Sally Tobin, The Mars Agency’s Managing Director ANZ, was named a finalist in the martech category of B&T Magazine’s “Women Leading Tech” awards for 2023.
Sally is the founder of XPO Brands, one of Australia’s leading commerce activation agencies. Over the last 10 years, she has built XPO into a multi-million-dollar agency that delivers first-class, end-to-end, shopper, customer, experiential and commerce marketing services to Australia and New Zealand’s leading brands including Mars, Nestle, Woolworths, Kraft Heinz and Target.
In April 2022, The Mars Agency forged an international partnership by acquiring XPO, and named Tobin to oversee all regional activity. She also has been tasked with helping Mars expand its experiential capabilities around the globe.
XPO’s ongoing mission has been to transform the way retailers and brands connect and influence people. That mission has been energised through the infusion of technology, for which Sally has both a passion and a talent.
She developed her first software platform (and sold her first agency business) by the age of 23, and more recently conceptualized and launched MateRiX, a cloud-based marketing ecosystem that connects marketers, agencies, suppliers and external talent through unified, transparent, and optimised workflows. By Sally’s design, the platform was developed entirely in-house on Australian shores by a team comprised of 50% women.
Sally is now working with The Mars Agency to introduce Marilyn, our industry-leading commerce marketing platform, to the ANZ market. Designed to collect, analyze, predict and optimize marketing performance to increase return on investment, Marilyn is expected to revolutionize the way ANZ brands track and measure their commerce marketing activity.
Outside of her agency work, Sally serves as Chair of industry organisation SHOP! ANZ, and is spearheading a new project to create benchmarks for marketing measurement. She recently shared frameworks from the project at Euroshop 2023 in Germany.
As an accomplished leader, Sally is most passionate about fostering environments that raise women out of “supporting roles” into positions of technology leadership, particularly in the marketing community. She currently mentors three young professionals who are developing fintech and martech products and is an avid investor in tech startups and VC funds.
“As a prominent member of The Mars Agency’s international leadership team, Sally drives global client success, commerce capability building, and technology platform expansion,” said Darren Keen, The Mars Agency’s CEO of International Markets. “There are few people in the industry with Sally’s verve, talent and determination to succeed.”
The four-year-old Women Leading Tech program was created to support gender parity and representation across the tech industry in Australia-New Zealand. The event is inclusive of non-binary and gender diverse professionals, as well as any individual identifying as a woman. Winners across 25 categories were revealed and celebrated at a special ceremony on 24 March in Sydney.
About The Mars Agency
The Mars Agency is an award-winning, independently owned, global commerce marketing practice. With talent around the world, they connect people, technology and intelligence to make clients’ business better today than it was yesterday. Mars’ industry-leading MarTech platform, Marilyn®, helps marketers understand the total business impact of their commerce marketing, enabling them to make better decisions, create connected experiences and drive stronger results. Learn more at www.themarsagency.com and meetmarilyn.ai.