Advertising and PR giant Omnicom closed the fourth quarter with $3.8 billion in fee income, 7.2% more than the same time a year ago.

The earnings report marks the latest in a long string of business milestones for Omnicom under the leadership of long-time CEO John Wren. Since taking over the reins in 1997, Wren has grown the firm into an industry leader with over 64,000 employees. 

The 7.2% growth Omnicom racked up last quarter was on an organic basis. This means the firm didn’t factor in certain one-item financial items that investors usually ignore when trying to assess how fast a company is growing.

Omnicom owns more than 1,000 advertising agencies and PR firms around the world. In 2021, more than 160 of those agencies won awards at the ad industry’s prestigious Cannes Lions trade show. 

Omnicom’s experiential marketing business experienced the fastest growth in the fourth quarter, having increased sales 17% year-over-year. Experiential marketing is a term that covers offline customer acquisition methods like setting up pop-up stores to raise the profile of new products.

Omnicom’s PR business also demonstrated strong momentum. The unit’s fee income grew 12% year-over-year.

All of Omnicom’s other core business units, including its advertising unit, grew as well during the fourth quarter.

It’s worth taking a moment to compare Omnicom’s fourth quarter growth numbers with its full-year results for 2022. 

Omnicom’s experiential marketing group grew 17% in the fourth quarter and 26.1% during 2022 as a whole. The PR division increased its top line by 12% in the fourth quarter and 13.7% during the full year.

The numbers show Omni’s business momentum slowed somewhat in the fourth quarter. Even so, Omnicom’s results were solid, especially when taking its profit into account: the firm increased its operating profit by $20.2 million for a total of $642.7 million in the fourth quarter.   

“We enter 2023 in a very strong position, building on last year’s significant new business wins and bringing together creativity, digital technology, and data to create marketing solutions that are responsive to the business transformation needs of our clients,” commented Omnicom CEO John Wren. 

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