Standing on the Technological Frontier, Gauging the Horizon

FOR SALVATORE IPPOLITO, THE COUNTRY MANAGER OF TWITTER ITALIA, THE MOST IMPORTANT ABILITY IN SOCIAL MEDIA IS THE READINESS TO LISTEN TO USERS AND FOLLOW TRENDS. AND ITALY IS FERTILE TERRITORY, THANK TO TO A VERY HIGH PENETRATION OF SMARTPHONES

In Twitter’s brand-new Italian offices you can breath the atmosphere of big corporations on the eve of launch: unwrapped boxes all around, freshly-painted white walls, untouched meeting rooms, giant logos yet to be stuck on the walls, colleagues doing first-time introductions.

Although Twitter is no novelty in our country, for the Californian social network, born in 2006 out of Jack Dorsey’s intuition, the time has come to get serious and start exploring the infinite possibilities for partnerships and interactions also with Italian firms, thus monetizing the services offered by its platform, as it has already done in other countries.

A few months ago,Salvatore Ippolito, a Neapolitan manager who graduated in law before getting his Bocconi MBA, was called to head the fledgling Twitter Italia division. His curriculum ranges from industrial ceramics to banking, before specializing in digital communications.

How pioneering is your position at the helm of Twitter Italia?

Twitter is an already established reality in many countries, but is still relatively novel in Italy. In Europe, Twitter has already a well-structured presence, thanks to its Dublin-based headquarters. My task is to make its presence take root in Italy, so as to develop relations with various industry actors, by increasing awareness of the platform through educational programs devoted to advertisers (clients), media agencies (the brokers that with firms decide the media spending mix), and creative agencies, with ultimate aim of creating real-time communication and marketing projects.

What is the relationship with the US headquarter? Do you have margins for autonomy?

We have almost daily relations with San Francisco. At the same time, there is ample room for managerial discretion. I must say I was impressed there by the ability to listen at all organizational levels, both in relation to the products and processes, and opportunity for their development. The flow for the acquisition of information is very well-designed.

Italy must certainly bridge the gap in technological infrastructure, but it also a country that is surprisingly enthusiastic about new technologies. Think of the number of smartphones currently switched on in Italy.

What are Twitter’s expectations regarding growth in the Italian market?

Italy has had a rapid adoption curve for smartphones, exhibiting today high penetration rates. Twitter was born mobile (today 78% of its traffic comes from mobile digital devices), and thus our country has a very interesting potential. Our culture also emphasizes the need to socialize, and is characterized by relatively high-levels of TV viewership. However, experience of the programs being screened is undergoing a deep mutation, and is more and more articulated around social conversations about the programs themselves.

In this regard, during your presentations, you said: “The smartphone might well supplant the television as the primary screen”. What role plays so-called social TV in the development and business plan of Twitter?

Mine was a provocation, but I don’t think I was being hyperbolic. In some cases, the prediction is already reality. For certain types of users, conversation on TV programs is the primary form of entertainment with respect to broadcasted content.

During the recent World Cup in Brazil, soccer fans got their updates on games, scores, and highlights by catching up on the discussion on Twitter. The social media worked as a primary screen, with real-time updates on goals scored, supplemented by the dimension of qualified comments and interactions with other users. In fact, conversation on Twitter really adds an extra dimension to a media event. I think this is a very interesting possibility for broadcasters, since, through Twitter, they can launch a TV event, deepen its experience as it is watched, and prolong it afterwards.

How does marketing change, considered that in the world of social media many factors are unpredictable (attention spans and thresholds, the kind of live reactions, etc.)?

We are living through a new marketing era, where it is concretely possible to develop real-time marketing initiatives, modulate a message, and target it at a precise moment toward the relevant audience. The Holy Grail of communication has always been the fundamental ability to address the right message to the right person at the right time. This is why Twitter represents an unprecedented medium in terms of real-time communication, engagement, and interaction. By merging instant communication with storytelling, it gives the possibility to alter the moment and the story being told. I like to think that if Dante were to write the Divine Comedy today, he would release it a tweet a time, one per each tercet. He would have needed about 3,000 tweets, and I’m sure the number of followers would have been staggering.

Each day the development of technology makes hitherto successful phenomena, uses, tools rapidly obsolete in favor of new ones... How do you build a solid business amid so strong winds of change?

By learning how to listen, first of all. If you keep your head up and listen to the right kind of information, you inevitably end up evolving in the direction where the rest of society is headed. I remember the first time I walked in Twitter’s offices on Market Street. I was immediately enwrapped by the sensation to be at the center of all what was happening in the... It seemed the whole company was completely focused on what was occurring around the world in that precise moment. Twitter was standing at the frontier and was looking toward the horizon. Whoever wants to survive in the technology industry must have this attitude.

You worked in media (Nielsen), in the Italian office of a US multinational (3M), in high-end manufacturing (Iris Ceramiche), in the digital industry (Microsoft, Wind, Italiaonline). Is your current position at Twitter the missing piece of the puzzle?

In a way, it’s really like that. I have completed the puzzle and my career has taken its final shape. I was working at 3M after my Bocconi MBA, when Iris Ceramica offered me to become director of marketing, an incredible opportunity, since I was only 30 years old. It was a totally new industry for me. I developed an experience in heavy manufacturing in the so-called Tile Valley around Sassuolo and Fiorano Modenese, commuting between Milano and Emilia. I still remember Friday meetings, when we examined the new tiles just out of the oven. I had to deal with creative and artistic components which were a discovery for me. We worked season collections and constantly renewed our palette of colors and styles. I remember the strong competition from Spain, and our North American forays, where the strongest competitor was actually carpeting. It was like acting according to a new script every day. But I didn’t know the plot of the whole story. I only had vague details. Now the yarn has been spun, and all my previous job experiences have come to a synthesis in my current role at Twitter.

by Lorenzo Martini photos by Paolo Tonato
Translated by Alex Foti