Nicole Bardsley

Head of Marketing

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

If there’s one thing I’ve learned since joining Uber six months ago, it’s that no two days are ever the same. We’re a business that moves with pace and I love the energy and momentum. As my role covers both the rides and delivery lines of business, we are always in campaign mode. At the moment we are launching the next evolution of our Get Almost Almost Anything (GAAA) campaign for Uber Eats, we are live with a campaign promoting Uber Reserve, wrapped up a campaign for our annual Red Cross Clothing Drive and in creative strategy and concept development for our 2025 mobility brand campaign. So a typical day includes updates on some of those campaigns, 1:1’s with the team and I also represent marketing on a number of cross functional forums with our operations teams where marketing input is required. So there’s never a dull moment.

How would you describe your role on GAAA year?

As head of marketing, I’m across all the critical milestones of campaign development from briefing, creative & media strategy, concept development, production and post campaign reviews but not as involved in the day to day development which is where my team take the lead. My role is to inspire and support the team by clearing the way for them and our agency partners to develop the industry leading work that Uber has become known for.

What's a challenge you encountered on this project and how did you overcome it?

Finding the right creative execution and the right talent to bring to life our Get Almost Almost Anything concept is never an easy task. There were many many rounds of creative development to find the right scenario and the right talent for the campaign. We’re really proud of the final execution but it took a lot of persistence and tenacity from the team to get here. The standard that has been set for creative is a high bar, sometimes this means being brave enough to keep going and striving for an even better outcome.

What is the biggest change facing marketers in 2024?

Australian consumers are facing some of the toughest times at the moment with the rising cost of living and economic pressures. Amidst this climate there’s often a question about whether businesses should pull back on marketing investment and especially brand building and I think many marketers have been facing that challenge in 2024. At Uber we believe that continuing to build brand saliency is critical for businesses to grow and that’s something we’ve been very conscious of. Our Get Almost Almost Anything campaign is about driving top of mind brand saliency for Uber Eats and also repositioning our brand to become known for more than restaurant food delivery. Staying the course and continue to invest in our brand is essential.

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

Honestly the team. Having the opportunity to lead such a talented and passionate team is a real opportunity and privilege.

Channa Goonasekara

Brand Lead

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

Uber Eats is a business that never stands still, so campaign mode is an always-on mode for me and my team. We've usually started our next big project before we've wrapped the campaign before it, keeping us on our toes with loads of motivation to make the next one better than the one prior. We manage the end-to-end campaign development process which includes the planning, briefing, strategic and creative concept development, into the thick of pre and post production where we strive for high standards of craft, into a full launch and sustain plan and finally, full campaign measurement and reporting. Our ambition is to deliver some of the best work for the Uber Eats brand not just here, but around the world. A typical day can be a bit chaotic running between our office, agencies, a shoot location, an edit suite, the retouchers, a sound studio, a media vendor or a myriad of other destinations to help lead and deliver world-class campaigns. We do this alongside a dedicated, passionate and fun-loving agency village team who are just as obsessed with creating brilliant work as we are.

How would you describe your role on GAAA year?

I've taken a leadership role to work with our brilliant agency Special and a very talented and dedicated team to define our strategy and creative development for the GAAA campaigns that we have launched here in Australia and NZ. It's been incredibly rewarding to see a campaign that was born in this part of the world, exported globally as the new brand platform for Uber Eats. As we approach the end of our second year with the platform, we continue to innovate and evolve how we articulate this new brand positioning, so Aussies and Kiwis won't miss the news that Uber Eats now delivers almost almost anything. In our first campaign under this platform, featuring Kris and Kendall Jenner, Abbie Chatfield, Shannon Noll and Mark "the Poo" Philippoussis, we wanted to announce our new brand line by self-deprecatingly making the admission that while we deliver a whole lot of things, we can't yet deliver anything. Then last year, we partnered with actors Tom Felton and Nicola Coughlan in a bid to demonstrate that in reality, almost anything is perhaps the perfect amount of anything... because if we truly did deliver anything (like Magic or a Period Era Romance), it would lead to calamity. This year, we had a lot of fun dreaming up new and entertaining expressions of this idea to continue telling this brand story and building on our selection narrative which showcases the many things you can (and can't) get on our app. Once we've cracked some phenomenal ideas, putting it into operation is the next part of my job - convincing some A-list talent to come make a funny ad with us, and then leading the team to deliver to a world-class standard.

What's a challenge you experienced on this project and how did you overcome it?

It takes persistence and great collaboration to make these campaigns a reality. It's something we've done for a few years now as an agency village so we collectively understand how to navigate the challenges that come our way when we're trying to execute. It's not a simple operational model to crack with a lot of variables at play, you never know when a spanner can get thrown in the works. Throughout this campaign we had a fair few spanners... but we pivoted when we needed to and remained optimistic with a solutions mindset. Learning how to plan contingencies helps make these unexpected bumps a little less daunting as we always have a plan B.

What is the biggest change facing marketers in 2024?

For modern day marketers, the tools and resources at our disposal to help deliver great strategic and creative ideas can at times be overwhelming. We work in a much more complex landscape with higher expectations from both the business and consumers, and the fear of messing up is real. It's hard to know what the right path is as we navigate campaign development and decision fatigue can very quickly set in when you overthink things. I've learned to rely heavily on my intuition as a helpful tool to push through the process, make good judgement calls and deliver great outcomes. When we have a culture built by our broader business that failure is okay and that it only helps us learn, it makes it a lot easier to take a risk. Moving into our creative work, it's never easy to know if it will land as we intend, but we're always keen to have a go and hope our instinct was right.

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

I have been lucky enough to deliver some career-best work at Uber. From recruiting Simon Cowell as the Grey Wiggle and Paris Hilton as the new zookeeper at Australia Zoo, to reminding Andre Agassi that he's lost his hair in the middle of a mullet renaissance or telling Michelle Williams she might just be the least favourite member of Destiny's Child... the creative work I get to develop with an exceptional team is a dream job. All the laughs we have along the way is the cherry on top!

Margot Deltour

Growth and Engagement Marketing Lead

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

I develop retail marketing campaigns that drive growth and engagement for our grocery and retail business. On a typical day in campaign mode, I collaborate with my colleagues in the brand team as well as cross-functionally with grocery and retail operations and commercial teams, comms, legal, creative and media agencies to execute retail campaigns that drive orders and grow our grocery and retail business. My role is at the nexus of upper-funnel Uber Eats brand campaigns (focusing on salience and fame) and lower-funnel growth-driven activations (driving short-term orders on Uber Eats); depending on the campaign shape, I will either extend brand campaigns down with relevant retail offers, or elevate sales-driven promotions with owned, earned and paid media.

How would you describe your role on GAAA this year?

I worked closely with the marketing campaign leads, along with the grocery and retail operations teams and merchants to create a steady drumbeat of attractive Uber Eats offers across grocery, alcohol and convenience. These offers were designed to fit the main campaign strategy, which focused on specific top-up grocery use cases to encourage adoption. We leveraged in-app merchandising and our owned channels to reach our users and nudge them towards that grocery and retail order for things they need now.

What's a challenge you experienced on this project and how did you overcome it?

In the past GAAA campaigns, we have been focused on creative consistency, which flowed down to the retail offers that were creatively-led by campaign assets. For example, when we first launched GAAA with the Kendall Jenner cucumber reference, we ran a promotion on all types of cucumbers on Uber Eats. This time around, we wanted to be focused on the campaign strategy, even if this meant departing somewhat from our existing creative assets for our retail executions. It was a different approach, which felt a little uncomfortable at times, as we wondered if we should be more closely aligned to the existing creative executions. Ultimately, we agreed to stick to our single-minded strategy of associating Uber Eats with a specific moment of need, and landing the right offer to drive adoption.

What is the biggest change facing marketers in 2024?

Whether during their weekly shop in supermarkets, or mid-week top-up grocery orders on Uber Eats, shoppers are searching for deals and value. We know Aussies love our brand, but we needed to ensure we had the right grocery offers to support the campaign if we really wanted to drive growth; the retail layer of GAAA, anchored on offering value on relevant items for specific use cases, was a crucial part of the campaign strategy.

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

The snacks. And my colleagues… But mainly the snacks.

Rebecca Macciolli

Marketing Manager

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

When we’re in the thick of a campaign, every minute counts! Our campaigns are inherently ambitious; we want to achieve a lot for the business, we want to outperform the campaign prior, and we want to elevate the creative to new heights. This takes time, and somehow, we never have enough of it! As a campaign manager, I’m responsible for being across every single detail of the campaign, every stage, every deadline. My day involves a lot of meetings and stakeholder engagement. From creative review sessions with our agencies, meetings with legal, our media partners, our data and insights team, and more. Put simply, campaign mode for me is incredibly hands on, eventful, and fast-paced.

How would you describe your role on GAAA this year?

I’d liken it to the conductor of an orchestra - guiding a collective and complex ensemble towards a unified goal (or harmony!). Sadly (depending on who you ask), my violin days are over, but as a campaign conductor for GAAA I still get my musical fix doing my best to keep everyone in sync and adhering to the tempo. This involves end-to-end management of our campaign ecosystem (one of two), including working with our agency, Special, to help land the creative concept across each touchpoint, overseeing pre-production (storyboards, treatments, art direction), production (the shoot) and post production elements (helping to finalise all edits). I support our media agency, EssenceMediacom, overseeing their ATL channel strategy and media plan, and work with our internal retail growth and ops team to ensure BTL/owned channel efforts pull the campaign through full funnel, along with various other teams including comms, research and insights and more, all the while aligning key global and local stakeholders at critical campaign junctures. We’re a small but mighty delivery brand marketing team, we divide and conquer well, making the ambitious workload possible.

What's a challenge you experienced on this project and how did you overcome it?

Working with celebrities can throw challenges and hurdles well out of your control, and this meant there were a number of elements still up in the air as we headed into our shoot. Having trust in our agency and production partners enables us to collectively lean in and best plan for every variable, helping us maintain focus on what we can control.

What is the biggest change facing marketers in 2024?

There is no denying that people are craving comedic relief and escapism, and as a brand, our role is to bring them some levity and joy. From past campaign iterations, we know that our campaigns aren’t just “another Uber Eats ad” for people; they’ve become a source of entertainment, they spark social conversation within communities and fan-bases. Being aware of this and not shying away from the entertainment value we can bring was very important to us. We want to bring a smile to people’s faces!

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

The opportunity to work for a business with such creative appetite and a willingness to produce campaigns at such a scale, it’s incredible and something I definitely don’t take for granted. That, and the office snacks. They’re world class.

Holly Dover

Marketing Associate

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

One of the best things about this role is that everyday looks completely different - we may be evaluating campaign talent as part of the development process. Alternatively, we could be in a work on wall session with our full agency village working through the nitty gritty detail of which assets are flighted when. Or we may be collaborating with our cross functional colleagues on how our campaigns could come to life on our surfaces and externally. No matter what the day brings it always involves working with a phenomenal set of people who are all energised about doing exciting work… and for me personally, it always involves multiple cups of tea.

How would you describe your role on GAAA this year?

I’ve been on the full GAAA journey this year. In particular, I’ve been focused on the project management of creative development and production of the Jason Alexander ecosystem along with the product layer of yes / nos that sit alongside the celebrity layer. I’m laser focussed on all the details of the campaign and ensure we’re delivering on time, on budget and in a consistent way!

What's a challenge you experienced on this project and how did you overcome it?

We’re always looking for different ways to understand the impact of our campaigns. This year, we ran different media channel mixes in different locations to understand impacts to key business metrics. This meant working closely with our media agency, EssenceMediaCom and our internal media and data science teams to plan and execute two different media plans while ensuring a balanced and fair test. Luckily we work with some of the best in the business and our strong working relationships allow us to navigate challenges, ask questions and solve problems collaboratively.

What is the biggest change facing marketers in 2024?

I’m constantly aware of my own lowering attention span in a world that’s cluttered with quick content from every angle, brand comms now more than ever need to cut through to stop thumbs and turn heads. It’s why we look at our campaigns as entertainment properties aiming to bring a bit of fun to people’s lives while telling our brand story. Every step of the way of developing the creative, we’re thinking about how we can make it the most enjoyable “ad” our consumers see that day - something that they want to watch or listen to… whether it’s the 60 second film, or a 15 second radio spot.

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

The ability to do career-defining work. It’s pretty epic to be able to work on a global brand that develops the scale and size of campaigns that we get to do locally.

Olivia Sykes

New Zealand Marketing Lead

What does a typical day look like for you when in campaign mode?

In such a fast-paced company, every day during campaign mode looks different. I can go from drilling down into geo-level media plans, to dialling into a radio recording session, or discussing bullseye CRM target audiences. It’s so varied and extremely thrilling - there's never a dull moment! And of course, this is all done in collaboration with our talented agency partners and cross functional teams.

How would you describe your role on GAAA this year?

We’re fortunate enough to have such a versatile brand platform in GAAA, that it can be adapted globally across different markets and more specifically across the Tasman. My role on this particular campaign was to take the platform ecosystem and creative in Australia and execute it in the New Zealand market whilst looking for areas of localisations. At Uber Eats we have built our brand and strong salience in the market by being local, disruptive and at the forefront of culture. It’s therefore my role to ensure we’re adapting creative that speaks to and engages our consumers, in their language and tone. Whether it’s recording new scripts or looking for local media partnerships; we adapt and shape our plans appropriately for New Zealand.

What's a challenge you experienced on this project and how did you overcome it?

With efficiencies in production budgets we are continuing to look at ways we can shape and adapt the GAAA creative to resonate locally. Rather than changing the creative, we’ve looked at ways to integrate our GAAA campaign through local partnerships like radio to leverage known and loved New Zealand personalities as part of our comms.

What's your favourite thing about working at Uber?

The culture to do brave work and take risks. If it
fails, we learn and move on from it. If it works, we repeat, we expand and we celebrate.