Thinkerbell’s former national head of earned Anjana Khallouf (lead image) has today joined youth media company Shameless Media, in a newly created Managing Director position.
The career agency leader wrapped up at Thinkerbell last month after successfully growing the agency’s earned offering over the past two years.
Prior to Thinkerbell, the native Kiwi spent the previous 11 years establishing and building OMD Fuse (now Create) in Auckland and Melbourne respectively.
Khallouf’s appointment at Shameless Media is a bold and exciting step away from the agency landscape.
“Shameless is a brilliant female-founded youth media company having a huge amount of fun on the cusp of another major growth phase. I have been fangirling over their success for a number of years so this decision felt equal parts natural and exhilarating,” said Khallouf.
“I can’t wait to inject my media and marketing knowledge, strong leadership skills, proven business strategy experience and obsession with pop culture into the next chapter of the Shameless Media journey. This is just the kind of challenge I knew it was going to take to lure me away from agency-land,” she said.
Shameless Media was founded by Michelle Andrews and Zara McDonald in March 2018 and is now a bustling team of 11 permanent staff who have recently moved into their own office space and custom-built recording studio in Melbourne’s Cremorne. Shameless Media boasts over 75 million podcast downloads and well over one million social media followers. Since July 2020, when the company welcomed Partnerships Director Rhiannon Joyce, revenue has increased by 394 per cent.
McDonald says hiring Anjana is a critical step in scaling Shameless Media to be known as more than just the home of Shameless Podcast.
“We’ve known for a very long time that Shameless Media is about more than just Shameless Podcast and more than just Michelle and me. We wanted to bring someone into the Managing Director role who can mentor our young staff, spearhead strategy and enable us to do the thing we know we’re really good at: making new shows,” she said.
Andrews added: “As soon as we met Anj, we knew she was the person for the job. We intend for Shameless Media to be the most engaged-with, and therefore impactful, youth media brand in the country, and Anj’s knack for constantly having her finger on the pulse is precisely what will take us to that next level. Her marvellous reputation precedes her, and we can’t wait to have someone so talented, warm and energetic lead the team.”
