Rhona is a media and marketing veteran with 23 years of experience in all facets of the industry, including media strategy and activation, branding and creative marketing, and visual communication.
Rhona is classically trained in media planning and buying, starting off her career in 2000 on the national TV buying side at Starcom Worldwide and eventually transitioning to strategy. Most of her career at Starcom was rooted in entertainment, working on Walt Disney Studios and gaming and music clients including Nintendo and EMI Records. Working on entertainment teaches you a particular set of skills – you learn that time waits for no one, how to break the rules, be at the right place at the right time, understand that big ideas are a must and not just a nice to have and how to outsmart the competition. Most critically, you learn to live and breathe in “hustle mode.” This way of working has become ingrained in Rhona to the point where she applies the “entertainment playbook” to any category or assignment she touches. In addition to entertainment, while at Starcom Rhona also worked on PetSmart, Lego, Morgan Stanley and DelMonte Foods.
In 2012, Rhona transitioned to an independent agency, Palisades Media Group, where she was tapped to start up the strategic planning discipline. She worked across all clients in the portfolio – including Netflix, Duluth Trading Co., UGG Australia, Mercury Insurance, Belkin, Arlo, and Del Taco – embedding strategy and innovation from start to finish. She also led all branding efforts for the agency including agency positioning, development of agency materials and style guides, and agency content and distribution strategies across all social and owned channels.
Rhona lives at the intersection of media and creative. Storytelling is at the core of everything she does, underpinned by in-depth consumer and cultural understanding and data. Over time, her career trajectory grew from the “blocking and tackling” of media to consumer-led strategic communication, and brand and creative marketing. This includes looking at the big picture and crafting a narrative that connects the dots between business objectives, consumer journeys, creative messaging and go-to-market strategies. In the process, she designs consumer experiences and identifies media touchpoints and activations that feature brands as the hero while simultaneously moving consumers to engage. She has established a reputation as a transformational leader who is driven by challenge, undeterred by obstacles, and committed to furthering standards of excellence.
