• by Larissa Faw , March 16, 2015

Mindshare North America has a new data czar. The global media agency has named Rolf Olsen as chief data officer to lead the agency’s Marketing Sciences group, a team of more than 70 analytics professionals across North America, and to drive new tools and data partnerships for The Loop, Mindshare’s real-time marketing operation.

Olsen reports to Colin Kinsella, CEO, Mindshare North America, and is based in New York.

"Data is at the center of what we do – it’s integral to making media a competitive advantage for our clients," says Kinsella. "Thus, Rolf’s key priorities are twofold. One, it’s to keep, and steer, our Marketing Sciences group on the forefront of data and analytics so that we can fuel our clients’ work with the insights they need. And two, to continue growing our work with The Loop -- our adaptive marketing engine.”

Olsen has spent the past ten-years at the Dentsu Aegis Network, most recently at the global digital performance agency iProspect.  His work there is credited with helping bring in new business assignments from Sony Mobile, PlayStation, Mastercard, Discover Card, and Mondelez.

With over 15 years of industry experience, he has worked with numerous brands, including P&G, The Home Depot, Macy’s, Bacardi, and Disney.

He succeeds Bob Ivins, who joined Mindshare as its first CDO in September of 2013. He departed for Rovi Corp. to take on the role of SVP business development last fall.

Mindshare is part of GroupM, WPP’s media management arm.