Hi, I'm Daz Martin…
and I help B2B organisations build trust, credibility and strategic relationships with their customers and stakeholders.
What I do
My work sits at the intersection of strategy, live events, content and communications. I plan how an organisation connects with the people who matter most, direct and produce the experiences that make those connections real, and often host them too.
Think of me as a journalist, creative director, project manager, sales rep and brand ambassador rolled into one: I find the story, design the experience, keep everything on track, turn the right relationships into business and represent you in front of your audience.
-
I build strategic engagement programmes - calendars of events and content that build connection, grow reputation and get results. I start with the need, not the event: who you want to reach, why they should give you their time and what happens next. Then I plan the events, the content and follow-up around them, the partnerships and the measurement as one programme. I’ve worked inside both sales and marketing teams, so my work ties brand and reputation to the sales pipeline, and the right relationships turn into business.
-
For 15+ years I’ve directed and produced live experiences for audiences of 16 to 16,000: conferences, summits, launches, awards nights, festivals and activations. As executive producer I’m responsible for the lot: the creative idea, the programme and speakers, the budget, the partners and sponsors, the suppliers and the team. Content gets the same treatment - a panel, a video series or a thought leadership piece is cast, shaped and produced like an event. I’m the structured creative: big ideas with a detailed plan behind them, hands-on from planning to pack-down.
-
MC, panel moderator, interviewer and facilitator, on stage, on camera and online. I trained in journalism and spent two years in live breakfast television at Newshub, producing up to five live interviews a day and presenting live crosses. TV journalism taught me to think on my feet, and I still prepare like a producer: every name checked, every guest pre-interviewed and a plan for running long, short or wrong. Because I also plan and produce events, I help shape the content before the day - the topic, the panel and the questions - so the conversation is worth your audience’s time.
MY STORY
What do an events manager, a caterer, a youth worker, a TV journalist, a corporate middle manager and an agency suit all have in common?
They're all me!
I often joke that I've lived many lives, but underneath it all, it's all been the same job: connecting people with a common purpose, getting them to collaborate, and delivering an experience that matters to them.
These days it has a title: engagement strategist and event director. I bring customers and the people who serve them together, then make sure something happens afterwards. The invitations, content and follow-up matter as much as the day itself. The event is the hero, but it's never the whole story.
I'm the structured creative. I come up with the big idea (a stage in a treehouse, a petting zoo on a campus, an AI photo booth that took over LinkedIn for two days), write the business case for it, then pack down the stand myself.
At Spark I established Spark Accelerate, a two-day summit for enterprise and government customers. In its second year, customer attendance grew 67% and partnerships finished 27% over target. At One New Zealand, where I'm Enterprise & Business Engagement Manager, I established the enterprise engagement programme, from Fieldays to executive roundtables. Before that: Kea's global network, live TV at Newshub (with a brief foray into reporting!) and student unions in Christchurch, Melbourne and London.
I'm as happy on stage as behind it. I MC conferences and awards nights, moderate panels and host fireside chats, and I've learnt that a conversation only works when someone in it is paying attention to everyone else.
I trained as a chef before I moved into events, and it shows. The best business conversations happen around a table, every detail matters, and nothing goes out until it's right.