It’s been a funny century for the marketing and communications industry: the rise of holding groups, consolidation, startups, digital disruption, even a pandemic, the effects of which we cannot yet even begin to analyse let alone understand. In the tumultuous 20 years so far, many names have come and gone. Once-mighty agencies have been subsumed […]
Clearly the cost of the pandemic has been enormous and at some point it will have to be paid for. The most likely source of funds will be higher taxes and, whilst the current UK government is very reluctant to hit people directly in their pockets, the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, has been making noises that […]
Back in the summer, Q magazine closed. If you’re of a certain age, or have more than just a passing interest in music, you’ll remember Q in its pomp. It was launched in 1986, a product of the publisher EMAP’s can-do culture and devolved management style (of which more in just a second). Q’s decline […]
Advertising is, they say, a people business: Saatchi & Saatchi; J Walter Thompson; Ogilvy & Mather; Abbot Mead Vickers; Doyle, Dane Bernbach. Historically it was all about the name(s) on the door. Many ad agencies were built in the image of one man – back then sadly they were always men – or a couple […]
Pre-lockdown there was already a strong case for companies to lead their strategy with digital and tech-driven activity, and the Covid-19 pandemic has only served to accelerate this. Green Square’s Barry Dudley weighs in on how companies can plan for the long-term in light of this, by finding an ‘ology’ of their own. For those […]
Who’d be in retail right now? While online vendors such as Amazon prosper (at the time of writing, the company is making $10,000 worth of sales a second), times for ‘brick and mortar’ shops have been – to put it mildly – torrid these past few years. Now, with the world enveloped in a Covid-19 […]
As the world faces its gravest crisis since the second world war and the Great Depression, it is inevitable that our attention will focus on behaviour – of all sorts. Since the Covid-19 pandemic affects just about everyone, will impact every corner and sector of every economy around the world; and because the disease occupies […]
There is no need to write an introduction explaining why I’ve pulled together this piece with my team at Green Square. What we have done is gather our thoughts and learnings, and put them together with the experience of various peers in the industry who have been through dark times before. We hope that what […]
What’s next for beleaguered M&C Saatchi is the question now being asked after the resignation of the agency’s co-founder and three fellow directors in a shock move many have described as a “sad” ending to the advertising mogul’s career. Yesterday (10 December) Lord Maurice Saatchi resigned from the agency alongside board directors Lord Michael Dobbs, Sir Michael […]
One of the biggest talking points in our industry over the past few months has been what might colloquially be termed a “cock-up in the accounts department” over at M&C Saatchi. To recap: back in August, it was announced the AIM-listed indie network’s auditors, KPMG, had raised concerns regarding accounting controls following an audit review. […]