Contributors

Director of OneDayOnly, an innovative online sales platform that is changing the way that people buy online, Laurian thrives on the challenge of constantly finding ways to be innovative and stay one step ahead. As a mentor and leader, she is proudest of the team that she has built at OneDayOnly.

Erin's career has predominantly been spent as an executive in consumer finance, alternative funding and fintech environments . She is passionate about creating engaging work environments and platforms to drive innovation while seamlessly aligning the business and people strategies. By combining creative thinking with analytical decision making, she has been heading up the brand and consumer experience as well as digital and content strategies for Retail Capital.

Leendert van Delft, Vice President Global Sales Programs, Marketing & Global E-commerce, works for the world’s most international company: DHL Express; a division of Deutsch Post DHL Group. He executes the overall direction of DHL Express’ Global Sales Programs and Global Marketing, with a specific focus on leveraging the cross-border E-commerce opportunity, and steers DHL Express’ E-commerce priorities globally. Leendert and the DHL team are dedicated to supporting e-commerce merchants of all shapes and sizes as they pursue the untapped potential of global commerce.

Amanda Reekie is an experienced brand strategist and researcher who thrives on uncovering insight and wrangling meaning out of data. She has over 30 years of marketing and consumer insights experience starting in fast-moving consumer goods, retail and e-commerce. She is the founder of ovatoyou, an HTML and app based research tool with an associated panel of over 21 000+ online South Africans. Amanda was nominated for Shoprite/Checkers woman of the year in 2006 for the womenNATION project.

Born digital, Thabo leads the digital marketing function at Colgate-Palmolive. He has extensive experience in digital marketing, having worked both as a client lead across different digital creative agencies with specialization in the FMCG vertical and having headed the digital portfolio across 23 African countries for one of the world’s largest consumer brands companies.

Tinyiko Mageza is Marketing Executive at the V&A Waterfront. Prior to joining the V&A Waterfront, Tinyiko held senior and executive level positions at various financial institutions but her passion for Marketing was born at the beginning of her career when she joined the South African Breweries. Tinyiko describes herself as a lowkey activist for kindness (because kindness trumps everything), a curious and purpose-driven marketer and a storyteller. Born in Soweto, Tinyiko fell in love with the idea of escapism through words, pictures and stories.

A Project Management Officer at Dis-Chem, Annemarie was responsible for implementing, and currently oversees, the organisation’s online logistics and delivery systems She has almost a decade’s experience in the pharmaceutical sector in South Africa and is a registered professional nurse with a Diploma in Nursing Science (General, Psychiatry, Community) and Midwifery.

Matt has more than 15 years of experience with roles that have spanned general management, strategy, product development, trade marketing, project management and brand marketing & communications. Currently Head of Brand at Yoco, Matt previously led strategy and innovation for Castle Lager and was project manager for FIFA where he delivered one of the 2010 World Cup’s biggest projects.

Kia has extensive consulting experience across strategy, innovation and communication, and is a passionate customer champion, using customer experience strategy and data-driven insights to solve business problems.

CEO of Picup, a logistics and technology company company using a crowd sourced driver network, Antonio has a strong passion for entrepreneurship and started Picup and pursued the dream of building something improved the way business operate both locally and internationally. Also seeing how people have earned their livelihood through Picup had been driving force behind the Picup journey. He’s always enjoyed the challenges of a startups and trouble-shooting problems and is actively involved in the Cape Town start-up community, he mentors young founders.

Customer Experience Professional (CCXP), Julia Ahlfeldt has dedicated her career to helping organisations gain market leadership through customer-centricity. She has worked with the C-Suite of businesses including Virgin, Old Mutual and Cell C to deliver on their brand promise and foster customer loyalty through great experiences. Julia is also the producer and presenter of the podcast Decoding the Customer, which explores business trends and innovation in customer experience.

A multiple local & international award-winning senior digital executive, Ya’eesh Cader is Head of Digital & e-Commerce at Sanlam Investments. He has been involved in online sales and advertising initiatives across four continents, conceptualising and implementing digital marketing and business strategies on both the agency and client-side for brands including Investec, Sanlam, SATRIX, Pam Golding Properties, Adidas and the PGA. Ya’eesh was recently named as "one of the most innovative and award-winning heads in digital for the financial industry" by Kurtosys.

Rahul is a co-founder of Peach Payments, a leading payments gateway in South Africa. He has worked with Edcon, Pepkor, Zando, SweepSouth and many more e-commerce websites and apps to improve their conversion rates, mitigate risk and optimise customer experience. Previously, Rahul worked with a strategy consulting firm in Boston, USA where he advised large retailers and airlines regarding e-commerce, marketing and ancillary revenue streams.

Charlie Stewart, Rogerwilco’s chief executive, has worked in the marketing industry for over 25 years. A Scot by birth, he began his career in London before moving to South Africa in the early 2000s. At Rogerwilco he takes a leadership role in crafting high impact ROI generating marketing interventions for the agency’s multinational clients. His book on B2B marketing, co-authored by Mark Eardley, was published by Penguin Random House in 2016. He contributes a monthly column on all things digital to MarkLives.