What I do

I’m a long-term freelancer, helping agencies and brands with:

Brand workshops

From ‘What do we stand for’ and ‘Where are we going?’ to brand development and campaign co-creation sessions, I’ve facilitated 65 strategic workshops and counting, including with the leadership teams of two £700M+ turnover retail businesses.

Brand positioning

I’ve extensive end-to-end experience with brands of all shapes and sizes, encompassing stakeholder interviews, workshops, tricky client meetings, umpteen powerpoint decks, brand books, brand films and consideration of the strategic and employer brand implications of rolling out a revised identity and positioning.

Creative campaign strategic support

I can help from initial client meetings and insight gathering, through developing a strategic approach and getting client buy-in, creative brief writing with the all-important creative springboard, support through creative development, keeping an eye on execution and measuring effectiveness.

Pitches

I love pitching and have a great track record with many £1M+ pitch wins behind me.

Strategic PowerPointing

Annual plans, brand plans, brand positionings, campaign strategy, strategic process sell-in…if it involves a powerpoint deck with an insight-led strategic approach (or doing the client’s job for them…), count me in.

Insight and Planning for digital

I’m comfortable working across the customer journey, user personas, communications architecture etc. and I play nicely with Data Scientists.

Qualitative research

I’m a trained qual researcher, with experience across management and moderation of focus groups, depth interviews and accompanied shops. I also enjoy working with great quallies to give them proper briefs and add a Planning-led viewpoint to their outputs. Currently only doing qual remotely.

Senior stakeholder engagement

I am a safe pair of hands to carry out stakeholder interviews with very senior clients and contacts. As well as my qualitative interview skills, I have a business degree and extensive experience interviewing hedge fund directors, university professors, former FTSE100 CEOs, medical directors and so on. If a CEO suddenly wants to talk about EBITDA mid-interview (yes, this has happened), I can keep up.

Short-term agency cover at Director and Head-of level

As a former agency Head of Planning, I can provide short-term cover while a strategy department lead goes on holiday or has to take urgent leave. I’ve previously looked after an international Strategy Director role for one of the world’s largest global communications groups and provided holiday cover for the Planning Director at one of the biggest agencies outside London.

Training

I help agency teams to upskill and grow, delivering training to account handlers at all levels on creative brief writing and strategic thinking.  I can tailor appropriate sessions to suit your needs, headcount and budget, with all training currently delivered remotely. I can also use my knowledge and experience to update your briefing templates and processes. Find out more about the training I offer on my training page.

Want to know more? Get in touch.