On the heels of a big rebrand in 2022, Stagwell media company Meeting has employed Bria Bryant as its new CMO. Bryant, who has already begun the brand new position, succeeds Mary Beth Keelty, who will take an elevated management position inside Stagwell’s Model Efficiency Community, of which Meeting is a subsidiary.

Bryant is predicated in New York and experiences to Meeting international CEO James Townsend. Her rent comes after Meeting directed vital investments this 12 months towards upgrading its model id and messaging. In February, it rolled out a brand new web site, emblem and coloration palette. Its new enterprise wins have an analogous sheen. Newer purchasers on Meeting’s roster embody Breezeline (previously Atlantic Broadband), Con Edison, amika, Elevance Well being, Emaar, Warner Music Group and Aesop. Meeting’s crown jewel is undoubtedly the Lenovo account, although, which it received in April.

“Our model shouldn’t be as massive as our enterprise,” Townsend informed Adweek of the company’s present predicament. He added that the company’s rebrand gave it “the platform to start that dialog on stable footing.”

It’s a pertinent time to be an company CMO, since there’s an industry-wide debate over whether or not or not holding firm company manufacturers must be strongly differentiated from their sister companies. There are two faculties of thought: Some holding firms more and more amplify their group-level choices, maybe on the detriment of their particular person company manufacturers. Others, like IPG and Stagwell, encourage company subsidiaries like Meeting to develop differentiated manufacturers. Company model constructing is a extra conventional method that some {industry} leaders criticize for its tendency to extend competitors between sister companies. However there are various staff and purchasers preferring to work for (or with) an company with caché, rendering branding essential and elevating the stakes of the continuing debate.

“Watching what Meeting has been constructing over the past two years has been extremely inspiring, and I’m completely happy to hitch at such a pivotal interval of development and enlargement for the corporate,” Bryant mentioned in an announcement.

Growing a contemporary company model

Bryant brings a spread of expertise to the highest job. Most not too long ago, she was head of communications in North America for Havas Inventive. There, she led community public relations and advertising and marketing communications. Earlier than that, she was an svp at MSL, the place she oversaw launches inside P&G’s international model portfolio. PRWeek beforehand acknowledged Bryant on its 40 Below 40 checklist.

“I’m a perpetually curious particular person. And I like a problem. I’ve spent a few years collaborating with media groups in interagency environments throughout my profession,” Bryant informed Adweek. The CMO has by no means labored in a media company atmosphere earlier than this, however as inventive and media assignments more and more collide, media companies are turning their consideration to leaders with inventive backgrounds. At present, Meeting is contemplating the way to mix inventive media and commerce disciplines; in keeping with Townsend, Bryant’s inventive understanding will assist the company place its method to doing so.

Bryant may even information the company because it repositions itself as a contemporary various to legacy choices. The company’s tech stack—together with its Stage viewers insights platform—is what swayed the Lenovo resolution in Meeting’s favor, Adweek reported in April. The company’s capacity to work alongside Lenovo’s in-house company successfully was one other differentiator. Touting expertise experience and structural flexibility in that occasion reveals that Meeting needs to market itself as a technologically-advanced, consultative company.

“We’re attempting to current ourselves as a contemporary various…a dynamic atmosphere for individuals to spend time, but in addition as a dynamic atmosphere for purchasers that wish to remodel and put themselves able the place they’re altering and rising,” mentioned Townsend. “It’s now an opportunity for us to inform that story on a bigger and extra international stage.”