How a relatively unknown digital agency won the Nike media account

Sometimes, it only takes one win to put an agency on the map. That's what happened with PMG, which shocked the industry in late July by winning Nike’s North America media business alongside IPG’s Initiative, which picked up integrated media in the rest of the world. Beating the odds, the 12-year-old independent agency, based in Fort Worth, Texas, trounced established agencies across the major holding companies for the assignment. Multiple executives told Ad Age they have not viewed PMG as a significant contender—until now. One prominent media executive called it a “threat.” See all of Ad Age's 2023 Agency A-List winners here George Popstefanov, PMG’s founder and CEO, recognizes that the agency has flown under the radar for a long time since it opened in 2010. The Nike win “was an introduction to PMG on many levels,” he said. “We feel like we've really built a great vision—and it feels validated.” “PMG is kind of a well-kept secret—a strong commitment to best-in-class digital thinking, but not top of mind amongst most marketers,” said Greg Paull, principal of R3, the consultant on the Nike review. Building a shopping cart While the digital agency might not be talked about like other agencies, it has continued to grow significantly beyond current clients such as Best Western, Old Navy, Survey Monkey and Apple. In December 2021, PMG was named Kohler’s media agency of record. This year the shop picked up over 10 new clients, which include lead agency duties for Shake Shack's mobile app growth and media agency of record responsibilities for Otter Products and Vineyard Vines. Lilly Pulitzer also returned as a client a few months after it departed PMG, according to a spokeswoman for the agency. Popstefanov, originally from Macedonia, first came to the U.S. when he was 17 as an exchange student. Studying in Forth Worth, Popstefanov graduated from Texas Christian University with a degree in e-commerce. “I always believed that things will be done online, so I decided to study e-commerce,” Popstefanov said. “At the time e-commerce was learning about coding and supply chains and building websites. Our thesis project for senior year was building a shopping cart.” After a couple of stints working at smaller agencies, Popstefanov, 28 at the time, started his agency in Fort Worth focused on digital and data capabilities. The agency's first two hires were a technologist and an engineer. J Crew and Madewell were early clients that remain on the roster. A milestone that helped grow the agency’s reputation, according to Postefanov, was winning seven Cannes Lions in 2016 for its “Straight Outta Somewhere” collaboration between Beats by Dre and the "Straight Outta Compton" movie. Building technology While R/GA’s Hustle was the creative agency for the campaign, PMG acted as the media partner, building out a site where people could meme the phrase “Straight Outta” by adding their own word at the end. The agency helped amplify the work on social and saw celebrities and even the White House participate in the trend. Beats has been a PMG client for seven years. “Many people focus on the creative and many people to this day still don't know we are probably behind every single media execution, especially in North America, for somebody like Beats," said Popstefanov. Now, at age 40, Popstefanov runs an operation with offices not just in Fort Worth, but also Austin and Dallas, Texas; Atlanta, Cleveland, London and New York, and has grown from 470 employees in 2021 to over 600 employees. One aspect that separates PMG from its counterparts is its focus on building technology, according to Popstefanov. The agency has built out its AI software, called Alli, which is used in all aspects of the agency from onboarding employees to finding creative insights in real time and buying media. In fact, Alli has become the agency’s biggest new business driver, according to Parks Blackwell, VP of marketing and client development at PMG. “In most cases from a new business perspective, we'll do a demo within those presentations,” Blackwell said. “We spend the first 15 minutes talking about what are the challenges that an advertiser has with data or with insights or with forecasting, for example, and then as we go through we'll customize that demo in real time, because we want to show the platform, we want people to see where they can get those insights and how flexible the system is.” Last year the agency used Alli to help Best Western navigate the pandemic, which crushed the travel industry. Alli was used to build a custom dashboard that monitored customer behavior and visualized the expected timing of booking revenue driven by PMG-managed media. The dashboard allowed PMG to look across regional trends for foot traffic, weather, vaccination and other data to identify changes in booking behaviors from years past or any surges in travel. In 2021 the agency also led media for Old Navy’s "Bodequality" campaign and helped SurveyMonkey rebrand to Momentive. While agencies using machine learning and AI isn’t new, Popstefanov claims Alli is a “differentiator” for the agency, especially in allowing for creative adjustments in real time. “So AI and machine learning, a lot of us use very similar open frameworks like Google and Facebook and Amazon and others, but our differentiator is the ability to act on it through the technology,” Popstefanov said. “It's not telling a client 'Here's the best performing creative.' A lot of solutions providers can do that," he said. "We also take actions and execute at scale. Meaning, could you change the creative? Could you optimize it across the funnel? Could you launch a YouTube campaign versus pulling out of TikTok? Things like that.” One example of the agency needing to adapt quickly: It helped sustainable fashion brand Woolmark Co. navigate its media schedule after Queen Elizabeth II died. The agency recommended that the brand take a ”brief pause” on its media and evaluate the situation, according to Blackwell, who said PMG used real-time social media sentiment to determine when was the exact right time to redeploy its ads. “We were obviously balancing New York Fashion Week and the brand’s goals in addition to the challenging news in the U.K.,” Blackwell said. “We determined based on the data that Alli was telling us that we needed to wait about 72 hours essentially to say, 'Let's allow the nation to recognize what was happening and not put our mixed message into the wrong places, or detract from what was happening.'” Read more: How to determine when to pause a campaign Alli tracks social media sentiment as well as news coverage and adjusted pricing for ad placements to help PMG employees make the call. “We understand the contextual keyword targeting on news sites, meaning what news sites are talking about it ... and what's happening from an API bidding perspective—like how's the competitiveness on programmatic, how's the competitiveness on YouTube on Facebook and everything else, to understand are advertisers in or out,” Popstefanov said. “We use this data also to make recommendations for customers on when to lean in and where we think there is an opportunity for cheaper media.” Solving problems Popstefanov said the agency licenses Alli and trains companies on how to use it, which now accounts for 20% of PMG’s revenue. Nike will also be licensing the technology, according to Popstefanov, which adds another layer to PMG’s remit with the iconic sportswear brand. “George brings an incredible passion and energy to every engagement," said Paull. “He’s one of those CEOs that takes things personally—he believes it's his mission and that of his team to solve problems. The overall team is truly digital native—it's what impresses clients, because it's different than more traditional agencies that have built media and creative teams from a legacy position.” The next step for PMG is to continue proving its model of creating quick-turn, digitally-focused work, Popstefanov said. Recently PMG’s creative studio helped develop and launch a new national campaign for Momentive (formerly known as SurveyMonkey) with a TV ad starring Giancarlo Esposito. The campaign, which includes digital and social work, features a new tagline, “Give the People What They Want,” and took about four weeks to create, according to Popstefanov. PMG also launched an integrated campaign for Kohler’s Sterling brand, the largest advertising investment in Sterling in five years, according to PMG. “Creative has been part of our journey since day one—the type of creative we haven't done has been hero TV Super Bowl ads,” Popstefanov said. “The main reasons why customers are asking for [creative] is not because they want integration. What they are realizing is that the [work] that some creative-only shops produce is not relevant for today. It's not relevant for TikTok, Meta, Google or YouTube.” Subscribe to Ad Age Sign up now for the latest industry news and analysis Click here PMG offers perks including paid time off for volunteer work, “Recharge” days throughout the year when the agency is closed, 16 weeks off maternity leave for moms and eight weeks of leave for dads and adoptive parents. “Our vision is to be the most respected global independent digital company, powered by great people and amazing technology,” Popstefanov said.

How a relatively unknown digital agency won the Nike media account

Featured Stories