Microsoft marketer Kathleen Hall to exit after 16 years

Longtime Microsoft marketer Kathleen Hall is exiting the technology company after 16 years, including the last seven as chief brand officer, she announced today on LinkedIn. Her departure comes as the company makes broader organizational changes and as it has reduced ad spending. “After 16 years at Microsoft, I have decided to return to New York and take some time off before my next adventure,” she wrote. “It’s been a great ride, and I am very thankful for my time, my team, and all that we accomplished together.” The post generated a plethora of responses from advertising leaders recognizing Hall’s contributions to the industry through her time at Microsoft. Hall started in 2008 as a general manager of global campaigns and product marketing at Windows and spent time on global advertising before her promotion to the chief brand officer role in 2016. In addition to Hall exiting, Microsoft will merge its global creative, global advertising and branding and operations with consumer marketing “to create stronger alignment,” according to an interal memo shared to employees. In addition, the company has also merged its research and insights team with its monetization and business planning division, and has realigned events, studios and communities. Numoto also wrote that Bryson Gordon is joining Microsoft as corporate VP in charge of global media, strategic partnerships and agency management. He previously worked at Google, leading global marketing for Google Workspace. Before that he had been at Microsoft in roles that included leading consumer marketing for certain products. In addition, Microsoft hired Alyssa Schutter, who had been head of events at Amazon Studios and MGM Studios, to lead its event creative experiences. The changes are effective July 1. Microsoft’s stated worldwide ad spending in fiscal year ended June 2023 came in at $904 million, tumbling about 40% from the previous year to a spending level not seen since 2004. Spending for the fiscal year ending June 2024 has not yet been disclosed. U.S. measured media spending on the Microsoft brand for calendar year 2023 plummeted to $197 million from $404 million the year prior, according to Vivvix, including paid social data from Pathmatics. U.S. measured media spending across Microsoft Corp., including on brands such as LinkedIn, Xbox, GitHub and Halo, totaled $409 million in calendar 2023, down from $624 million. (The above spending figures do not include Activision Blizzard, the game developer and publisher that Microsoft bought last October. Activision Blizzard reported worldwide ad spending of $882 million in calendar year 2022, up from $736 million in 2021.) In the memo, Chief Marketing Officer and Executive VP Takeshi Numoto highlighted Hall’s contributions, including her help in the launches of Windows 7, 8 and 10, Surface and Microsoft Cloud, as well as Hall’s work on Microsoft’s first Super Bowl ad, which aired a decade ago. Microsoft also aired a Super Bowl spot touting Copilot, its AI assistant, earlier this year. Panay Films worked on the commercial. Microsoft is reaping the rewards from new AI offerings such as the Copilot. In its most recent earnings report, the technology giant reported a 17% increase in revenue to $61.9 billion compared with the year-earlier period. Net income for the period, which ended March 31, was $21.9 billion, a 20% rise over the year-earlier period. Earlier this year Microsoft’s McCann New York’s “ADLaM” project from McCann New York, which digitized a West African language, won the ADC Black Cube for Best of Show at the ADC 103rd Annual Awards. “Her leadership has been felt across the industry, and in 2021, the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity named Microsoft its Creative Marketer of the Year—a position few brands garner,” Numoto wrote. Hall did not immediately respond to a request for further comment. In a memo she sent to Microsoft colleagues shared with Ad Age, she stated: “There is only so long you can keep a girl from her hometown in New York—new challenges and family are calling me.”

Microsoft marketer Kathleen Hall to exit after 16 years

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