Very fishy! I have a degree in Marine Biology but work as a marketing consultant? What's the catch?

Soon after graduating I found myself in a small software company with a project to publish a magazine about the now-defunct Pick Operating System — within three months. Not a hint of a fish scale here!

Using all my resources and contacts, a whole heap of energy and blinded to the impossibility of the task by the ignorance of youth, I actually managed to produce the first issue of Access, the Pick People's Periodical. I still have a copy today and yes, it does make me cringe.

IN LOVE

But here is where I fell in love with the publishing world and the amazing challenge of communicating with words and images to get a message across to an audience. I spent several years as editor of Access and then a stint on Piccadilly in corporate marketing before I got itchy feet again and came to Hong Kong.

At the sweet age of 25 I found myself as the Pacific Marketing Manager for a leisure magazine for the US Military. I did ask in the interview if they thought it odd that someone so painfully English was the right person for the job. I still got the job and, until the Gulf War broke out and stole my baby, spent a year jetting to US military bases around the Pacific.

DESERT TO DESIGN

With my market heading desert-ward I decided to go it alone and so started my 17 years working with an amazing range of clients as co-director of Firstline, a design and print production company still in full swing today.

As an account manager at Firstline I developed new business and worked with clients on a range of marketing communications projects, developing strategy and offering creative marketing solutions, managing clients’ expectations, anticipating their needs and delivering work of the highest standard to schedule.

THE NEXT RUPERT MURDOCH?

And then I decided to publish my own magazine—Fit!HK . While very popular, I have to admit that I bit off more than I could chew and after publishing around 17 issues of Fit! (you can see some of the back issues by clicking here), Fit! is now on the back burner with news, blog and updates published only online. No, I am not the next Rupert Murdoch.

KATIE MCGREGOR MARKETING

While publishing Fit!, I set up Katie McGregor Marketing and this is something I truly love. Perhaps it's because I'm a bit nosy but there is something so exciting and fulfilling about getting to know a business, pooling my experience and brainstorming with the owner or marketing manager to build their business. Please click here to read about recent projects.

Perhaps this bio is too long...

"Many attempts to communicate, are nullified by saying too much."

Robert Greenleaf