Tourism Australia chief marketer Nick Baker to quit in January
Tourism Australia chief marketing officer, Nick Baker, is to quit after seven years with the agency.
He will leave at the end of January after deciding it was time to look for “new challenges”.
A recruitment process to replace Baker is already underway.
Tourism Australia managing director John O’Sullivan paid tribute to Baker, saying he had led a marketing team which has “helped deliver arguably three of our most successful global campaigns, including There’s Nothing Like Australia, Best Jobs in the World and Restaurant Australia”.
“All of these campaigns have been meticulously planned, well executed, and, importantly, done so through strong teamwork and successful partnership with industry and our state and territory partners,” O’Sullivan said.
“Another major achievement, for which Nick should be very proud, has been the creation of one of the world’s most successful social media marketing strategies.
“We will not only miss Nick’s marketing expertise but his enormous enthusiasm and passion for our industry and for the Tourism Australia brand.”
Baker described his time at TA as the most significant of his professional life.
“Being part of such a dedicated team, getting to work on so many important projects with industry and our other partners has been incredible. Together, we’ve achieved some great things and that feeling of a job well done gives me great satisfaction,” he said.
“I believe we’ve developed a clear strategy to move our global marketing forward and also created the digital and social platforms necessary to compete globally in a hugely competitive market place.”
Baker joined Tourism Australia in 2007 at a difficult time for the agency after the embarrassing flop of the much-maligned “So Where the Bloody Hell Are You”” global campaign featuring Lara Bingle.
The campaign was derided in a number of markets which was viewed as offensive and aggressive. Asian markets in particular objected to being sworn at.
Baker will stay with the tourism body until the end of January while a replacement is recruited and oversee the completion of Restaurant Australia and “other key projects”.
Prior 10 years with Voyagers Hotels and Resorts
Steve Jones
And he managed to go through three agencies in those seven years.
Hmmm.
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