The Institute of Marketing in Malawi, the umbrella body for Malawian marketers this past week hosted its second annual marketers’ conference under the IMM banner since transitioning from the CIM Malawi Chapter at the end of 2020. 

This year’s conference was hosted in Salima from the 26th to the 29th of October 2022 under the theme ‘From Surviving to Thriving: Scaling Towards Excellence.’ 

This year’s theme was geared towards positioning marketers to thrive, grow and excel as individuals so that they can make an impact in their organisations. 

One of the key speakers: Helen McIntee

In a statement released yesterday, the conference organising committee chairperson George Damson said the conference was a success based on the feedback they got from the delegates. 

He said: “This was our second conference under the IMM banner and coming into this conference we took key learning’s and members’ feedback from our inaugural conference last year to make improvements to this year’s conference. 

“We had a very dynamic topic and a speaker line up that tackled a wide range of topics.”

He said some of the speakers from within and outside Malawi like the keynote speaker, Helen McIntee, who is President of the African Marketing Confederation and is based in South Africa, renowned Zambian radical entrepreneur Dumisani Ncube, British-based brand strategist Paul Bailey, Lekani Katandula, the Illovo Malawi MD and Levie Nkunika, who is Head of Marketing at FDH Bank, among others.’

The conference saw the introduction of masterclasses for the first time and Zambia’s Dumisani Ncube wowed the delegates with an inspiring personal growth story during his masterclass. 

On Saturday the marketers took time to donate various items to the maternity wing at Salima District Hospital and later hosted the Madolo Marketing Excellence Awards which saw both individuals and companies winning awards.

Companies that walked away with awards include Airtel Malawi for best CSR Initiative, PremierBet for Commercial of the Year Outdoor, FDH Bank for Marketing Team of the Year, Lorraine Phiri of Nico Holdings won the Marketer of the Year Award while National Bank of Malawi’s Akossa Hiwa won PR Personality of the year, among many other winners. 

A new council was also elected at this year’s conference which saw Isabel Kachinjika being re-elected as president for a further two years, George Damson as vice-president and Daniel Ngwira, Nicole Ngulube, Cecelia Mussa, Mercy Kamanga, Fanny Namonde and Enoch Nkomba being elected as council directors.

One of the delegates, Tiyese Kayimila from FDH Bank said: “I liked the general organisation, it was absolutely excellent, from arrival to programme and events happening, we were adequately informed.”

The theme, the speaker line up was on point and lastly the awards night was a beautiful occasion.

This for me was the best ever conference and awards night since I started attending marketers’ conferences.’

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