MANILA, PHILIPPINES – It’s no news to anyone that marketing and advertising have entered an era of transformation unlike anything we’ve seen before. As digital platforms redefine the way we consume content and engage with brands, what makes or breaks a brand’s success all comes down to how fast they and their teams have pivoted in these recent years and how well they can continue to keep up with all these shifts.
Kristine Go, Senior Vice President and Business Unit Head at Smart Communications, Inc., is well aware of these changes. In fact, she tackled the different phenomena the digital era has brought forward in a recent keynote for MMA IMPACT Philippines 2024.
According to Kristine, while the industry has been moving towards where we are now in the past decade, it’s these recent years that truly triggered a rapid digitalization. In fact, to her, we’ve come to a point that describing it as “fast paced” is an understatement.

We can see this even in the Philippine context. After all, up until 2020, the global and local media landscape were moving at a different pace. While digital was already taking over globally, the Philippine market was still driven by TV with ABS-CBN and GMA taking the reins. Then came the tipping point that Kristine marked as the start of the local digital acceleration: the pandemic and ABS-CBN losing its TV franchise.
But what specific changes did they bring forth? What exactly did this mean for marketers and consumers? In the same keynote, Kristine laid out a roadmap for understanding this transformed media environment using five themes that define the marketing landscape today.

1. Digital is our new reality.
While digital platforms have steadily been gaining more and more popularity since the early 2010s, it’s only in recent years that it has overtaken TV.
Kristine called attention to how the events of recent years along with the improvements in mobile connectivity and smartphone affordability have turned the once TV-led Philippines into an audience that now prefers content that they can control and consume and their own convenience. In fact, by the end of 2023, online viewership surpassed the viewership of free TV for the first time.

But watching videos, which totals to over nine hours spent weekly on an average among Filipinos, aren’t the only thing users are doing on their phones, either. On top of video streaming, Filipinos are spending an average of 12 hours a week on social media and over eight hours gaming.
This left brands no choice but to meet consumers where they are: online. That means that more campaigns were rolled out via streaming platforms, social media, and even gaming.
Here’s the kicker: brands have taken it a step further and even digitized other traditional advertising channels.
Take outdoor advertising for instance. Billboards and signage no longer only amplify visibility. With digital, many outdoor campaigns have become prompts for immediate engagement. From touchscreen capabilities and AR/VR experiences for elevated immersion to ads that users can engage with using mobile, the rise of digital out-of-home campaigns has turned the static to something users can interact with.
We can see the power of digitalization in how it has transformed even the most traditional channels in a big way. However, it didn’t just transform channels we’ve always known, it also led to the dominance of a newer channel.
2. Every person is a marketing channel.
While many brands have certainly stepped up to keep pace with digitalization, their official accounts and platforms are now far from the only points of conversion. Kristine pointed out how more consumers are now turning to other people.
Platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook have transformed users from passive consumers into active participants in the marketing ecosystem. As Kristine posited in her keynote, “The continuous rise of social media and influencer marketing has democratized advertising and communications.”
But whose recommendations do consumers trust? Whose reviews, tutorials and vlogs do they listen to? Well it ranges from key opinion leaders with a huge following or a regular joe they encounter on their feed.

The most important thing is that these voices are coming from personalities that provide entertainment the consumer resonates with, whether it’s through content about shared interests, relatable life circumstances and needs, or even humor. Unlike traditional advertising, which can feel distant and impersonal, recommendations that people can put a face to resonate more deeply, especially in a space where authenticity matters more than ever.
So, it’s no wonder that top digital entertainment platforms like TikTok are now where many of these conversions happen. In fact, 97% of shoppers convert after seeing ads on TikTok, and by 2023, the platform had become so popular that it began closing in on ecommerce giant Lazada. Kristine highlighted that this further shows that platforms like TikTok Shop have blurred the boundaries between social media and ecommerce.

However, as these two themes ushered in a marketing revolution, they have also revealed a challenge that comes with this era, which is audience fragmentation.
3. We live in a siloed digital world.
“The proliferation of content and on-demand viewing has created millions of options, which makes individuals live in their own, not-so-little digital world,” Kristine explained.
This fragmentation poses significant challenges for brands. With each platform operating as a “walled garden,” advertisers must navigate unique algorithms, rules, and data silos.
Plus, cross-device tracking complicates efforts to understand the consumer journey and personalize messaging effectively further. Brands now have to find ways to unify these fragmented experiences and accurately measure the effectiveness of campaigns across platforms, making it harder to execute personalization efforts.
Kristine added, however, that this doesn’t just make things trickier for brands but also creates frustration for users as they must now juggle multiple accounts, passwords, and interfaces across platforms.

However, Kristine doesn’t see this siloed digital world purely as a challenge. To her, it’s also brimming with opportunities, referencing new-to-the-world channels like Discord, Pinterest, and Roblox. These platforms present brands with new avenues to engage niche communities and foster a sense of belonging. Additionally, immersive technologies like the metaverse present innovative ways to create cohesive experiences that bridge digital silos.
The key, Kristine noted, is for brands to think beyond individual channels and focus on delivering value wherever their audiences are. By embracing platform-specific strategies while maintaining a unified brand voice, marketers can overcome fragmentation and create meaningful connections even among niche communities and newer markets.
Of course, in order for brands to keep track of what strategies work best for each silo and user, they need what Krisitine calls the new gold.
4. Personal data is the new gold.
With the technological advancements that marketing has been utilizing, personalization has become a rising expectation among consumers. Whether or not they know how personalization works in the platform they use or how aware they are of how digital algorithms are consistently being tailored according to their activity, more people go online with the expectation to see things that interest them on their feed.
Kristine cited the Euromonitor International Voice of the Consumer: Lifestyles Survey to elaborate on this point. 76% of the respondents are looking for ways to simplify life, which is why 65% of them find personalized ads – which often address their specific needs – helpful.

However, this also comes with a paradox. While consumers crave personalization, they are also hesitant to offer the personal data needed to achieve that. This is because while they want unique experiences that are designed according to their interests, they still, understandably, value privacy and anonymity.
So, how do they navigate these contradicting realities? For Kristine, “brands should realize the importance of collecting and utilizing data responsibly to give Filipinos unique experiences.”
This leads to the last theme that Kristine touched upon, the capability that has revolutionized how brands use data to amplify their personalization efforts – AI.
5. We are at the tip of the AI iceberg.
Almost everyone that frequents online spaces has encountered artificial intelligence. You can see AI everywhere in the digital world now, from ChatGPT to the new AI-powered features of specific apps and platforms.
In fact, the Philippines has exhibited a clear growing interest in AI. Along with other Southeast Asian countries Malaysia and Singapore, the Philippines is one of the global top 10 for AI-related searches per capita according to Google’s e-Conomy SEA 2024 report. These searches were driven by three key industries: education, marketing, and gaming.

Although, while it seems like AI has already become a ubiquitous force, Kristine believes that what we’re seeing now is just scratching the surface of the endless possibilities it poses. She believes that potential to transform marketing is immense, with applications ranging from automated content generation to advanced audience targeting. As she put it, “If the pandemic’s digital shift was a sprint, AI’s rise will be a rocket launch.”
She noted how tools like MidJourney are already being used to create key visuals, while virtual influencers like LU de Magulo from Brazil, who has 14 million followers on Facebook and 7 million on TikTok, are gaining traction globally. These innovations offer marketers new ways to engage audiences and streamline operations, underscoring the urgency of embracing this technology.
From the dominance of digital to the rise of AI, the industry is being reshaped by innovation and evolving consumer expectations, and Kristine Go’s provocations paint a vivid picture of what these exact transformations and shifts mean for consumers and brands alike.
And it’s important, more than ever, to have all changes laid out and recognized too. After all, it’s essential for marketers to be cognizant of these changes if they want to keep up and make the most of this marketing revolution.
By remaining cognizant of these five provocations, brands can be better equipped to take on the complexities of today’s media environment and build lasting connections in a rapidly changing world.
ABOUT KRISTINE GO

Kristine Go, Senior Vice President and Head of Prepaid, Postpaid & Fixed Wireless at Smart Telecommunications, is a visionary leader who is passionate about driving strong business growth while making a positive impact on the world.
In her previous role as General Manager for Unilever Nutrition Southeast Asia, Kristine led 9 markets across the region. In addition, she and her team won the prestigious Cannes Awards for Film, Spikes Effectiveness for Film, and Tambuli Grand Prix in 2012 for the campaign, “Gondappa / Help a child reach 5.” In 2022, she was awarded Chief Marketing Officer of the Year by Tambuli, and in 2023, she won the Business Leader of the Year at Campaign Asia. In addition, Kristine continues to work with the Philippine government to end hunger, as the Task Force Lead for Pilipinas Kontra Gutom (fight hunger).
With a general strong belief in the industry that innovations and acquisitions would propel faster growth, Kristine is an outlier who has believed ever since that focusing on the business’ core is key to faster growth by creating “fresh consistency.”
Her legacy, however, goes beyond business results. She has also made an impact on reducing malnutrition across the Philippines and Indonesia, working in tandem with the government, private and public sectors, and aims to bring it to the rest of the developing world.