Media puts Cherry on top at Bastion

Independent integrated agency Bastion has expanded into media appointing Anna Cherry to Bastion Media as the agency seeks growth across the region.

Independent agency Bastion has appointed Anna Cherry as managing director of its fledgling media operation as it seeks to grow and scale its integrated business.

Ms Cherry will helm Bastion Media, the integrated agency’s media division which launched in December with foundation client Kellanova. She joins from Clemenger, where she was chief media officer at CHEP; before this she held senior strategic roles at Spark Foundry, PHD and Dentsu Aegis.

The appointment comes as the integrated and media offerings within the ad industry undergo significant restructures, both globally and locally.

In the past fortnight, M+C Saatchi has “retired” the Bohemia Media brand in Australia and expanded its Performance Media brand in ANZ, Publicis Media’s Starcom has appointed Matt Houltham as CEO to grow the business locally, and WPP has restructured its GroupM business globally to launch WPP Media.

The moves reflect the broader advertising market changes as corporations increase in-housing models, media platforms push AI models to increase services, and independent agencies increasingly steal share from the big holding companies.

Bastion chief executive Cheuk Chiang said Ms Cherry’s appointment marked “a pivotal moment” for the indie agency, which harbours big ambitions to become the largest and most effective independent agency in Australia.

Mr Chiang, himself a media agency veteran with an extensive career in agencies across the Asia-Pacific region, said he believed the agency was strongly positioned for growth via its integrated end-to-end capabilities.

“With the trend towards integrated marketing communications, it’s critical that media and creative come closer together, it’s not just about the content, but also the context,” he said. “Clients are really seeing the benefit of integrating those two elements together because it’s not just about a piece of creative content, it’s also how you bring it to life in media that’s really important.”

Mr Chiang said he believed media was a key offering within the integrated model and helped meet a client need for stronger strategic media thinking within the overall marketing mix.

“Post-Covid, we’ve gone into a place where a lot of clients have put too much focus on performance media and on the planning and buying, and as a result brands have become weaker,” he said.

“There is now this shift towards better media thinking and more innovation and comms planning.

“Agencies need to be leveraging marketing science and behavioural economics.

“At Bastion, we want to bring smarter thinking back into media again and (Ms Cherry) will be at the forefront of doing this. From her time at agencies like PHD and Clemenger, she’s got a very strong understanding of how to unlock that integrated capability.”

Ms Cherry said: “Clients today need more than just great media – they need connected thinking that drives growth across every touchpoint. (Bastion) is the only agency that is capable of delivering on the promise of connecting culture, media and commercial creativity in a way that makes a real impact.”

Bastion clients include Air New Zealand, Kellogg’s, Microsoft, L’Oreal and Unilever, with offices in Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra and the Gold Coast, in addition to Auckland, Wellington, Los Angeles and New York.

DANIELLE LONG