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Rethinking Retail Spaces And Retail Marketing: Where South Africa Shops. Where Brands Win.

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Modern Marketing
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Rethinking Retail Spaces And Retail Marketing- Where South Africa Shops. Where Brands Win.

During an informative session, which was held during the Modern Marketing Power Hour Camagu Sam, Senior Sales Manager from Mall Ads explored how treating physical retail space as a structured media network, rather than simply a leasing asset, is reshaping the economics of shopping centres, with implications for retail marketing, and shopper engagement.

Where do purchase decisions actually get made? Not at the till. On the way to the till.

We Don’t Just Shop. We Go

A meal. A movie. A wander. Then, almost as an afterthought, the shopping. South Africa has a genuine mall culture. We get in the car, we drive, we spend the whole day there. That is not a shopping trip. That is dwell time money cannot buy anywhere else.

1. Why Malls, Why now?

Consider the scale, the science, and the last part of the shopper journey.

Where We Actually Live

We do not sit in the shops. We own what is between them. Of that 23 million square metres of retail space, our inventory sits in the non-GLA (gross leasable area) environment: the walkways, the courts, the common areas between the stores. It is where every single shopper passes, regardless of which brand they came to buy.

Malls are built with anchor tenants on either end, so every shopper walks the full length of the centre. Our screens sit on that predictable pathway: synchronised, so the message does not break as shoppers move from one zone to the next.

Format Follows Objective

Two formats. One network:

Static: Long-term visibility; durable brand presence; uninterrupted share of space.

Digital: Flexibility on demand; frequency and reach; dynamic, real-time messaging.

Format Mechanics

Loops, frequency and the 10-second ad:

Mall TV: Content-interspersed loop; news, sport and weather between ads; no advertiser fatigue.

Mall Vision: large 3×6 format screens; straight advertising, no content; maximum impact, high frequency.

Clients are moving from 30-second spots to 10-second spots for more frequency: repetition is what wins in a retail environment.

2. Attention and Measurement

Why Mall Media Wins the Attention Economy (and How We Prove It)

Attention: 76% of shoppers noticed static or digital advertising in and around the mall.

Introducing Protrack: our proprietary measurement engine, built to prove what mall media was never able to prove before.

What Protrack actually measures:

Foot traffic, hour by hour: Daily and hourly movement past every sensor. We know exactly when a mall is busiest or quietest.

Cone of visibility: Not just who walked past, who was actually positioned to look at the screen.

Heat maps and partner data: Layered with landlord Wi-Fi and camera systems where available, for a fuller movement picture.

Comparable metrics: Real reach, frequency and CPMs: schedules that finally sit next to TV and digital.

Why it matters:

Affordable: Mall media CPMs run more affordable than most out-of-home formats. A genuinely strong value case for advertisers wanting scale in this environment.

Transparent: Our monthly VAX audience moves with real foot traffic, up in a strong month, down in a quiet one. We report what actually happened. Nothing inflated, nothing smoothed.

3. Who’s In The Mall

The Footprint, the Audience, and the Calendar That Moves Them

Meet the shopper:

Value-conscious, not price-desperate: Wants the best brands and the best quality, and is happy to wait on layby to get them.

Young, and often supporting a family: Frequently balancing more than one income stream to make it work.

One of SA’s biggest-spending segments: The mid-to-low SEM shopper is where the real retail volume lives.

Woven into the community fabric: These malls are not built without the community around them, they are part of it.

Our Network:

The Mall Ads Footprint

One of South Africa’s largest mall media platforms: super-regional, regional and community malls, reaching every income group and lifestyle.

Shopper Behaviour:  Predictable pathways. Real influence.

Timing Is Everything: The Retail Calendar

We build retail-calendar content into Mall TV all year round, so campaigns land in the right cultural moment, not just the right week.

4. Proximity, Proof and the Missed Opportunity

Why We Win the Last Mile, and the Gap Most Brands Have Not Spotted Yet

Why it works: Our greatest strength is proximity. We reach shoppers while they are deciding, often minutes from the purchase itself.

Proof in the Aisles: from Awareness to Purchase, and Connected

A Gap Worth Selling Into: The Opportunity Nobody’s Selling Yet

Today:

– Mostly brand saliency.
– Competitions and promotions.
– Very little price or product content.

The opportunity:

– The digital evolution of the printed broadsheet insert.
– Weekly specials, dayparted, flighted by store hours.
– Fully agile, change it as often as retailers need to.

Creative Strategy: Design for Dwell, Not the Drive-By

Roadside:

– A five-second glance at 100km/h.
– Simple, single message.
– No time to explain a mechanic.

Mall:

– Pedestrian pace, captive dwell time.
– Room for more complex messaging.
– Space to explain an offer’s mechanic in full.

Most brands still run the same creative in both places. That’s the missed opportunity.

The Integration Play

The silver bullet: one seamless journey.

Billboard → Mall TV → In-store. Three budgets, three teams: one shopper.

5. The Future: Programmatic, Immersive Experience, and a Taste of What’s Next.

Looking ahead:

Programmatic is coming: DSP-enabled buying; price and promo automation; in-store budget, unlocked.

Beyond the Static Ad: Immersive. Playful. Memorable

1. Gamification: Interactive screen activations that turn a passing glance into a played moment.
2. AI facial recognition: Engagement-driven creative that reacts to the shopper standing in front of it.
3.Shoppertainment: When advertising becomes part of the day out, not an interruption to it.

A Moment That Landed: the Order That Arrived Mid-Shop

Our Vision: What Excites Us Most

1.Physical retail environments fused with digital technology and data.

2.Malls remain one of the most powerful places to engage active, deciding consumers.

3.Immersive brand experiences, interactive digital formats, smarter audience targeting.

4.Meaningful engagement that captures attention and drives measurable results.

MALL ADS
+27 86 177 6826
mallads@provantage.co.za
https://mallads.co.za/

Making Advertising Worth Watching

By
Modern Marketing
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Making Advertising Worth Watching

While the way audiences consume video has changed dramatically, television continues to offer something that is increasingly difficult to manufacture in a fragmented digital environment: scale, attention and a sense of occasion.

‘It’s easy to think of television as yesterday’s medium when so much of the conversation around marketing is focused on algorithms, digital targeting and performance metrics,’ said Marnelle Van Der Merwe, Traditional Media Director at Penquin. ‘But the reality is that audiences haven’t stopped watching television. They are simply watching differently. The opportunity for brands is no longer about choosing between TV and digital; it’s about understanding what each does best and using them together.’

Global viewing trends reinforce that shift. Nielsen’s 2025 analysis found that streaming has grown substantially, while traditional television continues to draw significant audiences, particularly around live sport, popular programming and news.

In South Africa, where television remains an important mass-reach medium, that ability to bring large audiences together remains particularly valuable. The challenge for marketers, however, is not simply getting an audience to see a commercial. It is creating something they remember.

The TVC As The Big Idea

For Van Der Merwe, the enduring value of the television commercial (TVC) lies in its ability to provide a brand with a powerful creative foundation. ‘A great TVC gives you a canvas to tell a story, create emotion and establish a memorable brand identity,’ she says. ‘It becomes the big idea from which the rest of the campaign can grow.’

This is particularly relevant for major product launches, where brands need to establish a strong identity quickly and consistently across multiple touchpoints.

The recently produced Suzuki Across campaign by Penquin provides an example of this approach. Built around the campaign line ‘Across – Move Between Worlds’, the commercial uses the vehicle’s ability to move seamlessly between different environments and lifestyles as a metaphor for navigating an increasingly connected world.

Rather than treating the TV commercial as an isolated piece of advertising, the campaign was developed as a central creative asset capable of extending across the wider media ecosystem.

‘Digital is clever, targeted and wonderfully measurable, but it can sometimes feel like shouting through a keyhole,’ said Justin Beachcroft-Shaw, Video Production Specialist at Penquin. ‘Television still gives a brand space, scale and a sense of occasion. It allows an idea to breathe and gives a product the kind of presence that can be difficult to achieve in a fragmented feed.’

The Screen May Have Changed, But The Power Of Storytelling Hasn’t

The rise of digital has not made television irrelevant. It has changed the definition of television itself.

Audiences increasingly move between linear broadcast, streaming services, connected TVs, social platforms and online video. Rather than competing for the same audience in isolation, these platforms can work together to create a more connected campaign journey.

Research from Nielsen similarly points to an increasingly cross-platform viewing environment, with audiences choosing where, when and how they consume video rather than adhering to a single format.

That makes the role of the TVC less about being the campaign and more about being the creative anchor. ‘Today’s strongest campaigns aren’t built around television versus digital,’ said Van Der Merwe. ‘They are built around understanding the role each channel plays. Television can establish emotion, stature and broad awareness, while digital can extend the story, personalise it, encourage interaction and deliver measurable responses.’

The distinction is important. A television commercial can create the initial emotional connection, while shorter edits, social content, digital video, influencer activity, search and other campaign elements can build on that idea in ways tailored to different audiences and platforms.

There is, however, a caveat: simply putting a campaign on television does not make it effective. As audiences become more accustomed to scrolling, skipping and switching between content, the creative standard has to rise. Kantar research has previously highlighted the challenge of cut-through in television advertising, with the effectiveness of TV advertising varying significantly by category, brand and target audience.

For Beachcroft-Shaw, that makes the craft behind the commercial as important as the medium itself. ‘The TVC has to earn its place on the screen,’ he said. ‘It needs to be polished enough to feel premium, clear enough to communicate the message and engaging enough to make people want to keep watching. Advertising can still be something people enjoy watching rather than something they instinctively want to skip.’

That requires a strong idea, considered storytelling and production quality that matches the ambition of the brand.

For the Suzuki Across, this meant creating a commercial that could communicate the vehicle’s versatility while also building an emotional world around the idea of moving between different experiences.

TV and Digital Work Better Together

The argument for TV in 2026 is therefore not an argument against digital. In fact, the opposite is true.

A successful campaign increasingly needs to recognise that consumers do not experience media in neat categories. Someone may encounter a brand on television, search for it on their phone, watch a longer video online, see it again on social media and ultimately make a purchase elsewhere.

The role of the agency is to ensure that these encounters feel connected rather than fragmented. ‘Technology will continue to change the way people consume content, and marketers need to keep adapting with it,’ said Van Der Merwe. But the fundamentals of effective brand building haven’t changed. People remember stories that make them feel something. Great TVCs still have the ability to do that at scale.’

For Penquin, the future of television advertising is therefore not about protecting an old medium. It is about recognising what remains uniquely powerful about it while allowing technology and digital media to extend its impact.

TV is no longer the only screen that matters,’ added Beachcroft-Shaw. ‘But when the idea is strong, the craft is sharp and the product deserves presence, it remains the screen that can make everything feel bigger.’

So, in a media landscape where brands are competing not only for attention, but for memory, that may be more relevant than ever.

PENQUIN
https://www.penquin.co.za

How An Accidental Decision Became 130 Years Of Heritage

By
Modern Marketing
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How An Accidental Decision Became 130 Years Of Heritage
André van Tonder, On the Dot.

According to André van Tonder, Managing Executive, On the Dot and the company distributing the Financial Times Weekend in South Africa, most companies manage their identity through language: a mission statement, a brand voice guide, a value proposition rehearsed until it stops meaning anything to the people reciting it.

Almost none of that is what actually makes a brand trusted. The identity that sticks is usually attached to something a person can hold, not something a person is told.

I’ve spent my career in print circulation, most recently helping bring the Financial Times Weekend back into local print in South Africa after more than a decade away, and that instinct is exactly the one the media industry forgot when everyone rushed to digital. Identity doesn’t transfer well through a screen. It transfers through something you can hold.

The Psychology Is Not Sentimental, It Is Measurable

Nostalgia used to be treated as a slightly embarrassing emotion, a wistful detour rather than something serious. That’s changed. Research led by psychologists Constantine Sedikides and Tim Wildschut, published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, found that nostalgia increases psychological wellbeing specifically by increasing authenticity, a sense of alignment with one’s true self, tested across both Western and East Asian samples. A separate body of research (Hepper et al.) found that nostalgia is overwhelmingly directed at specific tangible things: keepsakes, photographs, objects from a particular time, not abstract memories floating free of any physical anchor.

Nostalgia is rarely about a feeling in general. It’s about a specific object, not a memory floating free of one.

At a collective level, the effect scales up. A 2023 meta-analysis in the Journal of Business Research found that collective nostalgia, longing tied to a shared past rather than a personal one, strengthens group identity and social cohesion. That is precisely what a physical object with real history behind it can do for a brand that most digital-only experiences cannot.

The Financial Times did not set out to build a heritage asset when it started printing on pale pink paper in 1893. The decision was almost embarrassingly practical: unbleached, lightly tinted stock was marginally cheaper than bright white, and it happened to make the paper instantly distinguishable from its rival at the time, the Financial News. Nobody in that print room was thinking about brand heritage. They were thinking about cost and shelf differentiation.

What happened next is the interesting part. Within a generation, the pink became the whole identity. Today, the economics have completely reversed, dyeing paper pink now costs more than leaving it white, yet the FT has never once considered switching back. A cost-saving decision from 1893 is now protected at a premium, because the object itself, not the reasoning behind it, became the thing people trust.

That is a heritage story in the truest sense: not a value statement written by a marketing team, but an inherited, physical detail that outlived the logic that created it and became more valuable than the logic ever was.

What This Means For Anyone Building A Brand, Not Just a Newspaper

The FT’s own story makes the same point in reverse. The identity that actually sticks tends to be the one attached to something tangible, a specific object, ritual or artefact, that a person can physically return to and that carries meaning independent of whoever explains it.

The FT didn’t choose pink for meaning. Meaning arrived afterwards, once enough people kept doing the same physical thing for long enough: opening the same pink pages, in the same order, on the same kind of morning, for well over a century.

That’s worth remembering before writing another values statement for the wall. A mission statement can be rewritten in an afternoon. A genuinely trusted object takes decades to earn. Language doesn’t buy you a shortcut.

References

Kelley, N.J. et al., 2022. Nostalgia confers psychological wellbeing by increasing authenticity. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 102, Article 104379.

Hepper, E.G. et al. Prototype studies on the content and structure of nostalgic experience, cited in: Sedikides, C. and Wildschut, T., 2025. On the Nature of Nostalgia: A Psychological Perspective.

Journal of Business Research, 2023. A meta-analysis on the psychological and behavioural consequences of nostalgia: The moderating roles of nostalgia activators, culture, and individual characteristics.

Braithwaite Communications. Why is the Financial Times Pink? Available here.

Made Good Designs. Financial Times Brand Guidelines: The Pink Paper. Available here.

ON THE DOT
www.onthedot.co.za

Marketing Challenge Winning Student Team Revealed During Nedbank IMC

By
Modern Marketing
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Marketing Challenge Winning Student Team Revealed During Nedbank IMC

Run in collaboration with University of Johannesburg (UJ) and the Nedbank IMC, the Telkom Plug’d UJ Student Challenge asked students to respond to a live marketing brief built around one question: how can connection be turned into opportunity for young South Africans? UJ students put their marketing skills to the test, with Team Fourward named the winner at the Nedbank IMC 2026 and awarded R10 000 in prize money.

Students had to identify an audience insight, develop a strategic response and turn it into a creative idea with real-world value. In doing so, they put the Nedbank IMC principle that Marketing is Business® into practice, connecting customer understanding and creativity with commercial thinking.

A Live Brief, An Industry Verdict

An industry panel assessed the entries through a structured scoring process, with five teams progressing to the final judging round ahead of the Nedbank IMC on 17 September. Team Fourward comprised Aluwani Godfrey Kwinda, Asive Jaku, Gomolemo Mosimane, Luthando Zulu and Muyimeri Masiya. Gugu Mthembu, Chief Marketing Officer at Telkom, presented the team with its R10 000 prize on the conference’s main stage.

‘The students showed what can happen when young people are given a real opportunity to apply their ideas,’ said Gugu Mthembu, Chief Marketing Officer at Telkom. ‘They took a brief about turning connection into opportunity and responded with the insight, creativity and commercial thinking the industry needs. Congratulations to Team Fourward on a well-deserved win.’

Young Voices At The Conference

The challenge formed part of a broader youth focus at the Nedbank IMC 2026. More than 1000 students participated through YOUTH1000, the Nedbank IMC initiative run with MASA. A further 60 UJ students gained practical on-site work experience as part of the team delivering the conference.

Telkom Plug’d also supported The Next Shift: A Gen Z–Gen Alpha Conversation, bringing younger voices into the conference programme and giving marketers an opportunity to hear their perspectives on brands, culture, technology and opportunity.

‘We talk a great deal about developing the next generation of marketers, but that has to mean giving them real work to do,’ said Dale Hefer, CEO of the Nedbank IMC. ‘These students were given a genuine marketing problem, judged by industry professionals and given a platform to show what they could do. That is how we begin turning access into opportunity.’

For Team Fourward, the win brought both prize money and recognition on the main stage of Africa’s Biggest Marketing Conference™. For the wider student cohort, the challenge was an opportunity to test classroom learning against the demands of an industry brief.

The Nedbank IMC 2026 drew more than 3 700 delegates from 28 countries, bringing marketers, business leaders, agency executives, entrepreneurs, creatives, media professionals and young talent together in Johannesburg and online.

NEDBANK IMC CONFERENCE
www.imcconference.com

Courier Data Reveals South Africans’ On-Demand Delivery Needs

By
Modern Marketing
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Courier Data Reveals South Africans' On-Demand Delivery Needs
Ashif Black, inDrive South Africa.

An analysis of roughly 5000 inDrive.Courier orders placed in South Africa during the first half of 2026 found that cake was the single most-requested food item carried by couriers. It appeared in 9.1% of all Food & Drink orders, a higher share than in any of the other eight countries included in the analysis.

In fact, Food & Drink remains the biggest overall category in South Africa, accounting for 37.4% of classified orders. ‘Cake might seem like an unusual item to stand out in courier data, but it shows how people are using these services for very ordinary, personal needs,’ said Ashif Black, country representative at inDrive South Africa.

‘People might need a cake delivered for a celebration, a spare part collected for a car or a set of keys dropped off to someone who needs them. The range of items tells an interesting story about the role on-demand couriers are starting to play in people’s daily lives.’

From Clothes To Car Parts

Beyond food, inDrive’s internal courier data reveals that Clothing & Shoes is the next biggest category at 17.1%. Perhaps the more surprising finding is that Auto, Tools & Hardware follows closely behind, accounting for 13.3% of classified orders.

This is also a distinctly South African trend, with South Africa recording the highest share of Auto, Tools & Hardware deliveries of all eight countries included in the analysis. Electronics, meanwhile, accounted for just 6.7% of local orders.

The smaller categories reveal another side of how people are using couriers. Cosmetics, Beauty & Eyewear, keys and documents and papers all feature among items being moved from one place to another, suggesting that the service is being used as much for life’s practical errands as it is for more conventional deliveries.

‘What stands out is how specific some of these needs are,’ said Black. ‘If you’ve left your keys somewhere, need a document to reach someone across town or have a part that needs to get to a workshop, the value of a courier is really about solving that immediate problem without having to make the journey yourself.’

Trustworthy Courier Services

Trust is also an important consideration when South Africans hand their goods over for delivery. In fact, a 2025 report found that 85% of South African online shoppers would not buy from a retailer if they did not trust the delivery provider, highlighting the role that confidence in the delivery process can play when goods change hands.

‘Having peace of mind that a courier item will safely reach the intended destination is important to South Africans using inDrive.Courier, which is why the service includes features designed to help users keep track of their items throughout the delivery,’ said Black.

He adds that couriers also undergo identity verification during registration, while users can review ratings and trip history before choosing a courier and follow their delivery in real time through live tracking, where a tracking link can also be shared with the recipient.

For added certainty at drop-off, senders can also opt for proof of delivery using a one-time password provided to the recipient, which must be entered before the courier can mark the delivery as complete.

‘The latest data ultimately paints a varied picture of South African courier habits. Whether its cake, car parts and clothes or electronics, keys and documents moving between homes and businesses, we can agree that South Africans are increasingly using on-demand courier services to make light work of their everyday errands and tasks, and it’s nice to know people are able to get things done or even satisfy a sweet tooth quicker and more easily than ever before,’ concludes Black.

INDRIVE
https://indrive.com/en-za

Marketing Leader In Garment Industry Shares Insight

By
Modern Marketing
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Marketing Leader In Garment Industry Shares Insight
Yumna Parker Davids, Imagemakers.

As the Head of Marketing and Systems at Imagemakers, and a leading woman in the local garment industry, Yumna Parker Davids’ role is a high-wire act of balancing brand strategy with technical infrastructure and modern systems thinking.

It is a journey that began with a single, unexpected phone call nearly a decade ago. ‘I actually took a while to accept the offer,’ Yumna Parker Davids recalled. ‘I remember Anton (Spaun, the owner and CEO of Imagemakers) calling me personally and convincing me to come on board, and somehow that one phone call turned into almost nine years, and an evolving role from production to marketing and systems architecture.’

Today, looking back at the trajectory of the Cape Town-based manufacturer, the longest-running family-owned corporate clothing manufacturer in the country, the transformation is palpable. ‘The Imagemakers I joined in 2017 looks very different today, and I have goosebumps saying that.’

Navigating the rollercoaster of recent years, particularly the global pandemic, solidified her belief in the company’s agility. ‘What I appreciated the most is seeing how quickly the business could adapt to change, and that for me is so powerful.’

From Production To Systems Thinking

Her path to the executive suite wasn’t a straight line through a marketing department. She joined the business as a production planner, drawing on her extensive background in the beauty and fashion retail sectors. After three years, she stepped into an Operations Management role, a move that gave her an intimate understanding of the ‘entire customer journey and consumer behaviour.’

Her current dual oversight of Marketing and Systems reflects a modern necessity: the fusion of story and data. ‘My role is quite varied, which is probably what keeps it interesting,’ she explained. ‘One minute I’m working on a marketing campaign, and the next I’m discussing systems, data, or a tech project involving software or AI.’

A Foundation Of Resilience

Her formidable work ethic was forged long before she entered a boardroom. Born and raised in Cape Town, she credits her ‘strong mother’ for her relentless drive. ‘I grew up with a strong mother, and I think a lot of my work ethic comes from watching her,’ she said. ‘She taught me the value of working hard, being resilient, and getting on with what needs to be done.’

This ‘get-on-with-it’ attitude defined her progression within Imagemakers. Parker Davids grew into a trusted leadership role by consistently stepping beyond the boundaries of her job description.

‘I asked a lot of questions, wanted to understand how different parts of the business worked, and I never really saw anything as ‘not my job.’ If something needed to be done, I would figure out how to do it.’

Rising Above The Noise

For Yumna, leadership is less about having all the answers and more about having the guts to find them. Her personal mantra is simple: ‘Courage first, confidence follows.’

‘I’ve often taken on responsibility before I felt completely ready for it, but that is where a lot of the growth happens.’

This growth hasn’t come without the typical pressures of a working mother with a high-performance career. Juggling the demands of the office with the needs of three busy children, Parker Davids is refreshingly honest about the myth of ‘balance.’

‘When I’m not at work, I’m usually on the sidelines at soccer shouting a little louder than I probably should, or at ballet practice,’ she laughed. ‘I once read that there’s no such thing as perfect balance, and I think that’s true. Some days work needs more of you, and other days your family does.’

Her hardest life lesson, however, has been learning to ‘rise above the noise’. To Parker Davids, ‘noise’ encompasses everything from setbacks and criticism to internal self-doubt. ‘I’ve learnt that not everything deserves your energy or a reaction. I try to stay focused on what I’m working towards, learn from the things that matter, and keep moving forward’.

A Vision Of Opportunity

As Imagemakers continues to set the standard for Southern African professional wear and team uniforms, her focus is turning increasingly toward the legacy she will leave behind. She currently manages a team of six and oversees numerous external suppliers, but her ultimate dream is to be a door-opener for others.

‘My dream is to create opportunities, for the people I work with, for young people coming into the workplace, and especially for women,’ she said.

Her advice to those starting out? ‘Stay curious and never think you know everything. I also believe no experience is wasted. Sometimes you learn something without knowing why it will matter, and years later that knowledge becomes incredibly useful.’

C1W Initiative

Change 1 Woman (C1W) aims to empower women in the branding, print and signage industries. As part of this initiative, Modern Marketing would like to spotlight women-focused content like this piece. If you have any trend/business articles related to the signage, branding and printing industries, please email content to: info@c1w.co.za. Follow C1W on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram for more updates.

IMAGEMAKERS
https://www.imagemakers.co.za

Why The Home Screen Is The New Front Page

By
Modern Marketing
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Why The Home Screen Is The New Front Page

Adiela Dramat, Senior Client Partner at Reach Africa, writes that the home screen reaches viewers before they choose what to watch, opening a new way for brands to connect with audiences

When you switch on your TV, what do you see? The home screen, where you decide your next move. Should you stream a movie? Catch up on your series? Watch the live game? Whatever you choose, it starts right there, and that makes the home screen one of the most valuable pieces of advertising real estate on televisions today.

For decades, TV advertising has focused on programming. Advertisers could plan around a fairly predictable viewing schedule, knowing which shows audiences were likely to watch and when. Streaming has flipped the table completely, giving viewers far more choice over what they watch and where they watch it. For advertisers looking to capture attention, the home screen offers a way to reach viewers before they disappear into an app or channel. It puts brands front and centre, giving them visibility across an increasingly fragmented viewing landscape.

The Advantage Of Being First

I first realised the power of reaching people before they decide where to go next while working in a different medium. In 2013, I sold the first-ever wraparound advert on the main section of a major Sunday newspaper, making the brand the first thing readers saw.

For 70 years, television advertising has largely been built around interrupting what somebody is watching. The home screen creates an opportunity to become part of the journey before they have started watching at all.

For media planners, that creates a way to reach audiences that does not depend on knowing which programme or app they will choose.

We recently put this into practice when a prominent South African retailer wanted to connect with rugby audiences around a big match. The brand didn’t own the broadcast rights or sponsorship, so we focused on where those fans would be before and around the game: the home screen. They didn’t buy the rugby. They bought the journey to rugby. That allowed the retailer to become part of the viewing occasion without buying the content itself.

The campaign also showed why timing is so important. When viewers return to it, they are actively choosing what to watch next, which gives us a clear signal of intent. Instead of spreading spend continuously, advertisers can concentrate it around the points when their audience is most likely to be there. Behaviour, not programming, determines when a brand appears. And it’s not just for sporting events, a big entertainment release or retail event such as Black Friday can create its own high-value viewing windows, giving brands more ways to plan around audience behaviour at a particular time.

Start With The Audience

This also changes the starting point for connected TV planning. At Reach Africa, our partnerships across different TV manufacturers and operating systems such as VIDAA, TCL, LG and Whale TV allow us to look across the landscape rather than planning around the inventory of a single platform. We can start with the audience a brand wants to reach, rather than trying to find them one platform at a time. That means the media plan can follow the viewer instead of being limited by what one content owner has available.

And this is only the beginning. As the television evolves beyond a screen for broadcast, streaming and gaming into a more intelligent interface in the home, the opportunity for advertisers will evolve with it. The next phase won’t simply be about repurposing a TV ad or digital video for the home screen, but creating experiences and actions around those moments when viewers are actively engaging with the device. For brands, that means thinking less about filling an advertising slot and more about what they can do with the moment.

As more of our viewing converges on the same device, the television itself becomes the platform. And sitting at the entrance to everything is the home screen, the new ‘front page’.

REACH AFRICA
https://www.reachafrica.com

Red Ribbon Communications Wins PR Mandate For Cloudera

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Modern Marketing
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Red Ribbon Communications Wins PR Mandate For Cloudera
Ronelle Bester, Red Ribbon Communications .

Cape Town-based agency Red Ribbon Communications agency will run Cloudera’s media relations and thought leadership programme, with an initial focus on hybrid data management and enterprise AI adoption among South African IT leaders.

In the wake of Cloudera’s recent launch of Cloudera Anywhere Cloud™, a platform enabling organisations to scale AI applications across multi-cloud and on-premises environments with full data governanc, the tech PR agency will focus on communicating these capabilities to the local market.

‘This pitch came down to who understood the technical substance behind hybrid data and enterprise AI, not who could talk around it,’ said Ronelle Bester, founder of Red Ribbon Communications.

‘South African IT leaders have had enough of the generic versions, and what we’re building for Cloudera is the specific, deeper story, and that starts with getting the language right for people who already know the category. The hype-phase needs Cloudera’s ‘AI realist’-insights, and we’re the ones who can give that unique voice the platform it deserves.’

‘We needed a partner in South Africa who understood the detail of data and cloud architecture over and above just the terminology. As we help organisations build, deploy, and scale production-grade AI applications seamlessly across multi-cloud and on-premises environments with Cloudera Anywhere, we required a team that could articulate that technical substance,’ said Sara Lewis, Director of Communications, EMEA at Cloudera.

‘Red Ribbon’s deep understanding of this space, combined with their local media relationships, made them the clear differentiator in our pitch.’

‘South African organisations are accelerating their data and AI strategies, and how we communicate needs to keep pace,’ said Warren Olivier, Regional Vice President Africa at Cloudera. ‘Red Ribbon brings the local market depth we require to reach enterprise leaders directly, in language that matches where their thinking already is.’

Red Ribbon Communications has worked in South African technology PR for 23 years, with a client base spanning enterprise technology, cybersecurity and fintech, to name but a few.

RED RIBBON COMMUNICATIONS
https://redribboncommunications.co.za

Navigating Generational Behaviours In The Workplace

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Modern Marketing
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Navigating Generational Behaviours In The Workplace
Mark Baker, Mygrow.

Mark Baker, CEO at Mygrow, writes why emotional intelligence has become a leadership necessity. Today’s workplace can bring together people whose experiences of work were formed in very different environments.

Someone who began their career in a structured organisation where hierarchy carried considerable weight may now be leading employees who entered the workforce expecting flexibility and a greater say in how decisions are made.

These differences are often described as generational, but age is not always the source of the tension. In our work with organisations, we often find that the real differences concern people’s values and their expectations of what work should look like.

Baby Boomers and many Gen X employees built their careers in environments that placed considerable value on structure, discipline, commitment and respect for authority.

Millennials and Gen Z entered working life as expectations were shifting towards flexibility, self-development, inclusivity and involvement in decision-making. These are broad patterns rather than descriptions of every individual, but they help explain why people around the same table can approach a workplace issue differently.

Flexible working has brought some of these differences into view. Following the pandemic, we saw organisations where senior leaders wanted employees back in the office while younger employees resisted returning to previous ways of working. The disagreement concerned where people worked, but it reflected different ideas about commitment, autonomy and how performance should be judged.

When Communication Styles Collide

These differences become harder to manage when they influence how people communicate. A leader who has spent decades in hierarchical organisations may reasonably believe their experience should carry weight. A younger employee may have entered a working world where questioning ideas and contributing to decisions are actively encouraged.

When neither understands what is driving the other, questions can be interpreted as disrespect, while authority can be experienced as dismissiveness. We see situations where people effectively talk past one another: the leader places greater emphasis on their authority and experience while the employee continues to push for their perspective to be considered.

Feedback often exposes the same tension with younger employees often expecting to participate in conversations and wanting their views to be heard, including when they disagree with someone who holds greater organisational authority. Leaders accustomed to a different relationship between seniority and influence may find this challenging. The way feedback is given and received can determine whether the conversation remains constructive.

Technology Is Changing Who Holds The Expertise

Technology is also changing how knowledge and experience are shared within multigenerational teams. Younger generations tend to have greater familiarity with digital tools and may adopt technologies such as AI with relative ease. Experienced leaders may be adapting to technologies that bear little resemblance to the systems they used while developing their professional expertise.

Experience and knowledge no longer always follow the traditional organisational hierarchy. A younger employee may understand an emerging technology better than their manager, while the manager has years of organisational and professional experience that help determine where that technology can be applied effectively.

Leaders need to recognise the value of both because organisations lose something when experience becomes a reason to dismiss new ways of working. They also lose valuable judgement when enthusiasm for technology overlooks what can be learned from previous changes.

The Idea Of A Career Has Changed

Different generations may have very different expectations of what a successful career looks like. Many people from older generations developed expertise within a particular profession and progressed through an organisation over many years.

Younger employees are increasingly comfortable moving between roles and employers, even across industries. Technology has widened their options further by allowing someone in South Africa to work for an organisation elsewhere in the world without relocating. The relationship between an employee and an organisation has evolved alongside those opportunities.

This can create very different views of loyalty and career progression. For example, a leader who spent years building a career within one organisation may see frequent moves as a lack of commitment, while a younger employee may simply see them as a normal part of building a career in today’s workplace.

Where Emotional Intelligence Comes In

Managing these differences requires leaders to understand what people bring into an interaction beyond their job title or generational label. Emotional intelligence helps leaders understand those influences and respond appropriately.

EQ can be understood as an overall capability made up of individual competencies. Fitness offers a helpful comparison: we can talk about someone’s overall fitness while recognising that different physical capabilities contribute to it. Emotional intelligence works in a similar way.

One of the most important competencies in a multigenerational workplace is emotional self-awareness. People arrive at work carrying assumptions formed through their upbringing and previous experiences. Older employees may have developed professionally in environments where deference to authority was expected and emotions had little place in working life. Younger generations have often received greater encouragement to express their views and expect their individual perspective to be acknowledged.

Understanding these influences helps a leader recognise what may be happening during a difficult interaction. It does not require accepting every behaviour or lowering organisational standards. It allows the leader to consider why two people may respond differently to the same situation and decide how best to manage it.

Flexibility is another important EQ competency in this environment. Leaders cannot assume that the leadership approach they experienced will work equally well for everyone they manage. They need enough awareness and adaptability to adjust how they communicate while maintaining what the organisation requires.

Making Different Perspectives Useful

A multigenerational workforce gives organisations access to employees with different forms of knowledge. Someone with decades of organisational experience brings lessons gained through changing markets and previous technological shifts. A digitally native employee may recognise possibilities in AI and emerging technology that an experienced colleague has yet to encounter.

One perspective does not have to displace the other. Leaders can create working environments where employees bring both into the same conversation.

This requires enough psychological safety for employees to contribute and challenge one another without disagreement becoming damaging conflict. Leaders also need to examine their own assumptions about authority and what good work looks like.

Generational labels can help explain some of the influences people carry into the workplace, provided they do not replace an understanding of the individual. Emotional intelligence helps leaders recognise their own responses and consider what may be driving someone else’s behaviour so they can adjust their approach when needed.

A leader who can only lead people who think and work as they do is managing for conformity. Five generations in one workplace will test assumptions about authority and commitment, including whose knowledge deserves respect. Organisations that fail this test may call it a generational problem. But often, it is a leadership problem. Success lies in the self-awareness to know the difference.

MYGROW
https://www.mygrow.me/

Trust Isn’t Built By Going Viral

By
Modern Marketing
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Trust Isn't Built By Going Viral
Mkhuseli Vangile, The Dynaste Communication Firm

Mkhuseli Vangile, Founder and CEO of The Dynaste Communication Firm, writes why a brand’s credibility is now more valuable than a ‘pretty’ website.

In the time it takes to scroll past a cat video, a consumer has already decided whether they trust your brand. We live in an era of digital abundance, where a slick Instagram grid is as easy to buy as a cup of coffee. But as any South African who has been burned by a dropshipping site with stolen photos can tell you, looking legit is not the same as being legit. The digital landscape is littered with brands that mastered the aesthetic but failed the credibility test.

We have entered the age of the ‘Trust Economy,’ and for businesses, this is the only currency that matters. According to a 2024 PwC survey, 72% of local consumers say trust is a deciding factor in their purchasing decisions. Yet, despite this, many companies remain obsessed with chasing likes rather than building reputations.

People are exhausted by the constant barrage of adverts. They are skeptical. As branding expert Mkhuseli Vangile puts it, ‘People are not only looking at what a brand sells anymore. They are looking at how the brand presents itself, how it communicates and whether it feels genuine.’

This requires a fundamental shift in how we approach online communication. It is no longer enough to broadcast. Brands need to converse.

The first step is moving away from the ‘corporate robot’ tone. Digital natives can smell a scripted response from a mile away. They want to see the faces behind the business; the real people packing the boxes or answering the DMs. In a country as diverse and vibrant as ours, hiding behind a logo is a missed opportunity. Authentic storytelling sharing the journey of a small business owner in Cape Town or the craftsmanship behind a local product creates a connection that no amount of paid advertising can replicate.

Furthermore, we need to accept that our customers are our most effective marketing team. A study by BrightLocal found that 91% of 18-to-34-year-olds trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. We are a nation of word-of-mouth purists, and that is amplified tenfold online.

Are you leveraging your positive customer experiences? Are you responding to criticism with grace and a promise to do better? South Africans are forgiving, but they are not forgetful. Deleting a negative comment isn’t hiding the problem; it’s creating a conspiracy theory. As one local business owner recently noted, ‘Customers don’t expect perfection; they expect honesty when things go wrong.’

Ultimately, credibility is about the gap between what you promise and what you deliver. If your website says ‘Contact us within 24 hours,’ you better have a human being on the other end of that line.

Trust isn’t built in a day, and it certainly isn’t built by going viral. It’s built in the monotonous moments the follow-up emails, the clear pricing, the on-time deliveries. So, ask yourself this: If a stranger landed on your site today, would they hand over their hard-earned rands? If the answer is no, it’s time to stop performing and start proving.

DYNASTE COMMUNICATIONS FIRM
+27 11 038 9705
info@thedcf.co.za
https://thedcf.co.za/

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