Media Moves… TheMediaOnline’s weekly round up. Media24 announces key appointments. Digital triumvirate to drive Publicis Machine. Rogerwilco signs Red Bull, wins three Assegai Awards. Gillian Gamsy International Communications wins multiple new clients. Why marketers should get personal with email. Okuhle Media walks away with DISCOPRO. Ireland/Davenport backs Bakone through its Enterprise Development programme. A Presse signs agreement to provide Its La Presse+ platform to the Toronto Star.
Who’s moved where
Media24 announces key appointments
Media24 has announced key appointments to its management team. Taking over from Fergus Sampson, who left in October, is Ishmet Davidson (48), currently the general manager of local titles and southern newspapers. He has been appointed GM of Media24 News division.
Over the past three years he has been in charge of Media24’s local newspapers and more recently Die Burger and Son titles. “I have enormous faith in Ishmet’s abilities,” said CEO Esmaré Weideman. “He is respected by editors and managers alike and has a reputation as an inspiring leader who is firm, fair, cost-conscious and has a keen eye for detail.”
Lisa MacLeod (42) joins Media24 on 1 December as GM of Digital Publishing after a 11-year stint at the Financial Times and FT.com in London. She is currently head of operations at FT.com and associate editor of the Financial Times.
MacLeod, who has an Honours degree in journalism and anthropology from Rhodes University, joined the Daily Dispatch as a journalist in 1997 and worked at Business Day for eight years where she held the positions of news editor, night editor and managing editor. At the time she was Business Day’s youngest ever chief sub. She joined the FT in 2008.
“We are delighted to be welcoming Lisa back to South Africa and to her new home at Media24,” said Weideman. “She comes with a wealth of experience in print and digital integration and will play a key role in commercialising our digital assets.”
Digital triumvirate to drive Publicis Machine
Just one month following the much-talked-about acquisition and subsequent merger, digital powerhouse Publicis Machine has added two of the country’s top digital minds to bolster its already formidable team.
Alistair Fairweather takes on the role of chief technology officer, while Johan Steyn joins as head of development. Together with existing head of digital Andy Gilder, the three make up a digital triumvirate that simply cannot be matched.
Fairweather has worked in the digital realm since 2001, cutting his teeth building and managing web applications for news24.com and mweb.com, as well as working as social media manager for a portfolio of top brands including Huisgenoot, YOU, Fairlady, Men’s Health and Sarie. In 2010 he joined the Mail & Guardian in a role that evolved into chief technology officer.
Steyn has created a niche for himself as a specialist in bridging the gap between technology and creative for brands ranging from Robertsons and Radox, to Nederberg, Cape Union Mart, Seeff, PEP, Sanlam, Computicket and Ster Kinekor. Although his main areas of expertise reside in gamification, social CRM, server architecture, application architecture, scalability, user experience, open source technologies and API architecture, he can pretty much transform any business requirement into a sound digital solution!
Gilder completes the trio, having started his career in the financial services space working with the likes of Visa and Sanlam, before joining the founding team of Publicis Machine in 2007. Since then, he has worked tirelessly for brands including Nando’s,
Who’s won what
Rogerwilco signs Red Bull, wins three Assegai Awards
Rogerwilco, the digital marketing agency previously known as 2Stroke, has been appointed to conduct search engine optimisation work for Red Bull South Africa.
The new account win comes days after Rogerwilco won three awards at the 2014 Assegai Awards for SEO campaigns on behalf of Direct Axis, Genesis Medical Scheme and home loan originator ooba.
Charlie Stewart, Rogerwilco CEO, said, “To be appointed to handle SEO for a company that’s widely revered as one of the world’s best exponents of content marketing, is testament to the amazing skills the Rogerwilco team possess.
Gillian Gamsy International Communications wins multiple new clients
GGi Communications has recently added a number of new clients to its roster. The agency won the Flight Centre account, handling both the consumer and corporate divisions. It was also appointed by Design Partnership, a leading retail and hospitality design specialist, and long-standing client, the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA), has engaged GGI to profile Engenius, ECSA’s educational division designed to position engineering as a career of choice at primary and high-school levels.
Additionally, the agency has been retained by Sanofi, a leading French pharmaceutical company, to provide strategic PR support to the corporate communications team, including executive profiling and leveraging the various CSI initiatives that extend from early childhood development education support, to TB, HIV and AIDS support.
“We’re really proud to add these brands to our client base as they bring both depth and breadth to our current portfolio,” says MD Jennifer Stein. “We have significant experience in diverse sectors, and we are excited to be working with clients who embrace the benefit of a highly strategic approach to public relations.”
Who’s making moves
Okuhle Media walks away with DISCOPRO
Cape Town based, multi-award winning television production company, Okuhle Media, has added another sought after award to its growing list of achievements. The company entered the Formats category of DISCOP, Africa’s television and content festival, taking place in Sandton this week, and pitched its #Friendorsement concept to the judges and audience at Sandton Convention Centre on 7 November 2014.
According to Grant Flynn, Okuhle Media producer, each participant has two minutes to make an elevator pitch to a distinguished panel of industry experts and an audience of local and international delegates. ”It is a great honour to have won this competition. There were such great contenders with fantastic ideas.”
DISCOP facilitates a pitching competition each year and this is the second year that Okuhle Media has featured and won. In 2012, Okuhle Media’s executive producer and co-founder, Louise McClelland won when she entered the show called ‘It’s a Wild Life’, a show about parents and teens trying to repair their relationship by going through an experience in the South African wild.
Why marketers should get personal with email
Email marketing is still the most widely used tool in the marketer’s toolbox and a key driver of business value, but it should be used in an increasingly sophisticated way to tap into the full power of the inbox, says DUO Marketing + Communications chief executive Judith Middleton.
Announcing a new email marketing capability as part of the agency’s digital services, Middleton says that personalising messages, integrating channels and constantly innovating is critical to create relevant emails that boost sales.
“It’s surprising how many businesses still do one mass email blast without segmenting their databases for customers at different stages of the sales lifecycle,” says Middleton. “Other businesses make the mistake of sticking with a trusted recipe that isn’t always keeping up with changes in digital marketing and advertising platforms, formats and channels.”
She says businesses should also consider the whole customer journey and not just focus on creating the perfect email – where will the customer click through to from the emailer? “Customised landing pages where customers can go directly to the product featured in the email can increase conversion rates by more than 25%.”
Of course email marketing success all depends on good data so incorrect and outdated information doesn’t undermine your results,” says Middleton, whose agency offers social media management, search engine optimisation and content marketing with blogs and videos, in addition to database management.
Ireland/Davenport backs Bakone through its Enterprise Development programme
Ireland/Davenport, through its enterprise development (ED) programme, is providing an opportunity for the development of a new creative agency that is the brainchild of Joel Lebethe.
Bakone is a creative agency that specialises in mass market communication through the use of storytelling via the consumer, instead of simply to the consumer. Bakone aims to turn on its head the ‘traditional black’ agencies approach to communications campaigns.
Joel Lebethe, founder of Bakone explains. “We have a very specific people centred approach. Gone are the days where brands dictate to consumers and Bakone strategically makes an effort to understand the diverse markets and tell stories through consumers and not to consumers.”
For Ireland/Davenport, developing talent beyond the confines of their own business is part of the agency ethos. This is evidenced by the recent support provided to another member of the team – Ernest Nkosi – to realise his dream of producing a full length film, which has gone on to receive critical acclaim.
“There are not enough campaigns that are conceptualised in vernacular. Rather campaigns are translated from English into vernacular and this is not always ideal. While we acknowledge that there has been progress, it is not sufficient. It is for this reason that our industry needs people such as Joel to drive this mind-set change. Joel is an extremely talented individual and our industry needs people of his calibre and his skill,” said John Davenport, Ireland/ Davenport co-founder and ECD.
A Presse signs agreement to provide Its La Presse+ platform to the Toronto Star
La Presse has just reached an agreement in principle with Canada’s largest-circulation English daily newspaper, the Toronto Star. This agreement will allow the Toronto Star to develop a new tablet edition based on the La Presse+ news platform technology. The Toronto Star digital edition is expected to be launched in the fall of 2015.
“With this agreement, two of the largest Canadian newspapers are leading the digital transformation of news media. La Presse+ and the Toronto Star will share the same platform technology and offer advertisers common formats that will create a new standard for advertising on tablets”, Guy Crevier, president and publisher of La Presse, said.
La Presse+ digital edition for iPad and Android tablets has enjoyed great success since its launch in April 2013.
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