Atomic 212°, the country’s biggest independent media agency, has hired Sylvia Pickering as Melbourne general manager.
Pickering joins from GroupM’s Mindshare, where she was managing partner on the NAB account for almost five years. In her new role, Pickering will report to national managing director, Rory Heffernan.
“Her track record in building and motivating teams, her experience working with leading client brands and her digital media knowledge are perfect for our growing Melbourne office,” Heffernan said.
“Sylvia will also join our senior leadership group in further developing our product and rolling out best practice processes across our teams, to ensure we continue to push ourselves in delivering the best service, product and experience for our people and our clients.”
Previously, she was also group investment director at Amplify AUNZ, group client service director at Dentsu Mitchell, and digital client service director at Mitchell & Partners.
Pickering said she feels “very privileged to be joining such a dynamic, exciting agency and team.”
“In an industry that thrives on relationships, I’m happy to bring two decades worth of strong media connections to the table,” she said.
“I’m eager to help continue to grow Atomic 212°’s already impressive client list, and project the agency even further as it goes from strength to strength.”
Atomic also has offices in Sydney, Brisbane, and Darwin. Over the past 18 months, it has won or retained BMW Australia and New Zealand, Bupa, Craveable Brands, Entain (Ladbrokes and Neds), the Northern Territory Government, Tourism Northern Territory, Northern Territory Major Events Company, Victoria University, My Muscle Chef, Ponant, Growth Faculty, Sydney Water, VetPartners, Adyen, and UKG.
That list saw it rank #11 in media agency billings, and top the indie pile for 2023 new business wins.
Chief digital officer James Dixon recently told Mediaweek the next goal is to crack the top 10 this year, and the top 5 in the next three years. In the past few years, Atomic has “firmly actualised as the largest indie,” Dixon says.
“I think that was a big, hairy, audacious goal five years ago. And now it feels like we’re firmly there, if not heading to the next big, hairy audacious goal, being top five. We’ve got billings of $300 million now. Top five is $500 million. So potentially we can get there in the next three years.”