the Clemenger Group has announced the appointment of Vanessa Nicol to the newly created role of managing partner to run and manage the Spark business across six Clemenger Group companies: Colenso BBDO, Proximity, Touchcast, Creative Activation, .99 and Dynamo Media.

Her role is to lead the business – strategically and creatively across the group, allocating the right resources at the right time to achieve the best result for Spark.

The Clemenger Group recently consolidated all the Spark business under one holding company structure to reflect the consolidation trends in the global marketplace and represent a new structure for marketing activities at Spark.

According to Jim Moser, CEO of the Clemenger Group, it’s “a very exciting time to partner with Spark”.

“They are a company that has gone through tremendous positive change over the last few years and now lead the market. As a major technology provider, they are on the cutting edge of a fast paced, changing marketplace,” Moser said.

“Our group offer is unmatched in New Zealand and will provide the best marketing services for Spark in the years to come. Having someone the calibre of Vanessa Nicol on board to manage and over see that work is brilliant.”

Clive Ormerod, GM marketing at Spark NZ, added, “We are really excited to have Vanessa join the team.

“We partnered with the Clemenger Group to help take our business to the next level regarding the customer experiences we deliver New Zealanders, and with Vanessa’s vast experience in data, digital, customer personalisation as well as creative, we know she is going to make a great impact.”

Nicol comes to New Zealand with over 18 years’ experience in the UK and Australia. She has worked both client and agency side delivering effective and award winning work. Her skills span across digital, customer data and personalisation as well as having the more traditional means of customer engagement.

Nicol’s telco experience covers a wide variety of marketing, advertising and product development roles for the likes of British Telecom, Optus, Virgin and Telstra. Most recently, she managed the $110M Telstra business for OMD Australia.

Nicol said, “It’s an exciting era to be leading the Clemenger Group on the Spark account. The talent and passion that exists within each agency of the group is infectious, my role is to harness and lead that for us on this account.

“There is also a true partnership with Spark as an agency group – they have a clear ambition. I’m looking forward to working with this iconic and innovative client.”