Who

Who is Tim Flagg?

I’d like to tell you more about myself. If you just want to see my professional experience then head on over to Linkedin.

I am a learner

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing”

Socrates

I am curious. I have always sought to understand how the world works. I enjoy knowing a little bit about a lot of things. The one thing that fascinates me most is human consciousness and the miracle of life. I studied Psychology, Philosophy and Physiology at Oxford because it allowed me to study human consciousness from three distinct angles. I love learning and I enjoy sharing my knowledge and experience. Technology presents an an once in a generation opportunity to empower learning around the world, and I’m proud to have helped set up ed-tech businesses.

Favourite learning resource: W3schools.org (I’m always trying to brush up my HTML and CSS) and Lynda.com

I am a communicator

“Creativity does not happen in isolation, it requires stimulii, experience and discussion.”

I feed on ideas and ideas abound when we communicate. I enjoy connecting with other people, listening and learning. I thrive on collaborating and swapping ideas, helping and getting help in developing ideas into something concrete. Creativity does not happen in isolation, it requires stimulii, experience and discussion. I feel privileged to have worked with and learnt from some inspirational leaders, collaborators and team-mates over the years.

The thing I most enjoy is the challenge of distilling down ideas and then effectively communicating them either in talks, videos, books, blog posts or even 141 characters on twitter. Ideas and communication are fundamental to most of my interests, chiefly education, technology, politics and marketing.

 

I am a marketing geek

“I am rather disappointed never to have had a title which includes the words ‘marketing technologist'”

From an early age I have wanted to understand how consumers work. My psychology dissertation at university was a variation on the Stroop effect, analyzing how colour affects subjects processing of advertising statement. I am fascinated by the opportunity for marketing to harness the latest technologies such as Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Artificial Intelligence and Programmatic Advertising. I am rather disappointed never to have had a title which includes the words ‘marketing technologist’. I’m a big fan of Scott Brinker (chiefmartec.com). I can spend hours learning about the latest developments in social media advertising, or talking about ad-blocking. The challenge is being able to bring together the emerging technologies with the fundamental principles of marketing that still apply, to create an effective marketing strategy.

Other marketing idols include:

JonLoomer.com – To learn about Facebook advertising

Smartpassiveincome – To learn about creating online funnels

I am a founder

I used to enjoy playing with Meccano when I was a child. There were rarely manuals. I swapped Meccano for businesses, and they don’t have manuals either. Over the last two decades I have founded and built a variety of different enterprises, ventures and businesses. I thrive on turning ideas into reality. Most of my ventures have been quite successful, and I’ve learnt a lot from the ones that haven’t.

  • The 1997 University of Oxford Expedition to Peru (1997)
  • Marie Curie Cancer Care ‘Gold’ (2000) – Fundraising events at top London nightclubs
  • Wilenkin Productions (2002) – a startup TV & Film production business with business partner Mark Wilenkin
  • The Blue Room Forum (2005) – A social network for the right of centre
  • Bright Blue (2008) – A pressure group campaigning for socially liberal, economically conservative policies within the British Conservative Party
  • Go Launch (2010) – Marketing Consultancy
  • IDM Online (2014) – A partnership between the Institute of Direct and Digital Marketing and Floream to delivery online professional qualifications in digital marketing
  • The ADBL (2015) – Delivering training in digital business for business leaders and senior executives
  • The ClickZ Podcast  (2016) – A digital marketing podcast in collaborations with the world’s largest digital marketing community
  • Advantagious (2016) – More information, coming soon

I am an optimist

“Ownership divides us, but collaboration has the power to unite us”

I believe that we can change our world. Technology has brought us the tools, it has unlocked education and it is powering collaboration across the world. I’m optimistic that as we connect to the world through the web, as my children’s generation connect with generations of children across the globe, that something very special can happen. Ownership divides us, but collaboration has the power to unite us. I feel privileged to be living at the beginning of that change.