Table of contents for Sep-28-15 in Adweek

If you turned on your TV, browsed a news site or logged onto Twitter last week, it’s a good bet that you experienced some of the frenzy around Pope Francis’ first U.S. trip. News networks ran wall-to-wall coverage as the Pope visited Washington, D.C., New York and Philadelphia. (In fact, NBC News even brought Brian Williams out of exile to report on the event for MSNBC.) Social media was abuzz over #PopeinUS, with platforms like Twitter and Snapchat releasing their own Pope-themed emojis and geofilters. And despite the pontiff’s staunchly anti-capitalist views, local companies couldn’t help but jump on the bandwagon, peddling everything from “Holy Wooder” beer to Pope-emblazoned pizza boxes.…

General Electric taps former executive director of global brand marketing Linda Boff as CMO. Leo Burnett svp, group creative director Adam Kennedy heads to Uber as director of brand marketing. AOL video chief Dermot McCormack to depart after less than one year. Michael Finnegan named COO of Atlantic Media. NBC promotes Cesar Conde to chairman of the NBCUniversal International Group. Discovery adds DirecTV’s Paul Guyardo as chief commercial officer. Irene Edwards returns to Sunset magazine as editor in chief. Mother New York hires TBWA\Chiat\Day alum Peter Ravailhe as CEO.…

Volkswagen chief executive Martin Winterkorn resigned last week after the car company revealed it fitted roughly 11 million of its diesel cars worldwide with deceptive software, designed to cheat emissions tests. While Winterkorn insisted he had no previous knowledge of the software, he accepted full responsibility for the company’s misstep and, on Friday, was replaced as CEO by Matthias Müller, the head of the company’s Porsche unit.VW now faces an onslaught of class action lawsuits and millions of recalls globally.…

TIPS FOR MENTORS START WITH HIGH-POTENTIAL EMPLOYEES Invite your best and brightest young staffers to learn from your best and brightest veterans (all the way up to the C-suite level, if possible). GROUP TIME IS BETTER THAN NO TIME AT ALL If one-on-one sessions can’t be scheduled, shoot for two-hour group meetings once per quarter, with a no-holds-barred Q&A. TRUTHINESS COUNTS Don’t shrink from giving honest, constructive feedback about mentees’ work and progress. Millennials can smell insincerity a mile off. TIPS FOR MENTEES ASK QUESTIONS Ask lots of them. Don’t be afraid to show your ignorance on a topic. You’re there to learn, so make the most of mentoring opportunities. LISTEN TO THE ANSWERS Really listen. Try to comprehend the nuances and consider how applying mentors’ advice might help in…

With almost 30 years of constant creative output and touring, Melissa Etheridge has come to appreciate what technology and thoughtful marketing can do to amplify her voice and connect her to fans. Adweek’s sibling, the Clio Awards, will welcome Etheridge at its annual gala this Wednesday at the American Museum of Natural History in New York where she will be introduced by Clio Music juror Jennifer Breithaupt, svp, global head of entertainment marketing of Citi. Etheridge will then introduce live performances by X Ambassadors and Salt-N-Pepa, both on Clio and Billboard’s Top Commercials Chart (powered by Shazam). X Ambassadors will perform “Renegades” from the Jeep Renegade “Band” spot—ranked No. 1 on the Collaborative Debut Chart (which follows a yet-to-be released song or track commissioned specifically for an ad whose debut…

What led you to the agency world after working in consumer products with Avon and ConAgra Foods? A lot of things came together at once for me. I started my career as part of a professional services practice, but I was always drawn to consumer marketing and, after going client-side, I got excited about working for companies that are constantly looking to evolve. That’s what took me to my positions at ConAgra and Avon, which was about being a member of a truly global organization. When I started thinking about the “next thing” for me, the idea of being in a great creative environment that places a high premium on talent to differentiate itself from the competition was a top priority. What about RAPP in particular appealed to you? Now…

A career in advertising can be a notorious slog, especially at the beginning. Grueling hours on dog's-breakfast accounts, watching 99 percent of your ideas—often the best ones—die on the vine, then swallowing your rage when clients insist on mangling the few gems that actually survived to the meeting. But for the creatives who have the talent and ambition—or maybe just the stomach—to stick it out for long enough, there can also be great opportunities, running campaigns for brands that are big enough, and brave enough, to influence pop culture, maybe even make the world a better place. Here, a handful of jobs a driven young creative might wish he or she could someday have, and how the people who actually got them did it. Ryan O’Rourke Wieden + Kennedy, co-creative…

This past August, Spredfast acquired Shoutlet, an innovator in social data integration. The combination of Spredfast and Shoutlet creates a company with substantial resources to deliver powerful products in the fast-paced world of social. Additions to the Spredfast product portfolio include a sophisticated social campaign builder, enriched social CRM data and expanded integrations that power deeper consumer insights. The combined company will have more than 1,400 customers. “Shoutlet’s innovative technology, impressive customer base, talented team and open-platform philosophy made this an easy decision,” says Rod Favaron, Spredfast CEO.…

Top of the Advertising Charts This year’s Clio Awards program will mark the second year of Clio Music, honoring creative excellence in music marketing and advertising. Through a partnership with Billboard (using data from Shazam), Clio Music also presents a chart ranking of top songs in commercials. This year’s event will feature live performances from two of the past year’s chart-toppers: X Ambassadors, whose song “Renegade” for Jeep was No. 1 on the Collaborative Debut chart, and Salt-n-Pepa, whose spot for Geico using their 1987 hit “Push It” made it to the top of the Classic chart. For the complete list of winners: www.clioawards.com.…

THE SEAL Founder Lars Olsson Smith appears on the seal. A tireless worker and brilliant businessman, by his mid-20s he was distributing most of the vodka sold in Sweden. THE SAYING L.O. Smith was obsessed with the purity of his product. When he introduced Absolut, he invented a process called “continuous distillation,” which distilled the vodka hundreds of times. THE NAME Changed from the Swedish company name, Absolute Pure Vodka, because a common word like “Absolute” could not be easily trademarked in the United States. Legend has it that sometime in the mid-’80s, Andy Warhol fell in love amid the pulsing lights and throbbing beats at ultra-chic New York disco Studio 54. Gazing across the bar, Warhol spied a bottle of Absolut Vodka. Modeled on classic Swedish medicine vials traditionally…

New York’s Herald Square is home to a handful of IPG properties, including global media and investment agency Initiative. In 2014, the shop received a face-lift from design firm Ted Moudis Associates. Initiative’s 95,000-square-foot home is now an homage to the people who work there, with inviting lounge areas and communal workspaces, a coffee and snack bar, and even beer on tap. With an eye to Initiative’s core behaviors—fast, brave, decisive and simple—four distinct “neighborhoods” can be found in the facility. The office was made to ensure no one worked in a void, and its 380 employees are encouraged to sit in a different spot every day. “The space was designed to be a fun, collaborative space to inspire our people to do the best work of their careers,” said…

Agency: FCB New Zealand It’s Not OK New Zealand produced one of the most ingenious domestic violence awareness PSAs we’ve seen, with a feature in a magazine called Home. What appeared to be a normal editorial tour of a luxury house had some odd details—a smear of blood here, an overturned chair there. At the end of the feature, an explanation: Violence happens everywhere, even in high socioeconomic households. A great hack, perfectly executed, for the charity It’s Not OK.…

The Hispanic population is the fastest-growing segment in the United States, accounting for 17 percent of the U.S. population, according to 2014 census estimates. Despite the fact that there are 55 million Latinos, however, the amount of original content targeting the demographic is lagging. And comedy is one of the largest gaps, especially within the digital space. “There is no real hub for high-quality Latino comedy,” noted Saturday Night Live alum Horatio Sanz. Along with former castmate and Portlandia star Fred Armisen, Sanz has signed on to groom emerging Latino comics for a new venture from Broadway Video, SNL creator Lorne Michaels’ production outfit. The rollout of Más Mejor (More Better), a digital content studio focused on Latino comedy, will be announced on Tuesday during Advertising Week. Broadway Video plans…

Is mentoring different today than five or 10 years ago? The fundamentals of mentorship remain the same. You’ve got to listen, you’ve got to be honest and build on people’s strengths. And, candidly, point out weaknesses. It’s a two-way street where those coming into the business have a ton to teach to those who are already pretty high up on the corporate ladder. Is it harder now or easier than in the pre-Internet age? The only real difference between mentorship before the digital age and now is that mentorship is no longer limited by geography or industry. The opportunities are endless. I love when I get a text from one of my all-time favorite interns who is now a senior at American University, and I hope joins FCB when he…

When they were in college, your CMO and CIO did not have the same major. Their first jobs out of school were probably not the same, and no decent hiring manager would consider them for the same position today. Yet here we are, increasingly asking them to do one another’s jobs. As marketers depend more and more on technology to connect with consumers in an always-on world, and as IT is increasingly responsible for creative executions, the boundaries between CMO and CIO are rapidly blurring. Consider the now-famous prediction from Gartner analysts Laura McLellan and Michael Smith that “by 2017, the CMO will spend more on IT than the CIO.” As we approach that date, their forecast seems less and less far-fetched. This is not a bad thing. Consumers today…

This past summer, Kinetic closed $17.5 million in financing from Multiplier Capital and Bridge Bank, including growth capital and an expanded working capital facility to support continued revenue momentum. The financing will go principally to enhanced development of the company’s core marketing technology platform. It will also facilitate rapid expansion of Kinetic’s content management services, helping advertisers develop ad creative that captures user attention on social platforms while optimizing those creative elements in conjunction with audience data signals in real time. The company previously raised $21 million in equity funding in two rounds.…

Few fabled Mad Men have had the impact on both the creative and business sides of advertising that Keith Reinhard has. A true visionary, the chairman emeritus of DDB Worldwide helped usher in the holding company era as one of the architects of the 1986 three-way merger that created Omnicom. A working creative director in the ’60s and ’70s, Reinhard was responsible for legendary campaigns like McDonald’s “You Deserve a Break Today” and State Farm’s “Like a Good Neighbor.” Then under his leadership, DDB created award-winning campaigns for Anheuser-Busch, Volkswagen, PepsiCo and others. His mantra? Simplicity, surprise and a smile. An authentic influential. Multiple Clio Gold Winners More than 100 Gold Clio Awards will be celebrated at this week’s ceremony, where the Grand Clio winners will be revealed. Here are…

Ray Super Remote $249 While our TV viewing habits have changed a lot over the past few years, one thing hasn’t: the clunky remote control. Tech startup Ray Enterprises is hoping to change that with a new Super Remote that’s designed to reflect how we actually watch (and access) content. The touchscreen device—which looks more like a smartphone than a standard remote—links to your TV, cable box, Apple TV, Roku, Xbox and more, allowing you to control multiple platforms without switching remotes. By pulling programming information from your cable provider, Ray allows you to search for shows, filter them by type and rate them. Ray even addresses the eternal problem of deciding what to watch by suggesting content based on your viewing habits. Buy it: ray.co BREATHE Air Control Awair…

Kmart Sears Holdings finished its long-running review of agencies for its Sears and Kmart brands last week, retaining Havas Worldwide and Publicis Groupe while cutting Interpublic shop FCB. For FCB, which created Kmart’s popular and award-winning “Ship My Pants” ad and related spots, the Kmart account represents 2 percent of the agency’s revenue. In a memo sent to agency staffers last Thursday, FCB Chicago CEO Michael Fassnacht and CCO Todd Tilford said that the agency can now devote resources to “a more fiscally healthy retailer.”…

Seven years after a painful breakup, Pepsi and longtime agency BBDO New York have rekindled their relationship. The two had maintained one of advertising’s most high-profile partnerships for nearly 50 years, with BBDO creating iconic Pepsi ads starring the likes of Michael Jackson, Michael J. Fox and Cindy Crawford. The agency and brand parted ways in 2008, when Pepsi moved its business to another Omnicom shop, TBWA\Chiat\Day. But last week, BBDO released a new Pepsi ad starring notoriously press-shy Seattle Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch. While Pepsi said it was unable to confirm anything regarding future campaigns, sources suggested that BBDO New York will produce more work for the brand in coming months.…

Three years ago, Emely Perez, then a senior at the New York City College of Technology, knew little about agency life and didn’t necessarily plan to go into advertising as a career. That changed when she landed at J. Walter Thompson, New York, working for Aaron Padin, the agency’s head of art and design, on major accounts such as Energizer and Johnson & Johnson. Padin became Perez’s mentor, teaching his protégé—who was participating in the 4A’s Multicultural Advertising Intern Program (MAIP)—how design fits into the broader, high-tech world of modern branding. He also tutored Perez on how she might best achieve success should she choose Madison Avenue as her ultimate vocation. “To a person like me at the time, who did not have firsthand understanding of the mechanics of an…

Believe it or not, 100 variations of the same ad is not enough for some digital marketers anymore. That’s one of the reasons the stars appear to be aligning for tech vendors that have been developing systems for what they call creative programmatic advertising. Creative and programmatic once seemed incompatible, but here’s what is helping bring the two together. The long-called-for movement for makers of display ads to evolve from using Flash software to HTML5 is finally upon us, underscored by Amazon’s switch to HTML5-only promos and The Washington Post committing to publishing its content on Facebook with the software. On desktops and mobile, ads via HTML5 work better than those made with Flash, improving campaign deliverability by as much as 50 percent and bolstering marketers’ willingness to budget for…

LOCATION The hourlong discussion took place at LMHQ in New York, which serves as a work and event space for creative and innovative businesses. MIKA BRZEZINSKI As co-host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Brzezinski’s success didn’t happen overnight. It took time for Brzezinksi to realize her value and to share those lessons to help empower women in the workplace. Aside from her best-selling book Knowing Your Value and this year’s follow-up Grow Your Value, she has partnered with NBCUniversal on a series of live, Know Your Value events across the country. Each conference gives women networking and coaching opportunities to help create a plan for success. The next event will be held in Boston on Oct. 23. DAWN HUDSON A self-described hard charger, Hudson is no stranger to adversity. Before serving…

Crowdtap has been honored by a number of leading publications. It made the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies for the past two years—in 2015 it ranked 535 and in 2014 it placed at No. 54. In 2014, Crowdtap was named one of the 100 Most Promising Companies in America by Forbes. In addition, the company has been ranked one of the Top 10 Places to Work in Marketing & Advertising by Fortune, the No. 3 Best Place to Work in New York by Crain’s and the No. 6 Best Tech Company to Work For by Mashable.…

4Info recently published an eye-opening report detailing the industry’s first benchmarks for Return on Ad Spend based on offline sales lift attributed to mobile ad exposure. This analysis is based on the measured sales effect of 83 actual campaigns run over the past two years for 59 brands, providing performance guidelines for other advertisers to use for their mobile efforts. The studies were conducted in partnership with Nielsen Catalina Solutions, which independently compiled and validated the benchmarks shared in the study.…

Every minute, 13 children under the age of 5 die somewhere in the world, mostly from preventable causes. For the last six years, Dr. Mickey Chopra, as UNICEF’s chief of health, has been hard at work reducing global infant mortality, driving the agency’s work on maternal, newborn and child health. Under Chopra’s leadership, remarkable progress has been made. He ushered UNICEF’s efforts toward polio elimination in India, Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan—in March 2014, India was declared polio-free and in July 2015, Nigeria was one year without a case. Deaths due to malaria have dropped significantly. Vaccination and vitamin A campaigns have cut measles deaths by 70 percent. Chopra, who will soon be taking a similar role at The World Bank, has helped make people aware of these important issues. As…

What’s the first information you consume in the morning? I’ll run on the treadmill and go back and forth between CNN and ESPN, get my daily dose of info. I keep it very simple. I don’t want to exaggerate and say, “Oh yeah, I go on this site and this site.” I don’t have time. Did you join Twitter because of Community? You’re absolutely right, I really just [joined Twitter] because everybody else on Community used it. Twitter really helped solidify our audience. And it became an amazing—I don’t want to say “marketing tool,” which it was—but it really became a great place for the cast and creator Dan Harmon to interact with fans. The specificity and depth of knowledge of the Community fans really knows no bounds. So are…