• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, March 6, 2007

Horizon Media, the $1.6 billion media services agency that is probably still thought of as a big spot-buying shop, is in the process of transforming that image and reshaping itself as a strategic planning agency. On Monday it named two executives to senior "brand strategy" posts - including one raided from Havas' MPG - as part of its push into communications planning.

The moves expand on a brand strategy team formed by Horizon in January, which will now be headed by Gabrielle Magnani, who was named executive vice president-marketing and brand management. Magnani, who had been a senior vice president in the fledgling group along with Oliver Maletz, adds two other senior vice presidents: Elyse Pollock, a nine year vet of Horizon who most recently was senior vice president-brand group director; and Eva Kantrowitz, who joins Horizon from MPG, where she was senior vice president and group account director managing the global ExxonMobil business, Glaxo SmithKline, and Comedy Central.

The reorganization is part of Horizon chief Bill Koenigsberg's push to reposition the media shop from a big, tactical buyer of media into a strategic planning and brand management agency that can compete with the biggest and best of Madison Avenue's full-service and dedicated media services units, which themselves are stepping up the art of communications planning. Universal McCann, in particular, has been on a hiring blitz, recruiting top strategic planners as part of its effort to rebuild that function following the departure of its core team a couple of years ago.

While Horizon still has the image of a big spot buyer, it has recently begun breaking that mold through innovative uses of brand extensions in new communications channels, as exemplified by some high profile deals involving client Geico's "cavemen" characters, which have shown up at the Oscars and the Super Bowl, and which are now the focus of a new prime-time TV pilot being developed by ABC.