Interviews, insight & analysis on digital media & marketing

NDA’s Talent Tracker column provides a regular update on which companies are recruiting who and from where.

Talent Tracker: Factory International, AML Group, isla and many more

Former Channel 4 executive Jane Hector-Jones has been appointed as Head of Brand Partnerships and Sponsorship for Factory International as the landmark cultural venue prepares to open its doors in June 2023. Hector-Jones will spearhead Factory International’s brand partnerships and commercial events strategy, as well as develop new innovative models in IP, broadcast, digital and content-led partnerships. Hector-Jone’s decade-long career at Channel 4 spans leading the first partnership and content team for Channel 4 Nations and Region and delivering award-winning sponsorship campaigns with major brands including Aldi and Hillary’s. Now, her remit is to drive meaningful partnerships and sponsorships and purpose-led campaigns with brands that share Factory International’s passion for diversity, sustainability, community, and the future of the arts.  

AML Group has announced the appointment of a new creative team – Jack Smith and Dylan Burnside-Smith. Before joining AML, Smith (Copywriter) and Burnside-Smith (Art Director) worked separately for a number of different agencies across a broad portfolio of well-known brands including: SEAT, Nestlé Purina, McDonald’s and KP Nuts. Smith has returned to London from Barcelona where he worked with C14 DDB and AFG McCann and Burnside-Smith has recently worked with the London-based experiential agency GPJ and prior to that freelance experience with Ogilvy and McCann Health.

Events industry body isla has announced the appointment of Malcolm Leach as its first Chief Technical Officer (CTO) to develop TRACE – the measurement platform designed to help businesses measure and minimise carbon emissions at live, hybrid and digital events. Malcolm joins isla from his most recent role as CTO at finance broker Funding Options, and brings with him more than three decades of experience spanning across technical product development, operational transformation and business scalability. As CTO, he will also spearhead new data-driven product features to enable adopters to seamlessly measure, manage and minimise carbon emissions for events of all sizes, engaging their value chain and brand partners along the way.

Pyramid Analytics (Pyramid), a pioneering business analytics and decision intelligence provider, has appointed Martin McDonald as Vice President DACH. McDonald has held various management positions in global technology companies looking to enter the German (DACH) market, including FredHopper and CoreMetrics. He most recently was VP DACHEE, Southern Europe at customer data specialist Tealium. At Pyramid, McDonald will be responsible for developing and executing the regional strategy in the DACH market. This will include business operations and development, personnel development, key account management, growth of sales, and profitability in the region and, in turn, expanding Pyramid’s market position across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

Commvault, an enterprise data protection company for the complex and mission critical hybrid environments of today’s global businesses, is excited to announce Anna Griffin as its new Chief Marketing Officer. Griffin comes to Commvault as both an award-winning brand builder and results-driven marketer who has driven visionary campaigns for high-growth SaaS companies like Smartsheet; emerging brands, like Intercom; and global brands that include Saturn, Apple, Sony, Juniper Networks, and CA Technologies (now Broadcom). She’s earned a slew of marketing awards for campaigns—including the Golden Effies for effectiveness in marketing and the Edgar R. Murrow award for excellence in social media.

Ozone, the digital advertising platform built for brands, by publishers – has announced a number of senior internal promotions across the team as the business aligns itself for further growth in 2023. Sophie Shead has been appointed to the role of Sales Operations Director, a new position created to lead Ozone’s trading operations, publisher operations and marketplace operations teams. Reporting directly to Dora Michail-Clendinnen, Chief Strategy Officer, Shead will be responsible for maximising efficiencies, optimising performance and developing best practice across all three teams. In the commercial team, Joel Woodage has been appointed to the new role of Head of Independent Agency Sales, Danny Geelan to the new role of Head of HoldCo Agency Sales, and Bill Dennett to the new role of Head of Regional Agency Sales, UK&I. All three will report to Commercial Trading Director, Jacque Chadwick, and will work with their respective agency leads to foster the most effective working relationships with Ozone’s advertising customers. In addition, Ozone also announced five other internal promotions with Jack Oates promoted to Senior Agency Partner and James Clarke to Senior Client Services Manager. Mercedes Shackleton becomes Publisher Account Manager, Maff Brown is now Senior Publisher Operations Manager, while Conor Reed has advanced from Ozone’s internship programme into the role of Junior Trader. 

Digital marketing agency Spike has announced two new hires in its latest wave of recruitment. Analytics specialist, John Earnshaw, has been appointed in a senior position as the agency’s new Head of Search Analytics and graduate Rosie Snooke has also joined as a Digital Marketing & Outreach Executive. After working in the digital marketing sector for over nine years, Earnshaw has climbed the career ladder going from Senior Software Engineer to Head of Software Engineering. This progression has given him a wealth of experience across digital marketing software development, web development best practices, third-party SEO tool integration and the creation of bespoke analytics frameworks. Snooke has joined after graduating from Leeds University in her first full-time agency role. She will be working in the Outreach team as the agency’s new Digital Marketing & Outreach Executive. 

Asana, Inc., a work management platform for organisations, has announced that Sanj Bhayro has joined Asana as the new GM of EMEA to support growth and serve enterprise customers. With over 20 years of experience in technology and SaaS, Mr. Bhayro previously held the title of VP Sales EMEA at Intercom. Prior to his time at Intercom, he served as the EMEA Vice President of Operations and Customer Growth at Google where he was a member of the EMEA Google Cloud Leadership team that developed and executed the company’s EMEA plan for growth. 

SevenRooms, a guest experience and retention platform for hospitality businesses, has announced the hiring of Josh Todd as its Chief Marketing Officer. Utilizing his passion for human connection and creating stellar experiences, Todd will spearhead SevenRooms’ global marketing strategy. Todd most recently served as CMO at Mindbody from 2017 to 2022, where he helped grow revenue 117% and played a pivotal role in connecting millions of consumers with tens of thousands of wellness businesses on the Mindbody Marketplace. Prior to Mindbody, Todd was CMO at Localytics where he helped grow the app engagement platform by 250%.

DoubleVerify (“DV”), a software platform for digital media measurement, data and analytics, has announced the appointment of four strategic commercial hires in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region. Brandon Whitelock, Steve Sargent, Jonathan Lucas, and Taha Crorie, all join DV to take on enterprise sales roles, each focussing on areas across product, agencies and partnerships. Whitelock’s previous agency and sales experience – most recently at LoopMe – has led to him joining DV as Enterprise Sales Director for Northern Europe. Having been at the former buying and planning team for Dentsu UK, Amplifi, he will bring a wealth of experience to his new role, promoting and raising awareness of DV’s product stack amongst Dentsu’s client portfolio. Another new Enterprise Sales Director is Sargent who brings 14 years of industry experience to DV. Having spent time with global brands, such as TikTok and Twitter, he has worked with some of the world’s largest CPG brands spanning international markets. At DV, Sargent will apply his notable experience to focus on new clients across the IPG network and a number of independent agencies. On the partnership side, Lucas, another seasoned industry professional, has joined DV to further strengthen the company’s partnership with GroupM, with a particular emphasis on MediaCom and Essence. He has over 12 years of experience in ad tech sales, having previously worked for the likes of Unruly and Mobsta, helping build the former from angel investment to acquisition. Finally, Crorie has joined DV as an Enterprise Sales Director to nurture and grow DV’s relationships with OMD EMEA, PHD Worldwide, and Havas. Joining from business and finance ad platform, Dianomi, and prior to that, Triplelift – where he grew Omnicom to be the biggest agency patch in Europe – Crorie will offer value to DV across agency sales for DV. 

Specsavers has announced the appointment of Neil Hollins as UK Board Trading Director, who will have accountability for the UK marketing operations, mirroring the regional structure in other global markets. Hollins moves from Specsavers Northern European region to the newly created role of UK & ROI Board Trading Director. He will lead the UK marketing team responsible for the strategic and creative development of the award-winning work Specsavers are known for. Prior to Specsavers, Hollins had a stellar career at Dixons Carphone, where he played a critical role in the transformation of the Dixon’s business and was part of the team that oversaw the merger with Carphone Warehouse.  He finished his tenure as Chief Marketing Officer. 

Lumen Research, the global attention technology company, has appointed Blaise Lucey as senior director of marketing, promoted Tanwa Edu to chief strategy officer and Arthur Cole to chief operating officer as the business continues to expand globally, with a particular focus on US growth. Based out of New York, Lucey has over ten years of B2B SaaS experience across start-ups and enterprise companies. He has built marketing programmes from the ground-up and managed global and local marketing teams for ad tech and martech companies including Criteo, Roku, and Bitly. Tanwa Edu, previously head of consulting, has been promoted to chief strategy officer. Prior to this, she was head of media at Chanel and spent the previous decade within the media agency world at Publicis, Omnicom, and GroupM. She was also COO of a startup online magazine and her broad and deep experience gives her a unique understanding of all facets of the media world. Meanwhile, Arthur Cole takes the position of chief operating officer. He will oversee the sales and client success teams as the business continues to expand. He was previously COO at Avocet, which merged with Lumen late last year.