Succulence here, there, and everywhere.

@immapPH to go on HD! ISO ad agency/mktg companies for a brand refresh

pauljohnpena — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 12:32:08 +0000

The Internet and Mobile Marketing Association of the Philippines (IMMAP) officially invites advertising agencies or marketing communications companies who are bona fide members of the organisation to its

CALL FOR CREDENTIALS AND INTENT TO PARTICIPATE

as we re-engineer IMMAP and chart its future through a brand refresh with the following areas part of the winning agency/company’s scope of work:

Overall brand strategy aligned with our new mission and vision
New corporate identity and official applications including merchandising ideas
Web UX design and social content strategy aligned with the new brand strategy
Brand relaunch activation ideas
Strengthened member value proposition

Interested parties may submit an official letter of intent to participate to the ff:

Danny Eguia, Executive Director
danny.eguia@immap.com.ph
secretariat@immap.com.ph

Pao Peña, Vice President
pao@pauljohnpena.com

Deadline of submission of letter of intent to participate is on 17 February, Fri.

Agencies/companies that are represented in the current Board of Directors and Executive Officers of IMMAP need not participate.

For more information, please contact Pao at 0917 888 1910 / pao@pauljohnpena.com / @pauljohnpena on Twitter.

Goodbye, Whitney.

pauljohnpena — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 10:25:15 +0000

I remember hearing her songs on the radio and watched her on MTV when I was still a kid. Of course, like other children, I didn’t know much about her and just knew she was a popular celebrity in the US. Growing up, I heard her pepper the airwaves with songs whose titles I don’t even know by heart. But I knew they were great songs performed with so much passion, fervor, and elegance. Her voice flowed through the airwaves just as how every great performer would (and should) do.

While most people grew up with Michael Jackson and maybe the Beatles in the background, I grew up with Whitney’s music. The occasional top charters, the strong association with the Bodyguard, and her jarring and very well talked about battle with relationships and drugs make her one of my top of mind names of artists to even leave an impression so lasting that even though her songs are left without titles in my mind I feel sadness for what the world lost but I keep dearly in my childhood memories.

It’s like losing an aspect of your past that while they linger there, you realise they’re no longer somewhere out there and that you will no longer see nor hear them. Not now, not anymore, not ever again.

So long, Whitney. Thank you for leaving me one of my most favourite songs of all time.

R.I.P. Whitney Houston 1963-2012.

Leo Burnett Manila ISO of Regional Community Manager

pauljohnpena — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:16:05 +0000

We’re looking for a REGIONAL COMMUNITY MANAGER for a technology brand

Job Purpose:
The Community Manager is responsible for ensuring active and engaged social communities (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google+, Tumblr, etc.) by creating and managing editorial content calendars, monitoring online conversations and participating in those conversations to build product visibility and support brand awareness and engagement at local market level.

Primary Responsibilities:
Create and manage content for social media conversations and activities
• Post content for feeds and discussion-starter topics including writing Facebook Status Updates, Tweets, Blog posts, etc. in alignment with global/local SM strategy
• Manage page/channel daily operations, including themes/skin/layout changes when appropriate.
• Maintain editorial calendars and work with directors for proper approvals
• Adhere to the standard practices guide for social channel responsibilities and guidelines
Build community strategy within local market
• Identify, locate and engage advocates and influencers within the various social community sites to foster dialogue and allow discussions about brand’s products and promotions/campaigns
• Cultivate a social presence and activate community groups for the brand’s product divisions
• Review and respond to user generated comments in order to foster a positive community and add value to the users experience as outlined in the schedule
• Enforce Social Media Guidelines as defined by global/local social media strategy
• Monitor conversations and user generated comments and escalate to internal and client stakeholders as necessary

Analytical Reports

• May be required to pull and interpret data based on analytics reports. If required, the following tasks would be fulfilled by the role
o Provide regular reports during campaign/promotions to highlight key findings from social media forums, key areas reported include:
• Activity on Pages/channel management
• Community activity (fans, posts, comments, conversation topics, etc)
• Moderation actions (posts/comments/content removal/banning)
• Trends
• Issues and escalation performed
• Content opportunities

Qualifications:
• Proven experience managing social media platforms or communities for brands with an undergraduate degree, preferably with specialty in communications, marketing, public relations, or journalism

Important Considerations/Requirements:
• Digitally savvy and actively participates in wide variety of social media activities
• Understand popular social networks including design, functionality and users
• Affinity and passion for technology
• Excellent writing skills
• Superior communication skills
• Attention to detail
• Appreciative of creative product
• Self-starter
• Culturally sensitive
• Level of maturity required

Interested parties may send me their CV at pao.pena@ph.leoburnett.com Cheers!

Leo Burnett Manila ISO a Social Media Distribution Manager

pauljohnpena — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:14:41 +0000

Hooray for opportunities!

(Social Media) Distribution Manager

Job Purpose:
The Distribution Manager will be responsible for the design and creation of social media activation programs and strategies to maximize online engagement around the brand’s divisions, campaigns and promotions at the local level. This position will partner with the Community Manager but will interface with the local client, regional team and the Global Social Media Center headquartered in New York.

Primary Responsibilities:

Manage local social strategy and program design

• Understand the community and design programs, thought leadership for creating strategic marketing/communication plans across social media landscape
• Manage localization of global content into a strategic feed for production and integrations in local partner channels
• Collaborate with the project team to identify strategies, solutions and insight from content generated in social media on daily basis that drive traffic and grow number of fans/followers
• Identify what is working, what is not and create programs to adjust strategy to engage consumers in social media platforms
• Create and manage the local editorial calendar and ensure global/local content is pushed out, quality and timelines are met

Concepting & Executing Paid/Owned/Earned media programs
• Establish, maintain and leverage relationships with local bloggers & influencers,
• Understand online media landscape, identify target consumer lifestyles & create partnerships with relevant websites
• Understand the myriad of new web properties and distribution platforms
• Understand the ‘value exchange’ process by which earned partnerships are negotiated around
• Interface between Global Social Media Center, Social Media Director and other key stakeholders within the LB and brand organization

Qualifications:
• Manage page/channel daily operations, including themes/skin/layout changes when appropriate.
Important Considerations/Requirements:
• Ability to leverage existing media relationships to generate earned impressions & engagements
• Digitally savvy and actively participates in wide variety of social media activities
• Understand popular social networks including design, functionality and users
• Affinity and passion for technology
• Superior communication and presentation skills
• Attention to detail
• Appreciative of creative product
• Culturally sensitive
• LANGUAGE NOTE* Candidate must be fluent in English and local language(s)
• Level of maturity required
• Passionate leader who values and fosters collaborative, cohesive teams

Interested parties may contact me here or pao.pena@ph.leoburnett.com.

Sore left eye

pauljohnpena — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 03:31:27 +0000

Boo for raining on my last day of leave.

Page 2 of 366

pauljohnpena — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:04:47 +0000

Hello world.

Test post from devicedom.

Dear Lord

pauljohnpena — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 13:59:46 +0000

Dear Lord,

Thank you for this wonderful year.

You make all greatest things possible, and I thank you for giving me a fraction of it. Thankful forever for all the blessings you have given me and my family, my friends, and colleagues.

Thank you for giving us challenges that make us better people.

Thank you for the life you have given me and to all those around me and those whom I do not know yet.

Thank you for a life that only you make so succulent through others, through the world, through my everyday living.

Thank you for giving the world brilliant, creative, very sharp people.

Thank you for giving me a chance to be good and live life succulently.

Thank you for loving parents, a loving life-partner, caring family, wonderful friends and teammates.

Thank you for giving us the ability to engineer, design, create.

Thank you for giving us life.

I dedicate my 2011 and 2012 to you.

I love you. Every new year is a year dedicated to you.

Humbly,

Pao

2011: Tough, victorious, inspiring

pauljohnpena — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 06:57:58 +0000

I will never be a prominent blogger like some friends I know. I am bad at creating my own content. The best I do is post mobile photos to my Facebook, rarely on Instagram… my Twitter is luckily linked to my Foursquare check-in so that’s a bit of solid content there. Other than that, this blog is virtually a seasonal thing.
Some excuses:
No time

Okay, that’s the only excuse I use. No time. Quite true especially this year which witnessed me swirling about fast. There’s the new job at Burnett which required me to be on top of my game internally and externally. There’s IMMAP which required me to attend meetings at frequent intervals. There’s the drive to make money both for myself and the company I work for.

I didn’t even get to travel this year – not at least the level that I’d want to. This year I had hope to go to Nepal, revisit Europe, see NYC and club in it, and a whole lot more places to seize but left not done.

For all that I learned this year, one that tops my list is opportunity cost.

Opportunity cost is simply the cost of having chosen something over another – what you lose in the course of having chosen one over the other. And this is what I learnt most this year – and which I am now cherishing a lot.

Had I not decided to leave Globe, I would have received a generous amount of discretionary and performance bonuses. I would have been able to file my vacation leaves ahead and traveled, bought a new gadget here and there. Maybe bought a bag to replace my one year toddler, my everyday (and already tired) YSL bag that I got over a year ago in Paris. More money, no problem.

But I did. I decided to leave Globe. And there a ripple of effects was born.

Everyday I second guessed myself: can I do this? Can I handle this? I doubted myself if I could really do it. You know, facing clients who think they’re better than you is a problem for someone who has superiority complex. I will not deny it, it takes a lot of patience to listen and swallow your pride granted that you’re not part of the decision, you are the one at the mercy of a decision.

Then I always think of my revenue targets. It isn’t my first time to deal with revenues. At least at Globe, I was mandated to manage cost, to manage my expenses not revenues. Over at Zing.vn, I was mandated to bring to market a new service and manage my cost for bringing it to market. At Level Up, I had to manage my revenues, but the revenues were manageable, not crazy.

At Burnett, I woke up with it, I slept with it. I thought: Is this the track to being a general manager? I’ve always wanted to head a company and put everything under my control. I knew it was my training to becoming one. I have a lot of ideas on how to run companies effectively, efficiently, and how to inspire employees around a vision and how to create an atmosphere of friendly competition in order to achieve goals. And I knew this was my training. Something bigger is out there and I have to train for it.

Maybe I am dreaming too much. But this is where it all started: a dream. So be it.

I never thought 2011 would end on such a high note. Two weeks ago, I was doing my revenue tracking and I was literally harassing my leadership team over their revenues. I sent templates and called each of my staff’s attention to how much *more* we needed to generate in a few weeks’ time. Then I got a call from our comptrollership saying that as of that moment we were already hitting 108% of our revenue commitments.

I was caught in my own disbelief.

There were tears swelling in my eyes. That was an affirmation of, more than anything, that I could do it…. that I could turn around a company that was swelling with a lot of baggage. That I could inspire, that I could help others become what they want to be from a seven-year hiatus from the industry. That we are alive, we are a real large-sized agency *in* business.

So that’s how that story ends. Victorious.

Sometimes the opportunity cost is to be feared. I might have earned more had I not left, but the opportunity cost is less valiant when placed in comparo with the higher wave one could ride and risk.

Everyday I face personal challenges that I always promise to rise above. Some caused tears of anger, of pain and of pure stress. But it *is* bliss to see people smiling, people inspired to do and be more.

That is the highest order of commitment for me: to make people win, achieve, and be more. That is my promise in 2012. Nothing less.

To the best team, cheers!

What planning sessions are made of

pauljohnpena — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 19:38:45 +0000

My LB Arc leadership team goes on business planning for 2012.
Our first planning exercise was held when I was just less than a month old at work – when I was still the new kid on the block. Some of the guys who are now with our group weren’t in the first planning session… But much has changed.
Our first planning session was made of dreams, hopes and wishes… And some baggage, which was expected especially that this ain’t a start up, it is an agency that has been built over years of hardworking and perseverance from my predecessors and of those who are still part of this proud agency that I am now leading. Our first planning was fun, honest and hopeful and this is where we carved out what identity we want for the group we were renewing.

After eight months, much has changed… We are still hopeful, proud, and strong but all these are now more strongly grounded on experience that we will carry with us as we move into 2012. Quite challenging, I must say, especially that we have set pretty high standards for ourselves next year in terms of revenues, industry presence and quality of work.

But much is yet to be done. For one, much of these aspirations require massive support from all sources possible — management, peers, clients, even from the industry. Sometimes I wonder whether our dreams could even be supported if not only by ourselves and those who wish for us to succeed. But real faith doesn’t wither. Hope can only stem from a strong belief that ‘things’ will happen if we will them to.

Planning sessions are not only made of numbers, it is made of clearly drawn hopes, wishes, and even desires; all of which must be grounded on reality and the sincere, deliberate choice to not be simply caught by inertia, but by the choice to move and make things happen ourselves.

Potential energy vs kinetic energy… Inertia vs motion. The answer is clear. Planning sessions need to be about motion, force, and direction; the very same ingredients of success required to win next year.

My personal and professional thanksgiving post

pauljohnpena — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:21:21 +0000

I have been very busy these past few weeks, unbelievably busiest than ever before. On top of the full official work schedule and many things to do are ‘other’ things that require the same level of attention to detail and actual manual labour, ie. the massively successful first-ever IMMAP Open Mic Night and the recently concluded fun, alcoholic and insightful Ad Congress 22 in CamSur. Both these events would have called for individual blog posts but, as they say, that moment has passed.

But that is not an excuse to stop typing my thoughts; in fact, I missed it, but time and energy just didn’t permit words to come to this blog. At least if only for a time.My thing with thanksgiving since I am Filipino is that the spirit of giving thanks for me is livelier and much more climactic on Christmas and New Year’s Day simply because it is a great feeling to end and start a new year with. So every year-end I write or do something to give thanks to everyone who made that year possible through the difficulties and joys of being. Actually, not just ‘made possible’ but also for those who made it an awesome year.

This year, however, I find myself wanting to write a string of thanks even on Thanksgiving Day (in my case, +1 day after) simply because this year presented me a lot of changes, challenges, and great milestones both in my personal and professional lives.

That said, I have so much to be thankful for this early on, way ahead of my scheduled year-end post.

Let me start by thanking destiny, fate and the One for allowing my destiny to take place in my career. It was a difficult decision I had to make. I loved and still love Globe, but I gave in to the call of change in direction. That decision to leave Globe and join an ad agency (Leo Burnett) wasn’t easy at all given the circumstances: I built a team of highly competent digital marketing experts from the ground up, people from which have become my real friends beyond work… people I care so much about. Turning my back at them to say that I am moving forward was difficult to do. But at the same time it gave me a good feeling about how much more they could grow then that they were already on their own poised to do great stuff without – though temporarily – a leader.

For this I thank my Globe team for allowing me to move on and learn things only change could give. It was hard to leave them behind, but I know it would help everyone to grow bigger, fiercer, better through new opportunities, windows of perspectives.

In the same manner, I thank my new team at Leo Burnett where I face new challenges, new perspectives to take and learn from, new horizons to seize. It was not immediately easy doing digital marketing that is fundamentally the same as what I did back in Globe but different now in terms on which side of the desk I was on. But time allowed me to grow into it together with my team whom I’ve quickly learnt to understand, nurture, and appreciate. They cannot be compared to how my team was before — different personalities, different stories, different talents, different potentials. After downing how many Maker’s Marks, Malibus and Big Ass beers… we’ve bonded beyond the scope of the typical JOs and briefs we receive. Through all the difficulties, this team was able to rise above and are well destined to be the ones to change the face of digital in Leo Burnett. Together with them, I learn a lot about this new craft I have yet to master; but through it all, I see winners on our side of the fence.

This year also marks so many milestones I only fancied about before… this I think I have to thank people who left their identities anonymous except for a few who got me engaged on what I secretly really wanted to work on.

Late last year, I became a first time director at IMMAP… I fancied being on its board, secretly so but the opportunity came with a nomination to be a director. Voting happened and I got in. I loved it because I felt that I could contribute more to this industry where my mouth is, to do things in big ways that could help shape other people’s view of the digital practice. For this, I thank the people who nominated and got me into the board this year. Through that trust (I dare not dabble with politics because I only love doing things for their own good sake not for politics’ sake), I was able to help shape which by far is the biggest and most positive digital Summit and the massively successful IMMAP Open Mic Night. It’s hard juggling office work and industry work together and even saying those two in the same sentence without gasping for more air, but because the people I work with outside work are fun, insightful, big time experts much could be learned from, it was possible. I don’t really give a damn about what people have to say, but I love what I do and I thank those who have become instrumental to actually making things happen and generate positive results. (I cannot be dragged by sheer politicking based on unfounded, pedestrian rumour-mongery.)

If there’s one thing I absolutely love about this year is my realisation that nothing could go wrong if you are truly passionate and persevering about doing that things you love. That’s what moves generations, shapes the face of the earth, and changes mindsets for the good.

Above all these, I thank my family who though I don’t get to be with everyday I know loves me and wishes me well. Our silence in the family, particularly on just one side of the equation, is deafening but that is no reason for me to go astray or to hate or to feel numb about. I know there is love in each of us, we just have to find it back and live it.

I thank my sister, Ellaine, for constantly making us feel your love through your thoughtfulness and sweetness. Your children are your most visible achievements and for that and all that you are, know how proud I am of you and what you have done to your life, love and family.

The two most important people in my life deserve the most premier of spots, the finale:

Thank you Mum for being there for me and Rhex (and Bobby!) every day never failing to show your love through everything you do. You are indeed my truest, my most superlative (double!) of best friends. Thank you for the warmth of your embrace and kiss before I go to work and when I get home tired from it all. Always, I promise to take care of you and I will keep that promise.

Thank you, Moitie, for yet another fantastic year with you! Never a dull day even when one of us is not feeling well, or when we’re both tired… this love has made us grow together in very fun and yet profound ways never making our relationship taxing or a chore. Thank you for all your understanding, patience, and affection that never fail to soften even my hardest of mood swings. You make it light because you’re one funny partner only others could wish for. Thank you for love, sweetness and understanding that makes everyday and every moment happy. Thank you, Moitie! 365.26 ad infinitum.

It has been a great year so far and I look forward to the next…. thanks to the brilliant, loving, soulful, passionate people in my life. Thank you, thank you.