Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Publicis Woos Google

Filed neatly under the category of disrupting the level playing field, advertising agencies that fall outside of the Publicis Group and in some cases re-sellers of the Google product, will be nail biting tonight as, Publicis announced a major "cooperation" with the Search giant a few hours ago.

Publicis, the world's fourth largest advertising group, bought a leading edge Internet ad agency Digitas (formerly Modem Media) for $1.3 billion last year. Having a good understanding of the depth of Digitas’ capabilities and forward thinking, I believe this deal to be monumental for both partners and sadly, crushing for agency competitors.

While the details are very scarce, the idea would be that Google would swap its technological know-how for Publicis's analytical and media planning expertise.

I’m impressed by the magnitude of this announcement and will post shortly on my thoughts.

Disclosure: I was the Media Director at Modem Media Canada from 98-01

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