January 27th, 2012
Electric Media has signed an exclusive deal with the eBay global online auction site. In what is claimed to be a first for an Irish digital agency, the agency has sole sales rights to the combined eBay inventory for Ireland and the UK. In Ireland, eBay has 800,000 unique users with 51 million monthly page impressions.
The deal with eBay.co.uk means the Irish inventory offered to Electric Media results in an extra 150,000 unique users and four million monthly page impressions. Dermot Hanrahan, chief executive, Electric Media, said his agency’s clients will now be able to target a combined figure of almost one million unique users.
By Michael. Filed under Online marketing.
January 26th, 2012
Mark Cassin has sold his DMA agency for an undisclosed sum to RichardsDee, a new branding and communications company founded by Simon Richards and Celine Dee. Cassin has been one of the foremost direct response executives in Ireland over the past 20 years. He served two terms as Irish Direct Marketing Association (IDMA) chairman and is on the Marketing Agencies Association Worldwide (MAAW) board.
This time last year Cassin set up the Dublin office of Red Ant digital services fronted by former MEC executive Sarah McDevitt. Dee, who joined DMA last year, will be responsible for the new agency’s client services. Richards, who founded StudioRichards in 2008 and worked with other agencies, will be creative director. Cassin will act as a consultant to the new agency, which will operate from StudioRichards’ premises.
DMA clients included Bewleys, Nestle, An Garda Siochána and the Department of Defence. The agency worked with Murray Consultants and Carat on the Lisbon Treaty for the Referendum Commission. StudioRichards clients include Axa, Croke Park, Dunnes Stores, Fáilte Ireland, Kanchi, Meteor and Ulster Bank.
Mark Cassin with RichardsDee directors Celine Dee and Simon Richards
By Michael. Filed under Marketing Services.
January 20th, 2012
Sky Media Ireland hopes to launch its AdSmart audience profile targeting service for advertisers in Ireland by the middle of next year. Speaking at a Interpublic-sponsored conference on the future of television in Dublin this week, Richard Kelly, sales director, Sky Media Ireland, said AdSmart will take TV advertising to a whole new level by inserting ads into video on demand (VOD) shows and targeting them at specific audiences.
Sky will introduce AdSmart in the UK first by combining offline and online data in the household profile. Ads are tailored to specific viewer categories by using postcode and TV packages along with authorised data provided to Sky by other companies. The information, which is provided with subscribers’ consent, so as to allay fears of consumer privacy, is used to build up a picture of relevant products and services Sky can target at viewers.
AdSmart works on the basis of Sky storing a library of ads on its set-top boxes, creating a type of ad server of sorts which feeds content to the TV screen when an ad break starts during a show being played back on VOD. The idea is to stream the ads where it is not noticeable to the viewer. AdSmart will allow Sky update ads that run in recorded shows to make them more timely and derive maximum revenue from subscriber playbacks.
By Michael. Filed under TV.
January 19th, 2012
Behaviour & Attitudes director Luke Reaper is among the speakers at a Marketing Society research seminar next week. Reaper will talk about ‘the mobile puzzle – consumer segmentation for Meteor and eMobile’. The case study was the winner in brand development and strategy at the society’s awards and won the grand prix.
The seminar will showcase the best in class research from Ireland and the UK. Clients and agencies will present their winning entries, including visiting guest speaker Deborah Sleep from Engage Research in London. Sleep won the 2011 Marketing Research Society (MRS) award for innovation in methodology.
Also showcasing their research award winning papers from the Marketing Society Research Excellence Awards 2011 in the Royal College of Physicians in Kildare Street next Friday morning will be:
Richard Colwell, managing director, Red C Research
Winners of Innovation in research approach
‘24 Hours to Deliver Insight to Election Day Coverage for RTE’
Sarah Hargaden, account director, Millward Brown Lansdowne
Winners in public policy and social research
‘Food Poverty for Safefood’
Julie Angus and Justin Healy, directors, SparkQual
Winners in qualitative research
‘Bird’s Eye View and Beyond for Birds Eye’
For more details on the seminar, click on www.marketingsociety.ie
By Michael. Filed under Events, Research.
January 17th, 2012
A survey of those attending the annual Checkout conference in the Four Seasons hotel in Dublin showed an overwhelming majority of delegates are positive about their business prospects, with 23.5 per cent saying they were “very optimistic” and 59.2 per cent saying they were “moderately optimistic” about the coming year.
The conference attracted over 200 executives. Among the speakers presenting on the day were Michael Carey, chairman, Bord Bia; economist Jim Power; Michael Landymore, global sector strategist; Rabobank; Frank Gleeson, retail director, Topaz and Miriam Hughes (above), managing director, DDFH&B-JWT.
Some 41.3 per cent of delegates believe that the current upward only rent review legislation represents the biggest threat to survival for small businesses, with 38 per cent pointing to high commercial rates. A total of 60 per cent believe the easing of the cap on retail development is bad for retail, with one in four saying it was good.
Some 70.5 per cent believe there is too much retail space available in the market juts now, with 3.1 per cent saying there was “too little”. More than one in three brand owners say that private label is the biggest threat to a brand’s market share and one in four retailer terms and conditions, while 17.2 per cent say competitor NPD.
Lastly, the delegates’ survey indicated that 64.4 per cent believe that aside from location, best value is the main driver for a consumer deciding to shop in one store over another. Some 13.3 per cent of delegates say the main driver was lowest price, 11.1 per cent say customer service and 7.4 per cent differentiation.
By Michael. Filed under Events.
