In an effort to boost its worldwide reach as well as enhance strategic relationships with global clients and partners, Microsoft has created two new Vice President roles with Microsoft Advertising. In this regard, the company announced that Gregg Albright would serve as Vice President, Global Accounts while Marc Bresseel would occupy the position of Vice President, Global Agencies. Microsoft has yet to make public details on the structure of the two new groups, but it insisted that the teams would collaborate in order to ensure that communities made up of Chief Marketing Officers and agencies would have their needs met.

“Our clients – whether agency or advertiser – face one all-too-familiar need: to reach, engage and motivate their audience,” commented Darren Huston, corporate vice president, Microsoft Corp’s Consumer and Online group. “Our clients tell us that they see digital, and Microsoft, as critical to helping them more cost efficiently and effectively meet this need on a local, regional, and global basis with even closer collaboration.”

Marc Bresseel noted that the new VP roles were illustrative of Microsoft Advertising's efforts into driving growth for its partners in the ad space. As Global Agencies VP, Bresseel needs to build strategic partnerships for the software giant with media agency giants worldwide, such as: Aegis, Havas, IPG, Omnicom, Publicis and WPP.

“Microsoft Advertising has a wealth of experience in developing technology that enables agencies to create ground-breaking campaigns and then track and refine them through intelligent evaluation tools. The decision to create this new role affirms our commitment to building on existing relationships with the leading influencers in the advertising industry, and converting them into durable, long-term partnerships,” Bresseel said.

As VP of Global Accounts, Gregg Albright will need to work with advertisers in order to help CMO surpass the handicap synonymous with reduced budgets. “We know that it is a challenging time to be a marketer. Not only are audiences more fragmented and media more complex, the office of the CMO faces a move towards previously unseen levels of budget scrutiny,” Albright noted. “We have seen how this complexity can be turned into a strategic opportunity given the right tools, operational efficiency and scale. We’re looking forward to working to unlock this potential with our advertising clients.”