread and butter as a media agency, the area where we’ve had our point of difference.
She explained that Southeast Asia has seen a huge amount of growth and progress in terms of the customer experience brands.
‘It’s an advantage to take those case studies and present them to our clients here in Australia, where perhaps the behaviour isn’t quite there yet. But if they can get ahead of that from a product perspective and land it first for their category, it gives them sort of a leg up.
“Although Australia is certainly its unique market with its unique dynamics, there’s a lot that we can learn from what’s happening, particularly from a mobile marketing, perspective elsewhere.”
Gersbach on M+C Saatchi Performance’s short- and long-term strategy
Looking ahead, Gersbach said the Group’s overarching strategy is “to play in the spaces where we do have a right to win”
“Our focus at the moment is to prioritize the types of clients and industries that we have seen a lot of traction and success in the past.
Typically, from a media perspective, that would be digital-first clients and clients that are also perhaps only just moving into digital in a meaningful way.
From a slightly longer view, she said the agency is keen to examine how they can help traditional clients add value to their planning, strategy, and overall marketing efforts with the data-led media and marketing products in development.
“So the short-term strategy is play to win. The longer-term strategy is to apply some of these new products that we’re building to a broader set of clients throughout the group.”
Top image: Bobbie Gersbach