About me
Did I always want to be a marketer? My childhood dream was to be an Air Hostess or a dancer on Top of the Pops.
But then my first proper job in the book department at WH Smith sparked a fascination with why people buy things.
And I was hooked.
I’d watch and learn from the Mills & Boon masters who cleared shelves in days. I experimented with display to see what difference it made, and tracked the sales figures like a hawk for indicators of the next big thing.
That’s where my mild obsession with measuring results began and it’s become my mantra ever since.
I cut my teeth in marketing during the boom years in IT Reselling with a £1m marketing budget and an indulgence agenda.
Helicopters into sporting events, luxury sales club trips to Texas & Acapulco, Kilroy Silk (remember him?) to facilitate company meeting.
Over the years I watched the death of events (and later rebirth), the dotcom phenomena, the content marketing revolution, and the impact of video.
I adored the shift away from fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD tactics). Replacing a pure product feature approach with more focus on people’s experiences (some call it Human-2-Human marketing).
Building reciprocal communities of like-minded people and making their experience relevant and authentic.
We’re right back to putting the person at the heart of things rather than being led by a list or a database, and it’s refreshing.
The astonishing impact of social media on making connections helped me deliver a 295% increase in community membership applications, a 50% uplift in event attendees and sold out ClubCISO’s “Live Vote” seats in 24 hours.
I definitely have geeky tendencies and get lost for hours at times in the data and glorious tech us marketers have at our fingertips these days.
But I’m most definitely a people-first marketer.
Because a good conversation is the very beginning of something more meaningful. Something that actually matters.
A connection. A relationship. A customer.
Community Creator and Growth Maker
I’ve crafted communities to draw in specific audiences, create stand out conversation opportunities for sales teams and shared experiences that foster brand likeability and speed trust. Creator of Data Journeys & New-In-Role. Responsible for the largest ever growth of www.clubciso.org
Founder of the Social Organisation using LinkedIn
The Social Organisation initiative was one of the most progressive programmes of work I ever led within a business. Recognising that brands today are people, and that we trust our fellow humans, I coached a team of sales, marketing and subject matter experts to be heard and to listen well on LinkedIn.
Creator of feel-good marketing plans and results
Imagine your marketing working, feeling good and delivering you the results you want. I’ve energised pipelines, built value pre-acquisition, better connected marketing to sales, and created those valuable conversations with the people that matter. Whatever your challenge, I can take the lead.
My marketing truths
1
Put the person that matters at the centre of everything.
2
FUD and product features often make for dull and uninspiring marketing.
3
Likeability wins. Being the most popular brand in your category helps a lot.
4
We can speed trust with shared experience.
5
To stand out from the noise, sometimes you have to go left-field.
6
Time is as valuable as budget
7
Don’t dilute efforts in the quest for coverage. Instead, do less, exquisitely.
8
A wise marketer holds a quiet understanding of people’s strengths, and gaps.
9
Marketing is an experiment to be researched, measured and refined.
10
You can’t expect to make progress if you haven’t defined the goal and written a plan.
First conversations are exciting!
Even if we don’t end up working together, I’m confident our conversation will develop your thinking and add some new ingredients to your plans.