Winner: John Mclnerney, SVP, Director of Healthcare Digital Strategy, Ruder Finn
An enthusiastic digital evangelist, John McInerney leverages his understanding of the digital landscape – applying consumer insights to major B2C brands and exploring emerging technologies in the evolving healthcare space – to constantly innovate and ideate in a field always moving ahead of the curve, and inspire his colleagues to think outside the box.
PR agencies hustle to stay ahead of their evolving industry in the digital space -- and in the tightly regulated healthcare industry, this gets complicated. At a time when many healthcare clients are starting to push new boundaries in digital/social, McInerney has already pioneered many “firsts” and routinely harnesses deep insights and expertise to build products and amplify storytelling platforms for all of his agency’s clients. In addition, in his previous consumer marketing role, his leadership led Ruder Finn to one of its largest social accounts with Home Depot as well as one of its most innovative projects with SHOSports.
McInerney led an omnichannel social campaign for Home Depot, engaging the brand in emerging platforms. With a Mashable partnership, Vine influencer partnerships, Instagram challenges, a Jimmy Kimmel TV spot integration, and other tactics, the campaign resulted in 1 billion impressions and 1.3 million social engagements.
With SHOSports, he managed the brand’s first-ever effort to live broadcast on social – including the launch of the brand’s Vine channel – creating social-ready, premium video social content, giving followers a peek into the world of boxing. These efforts led to stellar results for SHOSports with 178 million total impressions, 1.6 million total engagements and 33 percent overall community growth.
In leading the healthcare innovations team, while also providing digital counsel and strategy across all healthcare clients, McInerney exhibits leadership in swiftly pushing through concept review documents. He has the ability to anticipate the needs of stakeholders, using sound judgment to move innovative initiatives forward.
Honorable Mentions:
• Reed Albers, Entertainment Software Association
• Andrew R. Campanella, National School Choice Week
• Brian Donahue, Craft Media/Digital
• Stephanie McCratic, Acorn: An Influence Company