Entrepreneur network and marketing consultancy founder Nadine Campbell
Meet Nadine
The collective knowledge and wisdom of the IPSE membership community is an invaluable source of inspiration and advice. Our Member Stories interviews highlight just some of the talented self-employed and freelance individuals who are part of IPSE.
Nadine Campbell is an award winner for both the marketing consultancy she founded, and the ACE Entrepreneurs business network. We spoke to her about growing both businesses, and the lessons learned along the way.
Can you introduce yourself and your business?
Hi, I’m Nadine, I am the founder of The Digital Helpdesk, which is a marketing consultancy launched in 2012 and also the founder of ACE Entrepreneurs, an organisation that specifically helps diverse and underrepresented entrepreneurs grow, scale and start up their businesses.
I have 20 years of experience in business and marketing, I am a Partner level Marketing Consultant and Digital Lead, with extensive experience within media agencies, brands, start-ups and consultancies. I'm an expert in business strategy and management, marketing, partnerships, tactical campaigns, analytics and data. Previous Digital Helpdesk clients include brands Sky ShowTime, Sky Group, Huawei, Samsung, Unilever, Ford, Virgin Media and Mobile, Britvic, Group M and Omnicom agencies.
My recent achievements include 2022 IPSE Outstanding freelancer of the year and Community Awards finalist, 2022 YunoJuno Marketing Specialist of the Year, TechRound 2021 BAME 50 under 50 Entrepreneurs list, IPSE 2021 Success Story Award for ACE Entrepreneurs, 2021 WATC Inspirational Woman, led the team at Samsung to win the 2020 eCommerce Social Campaign of the year, 2019 YunoJuno Marketing Specialist of the Year Finalist.
ACE Entrepreneurs is a membership organisation with a network of over 5,000, launched in 2020 to support and provide investment for marginalised entrepreneurs and black-owned businesses in the UK. ACE supports the diverse community and provides free access to over 20 key business & finance content hubs, alternative start-up funding and grant finder for non-profit and social enterprises. The mission is to make it easier for diverse entrepreneurs to run successful businesses. Most importantly, we have a growing network and collaboration is at the heart of the work we do.
I specifically use my transferable skills from 10 years of running The Digital Helpdesk, to empower diverse entrepreneurs via ACE. Being self-employed, a freelancer or an entrepreneur can be lonely sometimes, so it’s all about networking, working together, and supporting each other with our services.
The two go hand in hand and so that’s what I do at the moment.
Can you talk about the different challenges of being a woman of colour in business? And especially having your own business?
I think they fall into a couple of different buckets. The first is around funding. If we think about small businesses and funding for underrepresented or diverse communities, it’s about 2% of all funding. Then you move down the scale to around 0.02% if you are a woman too. I mean it’s really, really tiny.
If you’re thinking about starting a business, before you even get to that, you’re thinking “Will I even be able to do it in terms of financing? Can I afford to do it?” And on the flip side, when we think about wages for women in business, I think we’re at 82 pence to the pound right now in terms of the pay gap and pay equality. So, we’re not getting paid the same and it goes down for diverse women.
You have women that are usually the main lead in the household. They go from a full-time job at work to a full-time job at home. If the kids are sick, they’re probably the ones that are off and they still have to do everything at work. So, these are the challenges that women face. And by going into self-employment, or starting your own business, at the end of the tunnel, there’s that freedom, right? That you can set your day and set your timing, and set your rates to what they should be.
When you look at the board of most companies in leadership positions, in the C suite or at the board level, we’re not there, so that visibility is lacking. How do you even get up to the C-suite? You’re also not being paid enough, you don’t have time to do everything and there are no other diverse women up there. There are so many different challenges.
If you’re diverse and you go to work, there’s assimilation that happens; where you want to make sure you’re 'fitting in'. You just want to be yourself, but to get ahead, everyone is assimilating to that English male way or working or using whatever traits they have, usually, that’s tailored towards a male perspective. As a woman of colour, you can be labelled very, very quickly. Women of colour 'have attitude', whereas men might be 'forthright or direct'. So, you have to change the way that you are to work. Saying sorry a lot, men just don’t do that and women do it all the time.
These are all the different disparities that mean we need extra dedicated support, not only as women of colour, but women just in general.
What’s your experience of being involved in National Freelancers Day and being judged for an award?
The last National Freelancers Day was virtual for safety and availability, so that was really good. I did a morning talk on helping small businesses understand free and low-cost marketing. That was really cool and there was a great app so you could see the agenda. You could pick sessions and watch recorded talks back, and there were loads of contacts. I got to meet loads of other freelancers adjacent to me, like copywriters and video editors, and things that I need within my business.
The awards were amazing. The judging process was really seamless and quite smooth. You had to write your submission – that was quite lengthy and detailed - and then there was a virtual judging panel. It’s still quite nerve wracking to get your pitch out, but great to meet people genuinely interested in your story and hear their questions.
And then the event was wonderful. We were meeting in person with the other winners, talking about our stories and other nominees. So, I made a load of new connections again on that day. The awards were nice, you’ve got to get up and actually take a physical award. It was really excellent. I loved the process and I’d encourage everyone to try out for it.
