Iain Matthews, Account Director

As an Account Director working on the COI (government advertising) account I derive the greatest enjoyment from the diversity of work involved. One day I might be considering how to use digital channels to help people quit smoking, the next I’ll be trying to educate people about buying carbon-efficient vehicles.

This has its associated challenges – there is no one answer that suits all briefs and this means that as a team we utilise every form of digital advertising imaginable. For example, to try to combat the rising incidence of STIs in young people we promoted an online Christmas pantomime which highlighted the dangers of sex without using condoms. To help get new recruits for the Royal Navy, we got one of the stars of their TV campaign to set up a profile page and answer questions within a social network.

Of course, answering all these challenges and managing the proposed solutions requires a dedicated and enthusiastic team - though clichéd the fact is that life is made a lot easier by working with people you like and respect. The culture here is very much one where a good idea can come from anyone - the more ideas thrown into the mixer the better the eventual solution. It just happens to be the case that sometimes we get more ideas when considering a campaign over an alcoholic beverage in the local.