The mobile marketing industry is ever-changing, and that applies to the people as much as the technology. Movers & Shakers is our regular feature following the hottest hires in the industry, so you can keep track of who’s joined which company, and what they’re doing there.

Diezhandino to take up Diageo CMO role as Saller retires
Diageo’s chief marketing officer, Syl Saller, is to retire from the role after 20 years’ service to pursue a portfolio career, focused on leadership development and executive coaching, alongside non-executive roles. She will be replaced as CMO by Cristina Diezhandino, global category director Scotch, and managing director for Reserve, Diageo’s luxury brands business, with effect from 1 July.

Saller joined Diageo as GB marketing director in 1999 and was appointed CMO in 2013. As one of the World Federation of Advertising’s top five global marketers, she has been consistently recognised externally and was awarded a CBE in The Queen’s 2020 Honours list for services to business and equality. She is well known as a leading voice for greater diversity within the creative industries and as an active champion of progressive gender portrayal in advertising. She remains president of the Marketing Society and serves as an active board member and coach for the Marketing Academy.

Her replacement as CMO, Cristina Diezhandino, has extensive experience across marketing and general management, with deep experience in both emerging and developed markets. She has led Diageo’s work to fuel the consumer appeal of Scotch, including iconic brands like Johnnie Walker and Buchanan’s. Under her leadership, Diageo’s Reserve brands division has risen from no. 3 in luxury market share to no. 1. She has also overseen Diageo’s biggest single investment in Scotch Whisky tourism, including major work to create a state-of-the-art immersive Johnnie Walker visitor experience in Edinburgh, as well as the transformation of our visitor centres across Scotland’s four corners.

Prior to her Scotch and Reserve role, she was the general manager for Diageo Central America & Caribbean, responsible for Diageo’s business in over 37 territories, successfully leading an extensive distributor network and commercial team.
‘I have had the privilege to work closely with Syl over many years and we have enjoyed an amazing partnership,” said Diageo chief executive, Ivan Menezes. “Syl has always held herself and colleagues to the highest standards while showing great empathy for our people and their success. We are all hugely grateful for her leadership impact in delivering Diageo’s performance and building our reputation as a world class consumer marketing company.

“Thanks to Syl, our pipeline of marketing talent has never been stronger, and I am delighted that Cristina will be our new CMO. Cristina has consistently shown herself to be a widely respected and resilient leader, able to build high performing teams across geographies and businesses and I look forward to continued brand growth under her leadership.’

Lyons to head up media experience at Havas
Havas Media Group has appointed Jackie Lyons to the newly-created role of head of media experience, following the global launch of its Mx (Media Experience) methodology in 2019.

Lyons joins the group following over five years at Carat. As planning partner, she was responsible for leading the agency’s planning output, working across a number of its biggest clients, with a particular focus on FMCG and retail brands, including Mondelez, Adidas and Lego. During her time at Carat, she developed a number of bespoke client processes that allowed her team to incorporate more data-led insights, bridging strategy, planning and activation.

In her new role, she will lead a dedicated Media Experience team of 30, who will work to leverage connection, context and content to create the effective media experiences for Havas Media Group’s clients, which include O2, Homebase, Starbucks and Dreams.
She will report to John Paul Cadman, Chief Planning Officer, Havas Media Group. He said: “I’ve had the pleasure of working with Jackie before, and when we created this new role, I knew she’d be perfect for it. She is passionate about her craft, clients love her, and she just gets the job done. I’m really excited about her joining Havas Media Group, and I have no doubt that she will play a pivotal role in the continued success of the agency.”

Elvis promotes Hudson and Griffiths to creative director
Creative agency ELVIS has promoted associate creative directors, James Hudson and Rob Griffiths, to the role of creative director.
The promotions have been made in recognition of the award-winning work that Hudson and Griffiths have led since joining the agency. Their recent campaigns include the UNILAD ‘Blood Without Bias’ initiative, which sought to end discrimination against gay and bisexual men who want to donate blood; and Cadbury Creme Egg ‘EATertainment’, the chocolate brand’s own Netflix-style streaming platform.

In their new roles, Hudson and Griffiths will oversee the ELVIS creative department, developing the agency’s creative product across all clients and aspects of the business. The move will enable Neale Horrigan, executive creative director, to take a step away from the day-to-day running of the team in order to focus on clients, reputation, new business and new ventures.

He said: “James and Rob are a multi award-winning duo, responsible for some our most unexpected and unforgettable work in recent years. I’m delighted to see them step up to become creative directors as my own focus and role evolves.”

Hudson and Griffiths joined ELVIS as a creative team from Saatchi & Saatchi X in 2014.

Scott takes up video market development role at Xandr
Xandr, AT&T’s advertising company, has hired Austin Scott as head of video market development for EMEA. In this role, she will accelerate the development and deployment of Xandr’s video-first propositions for broadcasters, publishers, marketers and agencies.

Austin brings many years’ experience in video-first advertising technology and a mindset focused on collaboration, to drive a better video ecosystem. Most recently, she built the demand channel partnerships for StickyAds.tv, a French video ad tech start up, which was acquired by Freewheel. She also has proven accomplishments in sales and account management at SaaS companies. This includes automating demand channels in the US and internationally for a leading video supply side platform.

Hall to head up eCommerce at Reprise
Reprise, the full-service global performance media marketing unit of IPG Mediabrands, has appointed Neilson Hall to the newly-created role of head of e-Commerce, EMEA. Neilson will report into Jimmy Schougaard, president, Reprise EMEA and Craig Lister, CEO, Reprise Network UK.

Hall brings with him extensive client side experience from Shop Direct, where he lead one of the UKs largest in-house eCommerce teams. Prior to that, he led the eCommerce division at Omnicom. He began his media career at iProspect, before co-founding the agency and tech platform, Illuminate. During his career, he has delivered integrated marketing solutions for the likes of British Gas, Amex, Direct Line, Adidas and Apple.

Hall joins Reprise as the company continues to extend its eCommerce capabilities globally. In his new role, he will be tasked with working across the EMEA region to integrate and align skills to establish the newly formed eCommerce team, ensuring the function is developing, growing and delivering across the board for clients, and providing support to Mediabrands sister agencies UM and Initiative.

He said: “I’m really excited about joining the team at IPG, its clear the group is taking ecommerce and the incremental opportunity it offers our clients very seriously. I feel all the component parts are here to have a truly market leading offering – they just need to be pulled together around the customer.”

Adjust hires Mikkola to head up Coalition Against Ad Fraud
Adjust has hired Ville Mikkola joins as head of CAAF (Coalition Against Ad Fraud) an industry-wide alliance founded by Adjust in 2017 to tackle ad fraud. CAAF members agree on shared definitions and guidelines that include establishing what constitutes technical performance fraud in alignment with IAB measurement guidelines; committing to latency guidelines; and agreeing on responsibilities on dealing with the issue. CAAF now counts 30 members, including ironSource, Liftoff, TapJoy, CrossInstall, Vungle, Moloco, Jampp, AdColony and Fyber.

Based out of Adjust’s Berlin headquarters, Mikkola will be responsible for the strategy and global development of CAAF. He has has a long history and involvement in ad fraud prevention, both through his experiences at ad tech companies and later through his own company.

Prior to Adjust, he served as director of network operations at Glispa, and as managing director for Europe at mobile ad network YeahMobi. Most recently, he co-founded a casual gaming company, TreasureHunt, which worked with NBCUniversal and was recently acquired by Huuuge Games.

“With mobile ad spend continuing to break records, performance ad fraud is a problem that advertisers and networks can no longer afford to ignore,” said Adjust co-founder and CTO, Paul H. Müller. “Our network of trusted partners plays an integral role in providing accurate, actionable and fraud-free data for our clients. We’re thrilled to welcome Ville to the team, and look forward to working with him to move our CAAF mission forward.”

Head to lead partnerships at Impact
Partnership Automation firm Impact has announced the creation of a chief partnerships officer (CPO) role. Michael Head, former general manager of the Impact Partnership Cloud, was promoted to fill the role, effective 13 February. The company has also announced the appointment of Rob Perdue, former COO & board member of The Trade Desk, to Impact’s board of directors.

Head and Perdue’s appointments follow Impact’s March 2019 establishment of the Partnership Automation category, at which time the company also announced a $75m (£63m) round of funding to support the growth and adoption of Impact’s Partnership Cloud platform.
Head brings more than a decade of experience in business development to the role, with nine of those years spent at Impact, closing the company’s largest deals and creating new teams. An entrepreneur at heart, his prior role was co-founder of location-based deal app, SBClick.

As CPO, he will be responsible for growing client partnerships, establishing new company partnerships and the overall satisfaction, retention and growth of customers. He will lead the Partnerships and Customer Success teams and will report into CEO David A. Yovanno. 

He said: “I am excited to accelerate growth for our clients, our partners and our business. “Partnerships are the true economic engine for our company and enterprises all over the world. I am excited to work with our internal experts and champion the importance of partnerships as the third growth channel alongside sales and marketing.”

McCombe leaves Riverford for paid media and analytics role at Organic
Digital agency Organic has appointed Clare McCombe as the agency’s new senior paid media and analytics consultant.

She joins Organic from Riverford Organic Farmers, where she was campaign marketing manager. Her new role will include helping deliver paid media insight, strategy and campaigns for Organic clients, whilst supporting the agencys revenue growth, working alongside the new business team to produce and execute a paid media strategy.

Her hire will help bolster the agency’s paid team, with key responsibilities focusing on client management, reviewing and making strategic recommendations on Google Analytic platforms for clients, and managing the paid media and analytics team.

Alongside her previous role at Riverford, where she was in charge of the execution, development and delivery of campaigns, she has also worked at Coast and Country Cottages and HRA Food and Drink.

She said: “I cant wait to get stuck into my new role at Organic. Working brand side for the past six and a half years means I understand exactly what brands look for in an agency. I hope to meet these needs for Organics clients, whilst going above and beyond to help deliver paid media insight, strategy and campaigns.”

The Fifth hands commercial role to LADbible’s Coleman
Full-service influencer marketing and talent agency, The Fifth, has appointed Sam Coleman to the newly-created role of commercial director. He will lead the day-to-day commercial strategy, sales operations, and client services business for the rapidly-expanding agency, reporting to The Fifth founder and managing director, Oliver Lewis.

His appointment follows the launch of The Fifth Talent last month. Backed by News UK, The Fifth Talent manages the publisher’s content creators and journalists, creating opportunities to partner with brands independent of the News UK’s titles. The ambition is to bring together mainstream and social-first talent, celebrating diversity and promoting inclusion for brand campaigns across multiple sectors, on a global scale.

Coleman was previously head of group sales at LADbible, where he drove significant revenue growth, scaling the team, transforming the perception of the brand and the quality of its output. His 18 years’ experience in the media industry also includes positions at The Guardian, ESPN and Disney.

He said: “I am incredibly excited to be joining The Fifth at such an important time for the company. Influencer marketing is still relatively nascent and The Fifth is in a great position to professionalise it, ultimately to build trust with clients through bold and effective work. Oliver Lewis has a real vision for the company – and a client roster that already includes Tag Heuer, Marc Jacobs, Lucozade and TikTok.”

New business brief for Trewavas at RTB House
RTB House, which provides marketing solutions for top brands worldwide, has appointed Simon Trewavas to the newly-created role of VP, new business.

Prior to joining RTB House, Trewavas was head of Google display ads for 12 years, spearheading the company’s strategy in this area working in tandem with agencies and brands including WPP, Havas, MoneySuperMarket, Total Jobs, M&M Direct and Ford.
He said:

“Joining RTB House at such a pivotal time in the company’s growth is a privilege and a challenge I welcome. I’m passionate about developing innovative display ad solutions that meet the needs of individual brands and also appreciate the consumers’ desire for respectful and relevant advertising.”

Millward appointed to AIMM board
Nick Millward, vice president Europe at global mobile engagement provider mGage, has been appointed board member for the Association for Interactive Media and Micropayments (AIMM), serving alongside other board members from ITV, BBC and Global Radio from 1 April.

AIMM promotes success in the Interactive Media and Micropayments industry by driving commercial growth and protecting the regulatory environment under which members operate. Incorporating four main channels of activity, it seeks to bring together members under working groups and forums; educate them through knowledge seminars and training courses; and interface with regulators to ensure the robustness of members’ operational environments.

Millward said: “I am delighted to be appointed as a board member for the AIMM. I believe it is hugely beneficial for mGage to be part of the conversation, to be involved in regular discussions around the media and payments market and to have the opportunity to put forward new ideas to continue to grow this industry.

“With the emergence of new technologies such as Rich Communications Services (RCS), Apple Business Chat (ABC) and WhatsApp, alongside upcoming billing solutions, there is a growing opportunity in the market to build something together for the greater good of all businesses.”

The Marketors’ Company appoints Wilson as its new master
The Worshipful Company of Marketors, also known as the Marketors’ Company, has elected Lesley Wilson as its new master for 2020. The livery company’s membership is drawn from senior marketing practitioners and marketing services experts, together with recognised marketing academics.

Centring the The Marketors’ strategic direction around ‘the power of marketing to deliver economic and social good’, Wilson’s leadership of the company in 2020 will reset the Worshipful Company’s founding principle in a modern context, demonstrating how marketing is mutually beneficial for businesses, customers and wider society.

Wilson is an accomplished marketer, having worked in global and UK-based leadership roles in the Telco and IT sectors, including various roles at BT, where she led the multi-national marcomms team, ran a project to bring the Ignite subsidiary brand back to BT and led the formation of the organisation’s internal Marketing Academy.

She said: “Our founding principle is that marketing benefits everyone, and this is as relevant today in a digitally-connected world as it was when we were founded. Customers are increasingly demanding that businesses are responsible, sustainable, and have a positive impact on society. Our marketing profession has a huge opportunity to take the lead on how to operate in this era of increasing customer expectations.”