Martina Olbertova

Biography

Martina Olbertova is a corporate meaning strategist, commercial semiotician and doctor of media studies with a mission to redefine how the global marketing industry views and understands the value of meaning. With the information and data overload, meaning and sense are quickly becoming the new most important currencies of the 21st-century business. She is a founder & CEO of Meaning.Global and a Strategy Consultant to Signoi, where she’s developing new frameworks for analysing, measuring, interpreting and transforming meaning to help clients maximise value creation and navigate sense amidst global cultural complexity.

Her goal is to help organizations bridge the ‘gap of meaning’ between brands and society to improve their meaningfulness, restore brand value and boost symbolic equity. Through her work, she helps brand and business leaders become consciously aware of the meanings they create in the world to prevent future brand gaffes, transform their strategy and build brands of enduring value, cultural relevance and meaningful growth.

With 12 years of international experience from the UK, Ireland, USA and the Czech Republic, Martina has for global clients, including Kantar, Unilever, Vodafone, IBM, London Gatwick, British Land, ICAEW, KBC, Visa, Lloyds Bank, Bank of Ireland, J&J, Heineken or Pernod Ricard. Thanks to this diverse experience across markets and industries, she has been able to develop a holistic 360° view of the industry.

Martina is recognized as a global thought leader on brand meaning and a vocal advocate of the fundamental role of semiotics in business. She regularly speaks at international conferences and expert roundtables, leads educational workshops and contributes to Branding Strategy Insider, the world’s most influential resource on brand strategy. She is the creator of ESOMAR Semiotic Series, author of A Complete Guide to Commercial Semiotics and a fellow of Signum and the RSA. She is based between London and Prague and works on briefs across the globe.