Meet Casey Greig: Audience Group’s New Head of Advertising Strategy
Helping clients maximise their advertising budgets requires smart planning. Those two words cover a lot of ground. Evidence-based advertising strategy includes complexities such as:
- Media mix modelling
- Advanced analytics
- Navigating technology trends and innovations to stay ahead of industry shifts
- Staying on top of advertising products and publisher innovations
- Testing new ideas
- Continuously refining advertising strategy on a campaign-by-campaign basis
Casey Greig brings a research-driven approach to media planning as Audience Group’s newest appointment. Focused on advertising strategy (including media & brand strategy etc.), she ensures strategic moves are backed by empirical evidence, not assumptions.
As a result, Casey’s role is about helping clients lead rather than follow. She guides them through an evolving media landscape while also ensuring their advertising investments drive measurable results.
To explore this further, we sat down with Casey to talk about trends and the future of advertising strategy.
“I probably spend an unhealthy amount of time thinking about what’s next and about possibilities,” Casey admits. “But I appreciate that at Audience Group, we have the freedom to explore, fail fast, and push forward. In advertising, the only way to stay ahead is to test, learn, repeat.
“Sometimes that process tells you that you’re a few steps too far ahead, but I’d rather be 10 steps forward than playing catch up. I’m determined that we’ll be the ones bringing fresh, progressive, high-impact ideas to clients.”
Industry Shifts Impacting Advertising Strategy
When asked about industry shifts demanding action from brands, Casey highlighted two changes reshaping advertising strategy and audience engagement. On one hand, brands must adapt to sustainability expectations, while on the other, they need to rethink their approach to search visibility.
1. Sustainable Advertising
Sustainability has become a critical consideration for organisations and their stakeholders, and that now extends to advertising. Brands are under increasing pressure to reduce the carbon footprint of their advertising programs.
“We’re starting to see a shift,” says Casey. “Brands are becoming more conscious of the environmental impact of digital advertising and are looking for ways to take meaningful action without compromising advertising effectiveness.”
Innovations in green media planning, carbon-neutral ad servers, and more energy-efficient data practices are emerging as solutions.
Audience Group is working to help clients make advertising choices that reflect their ESG objectives. That includes our own journey to becoming a net-zero business, gaining carbon neutral certification covering Scope 1, Scope 2 and some Scope 3 emissions.
2. Generative Search
This represents a new challenge for brands competing for visibility and audience attention.
“Advertisers cannot afford to ignore this shift in audience behaviour and search technology,” says Casey. ”Consumers are turning away from the typical Google search in droves, in favour of AI-driven search experiences.”
Generative search models don’t just return a list of links. Instead, they generate AI-driven responses within the search window, meaning fewer users click away to other sites, such as an advertiser’s website. As a result, brands must rethink their digital presence to remain visible and relevant.
“Brands need a strategy to establish their presence and influence how they show up in generative search results,” she says, “especially those in expert-driven sectors like travel and health.”
“What I love about it, at least at the moment,” says Casey, “is that unlike traditional search, it favours brands that consistently provide high-quality, informative, authoritative and trustworthy content. This shift presents both a challenge and an opportunity for advertisers looking to refine their strategy.”
As for how to apply these shifts to media strategy, Casey says the conversations are exciting and will become a priority for smart marketers over the next 12–18 months.
We’re well on the front foot, and to make these strategies work we’re talking to some really interesting and innovative start-ups out of the US,” Casey says.
Breaking Out of the Industry Bubble
With experience across multiple sectors and a background in research, Casey has uncovered audience-based insights for hundreds of brands. We asked how this experience has shaped the way she thinks about media and advertising strategy today.
“I put people first, not platforms. It’s a phrase that gets thrown around a lot, but it’s an important approach,” says Casey. “Effective strategy development requires stepping outside of the industry bubble and working with data and evidence about audiences and their behaviours to challenge your own assumptions.”
“The latest Media i Industry Survey revealed that only 18% of Australia’s media professionals are over 40, and other research has told us that media professionals are more likely to live in affluent suburbs like Paddington or Bondi,” says Casey. “We get past that bubble, we avoid our own biases, we are surprised, we find patterns and opportunities when we focus on consumer behaviour. That’s why we strategise based on the audience, the evidence and our client’s objectives rather than on assumptions.”
Evidence-Based Advertising Strategy is about Accountability
Audience Group is known for its evidence-based approach to advertising. We wanted to know what that means, in practical terms, to the newest member of our management team.
“For me, it’s all about accountability,” Casey explains. “It means making smart, measured decisions for clients—based on data, not gut feel or industry politics. It means we aren’t chasing the lowest CPMs, making biased or short-term moves, or appeasing whoever took us out for lunch last week.”
“I value relationship building and love learning more about clients, partners, and the latest in ad inventory or AdTech over lunch. But when it comes to advertising strategy, every client gets Audience Group’s brand of sharp, smart, evidence-based thinking because we don’t just want to build effective campaigns, we also want our client’s businesses to grow.”
