THE ADNEWS NGEN BLOG: Advertising in 2020 - where will you be?

It was the place to be on Wednesday 22nd May when the inaugural AdNews Media Sales Summit was held at the new Doltone House Hyde Park.

Change and collaboration was the order of the day, an analysis of where the media industry has been and where it is going by some of the best in the business.

Amanda Gore kicked off the day with an entertaining explanation of the 'F' word and made a song and dance (literally) about the art of self management. Amanda’s enthusiasm provided the audience with an uplifting approach addressing the consistently evolving economic climate, understanding perspective and realising what is important. This was a personal highlight for me and I thoroughly enjoyed being a ‘Joy Fairy’.

We heard from key note speaker John Symonds who gave an insightful address about his entrepreneurial way of life, his business and the personal challenges he has faced. He spoke openly about his ability to adapt to change from growing up as a child  - the son of a nomadic fruiterer to creating and running the multimillion dollar business Aussie Home Loans.

Ellie Rogers took us back to basics and gave us a 101 in programmatic buying and the impact it will have on sales teams moving forward. According to Rogers, technologists rather than technology are those who would lead the charge in change and we will all need to keep up.

A panel of some of Australia’s most experienced media heads had a healthy discussion about programmatic buying, idea ownership and idea generation. GroupM CEO, Steady stated ‘by the end of the year 70% of all digital buying would be done programmatically within GroupM businesses’ with outdoor not too far behind as this was already occurring in other territories.  Moderator Paul McIntyre did a great job at keeping the gentlemen inline and the conversation upbeat.

While Jerry Harris from New Ltd spoke about pioneering a future sales team and the skill set needed for tomorrows sale executives, Myself and nine other Ngen’ers chatted with Peter Zavecz about what 2020 would look like. Zavacz uncovered Gen Y’s perspective on the changing industry, managing people and our roles.  It was fantastic experience and great to be a part of the high calibre of speakers throughout the day.

Throughout the summit we also heard from Tom Moult, who addressed the divide between media agencies, creative agencies and media sellers, David Hefter taught us about dealing with direct clients and Marcia Reheb outlined dealing with different personalities and achieving success. 

The line up speakers concluded with George Pesutto uncovering some invaluable insights from the recent Roy Morgan Media Benchmark Index Study.

The day was wrapped up with the announcement of Media Brand of Year – Seven Network and Media Company of the Year – Fairfax Media. Congratulations to both recipients and a huge Thank You to AdNews and IPG Media Brands for hosting such a fantastic event. I look forward to attending the event next year.

Danni Hudson
Account Manager
Ignite Media Brands