Meet Our Multi-Award-Winning Tourism Marketing Team
Strategic thinkers, creative storytellers and tourism marketing trainers
Say hello to a multi-award-winning team of tourism marketing strategists, storytellers and training facilitators! Together, we’re championing a new era for the tourism sector—one led by a regenerative approach to tourism design and delivery, that empowers local communities and inspires travel that creates and leaves behind a positive legacy.
With over a century of combined experience in tourism marketing, communications, advertising, sustainability and regenerative development, we help travel brands and destination marketing organisations connect with travellers, build meaningful engagement and meet their marketing objectives.
Our marketing team brings together specialists in tourism strategy, content creation, digital marketing and professional workshop facilitation, creating integrated tourism marketing and communications solutions that deliver real results for our clients. From developing destination marketing campaigns and travel content to designing and delivering workshops and mentoring programs, we partner closely with our clients to understand their goals and implement tailored strategies that support their long-term success.
Our founder’s vision
When I founded Mankind Digital in 2021, I was driven by an unwavering conviction that tourism had the power to contribute far more than just visitor numbers and profit. From the beginning, I knew that travel had the potential to bring hosts, guests and communities closer together, while reconnecting us with nature.
I had already seen and experienced numerous examples of mainstream, commercialised tourism designed thoughtlessly, extracting resources from the economies and environments we travel the world to see. At the same time, it strips the people of their culture, traditions and land and diminishes their ability to make decisions about what happens in their local region. When I compared what I’d seen with an approach that enriches our natural world, communities, the places we live in and host visitors from, I knew our work needed to support the latter.
I wanted us to champion a different approach to tourism development, one designed to benefit residents, shaped by local knowledge, cultural pride and caring for the land and ecosystems that sustain us. That intention has guided the development of our business ever since and it continues to underpin how we support destinations and tourism organisations to evolve in ways that are thoughtful, responsible and focused on the wellbeing of each place’s ecology, environmental needs and the people who live there.
This approach is of critical importance because tourism is now at a crossroads. While the pace of global visitor numbers is rapidly accelerating, people are seeking meaningful ways to experience and connect with cultures and places different from their own, but the reality of so much movement brings undeniable challenges.
Communities are feeling the strain of rising visitor numbers. Natural areas are shrinking as development expands. Emissions and resource use continue to climb. These impacts are being felt in most places around the world, from fragile small island ecosystems to major international cities with established infrastructure, now reaching the limits of what they can sustain.
We cannot turn away from this reality. At the same time, we can’t lose sight of the tremendous potential that tourism holds. At its best, tourism fosters cultural understanding, restores pride in place, celebrates heritage and creates meaningful economic opportunities. It also inspires people to care more deeply for the world and to recognise their part within it.
This is why Mankind Digital is committed to five key pillars that guide our business’s purpose, direction and evolution. These pillars are not simply strategic goals. They are expressions of who we are and what we stand for as a business that believes in the power of travel to enrich life and regenerate the places we love.
1. Thriving Communities and People
Our first pillar, Thriving Communities and People, is the foundation of our work because the wellbeing of both our own team and the communities we serve is essential to a regenerative future. We believe that strong, supported people create thriving places to live, work and visit when they are connected with each other, their communities and the world around them. This pillar represents our commitment to fostering an internal culture where our team feels safe, valued and empowered to grow, while also empowering and uplifting the communities who live in the places we promote. We champion shared learning, intergenerational knowledge exchange and equitable access to education. By inviting and encouraging collaboration, we help build communities, both within our teams and locally, that care for one another and develop the skills, leadership and vision needed for lasting positive change. When our people and our communities thrive, tourism becomes a meaningful force for good.
2. Protecting and Repairing Nature
Our second pillar, Protecting and Repairing Nature, reflects our belief that the natural world is not simply a setting for tourism to operate within, but a living system we operate as part of. The pressures on that system continue to grow. As referenced in our Impact Report, travel and tourism contributed 7.3% of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2024 and this was expected to rise to 13% in 2025*. These escalating numbers demand our attention and these trends make clear that our planet cannot continue to absorb these ongoing pressures without meaningful change. At Mankind Digital, our work matters because we care about, respect and have a deep awareness of the interconnectedness of all life on Earth. We champion nature-positive stewardship, honour its wisdom and are committed to contributing towards a future where both people and nature thrive.
3. Investing in Place
Our third pillar, Investing in Place, is focused on strengthening the identity, resilience and wellbeing of the places we work with and operate within. We are especially passionate about places where people feel a deep sense of connection to the land, their culture and their communities. Around the world, travellers are seeking experiences that honour, protect and regenerate the places they visit. Research from 2025 shows that 84% of travellers believe that sustainable travel is important to them, 93% want to make more responsible choices and 73% want their spending to support local communities*. These figures signal a growing demand for travel that considers and is aligned with the wellbeing of the places visitors go to. Our work supports the tourism sector to create experiences guided by local knowledge and caring for the environment. We are committed to helping shape places where local people lead, their traditions are honoured and tourism is developed in partnership with community and nature.
4. Regenerative Economies
Our fourth pillar, Regenerative Economies, is rooted in the belief that tourism can and should contribute to long term and fair prosperity for all. Tourism is one of the most influential sectors in the world, contributing 10% of global GDP in 2024 and supporting 357 million jobs, or one in every ten.* International visitor spending reached 1.87 trillion US dollars in the same year and was expected to rise to 2.1 trillion US dollars in 2025, with the sector projected to reach 11.5% of global GDP by 2035.* These figures are referenced with sources in our Impact Report and show the immense economic power that the tourism sector holds, whilst also reminding us of our responsibility to ensure that economic benefits are fairly distributed and balanced with an acute awareness of what they mean for the communities and environments in each destination.
5. Contributing to Systems Change
Our fifth pillar, Contributing to Systems Change, reflects our understanding that the challenges facing tourism cannot be addressed through surface level adjustments or outdated models and ways of working. They require bold thought leadership, collaboration and a willingness to unlearn old ways of thinking and operating, reimagining what is possible in collaboration with those around us. We need to embrace curiosity and innovation, welcome new perspectives and champion progress over perfection. By inspiring others and leading through example we contribute to the systemic transformation that the tourism sector urgently needs.
Together, these five pillars form the foundation of our purpose, vision, mission and values. They guide the way we work, the partnerships we form and the impact we seek to create. They remind us that tourism isn’t an industry, but a powerful connector of people and places, and a catalyst for positive change when approached with care and intention. Statistical evidence from numerous reports and other references supports our vision. *Our Impact Report provides the sources of these statistics and more details about the basis for our business decisions.
As we look towards the years ahead, we’re excited about reimagining what’s possible in a tourism sector reborn from genuine collaboration and deep respect for the places that welcome us. We envision destinations that flourish because of visitors rather than struggling to support them, communities with real ownership of their stories and futures instead of resenting visitors and disliking the changes they bring, and a world where nature thrives and economies are strengthened in fair and regenerative ways.
Keeley Warren, founder and co-Director
Meet the people and creative minds behind our brand
Our family-owned-and-operated organisation is directed by the Australian brother-sister team of Keeley Warren and Tom Langford. We bring three decades of combined leadership and professional experience blended with commitment to our personal values to support the tourism sector as it transitions towards a more responsible model worldwide.
Our core team members have worked directly with many tier-one global brands and government agencies. We use this world-class expertise to increase the exposure of tourism organisations and destinations offering sustainable, responsible and regenerative approaches to tourism design and development.
CO-DIRECTOR
Keeley Warren
Keeley is the founder and co-director of multi-award-winning tourism marketing organisation, Mankind Digital, pioneering a new approach to tourism marketing, with ethics, nurturing people and place, and purpose over profit at its core. She has specialised in tourism marketing, advertising and communications internationally since 2007. Her experience covers government roles, working with global publishers and media brands, and supporting tourism organisations in Australia, Europe and beyond.
Keeley is also the sustainable travel reporter for Travel Writers Radio and an active member of The Tourism CoLab’s Communiversity, Sustainable Travel International, Creatives For Climate, Flourishing Business, Skål International and Young Tourism Network, amongst many other organisations.
- +61 (03) 9114 9749
- hello(at)mankinddigital.com.au
CO-DIRECTOR
Tom Langford
Tom has extensive experience in training facilitation, workshop delivery and team leadership, gained while working with the Australian Government for over a decade. His expertise includes modernising training paradigms for business groups, and he remains involved in delivering and supervising learning and development from individual to organisational levels. As co-director of Mankind Digital, Tom works at a strategic level, overseeing business operations, finance and resources.
He majored in Psychology at Flinders University, South Australia, focusing on adult education and business psychology, and is also currently studying medicine. In his free time, Tom is either spoiling his Pomeranian, Gigi, or can be found indulging in culinary adventures at restaurants across Australia and beyond.
REGENERATIVE TOURISM SPECIALIST
Nadine Schmidt
Nadine is an internationally recognised lecturer, tutor and training facilitator specialising in regenerative tourism. With extensive experience in higher education in Australia and Europe, she delivers comprehensive training, courses and workshops that promote responsible and regenerative tourism practices.
Nadine’s expertise spans strategy, product development, organisational growth and the implementation of regenerative principles. She excels in designing and delivering customised training programs that assist industry professionals and tourism organisations to transition to a regenerative tourism model.
COPY EDITOR
Marion Halliday
Marion is lead copy editor at Mankind Digital. Her skills and keen eye for detail are incredibly valuable, helping us to deliver high quality content for our clients. Her background in copy editing encompasses many years of writing and editing reports, training material and policy documents.
Along with copy editing for Mankind Digital and other clients, Marion writes for and edits independent travel publication GlobeRovers Magazine. Her first book, Aussie Loos with Views! is arguably Australia’s quirkiest travel guide. Her co-authored children’s books, Hammie and the Lost Princess of Koh Ang Thong and Hammie and the Moken’s Magic Potion, introduce young readers to the importance of caring for the earth’s resources.
SEO & GEO CONTENT STRATEGIST
Saajida Akabor
Saajida is Mankind Digital’s SEO & GEO Content Strategist and lead copywriter. She has a bachelor’s degree in Media and has worked as a digital copywriter and SEO content specialist for over a decade.
She is passionate about helping businesses that are intent on maximising their social impact to attract new customers online across sectors including travel and hospitality, education and not for profit. She combines her love of storytelling with advanced SEO and Generative Engine Optimisation expertise to create content that inspires action, connects with audiences and delivers measurable visibility for our clients.
COPYWRITER
Karin Avila
Born in the US, Karin grew up in the Middle East and Europe. After studying International Relations and Environmental Management, she worked in healthcare. She has travelled extensively and is currently based in Spain.
Karin develops content for Mankind Digital that inspires readers to make ethical choices when travelling. She also produces SEO content that increases search engine visibility and enquiries for our clients.
Karin’s personal website is an outlet for her twin passions—photography and travel writing. She is also a correspondent for Travel Writers Radio.
COPYWRITER
Robyn Ruth Thomas
Robyn is a seasoned copywriter and content strategist who has invested over 10 years in developing her marketing skills for pitching and producing compelling stories. She develops high-quality content that helps brands from Cape Town to New York shine online, working on transformative projects ranging from Fintech and travel brands to nonprofits championing education.
Robyn has jumped off cliffs into the Zambezi, danced in the streets of Edinburgh on Hogmanay, and swum with dolphins, but few adventures match the joy and learning that she derives from impactful communication.
SEO SPECIALIST
Josh Byrne
Josh has been working with Mankind Digital since our business began, and he assists our clients with gaining visibility on search engines in order to increase their online enquiries and sales. He is details-oriented and focused on performance, which is a breath of fresh air in the field of SEO.
Josh specialises in website and SEO content audits to uncover the technical fixes that need to be applied to a website so it performs better and shows up on search results. He is passionate about SEO growth strategy, content marketing using SEO tactics and local SEO. The results Josh has generated for our clients speak for themselves.
PAID MEDIA SPECIALIST
James Pendleton
James is Mankind Digital’s resident paid advertising and analytics specialist. He is a results-oriented numbers expert with over 10 years of experience across multiple channels and industries, all of which he brings to the tourism and travel sector.
James’ motivation at work comes from understanding the cause and positive effect of new strategies. To him, there’s nothing better than trying something new for a client, exceeding sales targets and reaching new heights in performance marketing.
WEBSITE DEVELOPER
Shammika Munugoda
Shammika has been working with Keeley since 2019. He is an experienced software architect with a background in full-stack application development, cyber security, Artificial Intelligence and workflow automation. He has worked on large-scale government projects and with small-to-medium businesses.
Shammika specialises in building custom SaaS apps and software without writing a single line of code using no-code tools. This allows him to deliver apps up to 70% faster and at more affordable rates than traditional development.
WEBSITE DESIGN & DEVELOPMENT
Lilly Dreyer
Originally a multimedia designer, Lilly has been working in web design and development for many years. She is a talented webmaster with a passion for crafting customised websites in WordPress using Elementor Pro. Her primary objective is to deliver professional web design and development services that attract, engage and convert new customers online.
With Lilly’s expertise, your website will showcase your unique travel and tourism offerings, whilst providing your customers with a seamless experience when they engage with your brand online.
MEDIA PRODUCER & VIDEOGRAPHER
Michael Fletcher-Jones
Michael is a seasoned media producer and videographer with over 20 years of experience. With a passion for tourism and travel, he specialises in creating captivating commercials, documentaries, and diverse video content.
From quickfire social media content to TVC campaigns, Michael’s work reflects authenticity, enthusiasm and a deep understanding of the power of storytelling. He is an expert at crafting engaging content that seamlessly captures his audience’s attention, whilst delivering high quality projects that meet our client objectives.
Why our team loves working with us!
Our people are empowered through innovative work practices
Mankind Digital’s reimagined workplace prioritises well-being for our internationally based team members. Because peak creativity and productivity occur for different people at different times of the day, our flexible work schedule system means they can work at their most productive and convenient times. This has led to high employee retention and satisfaction, as well as consistent high-quality deliverables.
We promote remote work as a human rights innovation
Access to meaningful employment is a human right, but traditional work structures and staffing models often exclude people based on factors such as geography, gender, caring responsibilities, health or mobility. We help overcome these barriers with our flexible, remote work model, also demonstrating how tourism businesses can actively advance human rights, inclusion and fair labour practices without compromising output quality.
As a female-founded organisation, our approach actively creates employment opportunities for people such as parents with young children, those in regions with limited local options, part-time workers, contractors and freelancers. Expanding economic opportunity to marginalised groups and putting people first is a deliberate strategy which is embedded in our business model.
At Mankind Digital, our international team works across several time zones from home offices or co-working spaces with flexible working hours that suit their commitments. The majority of our core team identify as women, and our specialists are located across four countries, bringing cross-cultural perspectives to every project, and multi-country expertise embedded in everything we deliver.
This has resulted in a team that is fully onboard with our goal of inspiring systemic change within the tourism sector, and integrating these principles into all aspects of our operations.
We are cultivating a culture of continuous learning and collaboration
For Mankind Digital, our team is the greatest asset we have in driving sustainable tourism transformation, so directly investing in people is an integral part of sustainable business operations. We therefore ensure our team is uniquely equipped to deliver exceptional value for our clients, partners and consumers by encouraging continuous learning, collaborative knowledge exchange and specialised skills development in sustainable tourism, environmental literacy, regenerative development and communications.
We enable specialised skills uptake
We are committed to our management team’s professional development and sharing these learnings to upskill our team. Leading by example, our founder has completed many specialised training courses which inform our communications and marketing approach, including Intro to Regenerative Tourism by Design (The Tourism CoLab), Sustainable Tourism (University of Copenhagen), The Strategy of Content Marketing (University of California), Customer Experience Strategy & Design (RMIT) and User Interface Design (RMIT). We share new resources with the wider team through our central communications hub and online portal.
We value local employment
Our local-first recruitment strategy means we prioritise local talent so destinations are represented by people who know them, marketing expenditure stays within regional economies and we provide regional employment opportunities. Our clients get genuine regional expertise and the local economy is boosted through employment and skills enhancement.
We also actively promote local tourism employment pathways through published content that highlights the business benefits of responsible tourism employment practices. We emphasise the advantages of recruiting young local people into tourism roles to ensure knowledge transfer, succession planning and fresh perspectives for tourism innovation.
Strategic professional development trickles down
Course learnings, insights and resources are systematically integrated into our operational frameworks and client work to elevate our team’s collective expertise. For example, our founder recently completed The Tourism CoLab’s 20-week Regenerative Business Development Journey, a transformative program for organisations seeking to activate regenerative practices in their communities. During the course we revised our existing business plan and business model and developed a road map to inform our future direction. This program was complemented by the Centre for GOOD Travel’s Intro to Regenerative Storytelling course, and incorporated into our work. Regenerative Storytelling Framework principles and narrative development have helped us identify unique local stories for our clients, whilst adopting storytelling skills to enhance our projects.
Our low-impact business model reflects our ethos
Mankind Digital’s co-created and efficient remote-first international team structure based in home offices or co-working spaces supports high productivity with minimal environmental cost, contributing to a distributed yet low-impact footprint. Our primary home office space is proudly paperless and intentionally minimalist in material consumption and physical resources. We use eco-certified cleaning products, and limit packaging, optimise recycling and choose responsible waste disposal options. Our highly efficient, low-emissions workplace model demonstrates how global enterprises can thrive without compromising the environment.
Our business takes intentional steps to save resources
Incorporating our business ethos into our daily business operations is just as important as our service offering. So we’ve embedded sustainability principles into our practices, resource usage and strategic partnerships to actively contribute to a tourism industry that respects the environment by conserving resources and empowers others to do the same. Our lean, low-emissions business model, informative content, partnerships with like-minded organisations and being part of responsible tourism communities means we inform and influence people across the tourism sector.
Join our growing team of international tourism marketers!
Are you a strategic marketer, creative writer, or workshop facilitator who is passionate about transforming tourism for good? We’re always looking for experienced professionals or emerging talent ready to make a difference and share our commitment to sustainable, regenerative and responsible tourism.
Join a team where your skills drive real impact, where purpose fuels every project and where collaboration and creativity thrive. If you believe marketing can be a force for positive change—protecting and regenerating places, empowering communities and inspiring responsible travel—we’d love to hear from you!
Transform your marketing and communications strategy, transform your impact
Work with our experienced team of tourism marketers, copywriters and training facilitators for:
- Creative strategies that showcase your commitment to responsible tourism;
- Compelling copy that resonates with your ideal visitors;
- Transformative marketing and communications workshops to upskill your team or the local businesses in your region.
We partner with sustainable, regenerative and responsible tourism brands and DMOs who are ready to share their stories, projects and impact. Together, we can help you to develop marketing campaigns and content that inspires visitors to champion your destination, advocate for your travel brand and travel responsibly. Explore our services to discover how we can help.
