• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, April 22, 2025

Words matter, especially in media planning and buying. They shape the way we think, feel and act about the art and science of advertising by framing the inputs and outputs media pros use to benchmark their goals and outcomes.

Take Erwin Ephron's "recency," which revolutionized the way we think about reach and frequency.

Or more recently, "optimization," which -- as overused as it may be -- became code for media planning and buying's version of yield management.

It has been about 30 years since the birth of the modern audience reach optimizer, and based on an analysis released this morning by WPP health and wellness media shop, CMI Media Group, it may be time to embrace "orchestration" instead.

The analysis is based on the incremental revenue yield generated among 25 of the agency's clients since CMI rolled out a new technology, automated media orchestration (AMO), which metaphorically orchestrates media buys across the marketing tech stacks of the media supply chain to ensure campaigns work in concert across them and personalize advertising and customer experiences.

While the actual application is somewhat of a black box within WPP's owned-tech stack -- integrated into its proprietary operating system, "WPP Open" -- you can't argue with the results to date.

"We have improved the way media is planned and bought in ways unlike the industry has ever seen," CMI CTO Oleg Korenfeld boldly proclaimed when its orchestration model was unveiled a year ago, adding that it would reduce the "costly fragmentation of media investments" across platforms and stacks.

While the application is new, the concept of orchestration is not.

The first time I heard it was also nearly 30 years ago when Norman Lehoullier -- then managing director of WPP's Grey Interactive unit -- promoted the concept at an Advertising Research Foundation event, likening modern media planning and buying to a symphony conductor synchronizing ads across a multitude of instruments with the goal of ensuring they all played their part, in tune, and perfect harmony.

One billion dollars certainly is a harmonious start of CMI and its clients.