Omnicom continues organic growth lead over rivals

The owner of BBDO and PHD achieved organic growth of 9.3 percent for the second quarter of the year, helped by last year's global media wins for Volkswagen and AT&T. It was even higher than last quarter, with Omnicom reporting 4.4 percent organic growth.

However, it reported a 2.4 percent fall in reported revenue growth as the US company was negatively impacted by exchange rate movements.

By comparison, Omnicom's client roster includes less consumer goods companies compared to rivals WPP and Publicis Groupe.

WPP's organic revenue growth for Q2 shrank by 0.8 percent, while IPG was marginally up by 0.4 percent. Publicis Groupe was not much better at 0.8 percent. In May Procter & Gamble expanded its relationship with Publicis after retaining the FMCG giant's £210m media business. 

Unilever announced during its latest earnings call that it cut agency fees by 17 percent in the first half of 2017. The FMCG giant had previously announced its intention to cut the number of agencies it works with, as well as cut the number of ads it makes.

P&G, the world's biggest advertiser and Unilever rival, reported its lowest level of ad expenditure since 2006 earlier this month, driven by slashing its digital adspend during the second quarter of 2017.

Organic revenue growth was also negative for Havas during the quarter – down 0.9 percent, with UK revenues plunging 7 percent on a like-for-like basis owing to the loss of media accounts Nationwide and Unilever.