SPENCER WONG
FOUNDER / CEO
Spencer has spent his last 30 years being the face that represents the Hong Kong Advertising industry. With his unprecedented creative achievements in the world, He has made continued support and remarkable contributions to HK’s communication, branding & marketing Industries.
Graduating from the Fine Arts Faculty at HKU in 1987 & taken the MBS (Marketing Business Science) in NUI of Dublin, Spencer started his advertising career as a copywriter at Lee Davis Ayer in 1988 and joined the Ball Partnership HK as a creative director in 1992.
His first ever major creative win was the 4 silver Lions in Cannes. It had topped the show in 1994, Catapulting his company Bates Hong Kong to the 6th highest ranked agency within the Cannes worldwide ranking.
In 1996, he founded his famous creative hot-shop under the name of Burnett Boutique (under the Leo Burnett Group) which pioneered the trend of boutique agencies in the HK market.
After 3 years of successful experience as a commercial film director, he joined Ogilvy in 2003 as the Executive Creative Director for South China. In no time, he had elevated the culture there and helped the company secure the grand Prix in Kam Fan HK and the Asian Grand Spike.
He was the first ever adman nominated by Tatler Magazine in 2005 as the 10 most powerful people in HK for his unique persuasive power.
In 2005, He was promoted as APAC regional Executive Creative Director for WPP Y&R. The harder he worked on the regional marketing, the more he treasured and cherished the characteristic of the Hong Kong & Greater China market. He understood the importance of creativity over business.
After a year, he earned the opportunity to work with McCann World group as the CEO & ECD for greater china. It was an unprecedented phenomenon that made him the first ever person in Asia to have a dual role in both management & creative.
Under his leadership, McCann was ranked as the number one creative agency in both HK & China since 2006-2018, proceeding to also win 5 grand prizes in HK4A’s Kam Fan award in a span of 12 decorated years.
Another great accomplishment was when he led his company to victory in the Design Grand Prix at Cannes for Nike in 2009 as well as the Grand Prix at Spike Asia. This was a first for the whole Great China region.
He also won the most respected title in the industry – Creative Person of the Year in Asia by MEDIA.
In the past 15 years, he was the man that helped the Coke brand on a global scale by winning the most creative, digital and effectiveness award. He was also nominated as the top 10 creative contributors in the last 100 years for Coke. His famous Chok Campaign for coke won the Grand Prix in the China ROI awards and soon following after, tons of awards globally.
Aside from that, He has spent a large amount of his leisure time on giving lectures at different universities, marketing and creative forums as well as attending festivals, trade development councils in HK, Taiwan and Mainland China.
In January 2015, McCann Hong Kong renamed the company to McCANN & SPENCER.
A truly historic moment in the global advertising industry as a US based global network company partnered with a Chinese adman.
In 2018, Spencer sets up a joint venture with M&C Saatchi named M&C Saatchi Spencer Hong Kong. Under his leadership, M&C Saatchi Spencer Hong Kong focuses on local businesses while at the same time servicing Chinese businesses seeking to expand internationally via Hong Kong.
To the society and the industry, Spencer is the Executive Chairman leading the Hong Kong 4As Association from 2012 to 2018. He helped the association to garner the support from Create HK, to sponsor a massive internship programme and various overseas young stars competitions. He also spares some time to be an active board member for Save The Children as well as being a working committee for the HK Trade Development Council.
He was also invited by the world renowned and prestigious British D&AD to become the foreman for their professional awards. As the first ever marketing person to achieve continuous success domestically and internationally, Spencer has been voted as Hong Kong’s 100 most influential persons by Debrett’s.