Charo Santos-Concio is the new president of ABS-CBN

lopez ba si charo? kala ko sa lopez lang iyan hehe congratz

“Kapamilya” is truly the best word to describe the Philippine’s no 2 network’s sales and marketing team. The word screams “Nepotism” on all fronts, ‘family and political nepotism’.

Despite being dislodged as the leader, they still service brand clients the same way they did five years ago, like sh*t. I challenge any marketing outsider to conduct a short interview on any brand manager or media independent and chances are, 60-80% would say their servicing falls short on expectations. Not only do they ridicule the science of marketers, they even had the nerve to disrupt the business of creative agencies and production houses by creating cheap, un-thought of commercials, though would be the delight of marketers for the short term (due to meeting savings mandates), but eventually disrupts the ‘long term’ equity of the brand.

How can you trust a marketing team which is composed of a sales team who laughs at their clients, coupled with the fact they are headed by a man with a proven track record of steering companies towards an iniquitous direction.

Its’ funny how Kapamilya currently revamped its sales team a few years back, only to realize it still keeps its worst in its roster while it has let go of some of its’ valuable assets. A clear sample, its rival is being headed by a man who has a proven track record of positioning a UHF station from ‘zero’ to something. We all know where that rival station is right now right? . ABS also made the mistake of letting go of one of its best ‘research based’ marketing person who started his career in research. He and his team are nowhere in sight today (ran a short stint trying out running another VHF station to again limbo, recently associated with bahay ni chua), proving that anyone from ‘kapamilya’ are not stellar performers if thrown to the real sales and marketing world.

Ok, lets now focus on the little sales people of ‘kapamilya’ who see themselves as the big people in the Philippine marketing and advertising landscape. On a good month, these sales representatives make P100k to P300k in a month, working just 1- 2 hours a day, most of the time at home, make gossip the rest of the day and aren’t even armed with knowledge of the most basic marketing principles.

Despite this, they constantly complain how their clients berate them for not briefing them well, but in truth, they do not understand or more appropriately, their brains go blank once real work is required of them. Their most used phrase to comfort themselves.. “Haya mo na, tayo, at least malaki nakukuha, yung mga kliyente, maliit naman kita ng mga yan, lamang tayo no”. Some would even gesticulate…, “malulungkot lang mga yan kasi walang pera mga yan”. For marketers and ad practitioners who built their careers built on sacrifice and hard work, this is how we are viewed by these flies lucky enough to land on top of a carabao.

This sadly is what’s discussed inside sa bahay ni Kuya. Clearly with warped values and no knowledge of the process of growing brands, they simply see clients like cattle- running the rat race. Strutting the marketing world with their pretty faces, louis vuitton bags and brand new cars, there is a new class emerging amongst us.. airheads with lots of dough, sharp tongues, dull minds. Internally, they move up because prostitution of sorts happen within its various floors, concubines to the higher ups of the male kapamilya marketing heads. Those who benefit are those – you guessed it- are at the upper echelon of advertising sales haven.

Now, lets discuss the current ‘head of marketing’ because we all know that bad fruits doesn’t fall far from the tree…..

August is called the ‘ghost month’ in the Philippine stock market, where for the past 18 years, average performance is worst at this time of the year. There is surprising similarity with the August month and the current Head of kapamilya Marketing track record in terms of delivering the best yields.

Lets back track a few years, a former President of a now ‘to be closed’ media shop. He had a pretty long stint with the second biggest network back in the late 1990s up and was content being No. 2, hence the loss of favor from some parties wanting to take No. 1 spot (accomplished without him). He also fell from heaven with an uncovered ‘anime’ scandal, ala ZTE, he and his superior were caught red handed, receiving kickbacks from said program content provider (his superior is still currently connected with a free to air network with ‘nil’ sales figures and ratings). This fellow was then tapped by a scandal filled media independent tasked to handle a ‘milk giant’ who wanted to come clean this time around, losing that, then came a telco giant, where again as head, failed to meets its needs..and with his brief stint, press release was.., he was absorbed as head of another network with at the time, still had salvageable ratings and respectable sales figures. Nepotism or Pare Pare system prevailed and with his two year stint with this network, all the more it went into a spiraling depression. With what was observed and accounted for above, he does have a solid track record of delivering negative numbers.

At present, he is again lucky, bagging the coveted Head of Sales and Marketing position for this now No. 2 network, which still is on the downtrend in terms of ratings and sales, still services its clients like sh*t, and still is reportedly cleaning the coffers of earning opportunities within sales and marketing (trips abroad for brand managers and media people) . From my experience, good people shine in time and the bad apples-which stink will eventually stink too much they have to thrown out the trash…

Well, this story is still unfolding and hoping current President CS-C be enlightened to clean her network fast, before their current position falls further down the ladder. Fact- Most, if not all marketers wish the ‘kapamilya station’ would fall from heaven sooner then they would want to think. Be more mindful and respectful of your clients for you to survive. If nothing happens, see you all down south.