Restructure at M&C sees Lisa Thomas become chief executive of the agency's UK group

Lisa Thomas, the chief executive of the direct marketing agency Lida, has been promoted to chief executive of the M&C Saatchi Group as part of a restructure.

Graham Fink, the executive creative director of M&C Saatchi, and Camilla Harrison, the marketing director, become the creative director and chief operating officer of the M&C Group respectively.

The moves are designed to give the M&C Saatchi Group, which is made up of seven separate agencies, a defined leadership structure.

Thomas, who will report to the group chairman, Tim Duffy, will take over the day-to-day running of the group. She will also further develop the integration of the businesses while ensuring clients are aware of the offering. Harrison will assist her in this role.
Fink will now work closely with Shaun Moran, the executive creative director at Lida, in developing the group's integrated creative output.

Thomas said: "I've always been scathing of integration being matching luggage, and it's exciting to be part of bringing these companies together in an effective way."
She added: "Operationally, we haven't been great at servicing the separate entities, but Camilla and myself can change that and find effective ways to work across clients."

The news follows M&C's appointment last week of Enyi Nwosu, the managing partner of MCHI, to head planning across the group.

M&C Saatchi's group approach has recently helped it to win the iShares and Network Rail pitches, with both clients looking to appoint integrated offerings.

Breast Cancer Campaign calls UK advertising review

Breast Cancer Campaign, the UK breast cancer research charity, is looking for an agency to handle its consolidated advertising business.

The charity currently works with a number of agencies, including The Good Agency and Rapier, across its TV, digital and direct marketing accounts, but is now understood to be keen to find an agency to oversee all of its marketing communications.

Breast Cancer Campaign has held initial meetings with a number of integrated ad¬vertising agencies and is set to hold pitches for the business next month.

The charity is said to want to launch an ad campaign that helps differentiate it from the other breast cancer charities, which include Breakthrough Breast Cancer and Action Breast Cancer.

The Good Agency recently launched an integrated campaign that focused on how breast cancer can affect not only the lives of sufferers but also their families and friends.

The ad featured images of breast cancer sufferers, accompanied by the line: "My breast cancer doesn't just affect me."

It is thought that new campaigns will place a greater emphasis on some of the annual fundraising initiatives that Breast Cancer Campaign runs, including the "wear it pink" event that asks sup¬porters to wear any pink item on a designated day each October and then donate £2 to the charity.

Mobile ad spend hits £36.7m

Mobile ad spend rose by 32% between 2008 and 2009 with brands from the entertainment, media and telecoms sectors spending the largest amounts on the medium according to the latest figures from the IAB and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
The report said mobile ad spend in the UK rose to £36.7m despite a contraction in the wider advertising market. The total spent on mobile advertising in the previous year was £28.6m.

The report also showed mobile ad figures grew consistently quarter-on-quarter throughout 2009.

Entertainment & media companies contributed 61.5% of all mobile ad revenues and traditional telecoms companies contributing 14.7% in 2009.
Search now accounts for 54% (£20.2m) of all mobile ad spend after a 41% year-on-year rise. Mobile display advertising peaked at £5.5m in the final quarter of 2009 – representing a 28% quarterly rise and totalled £17.4 million throughout the year.
Jon Mew, head of mobile at the IAB, told New Media Age that the growth in mobile advertising in the context of a downturn in the wider advertising market was unexpected.

“The growth was better than we had hoped for. The first thing you expect to be cut from advertising budgets [during an economic downturn] are experimental things such as mobile.
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Alex Rahaman, head of mobile at ad sales house Unanimis, said that media and entertainment companies contributed so much to the overall figure because the definition included a broader number of companies, such as ringtone providers, mobile video providers and games.

“I think that mobile gaming would have driven that a lot,” Rahaman said.
Paul Constantine, MD at media agency Zed Group, highlighted that the growth in mobile advertising was to be expected but added that the figures were growing from a low base.

“I thought that it possibly would have been a bit higher,” he said.
The burgeoning mobile ad market has been under increased focus in recent months following significant moves by major companies including Google and Apple.
Google is hoping to ramp up its mobile ad offering through the $750m (£467m) purchase of mobile ad network AdMob, subject to a possible anti-trust challenge from the US government, while Apple launched its own mobile ad platform, iAd,

More money, more bonuses

CEBR has forecast that the City bonus pool will rise to £6.8bn in 2010-11 after a 'bumper year' which has led to increased recruitment. The body predicted that bonuses will rise to £7.2bn in 2011-12 and £7.7bn in 2012-13. Due to the introduction of the 50% tax rate, CEBR calculated that financial workers will receive a total of £3.6bn this year, while the government will receive £4bn.

Omnicom latest to signal improving advertising market

Omnicom Group, owner of the BBDO, DDB, and TBWA agency networks, says revenue increased 6.3% in the first quarter of 2010. The marketing services company, which also owns media agencies PHD and OMD, says revenue in the first three months of the year hit $2.9bn (£1.9bn), up from $2.7bn (£1.7bn) in the first quarter of 2009.
Revenue gains helped drive pre-tax profit up to $266.9m (£173m), from $261m (£169m) a year earlier.

Agency group revenues have been boosted by an increase in advertising spending as global economies come out of recession. Rival Havas, owner of Euro RSCG and Arena BLM, recently reported a 1.5% revenue increase for the first quarter.

The results come in the week that the IPA/BDO Bellwether reported the first upward revision of marketing budgets since 2007.

The report said around 21% of companies reported a rise in their budgets, while only 16% noted reductions in the first quarter.

Banks help stranded customers

Royal Bank of Scotland and NatWest have produced a package of assistance for customers currently abroad and unable to return home due to the cloud of volcanic ash. Initial measures include refunded fees on foreign ATM withdrawals and increased limits on credit cards. A spokesman for the banks said the package will the added to 'over the next few days'

John Lewis is rolling out a £6m advertising campaign to drive its “Never knowingly undersold” proposition.

The ad campaign, which the retailer claims is its biggest ever, will break on Friday (23 April) the in the ad break during Coronation Street on ITV. It has been created by Adam & Eve.

It includes a series of ads that show a woman progressing through the key stages of her life from giving birth to becoming a grandmother, and how the John Lewis brand is a part at every stage.

The 10, 60 and 90-second TV spots will air across terrestrial and satellite TV channels for six weeks.

They will feature a re-recorded version of Billy Joel’s “She’s Always a Woman”, sung by the Guillemots.

Craig Inglis, John Lewis marketing director, says: “For a long time Never Knowingly Undersold has been perceived as just a price promise, but it’s more than that: it’s about the total value we offer our customers, about the quality of the products we sell and the added value customers receive with the service our Partners offer. Now seems the perfect moment to reinforce this message.”

Little Nationwide

Nationwide is to return to TV advertising for the first time since October 2008. The society is planning to capitalise on its sponsorship of the England football team ahead of the 2010 World Cup. The new TV campaign will feature 'Little Britain' duo, David Walliams and Matt Lucas, plus a number of England internationals.

Who's a bad boy then...

FSA has fined David Baker, Northern Rock's deputy chief executive until 2008, £504,000 for doctoring the bank's bad debts, the largest penalty imposed on an individual at a retail bank. Richard Barclay, a credit managing director at the bank who left in March 2010, has also been fined £140,000 for his role in the misreporting. The watchdog's review suggests staff were pressured into achieving a better than average arrears position.

Homer Brown!

Gordon Brown has admitted in an interview to be televised tonight that he mistakenly succumbed to City pressure which resulted in insufficient regulation of the UK's banks. The Prime Minister conceded that he should not have listened to industry figures when they complained of over-regulation, and has therefore learnt to be 'tougher on the way [banks] behave', to ensure they 'act in the national interest'

Spend, spend and spend some more...

Daily Express has reported that 141,000 high-ranking public sector workers spent £1bn on Procurement Credit Cards in 12 months, with 2009 seeing a peak in monthly expenditure at £80m. The investigation also found that spending on such cards has increased 1,000% since 2002, while the combined amount spent is £5bn. The Taxpayers' Alliance campaign group said the cards 'should have tightly defined limits'