Media
General Mills and Kimberly-Clark launch media reviews in potential blow to Mindshare
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Update: This story has been updated with a comment from GroupM.
Two Mindshare clients, General Mills and Kimberly-Clark, have put significant parts of their media business under review, Ad Age has learned.
The scope for the General Mills review is global, while K-C is focused on North America, according to multiple people close to the situation.
“General Mills regularly reviews our agency relationships to ensure they meet our strategic needs,” said Chelcy Walker, a spokesperson for General Mills, one of Mindshare USA’s top three clients. “Our focus is on ensuring we have the right partners to help us meet the needs of our customers, stakeholders and consumers.”
K-C was not immediately available for comment.
Last week, Mindshare announced the departure of North America CEO Amanda Richman. An internal memo obtained by Ad Age did not specify any reasoning for her departure, but said her exit would be “effective immediately.” Multiple executives who spoke to Ad Age confirmed that Richman was let go by the agency and that the move came as what they called a “complete surprise.”
Richman, who joined the agency in mid-2021 from sibling Wavemaker, declined to comment. Mindshare also declined to comment.
It is unclear if Mindshare is defending the accounts.
General Mills consolidated its U.S. account and a bulk of its global duties with WPP’s Mindshare in 2015. Mindshare also handles U.S. media for K-C and in parts of Asia; in October 2022 K-C moved its EMEA business to Omnicom Media Group.
General Mills reported worldwide advertising and media costs of $690 million in the fiscal year ended May 2022, according to a regulatory filing, while K-C’s global spend for 2022 was $901 million.
According to Vivvix, General Mills spent $328 million on measured media in the U.S. in 2022, a drop from $461 million in 2021. K-C spent $188 million on U.S. measured media in 2022, a decrease from $224 million in 2021.
Performance marketing issues
A former WPP executive said Richman’s exit comes as Mindshare is under pressure from clients to improve what he called a “rigid” culture, which ladders up to GroupM.
“There are a few larger relationships that Mindshare has right now that are at risk,” the former WPP executive said, referring to K-C and General Mills. “They have real challenges in account management.”
The executive said clients have complained about slow response times from the agency and said that Mindshare will refuse to do projects that it sees as incremental. “There’s a culture there that is less partner-oriented,” he said.
Multiple executives with knowledge of the situation cited client issues with performance marketing as a potential reason for client dissatisfaction. Mindshare integrated its performance agency Neo under a plan announced last April, bringing Neo’s 1,200 performance marketing experts and consultants and its digital services into its global offering.
The former WPP executive said Mindshare hasn’t invested enough in performance marketing, which is especially concerning for clients in the current shaky economic environment where they have to prove the value of every marketing dollar spent. “The expectation to prove ROI is all the more required,” he said.
GroupM strongly contested the accuracy of the details and characterization of Mindshare’s business and relationships in this story.
Sri Lanka’s media divide along language and ethnic lines.
Privately-owned networks have the lion’s share of the TV audience. Non-state media often engage in political debate and criticise government policies.
The state runs two TV stations, radio networks and newspapers in Sinhala, Tamil and English.
At the height of the civil war Sri Lanka was one of the world’s most dangerous places for journalists.
Despite the pledges given by President Sirisena in 2015 to investigate past attacks on journalists, nearly all the crimes of violence against journalists remain unpunished, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in 2018.
RSF said political control over media ownership is a major concern and has the potential to undermine pluralism and impartiality.
There were some 8.9 million internet users by July 2022, comprising 41% of the population (Internetworldstats.com). The web is a popular and growing medium for news.
There were major restrictions to online connectivity and social media platforms during communal violence in early 2018, said US-based Freedom House.
Media
4 Ways Social Media Normalizes Unhealthy Spending And How To Break Out Of The Cycle – BuzzFeed
Though money actually can buy happiness, that really only works up to a certain point. Like, more money can definitely make you happier if you’re struggling to make ends meet, but if you’re already comfortable, the positive effects of making more drop off fast. And the same goes for our spending.
As Paige explains it, “We tend to think that there is a linear relationship between how much we buy and how much we spend and how happy we are going to be, and it’s simply not the case. So, don’t buy into the lie that social media is feeding us that more is better.”
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Fox Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch has announced he is engaged, marking his fifth marriage, after finalizing his divorce to actress Jerry Hall in August.Mary Altaffer/The Associated Press
Fox Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch is engaged to former San Francisco police chaplain Ann Lesley Smith, his spokesperson confirmed on Monday, which will mark the fifth marriage for the 92-year-old media mogul.
Murdoch finalized his divorce from actress and model Jerry Hall in August.
Murdoch and Smith, 66, first met in September at his vineyard Moraga in Bel Air, California, and he called her two weeks later, Murdoch told the News Corp-owned NY Post, which broke the news of the engagement. Smith is a widow whose late husband was Chester Smith, a country singer, radio and TV executive.
On March 17 in New York, Murdoch presented Smith with an Asscher-cut diamond solitaire ring, according to the Post. They will be married in late summer.
“I was very nervous. I dreaded falling in love but I knew this would be my last. It better be. I’m happy,” Murdoch told the Post
Murdoch’s nuptials are unlikely to change the ownership structure of businesses in which he holds stakes, including Fox Corp, the parent company of Fox News Channel, and News Corp. Murdoch controls News Corp and Fox Corp through a Reno, Nevada-based family trust that holds roughly a 40% stake in voting shares of each company.
Fox is currently defending itself in a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit from Dominion Voting Systems.
Dominion has accused the cable TV network of amplifying debunked claims that Dominion voting machines were used to rig the election against Republican Donald Trump and in favor of his rival Joe Biden, who won the election.
Fox has defended its coverage, arguing claims by Trump and his lawyers were inherently newsworthy and protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
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