B2B Rising Stars is back for its fourth year and has been more popular than ever with 40 nominations across agency and client-side. Up and coming talents are often not recognised outside their immediate teams so it’s great to see so many nominations for this crucial demographic in our industry.
Some of our Rising Stars have gone from graduates and apprentices to having a real impact on their respective organisations in a very short period of time. Others have used their initiative to trial new ways of working and offer up new revenue streams for the businesses they work in. They are valued by their colleagues, so much so that many run training programmes or are seen as the ‘go-to expert’ for an area of the business. Understanding the need to develop a strong relationship with stakeholders, our Rising Stars are able to convince senior colleagues of the benefits of digital marketing. Many are also associated with impressive ROI figures.
Below are this year’s B2B Rising Stars: their achievements prove that with drive and passion, great results are possible. Let their accomplishments inspire you to do more.
Agency
Michael Man
Job title: Digital media consultant
Company: EST Marketing
Twitter: @ESTMarketing
Michael was working in the telemarketing division at EST Marketing when he realised getting through to senior decision-makers was becoming increasingly difficult. Using his initiative, he started sending out targeted emails to see if this would help him get better engagement. He took a unique and highly personalised approach to his email marketing and saw fantastic results.
Michael approached the directors at EST to show them his success and suggest that this could be a lucrative new service offering for the company. He highlighted that not only would it increase the success of the ageny’s current client campaigns, but it could also add a new revenue stream.
EST implemented Michael’s idea to add email marketing as a new service offering, and now 40 per cent of client campaigns include email marketing services. The agency now has a whole department for its email marketing services, which Michael heads up, and it is bringing in a significant new revenue stream to the business.
Speaking about Michael’s success, James Reynolds, managing director at EST, says: “Our clients are absolutely delighted with the results our email marketing services have brought as it has really helped to accelerate the success of their campaigns and has provided them with an exceptional return on investment.”
Katie Ryan
Job title: Account manager
Company: The Individual Agency
Twitter: @Katieeryan_x
Katie joined The Individual Agency three years ago as a 17-year-old apprentice with no marketing experience. However, she didn’t let that hold her back and gained vital practical experience within the agency and studied the subject at college. As well as achieving two promotions, which now see her working as an account manager, Katie also has her level three CIM and is working towards gaining her level four by the end of the year.
Katie’s people skills, communication skills and compassion make her a natural leader. Unprompted, Katie has taken a junior account executive under her wing, teaching her how to manage her workload and helping to develop her career.
She manages 10 of her own clients in the national FMCG, printing and production, manufacturing and hospitality sectors. As an example of her client success, Katie devised a strategy for a large hospitality client to help it maximise rental income, which included an email marketing plan that delivered key messages, encouraged bookings, and helped fill pipeline business. Since implementing the campaign, the client has seen its ‘void properties’ reduce to zero and pipeline bookings increase by 10 per cent.
Clients are continually blown away by Katie’s professionalism. When a client needed an interim brand manager to work full-time at its office, Katie immediately put herself forward for the role, which she fulfilled without losing sight of the other projects she was managing. The client was so impressed they tried to poach her and offered her a job.
Daniel Trillo
Job title: Account manager
Company: OgilvyOne DNX
Twitter: @Dnxtra
Dan has succeeded in making an impact in three vital areas at his agency, OgilvyOne DNX. First, Dan took on a challenge many B2B marketers are shying away from. Despite not being part of the marketing automation (MA) team, he took it upon himself to become an MA expert and, off his own back, attended Marketo training. Once he completes the training he will be a Marketo Certified Expert (MCE).
Following the departure of his account director in July last year, as a newly promoted account manager, Dan took control of the team finances, and worked across the account team to train colleagues on the company finance system. He has now been selected to become one of the ‘super users’ for the roll out of the new company-wide finance system.
Finally, Dan demonstrated his understanding of the competitive business landscape he operates in by being aware of the need to be financially responsible, and understanding that everyone in the agency has a responsibility to seek out new business opportunities. This year he has already initiated and presented three new projects and generated unforecasted revenue for the agency.
Simon Fraser, creative director at OgilvyOne DNX, says: “No matter how busy I am, I’ve always got time for Dan because I know he’ll have done everything he can to make my job easier. He doesn’t fuss, he doesn’t flannel, he just gets on with it – and that’s probably why he’s so popular in our creative department.”
Cynthia Scheid
Job title: Copywriter
Company: Stein IAS
Twitter: @SteinIAS_EMEA
Cynthia joined Stein IAS four years ago as an office administrator. After revealing her passion for writing she began supporting the agency’s strategy and creative teams alongside her administration duties. Before long she was a full-time member of the creative team.
In her first year as a copywriter, Cynthia was recognised by her peers as the ‘Next big thing’ at the agency’s annual ‘Steinie Awards’. Thriving in the world of complex B2B value propositions, she has been the lead copywriter on two of Stein IAS’ most complex projects in recent years. The first: a multichannel, integrated campaign for ADP promoting solutions for US Healthcare Reform. The campaign was one of the most successful lead generation campaigns in ADP’s history. The second: Cynthia is the lead writer for Stein IAS’ Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) account, writing high-performing, award-winning multichannel campaigns about incredibly complex financial services products. Most recently, she has also taken a leading role in developing a global branding campaign for one of Merck Animal Health’s most important products in 2015.
Cynthia is described by her colleagues as having a tireless work ethic and being a strong mentor. She was recently promoted to a copy management role, overseeing workflow for the agency’s Americas copy team.
Client-side
Rose Malton
Job title: Senior marketing executive
Company: Sophos
Twitter: @Rose_posey
Since joining Sophos in 2012, Rose has used her knowledge of marketing and sales alignment to devise and manage campaigns that have smashed internal Sophos records – her flagship programme ‘Protect your network from invaders’ delivered ROI of 15:1 and was shortlisted for a 2014 B2B Award for ‘Most commercially successful campaign’.
This year Rose transformed a key end-user event for Sophos – Infosecurity Europe. After making strategic changes to a well-established programme, such as removing product demos from the company’s stand, Sophos is seeing some of the best results ever from a presence at this event – with 9:1 ROI already recorded and a cultural taboo of traditional events methodology quashed.
As well as already securing promotion to a senior role within the team during her time at Sophos, she has been key in business-wide projects and has become a crucial part of a small but highly successful UK marketing team. In a relatively short career in marketing she has already won accolades, driven leading-edge techniques in a traditional market and won not just awards but admirers and supporters in and outside the company. So much so that Rose’s nomination for this year’s Rising Stars came from her external agency.
Natalie Bayes
Job title: Marketing executive
Company: Newton Europe
Twitter: @NewtonCareers
Natalie joined Newton Europe as a graduate three years ago and has gone from knowing almost nothing about marketing to managing the marcomms programmes for three sectors, one of which is the largest fee earner for the business. For almost a year her line manager was on maternity leave, but she stepped up to the challenge of taking on the extra work and excelled. She managed the tactical implementation of the company’s rebrand, leading marketing programmes for three sectors at board level, and planning and organising over 30 events single-handedly.
As well as working at a much more senior level than her few years of experience would usually warrant, Natalie has been able to offer the business and the team a value-added service by being design savvy. She redesigned all sales tools and marketing materials, and various other creative platforms when the company underwent a rebrand, resulting in an estimated saving in the region of £10,000-£15,000.
Proving her passion for her team and working environment, Natalie will often run team and office CSR initiatives, such as Race for Life and SSAFA’s Big Brew Up, as well as creating additional opportunities for the team to bond both professionally and personally. Ric Whalley, business manager healthcare at Newton Europe, says: “Natalie is a great asset to the team, she has bundles of energy and enthusiasm and is always willing to help set up events and campaigns at short notice and to professional standards.”
Nada Alkutbi
Job title: Digital strategist
Company: IBM UK
Twitter: @Nadaalkutbi
Nada joined IBM on a graduate scheme in 2011 and since then her enthusiasm to deliver high standards of work has been noticed across her team and beyond. Nada is known for using her initiative and learning new tools and techniques, sharing her new skills with colleagues in the UK and at a global level. She helps the business address challenges and aids in the evolution of its digital strategy. Nada is frequently asked to provide insights and learnings on everything from influencer engagement to SEO.
Nada has managed to engage senior colleagues and convince many business leaders of the value of investing in digital programmes as a fundamental part of the marketing mix, as well as driving closer integration with the sales teams to ensure effective qualification and progression of responses. Not only concerned with issues within IBM, she cares about the client experience delivered via digital media and regularly goes the extra mile to support her sales colleagues by providing social media insights to aid their client conversations.
Speaking about Nada, Alison Orsi, VP marketing, communications and citizenship at IBM UK and Ireland, says: “Nada is incredibly passionate about digital marketing and ensuring we are doing the right thing to support our clients through their journey with IBM. She is a dedicated member of the team and handles every project with complete professionalism and a smile on her face. It is an absolute pleasure having her in our team and I have no doubt that she will go far in this organisation.”
Amy Willis
Job title: Marketing executive
Company: Achilles Information
Twitter: @AchillesLtd
Within two years of being appointed to her role as a marketing executive at Achilles, Amy has taken responsibility for lead generation activity for the brand’s UK SME market including integrating content marketing and a LinkedIn lead generation strategy for this target sector.
Her successes included tripling click-through rates from LinkedIn to the Achilles website and increasing targeted website traffic from LinkedIn by 39 per cent in eight months. At the same time, organic traffic to content marketing pages has grown by 24 per cent.
Amy’s passion for content marketing has seen her segment and reach out to Achilles’ SME audience with targeted content messaging. Thanks to this, sales conversion rates have improved by 15 per cent. In the last six months, Amy’s marketing activity has resulted in over £600,000 worth of revenue.
She has become the ‘go-to’ person for the whole team on marketing automation and has taken responsibility for mentoring the team intern, who supports her with managing email campaigns.
Amy also provides communications advice to enterprise customers on how to improve campaign conversion rates. She regularly presents, together with account managers, campaign plans and advises on messaging to key clients. Her biggest campaign to date saw a 10 per cent conversion within the first 24 hours.
Speaking about Amy, Janet Somerville, CMO at Achilles Information, says: “Amy is innovative and always seeking to find ways to improve our marketing ROI; she is a real asset to the team.”
Lucy Taylor
Job title: Marketing and sales manager
Company: Investor Publishing
Lucy joined Investor Publishing as an office junior in September 2011. Over the past four and a half years, and at only 26 years-old, she has risen to the second most senior commercial position in a company of 17 employees. Lucy now line-manages four other team members and is ultimately responsible for generating over 60 per cent of the company’s revenue.
Lucy’s quick ascension to a senior role clearly highlights her dedicated and efficient way of working. Tasked with organising and overseeing the sale of all delegate places for Investor Publishing’s events – mostly through e-marketing and telephone campaigns – Lucy has excelled in building up a rapport with her marketplace that has seen her exceed her targets year-on-year.
Lucy has also been a core part of Investor Publishing’s adoption of digital market techniques, such as the use of Salesforce and Mailchimp to interact with and monitor customers.
Vernon Baxter, managing director of Investor Publishing, says: “She is a great team player and is a lynchpin to most of the processes that make the business tick. As a business, Investor Publishing has increased its revenue by over 50 per cent in the last three years and Lucy and the team she leads have made a huge contribution to this growth. Her consistent and effective communication with the marketplace marks her out as a B2B Rising Star.”
Natasha Antunes
Job title: Marketing programs specialist
Company: Mentor Graphics
Twitter: @Mentor_graphics
Natasha heads up Mentor Graphics’ biannual magazine which has a readership of 10,000, built from zero just three years ago. In order to get the most from the publication Natasha uses it in its entirety as a sales tool but also breaks it into component parts to use across the web, on social platforms and in email campaigns.
Natasha was responsible for a campaign that saw interactions rise 10-fold over three quarters with the product line having its best ever sales year. Over 30 new pieces of content were developed reaching over 12,000 contacts across the globe.
As well as external work Natasha also raised the profile of her division and its products by storyboarding a division infomercial shown at the global sales kick-off in front of an audience of more than 1000 people.
Natasha is happy to take charge and lead projects as well as support colleagues with their work. She has introduced new ways of working and different content types to the company. These include animations, infomercials, and greater use of social platforms. She’s helped boost the skills of other members of the team by teaching them how to write success stories and structure campaign activity.
Jane Wade, field marketing and programs manager at Mentor Graphics, says: “Natasha brings energy, enthusiasm and communications expertise to our team. She’s a reliable pair of hands to leave in control of any task big or small.”
Kay Mumford
Job title: Communications and marketing officer
Company: Schaeffler UK
Twitter: @SchaefflerUK
Since joining the company in 2011 Kay has helped to significantly improve and broaden Schaeffler’s internal and external communications. She has helped the engineering-led business modernise the way it engages with its stakeholders.
She has pioneered the use of social media within Schaeffler globally, particularly Twitter, and is driving activities forward for the brand on LinkedIn. Realising the importance of measuring success Kay also raised awareness of the performance of the Schaeffler UK website – a satellite of the German parent site – by generating a comprehensive web statistics report inhouse. This has enabled the department to focus on optimising content, driving traffic to key pages and building strong links for good SEO results. An email platform, previously lacking within the business, is now also up and running thanks to Kay’s hard work and determination.
Keen to help the company adopt marketing best practice Kay has ensured product training courses are being marketed across all platforms – online, email, social media, direct mail, advertising, PR and POS.
Like some of this year’s other Rising Stars, Kay has recognised the importance of internal marketing. An internal email newsletter for all employees was launched to keep them up-to-date with the latest news across all functions of the business. A well-structured and disciplined process is now in place and accepted across all departments with strong buy-in at senior management level. This has had the added benefit of raising the communications and marketing profile within the business, an area Schaeffler has struggled with in the past.
Speaking highly of Kay’s work ethic, Karen Preston, communications and marketing manager at Schaeffler, says: “Kay is very focused, organised and professional in everything she does, and has earned much respect from her peers whether within the department or outside and at varying levels. Her can-do attitude and focus on delivering excellent customer service, both internally and externally has been very pleasing to see and will serve her well for her future career.”
