About Andrea

My core skills are in business analysis, requirements gathering, content strategy, information architecture, and user interface design.

I come to UX from a client management background. Since 2006, I re-invested 10 years of experience in classical advertising and marketing into digital marketing. I continue to use my skills and experience in analyzing customer and market data to develop digital strategies and tactics that align with business goals. Although my focus is on digital experiences, my background ensures that I’m acutely aware that a holistic user experience crosses media boundaries and affects every brand touchpoint.

My goal on every client project is to find that sweet spot where my clients’ business goals converge with their target audiences’ needs. I considers one of my key UX roles as a facilitator who works with client stakeholders to define goals and objectives, with developers and technologists to ensure my visions are feasible, with creative to refine the UI and to ensure their graphic designs for the UI are within the UX goals that have been defined (on brand, on message, on strategy).

What follows is a recap of my professional path since completing the course work portion of my Ph.D. in Medieval and Renaissance English Literature.

Devlin Digital, 2012 – present

2012 opened with an exciting chapter in my career as I join the passionate team at Devlin Digital as Manager, User Experience.

76design (a Thornley Fallis Group company), 2010 – 2012

In 2010, social media was just gaining mainstream awareness. I had been an early adopter on Facebook and Twitter, and experiencing more noise in those channels was an obvious clue that the landscape was about to change. Back then, advertising agencies and even digital agencies were dipping their toes in the uncharted waters of social media, while it seemed to me that the public relations firms were more sure-footed.

I joined the Thornley Fallis Group as a digital strategist to be part of a larger team of public relations professionals to learn to “do social media” right. It soon became clear that there was an additional opportunity for me to expand my role beyond strategy into specific user experience deliverables such as expert heuristic evaluations, personas, and wireframes, skills that I had started acquiring since my Mindblossom days in 2006. I’ve also been working hard with my team mates here to integrate web analytics earlier and more rigorously into the design process.

I have worked on digital projects for a variety of clients, including the Canadian Inernet Registration Authority, Toronto Hydro, Rogers, Allstate Insurance Canada, Pfizer Canada, and Parks Canada.

Fjord / Cossette, 2009 – 2010

My second stint at Cossette was with its digital division, Fjord. The opportunity to return to Saturn and SAAB at Cossette was too great to pass up. This was expected to be a short-term assignment since GM’s two so-called non-domestic or import brands were in the twilight of their life cycles. I joined Fjord to bring to bear my years of experience in advertising, marketing, digital, and strategic account management on one of their key clients.

A key learning from my training early on at BBDO was to apply a litmus test to every problem: is this a problem that advertising can solve? For Saturn and SAAB, the results of this litmus test was sobering. The beauty of this litmus test is that you can switch out the word “advertising” for any other marketing or communications medium. Not all problems can be solved by one medium.

Crimson Interactive (now TAG), 2007 – 2009

The opportunity and goal at Crimson Interactive was to establish processes for the digital division of a print-oriented agency. Based on my review and understanding of the agency’s client roster, I researched, developed, and proposed a business model for the digital group that enabled the agency to support its clients within their financial scope.

Mindblossom (now Isobar), 2006 – 2007

My full immersion into digital began at Mindblossom. While my experience with digital started at BBDO, Mindblossom was where I really delved deep into the world of web dev. Those were heady times: not only were we building digital social hubs for Home Depot, we also explored the leading edge with API-connected desktop widgets.

Of course, a huge part of my role at Mindblossom was to deploy classic agency account management expertise to our clients’ businesses: strategy, requirements gathering, project management, and creative review.

When I had some off-time, I fantasized about we can do with mobile, the so-called third screen: mobile-friendly web sites, RFID and QR codes for retail marketing, etc.

BBDO, 1998 – 2006

BBDO was where I honed my strategic as well as project and financial management skills. Yes, the latter skills are part of the perks that come with me. While my experience (earned at MacLaren McCann and Cossette a few years earlier) with dealer marketing and advertising strategy and execution continued to be valuable, I soon moved my focus to brand management.

Among the most valuable lessons I learned during this process is that to be successful at growing a brand, business goals must be underwritten by reality. A creative brief driven by goals that are not in line with reality is nothing more than a work of fiction. My proudest achievement at BBDO was the work I did for the Jeep brand. With each successive brief, I got closer and closer to the core of the Jeep story and how Jeep owners connected with it. Ultimately, the positioning statement that I wrote for the Jeep brand was deceptively simple: The world is your playground. The work that emerged from this positioning ranged from advertising to  experiential events and eventually to digital. And some of that work got picked up by network agencies in other countries.

Cossette, 1998

This was my first stint on the Saturn and SAAB accounts, along with Isuzu, which has since then exited the North American market. My experience in brand management began here at Cossette on the SAAB brand. The most important part of my first time at Cossette was learning how to craft a creative brief, which is not quite the same thing as a project brief. Here, I learned to dig deep into the limited consumer research that was available for the SAAB buyer or intender in Canada, to understand what makes them unique. For SAAB owners are a unique group of people, much like Jeep owners, who I will soon get to know well when I joined BBDO.

MacLaren McCann, 1997 – 1998

In the ad agency model, one of the most important roles in account management is strategy. It’s what separates a good ‘suit’ from a bad one. At MacLaren, my role as an account executive was to understand my client’s business through weekly competitive monitoring and analysis, as well as sales and buyer demographic data analysis to support strategic planning. The goal of all this research and analysis was to develop and implement advertising and promotional campaign ideas for my clients, GM’s dealer marketing associations in Alberta, Saskachewan, and northwestern Ontario.