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Mary-Jo Foley
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Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget

By | March 18, 2011, 1:25pm PDT

Microsoft periodically switches ad agencies for various parts of its business. The latest switch was announced on March 18, with Publicis Group’s Starcom MediaVest unit winning a substantial percentage (according to reports) of Microsoft’s North American media-buying dollars.

Microsoft officials confirmed in January that the company was shopping around the part of its ad spending that was handled by Interpublic Group of Cos.’ Universal McCann. The estimate of the value of the contract was $1 billion.

The Wall Street journal said on March 18 that IPG’s Universal McCann and Mediabrands groups would hold onto Microsoft’s ad-buying business in 35 countries outside North America.

“IPG had previously handled Microsoft’s entire global media account—currently around $1 billion in spending — and has worked with the company for more than 12 years,” the Journal said.

In the summer of 2010, Microsoft made an agency switch, awarding its cloud-computing campaign to Interpublic from WPP’s JWT. Interpublic (via its Agency 215 unit) also has been handling Microsoft’s Xbox creative ad campaign.

Today’s win by Starcom isn’t for the creative campaign side of the business; it is for media planning and buying. Microsoft is not disclosing the dollar value of the contract awarded today. (Reuters said it was for “the lion’s share.”) A Microsoft spokesperson sent me the following:

“We have completed our media agency review and have awarded our global media strategy and planning business to Starcom Mediavest Group (SMG). We look forward to partnering with SMG to drive exciting and engaging ways to deliver creative content to our customers in today’s dynamic media marketplace. Universal McCann remains a valuable part of our agency roster and will continue to manage our media planning and buying outside of North America.”

Interpublic’s McCann had been Microsoft’s primary ad agency for years. Recently, the Softies have been moving more of its accounts to other agencies.

Starcom has a number of high-profile clients for which it does advertising, including Allstate, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Kraft Foods and Walt Disney Co.

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Topics

Microsoft Corp., Advertising, Starcom MediaVest, Advertising & Promotion, Marketing, Mary Jo Foley

Mary Jo has covered the tech industry for more than 25 years for a variety of publications and Web sites, and is a frequent guest on radio, TV and podcasts, speaking about all things Microsoft-related. She is the author of Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft plans to stay relevant in the post-Gates era (John Wiley & Sons, 2008).

Disclosure

Mary-Jo Foley

Freelance journalist/blogger Mary Jo Foley has nothing to disclose. WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get). I do not own Microsoft stock or stock in any of its partners or competitors. I have no business ventures that are sponsored by/funded by Microsoft or any of its partners or competitors.

Biography

Mary-Jo Foley

Mary Jo Foley has covered the tech industry for 25 years for a variety of publications, including ZDNet, eWeek and Baseline. She has kept close tabs on Microsoft strategy, products and technologies for the past 10 years. In the late 1990s, she penned the award-winning "At The Evil Empire" column for ZDNet, and more recently the Microsoft Watch blog for Ziff Davis.

Got a tip? Send her an email with your rants, rumors, tips and tattles. Confidentiality guaranteed.

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RE: Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget
tomlin21-24319035676893835085146735905770 11th Oct
What i attain troublesome can be to find a blog site which may seize me for only mulberry bags a second but your running a blog website differs. Bravo.
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Whom ever they hired for the Kin, WP7 and the stupid Seinfeld
wackoae 18th Mar 2011
... were probably the worst ad agency in the history of ads.

Come-on:
- The Kin was advertised as sexting and sexual predator friendly device .... and target to pre-teens.
- WP7 ads show nothing worth looking at. They are just dumb blue "tiles" with nothing to show.
- Seinfeld ads were just beyond stupid.
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RE: Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget
FlatbushE21 18th Mar 2011
@wackoae Nothing surprising here, first comment = more microsoft hate. I will agree with the kin marketing and the sienfeld but what does the blue tile have to do with a marketing agency. Im pretty sure u know that they are more than just blue tiles or maybe its just pure ignorance on ur part.
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blue tiles
Return_of_the_jedi Updated - 18th Mar 2011
@FlatbushE21
"Im pretty sure u know that they are more than just blue tiles "

He could have said red, orange, or green. He just so happens to have picked one of the available colors.
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If you weren't such a fanboy you could see what it means
wackoae 18th Mar 2011
@FlatbushE21 Your fanboy mentality does not allow for simple logic.

Blue tiles .... as in that is all they show.... nothing but blue tiles. No functionality ... no apps ... NOTHING. They don't show any feature, advantage or even a working "smart" device. Just stupid and ugly blue tiles.
  • Flagged
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Too true
dazzlingd 19th Mar 2011
@wackoae
I don't often agree with you but you are absolutely correct here. Microsoft marketing sucks.

- The marketing for Kin didn't help, but neither did the stupid price for the devices or the ridiculous data plan cost. And the rumored Microsoft in-fighting was the last nail. The devices were actually not bad with decent specs (Tegra). They would have been a great bridge between feature phone and smartphone, but why buy one when the Droid was the exact same price for device and plan?

- The first round of WP7 ads were useless. The "Really" series would have been great as teasers followed up by proper demos of the phones. If Apple can show nearly every feature of the iPhone in 30 secs, why can't Microsoft? The Droid commercials were good too and got the brand out there, creating a halo effect on all Android devices. The latest WP7 commercials look much better but it's still crazy that the best WP7 commercial was put together by a fan!

- The Seinfeld ads were actually quite humorous. If I knew what they were actually selling then they would have been successful.

- "Windows 7 was my idea" is another wasted effort. They don't explain anything. If Microsoft wants to kill Windows 7, then this is the way to go about it. 300M Win7 licenses sold in spite of these commercials, not because of them.

- "To the cloud" - WTF? What has Windows Live Essentials got to do with the cloud (apart from Live Mesh)? Not that you would know they were advertising Windows Live Essentials as it isn't mentioned anywhere in the commercials. I haven't met anyone who knows what they are advertising or where to get the software.

The only ads that moved the needle were Kinect and the Laptop Hunters. At least the Kinect ads showed the product in use.

The Laptop Hunters counter balanced the Apple ads very well. They may have been FUD but after two years of "I'm a Mac" FUD, it was fair game.
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dazzlingd, which is why they changed the agency?
Mister Spock 19th Mar 2011
@dazzlingd
And do not forget, you are only referencing television ads, many of Microsoft's product lines are also advertised in technical and industry magazines. (would Microsoft need to advertise their servers or development tools on television, or in Business Weekly magazine?)

So I could understand why they would go with one that handles CocaCola amoung others for their television ads.
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Even their Enterprise advertising is not great...
dazzlingd Updated - 19th Mar 2011
@Mister Spock
Even in the business journals and technical magazines, the advertising leaves a lot to be desired. Anyway, they could still advertise their Enterprise products on TV. Cisco do.

Anyway...

"Todays win by Starcom isnt for the creative campaign side of the business; it is for media planning and buying."

Looks like we will be seeing the same poor advertising, but in different places.
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Laptop Hunters was not a good set of ads
HollywoodDog 21st Mar 2011
@dazzlingd ... they were misleading. Just because there was a bump in sales around that time doesn't mean the ads were responsible for it either.

To me, it looked like the Microsoft marketing department was frustrated and angry, and the agency designed a set of ads to appeal to them. They 'struck back' at Apple in a clumsy and hamhanded way, without a trace of wit. Admittedly I pay more attention than most, but most of the commentary I saw was about how the products shown were pretty crappy and the supposedly real participants were actors.

Most of all, from my standpoint, the ads said one thing only: Windows PC's are cheap. If that's the sum total of your marketing message, then you don't have much of a message. What computer buyer didn't already know that Windows laptops are cheap?

I did enjoy learning all about Lauren DeLong, the Hollywood actress who listed the commercial on her web site as an acting credit.

http://mac.blorge.com/2009/04/03/memo-to-lauren-ixnay-on-the-racy-myspace-snaps/

"These images have nothing to do with Microsoft or the company?s ad agency. They don?t say anything about the quality, or lack thereof, of the notebook computer Redmond bought for the actress, who (it must be said) has a certain appeal in a bikini or when she?s licking a vodka bottle."
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RE: Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget
apetti 19th Mar 2011
@wackoae if you have ever used a WP7 device you would know that it is better than iphone and android. You wouldnt know that because you aren't as cool as me. I am way cooler than you.
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Not sure changing ad agencies will help.
Userama 18th Mar 2011
Don't Microsoft's marketing troops have to approve, and probably in some cases, create the ideas that the agency implements? In recent history, their decisions/creations have been dismal. They'd better hope for MUCH better results in the future!
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It depends on the material offered them
Mister Spock Updated - 19th Mar 2011
@Userama
In the end they only can approve of that which is offered them for approval. Choosing the "best of three poor ads" may have been all they could do.
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So says the apologist
LTV10 21st Mar 2011
For one of the biggest corporate monopolies in the world.
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Read it and weep
Robert Hahn 19th Mar 2011
Every comment here so far has to do with the 'creative'. The article is about media buying and scheduling. No change has been made regarding the creative content. Regardless of what the resident experts here have to say, the Microsoft folks must be reasonably happy with that part of it. H
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Kin, Zune, WP7 all great products...
ashiedu Updated - 19th Mar 2011
...but not were not or are not viewed in a good light like Xbox. WP7 has a way to go in the states, but is apparently successful in the UK. The Windows brand has lost the war on cool if not market share. People are locked into the windows ecosystem, but have to interest in anything new with the Windows name. They should use "x" instead of "i."

I've never seen a Kin ad, Zune ads were scarce, and yes, they need to SHOW people why WP7 is better than iPhone. Be bold. Alot of people can't go back to iPhone after WP7. I'm still in my 30-day period and me keeping my WP7 might very well be dependent on if the copy-paste update comes in the next 12 days. Not just marketing, but if Microsoft can't demonstrate it's control, they have lost a customer.
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MJ: I've got the NoDo update WP7 for Sprint Arrive
YukioCowboy 20th Mar 2011
FYI, on a different topic entirely, I got the HTC Arrive WP7 with the NoDo update from Sprint at my local store on Sunday. Runs beautifully, fast, copy-n-paste works very well, synced with the Zune software on my 64-bit Win7 computer no problems, connected to Yahoo mail and my 802.11 wireless network without any hitches, Xbox integration works, YouTube plays nicely, physical keyboard very nice, sound quality very good. The phone is model HTC T7575 with OS version 7.0.7389.0.

On the bad side, still cannot sync with Outlook locally via USB cable (had to buy CompanionLink software to sync through Google -- VERY irate about this), there was no option to get a larger microSD memory module (immediately filled the 14.6GB), can't change IE homepage (???), and camera only adequate.

On the whole, very happy so far, except for the stupid lack of USB local sync with Outlook and the inability to get a larger memory module.
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RE: Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget
jackson1984-24316069205748857739440257893812 9th Oct
his attention-grabbing write-up made me smile. Probably will need to genuinely you throw inside of a handful of photos it could make the complete issue extra engaging. Anyway, in my language, there nfl jerseys regularly quite often are not quite a bit decent provide you with similar to this.
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RE: Microsoft switches ad-agency horses for key piece of its $1 billion budget
tomlin21-24319035676893835085146735905770 11th Oct
What i attain troublesome can be to find a blog site which may seize me for only mulberry bags a second but your running a blog website differs. Bravo.

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