MediaCom welcomes Matt Di Paola

MediaCom Canada has hired 15-year agency veteran Matt Di Paola to serve in the newly-created role of chief strategy and innovation officer.
 
Di Paola’s responsibilities include leadership on strategic, digital and research initiatives, as well as product and service development. He will report to MediaCom Canada CEO Jamie Edwards, who joined the firm last November.
 
Edwards said the hiring of Di Paola addressed changing media trends.
 
“Strategy, in my mind, is becoming much more than the old traditional model, and what I mean by that is that consumers don’t think in channels anymore and pretty much everything is now influenced through a digital filter,” said Edwards. “Having a guy with a strong digital integration and content background to lead a fully integrated strategy team just made sense to me.
 
“The key driver behind this move is that I fundamentally believe that you can’t separate digital from strategy anymore. You can’t create consumer-centric solutions for clients without having digital thinking at the core of that.”
 
Di Paola comes to MediaCom after four years at Proximity Canada, where he held the position of senior vice-president and managing director. His other agency management roles include stints at Leo Burnett and Tribal DDB.
 
In addition to his agency work, Di Paola is an advisory board member for NextMedia, AOL Canada, the Mobile Marketing Association and Google Agency Council.