Ogilvy Labs conducted "Semesters of Learning" every 6 months from 2007-2016 where they focused their research efforts, events, and partnerships on an emerging topic. This document provides summaries of each semester's focus, key activities conducted by Ogilvy Labs, and resulting client projects and campaigns that helped generate revenue, build relationships, and enhance Ogilvy's reputation in the innovation space.

1. Ogilvy Labs:
Case Studies
SEMESTER OF LEARNING OUTCOMES
AND OGILVY LABS OFFERINGS
2007 – 2016

2. Introduction
Ogilvy Labs is the innovation team within Ogilvy & Mather Group.
We educate and inspire in order to innovate – ensuring we are encouraging our staff and clients to do
new things for the first time, and learn how to then offer these solutions again. We connect creativity
and tech and are the go-to team for making anything new happen.
We do this through the following means:
• Finding best in class partners such as startups, government agencies, suppliers and
entrepreneurial organisations
• Recruiting diverse talent
• Researching the future state of the marketing industry as well as those of our clients
• Promoting Ogilvy in up and coming sectors through speaking and sponsorship
• Acting as the hyper-connector within the Global Ogilvy group and WPP as a whole
We believe solely in proving by doing and measure ourselves using our 6Rs:
Revenue, Relationships, Reputation, Recruitment, Retention & Responsibility.

3. Semesters of Learning
Every 6 months, Ogilvy Labs chooses a particular research topic to focus
its efforts on.
We hone our partner meetings (with startups, government organisations
and prospective clients), our speaker engagements, our conference
attendance and our client targeting to ensure we are relevant, single-
minded and creating the best innovation value for our staff and clients.
At the end of the 6 months, we host an event called Lab Day for all our
staff and clients to pass on all our learnings, contacts and ideas. Every
semester culminates in this conference and this is the incubator for the
campaigns and projects which come out of our semesters.

4. Future Travel & Tourism 2016
This semester we wanted to focus on corporate innovation in travel, tourism and logistics – highlighting those
success stories and truly facilitating the beginnings of change in our clients and prospects.
Over the 6 months, we hosted specific client workshops on how to innovate in travel, with IHG and Amex; and a
website full of thought-leadership. All our activations were organised to help our clients and prospects kickstart
their own innovation agendas. We held a Future of Travel Lab Day conference with speakers ranging from
startups, TED speakers, clients and travel experts – which we also filmed in 360 to experiment with new
immersive technologies.
www.ogilvylabstravel.com
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

5. Future Retail 2015
This semester we wanted to focus on corporate innovation in retail – highlighting those success
stories and truly facilitating the beginnings of change in our clients and prospects.
Over the 6 months, we hosted specific client workshops on how to innovate in retail; a C-Suite
Chatham House Rules dinner with the founder of LMarks – the company behind the John Lewis
innovation lab; a retail-specific chaperoned day at Social Media Week; and a website full of thought-
leadership. All our activations were organised to help our clients and prospects kickstart their own
innovation agendas. We worked very closely with WPP’s The Store to ensure we were also
consulting globally for WPP.
www.ogilvylabsretail.com
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

6. Startups 2015
For the Startup semester, we partnered with up and coming London start up conference ‘Digital
Shoreditch’ to ensure we were truly immersing Ogilvy and our clients in the community. As a result of
focusing our research more on the mechanics of the startup community as opposed to the startups
themselves, OgilvyUK began investing in MadTech (marketing and advertising tech) accelerator
Collider to ensure fast, streamlined access to early-stage relevant startups for our staff and clients.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

7. Internet of Things 2014
We spent 6 months getting to grips with the emerging consumer world of IOT for our clients. At the
time, there was little marketing activations in this area (it is now very popular) and we successfully
launched the first ever connected outdoor billboard campaign using our learnings for Battersea Dogs
Home and our Amex client. Labs acted as the activators of this campaign by connecting ideas with
partners, and by simply not saying no when barriers were hit.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Retention

8. Behaviour Change 2014 (I)
Following the Labs-backed launch of #ogilvychange, we dove into the word of behavioural
economics to ensure all Ogilvy staff and clients felt empowered to talk about this new brave world.
We also realised that we needed to make tangible the ideas behind behaviour change and prove the
theories through activation. We worked with Royal Borough of Greenwich and #ogilvychange to
reduce crime rates in the area – using only a few cans of paint…
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Recruitment

9. Behaviour Change 2014 (II)
A second campaign to come out of the Behviour Change Lab Day was Putpockets. OgilvyOne
partnered with #ogilvychange to develop a hard-hitting integrated campaign for independent crime-
fighting charity, Crimestoppers. The campaign showed footage of pedestrians being targeted by a
team of sleight-of-hand experts and former pickpockets.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Recruitment

10. Government Collaboration 2013
We were awarded a Business & Enterprise fund award from Innovate UK to work alongside Nexus to
create an experience which crossed the physical / digital divide. Using 3d printing, rapid prototyping,
arduino, Unity and all sorts of other open processes and maker tools, the Stage project was created
for the entertainment, cultural and advertising markets.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Responsibility
https://vimeo.com/90019727

11. Big Data 2013
As a result of our Big Data Semester of Learning and ’Big Data. The Big Debate’ Lab Day, a
collaboration came about with Labs, OgilvyOne and IBM to come up with a way to visualise big data
for their Wimbledon sponsorship. Calling upon our partners at 3D Print Show (Ogilvy Labs was a
sponsor for 3 years), we were able to use free 3D printers for the activation, keeping this
experimental project’s costs down, and ensuring we had the right experts working on the project.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

12. Storytelling 2013
As part of the Storytelling Semester of Learning, our Creative Lab Technologist attended a future of
broadcast conference in Amsterdam where he met tech startup Mynd Play. We hosted a Lab Lunch
in the creative department to host Mynd Ply and their technology, where an OgilvyOne creative team
matched them up with their Beyond Dark chocolate brief.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

13. Retail Experience 2013
As part of the Retail Experience Semester held in partnership with OgilvyAction (Geometry), Lab
beta-tested an augmented reality mirror from young start up Holition in our physical space.
OgilvyAction worked with Helena Christensen who had space in Selfridges for an experiential pop up
for an AR mirror. Holition is now one of the world leaders in AR technology.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

14. Music 2012
As part of our semester of learning on music, we held a music festival in the Ogilvy offices. We had
several stages around the floors and showcased both bands as well as future ways of consuming
music. We also met a new musical instrument startup called Alphasphere through a mentoring
programme at Media Sandbox, who went on to speak (and perform) on the world stages.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

15. Data Visualisation 2011
Following the Ogilvy Lab Day focusing on data visualisation, we used our newfound contacts and
knowledge on a campaign with Freggo to reframe taste of ice cream for a difficult to reach audience.
By utilising the principles of good, artistic data visualisation, we were able to successfully showcase
the beauty behind the data.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

16. Mobile 2009
As part of the mobile semester in 2009 – bearing in mind this was only 1 year after the iPhone launch
– we launched a campaign with Fanta and O&M to launch an app aimed at kids so they could
communicate in secret without their parents or any other unsuspecting adults from hearing.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

17. Augmented Reality 2009
Working with IBM on their Wimbledon sponsorship, off the back of the research into Augmented
Reality while it was still a relatively new concept, we played with the idea of no matter where you
were at Wimbledon, you could ‘see through walls’ using the IBM Seer app so you could always be
part of the action.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

18. Augmented Reality 2009
Following on from the Augmented Reality Semester of Learning, a few years later in 2012, we were
still using the partners and the know-how we acquired during the research sprint. We worked with
Wetherspoon to create an Augmented Reality offers app to entice students to become regulars at
their outlets.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

19. Gaming 2009
We hosted a Gaming Lab Day where we dove into the world of game design, new interactive
technologies and how the gaming industry could link into advertising and teach us about the
importance of play. The day led to BP creating a mobile game for one of their sponsored driver
events with Ogilvy & Mather.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Recruitment

20. Social Media 2009
As social media began to penetrate the masses and brands and agencies began to see its potential,
we hosted a Social Media Lab Day. As a result of researching this area so fully, we then took BBC
Labs and the Ogilvy Management team on a Silicon Roundabout tour to meet even more startups in
the social media world. It gave them a taste of what this new world of the London startup community
was really like.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation
Retention

21. Digital OOH 2008
We hosted a Digital OOH Lab Day at our offices where we took over not only all the screens and
projection areas in the building but also the CBS screens all around Canary Wharf to showcase the
power of Digital OOH. From this, Ford decided to experiment with projection mapping onto the
Senate House building for an experiential launch.
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation

22. Virtual Worlds 2007
As part of our Virtual Worlds semester looking into online worlds where consumers were flocking to
live through technology, we partnered with Adventure Ecology to flood Second Life to bring to the
fore the conversation around rising sea levels in an environment consumers least expected.
Responsibility
Revenue
Relationships
Reputation