Little Black Book Promotes from within to Supercharge the Americas

Little Black Book (LBB) has announced the promotion of two of its longest serving staff members.

Jake Otley, an employee of LBB for more than nine years, will become managing director, Americas while Addison Capper, who has been with the company for more than 12 years, will become managing editor, Americas. Meanwhile, Emma Wilkie, co-director of the Immortal Awards since December 2022, will join the Americas team to ensure LBB clients in the region have a dedicated point of contact for awards. She will also support all LBB members in Asia in the same capacity.

For the past two years, Addison and Jake have been working closely together to foster growth in the Americas, develop editorial coverage and ensure the region’s LBB members capitalise on the platform. Under Jake and Addison’s stewardship, client base, revenue and traffic from the Americas has experienced significant growth year-on-year. Their promotion to managing editor and managing director of the Americas - new roles within LBB - is recognition of their close partnership and success. It is also in acknowledgement of LBB’s overall growth as a business and in traffic across the Americas. 

Day-to-day, Jake is not only the face of new business but works hand in hand with Addison to guide the Americas account management team (Lily Bolgurova and Abi Lightfoot) to ensure growth and success for all LBB customers. This unique partnership allows open dialogue between all LBB departments and teams so that they can listen to issues and needs, and present smarter creative solutions to clients.

As managing editor, Americas, Addison oversees the growing editorial team in the region, which includes Ben Conway (US and LATAM), Jordan Won Neufeldt (Canada) and strategic writers for the Americas, Adam Bennett and April Summers. Adam’s role is also shifting - he will be moving into a hybrid role that encapsulates a mix of traditional editorial content and the strategic writing that he has specialised in over the past four-and-a-half years. Editorially, the aim of these changes is to increase readership from the US and Canada as well as key markets in Latin America.

Addison and the team ensure that LBB is covering all facets of the creative industries that are important to LBB members whilst guiding its style and approach. Over the past four years, as the team has grown and its focus has shifted, the audience and user base from the USA has been LBB’s largest globally. Users from Canada are the platform’s fourth biggest globally. At present, approximately 130,000 users combined from the USA and Canada visit LBB each month.

CEO and founder Matt Cooper says, “I’m incredibly proud of Addison and Jake. They have been with LBB from very early days and have grown into now running the region together. Emma has come into LBB with amazing experience and brilliant ideas. The intelligence and insight that these three have on the world of advertising and production is quite amazing and together they will help our clients no end.” 

Global editor-in-chief Laura Swinton says, “Addison has done a fantastic job building up the Americas region editorially and the USA is our biggest audience, which is testament to the work he’s done with Ben, Jordan, Adam and April. This promotion is so well deserved and I can’t wait to see the stories this beefed-up team uncovers!”

LBB has also promoted from within EMEA. Alex Reeves will become managing editor, Paul Cooper will become managing director and Zhenya Tsenzharyk will become UK editor. Meanwhile, Immortal Awards co-director Paul Monan will dedicate regional support for the Immortal Awards. Read more about that here.