Initiative (agency)

Last updated
Initiative
Industry Advertising, Marketing
Founded1970
Headquarters
New York, NY
Number of locations
Worldwide
Key people
Dimitri Maex, Global CEO
Stacy DeRiso, US CEO [1]
ServicesMedia planning and buying
Parent Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG)
Website initiative.com

Initiative is a global media planning and buying agency that is part of IPG Mediabrands, the media buying arm of multinational holding company Interpublic Group of Companies. [2] Initiative's roots date back to 1970. [3]

Contents

The company is based in New York, NY, with additional offices worldwide. [4] Dimitri Maex is the company's Global CEO, and Stacy DeRiso is US CEO. [1]

The company is famous for their innovative marketing framework Fame & Flow, and for winning double Agency of the Year Awards in 2023 from AdAge and Adweek. [1]

History

One of the two main predecessors of Initiative, Western International Media, was founded in 1970 by Dennis Holt. It was one of the first agencies dedicated exclusively to media buying. [3]

In 1986, Western International Media won The Walt Disney Company account, a watershed moment in its history. [3] It would keep the account until 2001. [5]

In 1994, the company was acquired by Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG). [3]

In 1998, IPG combined Western International Media of Los Angeles with IPG's European media buying network, Paris-based Initiative Media Worldwide. The new combined agency was called Western Initiative Media Worldwide. [6] The NY Times reported at the time that the new entity would have 75 offices in 35 countries, and handled an estimated $10 billion in billings, making it the largest media buying agency in the world. [7] The company's US business was managed out of Los Angeles, and the international operations were managed out of Paris. [7]

In February 2000, the company changed its name to Initiative Media. [8] In July, Initiative Media acquired PIC TV, at the time the largest source of promotional TV advertising spots in the United States. [9]

In January 2017, IPG merged its third largest media buying network, Brand Programming Network (BPN), with Initiative Media, which was at the time IPG's second largest media buying network. [2] In November, ecommerce company Amazon selected Initiative to manage global media planning and buying for Amazon's ecommerce hub, tech products and Amazon Prime subscription services. [10] Also in November, Danish toy company The Lego Group selected Initiative as its global media agency. [11]

In April 2018, Amazon also awarded its Amazon Studios business to Initiative. [12]

In February 2019, Initiative was named as the media agency for gaming company Nintendo. [13] Also in February, the agency was named trade publication AdWeek's Media Agency of the year. [14] In April, trade publication Ad Age named Initiative its comeback agency of the year. [15]

Global offices

Initiative is based in New York City, and holds additional offices in North America, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. [4]

Clients

Initiative's media buying clients over the years have included Amazon, Walt Disney Company, The Lego Group and Nintendo. [12] [3] [11] [13]

Cultural velocity

The agency created the concept of "cultural velocity", a measure of cultural relevance that refers to the speed with which the agency's customers respond and react to cultural data, in order to remain relevant to consumers and improve sales. [16]

Related Research Articles

LiveRamp Holdings, Inc., is a San Francisco, California-based SaaS company that offers a data connectivity platform whose services include data onboarding, the transfer of offline data online for marketing purposes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Interpublic Group of Companies</span> Advertising company

The Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc. (IPG) is an American publicly traded advertising company. The company consists of five major networks: FCB, IPG Mediabrands, McCann Worldgroup, MullenLowe Group, and Marketing Specialists, as well as several independent specialty agencies in the areas of public relations, sports marketing, talent representation, and healthcare. It is one of the "Big Four" agency companies, alongside WPP, Publicis and Omnicom. Phillippe Krakowsky became the company's CEO on January 1, 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FCB (advertising agency)</span> Global advertising agency network

Foote, Cone & Belding (FCB), is one of the largest global advertising agency networks. It is owned by Interpublic Group and was merged in 2006 with Draft Worldwide, adopting the name Draftfcb. In 2014 the company rebranded itself as FCB.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hill Holliday</span> Marketing and communications agency

Hill Holliday (HH) is a marketing and communications agency based in Boston, Massachusetts with offices in New York City and Greenville, South Carolina. It is the 17th largest advertising agency in the U.S. and is part of the world's third-largest advertising and marketing conglomerate, IPG.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MullenLowe U.S.</span> Boston-based advertising and marketing communications agency

MullenLowe U.S. is a Boston, Massachusetts-based advertising and marketing communications agency, a part of MullenLowe Group owned by multinational advertising network Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG). It has regional offices in Los Angeles, New York City and Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The agency provides creative, media, brand planning, direct-marketing, interactive, design, and public relations.

Weber Shandwick is a marketing communications firm formed in 2001 by merging the Weber Group, Shandwick International and BSMG. The company is part of global agency network Interpublic Group (IPG), as part of the parent company's IPG DXTRA operating division.

Campbell Ewald is an advertising and marketing communications agency headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, with offices in Los Angeles and New York. Campbell Ewald is part of advertising company Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG).

Deutsch NY, formerly Deutsch Inc. is an American ad agency headquartered in New York City. The agency was founded by David Deutsch in 1969 as David Deutsch Associates, Inc. In 1989, the company name changed to Deutsch Inc. when Deutsch's son, Donny Deutsch, took over the agency.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Larry Weber</span>

Larry Weber is an American entrepreneur and the founder, chairman & CEO of Racepoint Global, a communications agency headquartered in Boston, MA. He has served as CEO of both mid-and large-scale companies, and has founded several other public relations and interactive marketing agencies including The Weber Group, ThunderHouse and W2. His clients have included AT&T, Boston Scientific, Coca-Cola, Deere, General Electric, General Motors, IBM, Kaiser Permanente, Lotus, Microsoft, Panasonic, SAP, and Verizon Wireless.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rogers & Cowan</span> American marketing and public relations agency

Rogers & Cowan is a global marketing and public relations agency. A division of the Interpublic Group of Companies, the company is based in Los Angeles, with offices in New York, Miami, and London.

MRM is a global direct and digital marketing agency. MRM stands for McCann Relationship Marketing. It is part of McCann Worldgroup within The Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG), one of the Big Four marketing firms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Universal McCann</span>

Universal McCann (UM) is an international media and advertising agency. UM is a member of Interpublic Group, operating under the IPG Mediabrands branch. Some of its regional offices are known as Universal Media rather than Universal McCann but are still generally all known as UM.

Samba TV is a television technology company that offers real-time insights and audience analytics. It was founded in 2008 by early employees of BitTorrent, including Samba TV's current chief executive officer, Ashwin Navin. The company develops software for televisions, set-top boxes, smart phones and tablets to enable interactive television through personalization. Through its portfolio of applications and TV platform technologies, Samba TV is built directly into the TV or set-top box and will recognize onscreen content—live or time-shifted—and make relevant information available to users at their request. The service is available only after a user activates it on a device, and is supported by interest-based advertising delivered on the television or on devices within the household. Through APIs and SDKs for mobile application software developers, Samba TV is usable on a second screen or the TV itself. Samba TV has a global addressable footprint of 46 million devices globally, 28 million of which are in the United States. Its devices are distributed in roughly 118 countries.

Huge (digital agency) American design and marketing company

Huge is a creative growth acceleration company, founded in Dumbo, Brooklyn, in 1999.

The Martin Agency is an American advertising agency based in Richmond, Virginia, that is part of the Interpublic Group of Companies. The company's chief executive officer is Kristen Cavallo.

Carter Murray is an investor and public speaker and formerly chief executive officer of FCB, one of the world’s largest global advertising agency networks. On March 6, 2013, holding company parent Interpublic Group (IPG) announced that Murray would become CEO of Draftfcb. Murray officially joined the agency in his new role on Sept. 9, 2013. Based in New York, he oversees the agency’s 120 offices in 80 countries. Previously, Murray served as president and CEO of Young & Rubicam’s (Y&R) North American operations. He also served as a member of the Global Y&R Executive Committee.

Shashi Sinha is an Indian executive who is the current CEO of the Indian arm of advertising company IPG. He is heading all the three media agencies of IPG in India namely, Lodestar, Initiative and BPN.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MullenLowe Global</span> Marketing communications company

MullenLowe Global, formerly MullenLowe Group, is a marketing communications company headquartered in London. It is a part of the Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG).

Acxiom is a Conway, Arkansas-based database marketing company. The company collects, analyzes and sells customer and business information used for targeted advertising campaigns. The company was formed in 2018 when Acxiom Corporation spun off its Acxiom Marketing Services (AMS) division to global advertising network Interpublic Group of Companies.

Mediahub, formerly known as MullenLowe Mediahub, is a global media planning and buying agency. It is part of the IPG Mediabrands advertising network, itself a component of multinational advertising and marketing company Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG). Launched in 2005 as part of MullenLowe Group's predecessor Mullen, Mediahub has offices in 15 cities worldwide as of 2021.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "IPG Mediabrands Names Dimitri Maex Global CEO of Initiative". businesswire.com. 2022-04-19. Retrieved 2022-04-19.
  2. 1 2 "IPG Mediabrands to Fold BPN Worldwide into Initiative". adweek.com. 2017-01-06. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 "Media Buying and Planning: Western International Continues as Media Leader: Burgeoning Media Industry Vindicates Holt's Novel Idea". adage.com. 1998-08-03. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  4. 1 2 "Company Overview of Initiative Media Inc". bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2019-02-20.
  5. ↑ "Initiative Withdraws From Disney Review". adweek.com. 2001-12-20. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  6. ↑ "IPG Mediabrands to Fold BPN Worldwide into Initiative". Los Angeles Times . 1998-10-06. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  7. 1 2 "THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING -- ADDENDA; Interpublic Combines 2 Media Service Units". The New York Times . 1998-10-08. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  8. ↑ "Western Initiative Media announces a new name". adage.com. 2000-02-21. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  9. ↑ "Initiative Buys PIC TV". adweek.com. 2000-07-17. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  10. ↑ "Amazon Consolidates Its $1 Billion-Plus Global Media Buying Business With IPG Mediabrands". adweek.com. 2017-11-01. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  11. 1 2 "A 'Digital-First' Agency for an Analog Toy: Lego Taps Initiative for Global Media". adage.com. 2017-11-27. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  12. 1 2 "Initiative L.A. Wins Amazon Studios Media Business as IPG Consolidates the Larger Amazon Account". adweek.com. 2018-04-12. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  13. 1 2 "Nintendo taps Initiative as media agency in the U.S." adweek.com. 2019-02-12. Retrieved 2019-02-19.
  14. ↑ "Inside U.S. Media Agency of the Year Initiative's Remarkable 2018 Turnaround". adweek.com. 2019-02-24. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
  15. ↑ "Ad Age 2019 Comeback Agency of the Year: Initiative". adage.com. 2019-04-15. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
  16. ↑ "The kids are all right: Gen X rules Initiative's reverse upfront". adage.com. 2019-04-17. Retrieved 2019-05-29.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.