Interview with Alessandro Cormio - Chief Creative Officer at Naturality Digital

Alessandro Cormio is the Chief Creative Officer at Naturality Digital - a top creative and digital marketing agency from Shenzhen, China. Alessandro's experience started in Europe as a creative design partner for small and large businesses across the continent and beyond it. His passion for traveling has lead Alessandro in China, where he established Naturality Digital. About his traveling experience, leadership, business, and productivity we will find out directly from Alessandro in this exclusive interview for TechBehemoths! 

Hi Alessandro, welcome to TechBehemoths! Please tell us a little about yourself. Your background and how did you come to this point?

My name is Alessandro Cormio and I’m the Chief Creative Officer at Naturality Digital, a creative design and digital marketing agency based in Shenzhen (China), with secondary offices in Zurich (Switzerland) and Milan (Italy). After graduating in Art Design in Milan (Italy) I have been working with visual design with companies all across Europe and USA, from startups to big brands.

However, after some years of working experience in Italy/Europe, I had the need to look for a new challenge. On top of the design, I’m a very passionate traveler – or to better say it, I love discovering cultures. I like to discover places, and ways of living, and stay in touch with different people to help me understand how’s life in different places. In 2017 I took the decision to quit my job in Italy and travel all across Asia, and the silk road, by land with a budget of 10 USD a day. During this trip, I was working as a freelancer on the road, thanks to a couple of clients I kept from my past experiences. My trip lasted 2 years, and I have been sleeping on 211 different beds (when I had one), almost 600 cars (hitchhiking), and over 20 countries, “ending” in Timor Leste. Once in Timor Leste, where I have been staying for about a month, I decided to take my first flight and get to Hong Kong and cross the eastern part of China.

I didn’t know I was going to stay here till I got the chance to work in a company, and this is it how all started. Since that time, I have been working between Europe and China for many companies, helping them to boost and take their products and ideas to the overseas market. Today we run our small design studio and digital marketing agency with a very passionate group of people. We’re trying to build a new working culture – particularly if we talk about China – by putting every single member of our team on the same level. Our hierarchy is led by the team, and not by one single person.

When and how did you start your business? Is there an interesting story here?

I started this digital marketing agency in Shenzhen (China) - so called Naturality Digital - in 2020 together with my partner Kazaf Ye, which was a client of the first company I get to work within China, and some of the best people I had the luck to meet in the past years, through my trips, university, and companies I have been working with. We wanted to do this to find new opportunities right when the COVID19 started, and eventually things evolved and developed further. We have managed to establish a company in China, Italy, and Switzerland to cover in the best way possible the needs of clients and markets. We have quickly managed to put together a small group of experts with a very strong passion for what they do: today we can count a team of over 15+ people between videomakers, photographers, designers, and skilled marketers with a great variety of culture and international background from different continents. This is what will help us to do what we do at our best.

What I like the most is the relationship we have been able to put together: the team behind the content production is basically made of my ex-university classmates, as well as the rest of the team is coming from some of my best friends and talents from Switzerland, China, other parts of Italy, USA and many more. Each one of us is really "contaminated" with different life experiences and work paths in different countries and cultures. I’d like to catch this opportunity to thank each one of them: Francesco Di Biase, Federica Quadrelli, Valerie Teng, Phil Ye, Alice Micthel, Edgar Zollinger, Andrea Pelino and all the rest I can’t keep mentioning to don’t make the list extremely long.

What do you think you’d be doing right now if your business didn’t exist?

I’d be traveling somewhere else in the world, or maybe having another business activity or job somewhere else in the world. Maybe another digital marketing agency and design or so. Whatever it would be, I’d do it because I like it.

What’s your technique for staying productive throughout the day?

Listening to music is essential for me. On top of this, whatever I do here at Naturality Digital, is coming from the passion for what I do – and We do. This is what helps us at Naturality Digital: we always try to do our best, and bring in new creative ideas that can help companies to boost their presence, global sales, and brand awareness.

How do you define “being successful”?

Do something unique you can be proud of.

When I started to work in China, one of the first projects I put my hands on was the creation of a visual brand identity for a gaming company. I’d define this as one of the first and best projects I have been doing since I started and moved to China, and definitely, something unique that can explain “being successful”. This brand made about $42 million USD in 2019.

What do you like to do when you’re not working?

I love to do sports activities, meet with friends, read books or online articles, and watch movies. If possible, travel – or have an adventure -, of course.

In the image above you can see a good example of creativity and design for which I got inspired during a short trip, and then got to develop it more and more while doing some of my favorite activities.

What are your recommendations for a business or developer novice?

Do what you love to do, and commit yourself to it. Don’t start something with the objective of purely making money. It won’t work out, and it will dry you down.

Thank you for accepting this interview, Alessandro. Your business and travel experience is a great example of a successful blend between pleasure and work. Wish you and Naturality Digital good luck!

Alessandro Cormio is the founder and also the Chief Creative Officer at Naturality Digital. If you like this interview, please don't hesitate to get in touch with Naturality Digital on social media: Instagram - facebook - LinkedIn - Behance