Ben Wood

With over 20 years of experience, Ben is one of the few media practitioners on the global stage who can genuinely claim to be experienced in managing both traditional and digital media businesses, and working on both the buy and the sell side; locally, regionally and globally.

Starting life as a planner/buyer in traditional media, Ben was lucky enough to join the fledgling UK digital start-up i-Level at launch and spent the next 4 years building what became the UK’s first and largest independent digital media agency, winning awards and some of the UK’s most prestigious digital advertising accounts along the way.

Yearning a more integrated role, Ben spent the next 3 years building and running the Communications Planning department at creative agency Miles Calcraft Briginshaw Duffy working to build one of the UK’s most successful independent integrated agencies, later selling to Canada’s Creston Group.

In 2004 Ben was lured back into media with a brief from Aegis Media (now Dentsu Aegis Network) to build digital capability into its traditional media businesses.

At Dentsu Aegis Network Ben worked across Carat, Vizeum and Diffiniti, building and running digital media teams, before launching the digital performance marketing network iProspect in the UK in 2009. In 2010 the agency doubled in size both in terms of revenue & profitability and in 2011 the agency asserted itself as the UK’s largest and most successful agency of its type. Across 2012, the business recorded further organic revenue growth of over 60%.

In late 2012 Ben acquired independent UK digital agency iSpy, which took the UK iProspect business to over 250 staff, with revenues of over £20m and delivering services to over 100 clients across some of the fastest growing and most effective digital advertising channels – Natural Search, Paid Search, Data & Analytics, Web Site Conversion Optimisation, Video & Display Media.

In early 2013 Ben was promoted to run the iProspect EMEA network of 25 offices and over 700 staff, and then in the Summer of the same year Ben stepped up to become global president of the iProspect network. Under Ben’s leadership, the global iProspect business grew over the next 3 years to span 55 offices around the world and employ north of 4,000 staff, billing over £2bn & generating revenues of £250m. Ben oversaw close to 20 acquisitions as he scaled the business. iProspect continues to set the pace as the words largest and most awarded digital performance agency. As Global President Ben sat on the Global Executive & Brand Board of Dentsu Aegis Network, steering strategy across the Group.

In the Summer of 2016, yearning a new challenge away from the global networks, Ben jumped into Facebook and into the newly created role of Director of Agencies, EMEA. In this role, within Facebook’s Global Agency team, Ben is tasked with overseeing the strategic relationship between Facebook and the agency community in the region, targeting continued & sustained growth and the development of market leading relationships with these critical partners.