S4 Capital’s Monks has employed Linda Cronin as EVP and head of media, efficient July 15, the company solely shared with Marketing campaign US.
Cronin assumes some duties held by Chris Martin,who cofounded DataMonks (beforehand MightyHive) and now serves as an exterior advisor. She is going to oversee Monks’ world media technique and leverage the company’s partnerships with tech firms to embed AI into its media capabilities.
Her different duties embrace main paid media investments and utilizing insights from Monks’ efficiency and activation practices to construct customized media plans for brand spanking new and present shoppers.
Melissa Wisehart beforehand led media as chief media officer till October when she departed for Omnicom’s PHD. Cronin’s remit will differ as she focuses on using the company’s advertising and marketing workflow automation platform, MonksFlow.
Cronin studies to Bruno Lambertini, co-CEO of promoting providers. Eight staff report on to her whereas she broadly oversees a staff of round 500 individuals.
She beforehand spent seven years with Interpublic Group’s Initiative, most just lately as world managing companion since March 2022. She additionally served as an SVP at Dentsu’s Carat USA between June 2014 and Could 2017.
Initiative declined to touch upon its plans to fill Cronin’s function.
Cronin pointed to case research for Monks’ work with Hatch and Forever21 as examples of labor she goals to guide the staff to provide, regardless of not engaged on these campaigns herself.
On the finish of Could, Monks mixed MonksFlow with Google Gemini to create a marketing campaign for Hatch’s good alarm clock. The company used generative AI to conceptualize a method and automate artistic asset manufacturing and viewers segmentation, halving manufacturing time and lowering price of acquisition by 31% whereas rising click-through charges by 78% and on-site engagement by 46%.
In early June, Monks mixed its AI with Meta’s Benefit+ platform to automate the method of adapting artistic for various audiences, serving to the shopper produce visuals at scale for its big range of merchandise. Monks estimated that delivering these adverts with out AI would have taken three weeks. As a substitute, it produced them in sooner or later whereas driving return on funding up by 66% and click-through up charges by 71%.
“AI goes to be infused in what we do right here, and the concept is to check and study now in order that whereas others are nonetheless determining their imaginative and prescient, we’re getting learnings and making use of,” Cronin stated.
In July, Monks rebranded and consolidated its capabilities into two practices: advertising and marketing providers and know-how providers. Media will sit within the former, however Cronin will work carefully with the know-how providers group as her staff leverages the company’s AI platform.
The irony of Cronin being Monks’ first main rent because it rebranded to keep away from overemphasizing its media capabilities wasn’t misplaced on Wesley ter Haar, co-CEO of the company’s advertising and marketing providers.
“If Linda has huge plans, we would must rename to MediaMonks once more,” he joked.
Monks eliminated media from its identify as a result of it struggled to clarify the breadth of its providers to non-traditional shoppers at tech firms, he defined.
“About 25% of our enterprise now sits in that area … and we had been simply operating into the query, ‘Why would I belief a media firm with my know-how stack?’” he stated.
In Cannes, he told Campaign that he expects media shopping for to be one of many first disciplines to get replaced by AI.
By hiring Cronin, the company needed to indicate that it isn’t abandoning its media capabilities, which have been additive however not core to its enterprise currently, however is attempting to adapt them for the AI age.
“There’s such a second of disruption within the area that we wish to have a extremely clear go-to-market technique with equally sturdy and clear management behind it,” ter Haar stated.
Cronin additionally acknowledged a shift in media professionals’ job duties because of AI.
“Media has been utilizing AI for many years with programmatic shopping for,” Cronin stated. “Throughout that point, there was numerous concern from media consumers about not having a job … we’re on the similar apex after we speak about gen AI as a consequence of issues like AI search.”
Nonetheless, as Monks leans into AI, new analysis from Gartner means that 30% of businesses are likely to abandon their generative AI projects after reaching proof of idea by the top of 2025 as a consequence of poor knowledge high quality and unclear enterprise worth coupled with excessive prices.
Cronin stated stats like this underscore the significance of continuous to provide case research and outcomes to show to shoppers the worth of generative AI.
“Not each check goes to be fruitful,” she stated. “The query is, what learnings are you yielding from it? How are you setting it up in order that if it’s a perceived failure, you’re not failing, since you simply realized what didn’t work?”
In March, S4 Capital reported a Q1 income decrease of 11.7% year-over-year as a consequence of decreased exercise from tech shoppers. Earlier this 12 months, General Motors tasked Monks with creating personalized content material at scale utilizing AI.
