Tag: TBWA\

Singapore – TBWA\Media Arts Lab, the Los Angeles-headquartered creative agency solely dedicated to Apple, has named a new executive creative director for the Asia-Pacific region, Kenny Blumenschein. Blumenschein was most recently from advertising agency Energy BBDO, and before that, worked for Facebook as its creative strategist for the Greater China Region for almost three years.

TBWA\Media Arts Lab currently operates in 25 markets globally, with five regional hubs outside its HQ—London, Miami, Singapore, Shanghai, and Tokyo. The agency solely creates work for the tech and smartphone giant Apple.

As the new ECD for APAC, Blumenschein will be based out of the Singapore hub and will be partnering with Managing Director, Michaela Futcher and reporting into Global Chief Creative Officer, Brent Anderson.

At Energy BBDO, Blumenschein held the same role of ECD alongside being the agency’s senior vice president. During his time there, he notably worked on the award-winning Wrigley’s ‘For when it’s time’ campaign. Meanwhile, at Facebook, he assisted global brands in crafting their stories and reaching business objectives through Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, according to his LinkedIn.

Blumenschein said that joining Media Arts Lab is a no-brainer as he always had a ‘crush’ on the agency.

“It’s a very rare opportunity to work on such an iconic brand with the smartest and nicest people in our industry. To do this in APAC, which is one of the most diverse, fastest-growing, and exciting regions is a further privilege,” he said.

Blumenschein is of Thai and German descent. He has amassed experience across multiple continents, including Europe, North America, and Asia, bringing with him valuable global perspective to his work. Aside from his most recent roles at Energy BBDO and Facebook, he also previously held posts at Ogilvy as ECD Digital & Content, and as head of creative at VMLY&R. Back in Germany, Kenny has also spent time at BBDO and Isobar.

In the new role, he will be working with teams stretching across the APAC, from India to Australia, to develop business building and culture-defining work for one of the world’s most recognizable global brands.

Futcher commented, “This part of the world couldn’t be more important to us, and ensuring that we have the creative firepower to deliver on our ambitions has been a critical focus. I’m so excited to have found someone of Kenny’s creative caliber, humanity, and experience to help us do that. His background as a ‘cultural chameleon’ is critical to us unlocking the diverse opportunities across a region as vast as APAC.”

Meanwhile, Anderson said, “Kenny is a strategic, innovative, and artful creative leader with great instincts and taste. He’s led dynamic, modern teams across agencies both in Asia and North America. He’s spearheaded cultural, integrated work that breaks through for challenging clients. Kenny is a creative soul with a reputation of mentoring, building atmospheres wherein creativity thrives and protecting great ideas.”

Hong Kong – TBWA\Hong Kong has launched its commerce offering TBWA\Commerce, in partnership with sister agency The Integer Group, the commerce agency headquartered in the U.S. and a key member of Omnicom Commerce Group.

Integer is a leading commerce agency focused on driving business growth results and opportunities through retail marketing, e-commerce & social commerce, connected commerce media, and brand communications & activation, as well as retail experience design, and technology & innovation. The agency’s clients include world-leading brands like AT&T, FedEx, Frito-Lay, Michelin, Nestlé, P&G, PepsiCo, and Starbucks.

TBWA\Commerce will leverage Integer’s e-commerce expertise to center its offering around e-retail, specifically on HKTVMall, Hong Kong’s online shopping platform. 

Jan Cho, TBWA\Hong Kong’s managing director, commented that surprisingly, the e-commerce landscape in Hong Kong is less advanced than most developed countries because of its prolific and highly concentrated retail presence, which previously provided the unchallenged shopping convenience.

“But Covid upended the landscape and gave rise to a late, yet rapid e-comm boom from direct to consumer (DTC), social commerce to marketplace,” Cho said.

According to the agency, HKTVMall is one platform that has benefited significantly with the marketplace’s Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) more than doubling to HK$5.95b or almost US$800m in just a year and which is still climbing.

The agency said that despite the speed in development, marketplace commerce remains an unfamiliar territory for many Hong Kong brands, and like most e-commerce platforms, HKTVMall has its own layers and set of rules that feel foreign to most marketers, which can initially be intimidating.

Anne Chan, the agency’s head of digital and commerce, said, “HKTVMall is a fantastic platform for brands. Its volume of traffic, diversity of customers, promotion support, and online-to-offline (O2O) presence are second to none in the region.”

Chan shares that they’ve spent a great deal of R&D time to understand the inner workings, hidden codes, and rules of the platform. Chan said they believed they’ve cracked the ‘codes’ with the help of Integer’s expertise and the suite of tools from HKTVMall.

Cho added, “We’ve tried and tested [the] methodologies we’ve developed with actual businesses on HKTVMall, which have proven to be very effective. We’re confident we can advise any marketers to boost conversion, and the impact would usually be seen in a matter of months.”

TBWA\Commerce sits alongside other specialized offerings to provide full-funnel support to brands, namely, Disruption\Consulting which is catered to data-led business planning, DxD or which stands for design & experience planning, and BOLT, the agency’s in-house film production. 

The commerce offering will pioneer in Hong Kong but planning for expansion across other APAC markets is already underway.

Terence Ling, head of strategy at TBWA\Hong Kong, commented, “We have made heavy investment of resources to develop this proprietary capability. Brands can take advantage of our unique experience and know-how leapfrogging the competition.”

Ling said that while the immediate focus is on HKTVMall, brands can access the agency’s ‘ePlaces’ offering to map their growth strategy across the digital ecosystem.

Mumbai, India – Most of the time, ad campaigns in the education sector focus on the children or students as part of their messaging. After all, they’re the main stakeholder of education providers, and parents as decision makers would want to know what the school has in store for them. 

One India-based EdTech solution provider, LEAD, which aims to disrupt the education landscape in the country is also breaking the norm when it comes to promoting educational services. 

In collaboration with creative agency TBWA\India, LEAD has released a TVC that puts the spotlight on parents rather than children. In the ad, we see a young mom and dad having an intimate conversation and baring their sentiments about harbored feelings of jealousy towards the wide exposure their child is getting, specifically through a LEAD Powered School. 

LEAD

LEAD, which has presence in over 400 districts in India, offers EdTech solutions for both parents and schools. For parents, it has developed a LEAD Parent-Student app where parents can monitor and accompany their children in learning sessions. The EdTech has also been partnering with schools to make their institutions ‘LEAD powered’ by integrating its innovative curriculum that puts a premium on English and coding skills. 

According to both TBWA\India and LEAD, parents’ view on the newer modes of academic instruction has long been an unexplored insight in communication. A progressive educational landscape inevitably requires progressive parenting and this poses a challenge to parents. 

LEAD’s CMO Anupam Gurani commented, “Growing up, I have witnessed how my parents wanted to provide me with better education but limited opportunities always posed a restriction. Now as a parent, I echo a similar feeling for my child. With our first ever PAN India campaign, we want to reach out to all those parents who are looking to provide better school education to their child but have felt constrained due to lack of options.” 

Gurani adds, “LEAD Powered Schools [solve this] by providing International standard education in small town India, which is our core market. The underlying thought of the campaign is based on a beautiful insight tapping the emotion of how every successive generation of parents wants to give more to their children and in the process learn from them.”

Furthermore, both the agency and LEAD said that the film reflects an often side-swept result of witnessing the significant shift to new ways of schooling and this is the adaptation of parents which at times bring to the surface their unfulfilled desire of the interactive and innovative methods in education that is present today.

“[This is] a clear departure from the old, lecture-based passive modes of teaching and learning that the parents were used to growing up,” both said in a press statement. 

The execution of the film was helmed by acclaimed Director Nitesh Tiwari and he commented, “The ad film captures a parents’ perspective of how a LEAD Powered School is imparting interactive and enriching education, both at school and at home. I admire the brand’s vision of transforming conventional schooling in India.”

Parixit Bhattacharya, the managing partner of TBWA\India, also candidly said, “We often joke about being jealous of our kids because of the exposure they have in a world that is markedly different from the time we were kids. Though universal rules of child rearing still apply, today’s parents are dealing with an entirely new playing field. And the pressure to choose wisely is heavy.”

Meanwhile, TBWA\India’s CEO Govind Pandey, commented, “LEAD has a noble social mission to provide excellence in education to all. This commercial recognizes the role of hardworking progressive parents in the middle India of tier 2 and tier 3 as the real heroes who despite the odds of their generation have made something of themselves and now have the exposure and the determination to know the difference the right school education can make and do not want to compromise in that. Even more so in these uncertain and turbulent times.”

Auckland, New Zealand – Creative agency TBWA\ New Zealand and financial institution Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) has launched a new campaign to promote its latest brand platform ‘We Do How’, a platform that aims to help improve the financial wellbeing of all New Zealanders by providing them with the resources, support, and products they need.

The 2-minute campaign, titled samely as ‘We Do How’, narrates the story of Ravi and Claire along with their two children Sameer and Tara Sharma. The first story shows the many ways Ravi and Claire set out to improve the financial wellbeing of their family, but that the heart of the story is about father and son as Sameer spends years working towards his dream of becoming a Black Cap, a New Zealand cricket team.

True to its message of ‘We Do How’, Sameer’s dedication in cricket and the persuasion he got from his father led him to an easy path of success, much like how ANZ provides an easy resource for New Zealanders to become more financially-savvy, as best reflected in their eagerness to remind that wealth is more about knowing they can pay for things to help their family thrive, according to an ANZ survey.

Speaking about the campaign, Shane Bradnick, chief creative officer at TBWA\ New Zealand, stated that they aimed that the story be a ‘universal one’ that we can all relate to about why people work hard in New Zealand and how people want their families to enjoy a better, happier life.

“It’s also a modern New Zealand story that reflects our diversity and how our love of family and a desire to help our kids succeed is a ‘why’ we can all understand. The Sharmas show us a range of ways to help us all start to improve our financial wellbeing and through them, we can see that if you have a ‘why’ then ANZ has the ‘how’,” Bradnick stated.

Meanwhile, Matt Pickering, general manager of marketing at ANZ, commented, “Kiwis want to improve their financial wellbeing, but often just don’t know where to start and so it’s the ‘how’ part that’s important. ANZ is committed to giving Kiwis the practical tools and know-how they need to do this, which is why we’ve set up our Financial Wellbeing Programme.”

ANZ has set up a six-step Financial Wellbeing Programme that is available to everyone, not just ANZ customers at anz.co.nz/financialwellbeing. The program starts with calculating a person’s financial well-being score and more than 22,000 Kiwis have already found out theirs.

The ‘We Do How’ campaign is currently rolled out on TV, digital, social, PR, OOH and in-branch. The company is also set to roll out a similar project internally for their staff called, ‘The Deck of How’, which is a deck of playing cards packed with financial well being ‘hows’, and also a digital book for its employees ‘The Book of How’ is also being produced.

Singapore – Advertising agency TBWA\ in Singapore, which dubs itself as ‘The Disruption Company’, has promoted its managing partner Mandy Wong to the role of managing director, with immediate effect.

Wong who took the managing partner position in early 2019, has been with the TBWA\ Collective since 2001, working out of Malaysia and Singapore. Mandy will continue to work in partnership with the executive management team and work directly with CEO Ara Hampartsoumian, to preside over all aspects of the agency business such as people management, financial planning, productivity, and operations.

In her previous role, the agency said that Wong has been pivotal to setting the standard for industry best practice in the Singapore arm’s transition to remote working and return-to-office protocol amid the coronavirus, propelling TBWA\Singapore to continue operations and maintain its optimum productivity. 

As the new managing director, Wong will continue to lead a critical task force for the agency’s Covid-19 protocol in addition to her responsibilities of overseeing client management among key stakeholders, brand management efficiency, effective resource management, and operations management to consistently improve the agency’s overall internal process.

“TBWA\ has always provided a uniquely nurturing environment which has supported me and enabled me to fulfill my ambition and career goals. I am incredibly proud of my journey and to have reached this milestone alongside mentors who inspire me every day,” said Wong. 

She added, “My focus is to now continue that legacy for the next generation of TBWA\ Singapore’s leaders.”

Wong started her career with TBWA\ Kuala Lumpur as an entry-level account executive on the global Tourism Malaysia business. In recognition of her exceptional work ethic and reputation over four years, Mandy relocated to TBWA\ Singapore as an account manager to manage another piece of global business – Standard Chartered.

After a decade of successfully managing the Standard Chartered brand across Asia, Middle East, and Africa, Wong was part of the winning pitch team on the Singapore Tourism Board business and led the agency team on the launch of Singapore’s new global destination brand and thereafter widely-acclaimed ‘Passion Made Possible’.

Hampartsoumian commented, “I’m incredibly proud to promote Mandy to the managing director role, one that she truly deserves given her monumental efforts and contributions to TBWA\ Singapore over the years. We’re lucky to have her on our humble pirate ship and look forward to her leadership and relentless energy as we propel ourselves into the next phase of ‘Disruption’.”