Former Marketing publisher Lucy Collin has returned to the broadcast world, taking a new role as vice-president, marketing and innovation – integrated sales with Bell Media. Her first day was Monday.
Lucy Collin
Reporting directly to Bell Media sales president Luc Sabbatini, Collin will oversee trade marketing support for the company’s integrated sales teams in English Canada. Working out of Bell’s recently revamped sales offices in midtown Toronto, she will work closely with her Quebec counterpart, Nathalie Doré.
“We’ve got a pretty strong competitive advantage, and this role is really intended to elevate our awareness in the market, communicate with agencies and clients and making sure our trade media relationships are strong,” said Collin.
She replaces Nathalie Cook, who held the role before taking over as VP of sales for sports specialty channel TSN in October.
It is a return to a familiar environment for Collin, whose career has included 15 years with CBC in increasingly senior roles, including national sales director, and a one-year stint with Corus Entertainment as client marketing manager, responsible for product placement and program integration opportunities.
She was publisher of Marketing from 2010 to 2013, working her way up from account manager. After leaving the publication, she determined quickly that she wanted to continue working in media. The new position arose out of a conversation with Leslie Conway, senior VP of sales for Bell Media.
“I’ve always been impressed by [Bell]. It really seems like they have it all together after the Astral merger and have really created some great internal teams,” said Collin. “It’s all about integration and collaboration, and I think I’m going to really enjoy working with the teams here.”
She called trade marketing “critical” for modern-day media vendors, who are competing with multiple advertising channels.
“There’s so much inventory out there and so many platforms that it’s imperative that media companies make an effort to educate and keep agencies and marketers up to speed on what’s going on in the market, and the opportunities available to them” she said. “It’s always been a big part of any media company’s initiative.”
