2021 Annual Agency Panel

PANELISTS

Darren Yada is a Managing Partner and Head of Strategy in Rethink Canada’s Vancouver office. He leads a growing team of strategists, analysts and amplification experts fuelled by a desire to help brands challenge the status quo. This passion began while leading digital strategy at the Nettwerk Music Group where he had a front row seat to the transformation of an entire industry caused by digital disruption. While at Nettwerk, Darren also helped start up YYOGA, serving as the first and only employee for their first year of operations.

Louise Simkin is a Partner and the VP of Consulting at Noise Digital, a performance marketing and media company that delivers data-driven marketing for a variety of leading BC, National and Global brands. Originally starting her career in her home country of New Zealand, Louise has designed data strategies for industry leading brands such as Air New Zealand, Vodafone and Westpac Bank. Today, she applies her strategic thinking to some of BC’s most loved brands including Destination BC, BC Hydro, London Drugs, UBC Sauder and A&W Canada.

Charlie Grinnell is the CEO of RightMetric, a searchable library of data-backed case studies for marketers that provides quick answers to hard questions and informs faster and more reliable strategic decision making. Before RightMetric, he spent time working in digital marketing at Red Bull, Aritzia, Arc’teryx and Invoke. Charlie regularly speaks publicly about the topic of marketing strategy and was named 30 Under 30 by BC Business Magazine in 2019.

Mooren (Mo) Bofill is the newest Partner and Creative Director, Design at 123w – one of Canada’s leading agencies. In her new role, she will help expand their offering across Canada and continue to help build agency thought-leadership through the lens of Design. With over a decade of experience, Mo has helped transform some of Canada’s most iconic brands from the ground up: Bell, President’s Choice, Loblaws, Sleep Country, Winners, Shoppers, and Koodo to name a few. She has also helped global brands like KFC, Coca-Cola, Corona, Audi, Subaru, and Mitsubishi become relevant brands to Canadians.

Robyn Smith is a VP, General Manager at Canada’s largest fully-integrated creative agency Cossette, where she oversees the agency’s Vancouver office. Since joining Cossette in 2013, Robyn has applied her extensive knowledge and deep expertise in branding, communications, digital and 1:1 to some of the agency’s largest clients including McDonald’s Canada, Tourism Yukon, Destination Canada, TELUS and Coast Capital Savings. Originally from rural BC, Robyn is a member of the BCIT Marketing Management Program Advisory Committee and currently sits on the board of Ronald McDonald House BC and Yukon.

MODERATOR

Gordon Cairns 
Manager, Performance Marketing
TELUS

Gordon has over 15 years of experience leading the growth of digital sales channels both at British Telecom in the UK and at TELUS here in Canada. Gordon started out in digital leading teams at British Telecom as they automated and optimized eCommerce capabilities and grew their digital channel to over a third of sales. Moving to Canada in 2013, Gordon joined TELUS to continue his mission to create simple and engaging digital experiences for TELUS customers. Now leading the performance marketing team for TELUS Home Solutions and TELUS Health, Gordon’s team are at the heart of TELUS’ digital transformation, focused on delivering sales growth and increasing return on advertising spend.