Only child, ENTP-T personality. Up to 18, I lived in Soleto, an old Messapic town in Southern Italy, part of the griko ethnic community. Since 2014 I’ve been based in Brussels, Belgium, after living in Lecce, London, Sheffield, Rome and Milan.
Digital Marketing | Photography | Politics | Geography | Books | Music | Travel | Hiking
Communication and media have always captured my interest since very young. As a teenager, I started to work for local radio stations and newspapers in the second half of the 90s. With the arrival of the internet, I transformed my passion into a profession.
On a professional level, over the last twenty years, I have been fortunate enough to accumulate experience in the world of digital marketing as an employee, consultant and entrepreneur, bsides other experiences regarding artistic production (electronic music, photography, video and writing) and academic research (economic geography).
I built my first website in 1998, the year Google was officially launched. In 2003, a student portal made for my university student association in Lecce (ProgettoUniversitas) was the runner-up as the best web community at the Italian Web Awards, just a year before Facebook was born.
Presenting at Digital First, Brussels, 2019
From 2010 to 2016, I worked at British Council, the UK cultural organisation, starting as Business Development Manager, then moving to Marketing Manager, and, eventually, Digital Manager for the European region, moving from Rome to Milan and then to Brussels. In that role, I was behind a global project leading the web analytics team and pioneering one of the first implementations of Google Tag Manager (still not officially released at that time).
Later, among various roles, I have been in charge of digital marketing for a Belgian fintech active in equity crowdfunding and venture capital, supporting innovative and sustainable start-ups (MyMicroInvest, now Spreds & Inventures). As a digital marketing consultant, I also worked for a multinational corporation in the recruiting sector (ManpowerGroup), then for a Swiss law firm focused on banking (Caputo & Partners), and a creative agency (Karakas, now Karma) and its clients. I’ve been a social media manager in the financial services sector (Swift) and for an Antwerp-based corporate venture development firm (Bundl), working as a growth marketer and venture builder, covering the banking sector (HelloBank / BNP Paribas Fortis) primarily. Later, I’ve been a digital customer journey expert at the bank ING Belgium, a social media strategist at Stanley/Stella (a sustainable blank apparel manufacturer) via Upthrust, then a digital strategist at Cross-Border Commerce Europe, then at the social media agency Pivott and its clients – including Sony Universal Pictures and ALDI – and now back to the financial world at Euroclear – among the top employers according to a recent survey by LinkedIn.
From an entrepreneurial point of view, in 
2017 I founded the digital marketing consulting agency Oltre.Digital. Thanks to a network of experts, Oltre has been providing professional advice in various areas such as search engine optimization (SEO), web analytics, online advertising (SEA like Google Ads or Bing, display, native), social media marketing including Meta Ads and LinkedIn Ads, user experience (UX), information architecture, lead generation, conversion rate optimisation, influencer marketing, performance marketing/affiliates, web design, e-commerce.
In addition to client services, via Oltre Digital I have been launched own projects such as Solvy.Store, HexAchats, Wireless Education, Reset Italia, Doping Deals, 1common Club, Spaccio Italia, X-Playn, Free QRcode Generator, Oltre AI and more. The portfolio page lists recent entrepreneurial projects and clients’ works.
More detailed information about my professional background is available on my LinkedIn profile (CV). Check also the digital marketing consultancy services, read my blog or discover useful online tools for your business.
Due to my current working commitments, my time for consulting work is very limited. I could still consider some consulting services, article writing, training/coaching, and conference speeches – please reach out through the options below to discuss needs and availability.
Do you need any help with your digital marketing strategy?
Get in touch!
Since 2005 I have developed a passion for photography. After working extensively with Canon digital cameras, pioneering HDR technique, I have increasingly used smartphones in recent years, including faster mobile post-production that gained prominence over Adobe Photoshop. I try to make iconic images capable of identifying stories and places.
In 2020 my Flickr account reached +10M photo views, and some of my works have been published by prestigious media channels and institutions, including UNESCO, the Carabinieri, the European Commission, the London School of Economics, and Forbes.
Hundreds of high-quality prints are available in different sizes, with or without framing, and delivered worldwide.
During a political debate at the Imperial College in London, 2018
Debating about political issues has interested me since a young age. As a teenager and in my early 20s I supported libertarian movements battling for civil rights, anti-prohibitionism and ecology. I also had an experience as a student representative at the University of Lecce (now Università del Salento, Italy).
In 2018, after being selected through an online vote, I was a candidate for the Italian Chamber of Deputies representing the Five Star Movement in the European constituency, obtaining over 6000 preferences (thanks all!), resulting in the second of the non-elected, while the Movement was the most voted in Italy with about 33% leading the government until 2022. Among the most important battles, I supported the introduction of a universal basic income (UBI).
After such a short but intense experience, I quit any direct political involvement, focusing on professional goals.
Currently, I follow the debate concerning the relation between politics, society, media, communication and new technologies. In 2019, before the recent AI boom, I published an article for Data Driven Investor concerning risks and opportunities represented by AI in politics.
Recently, I’ve been working on a paper about aleocracy, an alternative method to boost democracy, representation and participation bypassing the evident limits of typical electoral systems – work in progress…
When a child, I was intrigued by geographical atlases, maps, elements of the territory, singularities and statistics. In my 20s, I’ve been doing research and working as a teacher and student tutor at the faculties of Economics and Political Sciences at the University of Lecce (now University of Salento, Italy, mostly focusing on local development, geographical information systems (GIS), geomarketing and memetics, or geomemetics – a pioneer attempt to apply genetics logic to cultural dissemination with a focus on key geographical concepts such as place, sense of belonging and identities.
After a MA in Urban and Regional Planning Research and Theory at the University of Sheffield (UK), in 2009, I obtained a PhD in Economic Geography at the University of Bari (Italy). It’s been the culmination of a research path from which I eventually moved away, embracing new professional territories. I participated in national and international conferences and am a member of the Italian Geographic Society (SGI).
Like many, I have written whenever I felt the need since a teenager. Normally my writing is abstract: it doesn’t include time, places or people.
In 2012 I self-published a first collection titled Glossario del Nulla (Glossary of Nothing).
Postplex, a second collection with recent entries, was published in 2021 and distributed through Lulu to popular platforms, including Amazon.
Books content, plus more recent stuff (including some lyrics for the music project Style Disorder, listed below), are all published and accessible for free on the blog Postplex.
The most recent blog posts are also re-published on this website. Blog content is mostly in Italian, but you can easily auto-translate from the desktop version (despite auto-translation having its own well-known limitations).
About reading preferences, here’s my Goodreads profile.
I have enjoyed electronic music production for more than 25 years, starting with the legendary Fast Tracker 2 (followed by MadTracker 2), then moving to Reason and Ableton Live and, recently, experimenting with AI in various ways.
The first album Random Pleasures was released in 2018. It’s a collection of tracks produced between 2004 and 2013, available on Spotify, iTunes, YouTube Music, Deezer, Soundcloud and other major platforms.
A full archive with old and recent works is available on Soundclick (more than 120 tracks to date, including some early demos, but still missing older stuff lost or forgotten in tapes, CDs or hard drives).
New singles and albums are produced under the new collaborative project, ‘Style Disorder‘ for the independent label Oltre Digital Media.
Demos from the new project work-in-progress
‘Style Disorder’
FULL MUSIC ARCHIVE ON SOUNDCLICK
130+ songs
‘RANDOM PLEASURES’ (2018)
Regarding music preferences, I listen to different music genres.
Below some of my Spotify playlists:
Given my passion for geography and photography, travel is a natural consequence. I hope I can find the time to say something about my travel experiences, trying to inspire or help those people ready to leave. For now, the traces of the places I visited – about 40 countries – are in some photo galleries published on Flickr, Instagram and Tumblr, and Swarm. I’m also on Couchsurfing as a guest or host, but relatively little.
If you are new to AirBNB create an account from this link and get credit on your first stay.
I am a contributor on Google Maps (currently 8/10), Yelp and Tripadvisor. If you enjoy sharing a good beer and discovering great pubs, I’m also on Untappd.
Some guides:
Brussels Hiking Group, 2017
On the summit of Toubkal in Morocco (4167m)
I am a member of some hiking groups in Belgium, such as the Brussels Hiking Group. Although Belgium has no mountains, it can be pretty hilly in Wallonia and has excellent routes. I also cycle regularly – it’s been my primary means of transport for years.
The top peaks are Mount Toubkal in Morocco and Volcano Acatenango in Guatemala.
