Aziz Musa. Twenty five years in digital marketing. Three companies turned around. Four thousand marketers trained.
Aziz Musa is British, based in Aswan, Egypt, and in Riyadh or Dubai most months. Former chief executive of Blackbird plc, a London-listed software company. He built Cush Digital because he had sat on the buying side of agency work and watched it produce reports instead of results.
The pattern he has seen most often is the same in London, Khartoum and Riyadh. A company buys marketing activity, measures the activity, and is surprised when the business does not change. He has run companies from the other side of that table, which is why the department he built reports on outcomes and not on effort.
He engages directly with clients through the fractional leadership tier. Everything else at Cush Digital is run by the department he built and trained.
Where the twenty five years went.
Founder and chief executive, Cush Digital
Built the firm from Sudan Digital into an outsourced marketing department for clients in more than twenty countries, on a retainer model with an average client tenure of two and a half years. Trained more than four thousand people to professional digital competence through a pro bono programme along the way.
Fractional chief marketing officer, Spartans Boxing Club
A franchise marketing model that took a Singapore boxing brand from two gyms in one country to a network across six. An inside mandate, disclosed wherever the case is used as proof.
Chief commercial officer, Canar Telecom
Commercial lead for a telecoms operator preparing for a public offering. New-customer sales up 318 per cent, revenue per salesperson up 92 per cent.
Client-reportedChief executive, Blackbird plc
Turnaround of a London-listed software business. Reversed several years of decline into growth, raised GBP 8 million across two funding rounds, cut fixed costs by 42 per cent, and saw the share price quadruple in twelve months.
Client-reportedDirector of global strategy, then general manager Australia, PhotoBox
Led an incubator that acquired three businesses and launched five new units, adding GBP 12 million a year to the P&L. Moonpig sat inside the same group.
Client-reportedManaging director, Pegasus Digital
Ran a digital agency: the first time the whole marketing function of other companies sat on his desk, which is the model Cush was later built on.
Director of cars product, lastminute.com
Owned the car hire product line at one of Europe's largest online travel businesses. Where the online travel trade taught him how demand actually moves, and how quickly it stops.
Director of digital transformation, Reed Business Information
Part of Reed Elsevier, a FTSE 100 company. Moved a print publisher's titles and revenue online, inside a business that lived on the result.
MBA, Warwick Business School. BA (Hons), University of Central Lancashire.
Management and business information systems, then an MBA taken while running businesses rather than before.
The Impact Lab, and a weekly clinic for founders.
Aziz hosts The Impact Lab, an Arabic-language podcast on business and entrepreneurship, and runs a live Business Clinic on X Spaces and TikTok where founders bring a marketing problem and leave with a plan. Both are where the ideas on this site get tested in public before they get written down.
Direct engagement happens through the fractional tier. That is a priced option, not a negotiation.
A fractional chief marketing officer role alongside the department: Aziz in your leadership meetings, owning the marketing agenda at board level, with the department executing beneath him. Saying this plainly saves everyone the conversation.
Alongside the department retainer. Time commitment agreed on the call.
Thirty minutes. He will tell you if the answer is no.
Book a call with Aziz or Lumyaa, in English or Arabic.