Matt’s career started after leaving university and joining the company ‘Friends Reunited’, a new social media platform for connecting schoolmates. Wanting to expand into online dating, Matt was given a role in digital. With only having experience in digital marketing, this would be a challenge for Matt. Luckily, an employee there agreed to teach Matt all she knew for three months before having her baby. Four days in, Matt received a phone call, she had gone into labour. Matt was now running a dating site with no experience or knowledge. Now ‘Head of Dating’ Matt had to learn everything he could in a short amount of time. Learning quickly how to navigate this new world, Matt learnt to ask lots of questions and absorb as much as he could.

Throughout his life, Matt was heavily into sports. However, with suffering injuries, dislocating his shoulder, slipping his disc, and tearing his knee ligaments, Matt realised he couldn’t continue and had to take his much-loved hobby and turn it into something else. Using his competitive instinct to harvest that in another way, in his career.

Fast forward a few years, and Matt felt unfulfilled in his current role. Whilst speaking with his wife, who worked at Just Eat, she described how great the company culture and vision were. A job role had opened up and Matt joined, within 6 months, he was asked to stay permanently. Matt became UK Marketing Director and was now faced with the challenge of changing the face of Just Eat.

In February 2020, Just Eat had a meeting with the advertising agency McCann, knowing the direction they wanted to go in, they came up with a concept. Matt was shown Snoop Dogg and the infamous Just Eat ad was born. However, in May 2020, Covid hit. Waiting for the right time to release the ad, it went out to the world and was met with an unbelievable response. A prime example of great advertising becoming a part of culture.

With Covid being a tough time for all, especially for parents, Matt also shares his struggles with parenthood during lockdown and how he was able to overcome them.

Matt is now Chief Marketing Officer at Rightmove and on a mission to improve the brand’s marketing strategy.

To hear Matt’s advice on creating famous advertising work and becoming comfortable in your own skin, listen to this episode of ‘How I Became’.

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Episode Sponsor:
⁠⁠⁠⁠Gray Matters⁠⁠⁠⁠ - A straight-talking business development consultancy that empowers agencies to position, market and sell themselves for new business success

⁠⁠⁠⁠Unity & Motion⁠⁠⁠⁠ - A London based production company specialising in commercials and branded content

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This is a ⁠⁠⁠⁠UNIFY⁠⁠⁠⁠ Podcast. Produced by ⁠⁠⁠⁠Unity & Motion⁠⁠⁠⁠

Credits:
Director: Charles Parkinson
Poet & VO Artist: Ashley Samuels-McKenzie
Sound Recordist: Paolo Neri
Editor:  Catherine Singh