2020 Annual Financial Report

1.3.1 Introduction

Publicis is a world leader in marketing, communications and digital business transformation. It was established in 1926 when Marcel Bleustein-Blanchet created what was essentially a start-up. Publicis now has offices in more than 100 countries and approximately 80,000 employees.

The passion that Marcel felt for communications and the creation of strong relations between brand names and consumers transformed this new business into a prosperous and respected profession. The Group has never stood still, continuing to grow, innovate and transform for more than 90 years. The core values dear to its founder’s heart have continued to define everything we do: respect, honest products, client satisfaction, quality and creativity, together with a pioneering spirit, unwavering conviction and the ethical values inherited from his legendary fighting spirit.

1.3.2 Strategy

Today, Publicis Groupe is the third largest communications group in the world⁽¹⁾, positioned at every step of the value chain, from consulting to execution, combining marketing transformation and digital business transformation. Publicis Groupe is positioned as the go-to partner for our clients’ transformation as they seek to create personalization at scale, in a world increasingly dominated by platforms. Our talent is organized into 10 areas of expertise in four main business lines: Communication, Media, Data, and Technology. Publicis Groupe serves its clients through a unified and fluid organization that facilitates access to all its expertise in all its markets.

Our model has always been client-focused. Our clients, companies, are faced with enormous challenges, but also tremendous opportunities: mobile and digital technologies have changed everything, transferring power to consumers and facilitating the emergence of new competitors. Relations between our clients and their existing or potential consumers have been turned upside down by the revolution in media. The explosion of the Internet has gone hand in hand with the omnipresence of platforms and social media: Google, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter—to name but a few. How we consume has shifted drastically as one-click access to products becomes the norm, which favors the emergence of e-commerce platforms. Direct-to-consumer brands are the newest arrivals, born on the web and creating a need for their well-established rivals to build direct relationships with their consumers. The development of Walled Gardens creates new advertising ecosystems in which clients have only very limited access to data. 

The use of increasingly diverse data sources, from the Internet as well as the physical world, also raises a raft of new questions for companies, chief among them being peoples’ right to privacy. Companies are seeking to grow the value of their brand name in a digital universe where differentiation is key, while operating in markets characterized by low growth and relentless pressure on costs. In 2020, all of these underlying trends were accelerated by the impact of the Covid-19 crisis, which had a profound impact on consumption patterns and working habits.

Very early on, Publicis embarked on a major transformation to offer its clients ever more adapted, innovative and effective solutions and whose relevance is now enhanced. Since 2006, the Groupe has focused on developing its digital business, notably with the Digitas, Razorfish, Rosetta and LBi acquisitions. The 2014 acquisition of Sapient positions the Groupe as the ideal partner for companies in their digital transformations, placing consumer needs and the client experience front and center.

2019 was a pivotal year for the Groupe with the acquisition of Epsilon, the marketing Big Data specialist. Epsilon has the technology and platforms to structure client first-party data, round it out with an incomparably diverse range of data sources and put together personalized campaigns at scale.

By making Epsilon the data expertise of the Groupe, Publicis draws on this wealth of resources for all its business activities turning it into a key, differentiating advantage. The Groupe is now in a unique position to serve clients across the entire value chain:

• iconic creative brands can draw on Epsilon’s deep client knowledge to boost concept design and create even more compelling campaigns, while in turn fueling the Dynamic Creative Engine to ensure they  remain agile in adapting to changing consumer needs in real time;
• the Media offering connects billions of contact points to Epsilon’s data to improve the creation of individualized profiles, thereby better optimizing client media spending. This combination enabled the launch of “The Pact, Powered by Epsilon”, a solution guaranteeing the results of digital marketing investments based on performance indicators defined in advance;
• Publicis Sapient has relevant proprietary information on clients, allowing it to optimize the solutions offered to its clients to shape their business models. The integration of Epsilon’s capabilities with Publicis Sapient thus strengthens its offerings in direct-to-consumer (DTC), digital acquisition, client data platform (CDP) and credit and risk migration.