Richard Thompson
Co-Founder & Partner
With over two decades of experience spanning media strategy, investment, and business leadership, Richard has operated across some of the most complex and competitive categories in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand.
Before co-founding D3, he held senior roles across leading global agency networks, advising high-profile brands on large-scale media transformation. His work has ranged from multi-market investment strategies to the early adoption of programmatic and data-led planning — consistently translating complex challenges into clear, commercially effective solutions.
Since launching D3 in 2018, Richard has been central to building the agency into one of New Zealand's most respected independent media businesses. His commitment to transparency, accountability, and genuine client alignment has shaped D3's operating model from day one — and continues to drive its growth.
He is known for working closely with senior stakeholders and cutting through noise to ensure media investment delivers real commercial outcomes, not just activity.
Outside of work, Richard enjoys time with family, following sports, and a long-standing interest in design and architecture.
Beyond the Dashboard
In the modern marketing world, we’re drowning in data but starved of wisdom. A dangerous fixation on easily trackable, short-term metrics has created a "performance paradox": the more we measure, the less effective we seem to become. This obsession with the dashboard is leading marketers to prioritise the illusion of precision over the proven, foundational principles of brand building. The result? A decade of stagnant growth and a generation of brands that are optimised for the click but failing to build lasting commercial value.
Milford.
10 Percentage Point Market Share Growth in Five Years
Every KiwiSaver provider was claiming superior performance - so Milford chose a different game entirely. Rather than competing on advertising, D3 turned Milford's own fund managers and analysts into the media, appearing weekly across NZME radio, the NZ Herald, Three, and TVNZ. Over a five-year partnership, the approach delivered 10 percentage points of transfer market share growth, a conversion rate 8% above competitor average, and a category-leading trust position built on expertise rather than ad spend.
The Cannabis Clinic.
Trainers on Power Lines. 400% Above Benchmark.
Medical cannabis is 100% legal in New Zealand but stigma meant most patients didn't know legitimate pathways existed. D3 reframed the conversation by reclaiming the most recognised symbol of illegal cannabis culture, trainers on power lines, and repurposing it as a beacon for legitimate medical access. Designed to generate earned media as much as impressions, the campaign delivered a 26% referral traffic increase within a week, 400% above benchmark social engagement, and simultaneous surges in category and brand search.
The Co-operative Bank.
Outpunching the Big Four with Smarter Media, Not Bigger Budgets
The Co-operative Bank couldn't outspend the Big Four - so the strategy had to be smarter. D3 built a brand-to-performance framework that connected brand activity directly to commercial outcomes, ran 'go dark' experiments to prove what switching it off actually cost, and targeted high-intent switchers at the moments that mattered most. The result: 32% brand search uplift, 171% growth in personal loan applications, and a 20% year-on-year lift in first home buyer applications.
ZIWI.
40% Sales Uplift. Zero Media Wastage.
ZIWI had never run above-the-line media and needed more than awareness they needed proof that investment drives sales. D3 mapped every stockist, identified peak traffic patterns, and deployed DOOH within a 1km radius during peak shopping windows only. A control group of unexposed stores provided clean, causal evidence of impact. In the US, the same precision logic was applied to conference buyers — mapping every touchpoint from airport to venue to arrive pre-primed. The result was a 40% sales uplift in targeted stores versus control, zero media wastage, and a foundational strategy now core to ZIWI's approach across ANZ and the US.
Metlifecare.
The 3km Insight That Changed Everything
A single insight changed everything: 70% of retirement village residents originate from within 3km of their chosen village. D3 used this to map 143 hyper-local OOH placements across Metlifecare's network, locked in for cost efficiency and competitive exclusivity, layered with precision digital targeting within each catchment. The result was a 19% increase in lead volume and a 63% reduction in cost per lead.