Charles Marks

Director of Operations, London

Charles Marks joined Benjamin West London early in 2008 taking on the role of Director of Operations. His first major role was to lay foundations for the successful establishment of the London operation. This included recruiting and training a team, growing the office from four to fourteen staff and finding new Central London offices.

He comes from a diverse background in the media, entertainment & leisure industry and brings a wealth of business, staff and project management experience to the London office.

Having started in the advertising industry in the late 1980’s as a media planner and buyer, Charles was purchasing massive advertising campaigns for many leading brands in the UK. His experience includes working in New York for one of the world’s first advertising agencies, NW Ayer.

Moving on from here to a sales background in newspaper advertising, Charles was part of a new breed of “innovative” media experts that evolved during the mid 1990’s as more creative ways were found to reach global consumers.

From here, in 1997, with a natural interest in all matters IT/technology related, Charles took his marketing skills and moved on to run one of the most successful UK online gaming businesses. Setting up online sports games for many of the UK’s leading media owners, including the BBC, Times Newspapers, Guardian Newspapers, ITV and Channel 4. Charles grew a small offline business from 6 to 24 staff.

In 2004, Charles joined a small internet strategic consultancy creating online strategies for the American pharmaceutical giant, Eli Lilly. Travelling the world, Charles assisted the online marketing teams in markets such as China, Japan, Spain, Germany, France and Italy to realize the potential of the internet as a business tool for reaching and retaining customers.

Perhaps Charles’ most “diverse” role was working in Lagos, Nigeria, where he spent a number of months training the Government’s Ministry of Communications how to track illegal radio stations.

Combining all these broad skills, the London office of Benjamin West is now establishing and innovating when it comes to setting up best practice processes for its purchasing projects.