Independent social media agencies Movement Strategy and Newfangled Studios are joining forces after more than a decade as competitors, ADWEEK has learned.
Movement Strategy has acquired Newfangled Studios in an all-cash deal. The transaction includes an upfront payment worth roughly half the deal’s value, with a two-year earn-out tied to growth targets.
The companies declined to share a specific transaction figure but said the deal was valued “well into the eight figures.” No private equity backer was involved.
“There are not that many companies that can create really high-quality social creative at scale,” Jason Mitchell, CEO of Movement Strategy, told ADWEEK. “It’s something that Newfangled can do. It’s something that we can do. And together, we feel like we can do it even at a greater capacity.”
Both agencies will continue to go to market independently, retaining their leadership and individual brands. But they will operate on shared systems and participate in joint knowledge-sharing, workshops, and events. Combined headcount is expected to be slightly north of 150 employees, and no layoffs are planned.
While the goal is to cross-pollinate on new business opportunities, existing client relationships at both agencies will be preserved.
“When I told my clients—Bank of America, Google and Staples—about the acquisition, all three said, ‘We’re so happy for you, but we hope this doesn’t mean we’ll lose that small agency touch,’” said Macaela Vandermost, founder and CEO of Newfangled Studios. “That’s really important to us.”
Social-first at scale
Both founded in 2009, Movement Strategy and Newfangled Studios have taken what Vandermost described as “parallel journeys” as social agencies—with the latter starting on the East Coast and the former on the West.
Mitchell and Vandermost met last year. “We just had a lot of really great meetings and conversations,” said Mitchell. “First of all, [Vandermost] felt like a person that we really like, someone we want to spend time with and work with, and someone we think we could learn a ton from.”
Strategically, the move pairs Movement’s focus on organic social with Newfangled’s capabilities in paid social media. “Together, that’s a very complete offering,” said Eric Dieter, COO of Movement Strategy.
And as clients increasingly expect bespoke creative for every platform, joining forces will help both agencies manage the scale and complexity that’s “just growing every day,” Vandermost said.
“We are regularly delivering social campaigns with 100-plus assets across ad units,” she added.
Beyond execution, the agencies hope to support clients as social becomes core to their overall creative and marketing strategies.
“We want to shift brands from thinking of social as a channel to thinking of social as a mindset,” said Vandermost. “Even the most traditional media should resonate with a social-first audience. That doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be an ad on TikTok. It could be an ad anywhere. But we want to integrate that spirit of social into all campaigns.”
