gianluca ruggiero

Assistant to the Natural Vegetables Brand Manager. Communication and management of PR events in the field of clinic nutrition.

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As the COO of a group of companies specialized in different advertising skills, my main role is to integrate the work, the skills and the souls of a wide group of talent into one single effective advertising consultancy firm. A company whose aim is to design sound and imaginative Brand experiences that can really change a Brand's performance for the good, also at international level. Brands managed with at an European level include: Coca-Cola, Mastercard, Nespresso, Chevrolet, Indesit. I also assumed the role of Interim Chief Strategy Officer, November 2011 through September 2012, with the aim of creating a new Brand Planning culture, one that includes Channel and overall Engagement strategy in the process. As of September 2012, I also took direct responsibility of the Rome McCannWorldGroup office.

Keep driving change to transform a former 15 people office into one of the biggest and successful integrated advertising agencies in Italy. My first goal was to make MRM the best digital & CRM agency in Italy; to this aim, significant investments were made in R&D for cutting edge projects (see the CAMPARI Social case and the OPEL IPTV case below). But we also wanted to take advantage of the lack of integration in the italian advertising business, and be the first in the market to propose a complete end-to-end in-house integrated advertising capability. That's why were the first digital&CRM agency to invest in great creative talent coming from the "traditional advertising" world. That allowed us to transform a formerly "bits&bytes" cold agency into one of the most interesting creative hot-shops in Milan, achieving a massive +350% growth in the period of my tenure.

Evolving a former Direct Marketing Agency into one of the most respected and successful Digital Agencies in Italy. My key role here was to foster digital change among people who didn't have digital attitude and skills in the first place. Convincing people that digital change was for good, and taking them by the hand in the whole process. Eventually contributing to the creation of a team of great people.

Management of Cornetto and Magnum Brands in Italy (about 50% of total Algida’s turnover). Member of the Global Brand Development Team for the aforementioned Brands, with the leadership of Europe-wide product innovation projects. That was a really formative experience, ranging across the whole marketing scope; from the very development of product recipes (among others, Magnum Seven Sins and Cornetto Love Potions limited editions), to the development of true interactive campaigns including every single possible touchpoint (see Cornetto Free Music Brand Activation, an event bringing more than 3M people at free music concerts expressely organised by the Brand and backed by a powerful web content strategy).

Definition and implementation of Unilever strategies in new information technologies, both B2C and B2B, with direct responsibility towards the company’s Board of Directors. Perhaps one of the greatest, most challenging tasks in my whole work life. I was given the responsibility to drive digital change in Unilever Italy, building advanced digital strategies for some of the most successful Brands in the country, pushing the whole corporate body for change. Pretty much a task, for a young marketeer with little support structure; the risk here was to be expelled by the organization as an unwelcome foreign body. On the contrary, Unilever became in that period one of the most advanced companies in digital marketing, with successful Brand Content strategies in place well ahead of the time (Invoglia.it became soon the 3rd italian recipe website for visits, 4Saltialcinema.it was among the top 5 movie websites, Cornettofreemusic.it was the backbone of the whole concert Brand activation with more than 3M users per month in the activation period).

Management of communication and innovation for Vegetables Category (16% of Findus’ turnover).

Reporting directly to the CEO, I am the Strategy Lead for some of the company's most prestigious global clients. While I have developed strategies for companies in every industry, in JWT I focus on Luxury and High-Tech, two areas where I have several years of experience. My goal is to create Brand positioning that are rooted on a deep, global human truth, as well as designing and implementing the Integrated Marketing Communications plans that bring them to life.

Dissertation titled "Product innovation and time-based competition". After the degree joined the team for the research project “Innovation processes in packaging and shoe industries”, promoted by MURST-CNR (National Research Centre - Ministry of Science and Technology). Activities and Societies: ILCA, FIV, Laser Class