About Me
I’ve spent my career working at the intersection of consumer behavior, strategy, and activation, both inside brands and on the agency side.
I’ve held roles as Creative Director, Head of Marketing, Head of Global PR and Brand Strategist, leading everything from global brand repositioning and sustainability transformation strategies to go-to-market strategies, campaigns, and long-term communication frameworks. I’ve worked closely with executive teams, led internal and external teams, and been accountable not just for ideas, but for results.
Today, I run Above The Clouds, my freelance brand and marketing consultancy platform. It’s where I bring together everything I’ve learned about consumers, culture, sustainability, and brand-building, helping brands make better decisions and create real marketing impact.
My Beliefe
I believe brands don’t grow by saying more; they grow by understanding better. Consumer insight is not the end goal. It’s a tool.
A powerful one, but only if it’s mastered, interpreted, and translated into strategy, creativity, and action.
I don’t work as a “consumer insights consultant” in isolation. I work with insight as the starting point for building strategies, concepts, and communication that people actually feel something for and act on.
Real relevance happens when insight, strategy, and activation are connected. When brands don’t just know what consumers think but understand why they behave the way they do and how to respond with clarity, honesty, and intent.
My Approach
Everything I do starts with the consumer, but it never stops there.
I work through an integrated, consumer-centric process designed to move brands from understanding to execution.
Mapping
Consumer motivations, tensions, aspirations, and behaviors.
Alignment
Defining what your brand means in the eyes of the consumer. Connecting brand values, positioning, and behavior to culture and context.
Planning
Turning insight into strategy, long-lead concepts, and campaigns.
Activation
Translating strategy and concepts into playbooks and communication that live across channels, markets, and touchpoints.
Lived in Malaysia working as a dive instructor and managed dive centers.
I lived in Malaysia for a few years, around the year 2000, working as a specialty diving instructor and managing three dive centers on the Perhentian Islands, a Marine Protected Area with a lot of illegal fishing and a unique mix of biodiversity that needed protection, at some times in unorthodox ways. Later this experience turned out to be my inspiration for - The Ghost Net Project - at Tretorn 2016.
Creative Strategist and Marketing Specialist.
With more than 20 years across brand strategy, creative direction, and marketing/PR, I help lifestyle, outdoor, and sports brands grow by understanding people and turning that understanding into strategy, concepts, and communication that actually work.
Fredrik Ekström
Creative Strategist & Marketing Specialist
Let's Connect & Collaborate
I offer a freelance consultant service where you as client get the benefits of in-depth expertise across a number of specialty areas, without having to increase your permanent staff or contract a full size agency.