Virgin Mobile Marketing Chief to Shift Roles

Ron Faris, the head of brand marketing at Virgin Mobile, is shifting to a new role at the parent company. He is expected to lead a new company at Virgin focused on mobile and commerce.

Faris spent seven and a half years at Virgin Mobile, where was a vocal proponent of content marketing. He set up a version of a newsroom to pump out everything from infographics to listicles. He struck an unusually deep partnership with BuzzFeed, which would hold joint weekly editorial meetings between BuzzFeed’s content marketing team and Virgin Mobile’s agencies and in-house writers.

The result: Virgin Mobile is now a staple on BuzzFeed. The cell service is squarely focused on the young demographic, and under Faris fully embraced the brand selling points taking a backseat to entertaining content. Case in point: this recent Virgin Mobile post on Buzzfeed, “15 Reasons Penguins Are Way Better Than Cats.” It’s not exactly a hard sell, although Faris insisted its content-first approach showed demonstrable business results. In a recent Harvard Business Review piece, Faris argued millennials “expect brands to live in the same world they live in, speaking the same language about the same issues they care about, find humorous, or strike an emotional chord.”

Faris’ replacement at Virgin Mobile has not been set, according to a Virgin Mobile PR rep.

https://digiday.com/?p=45378

More in Marketing

Why Georgia-Pacific consolidated most retail media spending with seven networks after testing over 25 options

Figuring out which retail media network is worth spending on given the glut of new retail media networks can be a challenge for marketers.

Why the creator industry is setting its sights on on the small screen

As the creator economy continues to boom, creators are making their way off of mobile screens and onto the small screen.

Inside marketing’s elusive Quixote quest for digital ad transparency

Stuck in a spin cycle, marketers are grappling with the endless challenge of making tangible progress on ad transparency.