San Francisco-Based Pierry Rebrands as Wunderman Thompson
Move bolsters Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence to deliver enhanced, connected experiences for clients.

March 3, 2020 – NEW YORK, NY – San Francisco-based marketing services agency Pierry Inc. has rebranded to parent company Wunderman Thompson, a WPP creative, data and technology agency built to inspire growth for its clients. Pierry’s rebrand solidifies Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence and enhances their marketing technology offering under one brand. The new identity leverages Pierry’s existing skills and combines them with Wunderman Thompson’s marketing technology expertise to meet clients’ growing demand for the Salesforce Customer 360 Platform, and Pierry and Wunderman Thompson’s shared clients will now have simpler access to the expertise of both agencies.

Founded in 2008, Pierry was acquired by Wunderman in September of 2017 and became a significant part of Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence after Wunderman and J. Walter Thompson came together in 2019 to become Wunderman Thompson.

Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce COE encompasses Pierry, Mirum, ENext, EMark, The Cocktail, and Gorilla Group to deliver expanded marketing automation, CRM and CDP solutions for clients worldwide.

Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce offering reduces complexity for clients by providing a one-stop solution to create customer experiences that deliver what consumers need, when they need it, at speed. By simplifying marketing technology, clients can focus on creating the kind of experiences that inspire customers and consumers to action, with technology that transforms customer journeys.

Wunderman Thompson’s marketing technology offering is comprised of three key elements: customer acquisition technology, experience technology and commerce, integrated with Wunderman Thompson’s data and mobile experts to deliver customized digital interactions and build deeper ties with customers.

“With Pierry’s rebranding, Wunderman Thompson positions itself as one of Salesforce’s largest agency partners globally for building data-driven marketing and advertising technology solutions for personalized customer engagement,” said Stephane Viallet, VP of Alliances, Salesforce.

“I’m excited to officially move Pierry under the Wunderman Thompson banner,” said Neil Stewart, Global CEO of Wunderman Thompson Commerce. “Data-driven thinking leads to consumer experiences that get results for clients, and Pierry’s expertise strengthens our Salesforce Center of Excellence to inspire growth for our clients.”

Salesforce and others are among the trademarks of salesforce.com, inc.

About Wunderman Thompson
Wunderman Thompson is a creative, data and technology agency built to inspire growth for its clients and people. Our experts deliver end-to-end solutions at a global scale with an entrepreneurial spirit that infuses creativity with emerging technology to deliver revolutionary work. Headquartered in New York, we are a worldwide agency bringing together over 20,000 people in 90 markets across the globe.

About Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Thompson Company
Pierry, Inc was founded in 2008 with one goal in mind – help its clients make the most of their digital presence. Today, this remains our goal, but we have since grown from a small staff servicing local businesses into a full-service digital marketing agency, providing world-class service to some of the most recognizable brands in the world. Our services include creative, strategy, campaign management and implementation of cloud-base technology. We are a proud Salesforce Partner.

In 2017, Pierry became a part of WPP and the Wunderman Group companies.

Redwood City, September 20, 2017—Pierry Inc. is pleased to announce today that Wunderman, a WPP company and globally leading, digital agency, has taken a majority stake in our company.

“Pierry is one of the very best companies at helping clients use Salesforce Marketing Cloud to manage their customer relationships,” said Mark Read, Global CEO of Wunderman. “I’m delighted that Josh Pierry and his team will be joining Wunderman, deepening our technology consulting expertise and giving our clients access to a world-class team for working with Salesforce, one of the world’s fastest growing software companies.”

Mark Read, Global CEO of Wunderman. Photo courtesy of AdWeek.

Pierry—which began as a team of two back in 2008—has rapidly grown to employee nearly one hundred strategy, creative, technology and digital specialists, with offices in Redwood City, CA, Boulder, CO, New York City, NY, Ruston, LA and Kyoto, Japan. Through our proprietary MaaS™(Marketing as a Service) approach—a unique blend of technological expertise partnered with creative excellence—our mission has always been to aid companies in optimizing their digital marketing initiatives, improve efficiency, impact and increase ROI. Pierry’s revenues were $14.5 million USD for the 2016 year-end.

“It’s not every day [that] you get the chance to become a part of one of the largest and most respected digital agencies in the world. Having Wunderman as our partner allows us to continue to scale rapidly and increase our service capabilities for our clients,” said our Founder and CEO, Josh Pierry. Today, Pierry serves a vast range of clients across a variety of sectors including, LifeLock, Louisiana Tech University, Major League Soccer team San Jose Earthquakes and Yeti Coolers.

Pierry Founder and CEO, Josh Pierry.  Photo courtesy of Media Bizj.

The investment is a part of WPP’s operational streamline—progressing its strategy to focus on three key verticals that differentiate the Group’s client services: technology, data and digital content. As a Platinum Salesforce Marketing Partner, Pierry will join the ranks among WPP’s other investments in innovative technology service companies, including AppNexus, mySupermarket and Within Unlimited (VR/AR). WPP’s digital asset portfolio includes companies like Cognified, Deeplocal (an innovation studio and spin-off from Carnegie Mellon University, Marketplace Ignition (Amazon-focused e-commerce), Medialets, Salmon and The Cocktail (a digital consultancy).

The Group has also invested in several digital content companies, including Russell Simmons’ All Def Digital, Gimlet, Imagina (a content rights and media company based in Spain), Mic, Refinery29 and VICE. Their roster of wholly-owned digital agencies also includes Essence, AKQA, F.biz, POSSIBLE, VML, Mirum and Wunderman.

WPP’s digital revenues came in at over $7.5 billion USD in 2016—representing 39% of the Group’s total revenues of $19.4 billion. The Group has set a projected target of 40-45% of revenue to be derived from digital in the next four to five years (digital represented 41% of WPP’s revenues as of June 30, 2017). WPP companies collectively employee 29,000 people and generate revenues of $7.5 billion in North America.

“Joining forces with Wunderman is a tremendous opportunity,” said Josh Pierry, and we look forward to the contingency it brings to continue to advance, grow and deliver our clients the best service in the industry.

Ah, the 4^th of July, Independence Day, the federal holiday we observe as a nation—commemorating the thirteen American colonies asserting their independence from Great Mother Britain—to stand as the unified and independent nation we know today as the great country on earth.

What better way to pay patronage to such an important occasion than reminding consumers what this independence yields them? The freedom to buy whatever they want, of course!

As marketers, and those providing these services to companies, it is our job to grab consumer or client attention, convince them in the span of a few seconds, or minute, that they need our product or service and—if we do it right— even make them smile or laugh.

These are 6 companies that used the 4^th of July holiday as an opportunity to do just that. Here’s what they did right and what we can learn from them:

Let FREE-dom Ring

What are you offering your consumers? A coupon or discount code? Information about a sale? A holiday greeting? A study done by Experian in 2013 observed 174 brands—that sent email campaigns within two weeks of the 4^th of July—noted that those mailings offering incentives to readers during the holiday—such as free shipping, a coupon or simply giving notification of a sale—saw open rates increase as much as 25%, transaction rates increase threefold and transaction-to-click rates increase as much as 51%.

What can we learn: If you are incentivizing your customer, draw attention to that initially by putting that in the subject line of the email.

Nail the Tagline, Subject Line or Caption

It’s a safe assumption that the majority of consumers will be receiving some sort of 4^th of July related email or advertisement—so do both parties a solid and write something memorable. Be clever, be concise and be associative.

What comes to your mind when you think of Independence Day? Fireworks? Red, white and blue? Grilling with friends and family? Include words that relate to the holiday and integrate them into the beginning of email subject lines, ad taglines or in the first sentence of a social media post.

California Avocados

What they did right: Grilling is a huge part of Independence Day festivities, California Avocados used this as an opportunity to integrate their product into an image that is quickly associated with celebrating American summers and holidays. They also had a clever play on the traditional “red, white and blue” slogan by integrating the color of their product in the tagline. Catchy and memorable.

Rover

What they did right: This dog sitting service company kept their message simple, clean and concise. With the hot dog image, Rover cleverly alluded to what their services cater to in a manner that was insightful—many dogs are afraid of fireworks during the holiday or need to be watched when families travel for long weekends—while also playing a double role as a visual commonly associated with the holiday. Rover wrapped it up with a clear CTA encourages customers to reserve their services during for the hoilday.

Lulu’s

What they did right: Lulu’s tagline integrates associative holiday words, “exercising your right,” into playful copy. Clear CTAs (Call to Actions) that tie in the holiday and highlight the seasonal relevancy of the product. Lulu’s also provided examples of their products to use for related and subset events— “Pool Party”, “Backyard BBQ”, enabling customers to visualize how they can use and wear the product in a variety of settings.

Credit.com

What they did right: Again, we see a play on “slogans” from the holiday— a smart tagline/title that integrates associative words with the holiday in a manner that also highlights the services Credit.com offers in an easily-understood, intelligent and humorous manner.

Jack Daniel’s

What they did right: Appealing to those with proud patronage, Jack Daniel’s alludes to its product actually being produced in the U.S.—something that has become increasingly rare with outsourcing and is thus an added-value aspect for customers. The ad also incorporates the standard color palette associated with the holiday and iconography with the eagle that is both on brand and holiday relevant from a design standpoint.

Lowe’s

Happy 4th of July! #Vine #loop https://t.co/1UllbqpjVk

— Lowe’s (@Lowes) July 3, 2013

What they did right: Lowe’s integrated its products in a subliminal sell format—reminding customers of their products without a hard sell. A fun and visually pleasing way to engage viewers and wish customers a happy holiday.

How are you celebrating and reaching out to your customers for Independence Day? Comment below and let us know!

Right now, before even getting into the true meat of this article— the cream de la crème— your eyes have already darted thousands of times towards the images, unconsciously running a full once-over. Why? Because the brain processes visuals faster than any other type of content—identifying images in just 13 milliseconds. In fact, 90% of the information sent to the brain, is visual; and by 2018, it is predicted that as much as 84% of marketing communication will be visual—talk about needing to nail the first impression! Perhaps, we need to reevaluate the old strategy, “content is king” and swap it to “visuals are king.”

What does this mean for your business and marketing strategy? Picture it. As the saying goes, a photo is worth a thousand words, so save yourself some verbiage and add a little visual—in your emails, on your website, even on your social media handles. Here’s why:

First Impressions are Everything.

A study done by the Stanford Persuasive Technology lab noted that 46.1% of visitors discerned a company’s credibility straight from its website design. If you’re not greeting potential clients dressed up with visuals and looking the part, you could be potentially losing half of your business and never get the chance to wine and dine them—if you know what we mean.

We are a Generation of A.D.D.-ers.

A recent study showed that human attention span has dropped down to a mere eight seconds… (yes, likely less than the time it took you to read this), that’s shorter than that of a goldfish. If that’s not bad enough, our brains are (over) stimulated— receiving five times as much information on a daily basis than we did 30 years ago. What does this mean for marketing and communication? We need to capture audience attention and do it fast. Content with visuals gets 94% more views than that without, so do yourself—and your audience— a favor and break up that encyclopedic-like block of text with some eye candy.

Increased Engagement.

Social media is another outlet that has completely changed the way that companies interact in a direct-to-consumer capacity—so don’t miss the opportunity to increase engagement by integrating visuals for the eyes to easily digest. Tweets get retweeted 150% more with photos than without and a recent study by Adobe discovered that Facebook posts with images see a whopping 650% higher interaction than those without.

Try a (Visual) Call to Action.  

Try serving up some imagery dishes to give your audience a brain boost. People are able to follow illustrated directions 323% better than direction without visuals. They also recall 80% of what they see and do, compared to a mere 20% of what they read. Trying to integrate a CTA (Call-to-Action) or inform your audience about a sale or important up-and-coming event? Mix in a photo or illustration the next time.

The Future is Visual.

As technology and social media have continued to evolve, video has emerged as a key player in the future of communications. In 2015, on a daily basis, users were averaging almost 11% more time spent with digital video than on social networks. Video will likely play the most prominent and substantial role in direct-to-consumer visual communication. Today, four times as many consumers prefer watching a product video to reading about it; but perhaps, this should come as no surprise as we can gather the sense of a visual scene in less than 1/10 of a second. Lazy or time-saving? You decide.

Where can you include visuals in your communications with consumers?

• Email marketing/email campaigns
• Websites
• Company blog posts
• Social media
• Fliers and brochures

Some examples of visual content are:

• Images
• Videos
• GIFS, memes
• Infographics

Still not convinced? Here’s one last tidbit for you—if this article had not included any visuals, you’d be likely to remember only 10% of the information three days later. Not to worry, since we integrated some beautiful aides, you’re likely to retain at least 65% of this. Guess it goes to combat the old saying— sometimes looks are everything!

We know— you’re welcome. Now get to work!

Sources:

BRAIN RULE RUNDOWN Rule #10: Vision trumps all other senses. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.brainrules.net/vision

Cooper, B. B. (2013, November 13). How Twitter’s Expanded Images Increase Clicks, Retweets and Favorites [New Data]. Retrieved from https://blog.bufferapp.com/the-power-of-twitters-new-expanded-images-and-how-to-make-the-most-of-it

Effects of text illustrations: A review of research. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF02765184

M., O’Neill. (2015, May 7). The 2015 Video Marketing Cheat Sheet [Infographic]. Retrieved from https://animoto.com/blog/business/video-marketing-cheat-sheet-infographic/

N. (n.d.). 13 Reasons Why Your Brain Craves Infographics. Retrieved from http://neomam.com/interactive/13reasons/

Pinantoan, A. (2015, May 20). How To Massively Boost Your Blog Traffic With These 5 Awesome Image Stats. Retrieved from http://buzzsumo.com/blog/how-to-massively-boost-your-blog-traffic-with-these-5-awesome-image-stats/

Shrivastava, S. (n.d.). The Power Of Visual Content In Your Content Marketing Strategy. Retrieved from https://blog.rankwatch.com/the-power-of-visual-content-in-your-content-marketing-strategy/

Watson, L. (2015, May 15). Humans have shorter attention span than goldfish, thanks to smartphones. Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/03/12/humans-have-shorter-attention-span-than-goldfish-thanks-to-smart/

Trafton, A. (2014, January 16). In the blink of an eye. Retrieved from http://news.mit.edu/2014/in-the-blink-of-an-eye-0116