Angie Tijam-Tohid joins Havas Ortega as executive creative director
Manila, Philippines – Havas Ortega Group has announced that Angie Tijam-Tohid joins the communications group as its executive creative director, where she will be responsible for driving the agency’s creative philosophy and creating meaningful brands for the Havas Village clients in media, digital, social commerce, CRM, public relations, branding, healthcare, and sustainability.
Tijam-Tohid will report to Jos Ortega, chairman and chief executive officer at Havas Ortega Group.
She was formerly a radio DJ and newscaster for some of Metro Manila’s most popular FM stations before joining advertising. Her two-decade journey in the industry has taken her to Ogilvy and TBWA\SMP in the Philippines, and Grey Group in Malaysia. Prior to her new post, she led the digital creative group at Ace Saatchi & Saatchi Manila as creative director and head of content.
Speaking about her appointment, she said, “I’m extremely excited to be joining Havas. The post-pandemic landscape presents greater opportunities for us to elevate our creative capabilities and create work that’s data-driven, culturally relevant, delivered in the most engaging and impactful ways.”
She added, “Stepping into this role, I feel massive support from Jos, Mother Hermie, Jay and the entire Havas Village. I’m looking forward to collaborating with this awesome and talented team, nurturing our young creatives and creating meaningful work that truly makes a difference.”
Meanwhile, Ortega commented, “We have always believed that diversity drives innovation and creativity. Angie’s unique perspectives, both as a woman and a leader in her field, will help us come closer to achieving our mission of creating a meaningful difference to brands, businesses, and people.”
The appointment of Tijam-Tohid further strengthens Havas Ortega’s leadership team as she joins previous appointees Jay Lim as COO of Havas Media Group, Mel Panabi as business director of Red Havas, and Apple Galvez-Castillo as business director of Havas Market.
Jay Lim appointed as new COO for Havas Media Group PH
Manila, Philippines – Integrated communications company Havas Ortega in the Philippines has appointed Jay Lim as its newest chief operating officer for Havas Media Group in the country. Said appointment took effect on 1 February this year.
Through his new role, Lim will be responsible for the continued growth of the Havas Media and Arena Media brands of the Havas Media Group. He will also contribute to the introduction of new products and services in 2022 and beyond.
In addition, he will be reporting directly to Hermie De Leon, currently Havas Media Group’s chief executive officer and Havas Ortega’s managing partner.
He brings into the company two decades of experience in strategy, analytics, and client management, where his most recent previous role was being the general manager and chief media officer at Publicis Media.
During his stint at Publicis Media for the past five years, he has built a track record of leading its agency brands with transformational changes that led to business growth.
De Leon also announced that Lim’s appointment is part of the transition plan the agency has put in place to ensure business continuity as she prepares for her eventual retirement late this year.
“I look forward to working closely with Jay as we collaborate on bringing the Havas Media Group to greater heights. His brand of leadership and experience in strategy and analytics is a huge asset to us as we create meaningful media experiences for our clients and brands,” De Leon said.
Meanwhile, Jos Ortega, CEO at the Havas Ortega Group, commented, “Jay will bring a fresh perspective to the agency as we elevate our position in a rapidly changing media environment. He will definitely play a key role in helping us achieve our mission of creating a meaningful difference to brands, to businesses, and to people.”
MARKETECH APAC’s Top 5 Stories for December: APAC content marketing agency bags top spot
We can’t believe we are now down to the last roundup of top stories for 2021! It has been a great year recognizing the most well-loved brands and stories in marketing and tech for the year.
Our monthly deep dive and conversation with the top brands resulted in the much-awaited regular MARKETECH APAC Reports, and this month of December is no less an exciting list of one-of-a-kind campaigns, inspiring new leadership appointments, and fresh product launches.
This month, we saw a food delivery platform moving into an entirely new vertical of consumer electronics. This period, a philippine arm of a global communications agency also announced a new business director, while, a content marketing agency with a presence in APAC unveiled an expansive roster of new hires in the region within its client servicing, creative production, and editorial teams.
For the month, a very interesting campaign from a BNPL service in Singapore has also entered the list for bringing back audiences to the golden age of advertising in the 80s. Meanwhile, our MARKETECH Spotlight episode on a digital agency in Malaysia also came out on top for walking us through behind the scenes of incorporating AR and VR in marketing campaigns.
Learn more about the top stories that will be closing off our 2021 with a bang:
For our Top 5 story, we have the MARKETECH Spotlight episode of Unicom Interactive Digital, a fast-leading digital agency in Malaysia.
In an interview with its COO Jareth Eng, we learn more about how brands are incorporating the tech of AR and VR in their marketing campaigns, and the best ways to deliver such that would effectively engage audiences at the same time push brands be top-of-mind.
Having helped numerous brands develop immersive campaigns since the start of the pandemic, Eng shared the agency observed that content remains to be the top determinant of a success of a campaign.
He says content must above all be personalized and authentic.
“More and more, let’s be honest, we start to get bored of the same stuff, and we start to look for authenticity in content, because there are so much paid advertisements today [and] so much paid endorsements, and we reach a point where we do not know what is being said is real or not,” said Eng in the interview.
Eng also shared his thoughts on the role of digital moving forward in the pandemic, “The perks of adding digital elements to campaigns have proven themselves during the past year. Even as we head back to a norm that we were used to, digital elements will still play a part.”
Havas Group’s media and communications agency in the Philippines, Havas Ortega, has appointedMel Panabi, former vice president of marketing communications at energy tech business WeGen Distributed Energy Philippines, as the new business director of its global public relations, social and experiential agency micro-network.
Through his new role, Panabi will be developing new products and services that will further strengthen Red Havas’ position in the country’s public relations and brands landscape.
MARKETECH APAC spoke with Panabi to know more about the area he is looking to prioritize in the role.
“I will be prioritizing promoting the ‘meaningful brands’ concepts of the agency. The global Red Havas Media Group actually made a study called ‘Meaningful Brands’, and it showed that people are now looking at the collective benefits provided by a brand, and its role in society,” said Panabi in the interview.
He adds that he is eager to start Red Havas’ sustainability and thoughtful corporate responsibility conversation.
“One other thing is that the United Nations’ sustainable development goal is something that the brands need a lot, which is a space we want to occupy. We want to be associated with that kind of ‘meaningful brands’ and sustainability conversation,” he said.
Buy Now Pay Later service Pace in Singapore enters our top stories for bringing a very refreshing and unique creative campaign that brought people back to the vibrant pop culture of the 80’s.
Armed with a video and an OOH ad, audiences saw VHS effect shorts complete with authentic 80s fashion, while decals on platform doors at train stations were reminiscent of the classic shopping advertisements from the period.
Speaking with MARKETECH APAC,Daren Goh, Pace’s head of growth, said that while BNPL is an inspiring tool for people to be financially responsible, payments could be something boring and pedestrian, hence, the push for the one-of-a-kind creative.
“We thought 80’s was great because it’s something that any generation can relate to whether you’re [a baby boomer], even to Gen Z folks who are interested [in] how it is like [in the] 90s and 80s,” said Goh.
He also shared that stimulating the feeling of Nostalgia was the goal.
“[80’s] seem like simple times and just really great times. So I guess we could tap into so many different feelings and people also see that no matter what age they are from,” said Goh.
The leading food delivery platform in Asia, foodpanda, will now move to offer a wide range of consumer electronics and appliances for on-demand deliveries in Singapore and Thailand.
Partnering with Chinese tech giant Xiaomi, foodpanda will be offering Xiaomi’s products ranging from smart devices, audio, and mobile accessories, to household appliances, and will be delivered to homes within 30 minutes.
Speaking to MARKETECH APAC, Christian Urban, foodpanda’s head of marketplace of new verticals for APAC, shared, “Xiaomi is one of the great new vendors coming on board recently, and of course, a very popular brand and we are super happy about that. They are on board with hundreds of their products from their flagship stores across Singapore and Thailand.”
Regarding the platform’s new partnerships and offerings in 2022, Urban said that they want to enable more and more vendors to join their marketplace, helping them to digitize and get their goods delivered within 30 minutes.
“Our goal is to serve a large portion of essential and non-essential goods, and there is actually a strong demand for it. Hence, strategically, the goal is to go deeper and offer more of those goods to our customers,” he added.
For this month’s #1 story, we take a look at the expansive company hire move by content marketing agency Green Park Content for the Asia-Pacific region.
The hires, which were made in November, span across three major work categories: the client servicing team, creative production team, and the editorial team. In addition to these new hires, GPC also announced the promotions of some of its senior leaders, including Que Ramli to the role of global social media lead, Martin Niens as head of operations, and Fe Husaint who was recently promoted to the role of creative and global brand head.
Speaking to MARKETECH APAC, Marcelo Bittencourt, managing director for APAC at GPC, shared that ever since GPC started out in APAC four and a half years ago with only two hires, they have tested the waters of the business in the region and have since grown to provide various services such as search engine optimization and editorial content.
“The goal for GPC in APAC is [trying] to answer to our global FMCG clients on how we can be more localized, how can we have content that is meaningful for the local countries, because we are seeing a shift from budgets being centralized, and we are seeing how important it is, and how empowered are the local marketers are in the countries. So [we] want to be there with them because we are a part of a global [and] regional work lines and as close to their local operations we can be,” Bittencourt stated.
On his insights on content development, he said, “Content is about connection, content is about building a bond with the audience. You cannot do this if you are not ‘there’, if you’re not using slang, if you’re not understanding what is the environment that you have. This is the biggest goal for us: to be able to grow our local expertise in the countries in APAC, to be able to be that partner to our global clients., and be able to answer their strategies to deliver their brand purpose with quality and with trust.”
Manila, Philippines – Havas Ortega, the media and communications group of the global Havas group in the Philippines, has appointed Mel Panabi, former vice president of marketing communications at energy tech business WeGen Distributed Energy Philippines, to be the new business director of its global public relations, social and experiential agency micro-network.
Panabi has more than 25 years of experience in public relations, corporate communication, stakeholder relations, and crisis management, as well as political communications, and marketing. He has worked on accounts and brands across industries like fintech, real estate, telecommunications, and entertainment, as well as renewables.
In his new role, Panabi will now be responsible for developing new products and services that will further strengthen Red Havas’ position in the country’s public relations and brands landscape.
Panabi believes that PR is building a relationship across different touchpoints in the customer journey. He shared that it is not just a campaign but a conversation with brands that consumers can trust.
“I am particularly looking forward to the new direction we’re going to take – highlighting sustainability as a centerpiece communication strategy as we partner with brands. I am also excited by our plans for 2022, as we align our efforts here in the Philippines with the standards and industry-leading initiatives of the global Red Havas brand,” said Panabi.
Jos Ortega, Havas Ortega’s chairman and CEO, noted that meaningful messages aligned to authentic values are what stakeholders look for, and that the new appointment is great support in achieving this.
“Mel Panabi brings with him a wealth of experience that will help Red Havas navigate through the new role of PR and corporate communication—one that is informed by thoughtful corporate responsibility and governance,” said Ortega.
Today, Red Havas in Australia has also announced the appointment of Lawrence Muskitta to be the head of the agency’s new public affairs offering in the market. The new division spans government relations, stakeholder engagement, patient and consumer advocacy, and public behavior change campaigns, as well as policy monitoring and intelligence gathering, crisis management, and strategic partnerships.
Manila, Philippines – Women’s month is long past its celebration period, but the conversation on gender equality and empowerment for women remains as vibrant and ever kicking only because of one thing: there is still so much to fight for and so much to improve in the system.
In the latest study of ‘prosumers’ by Havas Ortega, the integrated media and communications group in the Philippines of the global Havas network, it is found that almost all of Filipino prosumers, or 90% of them, believe in the power of female representation in media, specifically those in sports, to assert that women are as strong and capable as men in areas that are deemed fit only for the latter.
So first of all, what are ‘prosumers’? In an exclusive conversation with the Havas Ortega team, its Head of Data and Analytics Phil Tiongson admits they are hard to define, but that if they were to be described by a term that’s a close likeness, it would be ‘key opinion leaders’ – but still, more than that.
“If I were to put a name to them, they’re probably key opinion leaders. But they’re more than that. As an opinion leader, they’re also very much in tune with what’s happening in the world. While they’re searching for new things, new gadgets, new beliefs, new philosophies, new brands, or even new attitudes, for example, they also have a sense of social responsibility to making a difference in the world,” shared Tiongson to MARKETECH APAC.
To simply put it, studying prosumers is sort of like studying the future, Tiongson adds. Because, he said further, whatever the prosumers feel, or whatever they do now, are things that the rest of the population will do the same 18 to 24 months down the road.
So what do these future-oriented consumers think about the realm of sports and its connection to one’s lifestyle? The study, ‘Sports Forward’, in fact, presents a lot of interesting insights; some, we’ve never heard before.
Hidilyn Diaz made the country proud in 2016, winning a place in the Olympics – the first in a very long time for the Philippines.
First off, sports have long been a passageway for women to prove their strength and their agility, that while different from the physical abilities of men, are ever-present within them, and of equal value to society. Filipino prosumers ought to believe that there need not immediate ‘drastic’ changes in media representation when after all, the voice of women in sports is much stronger in today’s time but maybe–we just need more of it.
Now that the pandemic has halted many of the sports events in the country, it would be much trickier to do that, but still, possible. Add to this, the country witnessing an unfortunate government intervention in May 2020 to the country’s leading broadcast media network, ABS-CBN; denying them franchise, ultimately pushing the network to shut off airtime in traditional TV.
ABS-CBN has, for many years, been the home of the top collegiate sports associations in the Philippines, UAAP and NCAA, airing their games, which makes it more difficult on this front to give media share to female athletes. NCAA, however, has decided to ink a partnership with rival network GMA, while UAAP has also tied with another network TV5, to keep the ground running.
The same Havas study also unearthed other interesting data, letting us in on Filipino prosumers’ perceptions towards sports, most of which, transcends its traditional role in society.
The study found that sports are also being looked at as a source of mental health. About 88% of Filipino prosumers believe that people who play sports are more likely to stay healthy mentally and emotionally. The report notes that this points to a strong belief that sports are in the same category as relaxation, meditation, and other mental health practices that promote mental wellbeing – something we are all in need of as we continue to keep our heads above the water against Covid-19.
In line with inclusivity for women, everyone in the prosumer group, or 99%, also believes that sports brands should further create athletic apparel that takes into consideration people’s religion, most notably, the incorporation of Muslims’ hijab for women.
Ibtihaj Muhammad is the first woman to compete in the Olympics wearing a hijab
A lot of global brands like Nike and Adidas have the hijab already as a staple apparel in their collections. Women athletes have also accomplished important firsts, where in fact, in 2016, professional fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad became the first Muslim woman to compete for America wearing a hijab during the Rio Olympics.
What Filipino prosumers might in fact is waiting for, is for said global feats to be replicated in the local arena–more local sports apparel offering hijab attire and of course, more representation of women proudly wearing their faith in the Philippine sports industry.
In a press release, Tiongson said that sports have indeed gone a long way from being a mere spectacle and a battle for fame, glory, and money.
“Sports are now seen as content that is imbued with meaning and that can contribute to meaningful, positive change in society,” he said.
Finally, Tiongson believes that with these insights brought to the surface, all stakeholders involved in sports must rethink their contribution to all of this.
“Athletes, celebrities, leagues, clubs, federations, and even sporting apparel and retailer brands should think about their emerged role in the lives of audiences. People look up to them more closely for meaningful inspiration – and they expect more from them,” he said.
Prosumer Reports are a series of thought leadership publications by the global Havas which includes its own proprietary research across the Havas network and client companies. Philippines’ Havas Ortega Group fully implements the initiative with a local adaptation of Filipino insights and data.
We use cookies to improve your experience and to analyse our traffic. To find out more, please click here. By continuing to use our website, you accept our Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions. Cookie settingsACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
