B&T's CMO Power List 2025, presented by atn
Marketing isn’t easy. If it was, everyone would do it. But being a true leader in the marketing world—like the 20 below—is even harder. At a time when many businesses are doing it tough, it falls on leaders like these to stand up and show why they are the growth drivers.
So with the help of our friends at the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA), we’ve picked the cream of the marketing crop. These are the leaders that all of us in the industry would do well to learn from—whether that’s from their clarity of vision at a time when everything seems so hazy or their relentless pursuit of excellence.
There’s a broad swathe of industries represented in the 2025 Power List with grocers, telcos, insurers, FMCG brands and more. But what you’ll see is that all of them are driving their respective brands forward, carving out market share as well as a share of minds when audiences are ephemeral and money is expensive. They are the ones putting meat on the table for their businesses and getting the attention of consumers when their minds could very well be elsewhere.
Speaking of attention, we’re delighted to partner with atn for the CMO Power List this year. The team there know how to stand out amongst a crowded market and deliver real cut-through for their clients. We are indebted to the talents of the team at Made In Katana, whose studios, photographers, stylists and producers made this our best-looking Power List yet. Together, we whittled down an unwieldy list of marketers in Australia to reach this final 20. They are the pinnacle of marketing in Australia.
It would be easy to pick this Power List by looking at who commands the biggest budgets in the industry. After all, a suitably large media budget can overcome all manner of ills. But that is not the right way to think of marketing. Every one of the 20 marketing leaders below (note, not all of them have chief marketing officer as their stated job title) have driven the industry to new heights with smart strategies, creative and media excellence and, increasingly, deep marketing tech and digital transformation nous.
We would also like to pay tribute to Lisa Ronson, the former CMO of Medibank who passed away following a tragic accident last year. You’ll see Ronson as part of the 20 CMOs below, we interviewed and photographed her in November after being selected earlier in the year due to her stature in the industry and impressive plans for the insurer. She will be sorely missed in the industry and beyond.
But that’s enough from us. Here, in alphabetical order only, is the 2025 CMO Power List.
Amanda McVay
Coles
Amanda McVay, chief customer officer (CCO) at Coles, brings a wealth of retail experience and a customer-first philosophy to one of Australia’s leading supermarket chains.
With a career spanning more than two decades in merchandising, commercial, and supply chain roles in the US, McVay has transformed her deep analytical expertise into a data-driven and empathetic approach to marketing and customer engagement.
Joining Coles 18 months ago, McVay’s path to her current role was anything but conventional. “Most of my career was spent on the commercial and financial side of retail,” she explained.
“I transitioned to marketing only in the last few years, driven by a fascination with consumer behaviour and why choices were made, and all the different influencers and indicators to try to help best predict how customers may make their next choice.”
Central to McVay’s strategy is a focus on customer needs, particularly during challenging economic times.
“The cost-of-living crisis is a significant concern for Australians right now, and we’re deeply aware of our role in helping families stretch their budgets,” she said.
“We’re here to solve problems for our customers and make their lives a little easier,” she added.
“We really feel that it's our responsibility to serve customers in this time.”
McVay also sees segmentation as a cornerstone of retail marketing.
“What sets retailers apart is the ability to segment customers based on purchasing behaviour rather than demographics,” she explained.
“It’s not just about who they are but what they buy and how they shop. That allows us to personalise experiences and make shopping more relevant.”
Digital marketing and social media are key tools in her strategy. McVay is particularly interested in how these platforms inspire and influence customer behaviour.
“Social media is where consumers discover new ideas and products,” she said.
“We’re learning how to show up authentically in that space, using user-generated content and influencers to build trust and engagement.”
Beyond marketing, McVay has helped deepen Coles’ community connections, especially through sports sponsorships. Recent initiatives including partnerships with Football Australia and Little Athletics have reinforced the company’s commitment to local communities.
“It’s about more than sponsorship—it’s about enabling families to connect through sport, even during tough times,” she said.
While sustainability isn’t yet a focal point in Coles’ external campaigns, McVay noted that the company is working hard behind the scenes.
“Customers want proof points when it comes to sustainability—we want to make sure we can demonstrate that with those specific products as much as possible, more so than general statements.”
Leadership is another area where McVay shines. Described as a collaborative and empowering leader, she spends significant time working closely with her team.
“I believe in aligning on priorities and giving my team the freedom to execute,” she explained.
“I’m also a big proponent of cross-functional collaboration because success in retail requires everyone to work together.”
Despite the challenges of leading marketing for a major supermarket in turbulent times, McVay remains focused on Coles’ mission to support Australian families.
“It is a tough time for consumers in Australia, cost of living is a real issue and we play a very critical role in that”.
“We really feel that it’s our responsibility to serve customers in this time”.
With a blend of analytical rigour, creative vision and a deep commitment to customers, McVay is helping Coles navigate today’s challenges while building a stronger, more connected future.
Anneliese Douglass
Nestlé
Anneliese Douglass has served as Nestlé’s director of marketing and communications for a shade over three years. Her role is vast, covering brands from Nescafé and Nespresso to Maggi, MILO and Smarties.
But it also covers a huge swathe of the southern hemisphere. Douglass is responsible for Australia, New Zealand and thousands of islands across the Pacific. To give you a sense of the role it’s more than 7,700km from her Sydney office to the Pitcairn Islands—or Sydney to Perth and back with some change.
Managing that would be enough to make anyone’s head spin. But for Douglass, everything comes down to perspective, planning and leadership.
“We have an extraordinary team… but because we’re so busy, we have a list of priority big bets that we have coming for the year. The business knows that’s where we’re putting our resources, our energy and our focus,” Douglass said.
“Then I’ll focus on some key areas—for me what’s really important is driving a culture of creativity and creativity of work. But digital transformation is super important to me, it gives our marketers the fuel and the time they need to think strategically and creatively.”
Setting a business of Nestlé’s size and complexity on a digital transformation is no easy task. It might be as simple as making Microsoft Excel forms interactive but it could also be as complex as harnessing the latest AI advancement to deepen its consumer insights. And remember, that’s happening across multiple brands, in multiple verticals in multiple countries at the same time.
“I’m a bit passionate about my digital transformation!” Douglass added, laughing.
"Anything that is about change, sticking your head above the parapet can sometimes cause a headache. But that’s what true leadership is."
However, given the scale of the task that Douglass has on her hands, her role is as much about gathering, organising and empowering diverse teams to deliver dispersed outcomes as it is getting into the weeds.
“I’m a very big believer in having specialist functions within marketing. You need specialist expertise. I can’t always go deep in digital. I know the vision and what I want but I need the specialist expertise to get me there. It’s not left brain-right brain, I need to have different people in my team to help me deliver it,” she said.
Douglass’ humility in her leadership is noticeable, particularly when she is proving an exemplar to the rest of the industry on social matters. For instance, Nestlé’s KitKat brand partnered with the 36 Months campaign and Nestle was a founding member of Ad Net Zero.
“For us, we’ve done so much work on sustainability with our supply chain partners, recycled materials and more. It made perfect sense for us to focus more on marketing… I had felt a bit alone in the discussions on advertising and marketing because we didn’t have anything like Ad Net Zero, when I would have discussions with suppliers, agencies and so on, you’re kind of working it out for yourself. Now, we can all learn from each other and collaborate,” said Douglass.
“Anything that is about change, sticking your head above the parapet can sometimes cause a headache. But that’s what true leadership is, saying ‘This is right for us and our organisation’.
“From my point of view, you don’t have to do this in marketing and advertising—but it’s the right thing to do,” Douglass added.
We could all learn more than a thing or two from Douglass’ leadership in the space. Our planet depends on it, after all.
Brent Smart
Telstra
Brent Smart has been among Australia’s leading marketers for a while, having served as the CMO of IAG before joining Telstra in 2022. Before that, he spent three years as CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi New York with stops at BBDO San Francisco, Colenso BBDO and M&C Saatchi. It’s some CV, to say the least.
He has overseen a complete reimagining of the Telstra brand and perhaps a vertical. What if your telco could be cool—like genuinely cool?
“It’s a bit of a soundbite of mine but if you want to change how people feel about a brand, change how the brand feels. And we’ve massively changed how the brand feels,” Smart told B&T.
“The group that are noticing [the new Telstra] is the group that is hardest to move: non-customers. We had a big gap between our customers and non-customers.”
You’ll likely be aware of the exceptional creative work that the +61 bespoke agency comprising TBWA, Bear Meets Eagle On Fire and OMD has developed across TVC, digital, OOH and through Telstra’s CX. It’s won awards all over the world.
But it’s the customers, not the trophy collection, that matters most to Smart.
“Our customers actually rate us pretty well—we’re not perfect but our NPS is the strongest it’s been for a long time, our complaints are the lowest that they’ve been for a long time. Our customers think we’re doing a pretty good job and it’s this entrenched brand perception amongst non-customers that’s really hard to move and we’re noticing that starting to move.”
"Ultimately, you’ve got to get beyond the rational."
Of course, Telstra and its beautiful creative do not exist in a vacuum. Its largest rival, Optus has still not fully recovered from its 2022 data breach brand disaster. Its 2023 outage, which ultimately led to CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin resigning, didn’t help either. But it is this context that allows Telstra to have such potent marketing. Its network didn’t go down. Its customer’s data wasn’t hacked.
“Our network gets massive global acclaim. We’re one of the best networks in the world. We’ve had something like 60 world firsts on the Telstra network. I feel like the advertising is now living up to the network in many ways,” he said.
“Take ‘Better On A Better Network’ [Telstra’s sumptuous 26-part stop-motion TVC campaign]. We’ve invested $40 billion in our network over the last decade, it’s constantly getting better. I feel like we’ve just made a campaign worthy of our great network.”
Smart’s work extends way beyond the campaigns, too. The Telstra app, he explained, gets “fantastic” customer ratings, for instance.
“On many rational aspects, we perform really well. I’m trying to inject some emotion into the brand and ultimately into the experience. I want Telstra staff to be proud to work for Telstra. I want our customers to feel proud—it’s a big word, man, to be proud of your telco.
“Ultimately, you’ve got to get beyond the rational. Think about human behaviour and how people make purchase decisions, it isn’t rational—parts of it are rational, most of it’s emotional. You’ve got to find a way to communicate emotionally and it’s even more importantly if you’re in a boring category. You’d better find a way to be entertaining because no one is coming to your category with a level of interest. The idea of bringing entertainment is really important.
“I don’t believe there are low involvement categories. Only low involvement marketing,” he said.
Now that’s a soundbite to live by.
Chris Brown
McDonald’s Australia
When McDonald’s marketing boss Chris Brown first thought about the highlights 2024 would deliver, bringing a large purple monster and a lion to Aussie shores might not have been top of mind, but that’s exactly what has happened.
The Golden Arches delivered two of Australia’s most memorable and award winning marketing moments by rebooting the nostalgic Big Mac Chant for a new generation of Macca’s fans and also rekindling Grimace.
Brown, who took the helm of McDonald’s Australia’s marketing in 2020 before being elevated to chief customer officer in 2022, is in a purple patch, if you’ll pardon the Grimace-shaped pun.
“Australians are doing it really, really tough and it’s something we are acutely aware of because McDonald’s is famous for value,” he said.
“Things like Grimace allows customers to escape some of the tough things that they’re dealing with by coming to McDonald’s and having a fun experience that delivers on value and is good for business.”
Another cultural moment that McDonald’s rekindled was its famous Big Mac chant through its ‘The Original Mouthful’ campaign. A schoolyard classic for Baby Boomers and Generation X, the chant goes: “Two all-beef patties, Special Sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.”
McDonald’s Australia brought it back to great fanfare and for the social media age, using Snapchat and a competition to allow customers to win free products.
“We were able to lean into nostalgia, but also made it feel incredibly relevant in how we brought the campaign ecosystem to life for the social media era. Importantly, from a sales perspective, we saw north of 50 per cent uplift of Big Mac sales through the period… and it drove frequency in customer visits.”
The campaign picked up the B&T awards for Best Use of Tech & AI and Best Radio/Audio campaign. It also picked up a silver Brand Experience & Activation Lion in Cannes and a bronze Effie.
"Modern businesses have to meet and exceed customer expectations."
A successful relaunch of McDonald’s Loose Change menu and the growth of its loyalty program, which now has more than four million regular active users and 12 million app downloads, capped off a remarkable year for Brown and his team.
McDonald’s marketing function has four core focuses, delivering value; fun and feelgood factor; growing the loyalty program; and enhancing the customer experience.
Brown is a firm believer in ‘branded performance’, explaining “our brand is the strongest driver of performance.”
“We’re spending more money on what you’d call branded activity. But if I use either Big Mac [chant] or Grimace as an example, when we’re talking about branded activity it has a real urgency to it,” he said, adding that both brand led campaigns had clear calls to action and lifted short-term performance.
McDonald’s spends more than 50 per cent of its budget on digital media, embracing social and direct channels, such as its app—developed in partnership with B&T‘s Agency of the Year Akcelo, to complement brand activity on TV, outdoor and other legacy channels. Broadcast sponsorships of the NRL, AFL and other events are another effective way that McDonald’s reaches its target audience.
Brown said that although the marketing function is evolving—these days marketers need to be fluent in data and digital skills—they also need a strong grasp of the fundamentals, such as demonstrating the role marketing can play from a business and commercial perspective.
“Modern businesses have to meet and exceed customer expectations. And I would argue that the CMO and the marketing function is incredibly well placed to understand what those customer expectations are, the power of creativity and understanding how it can supercharge business outcomes.”
Dean Norbiato
KIA
KIA’s Dean Norbiato hails from Griffith in the north-western Riverina region of New South Wales. Having taken the wheel of KIA’s marketing team six years ago, its brand metrics shifted a gear in 2024 through arguably the most interesting advertising campaign of the year.
Norbiato regularly yearns to get off-grid and either go to a remote river or our bush to digitally detox, refreshing his batteries and creative juices.
It’s therefore fitting that the launch of KIA’s first Aussie ute is the highlight of the year for the kid from the country, but the story of how the campaign was conceived and snowballed is the stuff of legends, in this case, sporting legends—and lots of them.
“It wasn’t without risk launching a car without a name and out of product 18 months before launch,” Norbiato said. “But we saw that as an opportunity to get some clear space and make a bit of noise for the brand.”
Norbiato, a sports fan, initially wanted to leverage its Broncos sports sponsorship by getting the players to name the ute. This then progressed to NRL, as it was a national launch, into inviting sports legends from various codes to get in on the act, including the likes of Dylan Alcott, Steve Waugh, Buddy Franklin, Jessica Watson, Briana Clarke, David Boon, John Aloisi, Alexander ‘the Volk’ Volkanovski and a host more. What had started off as six sports stars soon ballooned into dozens.
“We knew we were onto something when the sports stars talked amongst themselves and were recommending others who would join,” he said, adding that Innocean led creative and Advertising Associates handled media for the campaign.
“With Ash Barty coming in and her line about winning the Australian Open for ‘two weeks of work’, I think stole the campaign. It’s the most Australian thing I’ve ever heard and added a real Aussie flavour to it.”
"We're fighting against what inherently [the car industry] feels is right, versus what a consumer actually wants."
That Aussie flavour sure did the trick when it came to lifting consideration, intent, brand love and loyalty.
“That campaign delivered the biggest single rise in brand metrics across all of our markers, of any period of time, that we’ve ever had as a brand,” said Norbiato.
The KIA Tasman officially launches in Australia this year and KIA is eyeing a 10 per cent share of the uber-competitive ute market. If KIA hits its target, the brand will become the second-most popular carmaker in the country, behind Toyota.
“This year, we’re going be calling on our celebrity or sports icons to help us fully launch the car, because next year, the rubber hits the road,” Norbiato teased. “We want to entertain our audiences and not fall into category tropes.”
Norbiato is mindful of not falling into the trap of most other car brands that produce identical ads in one of the world’s most cluttered car markets.
“We’re fighting against what inherently [the car industry] feels is right, versus what a consumer actually wants, which is a car ad that is going to entertain them and be different so they notice it,” he said.
“I would encourage every marketer to look at the tropes and category conventions that you know are abundant within your category, and look to find a unique position outside of that to help stand out,” he said.
“Being creatively distinct can have a real impact on our bottom line. And it’s not always going to be a return on ad spend (ROAS) model that’s as simple as dollar in, dollar out on performance marketing.”
KIA is on track to sell its millionth car to an Australian customer this year. And it would be fitting of Norbiato to celebrate this feat well away from the showroom and limelight.
The keen angler told B&T that outside of his CMO duties, his most proud moment in recent times was catching a 1.3-metre Murray Cod that he caught, although he would not reveal where.
“That’s where I get all of my best ideas and inspiration is when you get away from the grind and you can release the shackles and free the mind to come up with some of the better ideas. I’m a true believer in that, and I think you need to have the ying to the yang in your world.”
Georgia Hack
L'Oreal
Georgia Hack, CDMO of L’Oréal Australia and New Zealand, combines a deep passion for beauty with strategic vision to guide some of the most recognised and innovative global brands. Drawing on extensive experience in fashion retail, including senior roles at David Jones, Hack is redefining the way the L’Oréal Groupe engages with its diverse customer base while staying at the forefront of industry trends.
Hack’s leadership at L’Oréal is defined by a focus on innovation, sustainability, and inclusivity.
“At L’Oréal, we aim to deliver ‘beauty for all,’” she explained.
“This philosophy underpins everything we do, from developing products that meet diverse needs to creating campaigns that resonate with a wide range of consumers.”
L’Oréal Groupe’s extensive portfolio spans heritage brands like Lancôme and Garnier, as well as newer acquisitions such as Aesop. Hack embraces the challenge of maintaining each brand’s unique identity while aligning them under L’Oréal’s overarching vision.
“Our brands all have their own identities, their own product mix, their own purpose, their own target audience that they’re going after and a lot of that is driven at a global level,” she explained.
“At the same time, we leverage group-wide strengths like sustainability initiatives, advanced technology and scientific innovation to empower all our brands”.
Hack is particularly proud of L’Oréal’s commitment to sustainability, guided by its global ‘L’Oréal for the Future’ program. Locally, this has translated into initiatives such as Garnier’s partnership with the Great Barrier Reef Foundation and efforts within the CDMO team to reduce media carbon emissions through cutting-edge technology.
“When it comes to sustainability, all of our brands do subscribe to the same sustainable philosophy, which is ensuring that we operate within the limits of the planet, working with science based targets, empowering our business ecosystem and contributing to solving the challenges of the world together,” she said.
“We do that as a collective, versus at an individual level”.
“We want to set the standard for what’s possible.”
Innovation is another cornerstone of Hack’s leadership. L’Oréal continues to push boundaries with personalised beauty solutions including AI-powered tools for skincare diagnostics and virtual try-ons. These technologies, developed at a global level, are tailored to meet local consumer needs.
“It’s about leveraging cutting-edge technology to deliver meaningful experiences,” Hack explained.
“We want to be both a leader in beauty and a driver of change in the industry.”
Hack’s approach to marketing balances long-term strategy with adaptability to rapidly shifting trends. At L’Oréal, staying ahead of beauty trends is a constant focus.
“We have a saying: ‘Seize what is starting,’” she shared.
“We’ve identified six macro trends shaping beauty in Australia and New Zealand, such as the focus on health and self-expression, while also tracking 50 micro trends to ensure we remain agile.”
Hack’s emphasis on collaboration extends beyond marketing to product innovation. By working closely with the product development team, her team ensures that new launches reflect consumer demands and trends. “It’s a highly collaborative process,” she said.
“We share insights and market trends to ensure every product resonates with local audiences.”
Leadership at L’Oréal also means fostering a culture of creativity and empowerment. Hack describes her approach as a blend of passion, expertise, and empathy.
“I often talk about ‘the hustle and the heart,’” she explained. “The hustle is the energy and drive we bring to work every day. The heart is about empathy and kindness, recognising that we spend more time at work than anywhere else.”
For Hack, the future of L’Oréal is about continuing to push boundaries while staying true to its core values. Whether through groundbreaking sustainability initiatives, data-driven personalisation, or celebrating diverse beauty, Hack is committed to ensuring L’Oréal remains a leader in both beauty and social impact.
“Our goal is to inspire not just the beauty industry but the broader world,” she said. “We want to set the standard for what’s possible.”
Jenni Dill
Arnotts
When it comes to modernising an iconic Australian brand, the task requires both reverence for tradition and bold innovation. As the CMO of Arnott’s Group, Jenni Dill expertly balances these demands, overseeing a portfolio of some of the country’s most beloved snack brands, including Tim Tams, Shapes and Monte Carlos.
With a heritage spanning nearly 160 years, Arnott’s remains a staple in Australian households, but Dill’s approach ensures the brand stays relevant for modern consumers.
“We’ve got an incredibly rich history of amazing brands and products in Australia,” Dill explained. “A big part of the CMO job is balancing nostalgia and heritage with the new and modern.”
This balancing act is especially evident in the development of their gluten-free range; a category Dill describes as both a passion project and a significant market opportunity. With around three per cent of Australians diagnosed as coeliac and a further 25-30 per cent reducing gluten intake by choice, the team saw a chance to cater to these consumers without compromising on quality.
“We worked really hard with our product development and bakery teams to make sure that when we launched a gluten-free Tim Tam it tasted just like a Tim Tam,” Dill explained.
“You weren’t getting a poor facsimile or a poor copy that tasted like a gluten-free version of the original, we wanted to make sure it tasted just as good”.
“The minute you stop learning, you start staying still and in a career like marketing, you've got to stay fresh, you've got to stay current."
This commitment extended across the portfolio, with gluten-free Shapes, Jatz, Tiny Teddies and Mint Slices added to the mix. Meeting Australia’s strict gluten-free standards required significant investment, including the construction of a dedicated gluten-free bakery.
Beyond product innovation, Dill’s focus lies in ensuring that Arnott’s brands continues to stand out in a crowded snack aisle.
“With a heritage brand like Arnott’s, it’s essential to stand out in the mind first,” she explained. “Then, we need to ensure visibility on the shelf—from pack design to in-store displays, making sure we stay top of mind from the moment consumers think about snacks to the point of purchase.”
In a highly competitive landscape, Arnott’s isn’t just relying on nostalgia. The brand continues to expand its product range with both healthier options, such as the three-and-a-half-star rated Snack Right range, and indulgent treats for those little moments of joy.
Dill’s marketing philosophy is grounded in a deep understanding of the consumer. She emphasised the importance of respecting consumer values and preferences, especially in the current economic climate where cost-of-living pressures affect shopping habits.
“People are scrutinising every dollar they spend, looking for both value and products the whole family can enjoy together,” she noted.
“There’s more shared consumption going on, more at-home consumption, more family movie nights, more family game nights, or household game nights, whatever it might be, but more in the home than out of the home in the last year”.
Dill’s leadership style emphasises proactive learning and mentorship. Throughout her career, Dill has leaned on trusted advisers, recalling a valuable piece of advice from a global CEO: “The more senior you get, the less spontaneous feedback you receive. You have to seek it out actively and maintain a constant learning mindset.”
“The minute you stop learning, you start staying still and in a career like marketing, you’ve got to stay fresh, you’ve got to stay current. You’ve got to stay learning. You can never rest on your laurels of what you did last month, last year, or the last job. You’ve got to constantly prove yourself,” she said.
Ultimately, Dill’s strategic approach combines heritage, innovation and consumer empathy, ensuring Arnott’s not only maintains its status as a household favourite but grows alongside changing tastes and lifestyles.
Jenny Melhuish
ALDI
It’s been a standout year for Jenny Melhuish and her ALDI Australia marketing team.
In 2024, the business launched two new service lines, ALDI Insurance and ALDI Holidays, bringing to life new brand propositions outside of the bread and butter of groceries.
“We do love our grocery world but extending our offering has been rewarding,” said Melhuish, who took the helm of ALDI’s marketing in 2023 after a long stint heading up marketing at Westpac.
Nonetheless, the cost of living crisis and soaring inflation did not come without its challenges. Particularly as a greater spotlight had been placed on the supermarket category after the ACCC alleged rivals Woolworths and Coles had misled customers about pricing.
Melhuish said the economic climate and scrutiny over the supermarket category led ALDI to “sense check and double down on what was important to shoppers”.
ALDI took on the challenge, knowing that its purpose of ‘helping everyday Australians live richer lives for less’ and values of ‘simplicity, consistency and responsibility’ needed to underpin how the business operated and went to market.
“Playing the long game always wins."
“We worked hard as a business to ensure we found authentic ways to elevate our promise to Australians,” she said.
“Towards the end of 2024, our data shows we have over four per cent more households shopping with us, as customers seek the confidence ALDI gives when it comes to consistent, low-priced, high-quality products.”
For the first time, ALDI celebrated its loyal and passionate customer base with its ‘ALDIcore’ campaign. One Aussie shopper won three years’ worth of ALDI groceries while five runners-up each received one year’s worth of groceries—great messaging and timing at a time when weekly shopping budgets have been tight.
In fact, ALDI’s campaign work, which it worked with alongside the likes of its agency partners BMF, Zenith and Ogilvy PR, has certainly caught the eye in 2024.
Its ‘Go a Little Extra’ Christmas campaign encouraged Aussies to push the (gravy) boat out when it came to preparing a Christmas feast.
Melhuish said Christmas is the time of year when everyone ups their game, and ALDI wanted to show customers that it was no exception, overcoming perceptions that the supermarket only catered for the basics.
“The ‘Gravy Boat’ TV ad is a visual representation and a metaphor for ‘pushing the boat out’. If you have seen our retail and heard our radio spots, we worked hard to ensure our role of brand was a key takeout, being immediately clear that ‘With ALDI, you can go a little extra’ due to our pricing and quality focus,” she said.
Melhuish is a strong advocate for the importance of brand and said that “playing the long game always wins”.
She explained: “Brand building is critical to our growth, having circa 10.5 per cent market share means there is still a huge opportunity for new shoppers to understand our offering. If we don’t market our ‘brand why’—how will our consideration and preference to shop grow?”
Her advice to up-and-coming marketers who want to eventually become the next CMO is to be curious and genuinely interested in all areas of business.
“Marketing alone won’t achieve the business goals,” she said.
“Work with and alongside your peer group to understand how it all connects and have solid knowledge around how the company makes money.”
Sage advice, indeed.
Joanna Boundy
Commonwealth Bank
CommBank and its CMO Joanna Boundy have had a helluva 12 months. It recently became Australia’s most valuable brand—overtaking Woolies—and was the only Australian brand included in Kantar’s global BrandZ list. Few things serve as more of a testament to Boundy’s work with the bank in the three years she’s served as its CMO.
“There is incredible momentum within the business. It comes from the top and stems through the whole organisation,” Boundy told B&T.
“We’re really focusing on our customers and that’s really energising and so important in the role that we play in marketing and improving the customer experience.”
CommBank hasn’t had it all its own way this year, though. Its mooted $3 assisted withdrawal fee caught the ire of politicians. But considering that it was subject to a Royal Commission in 2017, its brand comeback remains impressive.
Part of that can be ascribed to CommBank showing Australians it’s helping them through a difficult economic time by showing up through the line. Boundy is particularly proud of its Brighter content offering, for instance.
“We started it last year as a magazine, but this year we continued into digital and social and we had a TV show in partnership with Paramount, with Medium Rare supporting. What I love about Brighter is it makes money accessible. It’s about giving people financial confidence, which we know they need—particularly in a cost of living crisis. The response we’ve seen, particularly to the TV show, has been phenomenal,” she said.
Similarly, CommBank’s Yello rewards scheme was a near ever-present over the summer—particularly during the test series against India. In fact, the program now has some eight million engaged members, around half of all CommBank customers.
“It’s our way of recognising customers banking with us. It’s a year old and we’ve got a lot of engagement. Interestingly the most popular parts are linked to entertainment—it’s keeping them with us and keeping them happy,” said Boundy.
"It’s about giving people financial confidence, which we know they need—particularly in a cost of living crisis."
But there are more actionable things, too. The CommBank app can help drivers find cheaper fuel, or apply for finance and buy cars available on CarSales. It can even help Aussies find cheaper hotels and flights before they go on holiday.
“Again, it’s about how we can help customers save money and be smarter with how they use it,” Boundy added.
Perhaps Boundy’s biggest move over the last year was the launch of Connect, the country’s first omni-channel banking ecosystem—though you’d probably know it best as something akin to a retail media network.
“We think we’ve got all the right ingredients to be successful. We’ve got the scale of our customers, the audience. We’ve got the infrastructure, both digital and physical, with more than 600 bank branches and over eight million people engaged with our app. We’ve got the trusted brand that third-parties want to be a part of and experience,” said Boundy.
“Data brings it all together—we can be really sophisticated and provide those advertisers and partners who want to be in Connect with the attribution and measurement they want which they don’t get across the more traditional media channels. We think it’s going to be quite successful.”
Boundy was quick to add, however, that Connect was not a money-spinner. Instead, it will improve the customer experience with relevant and timely content or offers. Plus, anything generated will be invested back into the customer experience.
The broadness of Boundy’s vision for what a bank can be is impressive, to say the least. But we suspect there’s still plenty more to come.
Joanna Robinson
THE ICONIC
Joanna Robinson, CMO of THE ICONIC, brings a unique blend of strategic leadership and storytelling expertise to the forefront of the Australian retail industry. Growing up with two journalist parents, she was immersed in the world of communication from an early age, which shaped her deep understanding of language and emotional connection—qualities she has carried throughout her career.
Today, she applies those parental lessons at THE ICONIC, ensuring the brand remains both culturally relevant and emotionally resonant.
Robinson stepped into her role during a challenging period for THE ICONIC, as the post-COVID shift in retail forced the brand to reassess its market positioning.
“We rode the e-commerce wave during lockdowns but underestimated how quickly traditional competitors like Myer and David Jones would strengthen their online presence,” she recalled. “We over-engineered our operations and were underprepared for the return to physical retail.”
Originally hired on an 11-month interim contract as a change agent, Robinson wasted no time making an impact. She led a strategic overhaul, shifting focus from short-term performance marketing to a more holistic, brand-building approach.
“We became obsessed with bottom-of-funnel metrics, focusing too much on high-performance channels because they were measurable,” she explained.
“We forgot about the power of storytelling and why people connected with us in the first place.”
“Brands need to connect with deeper feelings, not just deliver transactions.”
Since then, Robinson has worked to re-establish THE ICONIC’s emotional connection with consumers through campaigns that emphasise fashion as a form of self-expression and personal style.
“Ninety-five per cent of consumer decisions are driven by emotion, not goals,” she said.
“Brands need to connect with deeper feelings, not just deliver transactions.”
This mindset drove a refreshed master brand strategy centred on reclaiming THE ICONIC’s identity as a leader in fashion inspiration rather than a discount-driven platform.
Robinson is also acutely aware of the evolving economic landscape and how it affects consumer behaviour. With consumers feeling the strain, shoppers are more budget-conscious, which means brands need to deliver both value and premium experiences. This balance has shaped initiatives such as enhanced data-driven personalisation and a loyalty program aimed at fostering repeat business while maintaining emotional resonance.
Robinson’s leadership style emphasises empathy, particularly during challenging organisational shifts. When tasked with overseeing a major restructure, Robinson prioritised compassionate communication and transparency.
“There are moments when tough decisions have to be made for the health of the business,” she reflected. “But how you handle those decisions—with kindness, fairness, and honesty—defines your leadership and your culture.”
Looking forward, Robinson is focused on balancing sustainability with business growth. THE ICONIC recently launched its ‘People and Planet Positive’ strategy, targeting 50 per cent considered materials by 2030 and is working towards B Corp certification.
By combining strategic clarity, bold creative storytelling and a deep understanding of consumer behaviour, Robinson has successfully steered THE ICONIC back to its core identity, ensuring the brand not only stands out but continues to inspire long-term loyalty in a competitive market.
Kate Miller
Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola’s marketing chief certainly knows how to ‘Taste the Feeling’. A self-confessed Diet Coke fan, Kate Miller leads marketing operations not just for Australia, but also across the South Pacific.
In the past year, Miller said there were several personal highlights. From a campaign perspective, the brand launched two standouts, both with a distinctly Coca-Cola flavour. The other highlight was building a marketing team and culture that will make sure the soft drink giant doesn’t go flat at a time when low sugar options are growing in popularity.
Her first highlight is bringing Coca-Cola’s music platform, Coke Studio, Down Under.
Coke Studio arrived in April 2024 with Australian artist Tones And I joining forces with Young Franco and Kiwi artist CHAII to create a new track and music video. Fans were given special behind-the-scenes access to the artists, how they produced content and exclusive live experiences.
Coca-Cola is famous for being at the zeitgeist of culture and entertainment, and Coke Studio couldn’t have arrived at a more critical juncture for Australia’s ailing music industry.
“This year, we felt that in Australia live music events and the scene have been challenged, she said. “We wanted to bring a live event that consumers could win tickets for and go behind-the-scenes. In our first year it’s proven really successful.”
But it wasn’t just Coke Studio that got tongues wagging at Coca-Cola’s North Sydney HQ.
A collaboration with Oreo saw the soft drink giant release a special edition of Coca-Cola Zero Sugar that was inspired by popular chocolate and cream biscuits. Concurrently, Mondelēz released a flavour of Oreo’s cookies inspired by Coke.
"You will need [storytelling and creativity] even more in the future... it's going to be a lot harder to get attention than when we just put an ad on TV.”
Miller has led Coca-Cola’s transformation journey in this region over the past few years, which included consolidating its brands and approach to marketing across all key markets. In Australia, this has meant establishing power brands such as Coca-Cola, Fanta, Sprite and Powerade, and local favourites including Mt Franklin and the Kirks range of soft drinks.
Coca-Cola takes a unique, tailored marketing approach for each brand, with an increasingly important role for digital media, in particular digital video and social.
“The channels have adapted and moved on a little bit, and so has our investment. We look at it on a campaign-by-campaign, brand-by-brand basis. So we’ve got a couple of brands that we only do social, but we’ve got other brands that really benefit from being on screens, and sometimes that includes TV as well. We don’t have a blanket rule, but certainly the shift of our investment to digital is significant.”
Miller has also evolved the marketing function to meet the challenges of today and the future, which includes making sure they are measuring the right metrics, driving consumption habits and tracking success.
“The other area is around digital transformation, which includes areas like performance marketing, how we move into the AI space and use AI technology to better activate our brands,” she said. “It’s a resource that can save people a lot of time and allows us to focus on the higher value strategic parts of our role.”
When asked what skills and competencies marketers of the future will need, Miller said understanding the consumer will be key.
“What is changing is how you get to those consumer insights,” she added. “Digital, data and AI capabilities of the marketing function will be a lot more sophisticated, and we need to make sure our teams are equipped to handle it.
“The second area is around storytelling and creativity. You will need it even more in the future. It won’t just be about trying to stop people with your advertising. As they’re scrolling through their social feeds and various other media channels, it’s going to be a lot harder to get attention than when we just put an ad on TV.”
We’re fizzing with excitement to see what is yet to come from Miller and Coca-Cola.
Kirsten Hasler
IKEA
One category that has been among the hardest hit by the cost of living crisis is furniture. When Nick Scali reported that its annual profit fell almost 20 per cent in August, alarm bells would have been ringing in furniture warehouses across the country.
IKEA, however, hasn’t been as heavily impacted. Its sales dropped marginally (three per cent), its profit remained stable and the company even saw a net increase in the volume of products sold and store visits.
Kirsten Hasler, IKEA’s marketing chief across the region, and her team have been at the heart of making sure that it remains top of mind when cash-strapped customers are in the market for a new bed, cupboard, dining table or kitchen utensils.
“We are a discretionary category. We know we’re competing for the dollars people might have for going on holiday. So it’s about building that emotional connection to people’s homes and growing the category so that they prioritise those little home improvements that can make their everyday life better,” she said.
At a time when other retailers were raising their prices to secure profit margins, IKEA committed $125 million in price reductions on more than 3,000 items, with the goal of restoring prices to their pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2025. This has led to a 23 per cent volume growth on the reduced price products. Store visitations were also up by 2 per cent and online visits up 16 per cent.
“One of our highlights has been focusing on our prices and our affordability and seeing that translate into brand metrics. We’re now the number one in our category for affordability, which was one of our goals and it’s great to actually exceed that,” Hasler said.
“When there’s a cost of living crisis, it can also impact the resources that we have, how we stay top of mind in markets and how we can keep marketing at a certain level to build mental availability.”
"It's about building that emotional connection to people's homes and growing the category so they prioritise those little home improvements that can make their everyday life better."
Hasler said that trying to strike the right balance between short-term sales-led activity and longer term brand building has been a challenge.
“We know from our econometrics that the long-term brand building activity is equally as important. So it’s maintaining that balance between the long and the short, and being at the table in those conversations in the business to fight for the long-term activities,” she said, adding that IKEA’s brand-to-performance investment ratio is 60:40.
Winning the brand battle is helped by “speaking in data and the numbers they [the rest of the business] understand, such as ROI”. It also doesn’t hurt working at a Swedish business that is more progressive and less hierarchical than most other brands.
“It’s a very democratic culture, so everyone has a voice. So that’s good for marketers, because we can speak very openly,” she explained.
“It does mean people in other areas will have their opinions and are listened to. We will have a debate, but in the end we come to a consensus, we might just take a little bit longer to get there.”
An IKEA campaign that delivered strong brand uplifts was ‘Try This At Home’, which was all about “affordable rebellion,” according to Hasler. For example, it featured a gaming grandpa and kids using a toy cart to speed down the hallway.
“We’re really proud of that campaign for a few reasons. Firstly the diversity of the content…it showed our Australian community in a broad range of unexpected ways. We also managed to secure a broadcast sponsorship of the Olympics for that campaign, pushing it widely to viewers on live Olympics and catch up TV,” she said.
While IKEA’s flat-pack instructions may sometimes be confounding, Hasler’s clarity of vision is compelling.
Lisa Ronson
Medibank
Lisa Ronson was one of Australia’s most-lauded and powerful marketers before her untimely passing late last year following a tragic accident on her farm.
Ronson had only joined Medibank in July but had significant plans in the works for the business. She joined the insurer at a tricky time. It was still recovering from a significant data breach in 2022, when the personal information of some 9.7 million of its customers was strewn across the dark web by an alleged Russian cybercriminal gang.
As a result, it became the 14th most distrusted brand in the country, according to 2023 Roy Morgan data. By the end of last year, it had risen to become the 19th least trusted brand. Bringing the insurer back on track was key amongst Ronson’s priorities, and she had a number of strategies to get there. We could hardly have imagined anyone more capable of doing that than Ronson.
“We have recovered a lot, and that’s not down to me walking in the door,” Ronson told B&T.
“The recovery was well and truly underway before I came in. I think what’s heartening is that while it was a devastating incident for the business but the brand did, to a certain degree, hold up pretty well and that was largely due to the great communication that Medibank did—particularly with its membership base. I wasn’t walking into something that was completely broken,” said Ronson.
“My set of problems, so to speak, are a completely different set of problems. It’s a set of opportunities. There are some clear opportunities that we feel very passionately about. It’s a competitive sector, so I can’t wait.
She continued: “We are working really collaboratively as a business towards a couple of lights on the hill in the very short and longer term. It’s customer-focused and pulling all of the levers within our business from our customer group, of which marketing is a part, through to our clinicians to external affairs. It’s really, really exciting.”
"One of our biggest challenges as marketers is that we’re so close to the customer—and that’s a positive thing—but customers are changing the way that they interact with brands."
Ronson knew which levers to pull in any business. Before joining Medibank, she worked in the marketing departments of—ready—Carlton & United Breweries, Visa, Telstra, David Jones, Westpac, Tourism Australia and, prior to Medibank, Coles. She also served on the board of the Global Banking Alliance for Women, Great Walks of Australia, Flybuys, the AANA, Wheelchair Rugby Australia and as an advisor and investor in startup Journey Maker and as an adjunct professor at Deakin University.
But at the end of the day for Ronson, it all came back to the fundamentals of marketing.
“One of our biggest challenges as marketers is that we’re so close to the customer—and that’s a positive thing—but customers are changing the way that they interact with brands, it can be distracting,” she said.
“I think Mark Ritson makes some pretty good points. I was reading about the notion of performance branding and how it just doesn’t exist. That’s probably something we created because it suited us but we know fundamentally that performance has a massive role to play but it’s like any of the other aspects of marketing—they all have their role to pay.
“If we think that stretching it too far will solve all of the problems, it isn’t, we’re just kidding ourselves. We need the fundamentals but we need to keep abreast with what’s happening with consumers,” she added.
Many would do well to learn from Ronson’s ability to see the bigger picture, as well as her fierce loyalty to her colleagues across the industry, as well as her colleagues within the businesses she worked for. She will be sorely missed.
Michelle Klein
IAG
It’s been some year for IAG’s Michelle Klein and its NRMA Insurance brand. After joining the insurer in 2023, she has made short work of completely re-envisioning the brand for a modern world and an entry into the national market—no mean feat for a brand entering its centenary and in a very challenging market.
The changes have been rapid, too. Klein appointed Accenture Song to help rejuvenate the brand identity—resulting in its delightfully simple yet deceptively broad ‘A Help Company’ positioning—and its entire through-the-line customer experience. It was also a premium broadcast partner of Nine’s TV ratings-conquering Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games coverage.
“We’ve been building up to our centenary and we went national as a brand—we weren’t a national brand two years ago,” Klein said.
“[The Olympic and Paralympic Games] felt like the perfect opportunity to get our new platform idea across in a moment that is for everybody—the Olympic Games are so diverse and inclusive. It felt like the right moment for us in the lead up to our 100 years, it was also a really good test for us to see how something at that scale could deliver for the brand at a national scale.
“It was pervasive,” Klein said of Nine’s coverage and NRMA Insurance’s position within it.
“It was across all digital channels and TV—it literally reached everyone. We saw some fantastic results on the campaign overall, it was relatable, enjoyable, memorable. We saw non-customer consideration strongly across the country and then we also saw a direct response from customers, influencing business results.”
The campaign, which features houses hanging from helicopters, dance troupes, drones and fish raining from the sky, was deliberately designed to not look and feel like a typical Olympics advert. It’s just one of the benefits the brand has seen from appointing Accenture Song.
“Everyone at Song understands the brand and for the most part everyone is Australian,” said Klein, despite its global/local approach.
"Every time you do something that you think meets a customer’s expectations, another business or industry ups the ante."
Of course, brand campaigns at that scale are rarely set up to be direct sales drivers and it’s very easy to draw attention to a new positioning when you have a media budget the size of NRMA Insurance’s. What’s perhaps more important—certainly for individual Australians—are the range of experiences and real-life offerings that NRMA Insurance offers.
“The sum of the parts makes the whole greater. When we shared the original ‘A Help Company’ thinking, we actually started with the experiences. What would A Help Company do? It would get into communities with Australian Red Cross and give free emergency training—we’ve done hundreds of these workshops now,” said Klein, who has attended many around the country herself.
These workshops provide information about local risks and practical emergency preparedness advice for community members. The repositioning also allowed for the brand to offer drone checks for roof damage, empathy training for staff and more.
“You have to think about this as an expectations elevator. Every time you do something that you think meets a customer’s expectations, another business or industry ups the ante. For an insurance company, we need to keep ahead of customers’ expectations, that’s the vision,” said Klein.
In a world that is changing more rapidly than ever, whether it be because of climate change, demographic shifts, continued economic headwinds or anything else, brands should and need to show up to help—there it is again—customers navigate an uncertain world.
“We need to do more, writ large, across our industries to support people who are experiencing vulnerability. That vulnerability can take different forms, for example, domestic violence and financial abuse affects all our industries… When we come together and talk around the same table, it’s going to be better for Australians and better for society,” Klein said.
We can’t think of many things more powerful than that.
Mim Haysom
Suncorp
Sweeping change seems to have been the order of the day, or rather the year, for Suncorp and its CMO Mim Haysom. First, after being announced in 2022, the business finalised the sale Suncorp Bank to ANZ. It was a recognition of the long-standing tangential relationship the bank had to the rest of Suncorp, which was focused on insurance.
Second, its AAMI brand refreshed its brand platform in March, working with its longstanding creative partner, WPP’s Ogilvy. But by November, it had been announced that all of the nine Suncorp insurance brands would pool their creative with Publicis’ Leo Burnett, now simply Leo.
“Our business has undergone significant change in the last six months with the divestment and sale of Suncorp Bank, so there’s been a lot of focus on our strategy as a standalone pureplay insurer. In the context of that change, it was the right time to re-evaluate the agency model we had,” Haysom explained.
The Suncorp team briefed a select number of agencies and explored a variety of agency models before going with Leos’ option. Of course, the fact that it had produced such impressive work for the main Suncorp brand wouldn’t have hurt.
"The creative product is paramount to our success. We need really strong creative products, even within our own organisation having nine brands in the same category."
“It was a point in time decision when our organisation was changing. We’re looking to drive a lot of transformation. We’re looking to embrace technology and innovation. We need to be more creative than ever before with our portfolio of brands to really drive growth,” she said, adding that none of the decisions were taken lightly.
It may seem like a rationalisation, a consolidation or a streamlining from the outside but, by bringing all the brands under a single roof, Haysom believes the brands will be more distinct than ever—and they need to be.
“The creative product is paramount to our success. We need really strong creative products, even within our own organisation having nine brands in the same category. I genuinely believe that great creativity drives growth,” she explained.
But the role of an insurer is changing. Gone are the days when it was merely a nice-to-have, for many Australians in today’s world, choosing an insurance provider is potentially the single most important decision they will make in the face of climate change—though everyone involved hopes those customers will never have to make a claim.
“Our purpose is building futures and protecting what matters. The ‘One House’ campaign [created by Leo Burnett back in 2021] was the first of many iterations of the strategy we’re executing on—presenting to Australians how we can make our customers and communities resilient. The way we see climate change playing out is the frequency and severity of weather events is increasing,” explained Haysom.
“We’re making communities and customers more resilient in really different ways, through research and the learnings that ‘One House’ contributed to but also using technology in really different ways.
“We’ve built our Disaster Management Centre at our HQ in Brisbane with a nine metre-long screen that brings together geospatial information, satellite and aerial imagery and more to understand the impending weather. We then feed that to our disaster management teams to get them on the ground to pre-empt it, communicate to customers and help them manage what might be coming. Then it enables us to mobilise our support teams on the ground where they’re needed faster. We’ve just built five mobile disaster management hubs where customers can speak to us face-to-face.”
It’s said that with great power comes great responsibility. Haysom’s Suncorp and all of its brands, then, are models that everyone could learn from.
Naomi Driver
BUPA
Last year, Naomi Driver celebrated her third birthday as BUPA Health Insurance marketing boss. When she joined, the private health sector had been having a rough time. In 2018, a Royal Commission into aged care had been launched. Then in 2022, Medibank suffered a withering data hack.
Despite the challenges, not least the small matter of the COVID pandemic, as well, Driver said her remit and gameplay had been clear from the start to rebuild the brand.
“It’s an ever-changing environment but I came in with a clear remit and that remit extends just as the business keeps expanding. Year one was about building the foundations, year two was getting us to a place of best practice and then year three has been introducing propositions to help us live out our vision,” Driver said.
One of those changes included a reshuffling of its positioning from being not simply an insurance provider but a “healthcare partner”.
“We’re evolving. We’ve always had a breadth of businesses, of which health insurance is just one arm, we have optical, dental and we also operate in aged care,” she explained.
“The vision has expanded to try to make sense of all those different business units as a collective for our members and prospective members as well… It’s how we realise value for members. How do we use that breadth to our members’ advantage? We need to be the most customer-centric healthcare brand and that requires putting the business into a rhythm that supports that.”
It’s no secret that the healthcare industry—not least in Australia—can be quite complicated to navigate, particularly if one is experiencing a healthcare “moment” as Driver puts it. That fact is compounded by most punters approaching the sector—as well as financial services, telcos and more—from a position of “apathy,” again Driver’s words.
“The aspiration is to try to make more sense of your brand, for your members and your customers… We’re trying to have products and services that genuinely connect, make sense and provide value,” she added.
"We need to be the most customer-centric healthcare brand and that requires putting the business into a rhythm that supports that.”
Communicating that vision to consumers, especially across so many different categories, led Driver to craft a creative agency village with CHEP Network [now merged into Clemenger] as its lead, replacing Thinkerbell, with support agencies including 2045, Six Black Pens and Scooter.
“The breadth of services that we needed at an enterprise level was quite broad. This initiative brings all the marketing areas together for the first time to start aligning what the creative needs were,” she explained.
The village mode should retain a consistency in the creative across the different areas, but with enough nuance to make the services intelligible for users.
“We have diverse looking campaigns. We’ve got general insurance under the portfolio as well, so our pet insurance campaigns look very different to our optical business [no pun intended] but there’s a common thread that creates connection,” she added.
Underpinning all that connectivity and creativity, however, and one thing that Driver is “incredibly proud” of is having taken the business on a “journey to understand marketing effectiveness”.
“Our relationship with finance and other pockets of the business that didn’t understand the value of marketing, is now intrinsic to their thinking,” she said.
That change in mindset has come from working with the right agencies and implementing Mutinex’s media mix modelling to hone the balance between brand and performance and find the channels that work best for particular messages and objectives.
“It’s also due to the huge effort my team have put in to not only deliver great campaigns and results but to show the positive impact marketing can have on a brand and customer perceptions.”
It’s very easy for marketers nowadays to “go down the wrong path,” in Driver’s mind. But being “customer obsessed” will see any marketer worth their salt through challenges. Many would do well to learn from her.
Nicole Bardsley
Uber and Uber Eats
Nicole Bardsley is one of the newer additions to the CMO Power List, joining Uber and Uber Eats in March 2024.
She describes her time at the “incredibly complex” business as “a bit of a journey” but has been “blown away” by the level of creative ambition she has seen and led.
“There is a desire to really prove out the business impact of marketing among the talented group of marketers I get to lead,” she said, adding that she presides over a team of nine but with support from a wider APAC and global marketing division.
The cost of living crisis has not had a negative impact on Uber or Uber Eats in the same way it may have rival retailers.
The major difference, Bardsley points out, is that consumers are much more savvy in how they are spending and looking for good deals.
“We need to continually offer them good value with our restaurant partners and support our partners that are on our platform,” she said, adding that its Uber One loyalty program has seen impressive member growth.
For five years prior to Bardsley joining, Uber Eats had focused on its ‘Tonight I’ll Be Eating’ brand platform that helped lift the brand from number four to number one in the food delivery sector.
More recently, Uber has taken the strategic decision to deliver products beyond food and a new self-deprecating brand positioning, ‘Get Almost, Almost Anything’.
“Our ultimate job is to cut through and be remembered."
Bardsley said the shift is best illustrated by the recent campaign starring Jason Alexander, who played George Costanza from the 90s sitcom Seinfeld.
In the spot, the comedian’s jokes don’t always land, leading him to order canned laughter via the Uber Eats app, with awkward social situations ensuing.
“His tone and the overall role he plays is a great example of the self-deprecating humour that Uber is known for. We’re also really known for tapping into culture in really interesting and unique ways,” she said, adding that the campaign has seen strong lifts in brand awareness, first-time eaters and monthly active eaters.
Another example is Uber recruiting Formula One’s Valtteri Bottas to talk about Uber Car Share being Australia’s second car, driving 25 million organic views and a 25 point increase in product awareness.
Although that campaign didn’t have a large paid media component, Uber is a big advocate of the brand marketing and investing in top-of-the-funnel activity first.
“Our ultimate job is to get cut through and be remembered. So driving that top of mind brand awareness is our first priority. And then we work our way down the funnel in terms of the balance of prioritisation and investment,” Bardsley said.
Prior to joining Uber last March, Bardsley was the CMO for Cashrewards and has previously held senior marketing roles at Westpac and Virgin Mobile.
She is a firm believer in the power of marketing and the importance of the CMO.
“Where CMOs have the ability to impact organisations is in continually educating around why marketing is a growth driver for business, as opposed to a cost centre, and making sure that they’re continually telling that story, not only about the brand impact that you’re having, but also the business impact,” she said.
Rennie Freer
Kmart
As CMO of Kmart, Rennie Freer has played a pivotal role in maintaining the beloved retail giant’s position as one of Australia’s most trusted brands. Her approach combines long-term brand stewardship with a sharp focus on customer value and operational effectiveness, ensuring Kmart remains synonymous with affordability and quality in a highly competitive market.
For more than three years, Freer has been instrumental in building on Kmart’s strong foundation in the space.
“Kmart has been recognised as Australia’s most trusted discount department store for three consecutive years, a reflection of over a decade of delivering quality products at the lowest prices,” she shared.
“We’re never complacent, because we know that trust needs to be consistently earned”.
Central to Kmart’s success under Freer’s leadership is the company’s purpose: ‘making everyday living brighter,’ which is woven into the culture across its global team of 50,000.
“That commitment has been part of our DNA,” she explained.
Freer places customer insights at the heart of her strategy, often drawing inspiration directly from them. She recalled a letter from a loyal shopper who perfectly captured Kmart’s impact: “She wrote, ‘Kmart allows us to afford the little luxuries we feel we deserve.’ It’s that incredible, authentic commitment to the purpose of making everyday living brighter for our communities that holds is in such good stead”.
One of Freer’s standout achievements has been integrating user-generated content (UGC) into Kmart’s marketing strategy. By spotlighting customer creativity, Kmart has built a thriving community of loyal fans who inspire others while influencing the brand’s own product development. This engagement led to the launch of a dedicated community platform where customers can share ideas and designs.
“Our customers are our greatest advocates, and their creativity continually inspires us,” Freer said.
“We're never complacent, because we know that trust needs to be consistently earned”.
Sustainability is another area where Freer has made strides, demonstrating Kmart’s commitment to innovation and environmental responsibility. From redesigning everyday products to using more sustainable materials, Kmart is making meaningful changes.
“Environmental and social responsibility isn’t optional—it’s an expectation from our customers,” Freer explained.
Freer looks to strike a careful balance between brand building and performance. With nearly 500 stores across Australia and New Zealand, Kmart’s campaigns must resonate broadly.
“We analyse every individual campaign, regardless of the scale against campaign performance metrics or sales targets. We also recognise that that is never independent of brand health and making sure we’re constantly focusing on our customer sentiment,” she said.
Freer’s leadership style is deeply collaborative, with a focus on empowering her team and fostering cross-functional partnerships. Looking ahead, Freer is committed to ensuring Kmart continues to innovate while staying true to its core values.
“I really consider myself very lucky to have had the experiences I’ve had, it doesn’t get much better than this. It’s a real privilege to be involved with such iconic Australian brands, but certainly in my recent experience with Kmart, a brand that’s making an incredible difference to the lives of millions of families,” she added.
With a strategic mind, a customer-first approach, and a passion for collaboration, Freer ensures Kmart remains a brand that resonates deeply with its customers and continues to lead in the retail space.
Shaun Briggs
Specsavers
Shaun Briggs leads the Specsavers marketing team with a powerful blend of emotional storytelling, customer experience focus and data-driven marketing strategies. With nearly six years at the company, Briggs has established himself as a champion of purpose-driven marketing that connects deeply with consumers while keeping the business’ core objectives front-and-centre.
Stepping into the CMO role felt like a natural progression for Briggs, who describes his leadership journey as one built on capability and trust.
“At Specsavers, we focus on internal growth. When one of my colleagues moved into a global creative role, leadership asked, ‘Who can grow into this role?’ and I was fortunate to be trusted with that opportunity,” he explained.
This focus on internal development has created a culture where long-term experience and deep brand understanding are highly valued, something Briggs finds both motivating and rewarding.
Under his leadership, Specsavers has redefined its marketing approach by balancing humour, creativity and emotional resonance. The long-running ‘Should’ve Gone to Specsavers’ campaign remains central to the brand’s identity, but Briggs has refined it to ensure the messaging remains accessible rather than overly sentimental.
“We could play heavily on emotional storytelling,” he said, referencing the profound impact of videos showing children seeing clearly for the first time with glasses. “But our focus is on normalising eye care. The goal is to reduce resistance to eye tests”.
This philosophy extends to Specsavers’ hearing aid services, an often under-recognised part of the business. Briggs’ approach highlights the emotional impact of better hearing and how the company integrates hearing health checks into their optical services.
“It’s about changing lives through better sight and hearing,” he said. “The emotional reaction you get when someone experiences that clarity for the first time is powerful.”
“We could play heavily on emotional storytelling... But our focus is on normalising eye care. The goal is to reduce resistance to eye tests.”
Briggs also emphasised customer experience as a key pillar of his strategy. His marketing approach is shaped by a profound understanding of both emotional and practical consumer behaviour.
“We want people to feel cared for, listened to and confident when they leave our stores,” he said.
On the media side, Briggs has also overseen a shift towards impactful yet efficient campaigns. His recent media strategy pitch, which deviated from industry norms, received praise for its effectiveness. Rather than complex proposals, Briggs opted for a streamlined, three-step process involving open submissions, chemistry meetings and rapid turnaround scenarios.
“We needed to see who could respond quickly and collaboratively, which better reflected the fast-paced nature of our actual work environment,” he explained.
Specsavers’ budget allocation under Briggs reflects a balanced approach between brand-building and performance marketing. While 10 per cent of the budget is dedicated to the well-known ‘Should’ve Gone to Specsavers’ creative, the bulk is directed towards bottom-of-funnel activation, ensuring the retailer remains competitive in a crowded market.
“With nearly 500 stores across Australia and New Zealand, our priority is filling test rooms with patients every day, so local-level activations are critical,” he said.
Beyond marketing strategy, Briggs is passionate about Specsavers’ broader purpose. The brand has made strides in reducing avoidable sight loss through proactive screening programs and strategic partnerships with health professionals.
Susan Coghill
Tourism Australia
In 2019, Tourism Australia was looking for a new CMO to succeed in the massive footsteps of fellow Power List-er Lisa Ronson. Susan Coghill, who had been working at the government agency for two years, described herself as “an underdog” and had to overcome personal insecurities to build confidence in the Tourism Australia board and management that she was the right choice to lead the tourism industry out of COVID and through a period of recovery.
Coghill describes that appointment as the proudest moment of her career, landing “a dream role of selling the country that I have completely fallen in love with”.
She has since proven to be a shrewd and successful successor to Ronson.
Coghill, who manages a team of around 45 marketers, has guided Australia to one of the fastest tourism recoveries imaginable since Australia’s borders re-opened in 2022.
Although the tourism sector is still impacted by the cost of living crisis, lower aviation capacity levels and a slower-than-anticipated recovery of Australia’s largest source of visitors—China—the results speak for themselves.
“Expenditure from our international markets has recovered in real terms, but the actual number of visitors is still catching up. We’re about high 80s to low 90s in percentage terms of the visitors we had pre-COVID,” Coghill said, explaining that it places Australia’s recovery on a similar trajectory to other global travel hotspots such as the UK and US.
It is conceivable that 2025 will see visitor numbers match, if not exceed, that pre-COVID benchmark with Coghill at the helm of marketing.
Australia’s recovery has been driven by a number of factors, but one stands out above the others—a CGI-animated kangaroo called Ruby.
When the ‘Come and Say G’Day’ campaign, by M&C Saatchi, launched in October 2022, the creative had divided opinion, with some local ad experts describing it as bland and questioning whether it would make a splash abroad.
The answer was a resounding ‘yes’, picking up a slew of awards in 2023 and backing this up with five Effie Awards in the US and UK last year. In fact, Tourism Australia regularly re-tests the creative with System1 and it continues to score high marks.
“As a campaign, it has continued to outperform our competition. We are continuing to see our strong levels of consideration across the board in all of our markets,” Coghill said.
“The bottom of the funnel is never wider than the top of the funnel, so winning in consideration and setting our partners up for success and conversion will always remain a key focus for us.”
“If you look at the macro economic situation and global cost of living crisis... It is effective marketing that's going to help a business defend and grow market share and drive profitability."
Another highlight for Coghill was welcoming a new creative agency to the fold. Droga5 and Accenture Song replaced M&C Saatchi and Digitas following a hotly contested creative agency review.
Coghill told B&T that the Droga5 and Accenture Song pitch stood out by nailing the strategic approach for the Tourism Australia brand and advertising as well as the digital challenge of providing a visions of where for destination marketing organisations and their websites. This includes helping Tourism Australia refresh its digital strategy in a world of GenAI and zero-click search and how this might impact one of Tourism Australia’s major selling tools—its website.
Droga5’s embrace of the ‘Come and Say G’Day’ platform and how to evolve it was also a major tick.
Although Coghill couldn’t give much away at the time of this interview, she said to expect the next iteration to champion some of the lesser known tourism gems in Australia, places like Kangaroo Island and others.
Coghill has a firm belief that marketing and the role of the CMO has never been more important.
“If you look at the macro economic situation, which is so challenging at the moment and the global cost of living crisis that all businesses are facing, it is effective marketing that’s going to help a business defend and grow market share and drive profitability,” she said.
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