ESSAYS
EVA APPELBAUM, DIGITAL DIRECTOR AT THE BBC
what a sound strategy involves.
Where do you go to for information on what’s happening in
the digital industry?
I network a lot. I attend a lot of events. I read a lot. Right now I’m interested in people who are challenging conventional views about social media. Not necessarily because I agree 100 per cent with what they say, but because it’s good to have a bit of polemic or informed critique. This may sound slightly leftfield, but I find [writer, computer scientist and composer] Jaron Lanier very interesting. He’s not writing about marketing, but he is offering a philosophical critique of where social media can take humanity.
What’s the most important lesson you’ve learnt from your time in
marketing so far? Worked on a VOD start-up
It’s about appreciating the tension between the art and the science of marketing - the role that both those approaches have. On the the art side, there’s something magical about brilliant, creative content that no algorithm can replicate. On the other hand, particularly in digital, you understand how important it is to test and measure things and look at the evidence in order to make decisions. Marketing is the place where those two approaches meet.
What do you think is the most overused buzzword in marketing right now?
I often feel like the one who’s missed the memo telling us what the new buzzword is. I’m the one who’s got their phone out, Googling under the table. As I say, the pace of change and the proliferation of new technology can be
founded by Livia and Colin Firth.
Helped set up the social media agency offering at Group M (WPP) in Singapore.
Head of Digital Marketing
Transformation at the BBC. Launched the Digital Marketing Lab and worked on improving the BBC’s social media marketing capabilities.
Moved into BBC Television,
working in the factual (natural history) genre, launching a new brand, digital product and
integrating digital marketing with production.
EVA APPELBAUM: CAREER LADDER
Worked in Amsterdam during the first dotcom boom
researching media trends during the early days of web and
broadband. Shared an office with the nascent IAB Europe.
Established digital marketing
and ecommerce globally at the international consultancy Mercer.
First Digital Communications Director at Amnesty International.
challenging. If something is
slightly peripheral to what you do but you’re still interested in it, it’s hard to keep up. I was somewhere the other day and people were talking about ‘RTB’ and I was thinking ‘I have no idea what this is.’ So I was looking up real-time bidding. Then I was looking up ‘programmatic.’ I don’t work in a media agency so I wouldn’t necessarily know off-hand what some of these terms refer to. Twenty years ago buzzwords would enter the industry much more slowly. Now you’ve just figured out what one means and the next one comes along. It’s probably worth us all admitting that they can’t keep up. Where I fall foul is that I use a lot of management speak. I watched the BBC mockumentary W1A earlier this year, which features a lot of BBC people talking exclusively in management speak. I recognise a lot of those meetings.
Which other brands’ marketing strategies do you admire and why?
John Lewis. They’ve tried to create a business where what happens online and in the real-world is as seamless as possible. They’ve got really strong values at the core of their business and you feel that permeates everything. The values and the brand are intrinsically linked. For such an old and established business, they’ve done a really good job moving into digital in a way that plays to the strengths they’ve always had. Of course, businesses like Google or Apple, which were born into digital are always going to be better at some things, but I find it very interesting to see how those older businesses adapt.
33 issue 22 october 2014
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
