Mazda Motors UK has promoted Claire Andrews to the role of marketing director.

The new role, effective from October 1, was previously a combined responsibility of sales and marketing director Mark Cameron, however the functions have been split in a recent restructure of the sales and marketing functions at Mazda UK.

Andrews has been at Mazda in marketing and business management roles since joining it from Lotus Cars in 2002.

Her most recent position was senior marketing manager.

In that role Andrews focused on the development of the Mazda brand strategy in the UK, which she will continue in her director’s role. Already she has put in place brand building initiatives such as the Zoom-Zoom Weekends fully integrated campaign.

Managing director Jeremy Thomson said: "Claire’s commitment to ensuring consistency across all communications ensures a sustainable and enhanced future for Mazda.

"Short term, Claire’s priorities will be to continue to strengthen the brand in the UK market and increase car buyer’s purchase consideration, while successfully launching our cars and consistently portraying our brand as ‘Stylish’, ‘Insightful’ and ‘Spirited’ across all customer communications and touch points."

Andrews commissioned the sponsorship of Channel4’s ‘Jamie’s American Road Trip’ and ‘Kevin’s Grand Tour’ in 2009 followed by ‘Gordon’s Great Escape’ in 2010, which Mazda said have demonstrated strategic fit with the Mazda brand values; insightful, spirited and fun.

This month, Mazda is about to launch its latest sponsorship with ITV1’s new program ‘71 Degrees North’.

Mazda said the programme’s content perfectly compliments the Mazda MX-5 Thrills campaign theme ‘Once driven, thrills are harder to find’ and is due to launch on 11th September.

Furthermore, Andrews’ lead on the Thrills campaign has challenged the normal conventions seen in traditional automotive advertising by not showing any imagery of the car itself.

Instead, the ads focus on the thrill drivers experience when driving the Mazda MX-5, and feature images of people embarking on extreme thrilling experiences such as whale somersaulting, condor gliding, buffalo derby, lilo rafting down a waterfall, tea-tray sledging off the top of a mountain, or skateboarding down the Hoover dam, in order to match the feeling experienced when driving the car.