LONDON—Tara O'Donnell has relocated from New York to lead Text 100's London office, following the departure of previous MD Dan Baxter at the start of this year.

O'Donnell takes on the position after joining the Next15 agency in 2006 to launch its consumer practice, which now accounts for almost a third of its client portfolio in North America.

She told the Holmes Report that she intends to bring a similar focus to her UK role, pointing to entertainment and travel as areas where she aims to "bring additional diversity to our client portfolio".

In addition, O'Donnell is hoping that a stronger integrated mindset will help spur growth at an office that currently employs 26 consultants, working for the likes of Vodafone, Skype, SanDisk, Blackberry and Dropbox.

"I've actually been pleasantly surprised to see a lot of integrated work in the UK, but there's also a lot more that can be done," said O'Donnell. "A lot of times our clients are the CMO — they are expecting that our recommendations involve more than just traditional PR and also include owned, paid and social."

As part of that approach, O'Donnell plans to hire a UK-based analytics lead for EMEA, following the agency's appointment of Phil Kam as global head of analytics in New York. She is also aiming to work more closely with Republic Publishing, the content marketing shop that Next15 acquired at the start of this year.

Text 100 EMEA head Cecile Missildine, to whom O'Donnell reports, has served as acting MD of the UK office following Baxter's departure for a senior communications role at Coca-Cola. Baxter spent three and a half years as Text 100 UK head.