The Media Online’s weekly round up of moves in media. Jason Xenopoulos appointed Cannes Entertainment Lions judge. Stratitude welcomes interns from The Living Link. Primedia Outdoor steps up marketing services rollout into Africa. Letstango.com and Zasttra.com choose C1X SOKA to reform their e-commerce advertising goals. I’m Bored re-brands to showcase the ‘Fun Nearby’. Moving Tactics designs digital photo booth for Burger King and Dunkin’ Donuts
This week’s BIG move: Jason Xenopoulos appointed Cannes Entertainment Lions judge
Jason Xenopoulos, CEO and chief creative officer of NATIVE VML, has been selected as a jury member for the Cannes Entertainment Lions.
Lions Entertainment is a two-day specialist event that takes place on 21-22 June 2017 as part of Cannes Lions. Lions Entertainment focuses on the future of the entertainment industry and brings together global brands and entertainment creators to explore how content is incorporated into mainstream culture through effective storytelling.
“Judging Cannes Lions has always been a career ambition of mine,” says Xenopoulos. “And Lions Entertainment is my favourite category because I am passionate about branded entertainment and I believe that brands should strive to inject themselves into popular culture.”
The appointment as judge follows another historic milestone for the agency having ranked third in South Africa at Cannes Lions 2016 for winning campaign gold as well as silver and bronze Lions.
Who’s moved where
Stratitude welcomes interns from The Living Link
Jared Wordon and Kayleigh Kotze, members of The Living Link, have joined integrated agency Stratitude as new interns.
The Living Link is a training centre that encourages, enhances and supports the development of intellectually disabled adults, helping them attain a high quality of life. The centre focuses on life skills training, providing members with the tools they need in order to successfully enter into the mainstream work place. Both Jared and Kayleigh completed The Living Link’s Adult Integration Programme in 2016.
“We are very excited to have Kayleigh and Jared start their journeys as interns at Stratitude,” says Sylvia Schutte, managing director of Stratitude. “For the past five years, Stratitude has been working with Sunshine Association, which is a non-profit organisation that supports children with intellectual, developmental and physical disabilities. This relationship has given us the insight and understanding to now welcome these two young adults into our agency environment, where they will take their first steps in establishing careers for themselves.”
Kayleigh is interning in Stratitude’s creative team and Jared is supporting the client service team.
Who’s won what
Letstango.com and Zasttra.com choose C1X SOKA to reform their e-commerce advertising goals
C1X (Class One Exchange), an independent advertising and marketing technology (AMT) leader, has joined hands with two very competent Dubai and South Africa based e-commerce marketplaces, Letstango.com and Zasttra.com, to help them find difficult-to-source audiences directly and transparently.
C1X’s platform called the SOKA helps merchants promote products using native and customised advertisements on its seller bidding platform to advertise, execute and manage product campaigns. It can immensely boost visibility of products and maximise product views, helping vendors increase their business.
“We’re extremely pleased to partner with LetsTango and Zasttra to launch SOKA, C1X MarTech offering specifically designed for e-commerce platforms, in Dubai/SA,” says Pawan Setpal, VP and head of business Middle East & Africa. “Ancillary revenue makes up a significant amount of revenue for marketplaces globally, directly impacting their bottom line. SOKA not only helps create ancillary revenue but also helps create a more robust marketplace.
“In LetsTango/Zasttra we’ve found a partner that understands the value of creating a holistic marketplace and we’re very happy to supplement their existing efforts that’ll enable both our companies to grow. With thousands of data touch points, we not only equip platforms and merchants to visualise their inventory capacity, GMV, campaign stats, etc. but also help generate key business insights that allow them to make smarter more informed decisions around their business.”
Founded in 2014, C1X is a funded global corporation, headquartered in the Silicon Valley, with offices in New York, Dubai, Singapore, Tokyo, Mumbai, and New Delhi, and with development centres in San Jose, Chennai, and Bengaluru.
Who’s making moves
Primedia Outdoor steps up marketing services rollout into Africa
Primedia Outdoor has stepped up its marketing services rollout into the rest of Africa in early 2017. The team, which grew from one to three members over the past year, visited key clients in three of their African markets to demonstrate the tools and research that they have been working on.
“Marketing services is a new capability for this division, so we have been introducing ourselves,” says Primedia Outdoor’s marketing services manager for rest of Africa, Johan Haupt.
So far, the marketing services team have visited Namibia, Zimbabwe and Zambia, where Haupt says their efforts have garnered good results.
The marketing services team sets out to make the buying of Primedia Outdoor inventory in African markets a straightforward and accountable process, by using acquired data to design a visual
Their research draws on GIS analytics, along with profiler data for each country (population data by region, economic indicators such as GDP figures, inflation rates, interest rates, and various economic indexes). The marketing services team have also worked to derive convergence nodes for their African markets; these nodes identify areas where several specific points of interest (POI) are located close together, guaranteeing a constant high volume of returning consumers.
Moving Tactics designs digital photo booth for Burger King and Dunkin’ Donuts
In a digital age where social media and ‘selfies’ reign supreme, it was only a matter of time until digital photo booths were introduced into Quick Service Restaurants (QSR). Burger King and Dunkin’ Donuts have become the latest brands to install a custom digital photo booth in their N1 City outlet in the Western Cape.
Holding company Grand Parade Investments has built a unique kid’s play area on the 1st floor above their Burger King and Dunkin’ Donuts outlets in Goodwood, close to N1City Mall. The play area features touch tables, gaming stations, interactive floor projections and a fully-automated digital photo booth.
Moving Tactics, the leading South African digital signage solutions company, was employed to build a custom-designed, vinyl-wrapped, powder coated steel fabricated housing, into which a 32” industrial LED touch display, HD camera and PC have been installed to deliver a ‘selfie’ booth that needs no human interaction.
Andy Higginbotham, Creative Director at Moving Tactics Digital Impact, says, “This has been a great project for us to work on. These photo booths are very popular with the kids and in today’s day and age, the youngsters are very technically-minded and have no problem in quickly working out how the technology works.”
I’m Bored re-brands to showcase the ‘Fun Nearby’
Successful localised family ‘what’s on’ sharing app, I’m Bored, has undergone a refresh, and has re-branded as Fun Nearby. Created by KRS Mobile’s simplifier-in-chief Lorraine Steyn, and her then 10-year-old son, in 2014, the free events listing platform and service has grown to become a firm favourite for parents and kids in sourcing fun things to do close by.
Explaining the rationale behind the re-brand, Steyn said: “We have always seen ourselves as an international application and while undergoing an upgrade of the technology behind the platform, we felt it was as good a time as any, to move onto a global URL.
“When we analysed what this service accomplishes, we realised that the ‘bored’ moniker was negative and we wanted to promote the more positive aspect of having fun with the family.”
www.funnearby.com retains much of the I’m Bored iconography, but has streamlined the event uploading process – which can now be done by event organisers directly. It has also improved its categorisation and the geo-location function – on the site and via the Android and iOS apps. The service will continue to issue its newsletters and have a strong Facebook presence (currently over 50 000).
