Humans of Digital spotlights the people shaping Canada’s digital advertising industry, celebrating their expertise, insights, and personal stories.
Meet Jayanthi
Job Title:
Chief Strategy Officer
Social:
Company:
I help companies/brands make better decisions about their digital advertising by measuring what’s working, understanding customer behavior, and optimizing where they invest their digital marketing budget.
What’s one project, campaign, or achievement you’re most proud of in your career so far?
What I’m most proud of isn’t one campaign, but the moments when we’ve taken underperforming programs and completely turned them around by getting to the root of what wasn’t working. Whether it’s a pharma client navigating compliance constraints or a CPG brand struggling with attribution, I love the detective work of diagnosing the real problem and then building the strategy that unlocks growth.
What’s the best piece of professional advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice came from a mentor early in my teaching career: ‘If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.‘ That stuck with me when I returned to advertising. In our industry, we love complexity—multi-touch attribution, programmatic ecosystems, MMM—but the real skill is translating that complexity into clarity for clients. The strategists who win are the ones who can make the sophisticated feel simple.
In your view, what’s the biggest opportunity for our industry right now — and what’s the biggest challenge?
Streaming and CTV are finally delivering on the promise of premium, brand-safe, data-driven video at scale. Canadian brands can build sophisticated audience strategies without the waste of traditional broadcast. Challenge: Fragmentation. Between FAST channels, AVOD platforms, broadcaster apps, and SVOD inventory, the ecosystem is complex. Success requires partners who can navigate that complexity—not just buy the cheapest CPMs
If you could change one thing about the industry overnight, what would it be?
Eliminate vanity metrics from client reporting overnight. No more celebrating ‘impressions delivered’ or ‘click-through rates’ when we know they don’t correlate with business outcomes. Force every agency—including mine—to answer one question: ‘Did this campaign incrementally grow the business?’ It would be uncomfortable initially, but it would make our industry so much more valuable and trustworthy.
What role do you think collaboration through IAB Canada plays in driving industry growth?
IAB Canada is one of the few forces actually democratizing knowledge in our industry. Whether it’s guidelines on CTV measurement or research on Canadian consumer behavior, they’re saying ‘here’s what works—everyone gets access.’ That’s critical for boutique agencies and mid-market brands who don’t have research departments. Collaboration through IAB means we all get smarter together, not just the biggest players.
Getting Human
Coffee, Tea, or Something Stronger?
Tea
Creative boost go-to?
I’m a reader, not a binge-watcher.
Give me a complex novel with unreliable narrators—something like All the Colors of the Dark—and my brain starts making connections I’d never see staring at a campaign dashboard. I host a book club specifically because talking through layered narratives with smart people unlocks creative thinking in ways no marketing podcast ever could.
If your career were a movie, what would the title be?
The Long Way Around
— because sometimes the ‘scenic route’ through teaching, big agencies, and academia is actually the competitive advantage.
Complete the sentence – “The future of digital advertising in Canada is…”
Exciting.
Jayanthi is driven by the belief that clarity—not complexity—is what moves businesses forward. She’s committed to helping brands uncover the real issues behind underperforming programs and build strategies rooted in meaningful outcomes, not vanity metrics. For her, the most exciting work happens when data, honesty, and thoughtful storytelling come together to unlock growth that actually lasts.
Ready to lean in? Read more Humans of Digital stories and join IAB Canada to get involved in our committees, working groups, and cross-industry initiatives.