We Are Social’s Pete Hong Takes Up Influence Director Role At Social Soup

The Influence Group’s Social Soup gas announced the appointment of Pete Hong as influence director.
With over a decade of experience in content marketing and social media, Hong (pictured, left) joins Social Soup from We Are Social, where he led the Samsung global account. His resume also includes roles at Domain, Storyful and Volvo Car Group.
Social Soup managing director, Katie Palmer-Rose (pictured, right), said Hong’s appointment reflected the significant shift in how both brands and consumers think about influence and influencers.
“The world of transactional, paid for post influence is over. It has been replaced by more authentic connections between influencers and their communities,” she said. “Influencers need to be high quality and representative of the brand, and content strategies need to align to overall content narrative and brand strategy.
“Pete heads up the division of Social Soup which is leading the standard in professional influence. This is even more important now when people are searching for the human side of a brand and wanting to understand how it represents a diverse and values driven message. Influencers are the face of this, so it is critical they are vetted correctly and engaged thoughtfully throughout a program,” she said.
Hong’s role includes engaging with and vetting influencers, creating content-led paid strategies, and measuring influence performance.
Palmer-Rose added: “Driving new ways of measuring influence that matter is a key part of his role, including building ‘action’ based metrics and engagements that ensure influence doesn’t end with a piece of content.
“What are the key measures we need to look for and what does true impact and success look like? This will challenge conventional influencer measures to build on what has been established and look at not just reach and engagement, but success more broadly.”
The Influence Group Director and Social Soup founder and CEO, Sharyn Smith, said: “Pete’s role is further evidence of how we are leading the market in professional influence and investing in setting the standard for the industry in terms of best-practice benchmarking.
“His experience and passion for paid across a multi-platform scope ensures he is creating new products around ‘creator content-led paid strategy’ that can be tailored to achieve action or reach and create a long tail of advocacy and genuine influence.”
On his appointment, Hong said: “Across my career, I’ve built Facebook pages – and audiences – when every brand wanted a Facebook page. I created mobile apps when every brand wanted an app. I’ve created emojis, jingles, TV shows, even made a dance go viral.
“I’m excited by the evolving world of influencer/creator marketing and the creator economy, and very excited to join the Social Soup team. The brands that can harness the power of their actual consumers and co-create brand meaning are the ones that will have success in the future.”
The addition of Hong follows the appointment last month of Chris Burt-Allan as Social Soup’s first Creator Director.
Latest News

Study: 37% Of Aussies Admit To Reading Gossip Mags; With Adelaide Women Their Biggest Fans
A new survey conducted by magazine and newspaper subscription service Readly found that celebrity gossip mags are a popular guilty pleasure with more than a third of Australians (37 per cent) indulging in the habit. Perhaps unsurprisingly the biggest cohort of gossip and entertainment magazine readers were women (41 per cent) aged 30-39 followed by […]

Fabulate Names Marie Galinsky As National Sales Director
Market leading Australian content marketing platform Fabulate has named Marie Galinsky (pictured) to oversee its rapidly expanding national sales operation in the role of national sales director. Galinsky’s promotion will see her lead Fabulate’s growing sales team and comes just six months after she joined the content marketing startup to lead its Melbourne sales operation. […]

adidas And Indigenous Football Australia Team Up To Give Opportunities To Indigenous Children
A new partnership between adidas and Indigenous Football Australia, which oversees the strategy and expansion of Australia’s most successful and longest-running Indigenous football initiative, John Moriarty Football, will ensure more Indigenous children in remote and regional communities benefit from the power of football. The partnership will see adidas and Indigenous Football Australia (IFA) work together […]

The Advertising Council Releases Statement On Industry Bullying & Harassment
The Advertising Council releases some tough talk on bullying & harassment. Nothing on whether the beard's had its day.

Clementine Ford On Joining Nova And Finding A Woman Friendly Space In Media
The one & only Clementine Ford drops by B&T for an insightful chat. Office beer bong competition rescheduled to Friday.

Australian Studio Start Beyond Appoints Angus Stevens As Chief Executive Officer
Start Beyond, Australia’s leading producer and distributor of VR and AR immersive learning solutions, today announces the internal promotion of Angus Stevens (pictured) to CEO. Stevens, who joined the business in 2016 as one of the founding members, is moving on from his current position of managing director effective immediately. In his new role, Stevens […]

Nine Apologies After Journo Shares Contentious Abortion Post
Another day & it's yet another apology coming out of Nine's head office. Karl just thankful it wasn't him for a change.

FORWARD Agency Announced As PR Agency For Social Enterprise World Forum 2022
PR agency Forward announces exciting new win. Local BWS soon wiped out of Stoli and Moët piccolos.

Indie Agency Hardhat Boosts Its Senior Team With Hires & Promotions
Hardhat riddled with first day nerves & possible loose bowel or two as agency announces a string of new recruits.

Tuesday TV Wrap: MasterChef Sizzles But Nine Brings Home The Bacon
It has to be said that Ninja Warrior is off to a slow start. And who can ever tire of watching perfect specimens fail?

Sir Patrick ‘Star Trek’ Stewart Skewers The Staff Farewell In Witty Work For Yorkshire Tea
Yorkshire Tea's the tea of choice at B&T. Although it's often overshadowed by alcohol, which is the drink of choice.

Men With Large Penises Sought For New TV Doco ‘Too Large To Love’
Ever encountered a todger so extraordinarily large your eyes have watered? Get set to pat the pupils again on this news.

IAB Report Shows Brands Are Using Game Advertising To Extend Ad Reach
In exciting news for the sale of Red Bull & marijuana, new report shows gaming set to be adland's next big opportunity.

Triple M Comes Out On Top Amongst Footy Shows In Survey 4 Results
Triple M has recorded the largest commercial AFL and NRL metro footy audience, delivering almost double the listeners of any other commercial competitor, according to today’s Survey 4 radio ratings results. Triple M’s AFL coverage across Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth reported a cumulative audience of 679,000, while Triple M’s NRL coverage has an audience of […]

VMG Appoints Brendan Harper As Frontier Media Queensland GM
Independent Australian-owned media company VMG has announced the appointment of Brendan Harper (pictured) as general manager and group business director to lead media planning & buying agency, Frontier Media in Queensland. His appointment follows the departure of Queensland director Alexandra Paton, who has been with Frontier Media for more than 15 years. Harper holds extensive […]

Havas Australia Appoints OIS As Third-Party Verification Partner
Havas Australia has appointed OIS, leaders in out-of-home (OOH) verification, as its independent, third-party verification partner across digital, programmatic, and classic out-of-home client campaigns following a competitive review. Australia is among the top 10 global out-of-home markets by size and one of the most advanced, highlighted by leading adoption rates of digital and more recently, […]

Virtue APAC Appoints Fiona Knight As Head Of Account Management
Vice's Virtue appoints Fiona Knight as head of account management. A role, you'd say, would need a proficiency in Excel.

BetterBriefs Unveils New Best Practice Guide Addressing Industry Shortcomings
BetterBriefs will today unveil a new best practice guide, The best way for a client to brief an agency, co-authored by Mark Ritson and in partnership with the IPA, at the IPA Business Growth Conference. After shocking the world of advertising last October with the painful and alarming truths about the enormous misalignment between marketers […]

Dentsu’s Merkle Names Simon Doukas As Inaugural Chief Experience Officer
Adland continuing to see rise of the chief experience officer. Yet no correlation in the rise of anyone wearing linen.

No Better Time To Eat Macca’s Than Winter Proposes New Work From DDB Sydney
Macca's says it's the winter food of choice in new work from DDB. Arguably also the destroyer of the summer bikini body.

Report: Out Of Home Spends Up Almost 15% For Q2
Australia's outdoor industry continues its post-COVID purple patch. Camping, however, remains as shitful as ever.

oOh!media Strikes Deals With 10 Queensland Shopping Centres
oOh!media likes what it sees in Queensland shopping centres. Still can't find a decent park, however.

KPMG Launches End-To End Customer Business, KPMG Customer
KPMG unveils new customer-centric offering, KPMG Customer. Confirms shoplifters and wonky trolleys not its remit.

TABOO Launches Innovation & Design Division, TABOO Labs
TABOO announces the launch of TABOO Labs. Which kinda sounds like tabouli just without the bulgur wheat.

Uber ANZ Announces In-House Ad Division Headed By LinkedIn’s Michael Levine
Uber announces creation of its in-house ad division. No news of its drivers overdoing it with the air freshener.

Red Havas Boosts Health Team With Three New Hires
Red Havas unveils new health team recruits. All of which achieved 90% or above in Operation during interview process.

Big Red Group Nabs Naked Wines’ Paul Connell For CMO Role
Naked Wines' Paul Connell quits for new role. Also thankful he no longer has to explain what herbaceous means at BBQs.

Bank Of Queensland Drops OMD, Hands Media To Initiative & Performics
If there was ever a bank that could pull off the muumuu or the Hawaiian shirt it has to be the Bank Of Queensland.

Why A Federal Election Is A Treasure Trove Of Data For Strategists & Marketers
This columnist argues that elections shine a light on the zeitgeist of a nation. And insane billionaire candidates.

“Don’t Read The Comments, Darling!” Richard Wilkins On Helping Son Christian Navigate Logies Dress Backlash
Proof the red carpet's about the only interesting part of the Logies comes this story from B&T's Christian obsessive.

Why Trust, Not Crypto, Is Today’s Most Valuable Online Currency
In uncertain times, trusted sources become even more significant in the world of media. Elise Bennett (pictured), head of account management (APAC) at Outbrain, reveals what advertisers need to know about the new trust exchange. Instability breeds uncertainty. From bushfires to the pandemic and war, there’s been plenty of both to go around in recent […]

Monday TV Wrap: MasterChef Cooks Up Solid Numbers For 10
MasterChef continues to prove it's like a proverbial Thai red curry left in the fridge overnight - it just gets tastier.

Radio Ratings: Kyle & Jackie O Are Hot On Ben Fordham’s Winning Trail
Sure, B&T's radio ratings aren't always first or aren't particularly thorough, but we guarantee a Media Watch-free read.

Nine’s Radio Stations Bag Best Ever Survey 4 Results
GfK Survey 4 of 2022 reveals that Nine’s talk stations achieved a cumulative audience of 1.873 million – up 9.1 per cent on Survey 4 of 2021. It’s the highest ever Survey 4 audience for the network, and comes off the back of record audiences in Surveys 1, 2 and 3. Sydney’s 2GB is a […]

“Absolutely Disgusting & Racist!” Adlander Slammed For Age/SMH Column Calling For Nick Kyrgios To Be Deported
There is nothing more divisive than tennis ace Nick Kyrgios. Save for hot or cold custard or Nicole in 'Eyes Wide Shut'.

British Drag Queen Busted Sniffing Amyl Nitrate During Live Pride TV Show
B&T never condones the use of drugs in any manner. Except for crappy dance music, where they're almost a necessity.