The polarization of the country has been in sharp focus for some time, especially the second half of the year. That polarization isn’t new: There’s been a brewing — some might say bubbling or even boiling — so-called culture war for years and it’s spewed far beyond the political realm to become a norm that marketers have to contend with for their brands. 

As consumers put brands’ advertising and marketing messages under a microscope, looking for any hint that a brand is making a statement one way or another in the culture war, in which everything is looked at through a political lens, marketers have to be keenly aware of how anything they put out in the world could be interpreted — or misinterpreted. It’s a consideration that marketers and agency execs are aware of with some more vigilant and more worried about potential backlash than others. Getting messaging right is more important than ever as consumers pay closer attention to brands and there is potential for backlash.

What do we mean by brands at the center of a culture war? Let’s recap some recent examples. Jaguar’s rebrand was dubbed “woke” by several publications and incurred ire from consumers that they were making a statement of some kind that their brand may not have intended. Volvo, meanwhile, was recently celebrated for what has been described as a “pro-family” ad with a spot that was typical bread-and-butter storytelling for the carmaker. Another ad from Apple was also dubbed as “pro-family” and celebrated. Again it was standard fare for advertisers.

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2024 feels like a year that can be split in two: In the first half we saw some expected marketing trends panning out in expected and unexpected ways (Google’s cookie confusion, retail media obsession and generative AI). In the second half, however, it feels like marketers were in the midst of a recalibration of culture, and everyone was trying to understand how to show up and where to show up and they had to do so with stranger than usual change.

A good way to sum up 2024 might be this: It was a year in which marketers (and everyone else) had to get comfortable with expecting the unexpected.

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Omnicom’s proposed plan to acquire Interpublic Group, revealed at the beginning of this week, has thrown the advertising business into disarray.

It’s also thrown a spanner in the works for marketers who are currently in the middle of agency reviews.

CMOs already have to weigh up agencies’ tech savvy, their media buying capabilities and, in some cases, their creative chops in order to judge which shop’s best for their brand. They’re tasked with tempting an agency to make their best (and best value) offer, while seeing through the dazzle of the pitches themselves.

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Monday’s news of the proposed plans to combine Omnicom and IPG has already revealed what will surely be the biggest advertising story heading into 2025 — although surprises do seem to happen often in this industry. While the deal’s official close is still a long way off and there may be regulatory hurdles to clear before the acquisition is complete, it’s still worth charting out who the winners and losers may be if all goes according to plan. Let’s dig in.

Winners

Omnicom and Omnicom leadership

Eleven years ago, when the Publicis/Omnicom deal fell apart, one of the reasons it did was confusion about who would lead the combined entity. It’s already clear that Omnicom leadership will be in charge should its acquisition of IPG go through and that the name of the combined holding company will be Omnicom — another signal of who is in charge. That’s a win for Omnicom CEO John Wren, according to analysts and agency executives, who said that if the deal goes through it will help cement Wren’s legacy.

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It’s an end-of-year shake-up for adland: The third largest agency holding company, Omnicom, announced plans to acquire the fourth largest agency holding company, IPG, yesterday morning. The combination will have Omnicom leapfrog Publicis and WPP to become the world’s largest holding company, together accounting for $25 billion in annual ad revenue and over 100,000 employees, should the acquisition be approved by regulators. 

Consolidation has been the name of the game for some time for holding companies albeit at a much smaller scale. Think Dentsu Creative, Omnicom Advertising Group, VML, to name a few. There’s been a push to combine agencies (sometimes doing away with agency brands), find efficiencies where possible (like back office overlap) and use the scale of a bigger shop to woo advertisers. The push to do so is expected to continue with this acquisition. 

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Libie Motchan wants more transparency from Meta. 

Motchan, the co-founder of a direct-to-consumer orthotics brand, Fulton, that has prioritized Facebook and Instagram ads to help build its business, is trying to figure out why her brand has been flagged as part of Meta’s upcoming policy change for health and wellness brands. Communication with the platform so far has been “very opaque,” said Motchan, adding that the lack of transparency from Meta has left Fulton in the dark as to why it has been flagged and what it can do to satisfy Meta to allow the brand to continue advertising as it had been. 

In mid-November, Meta advised advertisers and agencies that it would “begin rolling out additional restrictions on certain categories of websites that are using Meta’s business tools” starting in January 2025, according to an email shared with Digiday. Those restrictions mean that some brands in the health and wellness category would no longer be able to use lower-funnel tracking data for conversions.

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