Meet the Mentors
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Oli Richards
CMO - THE BEYOND COLLECTIVE
Oli’s helped United Airlines promote their unrivalled service to the US, Canterbury to bring their brand to life for rugby players across the UK and worked closely with the MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS F1 Team to bring their fans closer to the team they love.
He’s worked in marketing and new business for agencies including Engine, Synergy, Dentsu and Mcgarrybowen. Now working at The Beyond Collective, he is responsible for Marketing and New Business across Above+Beyond (creative), Yonder (media) and Frontier (brand strategy) - to help win new clients.
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Ellie Ring
NEW BUSINESS DIRECTOR & PARTNER - BBH
A dynamic new business and marketing leader at top creative agency BBH, with excellent interpersonal skills, a strong creative flair and an impressive new business record. Responsible for shaping the new business agenda and providing growth for the agency.
Previously she ran the new business team at the UK’s fastest growing and largest independent media agency the7stars, leading the agency into the top 10 in the media agency league table. She also helped launch and win clients for start up agency Bountiful Cow and was instrumental in securing several industry awards.
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Claire Hutchings
FOUNDER - CHIME AGENCY
Chime Agency helps the UK's best independent agencies find their voice and shout it from the rooftops.
Claire has 15 years’ of experience spanning boutique independents like We Are Collider, HLabs, Climbing Trees, and Quickfire Digital to global networked agencies Publicis Groupe, Hotwire, and Fleishman Hillard.
Claire won Best New Business at the 2022 Women’s Business Awards and was Commended at the Global Women in Marketing awards 2022.
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Anna Stone
BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR - HOTWIRE
Anna started her career at a lead gen agency spending 5 years selling the services of agencies from TBWA to Cogent Elliott, including the launch campaign for The Engine Group. She then worked at a number of small independent agencies including 23red where she led the agency’s new business strategy. In 2015 she moved to Ogilvy initially to drive growth for their new B2B division, then later working across OgilvyOne as part of the teams winning F1, EY and TK Maxx. She also worked in a global role working directly into Ogilvy’s Global Chief Growth Officer. And now works as Business Development Director at Hotwire.
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Nathan Lomax
CO-FOUNDER & DIRECTOR OF QUICKFIRE DIGITAL
Nathan is leading innovation in the area of e-commerce and retail. He started his agency at 18 straight from school, then rebranded to Quickfire Digital 5 and a half years ago and formed the company Harper Lomax Ltd T/A Quickfire Digital.
He’s won numerous awards and most recently picked up the Rising Star Award in the European Agency Awards 2020. He’s also been awarded in the Rising Star category in the UK Agency Awards. Quickfire Digital was recognised in 2022 as the European e-commerce agency of the year.
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Jack Thompson
CLIENT SERVICES MANAGER - GHYSTON
Jack helps his clients create and implement effective business development strategies. He believes that Karma applies to business as much as it does to life in general so he shares his knowledge and time to help others wherever he can!
Over the last 17 years, he has worked in a range of creative agencies and B2B tech companies, consulting at C-Suite level with organisations ranging from startups to multinationals. As a consultant, he helps his clients to strategically grow their businesses. As a mentor, he supports the next generation of business people to thrive.
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Lucia Piseddu
FOUNDER - THE BD SCHOOL
Lucia Piseddu is the Founder of The BD School. With 15 years in business development, she experienced first-hand the pain and gains of working in this field.
That's exactly the reason why she decided to build The BD School, to shed a light on business development and help professionals be more effective in their jobs!
The BD School makes business development simple. Its mission is to enable individuals and ambitious founders to acquire the skills and knowledge they need to leave their mark in society.
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Keith Smith
MANAGING DIRECTOR - THE ADVERTIST
Keith’s company's agency new business platform The Advertist (www.theadvertist.com) is shaking up the world of new business and we only work with companies and people committed to growth.
The Advertist is the UK's only independent company data, insight and new business tool kit that effectively levels the playing field for new business campaigns. It offers marketing, PR, creative, digital and tech agencies the opportunity to access, affordable, accurate and simple tools to develop new business strategies.
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Katy Howell
CEO - IMMEDIATE FUTURE
Katy appears regularly on BBC news, Victoria Derbyshire, and Reuters, as well in The Telegraph, FT and Guardian. She’s considered the 4th most influential social media marketing expert, named one of the 25 women who have made an outstanding contribution to digital by the Drum, co-authored 4 books on social, and was honoured to be amongst the Top 100 Asian tech entrepreneurs in the UK.
Her agency works with brands including; lastminute.com, Princess Cruises, Selfridges, Google, Diageo, OnBuy, Fujitsu, Sony Music, and many more.
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Nathan Anibaba
FOUNDER AND MANAGING DIRECTOR - BRIDGE GROWTH AND HOST OF AGENCY DEALMASTERS PODCAST
As founder and managing director of Bridge, Nathan helps agencies connect with their clients through the power of podcasting.
In just 18 months, they have grown their podcast Agency Dealmasters into one of the leading marketing agency podcasts in the world, with hundreds of thousands of downloads, listeners from over 141 countries and a guest list from leading agencies from MediCom, Ogilvy, WPP, Havas and more.
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Kim French
HEAD OF MARKETING - COFFEE & TV
Kim French is Head of Marketing at Coffee & TV, a Certified B Corporation, independently run creative studio where their work and their artist-led culture have been recognised by BAFTA, RTS, Campaign, British Arrows, D&AD, AICP and more.
She has also worked at Preen, a video production agency based in East London, and global brands like LUSH Cosmetics, The North Face, Guinness and the Tokyo Olympics.
Kim values strong and authentic client relationships and believes in the power of community when it comes to marketing. She is a mother to a charismatic 4 year old called Yoyo and is an avid reader, particularly partial to a gothic horror novel.
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Brad Smith
FOUNDER OF SUCCEED DIGITAL
Brad’s won work with over 80 brands and has the full mix of working with top brands, great start-ups, innovative scale ups as well as enterprise organisations. He founded his own agency Succeed.Digital as well as new business consultancy Succeed.Agency dedicated to helping agency owners to find more leads, build better pipelines and most importantly close more business. He’s also written for the latest book by world renowned marketer ‘Damian Ryan’ ‘Understanding Digital Strategy’ and created 18 different agency propositions in the last year alone.
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Chris Longfellow
FOUNDER - WE TAKE FLIGHT
Chris blends experience from roles in both brand and agency, having helped ecommerce, real estate, and leisure brands grow, with a particular fondness for the nuts and bolts of Business Development. Through his consultancy, Chris steers companies to expand and solidify their market presence.
He's also at the helm of WeTakeFlight, where he and his team design and develop Shopify & Wordpress solutions, helping start-ups and emerging brands find their footing. He's all about practical business solutions and fostering a collaborative environment where everyone’s contributions are valued and success is shared.
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