By Paul Simons on January 16, 2013
With all of the worrying news on the UK retail scene (Comet, Jessops, now HMV) it makes me wonder to what extent management of these companies genuinely listen to what the great unwashed actually think. I fully understand the energy needed to turn around a business – I’ve lived through a few – but that’s [...]
Posted in Analysis, Clients, Creative, Finance, News, Research | Tagged BT, ggt, IBM, Lou Gerstner, Marc Bolland, marks & spencer, research, retail, simons palmer, Sir Ken Morrison, Voltaire
By Paul Simons on August 24, 2012
The news that Peter Souter (left) has been appointed to the top slot at TBWA London opens up a lesson in agency management worthy of a case study on what not to do. Not about Peter, by the way, nice bloke and I wish him every success. The real story is about the history that [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Finance, News | Tagged Bill Tragos, Carl Johnson, ggt, mergers, Mike Greenlees, omnicom, Paul Simons, Peter Souter, simons palmer, tbwa
By Stephen Foster on August 17, 2012
Over the years I’ve learned how to opt out of AMV/BBDO’s never-ending soap operas for BT broadband; however cleverly they’re done the notion of otherwise fairly human people devoting family/social time to discussing broadband speeds is just a leap too far. But I don’t like Eastenders or Coronation Street either. I might make an exception [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative, News | Tagged amv/bbdo, BT broadband ads, ggt, Paul Simons, Simon and Anna, simons palmer, soap operas
By Stephen Foster on May 10, 2012
And we shouldn’t ignore digital giant AKQA either, which shares Nike creative duties with Wieden+Kennedy. A few weeks ago we suggested that Adidas, a tier one World Cup sponsor, was looking for an agency “to kill Nike,” which regularly disrupts Adidas’s expensive relationship with both the World Cup and the Olympics through its artful deployment [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative, Media, News | Tagged 1984, adidas, akqa, Andre Laurentino, apple, bartle bogle hegarty, brazil, chiat day, ddb, ggt, Jay Chiat, Lee Clow, media arts lab, mother, nike, olympics, omnicom, sid lee, simons palmer, tbwa london, tbwa worldwide, tier one sponsor, w+k amsterdam, wieden+kennedy, world cup, write the future
By Staff on April 16, 2012
This is the second extract adapted from Paul Simons’ book Day 1 to Day 2555 (or 7 years in the life of an advertising agency). Here Paul explains how he went about choosing the right team to start successful London agency Simons Palmer Denton Clenmow and Johnson which merged with TBWA seven years later. I’ve [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative | Tagged anomaly, Carl Johnson, Chris Palmer, day one to day 2555 (7 years in the life of an advertising agency), ggt, hhcl, Mark Denton, money, new business, Paul Simons, profile, Rupert Howell, Simon Clenmow, simons palmer denton clenmow and johnson, Sir John Hegarty, tbwa, team, two suits
By Paul Simons on March 1, 2012
According to the Advertising Association 2011 ad expenditure in the UK will be circa £16 billion. So a client spending £1.6m in 2011 will account for 0.01% of all advertising. Makes you think harder about what is and isn’t effective, remembered, acted upon. My guess is the spread of spend might go something like this: [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative, Media, News | Tagged advertising association, ariston, Colin Gottlieb, computers, Dave Trott, Eric Cantona, ggt, holsten pils, Media, mgm, Mike Gold, nike, omnicom, Paul Simons, Pete Sampras, simons palmer, Toshiba, uk adspend, WPP
By Paul Simons on September 14, 2011
I’m wrestling with a new assignment at the moment and I’m struggling with this basic issue: what’s the problem we are actually trying to solve? Over the years I’ve been in the same spot quite a few times and the time taken to figure out the real issue really is worth the effort and time [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative, News | Tagged advertising, ariston, british airways, cheap flights, commercial reality, Dave Trott, emissions, ford, ggt, Greenpeace, marketing, Paul Simons, red mountain, right questions, search engine optimisation, seo, simons palmer, virgin
By Paul Simons on February 19, 2011
As we move into a new decade it’s a good time to think about that important new advertising agency that’s been waiting to emerge for some time. The reason is based on history; each decade we see a new set of ad agencies emerge. Going back a few decades we saw the emergence in London [...]
Posted in Agencies, Creative, Finance | Tagged adam & eve, amv, bbh, Carl Johnson, ggt, hhcl, Lowe Howard-Spink, Paul Simons, Simon Clemmow, simons palmer, tbwa, wcrs
By Paul Simons on February 6, 2011
I was with some senior chaps from the ad world the other day and the discussion turned to the topic of management; the good, bad and downright ugly. The collective view was that getting a management role is a bit like the curate’s egg – good in parts. One of the group was an ex-creative [...]
Posted in Agencies, Clients, Creative, Finance | Tagged agency management, Finance, ggt, new business, ogilvy, Paul Simons, simons palmer clemmow & johnson, tbwa
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