On September 17, INMA awarded 30 young professionals around the world with its debut “30 Under 30” award as part of its Young Professionals Initiative. This is the 15th in a series of 30 features about these impressive rising media stars who are shaping our industry. 

Robert Tidball started his media career in the strategy department of News UK during his university holidays. His first full-time job was on the portfolio strategy team at News Corp Australia, which hooked him on business strategy and analytics.

Robert then worked for six months in Peru with an advisory firm, returned to Australia as a management consultant, then realised he missed the news industry.

A position with Australian Community Media (ACM) as an analyst providing audience insights to sales teams quickly taught him the process could be much better. In his spare time, Tidball created an internal sales tool using Google Cloud Platform, which immediately brought in about A$50,000 in new revenue.

His current position — and department — didn’t exist until he pitched it to management. He now leads a team of six data engineers and data scientists.

“I champion data in my role at ACM,” Robert said. “Data will be increasingly important for all industries but particularly the news media industry, which has a complicated relationship with large platforms and is experimenting new business models.”

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