Media Moves… TheMediaOnline’s weekly round up. Continental leadership moves to next level. Ogilvy & Mather South Africa invests in Mobile Marketing. The making of a creative collective. Social@Ogilvy and Corporate Business Directors Appointed at Ogilvy PR. Richard Truter signs with Picture Tree as director. SIMONSAYS Communications signs photographer: Emma O’Brien. The SpaceStation to represent ESPN digital media in Africa.
Continental Leadership Moves to Next Level
The board of directors at Continental Outdoor Media Holdings have announced a series of high-level appointments with Barry Sayer assuming the role of executive chairman from Mark Hartmann of Helios Investment Partners, in an executive capacity. Hartmann will remain a non-executive director.
Bazil Lauryssen is the new chief executive officer with day-to-day responsibility for the running of the business, reporting to the executive chairman. Adelaide McKelvey remains managing director of the company’s Rest of Africa business outside of South Africa with James Scott as chief financial officer, both reporting to the CEO.
Sayer, a doyen of out of home media (OOH) and president of FEPE international (the Federation European Publicite Exterieur) has been promoted from his previous position as CEO, which he took up upon returning United Kingdom to South Africa. This was after a four-year sojourn in the UK, where he served as CEO of Clear Channel Outdoor United Kingdom and as regional president for the United Kingdom, Ireland and the Middle East of Clear Channel Inc., the world’s largest outdoor advertising company.
Lauryssen has been promoted from managing director, a position that he has held since the company’s inception. Lauryssen, a certified charted accountant in South Africa, has steered the Continental Outdoor Media brand with distinction and grown it into the rest of Africa during his tenure as MD, having worked for the company’s predecessor companies since 1993.
Lauryssen started as a financial director at Primesite Outdoor Advertising and worked his way up to general manager, prior to the company’s consolidation into Primedia. CorpCom’s then CEO, Sayer, recruited Lauryssen to be the operations director of its subsidiary company, Rent-A-Sign, which was at that time the biggest company in its sector. Within 18 months, Lauryssen restructured the business and played a critical role in CorpCom’s listing on the JSE.
Adelaide McKelvey, sales and marketing director at Continental Outdoor Media since 2005, was appointed as managing director Rest of Africa in October 2012. Continental Outdoor Media now operates in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Social@Ogilvy and Corporate Business Directors Appointed at Ogilvy PR
Ogilvy Public Relations (OPR) has announced the appointments of Nick Bedford as Social@Ogilvy business director and Yvette Van Rooyen as business director overseeing the Corporate division.
With 10 years’ experience in both traditional and digital marketing, both on brand and agency side, Social@Ogilvy Bedford has pioneered work on motoring, retail, extreme sports and telecommunication portfolios. His broad skill set spans marketing and communications, strategic business development, client service and financial management.
An accomplished marketer who has worked with some of the world’s top brands, Bedford offers substantial experience in offline and online media. His solid commercial and business acumen extends to sales, lead and revenue generation, client profitability, operations and client relationship management.
Van Rooyen has over 20 years’ experience in marketing and communications in sectors ranging from IT, corporate, FMCG and consumer technology. In addition to heading up her own marketing consultancy offering strategic marketing solutions to small and medium businesses, Van Rooyen worked at Microsoft SA for five years, where she played an integral role in the launch of Xbox 360 in South Africa. In 2010 she took on the role of Business Group Lead.
Richard Truter signs with Picture Tree as director
Richard Truter, born and raised South African, is a product of London Film School. He was a Y&R visualiser to mid-nineties, who then became part of the UK Soho madness with a signing to Geofrey Seymour Films & Livewire, and later with the eclectic ASD Lionheart roster of directors.
“Richard loves pushing the boundaries of film and photography and believes copywriters and film editors (which he has also done) make the best directors. Well, I’m not sure about that, but we are looking forward to having him in our fold and believe that someone like Richard can really contribute with a fresh look at our South African work,” says Gary King, executive producer of Picture Tree.
After spending 15 years in the UK and Europe and directing for such likes as Cadillac, Stella Artois, Elbow and Sigur Ros he returns to South Africa mixing his roots with a truly international edge. He is now based here in South Africa with his Icelandic wife, their kids and two rescue dogs.
Who’s won what
The SpaceStation to represent ESPN digital media in Africa
The SpaceStation has been appointed to represent ESPN as its sales agency in sub-Saharan Africa. This makes them the biggest provider of digital advertising sales to a sporting audience in SA.
The SpaceStation will exclusively represent ESPN Digital Media in Africa across its ESPNcricinfo (cricket), ESPNFC (football), ESPNscrum (rugby) and ESPNF1 (Formula 1) digital brands. Along with the other sporting websites and mobi-sites they represent, these additions to the agency’s stable take their sporting audience up to over 1.7 million users, giving them the largest online sporting footprint in the country. The platforms will be available on web and mobile here in SA and on web in Kenya and Nigeria.
“The SpaceStation represents some of the biggest and most credible online platforms available and ESPN is no exception. The ESPN brand is synonymous with sporting worldwide and is the leading sports media provider,” said Gustav Goosen, CEO of The SpaceStation.”
Added Alan Fagan, ESPN Group Director, Advertising & Sponsorship Sales, Europe, Middle East, and Africa, “ESPN’s online and mobile brands deliver the very best in content and products to sports fans and are able to deliver truly distinctive and customized ways for African brands to reach the world and for brands around the world to connect with African fans. We look forward to working with The SpaceStation to achieve that.”
The addition of ESPN’s business increases The SpaceStation’s stable to 23-premium web and mobile platforms in Africa reaching millions connected Africans.
SIMONSAYS Communications signs photographer: Emma O’Brien
SIMONSAYS communications has been appointed by one of South Africa’s leading fine art photographers, Emma O’Brien, to manage publicity and handle her communications requirements. O’Brien is a Johannesburg-based photographer, and endeavours to deliver work that has not only an artistic impact, but a social one too.
“Emma’s work speaks to the ethos of our agency; she recently travelled to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), to capture images of its citizens – individuals who deal with the trauma of rape, poverty and civil war on a daily basis. This project, entitled ‘Faces of Courage’ is intended to raise awareness of these human rights atrocities and to raise money for a micro-loan project that will empower people in the DRC by providing them with business skills. Emma also works extensively with CLAW (Community Led Animal Welfare), and the Sandton SPCA, helping those who cannot help themselves,” says MD of SIMONSAYS communications, Melanie Stevens.
For CLAW, she has photographed numerous animals, which has led to them being placed in loving homes. For two consecutive years O’Brien has photographed the Sandton SPCA calendar; the 2012 calendar raised over R100 000 and it’s hoped the pull of the 2013 images will top this amount. She has also started a photographic project called ‘Rescue Dog’, which features touching portraits of dogs who have been adopted from shelters and are now in new homes. The aim of the project is to raise awareness about the number and types of dogs in shelters in South Africa, and to change the perception that shelter dogs are problematic and mixed breed mutts.
Three new community radio stations for The Media Connection
The Media Connection, one of South Africa’s leading community radio advertising specialists, has added three new community radio stations to its bouquet of services namely, Ugu Youth Radio (South Coast, KZN) Ekhephini (Barley East) and EK FM (Tsakane).
Who’s making moves
Ogilvy & Mather South Africa invests in Mobile Marketing
Ogilvy & Mather South Africa (O&M SA) today announced that it has taken a significant step forward in developing its South African mobile marketing capability by acquiring a majority share in the leading SA mobile marketing company, Strike Media Proprietary Limited.
Strike Media (Strike) is a full service mobile marketing company with technology capabilities that enable it to stretch from customised mobile campaigns and added value mobile services to mobile payment and mobile business and integration solutions. Strike is currently engaged in providing mobile consulting to some of the country’s best-known brands and organisations.
Strike CEO, Russel Stromin, who is one of SA’s leading IT pioneers and chairman of the Code of Conduct Committee at WASPA, the mobile services industry regulator, describes O&M SA as an ideal partner. “Mobile needs to be integrated into the full marketing mix at many points along the customer journey and O&M SA has a class leading approach to integrated marketing and understands the potential for mobile to truly transform marketing. Mobile has the power to revolutionise clients’ business and brands as it is playing a significant role in enhancing customer experience,” says Stromin.
Abey Mokgwatsane, the CEO of O&M SA, described the Strike investment as another step forward in the rapid digital transformation that the company has embarked upon. “Strike is a quality technology and mobile marketing company that gives us access to new ways to connect with consumers in the always-on world of mobile. Mobile represents the most intimate medium. It is with our consumers every waking moment and in Africa and South Africa, it is a priority medium for us to develop,” says Mokgwatsane.
The making of a creative collective
Andrew Kyriako (director) and Liesl Karpinski (producer) have brought together their strengths, experiences and passion for the advertising and film industry in order to start a creative collective that encompasses the disciplines of film, animation, digital, post production, fine art, audio and casting all under one roof.
Spitfire Films, which was founded by Kyriako, known in the industry as ‘AK’, focuses on creative content and Aces-Up, the brainchild of Karpinski, specialises in animation and digital.
The office space offers freelancers a free desk to work at and an edit suite that can be rented out. A mini art gallery can also be found within the space and is used as a platform for artists to display their craft. A multi-purpose recording studio will soon be added to their service offerings. This all culminates into a one-stop-shop environment for all creative needs.
The Star Factory, a casting agency headed by casting director Anita Schonauer, makes use of the creative office environment regularly. She says the concept of a creative collective is just what the industry needs.
Karpinski hopes that the Creative Collective will become a hub where new and exciting creative ideas are born and seen through to execution.
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