OCL Vision, expert eye care specialists, worked with our Executive Search team to find a Marketing Director for their organisation. Following recent investment from BGF, they needed a marketing leader to take them to their next stage of growth.
Identifying a Fractional Marketing Director to support OCL Vision’s next phase of growth
The story of OCL Vision
OCL Vision is one of the UK’s leading specialist eye care providers, combining world-class surgeons, advanced clinical technology and exceptional patient outcomes across both vision correction and ophthalmology services.
Following investment from BGF and with plans to expand across additional locations, the business entered a significant new phase of growth. To support this expansion, OCL Vision needed to strengthen its senior leadership team with the appointment of a commercially focused Marketing Director capable of elevating the brand and driving scalable patient acquisition.
Challenge: Building a premium healthcare brand while driving scalable growth
OCL Vision partnered with 3Search Executive's Harrison Knowles to appoint a senior marketing leader capable of supporting both immediate commercial objectives and the longer-term evolution of the brand.
Historically, the business had relied heavily on performance marketing and lower-funnel acquisition activity. As the company scaled, leadership recognised the need for a more sophisticated marketing approach that balanced premium brand positioning with measurable commercial performance.
The successful candidate needed to:
- Sharpen and differentiate the value proposition across two distinct customer audiences
- Balance long-term brand building with immediate lead generation objectives
- Operate effectively at both board and executional level
- Optimise the patient journey across acquisition, conversion and retention
- Make strategic decisions around internal capability versus external agency support
The role required a rare combination of strategic thinking, commercial acumen and hands-on marketing leadership experience within premium, high-consideration consumer environments.
Solution: A targeted search in a competitive market
We delivered a retained executive search focused on senior marketing leaders from premium healthcare, luxury retail and high-consideration consumer service environments.
The search process included:
- Comprehensive market mapping across relevant sectors
- Benchmarking leadership profiles against OCL Vision’s growth objectives
- A structured assessment process focused on strategic capability, commercial impact and cultural alignment
- Weekly steering conversations with senior stakeholders to maintain alignment throughout the process
The process ultimately resulted in:
- 9 shortlisted candidates
- 4 final-stage panel interviews with the CEO, Chair and Lead Surgeon
- 1 successful offer and appointment
Throughout the assignment, we provided continuous market insight, candidate calibration and feedback management to ensure the process remained closely aligned to the evolving needs of the business.
Outcome: Strengthening leadership for the next phase of expansion
The successful candidate joins the senior leadership team, reporting directly to the CEO. They bring the strategic mindset and executional drive to refresh OCL’s brand, optimise the patient journey, and scale acquisition across both consumer and clinical markets.
It was a challenging brief and a tight time scale but Harrison at 3Search quickly grasped what we were looking for and helped refine the brief further. They then worked at pace to deliver a strong shortlist of candidates, communicating well throughout as a true business partner. We’re delighted by the outcome and quality of work delivered by 3Search.
Get in touch to learn more about our executive search services.
