Exclusive Interview with Diana Boo: "Staying agile is key to keeping ahead"

When it comes to building brands that resonate and leading teams that inspire, few do it with the insight and energy of Diana Boo. A mission-oriented marketer with experience spanning over 20 years in integrated marketing and advertising, Diana has spent her career leading high-performing teams across top companies like Lazada Group, Axiata Digital, and Boost.

Currently serving as the Chief Marketing Officer at Boost, Diana inspires through collaboration, creativity, and a relentless drive for excellence. Her leadership roles focus on driving successful business performance particularly in the transition from conventional to digital marketing.

Her expertise resulted in ground breaking campaigns such as Boost Bank’s launch, which achieved record-breaking engagement and established the brand as a digital banking leader, while also significantly contributing to the adoption of digital banking in Malaysia.

In this exclusive interview with MARKETING Magazine, Diana Boo shares her experience as one of the first marketing movers in the digital banking space.

Do you believe traditional marketing still has a meaningful role to play in today’s digital-first businesses?

Every industry has its own business strategies and territories, and they each chart their own direction. However, the world of marketing, martech and adtech are taking center stage – coupled with data analytics, artificial intelligence, and automation, these are shaping how we connect with audiences.

That being said, traditional marketing still plays a powerful role in brand building and amplifying a brand. When done right, it creates trust, drives visibility, and enhances cultural relevance. The real magic happens when both conventional and digital marketing come together to deliver greater impact.

We understood this clearly when we launched Boost Bank, Malaysia’s first homegrown digital bank with a pioneering embedded banking feature. People were curious: What’s a digital bank? What is embedded banking? Why do I need it if I already have a bank account?

For many people, ‘bank’ still meant physical branches and face-to-face customer service. So, we didn’t only need to raise awareness for Boost Bank – we needed to shift mindsets. Our challenge was to reframe digital banking as not just another product, but a secure, seamless, innovative way to bank.

The launch of Boost Bank was a standout campaign under your leadership. What were some of the biggest challenges of introducing digital banks to a skeptical audience?

In the digital banking space, complexity will only alienate customers and so, building trust meant we had to be authentic, human, and responsive to their needs. It starts with us breaking down the fear of technology, guiding customers through UI/UX experiences that are easy to use, coupled with offline assistance via events and a 24/7 customer service line.

To ensure we’re on the right track, we continuously listen and understand real customer pain points, tweak and improve our products and communicate in a way that feels clear, helpful, and transparent. When people feel understood, they’re far more likely to engage meaningfully with what you’re building.

For Boost, throughout our journey as an eWallet to now a digital bank, we’re working in uncharted territory. The fast-paced nature of fintech and marketing world combined with rapidly evolving consumer expectations, and emerging technologies means we need to stay adaptable and decisive.

Cultivating high performing teams in this environment starts with building a culture when people feel safe to take initiative, learn fast, and challenge the norm – then apply the advancements to drive the brand forward.

In the highly competitive fintech industry, how do you cultivate high-performing teams in such fast-paced, high-pressure environments?

Staying agile is key to keeping ahead of the curve and in a competitive environment. I believe we must be curious and passionate about our work and be lifelong learners who are willing to experiment with new technologies.

At Boost, we have a distinct company culture that encourages employees to ‘Be an owner’, ‘Be true’, and to take bold steps forward. One of the core values at Boost is ‘Be foolish, but not a fool’: It tells us that it’s okay to make a mistake but you must learn from it.

That mindset has shaped how I lead and how I mentor others. If there’s one lesson I’d pass on to any aspiring marketing leader, it’s that you don’t need to have all the answers, but you do need the courage to ask better questions, the humility to listen, and the resilience to try, fail, and try again. We believe that every winner has a list of losses – the key is to dare to try.

Diana Boo will be speaking at the Malaysian Marketing Conference Discovery Edition on May 9th. Learn more at https://marketingmagazine.com.my/cmo2025/

Presenting Sponsors are Ampersand Advisory, FCB SHOUT, GO Communications, GroupM, IPG Mediabrands and Moving Walls.