Tara Mckenty
Creative Director APAC ∙ Google
At age four, Tara’s kindergarten teacher told her mother that Tara would grow up to be the Prime Minister of New Zealand, or the devil itself. After casting a career in politics aside, and realising red wasn’t her colour, Tara found herself in the halls of Whybin\TBWA Auckland working in advertising. It was here that she and her creative partner gained international attention by floating shares in their creative future, successfully funding themselves to Cannes. During her time at TBWA, Tara had a complete disregard for discipline and convention, she was named in Campaign Magazines Top 50 emerging talent portfolio, and submitted several entries into the pantheon of ABSOLUT work, one of which was the creation of a limited edition ABSOLUT bottle design.
Then Tara decided to swim across the ditch to Sydney where she joined Saatchi & Saatchi. It was here that Tara created a children’s book for OPSM that tested the eyesight of children, which was named by the WARC 100 in 2016 as the most effective marketing campaign in the world. Tara now finds herself at Google where her and her teams remit is to come up with creative uses of Google’s products and platforms for Asia Pacific’s largest clients, from creating real-time marketing platforms that reunite lost dogs with their owners for Pedigree, to building immersive story time platforms for Disney. Tara continues to disrupt the status quo, and as a consequence has won over a hundred international awards during her advertising rebellion.
Then Tara decided to swim across the ditch to Sydney where she joined Saatchi & Saatchi. It was here that Tara created a children’s book for OPSM that tested the eyesight of children, which was named by the WARC 100 in 2016 as the most effective marketing campaign in the world. Tara now finds herself at Google where her and her teams remit is to come up with creative uses of Google’s products and platforms for Asia Pacific’s largest clients, from creating real-time marketing platforms that reunite lost dogs with their owners for Pedigree, to building immersive story time platforms for Disney. Tara continues to disrupt the status quo, and as a consequence has won over a hundred international awards during her advertising rebellion.