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Digital media is no longer a buzzword but a business reality. Penny Diamantakiou Yahoo!7 CFO shares valuable insights into the latest digital media trends at an Executive Women Masterclass hosted by Executive Women Australia.
I personally couldn’t think of a better way to spend a Friday luncheon than with a room full of inspirational women who are at the forefront of Australia’s business world. I was lucky enough to be invited to the Executive Women master class hosted by Executive Women Australia (EWA), a national initiative committed to increasing C-level career opportunities for executive women through improved managerial and societal influence.
Over a gourmet light lunch I spoke with women at the top of their game and those who had taken the brave leap of faith into the world of entrepreneurship. By the time lunch was over I was full of inspiration, well-connected, buzzing with energy and intrigued to hear what Penny Diamantakiou, chief financial officer (CFO) for Yahoo!7, had to say about the new world of digital media, digital trends and how to assess and measure business benefits beyond the return-on-investment (ROI).
Penny Diamantakiou painted a real picture of the emerging digital media trends and ever-changing world of digital media and how a strong strategy can transform a business into a global giant overnight.
According to her, the Fortune 500 has changed dramatically over the last 10 years with Facebook and LinkedIn dominating the shift. These two are among the top companies that are successfully tapping into a mass audience and generating huge revenue streams. Both companies have deftly used social media to create a captive social network with huge scalability. LinkedIn for example currently has two people signing up to its site every two seconds.
Penny added that companies are now looking at their marketing budgets and allocating 25% to digital media initiatives. Although most chief marketing officers (CMO) can’t track direct ROI to the investment, they know they still need to have some skin in the game.
She expressed the importance of tailoring digital strategies to each target market by asking the key questions of how, why and where as well as relying on big data, market trends and market behaviour.
As I was enlightened to the inner workings of the digital world I couldn’t get over the magnitude of how fast trends are changing and how important it is for a business to be constantly on its toes in order to consistently deliver value to its customers.
The rate of transition from desktop to mobile is another key factor to take into account. We use our mobile devices more than ever, and Facebook and Twitter’s mobile phone users have surpassed the 50% mark. An estimated 11% of Facebook’s revenue now comes from mobile devices and that reportedly, is a significant amount.
Penny also said that videos are the next big thing as people are most likely to remember and create an emotive connection to a brand via a video. For some perspective she added, “About 1.5 billion eyeballs are on videos every year and channels like YouTube have 13.2 million monthly views.”
Penny’s closing statement was that the digital media world is a fractured landscape and just looking at ROI the same way we do for traditional marketing strategies won’t lead to success. What will are a mindset shift, a focus on reduced expenditure, and capturing and analysing big data with a clear strategy on how and where you socialise with your market to create trusted value.
