SCA CEO, Grant Blackley, has announced that media agency executive, Seb Rennie (lead image) will join the business in the newly created role of executive head – LiSTNR Commercial. Rennie comes to SCA from Group M, where he has spent the past eight years, most recently as chief investment officer for Australia and New Zealand.
At SCA, Rennie will be responsible for leading LiSTNR’s commercial strategy and driving the digital audio commercial division within the business, as LiSTNR continues its strong growth trajectory.
Rennie has 20 plus years’ experience in the media industry and has worked in and with some of the largest and most influential media agencies, media owners, advertisers and tech vendors in Australia and Canada.
During his career, he has worked with Mediacom in the UK and Australia, OMD as Group trading manager and MEC as chief investment officer prior to moving to Group M in 2015.
In just under two years since its launch, LiSTNR has become Australia’s number one podcast network with more than 5.38 million monthly listeners.
SCA is the number one sales representation business of podcasting in Australia, representing its extensive premium, original podcast slate and a range of international and local podcast partners including Stitcher, Wondery, the AFL, NRL, Schwartz Media, DM Podcasts, and the Royal Institution of Australia. LiSTNR houses more than 500 podcast titles, 154 Hit and Triple M radio and DAB+ stations, 29 music stations, and news and information.
The LiSTNR app has been installed two million times since launch, and it frequently appears in the top 10 most popular entertainment apps. The number of plays per month on LiSTNR increased by almost 300 per cent in 2022.
Blackley commented: “Seb is a proven leader with unrivalled media negotiation and investment strategy skills, a strong managerial background, and a proven track record in the creation and implementation of plans to deliver on business needs. We are thrilled to have an executive of his calibre and experience join us and I look forward to seeing LiSTNR’s commercial strategy continue to gain further momentum – delivering a leading digital audio service and accompanying growth rate.”
Commenting on his new role, Rennie said: “The opportunity to lead LiSTNR’s commercial strategy was too good pass up. I have watched LiSTNR’s growth, innovation, and commercial success with keen interest; it’s a unique offering in the Australian market with enormous untapped potential for advertisers. The digital audio sector is primed for strong growth this year and beyond, and LiSTNR’s addressable audience of more than one million people is a sustainable and highly saleable commercial proposition. It’s a very exciting time to be joining SCA and I look forward to working with the team to deliver compelling commercial outcomes for both advertisers and LiSTNR.”
Rennie will commence the new role on 20 March.
Aimee Buchanan, GroupM Australia & New Zealand CEO also commented: “Seb is a fantastic operator and has played a phenomenal part in shaping GroupM and our agencies in his 18 years with the group.
“He has worked alongside our agency teams to drive our world leading Media Decarbonisation Framework and to implement our Responsible Investment Framework which puts Brand Safety, Data Ethics, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Responsible Journalism, Sustainability and Transparency at the heart of our investment strategy and he leaves a strong, experienced and stable team in place in the group and our agencies. I’ve enormously enjoyed working alongside him. We thank him for all his contributions and we all wish him the best as he takes on this new challenge. We’re underway with the search for his replacement.”
