GroupM Partners with Lazada and Consolidates E-Commerce Capability Across Asia Pacific

Singapore, 3 June 2020 – GroupM, the media investment group of WPP, announced an industry-leading partnership with Lazada Group – Southeast Asia’s largest e-Commerce platform – covering all six Southeast Asia markets where Lazada Group has operations.

GroupM has been designated a Lazada Preferred Partner and gives GroupM clients preferential access and pricing for Lazada Group marketing assets. In addition, Lazada will empower GroupM with in-depth e-Commerce knowledge and tools to help brands under the LazMall channel deliver a premium and seamless online shopping experience to customers. Lazada will also empower GroupM and its agencies to leverage its Sponsored Solutions, to support brands and sellers optimize their return of investment and ensure growth in sales through digital marketing and media optimization. As part of the partnership, Lazada will transfer best practices and knowledge on optimal Store Management operation and usage of the platform tools to grow the client’s sales on Lazada.

The Lazada partnership will be managed by GroupM Commerce, a dedicated team that consolidates the e-Commerce expertise across the group to meet the growing needs of Asia Pacific marketers. As consumer purchase behaviors continue to evolve, they will help marketers connect media and e-Commerce at scale with strategic support and activation capabilities that increase sales and revenues.

GroupM’s agencies – MediaCom, Mindshare, Wavemaker and Essence will leverage GroupM Commerce to deliver to their clients, an end-to-end solution spanning strategic planning, optimizing on and off-platform marketing investments (search and display), traffic generation, social, affiliate marketing, KOL, livestream, on-platform traffic management, content and creative development, online store management, analytics and reporting, and e-Commerce operations.

With successful e-Commerce operations already established in China and India under the leadership of Jerman Zhang and Suraj Dhillon, respectively, the GroupM Commerce team was completed with the Q4 2019 appointment of Roger Dunn in Australia, Toni Ruotanen for Southeast Asia, and the subsequent hiring of commerce leads in each of the local markets as well as agency dedicated commerce leads in Mediacom, Mindshare and Wavemaker. GroupM’s COO for Asia Pacific, Jon Thurlow, will lead the GroupM Commerce capability in addition to his existing responsibilities.

Ashutosh Srivastava, CEO GroupM Asia Pacific said, “Over the past four years, we have innovated a successful e-Commerce service model in China, and subsequently rolled out to India where it is rapidly growing. Our learnings have been valuable to understanding how to meet the needs of clients across the region, and now we are ready to accelerate deployment to help clients drive their marketing objectives with winning e-Commerce strategies and activation. We have seen a marked increase in client activity in e-Commerce since the beginning of COVID-19 and we are pleased to partner with Lazada to further enhance our capabilities.”

Mary Zhou, Lazada Group’s Chief Marketing Officer said, “We are pleased to partner with GroupM given their expertise and dedication to the e-Commerce space. Lazada Sponsored Solutions enable brands to better interact and engage with customers on our platform using our knowledge and insights about online consumer trends.”

ABOUT GROUPM

GroupM is the world’s leading media investment company responsible for more than $50B in annual media investment through agencies Mindshare, MediaCom, Wavemaker, Essence and m/SIX, as well as the outcomes-driven programmatic audience company, Xaxis. GroupM’s portfolio includes Data & Technology, Investment and Services, all united in vision to shape the next era of media where advertising works better for people. By leveraging all the benefits of scale, the company innovates, differentiates and generates sustained value for our clients wherever they do business.