R/GA Formalizes Mobile Marketing Practice

R/GA has bundled its expertise in wireless, advergaming, and other emerging channels into a new practice called Mobile and Emerging Media/Applications (MEMA). The six-person team reports to VP and Executive Creative Director Richard Ting.

The establishment of the MEMA practice formalizes a basic structure that’s existed at the agency for some time, wherein a centralized group of mobile specialists service various accounts on the fly. “The account will own the project,” Ting told ClickZ News. “We’ll be fostering new ways of thinking about this space with the existing account team.”

Two new hires bolster MEMA’s efforts, including that of Webster Lewin as director of mobile marketing. Lewin joins from WPP’s VM, where he led the agency’s mobile marketing efforts and worked on accounts including Microsoft, MSN, Burger King, Colgate-Palmolive, and AMC Theatres. He’s also co-chair of the Mobile Marketing Association’s Mobile Marketing Strategies and Best Practices Committee. Claudia Bernett joins the group as an interaction designer.

While certain forms of mobile marketing are well established, such as the use of sweepstakes-driven SMS campaigns, others are ripe for experimentation.

“The integration of social media into mobile is a space everybody wants to sink their teeth into,” said Ting. “Being able to integrate mobile into a billboard is also important. You take a static format and give it more life. You can text a short code to a billboard and add a back story to this traditionally flat medium.”

R/GA’s mobile campaigns have included a text-to-billboard effort for Nike in Times Square, as well as work for L’Oreal and Nokia. MEMA will have its own facility within the R/GA building.