How brian Whipple transformed Accenture interactive into a marketing leader for the digital age.
Brian Whipple, the longtime CEO of Accenture Interactive, loves fishing; casting his lure into deep waters of the Atlantic.
And from his Boston office, where since 2010 he’s run the world’s largest digital agency—to the tune of $6.5 billion in revenue in 2017—he’s reeled in some pretty big clients, overseen dozens of acquisitions and more recently, this summer, made big waves with the announcement that Accenture Interactive would offer marketers in-house programmatic services.
Yet Whipple is not your garden-variety consultant. Yes, he grew up in the firm, starting his career there in 1987 and spending the next 18 years building up a knowledge base and Rolodex. But by 2005, he moved on to the agency world, with senior leadership roles at RAPP and Hill Holiday. It was here in agency-land where he saw an opportunity—and the future.
“There was little talk, but no action, about the intersection of marketing and technology,” Whipple remembers. “The broader things of connectivity, mobility, the internet was not leveraged in a scalable way for marketing. It was more systems integration. Things were just beginning to wake up in this intersection.”
This intersection, he realized, was coming to a crossroads sooner rather than later. And in a bit of serendipity, Accenture was looking for an executive to lead its fledgling digital-marketing venture; one who was part business strategist, part ad executive and who could talk directly to the CMOs like the consulting firm was already talking to CIOs.
So the big consultancy called Whipple.
“I was interested in growing a scalable business in the billions, not in the millions,” he says of his decision to move over. “And while I am a big fan of various agencies, and the agency culture … they are by their very nature, intrinsically nonscalable.”
This story is from the September 10, 2018 edition of ADWEEK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the September 10, 2018 edition of ADWEEK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
News Anchor Of The Year Megyn Kelly
From Trump to ailes, the fox news personality fearlessly faces off with the powers that be—and ends up crushing the cable ratings race.
The Big Bang
Global consultancies are rocking the agency world, creating a new universe of offerings that meld marketing and technology.
DROGA5
Using the fingers on just one hand, David Droga argues, you can count the number of agencies that possess a “strong soul.”
Ogily
When it comes to leadership changes, 2016 will be remembered as a time of disruption.
The Myth of White Space
'Brands have to stand out in an obvious crowd—not stand alone in an unusual spot that no one cares about.'
Brand Phelps
Can the greatest olympian in history be as dominant out of the pool as he was in it?
Masters Of Their Domain
WHY DIGITAL BRANDS ARE KILLING IT IN ECOMMERCE. BY LAUREN JOHNSON
Winners' Playbook
BRANDS OFTEN FIND THAT WHEN THEY AIM TO DO GOOD, THEY ALSO END UP DOING WELL. HERE ARE FOUR RULES TO KEEP IN MIND. BY DAN TYNAN
Flipping The Disruption Script
THE FORTUNE 500 SHOULDN’T REST ON THEIR LAURELS OF HAVING A FIRST-TO- MARKET ADVANTAGE.
MCCann
All things old were new again in 2017 as McCann dominated the U.S. agency landscape with a string of wins and created the most-discussed campaign of the year in Fearless Girl.