Highly effective and commercially minded business leader with 15+ years’ experience in traditional, digital, social and data driven marketing in Australia and overseas markets.

ThinkTV is a research driven, marketing and technology development company that reinforces the value of television.

As the CEO of ThinkTV I lead a collective effort to demonstrate how advertising in broadcast quality content environments remains the most effective advertising platform for the Australian marketing and media community.

I am open to reconnect with old colleagues and open to new connections so please feel free to send me an invite to connect.

Mark began his career at JWT in 1989 working on Ford, Kraft and HP. Mark then moved to DDB Needham running the Cadbury Schweppes & Telstra accounts. Mark was one of 3 people who establish Carat Melbourne in 2001 before moving to Mindshare in 2003 to run Ford in Australia and Asia Pacific. Mark has been involved in big clients trading with the media and understands what is the best price to be paid in the market. Mark moved over to become Maxus COO and Trading Director in 2010.

Mark was then poached by the new CEO of Fiat Chrysler in April 2013 to become the Director of Marketing. Mark wrote and implemented the highly successful Jeep media strategy which focuses on more and more TV. Mark has continued the highly successful “I bought a Jeep” campaign and taken it to a higher level with outstanding sales success.

For more than 30 years, Deb has honed her knowledge of the travel industry in a cross section of roles, from Retail Management to Sales & Marketing. For the last 13 years, she has been with the APT Travel Group, currently as Executive GM for Global Sales & Marketing of APT and Travelmarvel,  Australia’s largest cruising and touring company.

As part of this role, Deb leads an uncompromising focus on partnerships and also on developing industry-leading marketing and sales strategies that ensure enviable brand equity, deliver exceptional customer experiences with attraction and retention strategies always through a customer centric lens. In turn, the company has received many industry and consumer accolades for touring and cruising excellence.

Jane runs the Australian and NZ operations of Standard Media Index, a global provider of real time advertising expenditure data, a business she co-founded in 2009. A former Media Editor of Australia’s national newspaper The Australian, Jane’s background is in media, having been a business journalist specialising in the sector for 15 years.

Media remains Jane’s passion, although these days she’s focused on SMI’s business development while also managing the relationships with SMI’s local data providers – the Media Agencies – and working with them to continually improve the data product.

Jane has a BA (Journalism) and a Graduate Diploma in Applied Finance and Investment.

Leslie Dance was appointed vice president of marketing and product development for the Hawai‘i Tourism Authority (HTA) on January 5, 2016.

HTA is responsible for strategically managing the State of Hawai‘i’s marketing initiatives to support tourism. Leslie directs HTA’s global marketing program in North America, Hawai‘i’s largest market, as well as Japan, China, Taiwan, Korea, Southeast Asia, Oceania, and Europe.

Leslie has an extensive and diverse background in marketing, public relations and advertising, coupled with longstanding ties to the Hawaiian Islands.

Her marketing experience with global sports brands is particularly strong, having collaborated on product promotions and partnerships with the NFL, FIFA, PGA, LPGA, USTA, Major League Baseball and the Olympics. In entertainment, she has directed global marketing partnerships with MTV and worked with performers that include Bono, Foo Fighters and John Legend.
Prior to joining HTA, Leslie held executive marketing positions for high-profile corporations in London, Chicago, Rochester (NY), and Seattle over the past two decades. Highlights include serving as vice president of worldwide brand strategy, management and communication for Eastman Kodak (2008-2013), and as corporate vice president and general manager of global marketing and communication for Motorola Mobile Device Business (2000-2007).
At Eastman Kodak, Leslie led a staff of 45 and global network of agencies in the reinvigoration of the brand and development of several online initiatives. Her efforts resulted in the National Association of Professional Women naming Leslie one of the Women of the Year in 2012.

While at Motorola, Leslie’s marketing efforts supported the launch of new products and opening of retail stores worldwide, including 300 in China alone. The company’s brand value during her tenure more than doubled to $5-billion. Advertising Age named Leslie one of the Top Women to Watch in 2006, crediting her with helping to “take Motorola from the brick-like mobile phones to some of the sexiest looking devices in the marketplace.”

Leslie has always considered Hawai‘i to be home and jumped at the opportunity to support HTA’s tourism marketing efforts for the State of Hawai‘i. She was born in Honolulu and has numerous family members living in the Hawaiian Islands. In addition, she worked for a decade in public relations on Hawai‘i Island and O‘ahu early in her career.

As global senior vice president of Expedia Media Solutions, Noah Tratt oversees all facets of the business including product development and execution, engineering, operations, media sales and business development for the Expedia, Inc. brands. Noah has overseen thousands of digital marketing partner initiatives and has significantly grown the Expedia Media Solutions business over the past several years.

With more than two decades of marketing and sales experience, Noah has worked at Microsoft and Xylo, and launched Daily Rocket, a tech startup acquired by Fiserv. He joined Expedia, Inc. in 2002 to lead the car rental business, and later served as vice president of supplier strategy for Expedia Corporate Travel.

Noah currently is an officer of the U.S. Travel Association, serving as secretary, and is also a member of the editorial board for the Journal of Digital and Social Media Marketing. He has been recognized as one of HSMAI’s Top 25 Most Extraordinary Minds in Sales and Marketing, and was inducted into the ClickZ Digital Marketing Hall of Fame. Noah is a graduate of Brown University, and lives with his family in Seattle.

During Inese’s career, she’s had the privilege of working with CEOs and Boards on major transformation agendas. She has led marketing, sales and channel partner functions within world class technology companies such Microsoft and Telstra.

She believes the role of the CMO is to champion the customer agenda so that brands and businesses remain relevant and sustainable. She leads with the customer and brand purpose front and centre.

She enjoys contributing to the professional community, in which she plays a part. For 5 years, she was a member of the Board of the AANA (Australian Association of National Advertisers), 3 of those years as Chair of Australia’s peak media, marketing and advertising industry body.

Stephen is a Brit living in San Francisco, from where he oversees the global sales, operations, product, partnerships and marketing for the core Sojern business. Throughout his career, Stephen has been a pioneer of data-driven marketing and is passionate about building global businesses. Most recently, Stephen served as the CEO of Qype, acquired by Yelp.

Prior to that, he led Yahoo!’s European consumer business and was EMEA Managing Director for Overture. Early in his career, Stephen was one of the first employees at Air Miles (acquired by British Airways). Stephen graduated with honors from the University of Birmingham and is a Non-Executive Director of several other internet and mobile businesses.

Phil Lees is Insights Manager at Intrepid Group, and has spent the last ten years in digital marketing and media in Australia and South East Asia. With the team from Tourism Victoria, he won 5 Bronze Lions at Cannes, the SxSW Interactive award for Technical Achievement and a Webby. He specialises in the convergence of analytics and customer experience. He also writes about food and travel on his own blogs lastappetite.com and phnomenon.com, for SBS Food and Wall Street Journal Asia. Lonely Planet’s Greater Mekong guide once called him ‘the unofficial pimp of Cambodian cuisine’.

Krish manages the product commercialisation and sales strategy for Nine’s data offerings nationally, including all Nine and Microsoft properties and their data partnerships with Experian, Roy Morgan, Red Planet, Data Republic and more. This includes all analytics, targeting and measurement products.

In addition, he also look after commercial & sales strategy for all programmatic solutions including their internal media trading offering as well as their display and video marketplace and most recently Automated Guaranteed and other automation solutions.

Deb O’Sullivan has 17 years of advertising and marketing experience within the digital space. After nearly a decade at Google, Deb came over to Microsoft a year ago to launch the strategic arm of the Microsoft Search Advertising business. She is focused on servicing Australia’s largest agencies and customers, with Microsoft search marketing consultative services.

Douglas started life in the world of data driven marketing. His first client was a UK company that sold rubber sheets to incontinent people via direct response advertising. In this environment, you learn quickly how to get response and what creates a profitable sale. Douglas came to Australia to set up the first in-house CRM team at George Patterson Y&R, with the team growing to over 70 nationally in just seven years.

He was named Australian Direct Marketer of the Year and in 2008 was elected Chair of ADMA (Association for Data Driven Marketing and Advertising). Fast forward to today and Douglas is one of the owners and creative partners at The Works, an independent integrated advertising agency with a team of 90 where creative thinkers are on the forefront of client business.

The Works has grown fast and now counts Optus, GSK, ING Direct, Sunbeam, Woolworths, Jim Beam, Intuit QuickBooks, Brother, Canadian Club, Tetley, and Visit Canberra among its clients.

Douglas is passionate about digital and social media marketing and is the driving force behind the Datafication project which for the last five years has delivered the first comprehensive analytics on how Australians engage across the top platforms to reveal new trends and insights. In 2015, he delivered a TEDx talk on deceit in social media, and in 2016 founded a startup sister agency to The Works called On Message, specialising in marketing via messaging apps.

Starting at Mindshare straight out of university, Katie has become known to be one of the brightest strategist minds in Australia. Katie was Mindshare’s National Chief Strategy Officer prior to being promoted to CEO at the start of 2013. Throughout her career, Katie has been recognised both nationally and internationally for her work and contribution to the media industry. Accolades include being listed in B&T Magazine’s Top Ten Most Influential Women in 2016, 2015 and 2014, being named as the only media person within the Top Ten Women to Watch in 2013, Australia’s Top 40 under 40 in 2012, and finalist for Asia Pacific Planner of the Year back in 2007. Katie is incredibly passionate about great media thinking across paid, owned and earned, and the role it can play for clients’ business. Not only is she a regular on this topic on the speaking circuit, but Katie also spent three years lecturing at university on the topic of media and communications.

For the last 10 years, Paul has partnered with a variety of Travel businesses (airlines, hotels, destinations, meta-search, cruise and car hire) on their global digital strategies. For the past 2+ years at Facebook in Sydney, Paul has helped partners maximise their engagement with travellers across Facebook’s family of apps and services, providing visual language strategies that enable them to succeed in achieving business outcomes in a mobile-first always on world. Prior to joining Facebook, for over 7 years Paul worked at Google New York where he was a founding member of the Travel team.

As Executive Director of Marketing and Digital at Australia’s largest hotel group, Matt oversees advertising, engagement, loyalty and digital customer experience at 127 Mantra, Peppers and BreakFree properties around the world. Prior to joining Mantra in 2015, Matt was head of marketing in a bank, and spent a decade working in advertising, digital and consumer PR agencies. Matt has been a mobile phone owner since 1999, and was crowned world Snake champion on the Nokia 3210, beating Sven ‘The Snake’ Andersson in the infamous Helsinki battle of 2001.

Founder of Klick Communications, Kim is a known for her strategic and visionary approach. With offices in Sydney, Los Angeles and Honolulu, Klick Communications is widely recognised as leaders in earned and shared media, servicing the Destination, Tourism and Hospitality industries.

A board member of the International Advertising Association and recognised as PR Employer of the year (3 years running) Kim ensures that Klick is a team of future thinkers, ensuring Klick’s clients have direct access to the industry’s best practitioners.

Katrina McCarter is the Founder and CEO of Marketing to Mums. She is a marketing strategist who specialises in helping businesses sell more to Australia’s most powerful consumer, mums.
Katrina is highly regarded for her creative growth strategies and her ability to negotiate strategic partnerships, and works with both small and big businesses to increase sales and profits selling to mums.
An award-winning businesswoman and mother of three, Katrina has more than fifteen years sales and marketing experience working across diverse industries including grocery, hardware and online.
Katrina is the author of bestselling business book, Marketing to Mums, and is a regular contributor to business media. She has featured on Today Tonight and in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald, The Brisbane Times and SmartCompany.

As publisher of YourLifechoices website, eNews and eGuides, Kaye has over 17 years’ experience in creating content for, and marketing to, Australian baby boomers. YourLifeChoices is Australia’s longest established and largest digital retirement community, with 210,000 members aged between 50 and 75 and nearly four million page views monthly. With a mission to deliver timely and independent retirement information on any device at any time, YourLifeChoices website has now gone ‘offline’ with Retirement Bootcamp events in major capital cities. Frequent surveys undertaken with our baby boomer members ensure that advertising promotions and native content remain relevant and targeted, delivering strong ROI. Travel is considered the ‘reward for years of hard work’ by most retirees so cruising, guided holidays and international adventures are high priorities for these intrepid members.
Kaye has been a full writer member of the Australian Society of Travel Writers since 2002. In her role as publisher Kaye is a regular commentator on retirement, retirement income and travel as well as baby boomer attitudes and trends. This includes frequent appearances on A Current Affair, ABC Radio, Macquarie Radio Network, commentary for major digital news sites and speaking at industry conferences. Kaye is also author of two best-selling ‘how to retire’ books published by Allen and Unwin. In addition to the weekly dedicated Saturday travel enews feature, YourLifeChoices publishes sponsored eGuides including the Essential Guide to Cruising and The Great Aussie Bucket List.

www.yourlifechoices.com.au
https://www.facebook.com/yourlifechoices

@YourLifeChoices

Kirsty Bloore is the Senior Director of Research for Asia Pacific at Viacom International Media Networks.  With more than two decades of media and research experience, Bloore provides the businesses with regional consumer and commercial insights, brands’ performance reporting and forecasting. Bloore has been instrumental in building recognition of the ANZ business as a leader in consumer insights by sharing key studies with the market.

Keith has over 40 years’ experience in business. Working with world-class brands and businesses such as Harrods of Knightsbridge, Argos Discount Stores, IKEA Furniture, Flight Centre Limited, Stella Travel Services and NRMA Group.

He is Managing Partner and shareholder in Komosion, one of the fastest growing Customer Centric consulting and digital driven agencies in Australia. Through Komosion he has worked with Flight Centre Travel Group, Liquor Marketing Group (LMG owner of the Bottlemart Brand), Tabcorp, Wattyl Group, Avant, and Unity Water among others.

Prior to this Keith was Global Head of Product and Marketing for Flight Centre Travel Group for 16 years and was invited back to run a Strategic program of change called Travel Shopping of the Future for the last 3.5 years there.

His global experience has had him working in companies with operations in the UK, USA, Canada, South Africa, South East Asia, China, India, Fiji, Australia and New Zealand. Keith’s passion for the customer, marketing ability, drive and skill were key ingredients of his approach to growth and success.

Also was CEO of Stella Travel Services (STS) in January 2007 and oversaw the integration of over 70 companies over two years to create the new entity which subsequently merged with Jetset Travelworld (JET) into what is now Hello World (HLO).

Working with the Australian Marketing Institute in 2000 as Deputy Chairman he championed the accountability in marketing and getting more marketers onto boards.

Bio to come…

Bri Williams is one of Australia’s leading authorities on habits – what we need to do to make and break the habits we rely on everyday.

A CPA with a degree in Applied Psychology, Bri is the Managing Director of People Patterns, a specialist consultancy that helps people understand and change behaviour.

Bri appears regularly as a presenter and panellist and has written four books, including “The How of Habits: Using behavioural science to make and break habits” and “The Little Book of Habit Change”.

An accomplished professional with 25 years of senior-level management including the full spectrum of industry sectors – distribution, cruise, hotel, airline, and public sector. Michael is characterized by a unique ability to bring strategic intent to businesses, a big-picture conceptual thinker who has delivered results in both domestic and international markets. 

In December 2013 Michael became the Managing Director of Virtuoso Asia Pacific, based in Sydney Australia. He had previously had a long term relationship with Virtuoso that included dealings as a hotel supplier, tourism office and as a tour operator. Michael is a strong advocate for the view that our industry needs leadership to champion the role of the expert travel advisor and the value of travel in our lives – this makes Virtuoso a perfect fit.

Before moving to Virtuoso Michael was Group General Manager, JTG Qantas Holidays, with roles in both the USA and Australia from 2007 to 2013. Prior to joining the Jetset Group Michael was Executive General Manager, Western Hemisphere for Tourism Australia from 2001 to 2007 and General Manager, Americas for Air Pacific from 1999 to 2001.

He has over 25 years of international experience across a wide variety of executive management positions including Director of Marketing for Shangri-La Resorts, Commercial Director Blue Lagoon Cruises, Director of Marketing for Traveland Australia, Wholesale Manager for Thomas Cook Australia and Product Manager for Fuji Film Australia.

Michael philosophy is to ensure a clear vision for the organization and to establish a culture that thrives on success. His broad based experience within tourism product and distribution has created a unique understanding of both how the industry works and the value added by each player – he truly believes that organizations are team sports.

A native of Australia, Michael’s career has seen him live in USA, England and the Fiji Islands. He currently lives in Sydney, Australia with his wife Kellie and two daughters Montana and Georgia.

Jeremy has over 20 years experience in the casino and travel industry using data to improve the customer experience through highly personalised and timely communications for companies such as Caesars Entertainment in the United State and Flight Centre Travel Group in Australia

John Quertermous has over five years of experience marketing the performing arts in Australia. In his current role John oversees the delivery of all of Opera Australia’s above-the-line marketing strategies and tourism sales. His previous experience includes positions with Showbiz International and Newtheatricals.

Leslie Dance was appointed vice president of marketing and product development for the Hawai‘i Tourism Authority (HTA) on January 5, 2016.

HTA is responsible for strategically managing the State of Hawai‘i’s marketing initiatives to support tourism. Leslie directs HTA’s global marketing program in North America, Hawai‘i’s largest market, as well as Japan, China, Taiwan, Korea, Southeast Asia, Oceania, and Europe.

Leslie has an extensive and diverse background in marketing, public relations and advertising, coupled with longstanding ties to the Hawaiian Islands.

Her marketing experience with global sports brands is particularly strong, having collaborated on product promotions and partnerships with the NFL, FIFA, PGA, LPGA, USTA, Major League Baseball and the Olympics. In entertainment, she has directed global marketing partnerships with MTV and worked with performers that include Bono, Foo Fighters and John Legend.
Prior to joining HTA, Leslie held executive marketing positions for high-profile corporations in London, Chicago, Rochester (NY), and Seattle over the past two decades. Highlights include serving as vice president of worldwide brand strategy, management and communication for Eastman Kodak (2008-2013), and as corporate vice president and general manager of global marketing and communication for Motorola Mobile Device Business (2000-2007).
At Eastman Kodak, Leslie led a staff of 45 and global network of agencies in the reinvigoration of the brand and development of several online initiatives. Her efforts resulted in the National Association of Professional Women naming Leslie one of the Women of the Year in 2012.

While at Motorola, Leslie’s marketing efforts supported the launch of new products and opening of retail stores worldwide, including 300 in China alone. The company’s brand value during her tenure more than doubled to $5-billion. Advertising Age named Leslie one of the Top Women to Watch in 2006, crediting her with helping to “take Motorola from the brick-like mobile phones to some of the sexiest looking devices in the marketplace.”

Leslie has always considered Hawai‘i to be home and jumped at the opportunity to support HTA’s tourism marketing efforts for the State of Hawai‘i. She was born in Honolulu and has numerous family members living in the Hawaiian Islands. In addition, she worked for a decade in public relations on Hawai‘i Island and O‘ahu early in her career.

Kristin Carlos was appointed Head of Digital and Entertainment at Qantas in July 2016.

Previously she was Head of Media Partnerships at Facebook where she was responsible for developing and extending relationships with key partners in ANZ, including media companies and public figures to meet the strategic objectives of partners and Facebook.

From 2013, Kristin was Director of Connected Entertainment at Yahoo!7 where she created and implemented the product and content strategy for connected entertainment across multiple devices. As a member of the senior executive team she was responsible for driving Yahoo!7’s corporate strategy to grow and retain one of the largest online audiences in Australia.

In 2007 Kristin was appointed Head of TV for Yahoo!7 where she worked alongside Seven to extend their TV programmes online and drive multimedia consumption. She launched a range of market leading products during her tenure including the catch-up TV website PLUS7. She joined the company as Integration Marketing Manager in December 2005. In this role, she was responsible for developing marketing campaigns to cross-promote Yahoo!7 products across the wider Seven Network and Pacific Magazine group.

Prior to this, she was Senior Communications Manager at Yahoo! Europe, where she was responsible for all corporate, trade specific consumer communications at a European level from 2000, including the FIFA World Cup 2002 official website marketing campaign. Before her career at Yahoo!, Kristin helped set up the newspaper summary department at Media Monitors Queensland.

Kristin completed a Bachelor of Arts at the University of Queensland in 1996, majoring in Journalism and Media Studies.

Vanessa has been part of the Contiki family for almost 3 years. She manages an exceptional team of multi-disciplinary marketers who are responsible for ensuring Contiki remains relevant with the youth of today and is the preferred choice for group travel. During her time at Contiki she has have delivered award-winning campaigns, collaborated with some of Australia’s leading influencers, and driven growth in online sales through improved pathways on mobile and desktop. Contiki has embraced 360 content, integrating virtual reality into trade shows, as well as campaign content. Prior to joining Contiki, Vanessa spent 7 years with the Westpac Group working in both their digital and marketing teams where she was responsible for online marketing, website design, and optimisation of the customer experience. She loves to travel, squeezing on average three personal trips a year (annual leave permitting!).

With over 15 years of vast experience in marketing and communications spanning across in-house and agency roles in London and in Sydney, Denny has been responsible for some of Australia’s most accomplished and well-known tourism marketing campaigns.

Charged with the direction of Hamilton Island’s marketing and communications activity, Denny has overseen two brand evolutions which have played a pivotal role in Hamilton Island’s continued success. Denny brought to life Hamilton Island’s notable marketing activity including ‘The Best Job in the World’ campaign, celebrity activations with Oprah and Taylor Swift, Audi Hamilton Island Race Week and of course the development of the ‘World’s first virtual holiday’ created in partnership with Qantas.

In addition to being responsible for Hamilton Island, Denny drives the PR and marketing activity for Australia’s champion ocean racing yacht, Wild Oats XI.

Prior to her role as General Manager of Marketing at Hamilton Island, Denny-Lyn worked with clients such as AMP Banking, Foxtel, Mantra, Jaguar, Piper Heidseick and managed events at no 11 Downing Street in London.

Bio to come…

Lauren Quaintance is Co-Founder of Storyation – a content marketing agency that counts Tourism Australia, Tourism Queensland and Carnival Cruises among its clients.
 
A former General Manager and Editor-in-Chief of Travel for Fairfax Media, she knows her Slovakia from her Slovenia and is on a quest to visit every Australian island.
 
In a previous life she was an award-winning journalist who covered everything from people smuggling toSeptember 11 for publications such as The Sunday Times in London before taking a much less life-threatening job to launch the newspaper-inserted Sunday glossy in New Zealand.

She had stints as editor of the(sydney)magazine and Good Weekend and took charge of launches, relaunches and digital strategy for Fairfax Magazines as Managing Editor. She later turned her attention to the company’s print and digital travel products including Traveller.
 
Quaintance has a Master’s from Columbia University in New York and spent a term at Oxford University in 1999 researching the impact of the internet
on journalism (hint: it changed everything.)

When she’s not helping travel clients to create content that people will actually want to read, she writes travel stories for Qantas and Etihad’s magazines among others. She also writes about stylish adventures with her kids on her blog www.luxetravelwithkids.com 

As a former CFO who drove the transformation of Tourism Australia corporate business systems, John understands the need for digital solutions to solve critical customer challenges and enable the Tourism Industry to meet the vision of making Australia the most desirable and memorable destination on earth for leisure and business.

He leads the next phase of Tourism Australia Digital Transformation which includes distribution platforms like Aussie Specialist and our Digital Marketing channels such as Australia.com, Australia.cn as well as our significant Social Media channels where we communicate to millions of consumers across the world each week. He has a keen interest in data as well as new customer experience technologies demonstrated in the recent release of 360 and Virtual Reality assets supporting the recent Aquatic and Coastal campaign launched globally on January 26th – Australia Day

Travel Writer Nina Karnikowski’s career has taken her across the vast plains of Mongolia in ex-Russian military vehicles, through Moroccan deserts on the back of a camel, tramping through the kaleidoscopic streets of India, exploring the raw deserts of Chile, safariing through a clutch of east African nations and beyond.

Previously staff Travel Writer for the Sydney Morning Herald‘s traveller print and online sections, Nina now writes for Traveller on a freelance basis and for various other travel publications, including YEN magazine, Yahoo7 Travel, Virgin Voyeur, Paradise Magazine – the in-flight magazine of Air Niugini, and for brands including Flight Centre and MasterCard.

Nina appears regularly on SKY News and ABC 702 radio as a travel ‘expert’, and runs her own blog travelswithnina.com, which focuses on wild, transformative adventures.

Nina lived in Mumbai, India in 2013, writing about her adventures for Traveller and contributing to Vogue India. Prior to that, she spent four years writing for Fairfax magazine titles including Good Weekend, Sunday Life – the Sydney magazine, and Sport & Style.

Following a psychology degree and a decade across clients, agencies and publishers, Susie joined Guardian Australia’s content team Guardian Labs in 2014, looking to create more authentic work. Susie is dedicated to helping brands create genuine connections with the Guardian’s audience through partnerships, and is particularly passionate about work which provides true utility and benefits to readers and thereby creating true brand uplift. She creates content across multiple categories, and Guardian Labs have created travel partnerships with Tourism NZ, NT, Royal Caribbean, Qatar Airways and Discover Canada amongst many others.

Justin Jamieson is the Founder and Publisher of the award-winning get lost Magazine, a 140+ page glossy travel magazine focusing on unique, boutique experiential travel.

get lost is known for its independence and passion for unearthing the more unique and exhilarating places, people and experiences the world has to offer. The printed magazine is distributed internationally and the digital version is available on the Apple Newsstand and Amazon platforms.

Justin can be heard discussing travel trends weekly on 2GB’s top rating Chris Smith Afternoon show and is a regular on the top rating 3AW travel and food program A Moveable Feast including co hosting. He can also be heard on the Qantas inflight program Up and Away, the Austereo networks and ABC nationally as well as guest spots on major TV networks and a regular guest on Sky News Travel.

Justin launched get lost in 2004 hoping to scratch an insatiable travel bug. It seems to have made it worse.

Richard leads FutureBrand’s commitment to creating brands for future business growth, playing key leadership and product development roles across the Asia-Pacific region.

With a degree in Litterae Humaniores from Oxford University, he started his career in Bangkok as an account planner before switching to media planning in London. Since arriving in Australia in 2001, he has contributed to a wide range of significant branding programs, all in the name of creating a positive future and many of which have been awarded by Cannes Lions, Brand New, REBRAND and D&AD.

At FutureBrand, he has continued to champion the company’s expertise in Country Branding, for the purpose of not only travel and leisure but also trade and investment. FutureBrand publishes the Country Branding Index, and recent branding programs include Bhutan, South Pacific Tourism and Tahiti Tourism, to add to his previous experience of working with Tourism Australia.

Richard was featured by AdNews in their 40 Under 40 list of rising stars of advertising, marketing and media, and he was one of 20 visionaries invited to speak at VIVID on the future landscape of design and creativity in 2020.

Colin is an experienced leader and entrepreneur in the mobile data and insights space with a strong bias for action.

He successfully launched, built and sold a pan-APAC mobile insights business. He currently leading a team of 50 talented professionals across 5 offices.

Caroline was born in the U.K. (Portsmouth, England), schooled in Australia and the U.S, studied Psychology at Sydney University, resides in Australia and has lived and worked in the USA.

After a period in international hospitality management for the Greater Union organisation, Caroline began her own business, Davidson Communications Pty Ltd, in 1990. This successful public relations and destination marketing business specialises in the leisure, entertainment and tourism industries. In addition, Caroline’s versatile skills and first-class media relationships have been employed as a consultant strategist and a specialist PR expert to benefit a range of clients as diverse as Australian Federal Government programs and launches, national sporting events and festivals, innovative corporate product launches and celebrity profiling.

Caroline was a shareholder and Director of Public Relations for Select Hotels & Resorts International between 2004-2009, successfully re-branding and building an enviable profile for this marketing group for over 50 unique, high-end luxury accommodation experiences across Australia, New Zealand Asia and the Pacific.

Davidson Communications has provided successful brand management, destination representation, public relations campaigns and initiatives in Australia, New Zealand and Asia-Pacific for a range of high profile international brands and corporate clients such as Rocky Mountain International (representing tourism boards for initially Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota & South Dakota and since July 2015 MT, ND, SD and WY); Visit Denver ( projects); Jackson Hole Mountain Resort/ Jackson Chamber of Commerce (projects); Travelocity ( t/a ZUJI.com.au in Australia); Starwood Hotels, Rendezvous Hotels & Resorts International; Select Hotels & Resorts International; Hard Rock Cafe; Hard Rock Hotels and Resorts (Asia), The Rees Hotel Queenstown and The Noosa International Food & Wine Festival ( NIFW, QLD) over a twenty five year period.

Caroline Davidson Accreditations, Memberships & Awards & Affiliations
• Australian Society of Travel Writers (ASTW) Annual national award for Best Tourism Board/ Product representation 2016
( for Real America States MT, ND, SD & WY)
• Executive Committee member and Secretary, Visit USA Australia (2015, 2016, 2017)
• Member, Australian Society of Travel Writers (ASTW) since 2000
• Visit USA Australia Member, Media Committee chairperson
• Media committee member, IPW16 (formerly known as Pow Wow)
• Brand USA AU Advisory Board member 2017

Currently working as Head of Marketing for guided holiday company Trafalgar, Katherine O’Neill has worked in the tourism industry for 18 years holding various marketing and communications roles with, Tourism Australia, Voyages Hotels and Resorts and Four Seasons Hotel Sydney.

Career highlights for Katherine include playing an integral role in launching two of Tourism Australia’s most iconic campaigns, the “No Leave, No life” campaign and “There’s nothing like Australia”.

The former of these projects won the 2010 Media Federation Award in the Media/Entertainment/Travel and Leisure category and Katherine launched and spearheaded this innovative promotion and managed the TV production with Endemol Australia.

During her current role heading up the Australian marketing division for Trafalgar, Katherine has been central to its multi-phased brand transformation since 2011 which included a major TV led campaign, integrating consumer reviews and advocacy through consumer and B2B creative and introducing a new brand advocate.

Katherine manages a team whose remit is to promote Trafalgar’s range of holidays to the Australian market and help alter the perception of ‘touring’ to immersive guided holiday experiences.

Jill is the Owner and Managing Director of Barking Owl Communications – a boutique Sydney based PR agency assisting companies in the tourism industry with strategic and creative responses to their communications issues.

With more than 20 years experience in marketing and corporate communications and issues management, she has worked in both local and global markets (including 11 years in the USA). Jill previously worked with leading global communications firm Edelman, where she managed their tourism practice from the company’s Chicago head office and was subsequently Managing Director of the Australian operation.

Jill has extensive experience in developing and implementing communications programs for the tourism industry, and has worked across a range of tourism clients including Destinations (Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism, Tourism Northern Territory and Tourism Tasmania), Online Services (Expedia, OnlyLuxe.com.au and TakeABreak.com.au), Airlines (Royal Brunei, Qatar Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Boeing), and Hotels (Radisson Blu Plaza Hotel Sydney, Wilpena Pound Resort, Delaware North Corporation and Qualia, Hamilton Island).

While managing the PR program for Hamilton Island, Jill spearheaded the on-island communications campaign for Best Job In the World and the PR program for Oprah Winfrey’s visit to Hamilton Island – the first stop on her tour down under!

She has also led some of the most high profile crisis management programs including the recovery program for Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism post their devastating earthquake and communications initiatives for Longitude 131 following the fire which severely damaged the property and Lizard Island following Cyclone Ita.

Jill is a member of the PRIA and ASTW and holds a BA (Communications) from the University of Technology.

Rowan is responsible for the domestic and international marketing of Christchurch and the Canterbury region. This includes the consumer marketing programme, PR and media activity, international trade representation and overseeing the website christchurchnz.com.

Ingrid Kocijan is one of Australia’s most experienced and respected rail industry executives. In 2006 she joined Melbourne-based Rail Plus – Australasia’s leading international rail specialist – and over the next eight years held a number of key operational, sales and marketing roles. In 2014 Ingrid moved to Sydney to head up Rail Europe’s regional operation. As Manager Australasia, she worked closely with European rail carriers and local GSAs to develop market-specific sales incentives and targeted marketing initiatives that raised awareness of rail travel and delivered sales growth across Australia and New Zealand.

Over the past 12 months Ingrid has also spearheaded the rail sector’s response to the European terrorist attacks, which resulted in minimal impact on Australasian sales compared to other key international markets. In January 2016 Rail Europe took full ownership of Rail Plus and in September 2016 it integrated the company into its global network. As part of the integration process, Rail Europe, which now trades as Rail Plus in Australasia, promoted Ingrid to the newly-created position of Commercial Director, Rail Plus – the company’s most senior customer-facing role in Australasia. Outside of work, Ingrid is currently pursuing an MBA.

Blake joined joined Luxury Escapes in April 2016 and has strong background in start-ups, travel and technology. Blake formerly ran Lonely Planet’s Business Development and Licensing business in the US before joining NileGuide, a travel start-up, based in San Francisco.

Since returning to Australia in 2010, Blake spent five years building and running GOOD44, an online food, health and wellness marketplace and most recently was part of the Australian leadership team at cloud accounting leader Xero, where he led their Partnerships and New Channels business.

He has been instrumental in transforming the Luxury Escapes brand and has focused heavily on the brand and marketing side of the business.

Luxury Escapes is now one of the biggest-spending advertisers in the travel sector.