I recently attended the 55th Annual Cannes Lion 2008 Advertising festival and saw the presentation from Unicef and their fund-raising partner David Droga of Droga5.  What these guys have achieved is nothing less than…amazing.

You see, what David Droga pitched to Unicef was such a simple, yet powerful idea for raising money and awareness of the plight of people around the world who dont have clean water.  Essentially, it works like this:

Restaurants in New York City (the initial launch city for the campaign) were invited to ask their customers to donate a minimum of $1 or more for the tap water they would normally drink for free with their meal.  For every dollar raised, a child somewhere in the world will have clean drinking water for 40 days.

Now imagine this.  If every restaurant in every major town or city in the world got behind this and did the same, unclean drinking water could become a thing of the past to those where sterlised and sanitised drinking water has been merely a dream.

So, I love this idea for its pure simplicity and scalability - two aspects of marketing and business I believe very strongly in.  I also love this idea because it has united the marketing and advertising communities in ways I’ve never seen before.  Since its launch in March 2008, it has leveraged over $7m of pro-bono creative fees and 1 billion FREE ad impressions online.  Not bad eh?

So, if you’re any agency or work clientside, join the likes of AMEX, Esquire and Turner Broadcasting, amongst others, & get involved.  Take a look at www.tapproject.org then contact Stephen @ Unicef or David Droga @ Droga5.   You’ll be glad you did!

Who am I & what do I do?

Hello!  For the most-part of my life, I work at a digital consultancy called ‘My Digital JAM Limited’, which I founded some 5 years ago after leaving agency life.   I’ve been in digital over 13 years, mainly working for myself, and in that time, I have crafted out myself a role as digital therapist, problem-solver, mediator, strategist, negotiator and general digital dog’s body!

My day job varies by the day – one day I am lecturer for the IDM’s Certificate in Digital Marketing qualification.  Next I am planner for a client.  The following I am a speaker at a conference, or a judge for an awards ceremony, or a writer / presenter for e-Consutlancy.com or media sales trainer for The Times!

My world is a strange one!  I do a kind of strategy, planning, analytics, advising type thing often with clients who need help with defining or executing their digital strategy, or just with help fixing a specific problem (like renogiating ad-serving rates, IP rights to a piece of work or agency fees charged!).  I specialize in online advertising – you know, that annoying rich media stuff that so many do so badly – hence why I specialize.  But, I’m also a generalist and I work across all digital media, including search, email, mobile, affiliate etc etc.

I’m pretty straight-talking, honest and not generally interested in all the bullshit that goes on in digital.  I don’t think I have an ego, as I’m not the worried about my 15mb of fame, but…

So, this site is about me telling you, the reader, what I think about when it comes to digital stuff.  I hope you like it.  Post your comments, tell me what you think – if its crap, I’ll make it better.  If its good, I’ll do more of it!

And now my past

My past is varied, but in the mid-90s I established Netfinity – a digital agency – which was successful and re-branded to Shrinking Earth.  That grew out of control and eventually became part of the Yellow Submarine.  I joined their board as Director of Digital, but that didn’t remain the case.  After some time out, I established My Digital JAM (aka Trust Digital) 5 years ago!  Today, I am a Fellow of the IDM, trainer in all things digital for e-Consultancy and i-Level and father of two beautiful girls (Willow 4 and Coco 3).

You can read more about my background, skills, experience, clients etc on LinkedIn.

James (Digital JAM) is an International speaker and trainer on digital marketing.  He covers all topics on digital, including web 2.0, social media, display advertising, media planning & buying, email, search, affiliate, analytics…have I missed anything?

You can ‘hire’ him by the hour, day or week (if you can bare it) to deliver conference keynotes on digital through to 2-3 day training courses for your team.  Recent international engagements include workshops in Dubai, Slovenia & China.

James has educated in excess of several thousand professional marketers in all things digital – here’s a list of the companies he has trained:

Royal Mail
Cisco
MBNA
JWT MENA
Wunderman
The Times, The Sun
Mirror.co.uk

Want to book James for a course or speaking event?  Get in touch here.