WPP is set to win Coca-Cola's global media, data and technology business, a prize that arrives at a strategically useful moment for the holding company's chief executive, Cindy Rose.

Rose marks one year in the CEO role amid an ongoing effort to fix the holdco. A win of this scale, from a brand with Coca-Cola's stature, gives a CEO exactly the kind of proof point that a turnaround is real — something Rose can point to when investors and clients question whether the recovery has substance.

But the victory comes with an asterisk. Publicis was the only other agency group still in the running for the business, and it dropped out before the pitch process concluded. As a result, no one found out whether WPP could have beaten its rival in a straight head-to-head contest. The field simply narrowed to one name, and that name happened to be WPP's.

Some observers might call that winning on a technicality. That reading, however, discounts how competitive the contest actually was before Publicis walked away. One source, who spoke to Digiday on condition of anonymity because they work with the team that was competing for the account, described the head-to-head between WPP and Publicis as close.

For marketers watching the agency shuffle involving PepsiCo, Coca-Cola and Publicis, the episode signals that WPP — while a beneficiary of circumstance in this instance — remains a credible contender for marquee global accounts. The question of whether Rose's turnaround can convert opportunistic wins into sustained momentum remains open.