Episode 36 - Iain Martin - Moonpig.com

Today’s episode is a little different and I’m really excited to be sharing it with you. Instead of my normal interviews where I’m the one asking the questions, today’s interview is taken from an event I attended last month, hosted by my good friend James Mitra at JBM Consulting. For those of you that don’t know, JBM are an executive search firm that place top talent into high growth tech firms, fintechs and consultancies. They are also the talent partners to the Fintech focused Private equity firm Motive Partners which is where this event was held. When James told me who the speaker was going to be I said that we had to record it for the podcast and it certainly didn’t disappoint. I’m a big believer that you can, and should, learn from the best. Regardless of their field. As you’ll hear in today’s interview, there are so many fantastic insights that are equally applicable to Consulting firms, and their clients, as there are to this guest’s specific industry. For those of you listening to this outside of the UK, or for those of you in the UK who may have been living under a rock for the last 10 years, Moonpig are the UK’s largest online card retailer with over 15 million cards sent through their online platform in 2017 alone. Iain was one of the early members of the Moonpig team and over his time as MD grew the business from a team of just 8 people, turning over £2,000,000 in to a team of over 160 turning over £60m a year. This phenomenal growth ultimately led to Moonpig being acquired by Photobox for £120m in 2011 James and Iain cover some really interesting topics in their conversation and the questions that follow including: Iain’s journey to becoming the MD of Moonpig and the unorthodox approach he took to get there. The importance of using data when it comes to Marketing and how this helped Moonpig achieve it’s rapid growth. How Iain and the team ensured they hired the best talent for the business and their unconventional approach for rewarding their team. The sale to Photobox and the steps they took from deciding to sell through to integrating the business with their new owners And the one I know many of you will want to know. How they decided on the name Moonpig and where the jingle came. It was great to meet Iain and I really enjoyed hearing his story and advice for those looking to grow their business as successfully as he did. This episode is brought to you by Create Engage the Digital Marketing agency for the disruptive Management Consultancy.