Fashion One to bring localised content to African audiences through partnership with Virtual Xchange Group. APO Group appoints Lionel Reina as CEO. SPARK Media partners with Private Property. Tribeca Public Relations appointed by eMoyo. Uber partners with JUMO to provide driver-partners with vehicle finance. McCann South Africa, 1886 Advertising Merge. 30 Graduates complete FCB Africa’s 2018 programme. Tribeca supports annual #Click2Feed initiative to feed hungry cats and dogs. The Herald to celebrate 34 years of cycling classic: The Herald Continental Cycle Tour. France 24 available on OpenNews channel in South Africa. Stellar line-up to kick off festive season with Spar Carols by Candlelight with Jacaranda FM
This week’s BIG move: Fashion One to bring localised content to African audiences through partnership with Virtual Xchange Group
African viewers will be at the forefront of the latest fashion and lifestyle trends following the announcement of a strategic partnership between Fashion One LLC, the New York-based international fashion, entertainment and lifestyle television network, and Virtual Xchange Group, an African creative, production and events company.
Through the agreement, Virtual Xchange Group and Fashion One will collaborate on the production of bespoke content for African audiences besides showcasing Fashion One’s industry-leading global content. Virtual Xchange Group will also engage a broader audience through collaborative marketing activity on digital platforms. The partnership means that Fashion One will reach 30 million households.
“Africa is a very important market for Fashion One, so we are delighted to bring African-themed content to African audiences through the partnership with Virtual Xchange Group,” said Ali Gursoy, Fashion One Group CEO.
Virtual Xchange Group offers industry-leading expertise in the areas of entertainment and hospitality from creative content production and distribution through to event staging and talent management.
“We are delighted to be partnering with the world’s leading fashion network,” said Kaycee Kennedy, the CEO of Virtual Xchange Group. “The partnership with Fashion One Group will enable us to bring the latest in global fashion and lifestyle trends, fashion shows, events and original programming to African audiences.
People moves
APO Group appoints Lionel Reina as CEO
Lionel Reina has been appointed as CEO of the APO Group, the media relations consultancy and press release distribution service in Africa and the Middle East, as it moves into the next phase of its development.
Founder and 100% owner of APO Group, Nicolas Pompigne-Mognard, 43, will become chairman with a focus on delivering high-level counsel for APO Group clients and developing his own investment fund dedicated to Africa.
Reina has over 25 years of senior management experience and has a strong history of providing effective leadership and delivering significant growth. From 2003 to 2012, he was Vice President and General Manager for Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa at Orange Business Services, the B2B division of French telecoms company Orange. In 2013, Reina was appointed Middle East Director in the Gulf region for Accenture. More recently, he was Managing Director Benelux for Damovo, which was acquired by Eli Global in July 2018.
Business moves
Retroactive knocks it out the park in first two months
Retroactive, the new creative sports marketing agency launched by former Springbok Bryan Habana, Mike Sharman, Ben Karpinski and Shaka Sisulu in October 2018, has already signed up three big-brand clients: Biogen, Jawitz Properties and Cricket South Africa, and has gone live with campaigns for all three.
“The market has welcomed Retroactive’s disruptive and fresh approach to digital sports marketing with open arms,” said Sharman. “The already profitable agency is achieving exceptional, measurable results for its clients, and we look forward to working with more sport and fitness brands and sporting personalities who want to change the digital sports marketing game for the better.”
The Retroactive Biogen campaign films and shares the #BiogenJourney of James Hobson, or ‘Hobbo’, a regular South African guy on his journey from being in the worst shape of his life weighing in at 130kgs to attempting to complete the IRONMAN 70.3 in Durban in June 2019. While documenting Hobbo’s journey and sharing his learnings and experiences, the campaign encourages South Africans to share their own journeys to #BeYourBest with Biogen.
Since he started his #BiogenJourney in September, Hobbo has lost 17kgs, dropped 4.8% in body fat, and 3.3 points in his Body Mass Index (BMI). The campaign has reached 1.3 million South Africans to date: 90 000 views of the fortnightly video diaries, more than 1 000 engagements, and over 6 500 downloads of the podcast content.
SPARK Media partners with Private Property
SPARK Media has announced a digital advertising sales partnership with Private Property, one of South Africa’s largest online property portals.
With over 12 million monthly page views, over four pages per visit and an average of seven minutes per session, advertisers can access audiences primed to engage with products and services that relate to the buying or selling of homes.
“In our continued efforts to connect advertisers with relevant audiences, we partnered with Private Property to bring a unique opportunity to our agency and brand partners,” said Marc du Plessis, Joint CEO of Spark Media.
While it may not be intuitive to think of a property portal as a prime audience for anything but homes and property financing, users on the site are however primed to engage with many other categories, such as home appliances, furniture, schools, tech for the home and many more.
Tribeca Public Relations appointed by eMoyo
eMoyo, an audiology technology company in South Africa, has appointed Tribeca Public Relations as its public relations partner.
eMoyo is a medical technology company that researches and develops medical devices that are designed to make primary healthcare more accessible for everyone. Dr Dirk Koekemoer, a medical doctor, futurist, and innovator in medical technology and informatics, founded the company. eMoyo holds extensive intellectual property on cutting edge medical devices and innovative software.
“Tribeca will apply solid public relations principles to help eMoyo talk to the people important to its business: healthcare professionals, audiologists, doctors and, most importantly, the patients who can benefit from its ground-breaking medical technology,” said Davina Malan, Business Unit Director at Tribeca.
Uber partners with JUMO to provide driver-partners with vehicle finance
Uber has partnered with JUMO, a financial technology company who has created JUMO Drive – a unique digital vehicle finance product that’s easing barriers to car ownership for existing Uber driver-partners. The product has been successfully piloted in Kenya, with the intention to expand the offering across Sub-Saharan Africa in 2019.
JUMO’s data prediction capabilities utilise driver behavioural data to facilitate credit scoring and offer JUMO Drive to qualifying driver-partners. The JUMO Drive and Uber app work together to generate and facilitate the credit scoring and application process for driver-partners. To ensure that driver-partners have a seamless and automated experience, all applications are transparent and require no upfront costs, no sign-up fees, no deposits.
Justin Spratt, head of business for Uber Middle East and Africa explained: “Earlier this year, Uber and JUMO ran a pilot with a select number of Uber drivers in Nairobi who were pre-approved based on their driving behaviour. Based on the success of the pilot, we are happy to bring this innovative financial solution to driver-partners in Sub Saharan Africa.”
McCann South Africa, 1886 Advertising Merge
McCann South Africa and 1886 Advertising are to merge and will begin trading on 1 January 2019. The new entity will be led by 1886’s current managing director, Derek Coles, and current chief creative officer, Stuart Stobbs.
Fraser Lamb, CEO of McCann South Africa, will return to his original role as executive chairperson of McCann Africa.
The new agency’s brand portfolio will include Cell C, Steers, Sasfin Bank, Johnnie Walker, J&B, Kulula, Mastercard and Fedex. It will trade out of FCB Africa’s Johannesburg campus in Sandton.
According to Group CEO of FCB Africa, Brett Morris, the decision to merge McCann South Africa with 1886 was prompted by a global review conducted by the Interpublic Group of Companies (IPG), which owns both the FCB and McCann global networks.
Making moves
Tribeca supports annual #Click2Feed initiative to feed hungry cats and dogs
Over 11 tons of dog and cat food will be donated to 40 animal charities across South Africa – with Tribeca Public Relations (Tribeca) doing its part to support Montego Pet Nutrition’s annual Click2Feed initiative.
The Click2Feed campaign aims to support and feed animals in need nationwide. The mechanic is simple: South Africans are invited to visit the Click2Feed website and click on an animal charity of choice. Montego then provides each charity with a meal for every click – allowing South Africans to help needy animals from their desks at work, at home, or via their mobile phones.
“Until now, the Click2Feed initiative has been driven by Montego’s annual 20,000 meal donation, supplemented by the generosity of individuals donating extra amounts if they wanted to. In order to double the donations this year, we had to think BIG, which led to Tribeca suggesting we approach corporate sponsors,” says Shaun Demmer, account manager at Tribeca.
Tribeca managed to secure 11 generous corporate sponsors including ourselves, Internet Solutions, Westpack Pet Zone, Cat Box Pet Hyper, Crazy Pets, Market IQ, Animal Kingdom, Quarto Press, Chaos Theory, Popimedia and The Neighbourhood Creative. This means that the 2018 campaign has almost tripled the amount of food donated with exactly 63 717 meals made available for dogs and cats in need.
The mechanic is simple: South Africans are invited to visit the Click2Feed website and click on an animal charity of choice. Montego then provides each charity with a meal for every click – allowing South Africans to help needy animals from the comfort of their desks at work, couches, or mobile phones.
30 Graduates complete FCB Africa’s 2018 Programme
A total of 30 graduates have completed FCB Africa’s 2018 Graduate Programme, 20 at the agency group’s Johannesburg campus, and 10 at its Cape Town offices.
At the recent graduation ceremony, Brian Majuru, a strategist at Hellocomputer Johannesburg, was named Valedictorian for the 2018 graduating class, while Siwe Thusi, a strategist at FCB Joburg, was named Top Mentor.
The Graduate Programme not only provides work experience and mentoring at the group’s various businesses – FCB Joburg, 1886, Weber Shandwick, Hellocomputer Joburg, FCB Cape Town, and Hellocomputer Cape Town – it incorporates a series of masterclasses, formal training and courses aimed at facilitating the graduates’ transition from the tertiary learning environment to the workplace.
Many of these graduates have been offered positions at one of the FCB agencies; the few that haven’t are being assisted with finding employment at other businesses within the industry.
The Herald to celebrate 34 years of cycling classic: The Herald Continental Cycle Tour
Tiso Blackstar’s Eastern Cape title, The Herald, will celebrate the 34th year of the now iconic sports event, The Herald Continental Cycle Tour which takes place in Port Elizabeth on 24 February 2019. The event has grown to become a highlight on the South African cycling calendar, and similarly boosts the profile of Nelson Mandela Bay.
As Port Elizabeth’s leading local daily newspaper, The Herald is responsible for the complete management of the annual cycle tour.
Justin Peel, CMO for The Herald says: “Managing and investing in the cycle tour is in line with our commitment to build community spirit and pride in our city. Over the years, the race has grown to attract a high quality, high profile field of professionals. But, we’ve also extended it to create opportunities for amateur cyclists and novices – from juniors, to mountain bike enthusiasts. It really has become part of the DNA of PE and its surrounds.”
France 24 available on OpenNews channel in South Africa
France 24, the French international news channel, has signed an agreement with OpenNews, a new local news channel launched on Thursday 1 November 2018 by eMedia investments, for the broadcasting of its English speaking channel.
OpenNews is the first local news channel to be distributed on the Openview DTH satellite television platform (channel 120) to all subscribers. The channel reaches 1.4 million households across South Africa and it aims to reach another million households in the country within the next months. The channel goes beyond the borders to the neighboring countries: Zimbabwe, Namibia and some parts of Botswana.
France 24 in English will be available in the OpenNews Channel schedule: Monday to Friday at 08:00-09:00am and 4:00-5:00pm; > Saturday at 06:00-07:00am and 1:00-2:00pm; > Sunday at 06:00-07:00am, 09:00-11:00am and 1:00-2:00pm.
With its 144 news bulletins a day, France 24 will bring to viewers in Southern Africa, the greatest number of newscasts every day, from a global and pan African perspective.
For the Diary
Stellar line-up to kick off festive season with Spar Carols by Candlelight with Jacaranda FM
SPAR Carols by Candlelight with Jacaranda FM, the highlight of Gauteng’s festive calendar – featuring a stellar cast of SA’s top artists – will be coming to Joburg on the 8 December at St. Stithians College and Pretoria on the 11 December 2018 at Loftus Versfeld.
Connell Cruise, Craig Lucas, Paxton, Swing City, Claire Johnston, Rubber Duc, Roan Ash and the Ndlovu Youth Choir will bring in the festive cheer to Johannesburg while Jo Black, Karen Zoid, Kurt Darren, Charlize Berg, Nadine and Nianell will be joined by Swing City and the Ndlovu Youth Choir in bringing the Christmas spirit to Pretoria.
The Jacaranda FM presenters will also be celebrating in full festive force – broadcasting live from both events.
This annual event, which has become a hit with families from all over Gauteng and neighbouring provinces, is undoubtedly the best way to officially kick off the festive season.
The kiddies’ entertainment area, provided by headline sponsors SPAR, will have the little ones thoroughly entertained with jumping castles, face-painters, games, crafts, buskers, movies and more!
Entry is free, but in spreading the love to where it is needed most, attendees are encouraged to bring a toy which will be delivered to selected charity organisations.
Candles will also be on sale at R30, songbooks at R10 and a songbook and candle bundle package at R35. All proceeds will go to Jacaranda FM Good Morning Angels.
Gates at both events will open at 16h00 and the programme will officially kick-off at 19h00 – 21h00.
Heart Music Festival 2019: More Than Just the Music
Following its successful inaugural event, Heart FM has announced the Heart Cape Town Music Festival will take place on the 9 February in 2019 at Newlands Cricket Stadium.
Confirmed artists already include the likes of Jimmy Nevis, Youngsta CPT, Dr Victor and the Rasta Rebels, Emo Adams, Mango Groove, Freshly Ground, Micasa, Lady Zamar, Shekhinah, Goodluck and AKA, to name a few.
Independently funded and run by the station itself, Heart FM believes that this music festival is not only a platform to connect with its listeners, but to bring together Capetonians of all ages to interact with on-air personalities and abundance of local talent; all on one day.
Managing director, Renee Redelinghuys, said, “Cape Town is globally recognized as one of the most beautiful cities in the world. As locals, we’re blessed with amazing summer’s, unprecedented scenery and a melting-pot of diverse cultures. Part of being Capetonian is celebrating our uniqueness and Music festivals are just one of the ways we express ourselves. As Cape Town’s biggest station, we love providing the opportunity for our listeners to connect with old friends, make new ones, experiencing world-class live music at the iconic Cape Town venue, Newlands Stadium.”
Tickets cost R150 per adult and R70 per child (under the age of 12).