Mumbrellacast

South Australian Tourism Commission (SATC) executive director of marketing, Brent Hill, was recently announced chief executive officer of Tourism Fiji. Before he joins Fiji’s National Tourism Office, where he will replace former CEO Matt Stoeckel, he joins Mumbrella’s head of content Damian Francis to reflect on his time at the SATC, dealing with being in a tourism role in the age of coronavirus, as well as what he’s looking forward to in his new role. One of the campaigns Hill is best known for is the ‘Old Mate’ campaign, which attracted widespread controversy and criticism over its tone. The spot features a sad old man seemingly regretting not having more fun in Adelaide in his younger years. Hill says he doesn’t regret the campaign, but admits he would change how the release and the communications were handled at the time.

This week the Australian Government released two COVID-19 vaccine campaigns aimed at increasing the rates of vaccination in Australia. The primary campaign, created by BMF, urged Australians to ‘arm yourself’ against COVID-19. Another featured a young woman in hospital suffering from COVID and was first rolled out in Sydney where cases are high and lockdowns have been extended. The team analyses both campaigns, and asks: does the government need a chief marketing office (CMO)? Nine announced on Tuesday that Chris Janz, one of the key players in the revitalisation of Fairfax (now part of Nine), is departing the media organisation. So what legacy does Janz leave Nine, and how will the organisation replace him? This week has seen significant moves and departures in the media and marketing industry. The Mumbrella team runs the rule over some of the key changes, and what they mean for the industry. Plus, The Brag Media CEO Luke Girgis joins Zanda Wilson for a chat about keeping on-top-of a rapidly expanding bus

Siimon Reynolds became an industry personality for being the creative brains behind the 1987 ‘Grim Reaper’ advertising campaign, which warned the public of the growing threat of HIV and AIDS. He later went on to co-found Photon Group, now Enero (which owns BMF, the agency responsible for the Federal Government’s vaccine campaign), and recently returned to Australia after several years in the US. Reynolds, who is now the director of Accelerator, which has since rebranded as DPR&Co, recently joined e-commerce start-up BuyersCircle as chairman. In this episode of the Mumbrellacast he speaks with Mumbrella co-founder and editor-at-large, Tim Burrowes, about what BuyersCircle is, why he's back in Australia, and what's next on the agenda for the rest of 2021. During the chat, which took place before the Government released its new COVID-19 messaging, Burrowes also asks Reynolds how he would tackle the communications challenge of overcoming Australians’ confusion and hesitancy about taking COVID vaccines.

This week’s radio ratings saw an historic result in Sydney, with KIIS FM’s Kyle and Jackie O taking the title of the #1 breakfast show, breaking a 17-year streak held by 2GB’s Alan Jones and more recently, Ben Fordham. So what does the result mean for the media and marketing industry? The team dives into the latest GfK ratings survey, bringing perspectives from media buyers on all five metro markets, as we wonder: are the radio ratings really just one big confidence trick? QMS won Australia’s latest out-of-home advertising account, the City of Sydney, in 2020, but the changeover from JC Decaux’s existing assets to the new QMS street furniture has been delayed again. This time, QMS cited mitigation against potential delays of shipping new assets due to COVID-19, with September now the date for the changeover to begin. So what will the new assets look like, and what will the proposition for advertisers be once QMS’ gets its infrastructure in? Finally, Optus Sport’s VP of TV, content, and product development,

This week’s long-form Mumbrellacast episode is something of a farewell, as departing founder and editor-at-large Tim Burrowes joins head of content Damian Francis to chat about his book, Media Unmade and spending more than a decade leading Mumbrella. Burrowes, who will leave the company he began in 2008 at month’s end, dives into the process of research and the extensive amount of interviews he conducted to create a patchwork of interlinked stories about the last decade in the media and marketing industry. With the full title of the book being ‘Media Unmade: Australian Media’s Most Disruptive Decade’, Burrowes admits that while every decade feels like the most disruptive, the 2010s and years surrounding genuinely saw several of the biggest shifts in Australian media history. As well as going behind the process of writing the book, and sharing anecdotes from the past decade, Burrowes looks ahead to the next ten years and predicts what is likely to drive change moving forward. Burrowes also recounts the hig

Stan Sport has added a third sport to its content slate, announcing a multi-year partnership with football’s Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) to broadcast the Champions League and associated competitions. The news follows several recent rights deals for different football competitions snapped up by streaming services, as the sport fragments further. So what does it mean for Stan Sport, and what are the implications for the wider sports broadcasting landscape in Australia? 2021 has seen many brands jump on the LGBTQI+ bandwagon, with 'rainbow washing' of logos and branding becoming more and more popular. In a preview of his feature on the topic, Calum Jaspan brings perspectives from Opr and Ogilvy Health CEO Richard Brett, and Getty Images and Istock head of creative insights Asia Pacific, Kate Rouke, about the mistakes brands make when it comes to rainbow washing, and why brands need to go beyond the rainbow and actually do something meaningful. As a new financial year begins, the team looked

Paul Cowan, former leading ad-man in the UK, now turned client-agency consultant, joins the Mumbrellacast to talk about some of the mistakes still being made in the account relationship, and how to fix them. Over the course of the interview, Cowan touches on several chapters covered in his new book, 'Connecting with Clients', such as the optimism bias with which 'problem accounts' are viewed, as well as 'the forced relationship' which can be the cause of tension in the client-agency relationship. Cowan's time within agencies, and then working externally to pinpoint and solve some of the internal issues that crop up within these volatile relationships, gives him a unique perspective on how the industry has changed over the past few decades. The conversation also covers Cowan's views on how Covid has changed the momentum of the industry, whether creativity can be sparked from remote working, and what he would tell himself, were he starting out now.

It’s been a big week of movements in the media and marketing industry, with some key departures across the board. Leo Burnett CEO Melinda Geertz has announced her departure, and she'll be replaced by recently installed Sydney CEO Emma Montgomery. Meanwhile, Nikki Warburton has left the CMO role at Audi. The team dissects these key moves and what they mean for the wider industry. With the Olympics now less than a month away, the Australian Olympic Committee launched a new campaign with M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment encouraging kids to ‘Have A Go’. Meanwhile, Seven revealed the details of its ‘Favourite Ad Of The Games Campaign’, a contest aimed at creatives with a $1 million prize pool worth of spend across major Seven sporting events up for grabs. Trust and transparency are the traditional factors when choosing to go with an independent agency over larger, holding company-owned agencies. But with the establishment of the IMAA (Independent Media Association of Australia), and more direct digital media bu

VaynerMedia recently opened its doors in Australia under the watchful eye of business director Amy Bradshaw, who has been charged with getting Gary Vaynerchuk's marketing agency off the ground locally. Bradshaw has worked for VaynerMedia since 2017, in New York and London, and so her move to Australia presented a perfect opportunity to fulfill Vaynerchuk's previous assertions that it would only be a matter of time before the business was in operation here. In this chat with Mumbrella's Damian Francis, Bradshaw speaks about the disconnect between media and creative in many marketing agencies, and suggests that while some holding companies today are merging companies that offer media and creative, it's not the same as a truly integrated offering. She says that's why VaynerMedia's seamless integration of the two sides of its business will make it an effective agency in today's marketing landscape. Bradshaw admits there is pressure and expectation on entering a market that is crowded, hyper-competitive and qui

iSentia is set to be taken over by Access Intelligence, after 12 months of the falling share prices for the media monitoring company. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions provider Access Intelligence will acquire 100% of the share capital in Isentia it does not already own at a price of A$0.175 a share. The team breaks down what this means for both iSentia and Access Intelligence customers, and what the takeover means for iSentia CEO Ed Harrison. Seven West Media has released a trading update, highlighting positive trading conditions in the fourth quarter of FY21, predicting that its digital earnings will double in FY22. Managing director and CEO James Warburton praised the company for making it through the "risky" part of its early-year slate. So, what should audiences expect from Seven for the rest of the year, and why is the network now expecting more 7Plus users by the time the Olympics rolls around than it originally anticipated? Plus, Zanda Wilson provides a brief rundown of today's virtual upfront

Marketers need to stop allowing their brands to pander to purpose, chief marketing and technology officer for Koala, Peter Sloterdyk, has told the Mumbrellacast. Speaking to Mumbrella’s head of content, Damian Francis during Pride Month, Sloterdyk delivered a strong opinion on the growing regularity of brands attaching themselves to causes, particularly when it is without the necessary thought required to do justice to the strategy. Sloterdyk spoke to Francis for the Mumbrellacast over 45 minutes in a wide-ranging interview that touched on running the marketing for one of Australia’s most well-known startups from the other side of the world (Denver, Colorado), taking on the leadership of the technology side of the business as well as marketing, and toning down some of the messaging in order to appeal to a wider market while not losing the Koala authenticity.

Game one of the 2021 State Of Origin series showed a significant recovery in audience when compared with 2020’s first clash, with 1.911 million viewers across metro markets, making it the top-rating program of the year to date. So how did the first clash of the series compare to ratings from previous years, what impact is 9Now having on audience numbers, and what do media buyers think about it all? This week Hearst Magazines International announced that Harper’s Bazaar will relaunch its iconic glossy magazine in Australia. The debut issue of Harper’s Bazaar Australia, a special collector’s edition, will hit newsstands in September 2021. It has since been revealed that Eugenie Kelly will again take the helm as editor-in-chief. The team discusses whether magazines are really viable option in 2021 amid a declining print market. Independent agency Howatson + White has announced a string of appointments across both its Melbourne and Sydney offices. The appointments total 14 and include hires in the creative and

Former Dollar Shave Club VP and executive creative, Matt Knapp, is the latest guest on Mumbrella’s new weekly standalone interview series, and joins Damian Francis this week for an extended chat. In it, Knapp chats about pulling the pin on his US adventure when COVID hit hard in April 2020, and how he came to the decision to move back to Australia a year earlier than planned. He speaks about a desire to do new things beyond “worrying about how to sell razors”, and how that drove him to spread his wings beyond Dollar Shave Club, though he continues to freelance for the company and says he still has a lot of love for the brand.

The third GfK radio ratings of 2021 dropped this week, with Sydney providing the most noteworthy movers as 2GB continued its downward trajectory. Breakfast host Ben Fordham lost share too and now sits just above the ABC and KIIS 106.5's Kyle and Jackie O, who set their own personal best record share this book. Can Fordham hold on to #1 or will 2GB lose its grip on the position that Alan Jones held for almost two full decades? Interpublic Group has sold a majority of its stake in Australian creative agency 303 MullenLowe and a minority of its stake in sister media agency Mediahub, as revealed by Mumbrella. The purchaser is the fast-growing New Zealand-based holding company Attivo, which is led by Cam Murchison, a former Ogilvy and DDB executive. The Mumbrella team breaks down the implications of the move for IPG and how Attivo got the deal over the line. Industry stalwart Brent Hill has resigned from his position with the South Australian Tourism Commission (SATC), having joined the body in 2015. The SATC ha

Christian O'Connell was the host of a #1 national breakfast show in the UK before Australian Radio Network took a punt on bringing him to Melbourne's GOLD FM - a move that has paid dividends. In this chat with Mumbrella's Tim Burrowes, O'Connell goes behind the stories contained his new book 'No One Listens To Your Dad's Radio Show', to talk about the move itself, the impact on his family, and more.

This week Facebook Australia has reported that its 2020 advertising revenue collected in Australia was $712.66 million, up $3.2 million on the prior year. Only $155.34 million is taxable, however, with that figure down from $167.1 million in 2019. So how is Facebook able to take in more revenue but pay less in tax? A near-two year saga around the rights to Australia’s premier football competition came to a close this week when ViacomCBS signed a five-year deal with the Australian Professional Leagues (APL) to broadcast the A-League and W-League on Network Ten and also new streaming service Paramount+. The platform will launch on 11 August, so will football fans in Australia sign up to Paramount+ for $8.99 a month, and will it prove to be worth the reported $200 million investment from ViacomCBS? Clemenger Group is set to give staff who had a temporary pay reduction in 2020 and earn less than $200,000 a 5% pay increase, Mumbrella revealed this week. The decision to give staff the increased pay, to be paid mo

Media monitoring company iSentia has made six redundancies and a number of staff changes to its commercial team as its share price and market value plummet. While the share price recovered slightly today, iSentia has had a tough time of it recently, having suffered a cyber attack in late 2020 which saw its financial revenue for the first half of the financial year suffer. So what does iSentia need to do to succeed, and is Ed Harrison the right person to lead the company forward? It was a week of developments in the world of paid streaming services, with Amazon Prime Video holding a showcase event and announcing a stack of new and original Australian content, while Network Ten owner Viacom CBS revealed it will launch Paramount+ in Australia to replace Ten All Access. The Mumbrella team breaks down the state of play among Subscription Video On Demand services at current and looks ahead to the rest of 2020 including where the A-League rights are going, and how anti-siphoning laws may be affecting new players en

The global pandemic had a significant impact on the Australian media and marketing industry, with many businesses forced to put staff on reduced hours and/or reduce pay on a temporary basis. Mumbrella was recently contacted by a group of “disheartened and angry” staff from Clemenger Group who voiced their frustrations at salary cuts, forced leave, and redundancies, particularly in light of the company going on to post a healthy profit for the 2020 calendar year. So should profit always the most important goal of a business, and how do you balance the needs of a business with the needs of staff? Coles announced this week that Samantha McLeod will join its marketing team as general manager of brand, digital and design, returning from the UK in September for the role. It follows the announcement that GroupM is bringing Seb Rennie back from Canada to be its CIO in Australia. The two are the latest in a steady stream of Aussies returning for executive roles in media and marketing, so is it just a COVID thing? And

Verizon announced the sale of Verizon Media this week, with private equity firm Apollo Global Management Inc. for US$5 billion. The company will go forward under the name Yahoo with Verizon retaining a 10% stake in the company. The team looks at how the deal may affect the company's Australian outpost, led by Paul Sigaloff, as well as what it means for the future of telcos trying to become media companies, and vice versa. Things are looking up for the Australian ad industry, with Standard Media Index reporting an upward turn in spend for the month of March and a surge in forward bookings for April. So which sectors are looking rosy going into the rest of the year, and how do you measure ad spend year-on-year when looking at a lockdown-punctuated 2020? Also this week, Seven West Media became the latest publisher to ink payment deals with Google and Facebook, thanks to the introduction of the News Media Bargaining code. The team analyses the ins and outs of the agreements, and other recent deals, and Tim Burr

This week Apple deployed iOS14.5 - a relatively standard operation for Apple when it comes to its update schedule for iPhones. But this one had some big ramifications for the media and marketing industry. The new operating system included Apple’s App Tracking Transparency updates that significantly change the relationship between users and the apps they use. The Mumbrellacast team dives into the implications for customers, as well as for advertisers. The game of musical chairs at WPP and GroupM continued this week, when news broke that MediaCom AUNZ CEO Willie Pang is stepping away from the agency to take a broader role across GroupM as managing director of GroupM services. Pang’s appointment follows the March departure of GroupM’s local CEO Mark Lollback, and with the search for the CEO is still underway, what's WWP's next move likely to be? Plus, Sunrise Weatherman Sam Mac jones a rare club of repeat guests on the Mumbrellacast, as he chats with Tim Burrowes to chat about his new book Accidental Weatherma