Simon Camerer, executive head: marketing of Cell C

Despite his many successes, Camerer says that he is “overwhelmed” to be the recipient of the Award. “Cell C is a pretty young brand, and we're still only third in the marketplace,” he points out. “So it humbles me that someone has noticed the work that we're doing.”

Extended period of time

The Marketing Leadership and Innovation Award was launched in 2007 to recognise an individual's marketing achievements over an extended period of time. For this year's award, a shortlist was compiled based on the success of brands over the last three years at the Loeries.

The shortlist included the following brands: Design Indaba, Virgin Atlantic, M-Net/DStv and Cell C. Each of these brands has been very successful in their marketing activities and each has one or more key individuals who have been instrumental in the brand's success.

“Having reviewed each brand, as well as the individuals behind the brands, it became clear that Simon Camerer was personally involved in Cell C's success in recent years, and has been an active contributor to the brand's market position in South Africa for many years prior to that,” said Andrew Human, CEO of the Loeries.

“As such, the Loeries committee has unanimously chosen him as the 2009 recipient of the Marketing Leadership and Innovation Award - and unanimously agree that he is a worthy recipient and an outstanding example of the leadership, dedication, loyalty and commitment to a brand that it takes to do something special.”

Started out at Saatchi & Saatchi

Camerer started out in the advertising world at Saatchi & Saatchi, and after completing his MBA, moved into consulting with Andersen Consulting. He then joined the Walt Disney Company as marketing director for Europe, Middle East and Africa.

This, he says, gave him the “exposure to international markets, top international brands and really good marketers to learn from - people who really know what they're doing - and to make marketing my own career and hopefully thrive at it.”

He came back to South Africa, where he had what he terms the “good fortune” to join Cell C in the early days. He has now been working for them for over five years.

“The challenges were that the competitor set was an entrenched duopoly with an eight-year head start, so we needed to break through and get people to sit up and take notice from an awareness point of view by being more funky and different, as well as driving innovation through product ideas that are relevant to customers.”

Relationships

He puts his success down to the relationships he has built with Cell C's agencies. “Net#work BBDO has been a fairly instrumental partnership in terms of generating awareness,” he says. “We've done well with The Media Shop on the media side and Gloo on the web side, as well as numerous activation agencies, who we ensure all carrying the golden thread through every aspect of the marketing mix.”

And of course, the team within Cell C has supported him as well.

“We're a passionate group of individuals, very fortunate to be in an incredible industry that is fast-paced and driven by technology and consumer change,” he says. “We feel that the industry is exciting and challenging, and we have a genuine desire to provide South Africa with alternatives.”