John Montgomery is GroupM’s Executive Vice President of Brand Safety. He was appointed to this role in August, 2016 to ensure that GroupM clients’ brands are protected from risks in the digital supply chain, like fraud and piracy, and to ensure that the digital components of their plans are effective in every region.
John’s WPP career began when he joined Ogilvy in South Africa in 1989 as Media Director and launched Mindshare in that country. In 2001, he moved to Amsterdam as CEO, Ogilvy Group Netherlands before relocating to New York in 2004 to lead the Interactive media practice for Mindshare and Ogilvy. He was subsequently appointed Global CEO of Mindshare Interaction in 2006 where he established the digital practice for Mindshare worldwide, then took on the role of COO of GroupM Interaction for North America and in 2015 was appointed as the Chairman of Connect North America.
John is seen as one of the digital innovators in the field and speaks regularly on issues such as Programmatic Buying, Brand safety, Data Quality and Privacy. He has represented the advertising industry to the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee and the White House and is on the Internet Steering Committee for the WEF. John is also Chairman of the 4A’s Media Leadership Council and leads the association’s Privacy Task group. In addition, he is co-chairman of the TAG anti-piracy initiative.
