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Movings/Shakings: 26 August

Foreign affairs

Indie agency Chemistry Interaction has hired four new staff members to help service new business wins from Blue Wing Honda, Sovereign, Fairview and Chevron. 

First up is Canadian copywriter and motorcycle soloist Sarah Hart, who joins from Taxi and Proximity in Canada where she cut her teeth on clients like Johnson & Johnson, Gillette and Pepsi. Hart, who has won awards at Caples and Echo, brings a load of international and digital experience with her, along with an enormous enthusiasm for New Zealand’s many scenic roads.

Adding some Irish wit to Hart’s Canadian charm is art director Avril Durkan, fresh off the boat from Publicis Dublin. With ten years of above and below the line experience on international brands like Diageo, Guinness, Vodafone, Barnardos, Cadbury, Tiger Beer and Johnson & Johnson, her work has been awarded globally by Clio and in Ireland by ICAD, Kinsale Shark and Ad Fx.

South African-born and Kiwi-trained copywriter Bronwyn Retief also joins from Rapp Tribal via a stint of international travel. She has worked across clients like Sky, Yellow, Telecom, ANZ, AMI, Lotto and McDonald’s and is an up and coming talent in the direct and digital space.

On the suiting side, Croatian-born Marija Horvatich joins from Jericho, where she was a senior account manager focusing on email strategy and championing best practice digital marketing. Prior to that, she worked at the Marketing Association as a web marketing executive, managing the development of the new Marketing Association website, social media and database management. 

Director Joseph Silk says these are all new hires, rather than replacements. 

“We really are starting up the United Nations of advertising here, minus Helen Clark,” says Pat Murphy, creative director. “Avril and Sarah have already hit the ground running with some very impressive TV and digital work. Bronwyn is proving to be an excellent writer with abilities beyond her years, and Marija’s extensive digital knowledge adds another string to our bow. We consider ourselves extremely lucky to have such award-winning talent on board.” 

Joiner up

via stuff.co.nz

RadioLive has promoted Cliff Joiner to network director for the nationwide news and talk brand. He replaces Rik van Dijk, who has been appointed general manager for MediaWorks’ Central Otago radio operation.

Joiner joined RadioLive in 2012 as executive producer for The Marcus Lush Breakfast Show and before joining MediaWorks, he was national bureau editor for TVNZ. 

General manager of talk brands, Jana Rangooni says: “Cliff has been a great asset to the RadioLive team for the past two-and-a-half years. He is a news heavyweight who has brought a stronger news and current affairs focus to our breakfast show which will now benefit our programmes across the whole day.”

And Joiner says: “The opportunity presented by the network director position at RadioLive was simply too good to be missed. RadioLive has assembled a team of hosts who are among the best journalists, broadcasters and communicators around. I’m looking forward to building on the great work that’s already gone in to focusing our attention on what matters most in our business: our listeners; their stories; and the stories that matter most to them. I’d also like to pay tribute to all the people who make up the RadioLive Breakfast team. You don’t choose to get up at 3am every week day unless you’re heading some place that you really want to be, and that’s been my story for the past two-and-a-half years.” 

Joiner begins his new role on 22 September.

Integrating Kyne 

MediaWorks has also announced the appointment of Glen Kyne. He will initially work with the TV sales team and will take up the new role in October. 

Kyne has led commercial strategy in the areas of radio integration, digital and music streaming services. And he joins MediaWorks from The Radio Network, where he was head of integration. 

Big hire

Big Mobile has announced the appointment of Sarah Fenton as its new sales manager for New Zealand.

Fenton, who starts on 8 September, will take over from Michael Buhagiar, who departs Big Mobile to pursue a new venture.

Fenton comes from TradeMe where she was national display sales manager and has a wealth of experience that spans over 14 years with roles at Yahoo! NZ, AOL UK, CBS Outdoor, and London’s Financial Times.

“We continue to develop and invest in the New Zealand market and have been busy building on our premium publisher network, audience profiling, performance offering and geo capabilities, alongside launching a range of new and exciting mobile ad products,” says Rob Hall, managing director APAC at Big Mobile. “Sarah has extensive experience working with both top brands and premium publishers and as such she’s a natural fit for Big Mobile.”

Big Mobile’s New Zealand publisher network includes Yahoo!NZ, MetService, Ticketek, Vodafone, CBSi, TVNZ and Pandora Internet Radio.

On call

CallPlus Group has promoted two of its leaders to head up its Orcon and Flip brands.

Mike Shirley, previously general manager of Flip, becomes general manager of Orcon, while Flip marketing manager Scott Hoogerbrug takes the role of head of Flip.

CallPlus Group chief executive Mark Callander says the appointment of Shirley and Hoogerbrug brings strong leadership to the group, and further positions the three CallPlus residential brands, Slingshot, Orcon and Flip, to challenge the incumbents.

“What we have is a varied portfolio of brands, each with strong leadership, and a vision to really challenge the big boys. Flip’s committed to winning the low-cost broadband game, Slingshot’s value-led, great-service proposition is making brilliant progress, with record sales figures in recent weeks, and Orcon’s drive to be the leader for early-adopters and heavy users is already well proven.”

Callander points to the latest TrueNet results, which had the three CallPlus brands at the top of the table, as proof of the company’s commitment to excellent broadband.

“The group’s position is clear. We want to grow by being better than the others, especially those distracted by rebranding phone boxes. We currently serve 15 percent of the market—and we expect to get to 20 percent in the not-too distant future.” 

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