Circles.Life hands marketing role to new consumer biz VP of growth

share on

twitter /
facebook /
linkedin /
- email
- telegram
- whatsapp
- wechat
- pinterest
- line
- snapchat
- reddit

Singapore-based telco Circles.Life has appointed Nelson Allen as VP of growth for its consumer business. In this newly-created role, Allen will lead growth for Circles.Life’s B2C operations as well as the regional marketing function, including brand development, customer acquisition and strategic partnerships, with a focus on accelerating the company’s global expansion plans.

The telco said in a statement to MARKETING-INTERACTIVE that it is aiming to grow its global team of over 500 employees across Singapore, Taiwan, Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, India and Pakistan. The appointment comes after Circles.Life announced plans to bolster its leadership team last October, while ramping up on global expansion plans.

In an interview with MARKETING-INTERACTIVE last year, Circles.Life said the company was looking to boost its headcount by 25% over the next 12 months and expand its Singapore core of tech and innovation talent. Key hires will include tech and “tech-lite” roles such as software engineers, product managers, and digital marketers across new and existing business lines. The company also had plans to grow the marketing team across both B2C and B2B verticals by at least 50% by the end of 2022.

Meanwhile, MARKETING-INTERACTIVE understands that Delbert Ty, who was head of marketing at the brand for over five years has recently left the role to take on an advisory position with the firm. Meanwhile, Megan Yulga, head of creative shop at Circles.Life also left the firm in mid last year to join Tigerhall, a mobile SaaS platform for social learning, as head of marketing.

Commenting on Allen's addition to the team, Rameez Ansar, co-founder of Circles.Life, said that the telco is excited to bring him on board as it continues to lead the digital transformation of the global telco vertical with its direct and indirect operations. "Allen’s vast experience in building high-growth businesses across multiple industries and markets is a huge asset as we continue to be a category game-changer delivering exceptional customer experiences and product innovation," he added.

Allen comes to Circles.Life with a wealth of experience most recently holding the role of chief growth officer at fintech platform GoBear, where he drove qualified traffic through integrated marketing across brand, PR, content, social media, SEO, SEM and display advertising. Prior to that, he spent over four years at Expedia Group where he was senior director, marketing, Hotels.com, APAC, and later general manager, Hotels.com, APAC, according to his LinkedIn. He was also previously with Microsoft and Samsung Electronics for over five years and 11 years respectively.

“I’ve always been impressed by what Circles.Life has achieved, having built a high-performing business from the ground up while maintaining a keen focus on its people, customers and innovation. I’m thrilled to be working with a vibrant and talented team to define the future of telco together," he added.

In an interview with MARKETING-INTERACTIVE Allen also reiterated that Circles.Life’s mission is to give power back to customers, and that has been its north star since day one. “We’ll also continue to invest in innovation and R&D to power digital transformation for telcos worldwide. Last year, Circles.Life launched the world’s first vertical SaaS telco business. We also unveiled a revolutionary new digital telco brand, povo2.0, with KDDI in Japan. In 2022, we look forward to replicating our successful digital telco model across the globe. We expect 2022 to be our biggest year ever for the consumer business, and will share more about our plans in due course,” said Allen.

He added that Circles.Life has a distinct brand personality and the brand will continue to stay true to its DNA of “embodying a challenger spirit that drives every word and action to bring power to the people”. That said, he added:

We view our brand personality not as something static, but as something that continually grows and evolves with the brand.

Allen added that at the end of the day, great marketing should change the way people feel about a brand, creating an emotional attachment that goes beyond a transaction. “It’s become increasingly hard to build such ‘irrational brand love’ because people have become desensitised to traditional advertising. Campaigns need to stand out by challenging our expectations for what advertising is, in order to connect to their target audience,” he said.

In short, marketers need to take more risks if their messages are to be heard.

Some examples include taking a stand on a social issue, tapping into a cultural phenomenon (in the right way) or featuring in an unexpected place. Circles.Life as a brand has built its reputation on catchy campaigns that often build on trending conversations in the market and societal issues. For example, last year, it launched a video in Singapore ahead of the upcoming Primary School Leaving Examinations (PSLE) results titled #MoreThanAnyNumber. According to a statement given to MARKETING-INTERACTIVE then, Circles.Life said it looks to tap on current societal concerns and discussions to build up their campaigns.

The brand thought up the campaign after coming across a post on Reddit which explained how the average Singaporean life is summed up in numbers, and the telco brand decided to tap on that discussion and portray the unimportance of numbers in one’s life instead. As such, the campaign aimed to show that Circles.Life as a brand never treats customers as just another order ID, phone number or statistic, but value them as people worthy of all the attention it can give.

“At Circles.Life, our marketers pride themselves on doing things differently. We have a great story to tell, so we put our efforts into dreaming up new and creative ways to tell it. What a great time to be in marketing,” he added.

share on