JDA was 'a shadow of itself' admits group chief executive
Recently rebranded marketing agency JDA ‘was a shadow of itself’ the chief executive of its ownership group has admitted.
Discussing the rebrand of The Direct Marketing Group, as well as that of Leeds marketing agency JDA, now named Involve, Martin Smith, chief executive of The Involve Marketing Partnership said that the agency was no longer operating in the manner that it did in it’s heyday under found Judith Donovan and her successor Carl Hopkins.
“We have had issues with JDA because JDA as it’s been for the last while, is not the JDA of Judith Donovan or Carl Hopkins,” commented Smith. “We acquired JDA about four years back and it had a lot of prestige due to the position that Judith occupied and Carl did also. It was a shadow of itself. We’ve had to make some changes, it’s not been great, but we feel now that we’ve got the right structure and are now capable of growing things, which is not where it has been at for the past few months.”
Discussing the changes at the group, Smith said that the change was due to a new ideology which saw it move away from its direct marketing offer.
“We see Involve Marketing as being a much more contemporary positioning as a collective group for our business. The agencies that we have, Millenium, JDA, Whitewater, DMS and new agency United down in London. What we felt was that we needed a new brand and visual identity to be able to encapsulate the Involve marketing ideology that we’re involved with now,” Smith explained.
“The structure is similar to what we have had in the past. We have managing directors in each of the agencies. They’ve got boards of directors themselves but the main thing is that we now have a single board in terms of Involve Marketing Partnership, which I a member of alongside each of the MD’s.
“We’ve also now got a new MD for Involve, David Pemberton who has effectively replaced Mike Ashton, [former managing director of JDA who left earlier this year].
“We have been working on this for the last 18 months because the challenge that we have seen is that the classic agency models would have a pretty torrid time if they don’t adapt. What we’ve looked for is to make sure that we have agencies that are racing fit. There has been some changes and it does create some upheaval but we’ve knuckled down and we’re getting through this now?”
Smith added that the changes could see opportunities created within the group and added that further information would be available potentially this week following discussions with Pemberton as to his “significant” plans.