Matt Willmott has experience developing growth strategies for SaaS companies spanning multiple industries and countries. Starting his career in Marketing, Matt realised the front end of marketing was broken, struggling to gather a complete overview of who their clients and prospects were, what they were saying across a variety of mediums, and how to reward those loyal to their brand. When the opportunity came along to join Falcon.io in a mission to fix these issues for other organisations, it was a clear choice and Matt joined Falcon’s HQ in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Matt moved back to his hometown of Melbourne to open Falcon’s first APAC office. Today as Head of APAC, Matt helps his team assist organisations to realise the potential of an all in one social media management tool to not only identify who is talking to them via media monitoring and community management, but take decisive action and retarget those with specific messaging.
Matt will be joining us at #DMWF Asia on 18-19 February, hosting the session ‘The Current and Future State of Influencer Marketing’.
Ahead of #DMWF Asia we caught up with Matt, to find out his thoughts on the digital marketing landscape, what he thinks us marketers should be looking out for in the future and what he’s most looking forward to seeing at #DMWF Asia on 18-19 February.
My Let’s kick off with a bit about your background in digital marketing and what you’re up to at the moment?
My background is in marketing and sales with mostly SaaS companies. I’ve been with Falcon.io, a social media management platform for almost four years now. It’s been a really exciting ride as we’ve grown from a startup to a worldwide organization. I was initially based in our Copenhagen, Denmark headquarters – but when our Asia Pacific clientele began to skyrocket I moved home to Melbourne to take up the position of Manager APAC Sales.
Which digital marketing trend that has impacted your campaigns the most in past year?
Being in the social media space they are very occupied with declining organic reach, which is why the spend being put into social media advertising has become greater than ever. Social media actually just overtook print to become the third largest advertising channel after TV and paid search. Our customers obviously want to know how to draw the most ROI out of their ad spend. There is so much to consider with channel mix and targeting, and that’s what we help them with.
What is the next BIG thing that marketers should be preparing for now?
My topic at DMWF Asia is The Current and Future State of Influencer Marketing. Now, influencer marketing is hardly new, but it keeps changing in response to social media user habits. These days the emphasis is on authenticity, and being relatable, which is why micro-influencers rather than big name celebrities are the influencers of choice for even big brands. Marketers need to figure out how they can employ all the technologies that are also “next BIG things”: e.g. AI, AR and VR while remaining authentic.
What is the best piece of advice you have been given as a marketer?
Looking at it from a sales point of view, I’d say great content is obviously vital, but it won’t get you where you want to be if you don’t have solid KPIs and a system in place for tracking metrics. You should test and optimize everything. All that work will be for nothing if you don’t ensure you are delivering the right content to people at the right point in their customer journey.
What, in your opinion, is the most exciting new technology for marketers?
Well, while augmented reality has been around a while, it’s now affordable and accessible to more “ordinary” companies so I expect we’ll be seeing more and more marketing campaigns doing a lot with it. It could be truly transformative in how we create content and engage with prospects and customers. It really is an exciting open canvas.
What can our community learn from you at your session/panel at DMWF Asia?
Influencer marketing has fallen under some criticism during the past year, especially because of influencers with inflated metrics and the discussion around the mental health effects of social media in general. We’ll find that despite these drawbacks, influencer marketing is still a multi-billion dollar industry for brands to connect with their core audiences, leverage their message and, ultimately grow. Come see for yourself!
Who else on our DMWF Asia speaker line up are you looking forward to learning from?
The speaker line-up looks very impressive this year. I’m genuinely excited about every talk, but if I have to name names I’d say I’m looking most forward to the panel discussion between Sisca Margaretta from Experian, Kabeer Chaudhary from M&C Saatchi Performance and Tyler Tai from Brandwatch. Their topic is about how digital insights are changing the way brands understand and talk to consumers. Take Twitter for example – it’s the biggest catalogue of human thought to ever exist, but few brands know how to properly utilise it to serve their customers and understand their needs.
Thank you Matt! We look forward to seeing you for #DMWF on 18– 19 February in Asia!
Matt Willmott will be hosting the session, ‘The Current and Future State of Influencer Marketing’ on day 2 at #DMWF Asia on 18-19 February 2020 at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.
To see our full agenda and book tickets please visit our website.
The post #DMWF Asia 2020: Interview with Matthew Willmott, Head of APAC at Falcon.io appeared first on #DMWF World Series.