Ocean Villas Group taps marketing legend Bird

Ocean Villas Group has secured the services of marketing legend Drayton Bird.

The company, with its head office in Singapore and branch office in Phuket, has appointed Drayton Bird Associates to manage their marketing activities, however Bird himself will personally handle the day-to-day business.

He said: “This is like coming home, really. I’ve worked with property developers in the past, and have spent a great deal of time in the Asian region, where Ocean Villas are so very strong. They have one quality I simply love in a client; they know their business back to front – when very few of their competitors do. I had quite a job thinking how I could help, but I hope I can contribute a few ideas.”

Drayton Bird is a marketing legend. He has worked in 50 countries, with many of the world’s leading brands, including American Express, British Airways, Deutsche Post, Ford, Microsoft, Nestlé, Procter & Gamble, Philips, The Royal Mail, Unilever and Visa. He has also worked with big advertising agency groups, business schools and management consultants, including Y & R, JWT, and Leo Burnett, INSEAD, Antai School of Management, Shanghai, Columbia University Business School, New York, McKinsey and A.T. Kearney.

As International Vice-Chairman and Creative Director, he helped Ogilvy & Mather Direct become the world’s largest direct marketing agency network and was elected to the worldwide Ogilvy Group board. David Ogilvy himself said of him: “Drayton Bird knows more about direct marketing than anyone in the world.”

Rebecca Smith, Sales Director for Ocean Villas Group, said: “This is a real coup for us and the property developers we represent. We have always taken the marketing side of our business very seriously, as this is the only way we can get good sales results for our partners. Apart from being an absolute pleasure to work with, Drayton brings with him 50 years of experience and successful campaigns and, let’s face it, who else can you find in any industry that has that much hands-on experience to bring to the table? His stories and anecdotes are priceless in themselves.”

In November 2003 the Chartered Institute of Marketing named Drayton one of 50 living individuals who have shaped today’s marketing. Campaign named him one of the 50 most important individuals in U.K. advertising during the previous 25 years – “the only universally acknowledged point of creativity in the direct marketing world”. U.K. magazine Direct Response said his impact on U.K. direct marketing was “unlikely to be matched by any other individual.”

He has written five books and well over 1,000 columns for magazines in Europe, the U.S., Australia, India, the U.K. and Malaysia. Today he works with market-leading U.K. firms like The Prudential, Everest Home Improvements, Hargreaves-Lansdown and a number of others around the world.