2016 in review

Inside or outside marketing and advertising, 2016 has been tumultuous. We take a look back at the year that was...

Microsoft/LinkedIn

Enterprise went social, with Microsoft buying LinkedIn for $26.2 billion, around four times what it paid for Nokia a few years before. Microsoft has been open about its ambitions and plans, sharing a helpful memo to all staff, and a presentation to show what it’s all about.

LinkedIn has 400 million users, all (presumably) professionals, and all of whom are tied to LinkedIn’s ‘economic graph’, according to Jeremy Waite’s superb piece of analysis. Some commentators are rather more cynical about the acquisition however.

Now Microsoft has bought LinkedIn, Bill Gates uses it to blog, and his recent post on innovation is definitely worth a read. Microsoft's creative turnaround has been impressive, with Windows 10 a success and the Surface emerging as a credible piece of kit, The Memo wonders if it's time for creatives to ditch Apple and consider using Windows products again.

ANA

One story dominated and continues to send shockwaves around the industry – the media buying corruption story finally came of age.

The US Association of National Advertisers (ANA) commissioned K2 (Jules and Jeremy Kroll) to look into the issue last year, and finally published their 58-page report.

They say that clients ask their media agencies to place their ads, and quote a price for that work. However, once the agencies place the ads, then the publishers give the agency a rebate (some might say a kickback).

This means that the agency is paid twice for that one piece of work – once by the client and then again by the publisher. And if the publisher pays the agency, shouldn’t the agency pass that saving onto the client? Is the agency acting in the client’s best interests if they are given this rebate (or kickback)?

One the one side, agencies call the report foul, and on the other, those who want this dirty part of the business to be exposed call foul because it lets these practices fester and continue.

With depressing predictability, nobody (except the ANA) was pleased. The report did not name names. This means that both the innocent and guilty can claim that they are innocent. Some have broken ranks to speak. While Group M’s global head, Irwin Gotlieb, slams that report as ‘business development’, the implication being that the report is fundamentally flawed.

Dominic Mills said the response reminded him of a certain New York property mangate.

Best ad?

Sexism and Kevin Roberts

Saatchi&Saatchi executive chairman and 'head coach' Kevin Roberts eventually fell on his sword after an interview with Business Insider's Lara O'Reilly, telling her that the gender debate is, "all over", and making a perplexing attack on former BBH president Cindy Gallop, who regularly campaigns for equality in marketing and advertising.

He was quickly asked to take a leave of absence because of the "Gravity of his statements", according to Roberts' boss, Publicis CEO Maurice Levy.

Adcontrarian Bob Hoffman, who has a history of spats with Roberts, was gleeful in his schadenfreude at the scale of the blunder. In Marketing Week, Mark Ritson was more restrained than usual and admitted that the events have woken him up to the challenges the industry faces.

Roberts' comments went around the world and Gallop appeared on numerous outlets to make her outrage clear. She was by no means the only one.

Eventually Roberts resigned. What drove him to make sexist comments at the start of the silly season and with a book to publicise is anyone's guess. One rule of advertising is you don't become the story and Roberts really failed here.

Roberts' debacle came shortly after the case against former JWT boss Gustavo Martinez. The whistle blower, Erin Johnson says she has faced significant hostility and ‘kept in a box’ and distanced from her duties since returning to work.

Karmarama

One of the largest and most successful independent indy agencies, Karmarama (which also won the DMA Grand Prix this year), was to sell to Accenture for an undisclosed sum, thought to be in the region of £50 million, making Karmarama a part of Accenture Interactive.

"The acquisition bolsters the full suite of customer transformation services Accenture Interactive provides to brands, from customer insights to creative conception and omnichannel delivery of meaningful human experiences. It also contributes to the growth of Accenture Interactive’s UK team of marketing professionals and creatives," reads the release.

How the lauded creative shop will sit with the management consultants remains to be seen, but could this be the beginning of a trend to challenge the large networks?

Black Friday vs Singles Day

Black Friday is the shopping bonanza to end all shopping bonanzas. Isn't it?

Think again and look to China, where Alibaba ‘Singles Day’ generated $1bn in revenue in its first five minutes. While there is some confusion over currencies in this piece, but it does seem to be the world's biggest shopping thing, turning over more than $14 bn in a single day - equivalent to the entire annual GDP of Zimbabwe - and dwarfing the whole Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales in the whole of the US (around $6 billion).

Alibaba founder Jack Ma was for many years an English teacher, putting himself through college before founding a web design agency at the start of the internet boom. He didn't write any code, and only bought himself a computer when he was 33 years old. He founded Alibaba in 1999 with a group of friends, designed to give SMEs a way to trade. When Alibaba launched on the US stock exchange in 2014 it raised $25 billion, making it the biggest launch IPO in history. It's much bigger than Jeff Bezos' Amazon.

Best Christmas ad: