It’s time to review our finalists for 2011 Agency of the Year. To find out which of our top 10 shops takes top honours, pick up the January 2012 issue of Marketing.
The year started with changes in the C-suite, but Leo Burnett never missed a beat, winning big accounts and turning big ideas into breakthrough campaigns
There are only a couple of brands that really get agency creatives excited, that are adventuresome, quirky and have a strong voice. Rather than limit creative teams, their brand books inspire. IKEA is one of these clients and in March its marketers chose Leo Burnett as their agency of record.
That happened in a year when the agency faced a massive shake-up; long-time agency president and CEO David Moore left, chief creative officer Judy John added CEO to her office door and former BBDO boss Dom Caruso stepped in as president and COO in January.
The agency was no worse for wear and has had yet another strong year, due largely to its otherwise long-serving and stable team. Creative group director Sean Barlowe, VP–creative director Lisa Greenberg and a deep creative pool provided remarkable bench strength to keep the agency-in-transition from stalling. The result: a couple of sizeable account wins, smart work and good client results that have led to revenue increases, organic growth among existing clients and a long list of awards.
Last year, Marketing wrote that the agency was a big multinational ship that was nimble like a boutique agency. That has remained true in 2011.
IKEA is, in many ways, similar to Leo’s long-time standout account James Ready (another account creatives drool over). The beer brand also has a strong, humorous, unconventional bent that has found its way to award show stages for years. In 2011, the juries for Marketing Awards, Media Innovation Awards, Cannes, One Show, ADCC and Effies again took notice as James Ready wrapped up a year-long Bottle Cap Recall campaign (sending consumers small gifts in exchange for caps that had fallen victim to a printing error) and continued its earnest use of outdoor media with a moveable billboard offering discounted hair cuts and snacks in small markets around Southern Ontario.
But unlike the James Ready work, Leo’s IKEA ads have started to turn away from the quirkiness consumers associate with the brand. As the stores have moved beyond student furniture to mid- and high-end kitchen sets, the marketing needed to evolve. Humour is still present in the TV ads featuring hungover couples recovering from a party, but Leo has also introduced more family-focused ads (a mom building pillow forts with her son) and one for younger homeowners (a couple unafraid to shake the kitchen cabinets with a little impromptu lovemaking).
Some of that missing quirk made it to an online music video for Australian band Strange Talk that was also a colourful (and popular) digital promotional effort for the P&G Cheer laundry brand. Leo turned the video into a contest, with viewers able to click on certain items at certain times for a chance to win.
But it was the more practical take on marketing that really showed Leo’s prowess this year. The Quebec Moving Day project—held around the July 1 weekend when seemingly everyone swaps apartments in the province—saw Montreal streets stacked high with IKEA-branded boxes, free for movers to take and laden with coupons. The event brought a 14% increase to store visits versus the same weekend in 2010, and a 24.5% sales increase (as well as a gold at the Media Innovation Awards).
There’s more! To read the full story in the Dec. 12 issue of Marketing, subscribe today.
