Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Hepmil Media Group in Malaysia has announced new additions to its local leadership team, which includes Stephanie Looi as its country general manager, and Nur Liyana Abdul Latip as business development director. It is worth noting that both are recently coming from Astro, with Stephanie recently as its head of digital solutions while Liyana was recently a digital sales manager.
In a LinkedIn post, Karl Mak, co-founder and CEO of Hepmil Media Group stated that after a few quiet years without significant investments or announcements, these senior hires mark a new chapter for HEPMIL Malaysia.
MARKETECH APAC recently caught up with Stephanie and Liyana to better understand their new roles, as well as hearing their insights on various trends and opportunities awaiting brands in terms of tapping into social media opportunities and strategies.
Understanding key responsibilities
In her capacity as country general manager, Stephanie has shared that her primary responsibility is to drive growth and expand their presence in the Malaysian market. This includes overseeing local operations, managing the creators’ network, building partnerships with brands and agencies, and ensuring their business objectives align with market trends.
“I will also focus on tailoring our content strategies to resonate with Malaysian audiences while scaling our platform’s reach and influence. We aim to continuously drive innovation. One of the products we aim to launch in the next quarter would be social commerce with livestream shopping,” she explained.
Meanwhile, Liyana stated that in her role as business development director for Hepmil Media in Malaysia, her key responsibility is to increase their clientele and identify new business opportunities by developing social content strategies across agencies and brands.
“As our core businesses are MGAG and HCN, the task at hand is to ensure these 2 products of ours are on top of mind when the brands are planning their social campaigns. As we are growing our Hepmil Creators’ Network in Malaysia, my responsibility is also to oversee onboarding and build rapport with up-and-coming new creators to work with us and together create award-winning campaigns for our clients,” she explained.
On implementing strategies related to new leadership role
For Liyana, her focus in her role lies into making sure the content they make for clients is relevant and in the end, making sure it’s engaging for the target audience.
“Having products that speak well to the youngsters, the strategy is to ensure the content is relevant to our client as well. We want to create partnerships with creators and brands that creates engaging content that at the end of the day is memorable for the target audience. Additionally, with the social commerce strategy that we aim to start soon, it will give us the additional benefits and clients can explore beyond the biddable media too,” she said.
Meanwhile, Stephanie stressed that they plan to implement strategies that cater to both creators and brands, ensuring that we are an essential bridge between the two. Moreover, they aim to localise content and campaigns and integrate social commerce as part of this consumer journey.
“When consumers come across engaging content from creators they trust, it generates authentic brand awareness and builds credibility. These creators act as influencers who can effectively communicate a brand’s value in a relatable way, sparking genuine interest and driving consumer intent. Through this journey, we will integrate social commerce capabilities,” she said.
Stephanie added, “We will be able to shorten the decision purchase from inspiration to transaction. Once a consumer discovers a product through creator content, they can immediately access shoppable links or embedded storefronts within the platform, allowing for a frictionless buying experience. We are also looking at enhancing this with live streaming shopping experience.
For her, this strategy not only boosts conversion rates but also enhances the overall customer experience, as the pathway from content to commerce feels natural and intuitive.
“Ultimately, the connection between discovery and purchase is strengthened, making it easier for consumers to move from interest to action, while brands gain a powerful channel to drive sales and foster long-term loyalty,” Stephanie noted.
Learnings to bring in new role
As both Stephanie and Liyana hail from Astro, both have shared their reflections on their past time at the company, and what skills they will bring to Hepmil Media Group moving forward.
“Astro gave us invaluable experience in understanding the local media landscape, content distribution, and audience behaviour. From that, I’ve learned the importance of localised content and how cultural nuances play a key role in audience engagement. Another takeaway is the power of integrated marketing, combining traditional and digital media strategies to amplify reach,” Stephanie said.
She also added, “We will bring this integrated approach to Hepmil, ensuring our offerings resonate with diverse audiences in Malaysia. Additionally, the experience of working in a rapidly evolving media environment at Astro will help us stay agile and adaptable, which is crucial in the social media space.”
Meanwhile, Liyana commented, “Astro gave me the opportunity to work in many different specialities i.e. production, content, operations and more! With many products under Astro, it allows clients to have integrated plans in their campaigns. We created content made for digital too and not just a mirroring from TV. Good thing about Astro, we are the experts for any type of demographics, we speak to everyone and clients can count on us on it.”
Addressing challenges, riding opportunities in the social media scene
For Stephanie, it is worth noting that with Malaysia, being a diverse, multiracial population, media companies need to continuously create localized content that resonates with its target audience. Moreover, they need to take into consideration cultural sensitivities that could potentially lead to backlash and brand reputation.
“Content saturation is a huge challenge too as we need to be able to stand out from the crowded media space. Another challenge would be the evolving regulation of digital content which requires us to stay vigilant,” she said.
Despite the challenges, she says that they do see significant potentials and opportunities, more specifically the rise of short-form video content, to creators, which is offering new avenues for engagement.
“There is also strong interest in social commerce, where brands leverage social media as a direct sales channel and creators/KOLs to lead to conversion. This presents a unique opportunity to create localised and culturally relevant content, reaching a highly engaged audience,” she noted.
Liyana also seconded Stephanie’s thoughts, stating, “This ultra-short, binge-friendly micro dramas means we don’t have to commit so much of our time and it can easily consumed wherever we at. If you notice as well the casts used in the series are not celebrity level, which means it could be anyone or even our Hepmil Creators can be the face of the show, as long as the plot is attractive and can hook people to keep coming back for the next parts. Ideally, it will be fun if Hepmil Media can also produce our own vertical series through MGAG, who knows?”
Liyana also addressed the rise of social commerce where all clients wants to venture into and it works very well for SME businesses.
“The seamless shopping experience which also leverages on influencer collaboration is definitely something Hepmil Media has been doing across regions and we hope to kickstart as soon as possible for Malaysia,” she said.
Meanwhile, Stephanie listed three key trends, including i) continued growth of short-form video content, especially on platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels; ii) huge demand on social commerce – more consumers turn to social media for product discovery and path to purchase are made easier, and iii) AI-driven content creation and personalisation will become more prevalent, allowing for highly targeted and efficient campaigns, at a more localised content level, personalities, behaviour and preferences.
Their recent appointments follow the recent appointment of new leadership in its Singapore office, with Mak stating that expect more appointments to follow.
