An African advertising industry shake up looms as three of South Africa’s top players in the online marketing space join to form the continent’s largest and first truly full-service digital agency.

On 1 October, Cambrient, Stonewall+ and Brandsh will merge to launch a new digital agency called Native (www.native.co.za) headed by newly-appointed CEO Jason Xenopoulos.

“The strategic integration of our pooled intellectual capital will see a new kind of agency emerge – one focused on digital-through-the-line,” says Xenopoulos. 

“By combining the skills and resources of three of the country’s leading digital specialists, we have harnessed the opportunity to build Native into a clear and unassailable market-leader,” Xenopoulos says. “The Internet is revolutionising the advertising and marketing industry and moving a bigger percentage of media spend online. As a result the focus is shifting away from traditional agencies towards their digital counterparts and this has created a definite gap in the market.”

Native’s combined skill set brings under one roof digital marketing strategy, creative conceptualization and design, web and mobile technology, online and mobile media, social media including community management and online content development as well as research and analytics.

Native’s pooled client list will include SA Tourism, General Motors, Standard Bank, Vodacom, Distell, Nestle, SEACOM and DStv.

“Digital marketing and media offers unprecedented opportunities for marketers to track campaigns across multiple platforms using a suite of interactive tools, many of which will be developed by Native.” says Xenopolous.

When Native starts operations in October they will have offices in Cape Town and Johannesburg and a head count of more than 120 staff, positioning them as the largest digital agency in the country.

Native will be led by Xenopoulos, an influential figure in the South African media, marketing and advertising industry. Co-founder and managing director of VWV Interactive, he was also CEO of JSE-listed Metropolis* Transactive and the architect of Primedia’s entertainment strategy. A director of internationally-awarded feature films and TV commercials, he was also Y&R South Africa’s executive creative director where he oversaw the MTN account and the Pick n Pay brand re-launch. Xenopoulos’ experience covers both digital and traditional media, as well as above-the-line brand advertising and filmed entertainment.”

Further details of Native’s dynamic vision and corporate identity will be revealed in the coming weeks.

Stonewall+ was formed in 1997 and is recognized for exceptional online design work. Supported by digital marketing strategy, the company’s offering has attracted leading brands including General Motors, Nestle and Vodacom.

Cambrient started in 2001 and has carved out a niche in the South African industry, focused on technology and building licensable software products that have the ability to develop large web platforms. Over 150 content-heavy web destinations including Moneyweb, DSTV, Pick n Pay and SA Tourism have been built using their software products.

Brandsh, the youngest of the three at just four years old, is a pioneer in the social media and mobile advertising industry and growing at a rapid rate. Brandsh’s work with clients such as Standard Bank, SEACOM and SA Tourism is bringing these entities into the new era as digital becomes an increasingly important part of marketing strategy.

A little about the experience. Firstly, the beauty is that our hotel is a road across from the convention centre. The convention centre is easy to navigate, although you do tend to rush to sessions, not to have the doors closed in your face. I managed three sessions yesterday. 

The first a Content Strategy session, hosted by Margot Bloomstein was a full house, and whilst she raised interesting points, admittedly there were no profound lessons. Well for me, and that's because I play in the space. For someone who doesn't, the interesting points she raised were:

• Message architecture should be confident, simple and inviting. 

• From a design perspective, content should be anticipated and the layout should support the content, broken up with bulleted lists, hooks, description splits and posted reviews. 

• In strategy, the first question is what content already exists, is it current, appropriate and relevant, always bearing quality in mind. 

• From an SEO perspective, translate meta content for tone, not just for keywords

I liked the point she raised about planning for the expiration of content - something I believe is always forgotten. And there is little worse than arriving at a site with dead content. 

I then moved across to Brian Solis' session. It was good. Someone likened him to a tele-evangelist. The topic covered most of what is in his new book, Engage. What was great was the panel, which included Dennis Crowley from Foursquare, Jeremiah Owyang of Web-Strategist and Frank Eliason of ComCast. They spent time discussing relationship management and whose responsibility in the corporate it is. CRM becomes Social Relationship Management. I often, and I wonder if you do too, get the feeling that the bigwigs change the goalposts too quickly. Spratty says I must use the word amorphous. Its as if they are adapting to keep up. And I find it disconcerting. I think its because it seems that their position as 'thoughtleaders' means that they continuously have to produce content to keep them current. Or popular? Or is it just because this industry is all about continuous evolution? Not sure. What is evident though is that the people needing to hear it are corporates. Service divisions of corporates. 

Finally, Heidi Patmore and I went to the Time, Social & Location talk. It was a bit vague and surface level. Allan Kent called it first-base. The best part of the discussion was meeting and standing next to Matt Galligan of Simple Geo, who I hope to interview over the next few days for his thoughts on time, social and location and how we should be developing for the SA market. We discussed Waze and how despite being a great product they are not sharing their data. Which is a big debate, and one I hope to drill more into.  

Justin Spratt made the Mark Cuban vs. Avner Ronen (Boxee) debate, and the most important thing that stood out to him was when the Mark Cuban reminded the audience to follow the money. The debate should be up on YouTube soon. There was a false fire drill during the session where attendees were evacuated and brought back in. Andy Folk summed it up his thoughts aptly. 

Other highlights included the fantastic dinner sponsored by Vinny Lingham and Yola hosted at a restaurant again, across the Road, Fogo de Chao. What a treat. Its a Brazilian steakhouse and the service and attention to detail are amazing. You have a 'coaster' in front of you. One side is green, the other red. If you want meat, place it green side up and the carvers will bring their dish to you and slice right then and there. We ate like Kings. 

I was also taken on a quick tour around the city (the University football stadium seats 100 000 - the 2nd biggest in the country - and that's University), was treated to a P Terry's burger and double thick chocolate shake.  Austin is beautiful, the sky is so big. Pics to follow!