Former marketing leader and experience travel industry executive, Jennifer Vandekreeke has been appointed as the new Chief Executive Officer of startup park operator, Urbnsurf
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Michael Hill taps Miranda Kerr as first brand ambassador
Michael Hill has officially debuted its new rebrand and announced Miranda Kerr as its first brand ambassador.
‘Anthropology v algorithms’: Archibald Williams partners split as Stuart Archibald launches special ops firm for CX, tech, creative, brand and strategy in Sydney, London
Stuart Archibald was one of the early proponents of database marketing in the 1990s, forming part of the exec team that launched Tesco’s Club Card, ultimately helping Tesco topple Sainsbury’s #1 UK supermarket slot. But Archibald says hefty corporate tech and CX investments today are spluttering after deployment and most companies “have lost their basic human understanding of customers”.
‘Media ecologist’ Jack Myers: No humans for 80% of media planning, buying by 2030; creative-media forced back together, brand-publisher clean rooms surge, programmatic and retailer media hit new turbulence before ‘rebirth’ of ad business
Five years ago media ecologist Jack Myers made a prediction in the second ever edition of Mi3: By 2025 media would be largely automated and almost totally AI-informed and just a quarter of sales would remain with people and ideas. It happened faster than even he thought. Now Myers predicts that within 12-18 months max, most media planning will be entirely machine-led. By 2030, he reckons “80 per cent or more of all media planning and buying will be done without human intervention or without the necessity of humans”, with major implications for jobs. Meanwhile, AI is already being turned in on itself to spotlight where the money is being wasted amid a “programmatic backlash”. The “machines are actually checking on machines,” says Myers, “increasingly, humans are out of the mix.” He forecasts an incoming wave of consolidation across major media companies and a “collapse of the programmatic marketplace”. For agencies, “the re-emergence of consolidated agencies”, i.e. creative and media back together, “is the big story of 2025-26”. Myers thinks generative AI will force that toothpaste back into the tube. “So I believe in 2024-25, we’re going to see massive consolidation, massive contraction, and then in 2025, 26, 27 a rebirth of the advertising business.” But 2025, he warns, will be tough, with a “reasonably massive cutback in spending as marketers work out what is working, and what is not”.Plus Myers – who likewise called out retail media’s impact early – sees a “can of worms” for the sector as journalists and analysts uncover instances of arbitrage of non-retail inventory within some retail media networks. He also has reservations on the surge by media owners into data clean rooms – Disney alone is operating 100-plus – “Who is cleaning the data? Who is validating that it is clean?”Meanwhile, Myers thinks Accenture’s “quiet” ascendance to become a top tier digital media buyer likewise warrants greater scrutiny.
Mercer Super kicks off 3-year, digital uplift for customers: Restructures marketing and CX into a single group; Promotes Nicole Mathias-Browne from CMO to CCO
Following on from its April 2023 merger with BT Super, Mercer Super has restructured its marketing and customer experience teams into a single team called Customer and Growth, and is embarking on a three-year overhaul of digital experiences for customers and advisors alike. A new mobile app is due in H2 this year for customers too, with an emphasis on delivering a better experience rather than new capabilities. That will come later in the project. Advisors will see improvements to their experiences early next year.
Financial advice gap: Research from Great Southern Bank shows young people turn to family over experts
Less than a quarter of of Millennials and Gen Z have a current financial plan prepared by a qualified expert, instead leaning on family and friends for financial guidance, according to the latest research from Great Southern Bank.
BCU Bank positions itself as a the best back up bank in new brand campaign
BCU Bank has embraced its challenger narrative, positioning itself as ‘A Better Back-Up’ to the big four in a new brand campaign from The Hallway.
Interbrand and Unyoked study explores nature’s impact on commercial creativity
A new report by Interbrand Australia and Unyoked exploring the impact of nature on commercial creativity has found less pressure even as constraints drive lateral thinking.
Twilio study finds glaring gap in Australian brand’s estimation of consumer perceptions
Twilio has published its annual State of Customer Engagement Report, revealing a significant perception gap in Australia, between brand’s understanding of their customers and customers’ actual views.
New report shows unlicensed content use as a hidden threat in Australian businesses
New research reveals a concerning trend among Australian white-collar workers, with a significant 66% accessing published content in their roles, but only 7% certain their business has a licence to use the material.