Publicis Groupe has announced the acquisition of Mars United Commerce, an independent commerce marketing company. Mars and Publicis will aim to solve the challenge facing marketers of being able to activate in commerce, due to a fragmented ecosystem. This will be done via a connected commerce solution, enabling clients to plan and activate through the full marketing funnel. Features of the combination will include a fusing of Epsilon’s first-person identity data with Mars’ data on shoppers and shopping behaviour, Publicis Media’s scale being coupled with Mars’ understanding of retail organisations, and a merging of insights into ecommerce sales and operations from Publicis’ Profitero with Mars’ dataset on commerce media performance. Mars has more than 1,000 employees in 14 hubs around the world.
London gym group Gymbox has partnered with creative agency Pablo to create an out-of-home (OOH) activation challenge that encourages Londoners to workout. Pablo was tasked with bringing to life the gym’s philosophy of ‘Anything Goes’ – a belief that working out should be as fun as going out. In this spirit, Gymbox wanted to bring this to life by creating another way to make working out as fun as it can be with a new streetside challenge. Gymbox decided to turn billboards into a workout for passing Londoners. The OOH activation, ‘Start Line,’ features a start and finish line spread across two billboards, encouraging passers-by to challenge their mates, themselves, or anyone who’s up for it, to a 10-metre dash. The billboards are live for one week from 17 September just outside of Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium.
Publisher-powered social and influencer agency The Wild by Jungle has been appointed by gut health brand Symprove to boost its influencer marketing activity and drive sales within the UK. The Wild will adopt a bottom-funnel influencer marketing strategy by working with micro- and macro-influencers in the fitness and nutrition space on Instagram in the hope of empowering purchasing decisions and increase conversions. The campaign will target UK women primarily aged 35+ who are interested in gut health with potential plans to move into men’s health in the future. As part of the partnership, Symprove will have access to The Wild’s data-driven search and select tool, Pollinate. The tool uses a mixture of social media mapping, audience overlap, and affinity scoring to find the relevant influencers for brands to help reach new audiences and improve the impact of existing campaigns.
The Cotswold Company has launched a TV and BVOD campaign showcasing its handcrafted furniture and homeware range, along with the life that goes on around it. ‘The Company You Keep’ is created and produced by Supernova, the7stars in-house creative production studio. The 30-second film features a family enjoying their home life, as the audience taken on a journey from room to room. The TV ad is part of The Cotswold Company’s new brand platform ‘Made for Life,’ which was developed by the7stars and is based on The Cotswold Company’s brand values.
Imagination, a brand experience agency, has partnered with Steve Madden to a fashion show event experience in London. Wholesale/retail partners, media, and influencers from across Europe were invited to the ‘Sole Survivor’ event, where immersive theatre and interactive storytelling helped to create a game-like experience for guests. The game was brought to life through a custom-designed app. Guests experienced Madden’s story as ‘game levels’ through a series of connected moments that weave together physical and digital storytelling. Each ‘game level’ told a chapter of Madden’s life, as well as being related to a look from the FW24 collection.
Dunelm, a UK homewares retailer, has unveiled the latest iteration of its ‘Home of Homes’ campaign, ‘Easing Into Autumn’. The campaign, created by creative agency Creature London with media support by Goodstuff, is designed to resonate with consumers as they prepare to transition into Autumn. The visual and audio-visual elements of the campaign feature a new take on ‘You’re The One That I Want,’ with the ad following the story of a young couple preparing their home ahead of a long winter, before being transported into a Dunelm space. The campaign will run until 3 November across TV, BVOD, streaming services, cinema, radio, online, print, digital, social, and press.
WPP brand design agency Design Bridge and Partners has announced the launch of ‘The Point,’ a sustainability proposition to help brands to identify the ‘point’ of maximum impact within their sustainability strategies. It was created to challenge the common misalignment between brand and business when it comes to ‘marketing’ sustainability, often leading to greenwashing and greenhushing alike. The Pointbrings together double materiality assessments with the storytelling capability of brand and design. It will be led by Design Bridge and Partners’ London Managing Director, James Brock.
British kitchen appliance manufacturer Kenwood has unveiled a new social-first global campaign to launch its new compact Go Collection. The push was developed in partnership with M&C Saatchi UK. To drive awareness and sales of the new range amongst a Gen Z audience, M&C Saatchi has partnered with Kenwood to create a campaign which reveals a series of fortuitous events, showing how the compact Go Collection can turn a small ingredient into a “make it big” success story.
Digital marketing agency Mediaworks has announced a strategic partnership with Travis Perkins, a UK supplier of building materials. Mediaworks has been entrusted with developing and deploying an SEO strategy aimed at increasing organic traffic, boosting ecommerce revenue, and enhancing ‘trade account customer’ acquisition for the Travis Perkins brand. The partnership is centred on driving growth within Travis Perkins’ trade-focused audience, solidifying its position as a market leader. To enhance brand visibility and engagement, Mediaworks has also crafted a digital PR strategy that focuses on interests such as sports, travel, and lifestyle to build brand awareness in a way that resonates with the trade audience.
UK clothing and footwear digital retailer N Brown has selected MediaVision as its digital PR partner for all three strategic brands: Simply Be, Jacamo, and JD Williams. The retailer has hired the search agency to transform their brand’s offsite strategy, help launch products, new categories, and build brand awareness across the UK.
Digital performance marketing agency Vallo Media has been retained by the Tianqiao & Chrissy Chen Institute (TCCI) to promote the Chen Institute and Science Prize for Al Accelerated Research. Executed in partnership with Sciencemagazine, the prize will recognise innovative young researchers who apply techniques in artificial intelligence (Al) to promote breakthroughs in the physical or life sciences. Vallo Media’s campaign to drive awareness of TCCI’s AI prize and encourage qualified candidates to submit an application includes media strategy and planning; creative development; and execution, management, and optimisation of an integrated media campaign across Google, X, and LinkedIn.
Juice Media, an omnichannel media and advertising platform, has acquired mobile/social performance agency Mooko Media and linear and streaming specialist Media Design Group (MDG). The Mooko deal closed in April 2024, and MDG closed in August. The integration of Mooko and MDG into the Juice Media platform, which includes MTA, MMM and optimisation products, will aim to enhance the effectiveness of their clients’ marketing campaigns and deliver data-driven advertising solutions across web, mobile, and app channels. Scott Park, President of Mooko, and Stacy Durand, Partner and Founder of MDG, along with Ben Zimmerman, President and Founding Partner of MDG, will join Juice Media’s senior leadership team. In 2025, all brands will be operating under the Juice Media brand name and within the Juice Media.ai platform. Juice Media itself was acquired in 2022 by telecoms provider Altice USA.
