The Martin Agency Hires First Managing Director of Its New York Office

After a decade in the city, The Martin Agency hired Amber Guild to serve as the first managing director for its New York office, Adweek reports. Guild began the position last week, reporting directly to The Martin Agency CEO Matt Williams.

The office’s client roster includes Kayak (for which it won creative duties back in February), Sunglass Hut and Optimum.

“Martin New York has grown dramatically in the past couple of years, but we’ve been eager to find just the right person to help lead that office to an even higher level, and Amber is that person,” Williams said in a statement. “She will bring her extensive expertise and be a great partner to executive creative director James Robinson and director of brand strategy John Gibson as they grow and shape Martin New York.”

Guild joined The Martin Agency form brand consultancy Collins, where she served as president since December of 2014. Prior to Collins she spent five years at full-service agency T3, rising to managing director of the agency’s New York office after joining as a group account director in September of 2009. Before that she spent two years as a senior account director with Swift Integrated Marketing, following a year as an account director with Y&R. She has also held account management positions at Saatchi & Saatchi and Ogilvy & Mather.

“I’ve had a crush on Martin since my early days as an account executive,” Guild told Adweek. “When I was growing up in account management, my job was to become a trusted adviser to our clients by understanding their business, building and creating affinity for their brand, and creating an environment for my team that inspired great, effective work,” she said. “If anything, as I’ve become more senior, I put even more attention to building environments and cultures that allow for people from different backgrounds (diversity!) to thrive—it’s not just the right thing to do, it’s business critical.”

“It’s important to point out that Martin New York has already been here for several years and has steadily grown since it first opened its doors,” she added. “We live in one of the most diverse cities in the world—a city I was born and raised in—and our opportunity is to make sure our talent and our work reflect the creativity, diversity and complexity of the world we live in.”

Guild’s arrival follows the office expanding its creative team with a series of new hires at the beginning of the year, about a month ahead of the Kayak win. The office added executive creative director James Robinson in March of 2015.

twofifteenmccann Crafts ‘#ThumbMoments’ for Pandora

twofifteenmccann have created a new campaign for online radio service Pandora, entitled “#ThumbMoments.”

Users of the service typically give a song a thumbs up to favorite a song, and a thumbs down to not hear the song on their station again. But on September 5th, twofifteenmccann and Pandora made the thumbs up much more meaningful. Fans who favorited a song by Lindsey Sterling, the song was interrupted by a live message from the star, followed by a one-on-one concert for the fan. Over the course of three hours, Sterling performed seven of these concerts for Pandora listeners. Their reactions form the backbone of the new online campaign, which debuted today.

The emphasis on the thumbs up emphasizes one of the service’s more recognizable features, and allows for Pandora to surprise fans of other artists with similar concerts in the future. Indeed, The New York Times reports that future “commercials will follow the same format, but Pandora declined to name participating musicians.” Additionally, hitting thumbs up for certain (unspecified) artists in the future will result in fans receiving “thumb gifts,” such as signed instruments.

“It was very emotional for listeners, and very emotional for Lindsey, too, because she could see them one-to-one in a way that she doesn’t even get to in a concert,” James Robinson, chief creative officer of twofifteenmccann, told The New York Times of the campaign. “She could see what her music meant to these people.”

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Check Out Twofifteenmccann’s Cinematic Campaign for Xbox One Exclusive ‘Ryse: Son of Rome’

Ryse: Son of Rome “Path of Vengeance” from H.K. McCANN on Vimeo.

Twofifteenmccann’s new campaign for Xbox One exclusive “Ryse: Son of Rome” is cinematic in approach and scope.

At the heart of the campaign is the 60 second TV spot “Path of Vengeance” (featured above) which sees the game’s protagonist, Marius, “fight his way from the wilds of the Roman frontier in Brittania, across the Coliseum floor and into the Imperial Palace itself.” In one of the spot’s more interesting touches, the action is accompanied by whispers from Roman citizens spreading his legend. Twofifteen wanted to represent how in ancient Rome “deeds of epic heroism were quickly spread by word of mouth, and the story changed based on who was doing the telling,” which they mimicked with the differing accounts of Marius in the spot. It’s a nice, immersive little detail that’s telling of the overall approach to the campaign.

In addition to the TV spot, Twofifteenmccann, in conjunction with production company Smuggler, created a web series featured on Machinima. Entitled “The Fall,” the series features four, five-minute mini-epics detailing Marius’ backstory, history and motives. The agency claims that each installment is a “mini epic film unto itself.” While that may be overstating a point, this is a very large-scale approach to market the game, and “The Fall” is a solid accomplishment in its own right. It also succeeds quite well at making the game look badass, with what appears to be a pretty compelling story. You can check out the first installment of “The Fall” after the break, along with campaign credits.  continued…

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