Cootes joins from Lida, M&C Saatchi where she held position of chief operating officer and led the O2 account for over five years. Prior to joining Lida, in 2013, Cootes held senior positions at both Ogilvy and Iris Digital, bringing with her a wealth of knowledge in customer engagement, marketing strategies and communications.  

In her new role as MD, Cootes will lead the day to day running of the agency, and will be responsible for continuing to build Digitas’ client services team and grow its customer engagement proposition. Cootes is the final addition to Danielle Bassil’s exec team refresh alongside promotions from within Digitas.

Paul Doherty has been promoted to managing partner, leading on the agency’s growth strategies, after nearly 10 years at the agency.

Owen Hughes has been appointed as chief operating officer. He was previously Digitas’ commercial director for five years before taking on the role of commercial director of Publicis Groupe in early 2019. The new arrivals join the existing leadership team of chief creative officer Emma de la Fosse, chief strategy officer Matt Holt, and Rafe Blandford, chief product officer.

The executive leadership team will have a continued focus on creating connected experiences that bring brands to life.

Bassil says, “They say you should surround yourself with people better and smarter than you. No better case in point than Claire and this whole team. They are absolutely world class.”