George Parker: Omnicom/IPG – why big doesn’t mean better

For the last week or so we have been bombarded with news items in the ad trades and the financial press about the forthcoming merger of Omnicom and Interpublic. Most of these are merely a rehash of the pablum generated by the holding companies PR departments telling existing clients that they will benefit not only from the combined buying power of the two holding companies in the media marketplace but also from their combined technology prowess — a point that Omnicom and IPG leaders tried to hammer home on a call announcing the acquisition plans.

Obviously, most of this is bullshit. The major beneficiaries will be a majority of the senior management of the two holding companies who will trouser massive bonuses, whilst a few token executive dismissals will walk with humungous Golden Parachutes.

Let’s get a couple of things straight. This is not a merger; it is a takeover. Omnicom will swallow IPG and spit out the bones. The remaining company “Omnicom,” will be run using the Jack Welch system of management. i.e. you must slash and burn your way to making the quarterly numbers, doing whatever it takes, particularly when it comes to personnel. Hundreds, if not thousands will be laid off. No wonder this ability to instantly empty buildings whilst leaving them intact, earned him the nickname “Neutron Jack.”

At the new “Omnicom,” the vast majority of these agency layoffs will occur in the creative and media departments. They will be replaced by AI bots churning out glossy, inane and ineffective work in the style of the recent Jaguar campaign. No more flying off to Tahiti for a couple of weeks to shoot your new haemorrhoid creme spot. Those days are long gone. Perhaps the situation is best summed up in an excellent article in The Wall Street Journal…“Sorry Mad Men. The Ad Revolution is here.”

The opening paragraph says it all…During an hour-long call this past week to sell investors on the virtues of a $30 billion merger of two advertising giants, data and technology came up a dozen times each. AI, eight times. ‘Creativity’ was uttered once.”

And this gem buried in the comments…“Meanwhile, use of AI to polish the resumes of everyone who works for these agencies spiked. Massive redundancies coming … which HR director will get to fire the other HR director? What exactly do you do for the company?”

I hasten to add here that it is rare indeed that I will praise the WSJ a part of Rupert “The Wizened of Oz” Murdoch’s evil empire. I had the misfortune to work on the SuN account back in the seventies. This required many meetings with “Rupe” at weird times of the day or night when he would tell us exactly what to do. This invariably meant more “Tits & Arse.” I’m sure the AI Bots will be able to handle that.

On a final note, this from the CMO of a Fortune 500 company. “Any redundancies that are created by the merger could widen the talent pool for in-house marketing departments, in which marketers employ their own creative and media workers to do their advertising and other tasks.” Hey you fucktard. Doesn’t this mean that if clients bring their accounts in-house, they no longer need agencies, let alone holding companies? Duh!!!

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