9 June, 2022

Booktopia Nabs Former MediaCom Planner Pathum Wanigasekara As Head Of Performance Marketing

By B&T Magazine

Australia’s biggest online bookstore, Booktopia, has appointed Pathum Wanigasekara as its new head of performance marketing. Wanigasekara joins as the company seeks to continue to scale up its marketing capabilities and further enhance its customer experience to align with the company’s growth trajectory.

Wanigasekara will have responsibility for the acquisition and retention of customers through paid search, paid social, affiliate marketing and other performance channels. A key part of the role will be shaping Booktopia’s marketing activities in real-time to contribute to traffic and product sales flow, in line with the company’s proprietary algorithmic modelling. The goal is to ensure customers receive the best possible experience while also staying true to advertising principles and ROI protocols, as well as ensuring a consistent strategic positioning for the Booktopia brand.

The role will see Wanigasekara work alongside other channels and departments including Booktopia’s organic search, social, CRM and partnerships teams, to maximise impact. There is also a focus on leading Booktopia’s adoption of marketing technologies, cross-channel analysis, inventory planning and buying and exploring opportunities in emerging channels to reach and engage customers.

Wanigasekara’s most recent role was as account director at global digital marketing agency, Incubeta, while he has also served as head of paid and optimisation at social technology company, Digivizer and as senior planner and buyer at Mediacom both in Australia and the UK.

The appointment is effective immediately and Wanigasekara will report to Booktopia’s chief marketing officer, Steffen Daleng. On his appointment, Wanigasekara said: “It’s a privilege to join Booktopia which has fast become one of Australia’s biggest retail businesses and homegrown success stories and help contribute to its growth trajectory.

“Digital marketing continues to be a rapidly-changing landscape but that presents a heap of opportunities to find new and innovative ways to connect with customers on a deeper level. Elevating Booktopia as the brand to consider for customers seeking their next source of entertainment is a great proposition to be involved with and has potential to have a big impact on the overall category.”

Steffen Daleng added: “I’m thrilled to have Pathum on board with his vast experience in advertising and marketing technology and helping retail businesses grow. Pathum has a strong track record of contributing to revenue and brand growth for a range of blue-chip companies and I’m looking forward to him bringing his impressive acumen to Booktopia.

“This appointment is another step in our strategy to scale our brands and sales delivering a compelling multi-channel ecosystem which results in a high-quality, high-impact experience for customers.”

Booktopia has been shortlisted as Retailer of the Year at the Australian Book Industry Awards and was also named in Power Retail’s Top 100 retailers. The company has an unrivalled access to more than six million books, selling a book on average every 3.9 seconds, through its extensive library, which includes physical books, e-books and audio books from thousands of authors across more than 50 categories.

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