Has the novelty of remote working worn off? The answer to that depends on who you ask.
But, if you ask John Nardone, he’ll say a lot of brands are now struggling to cope with the twin pressures of the “great resignation” and the wish to enact boundary-pushing change.
In this video interview with Beet.TV, Nardone says his company is trying to help.
The remote barrier
Nardone is president of Mediaocean, an ad-tech company providing omnichannel advertising solutions to agency holding companies, independents, and brands like P&G and IBM.
He says many companies adjusted reasonably to the pandemic’s initial remote-working compulsion. But now he is noting “fatigue”.
“We’re seeing that a lot of companies and a lot of our clients are finding it harder and harder to execute ambitious new things,” Nardone says. “They can still sort of execute the stuff that are well-practised motions within their companies, but trying to do new things and build new muscles is much harder in a remote situation.
“Now (they) have to onboard new team members in a totally remote environment … It’s not easy and we definitely see clients struggling with it.”
Hands across the ocean
Mediaocean has a global footprint with 1,500 employees across 30 offices worldwide. About $200 billion in annualized media spending goes through its platform, or about a third of the global total.
For more than 50 years, Mediaocean, formerly known as Donavan Data Systems, has been the software solution of choice for both TV advertisers and sellers, powering ad management, inventory and billing.
With the acquisition of 4C, Mediaocean became a cross-platform company that expanded beyond its roots to planning, optimization and measurement.
Nardone says his own company has “overcome the barriers” of remote working through “foundational cultural elements” of communication and collaboration.
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Filling the gaps
But advertising clients, on the other hand, need a helping hand, he says.
“If clients are struggling with onboarding new people or not having the bandwidth to take on new things, we as a vendor and a partner and a supplier have to try to fill that gap,” Nardone says.
“Part of how we’re responding as a company to that is to make more support available. And so we’ve put a lot more energy into formalising our partnership structures, our service structures …
“Where they’ve lost team members and have a short term hole in their team, we’ve been willing to jump in as partners and to try to fill those gaps for them.”
You are watching “Advertising Transformation: What’s Next for Converged TV and Video,” a Beet.TV Virtual Leadership Summit presented by Mediaocean. For more videos, please visit this page.
