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Marketing Featured Southeast Asia

What happens when someone hires from social media? JobStreet PH pokes fun at it with these ads

Manila, Philippines – With companies actively doing background checks when hiring someone, viewing someone’s social media can get confusing for employers. With some potential applicants still hiding under anonymity, employers often have less transparency to look into as to what type of individual their next employee is.

And that is exactly what the latest ads from JobStreet Philippines show: instead of relying on social media for hiring, companies can get ‘real talent’ by visiting the JobStreet platform.

The ads, conceptualised by local creative agency GIGIL, feature a series of hilarious situations when an employer interviews someone from social media. Instead of a real person, they interview a fictional character, an avatar, or even the whole family of the applicant.

For Soleil Badenhop, associate creative director at GIGIL, humour has been an integral part of most of their campaigns, even for a formal brand such as JobStreet.

“Hiring can be really taxing for HR managers. We wanted to come up with content that would break the monotony and entertain them, get their attention while getting the message across clearly,” Badenhop said in an exclusive statement to MARKETECH APAC.

When asked how GIGIL came up with the idea for these ads, she said that while the brief for the ad was to simply market the service for free to HR managers, they wanted to dig deeper into the insights from HR managers to conceptualise the ads.

“We dug deep for true insight and found that HR managers still hire largely on social media simply because the Philippines is still the social media capital of the world. The funny thing about hiring on social media is, you don’t know whom you’re talking to because most profiles use cartoon pictures, avatars, group pictures, and fictional characters. By showing the reality of hiring there, we were able to push JobStreet as the reliable yet free option for hirers,” Badenshop told MARKETECH APAC.

Meanwhile, Kim Martin Viray, country head of marketing at JobStreet Philippines told MARKETECH APAC that aside from promoting said service to HR managers, the overarching objective of the ads was about addressing unstructured hiring, particularly on social media, where it is prone to scams and fraud.

“We have seen ads with humour and lightness to engage better with Filipino audiences, especially on digital. Our ‘Hire With Real Talent for Free’ campaign is one of the first-ever hyperlocal ad creatives we’ve produced for JobStreet Philippines, fronting our employer franchise that is emotive and targets real situations of HR professionals when hiring on social media,” the company told MARKETECH APAC.

They added, “Specifically, the already-heavy and often stressful situation of an SME hirer and then only to get low-quality candidates. To resonate more with the target audience, we re-imagined that situation lightly and with humour while highlighting our key message on what JobStreet can deliver better.”

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Marketing Featured APAC

SEEK Asia rolls out pan-regional campaign to empower job-seekers to ‘get to work’

Singapore – SEEK Asia, the parent company of jobs platforms JobStreet and JobsDB has rolled out its pan-regional omnichannel campaign for Asia that is targeted to empowering job seekers to go after careers they are passionate about.

A prime figure for the campaign is its TVC that depicts workers encouraging job-seekers to find work that matters to them, whether to save lives, design for fashion, explore new things, or discover future technologies. All of the TVCs, localized for their respective markets, end with the campaign’s mantra and name ‘Let’s Get to Work’.

The inspiration for the campaign stems from the fact that the pandemic has changed people’s attitudes towards their jobs, with many re-evaluating where and how they want to work and the kind of work they want to do. This has led to the emerging trend known as the “Great Resignation”, a term coined by associate professor of management at Texas A&M University Anthony Klotz, which explains why even experienced job seekers are choosing to leave their current careers in the search of something more meaningful.

The campaign is made possible by the direction of acclaimed Manila-based director Adrian Calumpang and through the creative direction from marketing company McCann Worldwide. As part of the campaign activation, Ogilvy will lead the social drive for the campaign, while PRecious Communications will drive the campaign’s PR.

Speaking about the campaign, Jane Cruz-Walker, chief marketing officer at SEEK Asia who was recently appointed as CMO for SEEK this year, said that the campaign is launched to motivate job seekers to pursue the jobs they love, adding that by providing them with these opportunities, they at SEEK Asia want to be the career partner that will inspire the next generation of workers to be the ‘heroes’ in their own career journey.

“While the pandemic has caused widespread job loss, reduced working hours, and pay cuts, it has also caused many to re-evaluate what they want out of their career. Job seekers’ demands have evolved beyond remuneration — they want a sense of fulfilment, good work-life balance, and career progression — and it is time for companies to adapt to this new world of work,” she stated.

Focusing on the hyperlocal nature of the job market, ‘Let’s Get To Work’ will also feature influencers and key opinion leaders will be used across the region — including Singaporean actress Sharon Au, Malaysian stand-up comedian Harith Iskander, Indonesian vlogger Gerry Girianza, Filipino actor and chef Marvin Agustin, Thai musician Manassavee, and Hong Kong fitness entrepreneur Charlz Ng.

Additional activities will also be introduced to get local job seekers excited, including Roro Jonggrang in Indonesia. This hyperlocal campaign will use the popular Javanese legend to tell the story of love and betrayal, and contrast this with how finding a job with SEEK Asia can be easy and drama-free. Said hyperlocal campaign for Indonesia is directed by Ben Wee, a freelance film director and cinematographer that has worked on multiple projects locally, including advertisements for Google and Indomie.

Meanwhile, Peter Bithos, CEO at SEEK Asia, commented that through their campaign, they hope to be able to better engage with and inspire job seekers to find jobs that are meaningful to them. He added that with their appeal to job seekers, this will also allow them to get more employers on the platform looking for quality talent, allowing an ‘explosion’ of opportunities. 

“Let’s Get To Work is an integral part of SEEK Asia’s commitment to job seekers and employers, and this is just the beginning of our exciting developments and plans,” Bithos stated.

He further added, “SEEK Asia is the biggest and most trusted jobs board in Southeast Asia. Our ambition is to grow fourfold in the next five years and to expand our platform beyond what people have come to know and love us for today. We are strengthening our existing business by making big investments in ​​people, innovation, and technology.”

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Marketing Featured APAC

JobStreet’s parent firm names former HOOQ marketing head as new CMO for Asia

Singapore – SEEK Asia, the mother firm of two leading job portal brands JobStreet and JobsDB, has recently announced its new Chief Marketing Officer Jane Cruz-Walker

Walker is most recently the chief digital adviser of Metro Pacific Investments Corporation in the Philippines. Prior to that, she was most notably the vice president of marketing of the now-defunct streaming platform and Singapore-born HOOQ. 

The appointment of Walker comes after a year SEEK Asia announced Peter Bithos as its CEO, who similarly came from HOOQ. 

The CMO charge will have Walker building and evolving the JobStreet and JobsDB brands for both the jobseekers’ and employers’ sides of the marketplace across SEEK Asia’s six markets. 

Walker will be bringing 20 years of experience in tech and media & telco (TMT) in both start-up and large-scale organizations within Singtel, MediaQuest, and PLDT groups, where she held key leadership roles across marketing, communications, and commercial business units as well as business development and country operations. 

Prior to her TMT cross-over, Walker held marketing positions which saw her lead FMCG brands in Colgate-Palmolive for markets in the Philippines, APAC, and Latin America as well as brands from Filipino corporation San Miguel Corporation, and also Magnolia-Nestle.

Bithos, to whom Walker will be reporting, shared that in their search for a new CMO, the company undertook a thorough regional and global search for a candidate who will bring deep experience as a CMO in the TMT space as well as someone who’s a leader that has a record of building brands from scratch and of bringing life to legacy brands.

“We want someone who has experience managing large scale marketing teams across the region and interacting across large organizations, and has demonstrated experience in commercial roles as well. Jane brings all of this in one dynamic package,” said Bithos.

He adds, “And, most importantly, I am confident that Jane will be a great leader for each and every one of our marketing team members across the region, besides bringing a unique combination of diverse cultural perspectives and global mindedness to SEEK’s transformational journey.”

Coinciding with Walker’s appointment is also the announcement of SEEK Asia’s new Chief Technology Officer Shen Tham

Just like Walker, Shen Tham boasts of 20 years of experience across various technical and leadership positions, and most recently held the position of CTO for REA Group operations in international and Asia markets.

SEEK Asia said that Shen Tham will be accountable for partnering across the Asia business to shape and deliver a transformed Technology strategy and capability in that region. 

Categories
Marketing Featured APAC

Company behind JobStreet appoints new CEO for Asia

Singapore – SEEK Asia, the company which runs job portals JobStreet and jobsDB, has announced that it has appointed Peter Bithos as its newest CEO.

Bithos was formerly chief executive for companies Virgin Mobile Australia, Philippine’s Globe Telecom, and most recently for the now shut-down streaming service Hooq.

In his new role, he will be responsible for leading and driving the business growth and operations of the company, while building on its 23-year presence in Southeast Asia.

SEEK Group COO Ian Narev said, “Peter has a proven track record growing Tech, Media and Telco (TMT) businesses, leading digital business transformation programs and building strong company cultures in diverse markets across Asia Pacific and the United States.”

Commenting on his appointment, Bithos said: “I am deeply privileged to join one of the largest and best tech companies in the region. It’s truly exciting to be a part of fulfilling SEEK’s purpose in these times. The opportunity to work with SEEK’s teams and people across Asia to create step-change growth and an even better experience for our customers is unique and special.”

He added, “I feel fortunate to be joining at this very moment because SEEK Asia’s purpose to improve lives through better careers has never been more urgent amidst the current social and economic environment brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Peter replaces Suresh Thiru, who served CEO of the company for four years.