Optimize marketing with agency expertise

In this moment of change, as AI transforms marketing, what do you need to stay ahead?

Going by the success of forward-thinking marketers, the ability to promptly put AI to work is critical. To move fast on this, they’re collaborating with media and marketing agencies that have deep expertise in AI in marketing.

Together, they’ve accelerated growth by using AI to develop durable measurements that help optimise performance, and increase reach, demand, and acquisitions.

Here are three inspiring examples of that powerful partnership at play.

Partner to build a strong foundation for measurement and AI-powered advertising

As a brand that thinks ahead, travel experiences platform Pelago wanted to be ready to measure its conversions accurately after third-party cookies are deprecated next year. Its aim: to better assess and improve its campaign performance.

Annalect Asia Pacific, part of the Omnicom Media Group (OMG), had a ready plan to realise the ambition of its client, Pelago.

Kothandaram Venkatakrishnan, Chief Client Officer at Annalect Asia Pacific shared that “OMG APAC has a multidisciplinary task force that helps our clients navigate a cookiless future with privacy-safe technology and first-party data.”

OMG knew, through its partnership with Google, that enhanced conversions is a durable, privacy-centric way of measuring first-party conversion data.

Brands that use enhanced conversions have seen a 5% median increase in reported conversions on their Search spend than those who don’t.¹ And with accurate, comprehensive first-party data, they can unlock better performance with Google AI ad solutions because quality data fuels AI-powered results.

OMG implemented enhanced conversions for Pelago and saw:

By partnering with Google, Pelago boosted their marketing campaign performance through first-party data measurement strategies, leading to a 36% increase in conversions for Search campaigns, suggested by a dollar coin and a blue upward arrow.

Puja Bhargava, CMO at Pelago, shared that “Enhanced conversions helped us drive more conversions at a lower acquisition cost. It also future-proofed our measurement with a more accurate way of tracking conversions. We’d recommend it to others.”

Collaborate to unlock mid-funnel marketing growth with AI-powered acquisitions

A strong brand-agency partnership can also unlock new areas of AI-powered growth for a brand. That was the case for Standard Chartered and its agency partner Dentsu.

Dentsu, given its experience across industries, knew brands tend to plan their marketing around upper funnel awareness and lower funnel conversions, but place less focus on the “messy middle” phase. That’s where customers spend significant time exploring their options before making a purchase decision.

Sunil Naryani, Chief Product Officer of Media at Dentsu APAC, shared that mid-funnel planning is key to guiding potential customers down the funnel, achieving marketing success and that Demand Gen is the AI solution that makes this process efficient.

So Dentsu and Standard Chartered focused on unlocking that mid-funnel marketing growth opportunity. For that, they partnered with Google and experimented with Demand Gen campaigns to achieve qualified leads.

Demand Gen’s AI-powered bidding capabilities let the bank optimise for consideration goals such as website visits, and reach high value customers at an optimal frequency. At the same time, it delivered immersive creatives across YouTube, Discover, and Gmail to catch the attention of customers in the mid-funnel and help them make purchase decisions.

By integrating Demand Gen into its always-on Search campaigns, Standard Chartered saw:

By using Demand Gen for Search campaigns, Standard Chartered saw a +29% increase in Search leads and a +31% boost in overall leads from Discovery, Demand Gen and Search campaigns, suggesting AI's effectiveness in optimizing marketing performance.

Unite to use AI and maximise the appeal of creative campaigns

A brand with a savvy agency partner is also well-positioned to unleash the creative potential of AI marketing campaigns and increase audience reach. Take leading Southeast Asia superapp, Grab, as an example.

Asha Gourinath, Regional Head of Growth and Performance Marketing at Grab, says that “Grab has been actively leveraging Google’s AI-powered solutions like Video reach campaigns to optimize campaign effectiveness.”

It has had success using YouTube’s mid- to long-form assets to raise awareness and consideration among mobile-first audiences. But given how young customers have taken to short-form video content, it was keen to expand into this creative format.

So its agency, M&C Saatchi Performance, collaborated with Google to develop a head-to-head test between YouTube Shorts and another short-form video platform. That allowed Grab to compare performance metrics and find the best platform for its creative campaign.

On YouTube, the team implemented the AI-powered Video reach campaigns, which let Grab reach a broad, mobile-first audience across Shorts, while maximising unique reach within its budget. The results outperformed that of the other short-form video social platform.

Through partnering with its marketing agency expertise, Grab can determine that YouTube Shorts ads, versus ads on another short-form video social platform, had 2.5X more completed views at 60% lower cost per view, and 12% higher reach.

Vaibhav Chopra, Client Partner at M&C Saatchi Performance, shared that the head-to-head comparison affirmed their choice of YouTube Shorts and helped them customize strategies to maximize the strengths of Shorts for future video-centric campaigns.

AI in marketing has enabled brands to achieve greater growth and performance. But it takes expertise to unlock accelerated results from the get-go.

A strong partnership with agencies lets you readily tap into their expertise to maximise the possibilities of AI — from having accurate measurement and insights, to optimising marketing performance and maximising creative impact.

If you want to go far, and fast, you can’t find a better partner than an agency that knows how to put AI to work for you.

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