Getting the new job, according to Media Daily News: Maryam Banikarim, senior vice president of integrated sales marketing for NBC Universal, where she "struck deals with major NBC marketing partners for cross-marketing efforts," reports Wayne Friedman.
I do not believe Corporate has announced the creation of this job, or Banikarim's hiring, so this remains unconfirmed. Her arrival would come as GCI is already rolling out its first corporate brand campaign, one designed to persuade Wall Street and top marketers to see the company as much more than a traditional newspaper publisher and TV station broadcaster.
Banikarim, who is 42about 41 years old, has been at the NBC marketing post since February 2009, according to Friedman. Before NBC, she had been chief marketing officer at Univision Communications.
[Updated at 5:41 p.m. ET. In the many Gannett Blog comments, below, some posters wonder why a chief marketing officer job would be filled after the new brand campaign was created and launched.]
[Updated at 4:35 p.m. ET. What people have said about Banikarim. For one: "Bubbly and blunt."]
Related: Jeffrey Wilks named to newly created position of senior vice president of brand marketing for USA Today.
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| Banikarim |
Banikarim, who is 42
[Updated at 5:41 p.m. ET. In the many Gannett Blog comments, below, some posters wonder why a chief marketing officer job would be filled after the new brand campaign was created and launched.]
[Updated at 4:35 p.m. ET. What people have said about Banikarim. For one: "Bubbly and blunt."]
Related: Jeffrey Wilks named to newly created position of senior vice president of brand marketing for USA Today.
Wow she's a player. Google her
ReplyDeleteYo My Boss missed this scoop. Kind of quiet in Digital these days. No rumors at the copy machine?
ReplyDeleteIf this is true, I applaud Gracia. This woman is a graduate of Barnard and Columbia and seems capable. Her key job at NBC was cross-platform deals which makes sense that Gracia would want her. Especially given the new focus on Gannett Brand campaign designed to bring advertisers to one-stop shopping across our companies. From Banikarim's LinkedIn:
ReplyDeleteAMA BackPage - Mktg Q&A
Fast Company - Fast 50 Profile
Ad Age - 40 under 40
She will make a lot of money...for herself. She'll do nothing to help the company and be gone within two years.
ReplyDeleteShe's not under 40. She's 43. Looks to me as if Comcast is beginning to clean out the executive suite after taking over NBC.
ReplyDeleteOf course they are. You can never have too many highly paid executives ... especially when the priority is thinning the ranks that actually impact the quality of your product. Nothing against her, but she'll have to be VERY good at her job since she's essentially marketing crap.
ReplyDelete11:23 and 11:55 is exactly what is wring with this site. You have no idea how accomplished this individual is and you post negative comments. This is the type of free thinking, successful leader you've all been begging for and you immediately take the negative position. Your extreme bias is quite sad.
ReplyDeletewhile the thought of adding another 6 to 7 figure person at the top makes me cringe (some of that money could be given to the overburdened and under compensated workers as merit pay-remember that?) I'll reserve knee jerk judgment and hope that a person from the outside can help get this dinosaur marching into the late 20th century, if not the 21st.
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree. They would take the top 10 people, let them go, and distribute that money to everyone else. That is a very good idea. Maybe it would be top 20 to move more money down.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't mind the pay so much if the suits were doing something. They are not. It's like a slow leak in a tire, but the innovation and creativity of this company is gone. One person isn't going to make any change, as we saw with Saridakis. The bureaucratic inertia just swamps and buries any creative ideas.
ReplyDeleteShe'll almost certainly report to Martore. The big questions:
ReplyDeleteHow will Banikarim build her own team? Will she be made a member of the top-level Gannett Management Committee? What's the size of her budget? How many folks will she bring from outside to work with her? Who within Gannett will have to give up turf to her? Who within GCI will have to report to her, instead of someone else? Does Banikarim become part of the advertising sales arm, or does her office become a hybrid of advertising and circulation?
Is marketing really our problem? Or is the real problem that we haven't yet discovered the digital technologies are about to roll over us and drive us under. We need a head of digital to oversee this and guide us into the future, but Gracia seems to be determined to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear and sell this company. Very, very strange.
ReplyDeleteIs this an effort by corporate to take over and run what Yahoo was trying to do with its newspaper alliances? The Yahoo consortium is falling apart, but corporate thinks it was such a good money-coining idea that it needs to continue in some fashion.
ReplyDeleteIt won't take long before she and Martore clash. She's on her way to the top.
ReplyDelete2:03 is right. SXSW (going on in Austin right now) journalism panels are all about the digital shift. Jim, maybe you want to link the NYU blog from the journalism conversations going on at SXSW. NYTimes had a showing of their documentary The Front Page. Its worth following SXSW as it's a tech conference and alot is being discussed about journalism.
ReplyDeleteTo 11:23am and all the Debbie Downers, geez can we at least hope that bringing in someone with Banikarim's credentials and background might actually benefit all? How many times have we all seen entries on this blog calling for new blood with new ideas? Do what the first commenter said and google Banikarim. She speaks French, Spanish and Farsi, earned a BA from Barnard in poli-sci and an MBA and MA/international affairs from Columbia. In an old video when asked what other profession she would have pursued had she not made a life in marketing, she said investigative reporter because it takes the same curiosity, drive and empathy. She speaks about the wisdom of hiring people smarter than herself. At first glance it appears we've hired someone smart and committed enough to speak truth to Martore and the division heads. I like what I hear but know that confirmation of Banikarim's character and abilities will only be found in what she actually accomplishes as CMO.
ReplyDeleteLet's be adult-like and hold the judgements until there's something to be judged.
So you are saying we need a head if digital correct? And if that position was filled you'd stand up and cheer?
ReplyDeleteQue es My Boss?
ReplyDeleteShe may be the greatest marketing wizard since butter beans were invented. But is marketing our problem? It looks to me as if our problem is a decline in advertisements and readership. What marketing is going to do to reverse that, I don't really know. They already know who we are, what we do, and where we do it.
ReplyDelete2:38 she was head of cross-media selling at NBC. She put together very large deals with advertisers and all NBC properties. According to the MediaPost article. So that is a revenue driver job.
ReplyDeleteI'll give her six months. Another Sadirakis here. Gracia doesn't do bright ideas.
ReplyDeleteHow much new business did that new branding ad campaign bring in? I don't think filling up the empty offices in the Crystal Towers is going to improve the revenues at ny paper,
ReplyDeleteI don't care if she speaks Latin and ancient Greek, but I have just gone through my furlough and I can't tell you how much I resent reading that corporate is larding up its staff.
ReplyDeleteThe CMO position has been pushed by our Coke-affiliated board member for a couple years. Ditto the branding campaign. She looks to have great credentials, but as others have posted, I suspect she may become frustrated once she gets here and sees the hollow force she has to work with.
ReplyDeleteWonder if Jeffrey Wilks at USAT is happy about this? His incoming mission was to serve as a de facto CMO for Gannett while he spent most of his efforts on USAT. I guess they decided to look elsewhere for talent.
She is very much like Saridakis. Smart, energetic with a great pedigree, but those people are too smart to stay here long enough. Seriously speaking, why would she join Gannett?
ReplyDeleteAlso, we now have more chiefs than an Indian reservation in Gannett!!!
Does anyone do the regular work?
She's WAY to talented to work at Gannett. She'll scare all the other useless vampires at corporate.
ReplyDeleteThen they'll circle around her and get her out. They can't have someone succeed. That would ruin their whole "it's not our fault the economy is bad" excuse for constantly failing.
I give her more than six months. Less than a year.
And I'll save some poster a step up to the soap box.
You obviously haven't been around long enough to know how this company works. More to the point how it doesn't work. Everyone here has seen the story before. Bright promising go getter comes in. They could turn the company around. It starts of with a bang. Then they have to deal with the idiots around them. There are to many. They give up. They leave. The end.
Blah, blah, blah, so she's too talented to work here...she'll leave in 6 months, a year...why bother hoping she might bring us some advertising opportunities and grow revenue...there are other areas needing improvement that management should focus upon such as the quality of our publishing and broadcast operations, the effectiveness of sites like the graphic production centers and the regional toning centers, and on and on and on. Yes, management needs to fix all of these problem areas but if they can do that while also bringing in someone like Banikarim to attract new revenue streams then perhaps the future won't look so bleak. Piss and moan all you want but at least hope for the best.
ReplyDelete11:23 here... If i'm wrong, i'll buy everybody here a beer. If she leaves in less than two years, she buys.
ReplyDelete