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Speaking in the country's leading business newspaper, Diário Económico, António Vieira da Silva, president of the communications group, Ogilvy Portugal, says that the country has a longstanding problem in creating adequate marketing structures and a traditional inability to think strategically.

DE: How do evaluate your three years as President of Ogilvy?

Vieira da Silva: Positively! Not only by talking to our shareholders, but also through internal discussions, we defined five fundamental objectives for the group. The first was to implement Ogilvy's international positioning, or '360-degree branding'. This positioning is about taking into account that, increasingly, the challenge facing brands and companies takes in a number of target audiences. In such cases, you need communications that are consistent and coherent across all contacts that the brand has with all its targets. To do that, you need a communications group with the skills to handle all the different disciplines involved.

The second objective was to get Ogilvy back among the top 5 in terms of ranking, based on our volume of business. At the end of 2000, Ogilvy was in 10th place. Right now, we are number 5.

The third challenge was to make Ogilvy one of the three best agencies on the market. In terms of quality, we divided that along two dimensions: to be one of the three best on the market, in terms of client perceptions, and tobe one of the three most creative agencies in Portugal.

Our fifth objective was to move into more modern office, with more interaction between the group's different companies. And we have achieved that.

We are not yet among the three most creative agencies, but we have singled out 2005 as a year when we plan to appear in more pitches and be more proactive in getting our creative work seen.

We are on the right route, not least having brought in José Carlos Campos as our head of creative. Campos is one of Portugal's top creative professionals and he will certainly be able to help us towards our objective.

DE: How have you implemented the 360-degree positioning?

Vieira da Silva: Ogilvy used to consist of only two companies: Ogilvy One, whose business was direct marketing, and Ogilvy Mather Advertising, the advertising agency. For a 360-degree approach, we needed to cover more communications disciplines. We integrated a company from the WPP group. Absolut, whose business is interactive communications, which we then transformed into OgilvyInteractive. We acquired a data services and relationship marketing consultancy, Acxiom, which was integrated into OgilvyOne and by way of which we were able to turn that division from a direct marketing into a relationship marketing agency. Then we launched three new companies: Ogilvy Design, Ogilvy Comunicação & Imagem, whose specialism is press and public relations, and Ogilvy Activation, which operates in the area of promotions. So, by the end of 2002, we had coverage of all the principal communications areas.

DE: How do you measure the quality of your creative output?

Vieira da Silva: A company called Grupo Consultores carried out an image survey of local agencies, interviewing 150 of the country's leading advertisers. It was the first time that such a study had been undertaken in Portugal and a very extensive survey, allowing for the assessment of which are the best agencies here. We came second. We were the agency with the highest number of first places on the nine attributes surveyed, for example in brand management, relationship marketing, promotions and 'value for money'. It was a really excellent result.

DE: Do you think the fact that yo have established yourselves among the top 5 has something to do with the fact that you have widened your offer?

Vieira da Silva: In a way, yes. But I think it is also due to tha fact that we have adopted a more 'aggressive' attitude in the marketplace, from the point of view of new business development. We had two fantastic years, in 2002 and 2003, in terms of pitches, winning a series of new clients. I think we reached the top 5 on a combination of these factors

DE: Do you concentrate more on international competitions or on Portuguese ones?

Vieira da Silva: Interestingly, in the past two years we have concentrated more on international award schemes, especially in the area of interactive communications. We won a mention in this field at the One Show, in New York, and a first prize at the Stevie Awards, also in New York. We have taken part in local competitions in other disciplines.

DE: Why have you been concentrating on the international dimension?

Vieira da Silva: Becaues it allows us to test our quality.. it's more attractive when your work is recognised internationally, as in those New York festivals. It tells us we are taking the right route. In 2005, we are going to turn our attention to Portuguese award schemes too, while continuing to pursue opportunities internationally.

DE: In terms of your creative teams, do you prefer Portuguese professionals?

Vieira da Silva: We have four different creative departments: advertising, design, interactive and marketing, and in each of them we have purely Portuguese creatives. In other agencies you will normally find Brazilians. We have some Portuguese creatives with experience in Brazil, but they're Portuguese.

DE: You came from Shell, a company operating in a completely different area. How has your experience there helped you to run an agency like Ogilvy?

Vieira da Silva: At Shell, I was directly responsible for the marketing department and therefore knew how agencies worked. Throughout my career I have always had involvement with the area of marketing and communications. I would say I can see things from the client's point of view. Thanks to my experience in areas such as management, strategy and marketing, I can bring more methodology to the way the agency manages its business and make it a little more professional. The advertising industry still lacks in many aspects of professionalisation of management, systems and structures. It doesn't mean you have to stop being creative, but you have to create a way of working that is supported by professional organisation, thus allowing you to be more creative.

DE: How do you see the current market situation among advertisers?

Vieira da Silva: We are evolving from a period in which companies were poorly structured and I think, in terms of clients, we are starting to see them start to think more about their brands, do research to understand consumers better and develop more solid, strategic plans.

In Portugal, perhaps just out of habit or the background and education of clients, compared to some international markets, there is a certain lack of knowledge. Many times, we are asked to perform certain actions whihc makes it evicent that there is still a great need to evolve, both on the client and the agency side in terms of thinking strategically about communications and brands. At times, the challenge lies in thinking more about how to manage the brand and about strategy. That's an important step that has to be taken before you move on to creating campaigns and I think it's a step many Portuguese marketing professionals haven't yet taken on board.

DE: Do you think it could be a question of training?

Vieira da Silva: I think you can put it down to two things: educational background certaily is important, but if, when those students take on their first job, their boss doesn't have the right mentality, then the same situtation tends to repeat itself. But I think we are beginning to notice a different attitude among the younger generation, better prepared and able to think in a more structured way.

DE: How do you see 2005 evolving?

Vieira da Silva: In 2005, we would like to take our place among the country's top three agencies in terms of creativity. We have taken a number of steps to help us get there. Creativity is all about people abnd that's why we have doubled the size of the creative department at OgilvyOne over the past two years, increased the size of our Design creative department by 50% and gone from 4 people to 6 in Advertising. We have invested heavily in people: José Carlos Campos has come in, as has Miguel Paté as creative director of OgilvyOne. These were sure investments and necessary ones if we are to reach our goal of being one of the three most creative agencies. That's what we are going to concentrate on in 2005.