Media Innovation Group Moves Beyond GroupM, Signs NEO@Ogilvy

  • by June 14, 2011

Jon-Greenwood

Media Innovation Group, the ad technology business spun off two years ago out of WPP's 24/7 Real Media online ad services unit and known primarily for its work with WPP's GroupM media buying agencies, has begun actively offering its services to WPP's entire company roster.

The most visible non-GroupM partner signed up so far is NEO@Ogilvy, the full-service digital unit of The Ogilvy Group.

While MIG's initial industry visibility came through its media targeting and optimization service, called B3, it then developed its Zeus Advertising Platform -- ZAP for short. The ZAP platform includes a wide range of advertising and analytics capabilities, such as ZAP Search, ZAP Ad Manager and ZAP Reporting, all built on top of an underlying data warehouse, said Jon Greenwood, MIG general manager.

That database and the ZAP technology, per Greenwood, now allows MIG to expand its services beyond media buying to any digital-related, data-driven marketing services offered to advertisers by any WPP agency. Greenwood, who has been working at MIG behind the scenes for "a few months" and took on his present role in March, said he's in active discussions with WPP agencies in North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia.

Formerly senior vice president of 24/7 Real Media's global business operations, as well as its general counsel, Greenwood replaces Brian Lesser, another 24/7 Real Media vet. WPP said that Lesser will move to another, not-yet-identified, role within the holding company.

Greenwood has a background in the type of global business operations and corporate partnerships envisioned for MIG. He was already with 24/7 Real Media when WPP acquired it in 2007 and was then tapped as executive point person in integrating the two organizations. More recently, he's been responsible for partnerships and international expansion initiatives at 24/7 Real Media.

"We built fully fledged DSP [demand side platform] and DMP [data management platform] capabilities before these acronyms even existed," said Greenwood. "We will continue our technology leadership in this space. However, our ambitions have grown alongside our success."

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