Adaptly Appoints Social Maven With Search Experience To VP, Client Services

Marketing technology company Adaptly this week will announce the appointment of Lisa Cucinotta to VP of accounts to lead the East Coast client strategy team. Cucinotta joined May 1 from Horizon Media, where she served as director of social strategy and business development. Prior to that she worked at iProspect and Resolution Media.

At Adaptly, Cucinotta will oversee, mentor and manage the team and will work on processes that deliver client services. She believes social could replace search in many aspects. What follows are excerpt from her discussion with Search Marketing Daily.

SMD:  What keeps you up at night?

Cucinotta:  Measurement, because there is a lot to be done. There are exciting things happening in social with Snapchat's acquisition of Placed, and Pinterest launching conversion tracking. Even with attribution solutions and media mix modeling, social is not prioritized to drive business. The industry is making strides, but I don't think we're fully there, yet.

Improvements are being made to connect people with an experience, so I think a lot about how people use social in different life stages. About 82% of couples create a wedding hashtag to use in their posts. It's interesting to think about how different that is from the early days of social media.

Search is often thought of as being a primary source for information gathering, but I think social has changed that. I also wonder about how the face of social will change. Will we consider 'camera first' as the new direction of social, such as Instagram and Facebook Stories. [Since Snapchat is the original camera-first platform, will we start to see other platforms go camera-first, especially now that Facebook and Instagram have introduced Stories?]

SMD:  Does social lack standards?

Cucinotta:  Yes, I do think so. Sometimes when multiple platforms have their own measurement it can prevent advertisers from running full-funnel social strategies across platforms. There's little standardization in terms of compliance. Certain platforms have made strides with measureble outcomes. Facebook offers co-tagging, which lets you see when you're doing something in partnership, but is not consistent across platforms.

Where do chatbots fit into social?

Cucinotta:  I think there's a huge role for chatbots within social. It furthers the customer service role that social played for a while, and I think it could ease in the ordering process. In some ways it also could replace search activity if you can get quick answers from it.

SMD:  Are chatbots the convergence of search and social?

Cucinotta:  I think search is a component of most social networks. It's a different taxonomy. I used to work in paid search before I went to work in paid social, so I see the comparisons and differences. For example, people tend to use social to search for things more for what they have interest in rather than for things they need. Social searching has a lot more of discoverability. On search engines, people use search for more of a utility.

SMD:  What is the best piece of advice you ever received?

Cucinotta:  Tattooed on my arm I have the words "this too shall pass," because I believe in it. I like this expression because it's a phrase applicable to all situations. It means enjoy the good times because they're not permanent. Just as true -- when you go through a bad time it won't remain bad forever.

This industry changes quickly, so it's helpful to remember that personally and professionally. I find the phrase to be an inspiration of strength.

SMD:  What type of advice would you give to others?

Cucinotta:  I refer to it as the karmic circle. I'm a huge supporter of mentorship and assisting people in their careers. I received a lot of help and when you can show that generosity back to others, it helps to teach them how to be better employees and managers.

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