Mike Nicholson has been in the industry for over 30 years, formerly at companies including The Evening Standard, The Telegraph, Opera Mediaworks and OpenX. Today he is Co-Founder of Six Sells, a B2B communications agency that works with senior leaders on planning and producing their personable digital content.
Who is your digital hero?
It is so hard to try and single out just one person, but I have been such a huge fan of Rory Sutherland forever, so I have to pick him.
What has he done to win hero status in your eyes?
Rory invests a huge amount of time thinking about marketing problems, and sharing his unique, brilliant, and often entertaining insights with the world.
His commitment to producing the quantity of content that he does, with such a ridiculously high quality level every time, has been of huge benefit to the millions of people who have watched or read it. If you Google ‘Rory+Sutherland+Ogilvy’ you get 219,000 results, that’s a lot of content!
How has his heroism helped drive digital?
Rory has freely given away thousands of hours of his time to educate and inspire millions of people worldwide.
After watching or reading his content, you feel a little smarter as a result. Often you will come away with an actionable item that can improve your own business. His thought leadership and unique, brilliant mind should be treasured by us all I think. I highly recommend that you watch his TED Talks, read his books, and follow him on LinkedIn.
What’s the biggest challenge in digital we need another hero to solve?
The quality of the creative in TV is a number one priority, but in digital it can sometimes feel like an afterthought. With the advent of eye-tracking, we now know that the actual creative does a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to attracting and holding attention.
Rory’s leadership in all things relating to creativity and behavioural science is therefore more vital than ever.
What is your most heroic personal achievement so far in digital?
I’m not sure I have ever done anything particularly heroic, but I am most proud of setting up Six Sells five years ago with my wife Karen, and keeping afloat despite a worldwide pandemic and economic downturn!
