McKinsey acquires India's ET Medialabs to bolster digital marketing capabilities

McKinsey & Company has announced the acquisition of ET Medialabs (ETML), a leading performance marketing and analytics agency based in India. This strategic move aims to significantly strengthen McKinsey's Digital Marketing Operations and Technology (DMOT) capabilities, expanding its global reach and expertise.  

Sixty colleagues from ETML, bringing deep analytics expertise, proprietary technology, and proven methodologies, will join McKinsey. This integration will expand McKinsey’s DMOT team to over 200 digital marketing analysts, performance marketers, and data scientists across global hubs in Asia and Latin America.  

"Customer first is core to our DNA," stated Raghav Kansal, founder of ETML, emphasizing the shared values between the two companies. "It's a value we immediately felt was shared by McKinsey and deeply embedded in their culture."  

The acquisition comes as CMOs and marketing leaders increasingly recognize the importance of customer-first marketing, which drives significant growth. McKinsey's DMOT offering helps clients achieve this by blending digital marketing expertise, tech-enabled capabilities, and a new operating model.  

"To keep that muscle strong, rigorous performance management is a critical lever to driving any growth transformation, and it significantly enhances our ability to deliver rapid impact for our clients," said Vincent Cremers, a McKinsey senior partner and a leader of McKinsey’s Growth, Marketing & Sales Practice. "That is where ETML, with its technical expertise in digital marketing-led scale-up and optimizing marketing spend, comes in."  

McKinsey selected ETML after a six-month search, recognizing its deep domain expertise and ability to drive rapid impact. ETML’s capabilities include reducing ad waste, optimizing budgets, and accelerating campaign impact time. Its diagnostic-to-insight approach, for example, cuts digital ad spend optimization time by 66 percent and boosts campaign impact time by 62 percent.  

"Their deep domain expertise along with McKinsey’s breadth of knowledge brings a unique end-to-end offering to clients—enabling both short- and long-term impact," said Lisa Harkness, a McKinsey partner.  

The integration of ETML will enhance McKinsey's ability to support clients globally, providing 24/7 digital marketing expertise. The two companies have already conducted 20 pilot tests together, demonstrating the effectiveness of their combined approach.  

ETML’s proprietary tool, which leverages over 100 analytics frameworks, machine learning models, and ad experiments, has proven to be a significant driver of success. For a leading Indian life insurance company, ETML helped achieve a 15 percent reduction in acquisition costs and a fourfold increase in revenue.  

"This partnership with McKinsey represents a tectonic shift in the trajectory of career growth for our people with infinite learning opportunities and exposure to high-impact projects across some of the biggest companies in the world," said Raghav Kansal.

With this acquisition, McKinsey aims to further solidify its position as a leader in digital marketing solutions, providing clients with unparalleled expertise and capabilities.