Originally posted on AdAge – OMD wins big with data-driven new business strategy
When Chrissie Hanson was named U.S. CEO of OMD in 2022, she told Ad Age she anticipated “a year to reset.”
That reset paid off last year, as OMD’s collection of data-powered tools increased the relevancy and efficiency of clients’ marketing—and led to a slew of new business wins and organic growth. The shift enabled OMD to climb Comvergence’s new business ranking from No. 10 in 2023 to second last year.
The ascension was fueled by multiple account wins during 2024, including Gap, AliExpress, MSC Cruises and Michelin, representing a collective $731.2 million in net new billings year over year. The shop lost only one account during the year, the $8 million Tropicana account. Meanwhile, OMD expanded its relationships with existing clients such as Disney, Apple and Wells Fargo, resulting in $10.2 million in revenue growth from the clients’ added services, according to the agency.
At the core of OMD’s success is the prioritization of not just identifying trends and cultural moments for marketers, but turning those into capabilities for clients, said Hanson. For example, OMD has adopted its parent group’s “agency as a platform” model, meaning it will curate the tools, technology and personnel from across its agency as well as Omnicom’s cross-network products for each client.
This approach was core to winning Gap’s media business in early 2024. For the retailer’s account, OMD designed a bespoke solution that integrates Omnicom’s culture, commerce and analytics tools with Gap’s own marketing capabilities, according to Burak Kurtun, executive VP, data and analytics officer, OMD U.S.
The terms “custom” and “integrated” are guiding stars for OMD’s leadership as it looks to differentiate itself from the competitive and crowded media agency marketplace, said Erin Kienast, chief operating officer at OMD U.S.
One product of this thinking is the Omnichannel Performance Engine, which provides 24-hour campaign performance reporting to clients. The Engine utilizes Omnicom’s central Omni data and intelligence technology as well as specialists who in tandem monitor a client’s media and its impact on daily sales.
In the case of Gap, “retail doesn’t sleep; people are shopping at all hours of the day, and so we also can’t be offline,” said Kienast. In building the Omnichannel Performance Engine, “what we really thought about was not just what’s going to win a pitch, but what is something that’s going to have a long-term impact and be a growth driver for not just Gap, but for our other retail accounts.”
OMD applied the same data-driven technology to State Farm’s 2024 Super Bowl ad, which topped the USA Today Ad Meter with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito’s clash over the pronunciation of “like a good neighbor.”
The Big Game spot’s rollout was modeled after a blockbuster release blitz with late night appearances, paparazzi snaps, red carpet, fan art, an IMDB page and a cliffhanger teaser before the Super Bowl. The campaign resulted in a 92% increase in brand recognition and 24 billion earned media impressions, according to the agency.
The strategy was based on OMD’s Q Cultural Intelligence Platform, which filters data from thousands of sources ranging from tweets to research to create identifiable elements of culture to strategize against. State Farm’s Super Bowl campaign was built around “near nostalgia,” or the craze for the stars and culture of the not-too-distant past.
The insight-into-practice ethos that led to the creation of these tools inspired OMD’s recent rebrand, featuring the tagline “We create what’s next.”
