Yara El Saadani is EMEA Commerce Strategy Director at WPP Media. A Campaign & Media Week 30 Under 30 honouree, previous roles have included at Wavemaker, Mediacom and GroupM. Her digital hero has “made retail media and commerce media digestible and accessible for industry leaders and brands of all sizes”.
Who is your digital hero?
Alice Anson, Director of Digital Media at Nectar360.
What has she done to win hero status in your eyes?
Alice has brought humanity back into the work we do. She is not only brilliant at her day to day, but she’s been able to talk about our industry, especially commerce, with such positivity and insight. She reminds us all that innovation and culture should be at the heart of what we do. On top of that, she’s an advocate for neurodiversity and uses her platform to drive awareness and comfort around the topic.
She’s also opened doors for me by helping me join industry communities and giving me my first panel opportunity, which I’ll never forget.
Having a silent supporter on your side is rare. She’s set the tone for me on how we can bring people together and give them, no matter their seniority, the opportunity to shine.
How has her heroism helped drive digital?
Alice’s heroism has made retail media and commerce media digestible and accessible for industry leaders and brands of all sizes, helping them understand the power of this channel.
She’s consistently put innovation at the heart of commerce media and has brought genuine excitement to the industry. She’s made real waves in how we think about commerce media.
She’s also been a big part of the Women in Retail Media initiative in the UK, bringing together like minded people while inspiring women in the industry to understand that perfection isn’t everything and that showing a bit of personality gets you a long way.
What are the biggest challenges in digital we need another hero to solve?
The biggest challenge right now is navigating what agentic commerce really is and how people are changing the way they shop. There’s a huge piece of work needed around the psychology of shopping behaviour and decision making, and how we as an industry can come together to understand what makes a consumer tick and drives loyalty to a brand.
That’s something I’m really interested in learning more about, digging deeper into how we can shift out of purely tactical or strategic thinking and truly put the consumer back at the heart of everything we do.
What is your most heroic personal achievement so far in digital?
To date, my personal achievements in this space have been getting under the hood of how businesses structure themselves around commerce, helping brands navigate potentially sticky conversations like “Where should commerce media sit, in our trade or marketing teams?”.
I’ve also developed proprietary tools and products to support questions like “Where should I put my next commerce media dollar, which retailers align best?”.
That’s been a big focus for 2025, and I’m very much looking forward to what 2026 will bring.
