Bukalapak names former Facebook exec as VP of advertising

Indonesian eCommerce firm Bukalapak has appointed Haswar Hafid (pictured) as VP of advertising. Prior to this, he spent more than five years at Facebook as the head of agency.

In his new role, which is newly-created, Hafid will be ensuring Bukalapak's marketing solution and advertising model can reach brands of all sizes, including micro SMEs. He will also look at ways that adtech partners can embed their solutions into the platform. Other responsibilities include building commercial relationships and working closely with agencies to scale offerings in the market, as well as setting up advertising growth roadmap to develop a sustainable and scalable advertising revenue stream.

Hafid brings with him more than a decade of experience working in technology companies such as Facebook, Yahoo and Microsoft, helping multiple brands and agencies to find business impact when entering in a partnership. In a press release, he said that one common thread tying his previous employers to the spirit that Bukalapak embodies is scalability. He plans to work with brands and agencies to ensure Bukalapak as a platform can work for them at different scale.

“The last thing that we want to have is an eCommerce advertising model that just sells banners. We want to help brands find business impact when they’re partnering with us,” Hafid added.

Meanwhile, Bukalapak COO Willix Halim said Hafid is the kind of person who will "push boundaries" to drive scale of the company's initiatives. Bukalapak currently has more than 70 million active users and over than five million sellers. It records more than two million transactions per day and an average of 134 million visits per month on its marketplace.

Bukalapak has been doubling down on Bukalapak micro SMEs of late. It claims to be working with more than two million mom-and-pop kiosks and agents throughout Indonesia. Earlier this month, it partnered Google to drive digitalisation among Indonesian micro SMEs or more commonly known as warungs in the country. The collaboration will help warungs on Mitra Bukalapak onboard to Google My Business, and appear in Google search results to gain more traction and exposure. To date, some 95,000 warungs have created their Google My Business profiles in the Mitra Bukalapak App.

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