Melanie Minnaar

Hi, I'm Melanie Minnaar, Managing Director of Halo Advertising and Founder of the Twitter Blanket Drive.

Melanie Minnaar is experienced across varied industries - from Gaming & Hospitality through to Banking & Financial Services, but always within Marketing and Communications. Minnaar started off in PR as a generalist role, moved through marketing to specialise in MarComm. Melanie's experience also includes organisational & marketing systems design and global agency & creative management. Melanie Minnaar is passionate about Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) as the basis for effective marketing outputs that can actually deliver real ROI.

Senior manager: Creative and media at Standard Bank

June 2011 - July 2011

Responsible for all advertising and media outputs across the Group (globally) through management of all Advertising Managers on all portfolios.

Senior Manager: Creative Management, Marketing Ops & Strategic Projects at Standard Bank

September 2010 - June 2011

Responsible for Global creative management including advertising style definition, training and implementation through the marketing teams and through the global agency networks. Responsible for developing marketing resource management in line with IMC principles for effective marketing communication outputs. Responsible for coordinating the marketing communication budgets across the full Brand Marketing function (including Brand, Digital, Ops, Advertising and Media). Responsible for global agency contracts, SLA's, scope of work, fee schedules and media commitment negotiations.

Senior Manager: Integrated Marketing Communication at Standard Bank

August 2007 - September 2010

Responsible for championing IMC as a marketing philosophy beyond an execution plan to the full marketing function. Developed training material and presented on IMC as per the internal training curriculum for the Standard Bank marketing function. Responsible for overseeing execution across all specialist areas to maintain IMC integrity (i.e. digital, ATL, BTL, events, PR and communications). Responsible for building the foundations for IMC success at an architectural level through Marketing Ops and Marketing Services.

Founder at Twitter Blanket Drive

2010 - 2010

The Twitter Blanket Drive (#TBD) was founded in 2009 at the onset of winter in South Africa. The project grew rapidly through social media alone and 2010 saw a significant growth of the project in donations, participation by social media enthusiasts and the marketing fraternity in general. With the anticipated further growth of the project in 2012, work is underway to formalise the project as an official NGO/NPO and organise a management team to ensure that the integrity of the initiative is not lost due to poor administration or other human error. www.twitterblanketdrive.co.za

Head: Brand Marketing - Group at Standard Bank

2001 - 2006

Responsible for the Group portfolio of work as pertains to MarComm strategy and execution.

Marketing Coordinator: Gaming North at Sun International South Africa

1993 - 2001

Responsible for advertising, promotions and direct marketing for all properties within the division. Includes agency management and competitor analysis.

Marketing Coordinator: Gaming North at Sun International South Africa

1997 - 1999

Responsible for advertising and communication across all Gaming North properties (including Carnival City, Morula Sun, The Carousel, Sibaya/SugarMill and Meropa). Responsible for agency management for the division and acting as single point of contact for agency interactions. Responsible for competitor analysis for the division.

Casino PRO at Amatola Sun Hotel & Casino

1993 - 1996

Public relations, promotions, client service, advertsing responsibilties for the property. Management of all marketing suppliers.

Managing director at Halo - the brand led communications agency

August 2011

Everything either works for or against a brand... Marketing communications & great advertising can only achieve so much, generally short-lived results. To maximise on marketing spend and achieve sustainable marketing ROI there has to be more to the story than "creating awareness", sales and creative awards - there has to be a closer relationship between brand strategy and brand execution. Enter the brand halo. Enter Us. Halo. A brand led communications agency. Beyond awareness. Office: +27 (0) 11 783 9595 Email: [email protected] Mobile: +27 (0) 71 678 4151

University of South Africa/Universiteit van Suid-Afrika

2005 – 2005

Marketing

University of South Africa/Universiteit van Suid-Afrika

2004 – 2004

Marketing

Concentration: Programme in Marketing Management

University of South Africa/Universiteit van Suid-Afrika

2003 – 2003

Marketing

Concentration: CRM

Hudson Park High School

1986 – 1990

Matric

Concentration: High School education

St Anne's Primary School

1979 – 1985

Concentration: Primary School

Geek girl, Rock chick, eternal optimist, over analyser...