Programatic marketing platform Bench has announced the appointment of Dan Johns who joins the business as an independent board adviser to spearhead the company’s new enterprise division.

Following a four-year stint at IPG Mediabrands, Johns will now act as a key adviser to Bench, supporting the company’s growth across the Asia Pacific region.

Johns is a communications industry executive with nearly 25 years of experience gained in both Australia and the UK. In his previous role, Dan oversaw strategy and operations across the IPG Mediabrands Australia group. Prior to IPG Mediabrands, Dan was the CEO of Ikon Communications and has been a long-standing board member of the Media Federation of Australia.

John’s appointment comes at an important time for Bench, recently ranked 101st in the 2017 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Asia Pacific Index. This follows the company’s second annual win in the Deloitte Australia Fast 50 awards.

Johns said, “It is clear that the marketing industry transformation that has been spoken about for so long is now underway. I’ve been fortunate to spend the last few months meeting many businesses from all sides of the industry to understand who is best placed to drive this change.”

“Bench is an incredibly innovative and ambitious company whose capabilities both brands and agencies are in need of globally. I greatly look forward to assisting the business during the next exciting stage of its journey.”

With the increased fragmentation of advertising channels, marketers want to gain control over their media budgets and technology platforms. As programmatic becomes the main method for buying media, planning and managing campaigns becomes increasingly more complex.

Bench allows advertisers to quickly experiment with messages across multiple channels faster, and more safely, than ever before to find those that truly resonate with their customers.

The launch of the Bench enterprise division will let large advertisers take advantage of the programmatic revolution while placing control of media spend firmly in their hands. Bench’s current customer roster consists of iconic local and global brands such as Epson, Murdoch University, RSPCA, Oz Lotteries, 20th Century Fox, SBS & Medtronic.

Ori Gold, CEO, says: “We’re very excited to have Dan join us and bring his wealth of experience to the Bench team. Dan’s involvement will help us show enterprise clients how they can maximise their media potential by giving them a platform that allows them to safely experiment and get results with their digital advertising faster than ever before.

“Dan’s understanding of the media landscape combined with the AI-powered capabilities of the Bench platform will enable enterprise brands and agencies to take control of their marketing decisions.”

Coming into 2018, marketers will increasingly start moving away from publisher- centric metrics that don’t tie in with their long-term marketing objectives.

The Bench platform will help them more closely align their media strategy with their brands’ desired business outcomes, while adding value to audiences through more relevant advertising messages.