Islam ElDessouky

Celebrity endorsement is not a luxury; it is a necessity for brands that want to lead. True or False? The Egyptian media landscape has seen a surge in celebrity-led campaigns across categories — from food and beverage to personal care and tech. Very strong brands across all categories have all leaned heavily into celebrity endorsements to: • Stand out in cluttered media spaces. • Signal brand strength and confidence. • Drive emotional connection and memorability. According to some business reviews, this trend is not just cosmetic..it’s strategic. Celebrity campaigns are being used to reclaim market share, refresh brand equity, and build mental availability through distinctive brand assets. From your experience in Egypt, when does celebrity endorsement truly move the needle and when does it become an expensive distraction? What are the watch-outs brands tend to underestimate?

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Creativity in Action: How PepsiCo Showed Up at Cannes Lions 2025 This year at Cannes, PepsiCo showed up with purpose. We arrived with three intentions: to learn, to lead, and to celebrate. We left with even more: a renewed belief that creativity isn’t just a spark—it’s a system. A force multiplier of cultural relevance and growth. Bringing the “Outside In” and the “Future Back”   Across five packed days at the PepsiCo Cabana and Palais, we immersed ourselves in some of the most cutting-edge thinking in marketing today. From masterclasses with CMOs from Diageo, McDonald’s, Mars, and Unilever to powerful sessions with our partners at Omnicom, Publicis, Meta, Google, and TikTok- we explored how creative excellence is evolving in real time. We tapped into insights straight from the jury rooms of categories like Creative Strategy, Social & Creator, and Entertainment for Sport. And we listened deeply to what’s shifting, what’s sticking, and what’s next. A few “ah ha” moments: 1. Creativity wins when it’s human. Amidst the excitement around AI, one thing stood out: it’s not machine vs. maker - it’s both. Technology that builds upon human creativity, not replaces it, will be the real unlock. We must remain human-centric as the future is tech-powered, yes—but still human centric. 2. Strong strategy fuels speed. There was a moment listening to a Creative Strategy jury chair when I thought: this is it. Magic happens when tight strategy meets real-time responsiveness. That’s how you build ideas that move fast—but never feel rushed. 3. Great platforms guide great work. Our most consistent, culturally resonant work ladders back to clear brand platforms. At Cannes, that was a throughline across winners—from film to social to sport. It affirmed that when you know who you are, creative freedom gets even bigger. 4. The creator economy is the new word-of-mouth.Today’s fans, followers, and creators are redefining what our brands mean in real time. We have known that the creator economy isn’t a trend - it’s a new operating system. To thrive in it, we have to move beyond storytelling to our audiences and continue building with them. 5. Simplicity is a strategy. In a world overflowing with content and choice, the brands that stand out are the ones that cut through with clarity. Clarity is kindness - it shows respect for people’s time and intelligence, and it breaks through. It’s not about doing less; it’s about focusing on what matters most, and delivering it with precision, emotion, and impact. We left Cannes not just inspired but energized and mobilized. With this momentum, we’re putting our learnings into action with tangible shifts across how we build brands, brief creatives, and organize for growth. We came to Cannes to learn, to lead, and to celebrate. We left energized, aligned, and ready to build what’s next, together. Jane 

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PepsiCo unveiled a new corporate identity and three key messages came across in the logo, tagline and Chairman's message. 1. A conscious move to put Foods ahead of Drinks. 2. Greater emphasis on Sustainability, health and better ingredients. 3. Abandoning the iconic Red-Blue to a more colorful logo to delink PepsiCo from Pepsi, the brand. Obviously it doesn't impact consumers. But it signals a lot to the shareholders, employees and governments on where the company intends to go in the next twenty five years. #pepsico #branding #corporateidentity

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Introducing camel milk into 183 branches of Tim Hortons across KSA is not a marketing move. It’s a market statement. With Noug, we launched 4 new LTOs built entirely around camel milk, now listed nationwide. This wasn’t about adding an alternative to the menu. It was about proving that a locally rooted product can operate at scale inside one of the world’s most standardized coffee systems. The work behind this included: – Product development aligned with international SOPs – Full operational rollout across all KSA branches – A nationwide campaign to drive awareness and trial Camel milk has always belonged to this region. Now it belongs in modern coffee culture — commercially, not symbolically. This kind of execution only happens when strong teams align. Thank you to Ghada Alshafi, CMMP®, Tarek Mrad for driving this from our side, and to Yasmeen A., Lama Khalil, Sahr Amin from the Tim Hortons team for the collaboration and operational excellence throughout the rollout. Appreciation as well to Bander Alqahtani, Maher Eldaly for the leadership support and trust that allowed us to move at this scale. This is how local innovation scales.

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The Future Belongs to Marketing Teams That Learn Faster Than the Market Changes ... One thing I’ve learned as a global CMO: strategy and creativity matter — but transformation starts with capability. You can’t transform a brand, a business, or a pipeline of innovation without first transforming the capabilities of people who build it. At Sodastream, we faced a familiar global-scale challenge: brilliant marketers everywhere, but uneven capabilities across markets. And in today’s reality — where new trends and tools appear daily — uneven isn’t just inefficient, it’s a growth blocker. So we made a deliberate choice: to transform our marketing organisation into a life-long learning engine. Enter the Sodastream Marketing Academy — our global capability program designed not just to “upskill,” but to reshape how we think, decide, and execute. How we approached it: • A Global Capabilities Audit ... to confront the real baseline: strengths, gaps, and transformation priorities. • A Core Curriculum ... blending foundations, PepsiCo’s world-class frameworks, and future skills like GenAI, A&M ROI, and performance media. • A mix of internal mastery and external provocateurs ... like Contagious to elevate standards and spark creative transformation. The impact is clear: Faster learning. Sharper strategy. A more consistent global operating system. A marketing organisation that is not just growing — but transforming. We are only a few months into this journey but it already reinforced a belief I speak about often: High-performing marketing organisations don’t emerge by accident. They’re built — intentionally, systematically, and with a bias for transformation. Huge thanks to Shay Zinger, my HR L&D partner, all our trainers Ramasubramanian Narayanan Chris Nolan Ioanna Bontari and many more, plus to all our global teams for choosing to level up, together. #MarketingExcellence #MarketingTransformation #CMOLeadership #CapabilityBuilding #LearningCulture #GlobalMarketing #StrategicMarketing #FutureOfMarketing #BrandBuilding #MarketingAcademy

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Hello 2026 - Here’s a marketing story worth sharing. In 2nd half of 2025 we turned around the KSA Ice cream category’s biggest brand – the Saudia Sandwich – suffering from years of stagnation to an unparalleled growth. The solution wasn’t reinvention—it was strategic marketing discipline and razor sharp execution. 1) We started with the product. The team delivered quantitatively consumer validated product improvements to secure the #1 taste 2) We then reset how the brand showed up. The new product recipe relaunched with a packaging that sharpened the proposition, made the product a Hero, and rebuilt confidence at freezer shelf. 3) Only after that did we scale communication. A ‘Truth’ campaign designed to create genuine news and connect with Gen Z—culturally relevant and commercially accountable. The outcome: An unprecedented +30% growth in the immediate 6 months post relaunch, anchored in record high levels of brand awareness and equity attribute ratings. To me marketing is about creating a growth story and bringing the organization onboard. In this case, when a big brands stalls, progress comes from building strategic clarity, pursuing evidence-based decisions, and empowering teams to execute! #strategy #marketing #teamwork #turnaround #KSA #saudiasandwich

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In the corporate world, we’re trained to chase clarity — in strategy, in execution, in metrics. But the truth is: not everything that matters fits neatly into a slide. Sometimes a breakthrough feels more like a poem than a process. A great brand idea isn’t born from data — it’s sparked by instinct, tension, and timing. I’ve sat through enough boardrooms to know — creativity isn’t a department. It’s a survival skill. And often, the most logical thing you can do… is something beautifully illogical.

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🚀 The leadership in the age of AI at Seara MENA🌍 At Seara MENA MENA, we believe that leadership is not just about managing teams, it’s about inspiring, adapting, and creating environments where people thrive. To equip our leaders with the tools they need to excel, we’ve introduced two cutting edge business simulations from KNOLSKAPE **iLead** and **CommSim**. 🔑 **iLead Simulation**: This immersive experience challenges leaders to employ diverse leadership styles, energize their teams, and navigate complex scenarios. It’s about contextual leadership understanding team dynamics, gauging morale, and taking the right action at the right time. 🗣️ **CommSim Simulation**: Focused on communication excellence, this simulation places participants in real world scenarios where they must interpret, articulate, and influence effectively. It’s a fail-safe environment to refine the art of impactful communication, a cornerstone of organizational success. As part of this initiative, I’m thrilled to take on the role of my clone, my mini me AI assistant of debriefing our leaders Pre and Post simulation. These sessions are designed to unpack the learnings, analyze actions, and connect the dots between simulation insights and real-world applications. The competencies covered ranging from contextual leadership to strategic communication are critical for driving performance and fostering collaboration across our teams. Together, we’re not just building leaders, we’re shaping a culture of growth, innovation, and excellence. 💡 #LeadershipDevelopment #SearaMENA #KNOLSKAPE #iLead #CommSim #GrowthMindset #LeadershipExcellence

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