Malta Business Review COVER STORY INTERVIEW BEST OUTCOMES By Martin Vella For the first time <strong>MBR</strong> interviewed Margaret Brincat, Director and Managing Partner of <strong>MBR</strong> Publications Limited about the company’s web and social media rebranding, technology and female entrepreneurship. <strong>MBR</strong> is dedicated to reporting on the most recent trends and influencers in the local business community and various industry clusters, while showcasing inspiring, passionate women within the field. In the interview, Margaret, gives an insight on the company’s rebranding strategy and what it means to be a woman entrepreneur. <strong>MBR</strong>: What are the most significant changes in social media you have seen in the past few years, or even the past few months? MB: I shall start with the past few months– Google continues to dictate how social media performs, its popularity and its advantages. Because search engines are driven by the social media activity, businesses are getting it. They have stopped asking the question, why social media? They just kind of went, oh, we have to do it. In our case, it was a question of where do we stand, where do we need to go, how well is it done and what types of best business practices exist? So, in the last few months we just continued to see the nuances evolve with search engine optimization and quality content actually valuing people who have a genuine journalism background and we decided that we need to rebrand our company logo, our website, facebook page and organise a better, pronounced presence on social media platforms. DRIVING THE <strong>MBR</strong>: You co-founded the company with Martin Vella, what are some difficulties you faced as a female entrepreneur? MB: I can think of about 100 things to tell you, but I shall be direct. I have worked assiduously for the last two employers I was engaged with, staying late hours, marketing them and giving my all, without hardly being recognised for it. I look at them and am like, you have financial backing, you have had marketing education program, you have been singled by your colleagues and peers in the industry. Then Martin Vella, the present Managing Director and lifelong partner came along budding with ideas and dreams. So it was natural to ask myself how do I get to that next best point. Martin was the key to that question, and we are a team, wherein I have discovered that your errors and omissions decrease, your motivational level goes up and your success ratio goes up. The encouragement, as well as the trials and tribulations that came with it all, helped me be where i am today. I didn’t have any of that– I didn’t even think about it. I knew I needed to do something different with my career. I knew I had a bunch of skills and positive can-do I wanted to pull on and bring into my business. Actually, I didn’t think about it- I have a really awesome person I am in contact with 24/7. I always say to people, make sure you have a great corporate companion and a great money person, like a great financial advisor, because you cannot make a single decision about your business without talking to your partneradvisor every day. <strong>MBR</strong>: What is your end goal? MB: Being popular as a social media influencer never converts. Having something compelling to say that connects you to your target audience in such a way as to convey you “get” their pain points, you have a solution, and you care… that’s what converts. Trust converts. Markets and social media evolve in funny ways and successful companies are companies that consist not of people executing business plans well, but of sales executives who are on the balls of their feet and resilient, who can deal with adversity and market changes and unanticipated events. Good sales executives can figure out how to seize those opportunities and move around them. Marketers today are challenged to become knowledgeable technologists. It’s CMOs today who are making purchasing decisions on CDN (Content Delivery Network), not the IT department. In a world of Digital Transformation where companies must become digital to the core or bust, the rules have changed. Perceptions and cultures are challenged, and the ‘who does what’ lines are blurred. Today, a digitally savvy c-suite and board are imperative to withstand the futuristic winds and shifting tide. The end goal is action not eyeballs! <strong>MBR</strong>: For women who are thinking about starting a business, what advice would you give them? MB: For women who are thinking about starting a business, I would say, why stop? I mean, women, we can conquer anything. Look at everything we do on any given day. We know how to run a business, we are great with people and we are very intuitive. If any woman has any doubt about starting a business, I would say why would you even question it? We are designed to divide and overcome. We are designed to delegate. Why would we even question that? If you have a great idea and you feel like you divided it up and you have figured out your pros and cons, risk and rewards, you know how much time it would take and you have the group, why stop? Younger women are experiencing rapid grown in their careers. They are realising that they do not have to climb the ladder like the generations before them had to. I had the opportunity of working with a lot of female executives that are older than me and I have learned the value of being respectable, asking them a million questions about their career, understanding the challenges that they faced and really appreciating that I don’t have to deal with that. Therefore, what’s happening is that the catalysts that have gone on for the younger generations is why young women are having more success today. <strong>MBR</strong> 6
COVER STORY INTERVIEW Malta Business Review www.maltabusinessreview.net 7