Our Industry Profile takes a look at some of the professionals working across the advertising, adtech, marketing and media sector in Australia. It aims to shed light on the varying roles and companies across the buzzing industry.
This week we speak to Lionize head of strategy Dan Machen.
Time in current role/time at the company:
10 years in strategy roles / three years with Lionize.
How would you describe what the company does?
We lionise our clients using a balanced combination of strategic strength, measured media and creative alchemy.
What do you do day-to-day?
Identify challenges and the best way to overcome them.
Define your job in one word:
Championing.
I got into marketing because:
I did English Lit. as a degree and based on a love of the creative use of language, marketing seemed like the perfect vocation to sustain that.
What’s the biggest challenge you face in your role?
Micro-interruptions meet my magpie mind.
What’s the biggest industry-wide challenge you’d like to see tackled?
The balance on investment of time and budget in brand-building versus short-term sales activation.
Notable campaigns you have worked on:
NSW Govn., ‘The Age of Inclusion’ – jobs for people with disability
Zambrero, ‘Zam Right’
RAISE Foundation, ‘Letters to My Mentor’
Who has been a great mentor to you and why?
Neil Davidson – exec strategy director and then CEO in London. He taught me use behavioural framing to see ‘the jumper amongst the wool’.
Words of advice for someone wanting a job like yours:
Learn by doing and scouring three specific sources of info:
- How not to plan, Les Binet and Sarah Carter
- The Advertising Effect, Adam Ferrier
- IPA, Marketing Effectiveness in the digital era series
If I wasn't doing this for a living, I'd be:
Launching a cannabis-based hard seltzer.
My mantra is:
How can this be better?
My favourite advert is:
Guinness Surfer remains unbeaten.
Music and TV streaming habits. What do you subscribe to?
Spotify, Amazon Prime, Disney+ (that I pretend is for my daughter, Willow).
Tell us one thing people at work don’t know about you?
I make a mean Yorkshire Pudding. (Originally from York in the UK.)
In five years' time I'll be:
Good at guitar on a beach somewhere.
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