Hattie Adam-Smith – Marketer

In this senior leadership role, I was responsible for overseeing all elements of the running of the Vintage Classics imprint in the UK and internationally, including developing an ambitious five-year growth strategy. I line-managed a team of direct reports, working with the Directors of multiple departments including Sales, Contracts and Legal, International, Design, Marketing, Brand, Publicity and Production, to oversee the publication of over 100 titles a year and maintenance of a list of over 1,000 books. Through vision, a strong understanding of complex sales data and a commitment to collaboration, I ensured that our publishing, campaigns and assets aligned with work-flow, objectives and critical paths for multiple areas of the business as well as overseeing crisis management and maintaining an exceptional level of author and estate care.

I used my experience as Brand Director to inform a major project assessing how the visual identity and creative could evolve, collaborating with our design and brand teams on many creative briefs across cover design, brand updates and developments and marketing creative to ensure that our approach was joined-up and backed by research and data. I was also responsible for our acquisitions strategy, including buying new books, managing contract renewals, publishing partnerships and negotiations with literary agents and estates across the globe. Design, visual identity and brand were at the heart of the role and I worked extremely closely with the design and marketing teams to produce both book covers and marketing creatives that were innovative, engaging and directly relevant to the audience and our longer-term business objectives for growth.

A short-term position at the book trade’s B2B publication, to consult and advise on the set-up of their marketing operations. In this part-time role, I met with the marketing, sales and promotions teams to assess the current set-up and structure and advise on how this could be improved upon. This meant identifying strengths and missing skill-sets, consulting on staff development and training as well as the structure of the team, systems and work-flow.

I also managed multiple agencies around The British Book Awards (‘Nibbies’) to build and execute a strategy for this annual event that could be taken forward and built upon in future to drive revenue and build the award’s profile outside of the trade.

Overseeing all elements of the Vintage brand and promotion strategy, I directly line-managing the Brand team I was responsible for building, maintaining, developing and analysing our brand strategy which included our vast social media channels, podcast, newsletter, website, partnership strategy, B2B and internal communications. This also included designing and implementing marketing campaigns as well as supporting the publicity, sales and marketing teams across Vintage to augment their promotions through our channels.

Under my direction we saw vast growth in our digital communities and created a space for Vintage above the line through premium partnerships and events. I also managed all B2B output for the brand, overseeing the creation of all creative and working with our International teams on brand development in territories outside of the UK.

Working across commercial and literary fiction, and celebrity, literary and business non-fiction, I supported the Director in managing a team of nine, with five direct reports, ensuring that the output and all marking campaigns were of an excellent standard, on time and within budget. I worked very closely with the senior Editorial, International and Sales teams as well as our media agency and creative agencies to create long-term strategies for our books and authors that supported wider business objectives. This included producing and presenting pitches.

I led the campaigns for many of Cornerstone’s biggest books and authors in this time including Tom Hanks, Tim Peake and E L James, overseeing all strategy, booking and production of multi-faceted consumer and trade campaigns. This included many formats and creatives for both online and out of home campaigns including cinema advertising, multi-platform online campaigns, as well as multiple consumer digital, trade and out of home campaigns and activations – using both digital and static creatives. I was also responsible for all international and digital creative for our international markets, working with local teams to ensure that assets were produced in-line with our guidelines and to the expected standard.

I took a lead role in Tim Peake’s publication event in London to produce a digital element to the evening that engaged over 140k people and won a prestigious Hire Space award for ‘Best All Round Event Experience.’

Working as a senior member of the Communications team, I was responsible for both developing marketing strategy and executing campaigns for a huge range of commercial fiction and non-fiction titles. In this role I worked closely with both our media agency and multiple creative agencies on to produce the creative for both online and above the line campaigns.

I had the pleasure of working with Marian Keyes, Jojo Moyes, Jamie Oliver and Sylvia Day to produce top-tier campaigns. Each of the campaigns I delivered for these brand authors produced a Number One Sunday Times Bestseller. I also launched the global publishing phenomenon The Ladybird Books For Grown-Ups, and was instrumental in pitching for new authors, including crime-writer Ragnar Jónasson.

I worked extremely closely with our sales teams to ensure that all trade marketing both in the UK and internationally was supported and that our divisional presentation for the annual sales conference was produced. I also worked extremely closely with Warner Bros. Entertainment and our international and foreign-language publishing partners to coordinate a book and film campaign Me Before You.

Working in a small team at this leading digital agency, I was instrumental in building the publishing department from the ground up. I oversaw every single campaign from the initial pitch to the final report, managing multiple people including my own team of four publicists. In this time, I developed relationships and partnerships with a huge number of contacts across the creative, entertainment and publishing industries and gained a valuable insight into the workings of the film and theatre industries. I also developed an expertise in social media which has continued to evolve. Additionally, I worked to support the film and theatre team on campaigns, leading campaigns for major a feature film and many West End theatre productions.

Working across Metropolis Music and Metropolis Music Management, I was responsible for creating content, managing show announcements and enquiries across their social media channels, as well as building engagement and the online community, especially in promoting new artists. I also worked closely with the company’s media agency and managed all paid for social media activity across the company.

Assistant to the Marketing and Publicity team at Macmillan Children’s Books. As well as general administration and office support I worked on a number of smaller marketing and publicity campaigns, as well as playing a key part in organising and providing assistance at many events and tours – including ‘being’ The Grufflalo on many occasions!