New ways for Mail.ru Group to manage social networks: Andrey Rogozov heads Strategic Council responsible for its development

Mail.ru Group is changing its approach to social media management: the company is introducing its Strategic Council for this business headed by Andrey Rogozov, who earlier held the post of VK CEO, and now will take on the role of Vice President for Social Platforms. In this role, he will lead another new structure — the division of experimental projects in the field of social networks and services with social mechanics.

The Strategic Council will guide the development of Mail.ru Group in the field of social networks, including strategic planning for VK and OK. The new structure will make it easier to synchronize and prioritize, allocate resources more efficiently, and introduce innovative technologies faster. All this, among other things, will help accelerate the development of the VK ecosystem. It brings together the projects that Mail.ru Group offers to users for communication, entertainment, self-development, and other everyday issues: social network VK, financial service VK Pay, loyalty subscription VK Combo, food and groceries delivery services Delivery Club and Samokat, VK Mini Apps platform (mini-applications VK Taxi, VK Food, VK Jobs, and others), taxi service Citymobil, voice assistant Marusya, and others.

The division of experimental projects led by Andrey Rogozov will analyze the data from social networks, put forward hypotheses, and initiate new projects, including those for the international market.

Marina Krasnova will be in charge of VK. She joined the social network team 1.5 years ago as Product Director, and now she will take on the role of VK CEO. She will also continue to develop Mail.ru Group’s single video and call platform.

Boris Dobrodeev, CEO of Mail.ru Group:

“There is a reason we are building our ecosystem around social networks: our unique advantage lies in knowing and understanding social connections. Every social network has its own audience, its own strong team, its own developments and technologies, but at the same time they collaborate on many projects. Moreover, their solutions are applied far beyond the boundaries of social networks. We will have more similar projects in the future: all our teams are focusing on internal integrations, and we are rapidly transforming from a range of products into an ecosystem. Andrey's many years of experience will help us do it faster, smarter, and more efficiently."

Social networks are some of the main growth drivers for Mail.ru Group. The division of social networks and communication services accounted for around a half of the company’s revenue in 2020 - 52.7 billion rubles. The audience of OK has reached 40 million people. There are 73.4 million VK users in Russia, according to Mediascope. Despite the pandemic, the number of active advertisers increased: by 30% year-on-year for VK, and by 34.8% for OK.

Anton Fedchin will continue to lead OK — he has been managing the platform since 2014.

Andrey Rogozov graduated from the Faculty of Technical Cybernetics at the Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University. He has been working at VK since 2007, where he has grown from developer to operational and managing director.