Trinidad native Alexia James recounts that her foray into marketing began while pursuing her undergraduate marketing degree at The University of the West Indies, Mona. With her relentless passion for marketing, James worked for Red Bull during her university tenure, where she had the opportunity to experience how the company used marketing to attract customers, ultimately giving James a deeper understanding and appreciation for brand storytelling and marketing.

Interestingly, James worked for different brands across various industries and verticals, gaining more exposure to the world of marketing while broadening her scope and channelling her natural abilities as a creative and her learnt skill sets to create sustainable value.

Today, James is a digital strategist overseeing her company’s clients by ensuring their brand messaging and marketing efforts align with client goals and industry standards. She sees new opportunities with the emergence and growth of new technologies such as Web3, cryptocurrency, and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as an opportunity to continue to learn and grow in the digital realm.

Additionally, she is thrilled to continue to explore her passion as a creative while being invested in educating and empowering her community about these emerging technologies.

James engages in virtual events and has created digital guides and blogs where she supports her community through knowledge sharing: “Since the new technologies are decentralised, there is little or no restriction to using and sharing knowledge on these platforms. The information is also easily accessible due to its community-oriented nature giving technology enthusiasts, experts, and evangelists greater autonomy to explore, learn and share their insights,” she said.

Her desire to learn more about this novel space led to leveraging her marketing expertise to fit the emerging needs of the digital space.

James is also convinced that continuing education and upskilling are pivotal to one’s growth and development. She shared the perspective that society must be literate to leverage the benefits and capabilities that technology provides fully.

Believing it is fundamental for Jamaica to become a digital society to compete globally, James further mentioned that many individuals in Jamaica, particularly in rural communities, lack the resources needed to learn in-demand digital skills such as coding, UX design, and graphic design. Therefore, she supports the importation and access to critical resources such as laptops and subsidised Wi-Fi to achieve nationwide digital transformation.

This digital strategist aims to build her legacy as a creative and aspires to launch a foundation in the loving memory of her parents. She sees the foundation as focusing on assisting Caribbean creators in promoting themselves and their work. She believes in paying it forward as someone fortunate to be given many opportunities for growth, learning, and development while on her journey.