Guest Backgrounds

We've made sure that perspectives from every angle give students a well rounded CRM view

  • Brand practitioners who live CRM strategy and execution everyday

  • Agency strategists who dig deep into strategy across many indistries

  • Solution providers who know technology and their capabilities

Gianfranco Cuzziol

Chief Curator

From Astrophysics to CRM; from Disney to Aesop, from brand to agency and back again.

Perspectives

The CR(M)BA is fortunate to have so many experienced practitioners bring their knowledge to the course.

Listed in alphabetical order so as not to offend:

Margarida Batista

Omnichannel Operations Lead - Grünenthal

At the intersection of strategy and action, I lead Grünenthal Group's omnichannel operations for UKINOR, with a mission to transform healthcare communication. Margarida is driven by the belief that powerful change happens when innovative thinking meets real-world execution, and that’s exactly where I thrive!

Pietro Cammerini

Co-Founder and CEO - Merx

Pietro is the Co-Founder & CEO of Merx. He has 10+ years in consumer and retail, previously leading digital commerce at Accenture UK and helping scale a start-up from 20 to 200 people. After seeing how leading brands struggled to build direct, personal relationships with customers, he founded Merx to turn one-way CRM into two-way WhatsApp conversations powered by conversational AI. Italian in London and an INSEAD MBA, he’s a product-minded tech geek at heart.

Simone Cesco

Head of Loyalty - TUI

Simone is currently leading the development of TUI’s new loyalty programme. Previously Head of Brand and Programme for Nectar, the UK’s largest coalition loyalty scheme, he led its transformation into a digital-first platform overseeing brand, lifecycle management, proposition, partner marketing and digital engagement strategies. With extensive experience across loyalty, data, customer strategy, and personalisation, Simone focuses on creating insight-led programmes that strengthen customer relationships, enhance brand equity and deliver measurable commercial impact.

Florian Clemens

Director Strategy and Measurement - Tesco Media

Florian leads Tesco Media’s long-term growth strategy, shaping its Brand and Performance propositions and overseeing client measurement. With more than a decade in Retail Media he specialises in building growth strategies and measurement frameworks that help retailers and brands monetise data, demonstrate ROI, and create lasting competitive advantage.

Mike Dando

Founder - In The Mind

Helping brands connect to minds that matter

StJohn "Singe" Deakins

CEO and Co-Founder - DataSapien

Working with brands to deliver the world's First Personal-Edge-AI Platform: enabling brands to easily upgrade existing customer apps with AI and AI agents

Gavin Hilton

Director Customer Retention

I help brands grow by getting closer to their customers, using data, insight and common sense to drive better marketing decisions. For over 25 years, I’ve worked with major UK corporates across financial services, retail, gambling, and beyond. From launching the first contactless credit cards to building CRM programmes that deliver millions in revenue, my focus has always been the same: making marketing work harder by understanding how people behave, and why.

Flavio Adriano Iervolino

Senior CRM Manager - WeRoad

End-to-end CRM expertise: strategy, execution, and optimization with the ability to bridge marketing, product, tech and data to deliver measurable impact.

Abhineet Kesarwani

Regional Director Customer Value - Lyca Mobile

Commercial & Transformation Leader driving Strategic B2B & B2C Growth through Marketing, CRM & Digital Product Innovation

Nick King

Insights Director - Autotrader

A consumer psychologist and expert in digital media and marketing, possessing the experience to analyse and interpret trends in consumer adoption of technology and develop strategies for customer acquisition and retention through digital and offline channels Nick is also a visiting lecturer in consumer psychology at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge.

Ryan Mancino

Head of Data and Analytics - WeRoad

An experienced Statistical Analyst by trade, with a background spanning various industries. His main focus is on overall, full-cycle data strategy and application

Nessa O'Gorman

Director Product Management - Expedia

Nessa creates Products & Experiences that make people’s lives better. She specializes in joined-up strategic product thinking on innovation to transform business outcomes. Nessa set a vision, define a roadmap, and deliver high-profile E2E strategic initiatives to unlock maximum impact. Nessa is also a a High Performance Wellness Coach and founder of Nourish Route

Lucy Spooner

Head of Data & Analytics - Fortnum & Mason

CRM / Insight / Data Specialist - through the narrative of analytics understanding customers to drive business change

Simon Spyer

Founder - Data Agents

Simon helps marketers and business leaders cut through the noise around AI to unlock real commercial impact. As CEO of Data Agents, he’s building a new kind of marketing partner - one that blends human intelligence with automation to make marketing smarter, faster and more effective. With a background leading global data-driven performance practices, Simon’s work sits at the intersection of creativity, technology and customer understanding. His mission is simple: to make marketing work better by making it more intelligent.

Pauline van Dongen - Deckers

Owner - The Loyalty Matchmaker

My approach is part data-driven precision, part tech-savvy innovation, and part deep-dive into consumer behavior. It’s a combination of insights that keeps projects dynamic, impactful and refreshingly human. :-)

Chris Whitson

Co Founder & Strategy Partner- MW London

Chris is a truly integrated strategist with 25 years’ experience. He is passionate about helping businesses create long lasting, commercially successful relationships with their customers and clients. He is passionate about the connection between brand purpose and customer experience and works with clients to help them embed their purpose through every element of their customer proposition. Through his career he has launched agencies, built agencies and run strategy teams for large networks, giving him deep experience of the agency landscape and how it can best serve its clients.

John Willshire

Founder - Smithery

John is the founder of Smithery, an independent Strategic Design Practice established in London in 2011. Smithery helps organisations take an active role in shaping their futures as they look out over an uncertain landscape.