OgilvyOne strengthens mobile credentials with Acision alliance

By Mickey Alam Khan

February 14, 2008

Brian Fetherstonhaugh is chairman/CEO of OgilvyOne

OgilvyOne Worldwide signaled deeper interest in mobile marketing with a new alliance struck with Acision, one of the leading text messaging and charging firms nationwide.

The WPP Group plc direct and interactive agency will use Acision's platforms for text and multimedia messaging on behalf of clients. Acision's loyalty and campaign management tools will also support OgilvyOne's mobile advertising campaigns on behalf of clients.

"OgilvyOne's strategy in mobile is to … create innovative and compelling experiences for their brands," said Brian Fetherstonhaugh, chairman/CEO of OgilvyOne, New York. "Examples would include work done by our Ogilvy Digital Innovation Lab in Singapore for American Express and Diageo.

"In 2008 we will have Digital Innovation Labs in Singapore, New York, London, Beijing and Sao Paulo," he said.

OgilvyOne also handles direct and interactive marketing for clients such as Cisco Systems, DHL, IBM Corp., Lenovo, Unilever, Nestle, SAP and Yahoo.

The Acision deal will help OgilvyOne with mobile marketing campaigns that are targeted, a key requirement for an agency's whose bread-and-butter is one-on-one outreach.

"This is our first partnership with a mobile messaging partner," Mr. Fetherstonhaugh said.

A $500 million company, Acision handles messages and charges for more than 300 network operators and service providers. The Plano, TX, firm claims that more than 50 percent of global text and multimedia messaging traffic was generated through its platforms.

Acision's mobile data services include text and multimedia messaging, IP messaging, mobile Internet, mobile advertising, IP voicemail and IP videomail. The company's payments systems enable real-time charging to blur the lines between prepaid and postpaid subscriptions.

The deal between OgilvyOne and Acision was made public during the GSMA Mobile World Congress organized this week in Barcelona, Spain by the GSM Association. The show is said to have attracted more than 50,000 attendees, many of them from wireless carriers and mobile service providers.

Given mobile marketing's growing importance, Mr. Fetherstonhaugh was in Barcelona for the show and to touch base with carriers -- the repositories of some of the largest and most targeted databases around the world.

"OgilvyOne helps telcos unlock the value of their customers' data," Mr. Fetherstonhaugh said. "This is why we're partnering with Acision globally."