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Patrick Ehringer, president, DDB Middle East and Africa, says that his background in finance comes handy in the creative world .

Ehringer wears a number of hats. Apart from looking after the MENA region he is also the agency's regional talent director for Europe. Ehringer is a promoter of DDB Travel and Tourism and DDB Matrix – a tool for measuring the impact of marketing investments on sales. As the foreign trade councillor of France he looks after promoting bilateral trade between France and other countries. Ehringer was in Oman recently to talk about DDB's new logo and the agency's efforts to reinvent itself. He took time out for an interview with BusinessToday.

Some excerpts:


GCC countries are witnessing rapid economic growth. Are these interesting times for advertising professionals in the region?
From an advertiser's point of view what is interesting is that apart from communicating messages for entrepreneurs within the region there is a growing need to communicate the message of regional entrepreneurs outside the region. We are excited about this prospect. The Middle East has great potential for growth. Everybody talks about the BRIC countries of Brazil, Russia, India and China, but I believe that the Middle East ranks along with them. This is not merely because of high oil prices but also because of development in sectors like real estate and tourism. We recently pitched for the account of a multinational detergent maker and the company told us that they expected the highest growth from this region in the coming years.


One of your designations is chief people officer, Europe. James Best, the former DDB CEO, was worldwide chief people and strategic officer. Is this merely lip service or a deeply held belief at the agency?

To answer this properly one has to go back to our principles and value chain. If you look at what we stand for, you will find that we stand for creativity and humanity and this comes from Bernard Brochand, president, DDB International. In our business the only asset we have is our people.

Now let us assume that we put them in a favourable environment and give them good working conditions. This is sure to make people happy and motivate them to create a good product. If they do a good job we can rest assured that our clients will be happy and will pay for the service. Once we are paid we go back to reinvesting this in our good people.

That's the DDB value chain. This value chain comes from a Harvard professor, David Maister, who said you are in the people's business with only two key variables: you have people (executives) on one side and clients on the other. Since we work with people on both the sides we needed to have a people's policy. Unfortunately it took us a long time to realise this simple truth.

Finally in 2000 DDB came up with a people's policy and this is where the chief people officer
designation came from. I had worked closely with James Best on the first worldwide task force on managing people.

Are there enough media options in the region for advertisers to communicate their message?
I see two things happening in the region. On the electronic media side there are local, regional and international television channels. Then there are newspapers, magazines, outdoor advertising and the Internet.

So there are a number of options to reach out to people. In a technologically connected world you see the same messages across the world though the language may vary.

The advertising industry is dominated by large networks like WPP, Omnicom and the Interpublic group. Where does this leave standalone agencies which may not be a part of a larger network?


There are different models and everyone is looking for the best model. Broadly there are two specific models: networks like the ones you mentioned and some very creative advertising hot shops like BBH (Bartle Bogle Hegarty) which works on brands to provide worldwide services. The problem with such creative hot shops is that they have limited international presence.

In today's environment most clients ask for a global campaign. So even if a creative hot shop creates a great piece of work a company will still need a network to implement this campaign. There are companies like Nokia that have split up its advertising account into two parts – one for creative work and the other for implementing the campaign. Communication today is all about talking to the customer directly and an agency in London cannot do this in Oman.


There is scope for standalone advertising agencies but only at the local level. Assume that there is a local agency that services a big company in Oman. This company has a potential to grow beyond Oman so once it goes to Qatar or Dubai it will need to use the services of a local agency based in that country. I know of clients who work with 350 agencies.

You can imagine the nightmare that this presents – like repeating the same message to each of these agencies. In contrast if you hire a network you need to communicate the idea only once. The network then does the rest, bringing in economies of scale.

You have coined and championed the message – 'better ideas, better results'. What does this mean?
It means that if you can come up with an idea that is based on proper insight and analysis then it is sure to sell. We are in the business of marketing whether it is a product or an idea. As a marketing solutions provider, our business is to provide creative solutions for issues that our clients may have. So if I can come up with the big idea it will ensure that one is able to sell a client's product, so better ideas, better results.

You started your career at Arthur Andersen as an auditor and later worked as a chief financial officer at Japy Hermes, an Olivetti group company. How has the transition been from numbers to something more abstract as advertising?
Advertising is just one line in a profit and loss statement, the main entry on the balance sheet being revenue. If our business is that of being a marketing solutions provider, then we need to market things that are related to a client’s business. This makes it important that we have a better knowledge of a client's business and since I have worked in other industries I have an understanding of how things works there.

This is something that most agencies are waking up to. Earlier there were account executives, but now there are brand managers. That means it is important to speak about what makes a brand. As soon as you know the marketing mix that creates a stronger brand it leads you to consider advertising spends not as cost but as investment.

People in advertising need to think in terms of business, they need to talk about figures and measure efficiencies. I have enough knowledge about advertising but more than that, I am interested in my client’s business so that we can help them. It is here that my background in finance comes handy. We are less admen and more consultants