Go digital in face of downturn, Ogilvy tells clients

MANILA, Philippines - Optimize all your existing digital marketing efforts to ensure they are performing as well as they can. This is the advice given by Ogilvy to companies looking at how to make the most out of the current global economic slump.

“There are digital options at your disposal today that simply didn’t exist in previous downturns. In fact, just within the past couple of years, a number of new channels, media properties, and techniques have emerged. So the starting point is to be aware of and consider some of the newer options,” Ogilvy wrote in the booklet “Digital in a Downturn: Smart Strategies for Tough Times.”

The online publication is one of seven booklets that Ogilvy has published and posted on www.ogilvyonrecession.com.

These booklets highlight strategies and tactics across different marketing disciplines that illustrate how companies can support and build their brands even during these uncertain times.

Locally, OgilvyOne Worldwide, the one-to-one and digital marketing discipline under O&M Philippines group, has established a website, www.ogilvyone.com.ph, that supports the global initiative.

“This is our way of helping ‘unknit the digital fog’ and help marketers discover for themselves the benefits of tapping digital channels, specially in these tough times,” OgilvyOne Worldwide managing director Elly Puyat said.

Those who have visited the OgilvyOne portal particularly appreciate the homepage that highlights the top 100 websites frequented by Filipino Internet surfers.

Accessible to visitors are brief descriptions and links to popular sites classified based on general interests such as business, entertainment, lifestyle and social networking.

The site enables the user to browse through the websites according to their personal preferences or to the target market’s.

It illustrates the complexity of the World Wide Web yet it shows how easily segmentable these various portals are according to their target segments.

“It’s a map of the World Wide Web which we would like our visitors to navigate, with OgilvyOne, of course, as their guide,” Puyat said.

Another interesting section of the OgilvyOne website is the collection of the agency’s featured works representing powerful creative ideas and strategic executions that enable clients to achieve their respective business objectives.

“As a pioneering one-to-one marketing agency, our work is to connect our clients’ brands with the people who count, to develop strategies that build and sustain these brands, and to create enduring relationships between the brands and their customers,” Puyat said.

The website also carries a section that presents OgilvyOne’s point of view on issues concerning the practice of customer relationship management as well as write-ups intended to help clients “stay on top of a constantly evolving marketplace.”

Currently, it contains the articles “Marketing Recession – 9 Rules of Thumb,” “The 4Ps are out, the 4Es are in,” “What percentage of budgets are spent online,” and “We sell or else, like David (Ogilvy) said.”

The website also boasts of a blog section of key personalities from OgilvyOne: Puyat, business director Isa Garcia and creative director Dino Ocampo.

Puyat talks about the benefits businesses gain from one-to-one marketing through digital; Garcia blogs about the dynamic life at Ogilvy; and Ocampo provides a creative point of view on digital campaigns. 

“Instead of simply providing contact details, we would like to show how committed OgilvyOne is in getting the digital conversation going,” Puyat said.

The OgilvyOne website has been up since February.