Tag: Marketing

Singapore – Marketing analytics company AppsFlyer welcomes strategic technology marketing veteran Sam Chiu as the new senior director for marketing for Asia-Pacific, where he will be responsible for spearheading AppsFlyer’s brand awareness, strategic marketing strategies, and demand generation for the company in the region.

Currently based out of Hong Kong, Sam will relocate to AppsFlyer’s SEAPAC hub in Bangkok, where he will play a critical role in driving AppsFlyer’s go-to-market strategy for over 22 markets across ASEAN, South Asia (including India and Pakistan), Japan, Korea, and ANZ.

Sam brings an extensive amount of experience with close to twenty years of digital transformation and omni-channel strategy implementation to AppsFlyer’s Southeast Asia-Pacific (SEAPAC) team. His full stack marketing tech career spans Boston, New York City and Hong Kong across agencies like iProspect, publishers and ad networks such as Microsoft and Yahoo, as well as B2C & B2B advertisers, with deep experience driving campaign results for various Fortune 500 firms.

Speaking about his appointment, Chiu said, “AppsFlyer is experiencing phenomenal growth, not only in APAC but globally, and I am honored to work alongside talented individuals in the team to further advance our marketing efforts and assert AppsFlyer’s dominance in the region. AppsFlyer is well-positioned to help marketers transform their businesses, and the mobile marketing industry continues to expand with the use of mobile apps wildly increasing day by day. I am excited about what lies ahead.”

Chiu will report to Ronen Mense, president and managing director for APAC at AppsFlyer.

“Throughout the last twelve months we have continued to focus on growing AppsFlyer, not only in APAC, but globally. In a crucial time of AppsFlyer’s expansion, Sam brings in a wide range of experience, having worked at an array of established players in the industry. His role will drive key business goals in the region,” Mense added.

Manila, Philippines – Professional services and investment management firm Colliers has recently appointed Rodel Ambas as the new head of marketing and communications for Colliers Philippines, effective immediately. 

Ambas will continue to implement Colliers’ brand guidelines to ensure that all of the firm’s marketing and communications efforts are consistent and well aligned with their core values and vision, collaborating with stakeholders to drive exceptional results.

Prior to his new role, he was with consulting firm Pinnacle Consulting as the head of marketing, where he was responsible for the property listings and customer service teams to ensure that the company’s branding, communications and performance marketing initiatives are well aligned and executed.

Before joining Colliers, he also had experience with companies like real estate marketplaces ZipMatch and Lamudi, and has provided consulting for various companies to help boost their content and public relations strategies to earn PR mileage through events and regular seeding of press releases.

Speaking about the recent appointment, Richard Raymundo, managing director for Philippines at Colliers, said, “I am confident that Rodel will contribute to leading our industry into the future given his enterprising and collaborative spirit. This will further strengthen Colliers’ branding and positioning in Philippine real estate.”

Meanwhile, Michelle Doyle-Jones, director of marketing and communications for Asia at Colliers, commented, “We are excited to have Rodel join our team to lead and further strengthen the Colliers brand in the Philippines. His relevant experience in real estate will certainly help us to drive exceptional results to accelerate the success of our clients and our people.”

Melbourne, Australia – Following its recent brand repositioning to cater to the theme of ‘Everything Activation’, activation agency Traffik has announced the roll out of its new sponsorship offering, which offers marketing and creative expertise to client businesses.

As part of the sponsorship offering roll out, it has appointed Mark Edney as Traffik’s head of sponsorship.

Through the offering, Traffik will be working in tandem with the wide expertise of the Clemenger Group to offer business, marketing and creative services to clients, which includes sponsorship strategy, portfolio evaluation, contract negotiation and servicing.

For Edney, there has been an evident lack of transparency in sponsorship consultancy that is blurring the motivation around recommendations. He added that the aspect of sponsorship is one of the biggest and most powerful decisions the modern-day marketer has to navigate.

“Unlike other areas of marketing, sponsorship decisions at times lack strategic rigour and are disconnected from the broader business and marketing objectives. We are a proud, brand-side only sponsorship consultancy product which provides clients with objective, commercial and strategic support, without rights-holder biases,” he stated.

Meanwhile, James Neale, CEO at Traffik, commented, “We know that there’s been a real need for a change in the sponsorship industry that is more transparent, more focused on commercial outcomes and ultimately, tied in with recommendations around how to activate that sponsorship across the full gamut of channels, which is what Mark and his team have created. We’re thrilled to see it come to life and the positive impact it’s having with clients already.”

I remember going through a monthly stock report that described my investment portfolio. There were layers of data to it and more. My mind drifted for a second and the thought just caught me in a jiffy. I was bored! The report was great, per se. It told me everything about the ‘what’. But it still left me wondering about the ‘why’. It was number-heavy and gave me cognitive nausea.

I find this quite standard with data that is trying to tell stories. It doesn’t really tell a story at all, in most use-cases! It is often detached, leaving the reader dulled. Just like this report left me.

Hard-wired for stories

We are humans! We are hard-wired to register stories because we have an innate tendency to make sense of things around us. That is how we have evolved. That is how our communication cultures evolved, around the world. We tailor our message to the person we are talking to, including oneself, to share the ‘why’, ‘how’, ‘when’ along with the ‘what’.

Then why are research processes and outcomes still laden with just data and negligible human perspective?

Despite the recent advancement in data-led solutions for businesses, there are many hidden opportunities to cultivate a storytelling culture. Data is not just numbers and charts. These lack the component of a narrative for communicating insights, and the reason is overemphasis on tools and analytics that make scaling of information to the masses difficult. Most teams working on data also often do not have the resources to present insights in a way that makes it an advantage. The language and format it is shared in often lacks a customized connection and tonality.

Stories – they strike a chord!

What could be a great way to understand the actual context behind why something is selling or bombing? Delineating personalized statistics of consumer experience with a product, for instance, immediately shows how much impact it has made on one’s life. Global diaper brand Huggies’s ‘No Baby Unhugged’ campaign utilized the power of data-storytelling to increase sales by 30%. Why? It struck a chord with the masses. More and more brands are repurposing data to reach the last mile to get real actionable insights.

Data has become inadvertently critical to innovative solutions across the board. But it has to be amplified with a narrative to drive impact.

Value of insights

LinkedIn recently reported that data analysis is one of the most sought-after job categories. Data has made amazing changes to our lives in the past decades, making us better prepared for informed decisions. And that is the science of it. Experts who are magicians with tech, tools, and tally. But I am piqued about the ‘tale’, both as an entrepreneur and a consumer.

What makes you sign up for a survey and why? Why do you enjoy ads on TV? Do you want to watch a movie without a great story? With more and more channels serving content now, which brands do you think stand out and create a recall for themselves?

From paintings hung in museums to fiction novels to sci-fi movies, stories are epicentral to sensemaking. Data science simply presents facts but stories provide context, which augments the value of insights.

Context for real change

Data-based storytelling is a powerful, yet, underutilized method of marketing. Consumers prefer to learn about a brand through content, especially visual. Hence, stories make up at least 65% of the content today. The psychology of storytelling engages more parts of the brain, making the story, and its elements, easier to recall.

Companies are deploying more AI-led natural language generation technology. While we try to develop products – we put the context of the problem we are trying to solve and the psychology of the audience we are trying to cater to at the crux. This makes communication simpler and uncomplicated – to tell stories with data, not just present facts. Weaving language in a way that is tailored to our consumer’s needs, we employ data as proof points to convey insights and give it a voice.

Data storytelling has the power to shape values, determine preferences, and influence our aspirations. Collecting, engineering, and delivering data is a skill, no doubt, but leveraging it from insight-to-value to communicate true understanding of stories hidden in it, is an art. And this is what brings real change. Any PaaS company that is committed to an end-to-end, real-time data integration and analytics platform, will transform data into optimized relationships to bridge gaps between data, insights, and action.

This article is written by Monalisa Saxena, COO of Merren.

Singapore – Luxury travel and lifestyle brand TUMI has announced a new lineup of its esports-themed collection of bags and accessories, and first debuted on the Asia Pacific-centric reality show ‘The Apprentice:ONE Championship’.

‘The Apprentice: ONE Championship’ is a reality show first aired on the AXN Network which centers on 16 candidates from around the world competing in both business and physical challenges. The winner will receive a US$250,000 job offer to work directly under ONE Chairman and CEO Chatri Sityodtong.

TUMI appeared in one of the episodes of the reality show, where Adam Hershman, vice president at TUMI Asia Pacific and Middle East, challenged the show’s contestants to work on a 360 degree global marketing rollout plan to launch the TUMI Alpha Bravo Esports Pro collection as the ultimate luxury esports collection. 

The collection is called the ‘TUMI Alpha Bravo Esports Pro’, which according to TUMI is aimed at esports athletes and hobbyists who aim to not only survive every journey, but help themselves excel whether that’s on the road, behind the desk or being cheered on by fans.

‘Esports Pro Large Backpack’ is the flagship product of the collection, which features many compartments such as collapsible shelves that optimize organization and protection. In addition, the backpack also features a padded, expandable back pocket to hold multiple keyboards, a mouse, and other valuable tech essentials, while an additional padded laptop sleeve is located in the interior. 

Added features include a designated molded pocket on the top that gives protection and quick access to headphones. Lastly, drives and other similarly sized accessories can be secured in the rigid, molded side pockets while the integrated USB port will help keep gamers powered on the go.

TUMI offers compact accessory designs including the Pro Sling, Pro Accessories Case, and Pro Crossbody, with dimensions perfect for a handheld gaming console and peripherals. Additionally, there is a designated pocket that holds wireless earbuds. Even for gaming at home, the ample pocket space and purposeful design allow for staying organized when off the road.

For Victor Sanz, creative director at TUMI, the vision behind TUMI’s latest collection was all about looking towards those whose passion is gaming — just as innovation is theirs. In addition, they have channeled that vigor to create the ultimate collection for every gamer, as they consulted with numerous industry experts from game developers to professional esports athletes to help design top-of-the-line bags that meet, if not exceed, the needs of today’s gamers like none before. 

“Now more than ever, we see gaming as an outlet to escape our realities, striving to be the champions we all want to be. So, with guidance from those who know the industry best, we immersed ourselves into the gaming community and created innovative products they haven’t experienced yet. Each element was obsessed over and engineered to deliver optimized utility and enhance every champion’s journey,” Sanz explained.

TUMI has launched in the past its virtual experiential store which aims to give customers an immersive and enhanced omnichannel experience through augmented reality (AR)and 360-degree view rendering.

Australia – Basketball Australia (BA) has recently appointed Jo Juler, former head of marketing of Tennis Australia, to be its new executive general manager for marketing, communications, and digital.

Juler brings with her more than 20 years of experience in the marketing industry. She also has a wealth of executive-level experience at high-profile international and domestic sporting bodies, including Tennis Australia, Melbourne and Olympic Parks, and Melbourne Football Club. In her new role, Juler will be leading the governing body’s marketing, communications, and digital team, working with internal and external stakeholders to drive BA’s growth agenda as identified in the organization’s new four-year strategic plan.

According to Carolyn Campbell, the interim CEO of Basketball Australia, they are delighted to welcome Juler to the organization, as her appointment is truly important for Basketball Australia.

Campbell believes that Juler will bring an enormous amount of industry experience to Basketball Australia, where she has a strong record of delivering outstanding results and joins the organization at an exciting time for the sport.

“As a sport and as an organization, we have a huge amount of untapped potential which is reflected in our new strategic plan, and we are thrilled to have Jo on board to support the implementation and delivery of this strategy,” said Campbell.

Melbourne, Australia – Activation agency Traffik has announced a major rebranding as part of its new positioning ‘Everything Activation’.

The agency’s expanded service offering has seen it build out its sponsorship, shopper marketing, planning, PR and social functions, adding to its established experiential, digital, shopper marketing and staffing credentials. 

The ‘Everything Activation’ positioning and expansion of the agency’s capabilities has been developed in response to clients seeking a simpler model by housing the full suite of specialist services under one roof, creating a holistic activation agency that works in tandem with marketers’ more traditional creative and media agencies. 

According to James Neale, CEO at Traffik, the new rebranding and positioning allows them to continue having conversations with their clients about the complexity borne from the volume of agencies working on their business.

“We’ve been deliberate in rounding out our skills and capability to support the belief that a three agency model – Creative, Media and now Activation – is the most effective and efficient way forward for clients, and we’ve hired the right people and put in place the right tools and processes to achieve those goals,” Neale stated.

To support the agency’s new brand positioning, it has brought in new talents namely Sam Fairley as head of shopper, Mark Edney as head of sponsorship, and Eliza Millet as planner, as well as Elena Macdonald as creative, and Steph Sheen as account director with Aleks Corke as production.

“It’s fantastic to have Sam, Mark, Eliza, Elena, Steph and Aleks join the team at an exciting period of growth and development for the agency. We’re thrilled to have them on board as we offer a more complete and well-rounded service offering to market,” Neale added.

Manila, Philippines – A handful of local brands and organizations in the Philippines have shown their quirky side by joining the online trend in regards to the recently-debated online trend #LugawIsEssential.

The context draws its origin from the now infamous ‘lugaw incident’ where Marvin Ignacio, a food delivery rider working for Grab Philippines, was held in a checkpoint at Brgy. Muzon, San Jose del Monte, Bulacan by barangay (local government unit) officials since his delivery of ‘lugaw’, the Filipino equivalent of savory porridge, was not deemed ‘essential’ in terms of service.

As the Greater Manila area, including the province of Bulacan, is still under enhanced community quarantine (ECQ), many people resort to food deliveries, to which the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) has deemed ‘essential’.

The video appeared in the Facebook Live video of the food delivery rider, who streamed the confrontation with barangay officials. The incident went viral on Maundy Thursday, 1 April, which has drawn flak among netizens due to the ‘paradoxical’ nature the barangay officials gave in terms of the item’s essential nature. Despite initially blowing up on Facebook, the trend became more prominent in other social media channels, including Instagram and Twitter.

As the trend #LugawIsEssential spiked in popularity on Twitter Philippines, several known and local brands have jumped in the trend to poke fun at the ongoing trend, while maintaining campaign presence and relevancy at the same time.

Jumping first on the trend is the rider’s employer Grab Philippines, where in one of their posts, they quote that “If food is essential, and lugaw is essential, therefore LUGAWISESSENTIAL”. The post itself has acted as a new local campaign by Grab PH of using the promo code to gain a free delivery perk from the service itself.

Furthermore, the Philippine arm of GrabMart also uses the same promo code campaign to entice customers with a free delivery perk when they buy the ingredients of lugaw, which include rice, egg, garlic, salt, and ginger as staples.

Some Grab PH users have also noted a new advisory message on the app’s dashboard which similarly pokes fun at the lugaw incident, stating that they are “serving you 24/7 this ECQ so that you can stay safe at home while we bring you essentials (food and lugaw included!).”

Meanwhile, the Philippine division of smartphone brand Xiaomi posted a tweet reminiscent of the time of how the founders of Xiaomi in 2010 united on a meal of lugaw in deciding what to call their company as.

Oil company Phoenix Fuels, on the other hand, pokes fun at the debacle by posting an infographic stating the ‘essential’ ingredients of making lugaw, accompanied with a Twitter thread helping online users how to cook porridge. The online post aims to promote Phoenix Fuels’ liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) products.

On a similar note, local weather channel Panahon.TV also posted a photo, enumerating and visualizing the lugaw ingredients at the same time.

As the trend fell into the observance of April Fool’s Day as well, some smaller local brands have also jumped into ‘trolling’ their online audiences with ‘new products’.

On a weird note, local adult pleasure brand frisky ‘announced’ that they have recently launched a new lube product, with lugaw as the new flavor, to which they ‘announced’ is on sale on both Lazada and Shopee.

https://twitter.com/FriskyUltd/status/1377406606963396610

Meanwhile, local candle scents maker Clementine Scents announced that they have launched a ‘lugaw-scented candle’ to allow customers “enjoy the scent of [the] favorite Filipino porridge, wherever, whenever.”

A screenshot of the Instagram post of Clementine Scents

Other brands and organizations that poked fun on the #LugawIsEssential debacle includes the National Historical Commission of the Philippines, local anime media group portal AniRadio Plus, and Default Cafe Pub, which made a jovial take on the likewise viral photo of President Rodrigo Duterte blowing a ‘birthday cake’ made out of steamed rice.

Singapore – Data and artificial intelligence (AI) company ADA and growth management platform Insider have announced a new partnership to aid enterprises in achieving a greater return on multichannel personalization and marketing campaigns through AI and data analytics.

The partnership entails unifying ADA’s newly formed MarTech-as-a-Service offering and Insider’s AI-powered Growth Management Platform (GMP) which will empower enterprises to scale up and predict customer behavior in real time. Marketers can also seamlessly personalize and streamline campaigns to acquire, activate, and retain customers.

“We’re really excited to be working with Insider. We believe this partnership will help our clients realise more value by allowing us to offer an end-to-end solution that covers the full marketing and sales funnel. We have big goals to continue to expand our business in Asia; so, ADA and Insider’s strong MarTech proposition will help us achieve our ambitious targets,” said Chris Wiseman, head of marketing technology at ADA.

For Patrick Steinbrenner, managing director for APAC at Insider, he believes that with the right recommendation algorithms powered by AI, enterprises can deliver precise individualized cross-channel recommendations and uncover full revenue potential. 

“ADA’s digital and data maturity models’ expertise combined with Insider’s platform capabilities will take marketing to the next level. We’ve enjoyed collaborating with the team at ADA to bring more value to our end customers,” Steinbrenner stated.

New Delhi, India – The Indian arm of the ridesharing platform Uber and dentsu international’s digital agency arm Dentsu Webchutney has launched a new campaign called ‘#WithinHerReach’ which aims to make work opportunities closer and accessible to women.

The latest campaign is released as a print ad on the first page of the national newspaper The Hindustan Times and has already started leading narratives on the subject across LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram and among key decision-makers from the workforce.

#WithinHerReach, originally launched by the two companies last year, was in response to the fact that 3 in every 5 women limit their career opportunities within a radius of 1 kilometre from their respective homes – even at the cost of a higher paying job. Evidently, this highlighted the stark gender commute gap among the country’s workforce. 

In response, Uber has decided to drive conversations that support work from home (WFH) as a consistent option for women, driven by the current global states of the world due to the global pandemic. 

“2020 has been a year to forget but it did have one silver lining. More Indian women entered the workforce during the pandemic-induced lockdown, attracted by the possibilities of working remotely and on flexible hours,” said Sanjay Gupta, marketing director for APAC at Uber.

He added, “Participation of women in India’s workforce rose to 37% as of July-end from 30% in April. As we enter the new normal, let’s continue to fuel this momentum and make flexible work and WFH essential elements of corporate India.”

Speaking about the campaign, Priyanka Borah, vice president at Dentsu Webchutney said, “It’s safe to say that geography is history. With WFH and remote-working opportunities, fewer women will feel compelled to drop out of the workforce. And as a result of this, more women will grow into senior leadership roles. It’s taken a pandemic for us to get here – but it’s important we seize this silver lining to move forward.”