Mark McDowell

CEO at Primal Digital Agency

Mark McDowell is the CEO and co-founder of Primal Digital Agency, a leading digital marketing agency based in Bangkok, Thailand. He is also an entrepreneur and a well-known speaker with 10 years of experience in digital marketing.

Awards

Future Leader Awards
Issued by Digiday in March 2021

The Future List 100
Issued by Tatler Magazine in September 2020

30 Under 30
Issued by Forbes in April 2020

Young Achiever of the Year
Issued by Campaign Asia in November 2018

Young Professional Award
Issued by TIBA in October 2018

Organisations That Mark Is A Part Of

He is the Communications Chair of the Entrepreneurs’ Organisation in the Bangkok Metropolitan Chapter.

Primal Digital Agency

In 2015, Mark is a CEO and a speaker who co-founded Primal, a digital marketing agency, hoping to share his learned expertise and help businesses in Thailand realise their full potential in digital marketing and achieve the same successes he’s seen with businesses overseas. Today, Primal is one of the fastest-growing digital marketing agencies in Thailand for 7 years. It was recently ranked in the Financial Times: High Growth Companies Asia Pacific 2022.

Biography

He started his career building websites for various companies as a freelancer after completing a programming course to make money to support himself throughout University in New Zealand.

He then started his first job as a marketing executive at a small barbecue business back in Bangkok, selling and marketing barbecues where he learned about Google Ads and Facebook.

Having student debt where he took out a loan for his University studies, he realised that he was going to get nowhere close to paying it off with his current job.

Afterwards, he left Bangkok to Melbourne, in Australia, where he landed his first gig at a digital agency as an Account Manager hoping to earn enough money to pay off his student loan.

After spending 2.5 years working in one of Australia’s largest agencies, he decided it was time to come back to Thailand. He suggested to the then owner of the agency, Nick Bell, that he open a new agency with him in Bangkok.

And he finally paid off his student debt.

Education

Mark attended Bangkok Patana School from 1994 to 2008 and graduated from Otago University in New Zealand in 2013 with a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce and Business Administration.

Values

I’m passionate about helping others and I believe leadership is about others.

Being 25 when we first started, I made a lot of mistakes especially with people and decisions and I am constantly learning from my failures – I will never stop learning and continuously seek to be better everyday.

After all of my experiences I truly believe a few key values for success at any level:

  • You get what you put in, hard work always beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.
  • Always be hungry for knowledge and to continuously be learning.
  • Take on challenges, grow from your mistakes.
  • Move fast, get shit done and reap the rewards.
  • Contribute to problem solving, there is no time for complaining.

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