Young NZME account manager Maggie Campbell wins Inma award

Maggie Campbell, account director at NZME. Photo / Supplied

An NZME account director has been named one of the International News Media Association's 30 under 30 award winners, recognising rising stars in the global media industry.

Maggie Campbell, who has been working for New Zealand Media and Entertainment for about a year, after 3 years at Mediaworks, was on Friday named among the winners - and the only one to come from New Zealand.

The 26-year-old already holds a senior leadership role at NZME and already has a $5 million deal with supermarket giant Foodstuffs in her portfolio.

Campbell was one of 163 entries into the Inma awards and was voted as one of six winners in the Advertising category, other winners came from the fields of Audience, Business Intelligence, Content + Product, and Leadership.

Just four years into her career, Campbell said the win was "exciting" and put it down in part to the support of her boss Lloyd Aickin, and mentors Aaron Dawson and Paul Glaister.

"I love what I do and [this award] shows me that I am doing a good job. I work really hard so it is nice to have the recognition," Campbell told the Herald.

"During Covid everyone has had to learn to adjust so quickly. In sales, our role is so crucial on our relationships and face-to-face meetings so for us we were literally sent home one day and then for three months we were doing Zoom calls, and that's been difficult, but I think now we're getting into a really good space again.

"For media, especially being from New Zealand and a small country, we need to work together locally better and our agencies need to make sure that we are working as one to keep money here rather than sending it offshore to places like Facebook and Google."

In her entry, Campbell talked about some of the highlights of her career so far, including breaking exclusives "resulting in more money for the company" and selling podcast advertising campaigns.

Passionate about radio, other deals she has done include: selling a podcast to retailer Mitre 10 and a multi-platform campaign to Chorus.

"NZME has been awesome, they've given me these amazing opportunities - I'm lucky to work at a place where I have so much support."