Westpac’s Lisa Cronin to join Foxtel as director of customer marketing and loyalty
Lisa Cronin has joined Foxtel as its new director of customer marketing and loyalty, replacing Lisa Johnson who returned to the UK, Mumbrella can reveal.
Cronin joins from Westpac where she was head of personalised marketing, home ownership.
Cronin will join the business in September
The announcement was made this afternoon by chief marketing and sales officer Keiren Cooney who said in an email to staff that Cronin will be joining the business in early September.
“Lisa has built an impressive international career in customer marketing and loyalty, working across the telco and banking sectors for several big brands. She was loyalty manager for O2 and retention marketing manager for British Telecom during her time in Europe, before returning to Sydney in 2008 to join Optus for a successful 11-year stint,” said Cooney.
Cronin worked across customer lifecycle, retention and loyalty strategy at Optus, three things which have been flagged as key focuses for Foxtel. She also introduced customer retention and data strategies to Westpac’s home loan products.
“She has been a keen follower of Foxtel for many years, and is excited to have found the right opportunity to join our team and make a difference,” said Cooney.
Foxtel’s marketing department has taken on several different forms in the last couple of years. Cooney joined the business in 2018, replacing Andy Lark. Group director of marketing, John Casey, exited in 2019 after three months. He was replaced by Arianna Saita who has also since left.
General manager of advertising sales and brand partnerships, Andrew Mulready, also left in 2019, as did head of sport marketing Adam Ballesty. Olivia Nixon (head of brand marketing for brand content and products), Jesse Stephens (director of growth marketing), Chris Pocock (head of marketing at Fox Sports), Irena Kelava (head of brand marketing), Amy Alder (general manager of Foxtel agency, Felix), Polly Blenkinship (marketing director of insights and media), and Lisa Johnstone (director of loyalty) all left the company also.
Foxtel’s three creative teams – Felix, FNA Creative and Fox Sports Creative – have been rolled into one team during the changes, and the sales and marketing departments were restructured in October 2019.
Aside from its marketing department, Foxtel, like other media companies, has also seen redundancies across its whole business during COVID-19. The subscription TV business has been open about the transformation it is currently undergoing, with the 250+ redundancies chalked up to the business repositioning itself for a tighter 2020 market.
CEO Patrick Delany was blunt in an email to staff, saying the changes were necessary for the business to continue.
“Restructuring and changing the way the company works is not an easy thing to do at any time. But with the impact of COVID-19, the only option is to act now to ensure we ride out the current situation and remain strong to compete with local and global media companies,” he said.
Foxtel has also launched a new product this year in Binge, it’s entertainment streaming platform, which it hopes will perform similarly to Kayo which achieved quick success when it launched in 2018.
