49 agencies turn up for SG whole of government media tender

The Ministry of Communications and Information's whole of government (WOG) media buying services tender has seen 49 players vying for the account. The tender includes three categories: master media agency, panel of media planning and buying agencies, and panel of content publishers.

A check by MARKETING-INTERACTIVE on Gebiz, found that GroupM, OMD Singapore and Starcom had pitched for the master media agency account and panel of media planning and buying agencies. Starcom-led Publicis media solution is the incumbent master media agency. It was appointed in 2018 for the MCI account; then valued at SG$80 million. Meanwhile, production company t-eight had pitched for the master media agency account and panel of content publishers. RS Photography was the only player to pitch for all three categories.

Overall, MCI saw 18 more players pitching for the media planning and buying category, and 26 more pitching for the panel of content publishers. These included Brainlabs APAC, Havas Media, IPG Mediabrands, Spark Foundry and Tate Anzur for media planning and buying; and Eatbook, Night Owl Cinematics, Mediacorp, SGAG Media, SPH Media, Titan Digital Media and TikTok for content publishers. Overall, the appointment will last for 36 months with the option to extend by 24 months. MCI first called for a pitch on 1 October, 2021. 

The roles for the master media agency include overall planning, coordination, execution and evaluation of media buys across digital and non-digital media platforms across the WOG. The appointed agency will have two groups to account to the adviser under the master contract, and the customers in respect of the purchase order issued by the customers in question. The agency is also required to form a dedicated hub team and manage the individual planning, execution and evaluation of media buys for each customer, across digital and non-digital media platforms.

Meanwhile, the panel of media planning and buying agencies will manage the individual planning, execution, and evaluation of media buys for each customer, across digital and non-digital media platforms. The media buys in this category include, but are not limited to, government communications efforts. This category is non-exclusive, hence agencies may purchase from other vendors or utilise in-house resources where deemed more appropriate during the appointment period.

On the other hand, the selected panel of content publishers will work to meet content and amplification needs for WOG users who might need access to publishers directly for long-term or special engagements, for example. The appointed content publishers will also be required to pass engagement data back to MCI in a template set out by MCI and the WOG users. To qualify, publishers must have a minimum of either 100k followers on Facebook or Instagram; or 100k subscribers on YouTube; or have a minimum of 500k web visitors a month on a single page, channel and social media handle.

Earlier in April, MCI appointed consultancy R3 to assist with the development, execution, and evaluation of its media buying services contract.

Separately, MCI is also currently in the midst of selecting agencies for its creative WOG account which was launched in April this year. There were currently 162 agencies vying for the account, including Accenture Singapore, ADK Connect Singapore, Asia PR Werkz, BBDO Singapore, BLKJ Havas, DDB Worldwide, dentsu Singapore, Disney, Edelman, Fishermen Integrated, formul8, Forsman & Bodenfors, GOODSTUPH, Grey, Wunderman Thompson, TSLA, VaynerMedia, Wild Advertising and UltraSuperNew, among others. This was a jump from the 67 agencies which previously competed in 2018, among which 39 were selected.

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Photo courtesy: 123RF

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