Duncan
has extensive experience in building on-line businesses in the UK and across
Europe, and wide experience within online travel and internet start-ups. Duncan has detailed knowledge of high volume
e-commerce and search engine marketing across all global channels and has a
gift for digital transformation and innovation.
Duncan’s
digital career started in 1996 when he joined holiday autos where he swiftly
rose through the ranks to become Group E-Commerce Director for the business. Following the acquisition of holiday autos by
lastminute.com, Duncan’s flair for digital growth helped steer their 36
websites to global dominance. Upon
exiting lastminute.com in 2006, Duncan joined forces with the founder of holiday
autos, Clive Jacobs, a serial entrepreneur/investor, to help build his
private investment portfolio; this includes media, technology and travel assets
around the world.
In 2009 Duncan supported Clive in
acquiring his first media investment with the purchase of Travel Weekly from
Reed Business Information creating the newly formed Travel Weekly Group. Duncan was subsequently appointed chief
executive of Travel Weekly Group in 2011 and led a process of transformation,
taking Travel Weekly from a traditional B2B magazine business and turning it
into a forward-looking multimedia business, encompassing the market leading
brands of Travel Weekly, Travel Weekly Business, Aspire, Travelanswerz,
TravelGBI and Travolution. In 2012, the
business completed the acquisition of The Caterer, the UK’s leading B2B media
brand for hospitality. Today, under
Duncan’s leadership, the newly formed parent group Jacobs Media Group uniquely
connects the travel and hospitality industries with a portfolio of brands and products,
which expand across print, digital media and face-to-face events. It now publishes in excess of 150 print
products per year, in addition to hosting seven content-driven websites which
generate over 500,000 unique users a month and 160 events including a portfolio
of international buyer and seller-led events, collectively known as
Connections. Jacobs Media Group is now
Europe’s largest travel and hospitality B2B media group.