Historically, ad consultancy firms have been data wranglers that businesses hire to suggest advertising improvements based on trends and target markets — and then their clients have gone off and hired creative agencies like Droga5 to execute.
Recently, consultancy firms have tried to cut out the middleman and get creative as well, but now they’re just acquiring them. Pending official review, the ad industry’s largest consultancy firm, Accenture Interactive, will soon buy Droga5 — one of the top independent ad agencies in the biz.
According to Fast Company, this is the industry’s highest profile deal in recent memory (in 2017, the 2 companies brought in around $8B in collective revenue).
It’s not just about advertising anymore
In the past few years, ad agencies have been on the hunt for the most lucrative way to answer the ever-expanding requests of a volatile landscape, where marketers want bigger, better, faster, and smarter.
It used to be about coming up with 2-dimensional attention-grabbing ads — “make 7-Up yours!” Now, it’s about injecting a person with a broader consumer experience: from VR to wearable-connected avatars for Carnival Cruise Lines… Future stuff.
A match made in heaven (brought to you by Capri Sun)
As Accenture wields a fat market share to push more ambitious consumer experience projects, the company knows it needs Droga5’s creative touch.
David Droga, the founder of Droga5 who once said he would never sell, acknowledges the symmetry of expertise between the two giants is going to be crucial for all brands down the road: “This isn’t a nice-to-have… This is future-proofing.”