Former P&G Innovations Head Joins ARF

In the US, the Advertising Research Foundation (ARF) has appointed former Procter & Gamble senior exec Ted McConnell in the new role of Executive VP - Digital.

McConnell retired last week from P&G, where he spent around thirty-two years and was most recently General Manager - Interactive Marketing and Innovation. His new role will focus on identifying new measurement initiatives to support and validate digital marketing, and he has already offered clues as to his take on this in a statement, saying that measurement 'should endeavor to correlate the quality of attention, and the quality of context - not just impressions' and that there is a need 'to examine the balance between standards and proprietary methods and data'.

In a November 2008 speech at a conference in Cincinatti McConnell famously questioned whether advertisers should be bothering with Facebook, asking 'Who said this is media? Media is something you can buy and sell' and added: 'What in heaven's name made you think you could monetise the real estate in which somebody is breaking up with their girlfriend?'

More recently, he has co-authored an industry call for action on measurement, the Blueprint for Holistic Measurement, which ARF President and CEO Bob Barocci says 'helped reinvigorate the industry dialogue'. In a statement, Barocci said the appointment was 'nothing short of a coup for the ARF. Several years ago, Ted was the cornerstone of our industry effort to move the industry toward an 'engagement' metric, and we now have tremendous opportunity to tap into his world-class thinking and leadership on a more sustained basis.'

The appointment follows a raft of recent hires for the ARF: the recruiting last month of long-time IBM exec Todd M. Powers, Ph.D. as its Chief Research Officer; the full-time return of Bill Cook as EVP - Research and Standards last month and media research veteran David Marans as EVP of Media in July. Former CRO Joel Rubinson announced in July that he was stepping down from the role.

Web site: www.thearf.org .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.