David Mayo, VP-Chief Marketing Officer OGILVY & MATHER ASIA PACIFIC, SINGAPORE

When major corporations with their roots in developed countries look to grow in emerging markets, their playbooks have to be re-written. David Mayo,VP-chief marketing officer, Ogilvy & Mather Asia Pacific, Singapore, was well aware that strategies that work well in the U.S. or Western Europe often fall flat elsewhere.When Gillette set out to be a major player in China, India, and Russia, Mayo led the emerging markets strategy that is set to deliver 150 million new users in the three largest markets by 2015. Research pointed the way to a new way of communicating with people who generally are not part of the regular media demo/psycho makeup.“We opened up channels and media which together altered the entire way of selling in this segment,” Mayo says. For another client, Motorola, he and his team developed a touch point strategy for the implementation of communications in India and all low-tier market segments from India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka to Cambodia, Laos, and other parts of Indochina. From a regular advertiser in 2004, Motorola is now a multimedia, multi-channel communicator. Mayo is no stranger to swimming against the tide. In 2001 he launched the creative boutique RedCard and built a business by challenging the existing agency setup.The agency’s philosophy is centered on being small, creative, quick, clever, and deft with the belief that whatever the modern ad agency model, there will never be a substitute for brilliant creative marketing ideas based on intelligence and raw curiosity.