Podcasts about dmas

Tonight's Guest WeatherBrain is a Professor of Geology from the University of Alabama, where he specializes in synoptic climatology, which focuses on the intersection of weather, risk, perception and public response.  His research focuses on how people interpret severe weather messaging; especially tornadoes and hurricanes.  He's also a key contributor to projects on warning communication.    Dr. Jason Senkbeil, welcome to WeatherBrains! Tonight's First Guest Panelist is a WeatherBrains regular and is the Science and Operations Officer at the NWS office in Birmingham.  Kevin Laws, it's always good to see you! Tonight's Second Guest Panelist is the Director of the NWS Operations Proving Ground.  He graduated with a Bachelor's in Geography at Arizona State University.  JJ Brost, welcome to WeatherBrains! Our email officer Jen is continuing to handle the incoming messages from our listeners. Reach us here: email@weatherbrains.com. Baseball sized hail near Bowling Green (06:28) Weather literacy in the U. S. Southeast (09:28) Factors in geography in risk perception (10:41) Path direction of tornadoes (17:15) General public's lack of geographic awareness and its long-term effects (18:40) NWS BMX leads the Nation in FAR and POD (20:55) Two Dimensional map space vs Three Dimensional world space (27:50) General public interpreting text from a NWS warning polygon (35:20) Literacy issues with audiences when distributing a weather forecast (40:30) What does an Enhanced severe risk mean and why is it so difficult to forecast?  (01:03:00) Improving consistency with different NWS offices as DMAs dissolve (01:28:30) Parking under overpasses (01:53:00) Bruce Jones/Midland Weather Radio  (Out this week) The Astronomy Outlook with Tony Rice (01:37:43) This Week in Tornado History With Jen (01:41:01) E-Mail Segment (01:42:38) and more! Web Sites from Episode 1009: Midland Weather Radio Picks of the Week: Dr. Jason Senkbeil - "Geographical constraints on rapid comprehension of tornado warning information" by Dr. Jason Senkbeil Kevin Laws - NWS Heat Safety Risk Program Bruce Jones - Out James Aydelott - Out Jen Narramore - Victims of Kentucky's recent severe thunderstorms/tornadoes Rick Smith - Out Troy Kimmel - KAKE News on X: News Coverage Kim Klockow-McClain - Are Smartphones Creating A Loss of Spatial Awareness In Children? John Gordon - The man who's blindness, deafness, and baldness was cured by lightning Bill Murray - Out James Spann - Aaron Brackett on X: Lightning strikes a Newcastle, OK police cruiser The WeatherBrains crew includes your host, James Spann, plus other notable geeks like Troy Kimmel, Bill Murray, Rick Smith, James Aydelott, Jen Narramore, John Gordon, and Dr. Kim Klockow-McClain. They bring together a wealth of weather knowledge and experience for another fascinating podcast about weather.

Sam and Max dial in with Liam Fray, frontman of Manchester's iconic Courteeners to speak about the release of their seventh studio album, "Pink Cactus Cafe". In Liam's first ever Australian Interview, the cover off the different kind of magics in a 50,000-person gig and a 300-capacity nightclub romp, collaborating with their musical mates (including some Aussie favourites), and how they manage to pick and choose a tour setlist from their massive back catalog.Connect with Courteeners on Instagram and Facebook, and listen to their seventh record, "Pink Cactus Cafe" on Spotify or Apple Music.Discover more new music and hear your favourite artists with 78 Amped on Instagram and TikTok.

Max dials in with Illy around the release of his seventh album, "Good Life" to find out what inspired the genre-hopping record. Along the way they cover how a few of the bangers have been on the hard drive for nearly five years, what fans can expect on their return to Illy's triumphant return to the live stage, and whether a certain Manchurian band might have a spot for him at their shows.Connect with Illy on Instagram and TikTok, and listen to his latest album, "Good Life", on Spotify and Apple Music. For tickets to his live show, and information about album listening parties, head to his website.Discover more new music and hear your favourite artists with 78 Amped on Instagram and TikTok.

Toby Espinosa, the VP of DoorDash ads, reflects on the tremendous growth of the delivery platform, saying the key to this is local businesses. Episode TranscriptPlease note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio. Damian: [00:00:00] I'm Damian Fowler.Ilyse: And I'm Ilyse LiffreingDamian: And welcome to this edition of The Current Podcast.Ilyse: This week, we're delighted to talk with Toby Espinoza, the VP of DoorDash Ads.Damian: And Toby is responsible for connecting brands, local and national, to the more than 37 million customers who place orders on DoorDash marketplaces each month.Ilyse: At this point, DoorDash is a household name, no pun intended. It has more than 7 million couriers delivering orders for DoorDash from around 550, 000 merchants.Damian: Hard to believe that the company was founded just over 10 years ago in 2013. And Toby joined the company in 2015. So he's seen DoorDash go from strength to strength.Naturally, we start by asking him about how the company has changed over the last decade.Ilyse: So Toby, DoorDash celebrated its 10th anniversary last year. And I, I remember when you guys launched, I would just say, because I was like a hungry college student at the time.And it was like, perfect timing to get [00:01:00] anything delivered to my dormToby: And where were you?Ilyse: In San Francisco.Toby: Francisco? No way. Oh, awesome.Ilyse: was like, yeah, it was like I was in the right place at the right time for sure. Yes. And, so how would you say has the company evolved from a food delivery platform to the platform it is today?Toby: When I joined the company, we were in 4, 5 metros.And we were completely focused on one product in four or five markets. And back in 2015 when I joined the food delivery market, as you remember, seamless reigned supreme in New York. Grubhub was in Chicago and everywhere else food delivery was pizza: Domino's, Papa John's, Pizza Hut. And a few local restaurants that were able to afford having couriers. The market, everybody thought, was saturated. We entered, the company had a thesis that the market itself, given the advent of mobile technology, we believed that [00:03:00] if you took this device, this mobile device, where now a dasher had a mobile phone, a consumer had a mobile phone, and actually restaurants had access to this mobile superhighway, that if we connected all of them, there would be a larger opportunity for growth.Growth being the key word there, because as much as DoorDash has changed over the last 10 years, we have gone from a one product, one market business to a multiple product, multiple geography business, with 37 million monthly active users, over 15 million monthly active subscribers to our platform.If you go back to our founding story, Tony, Stanley and Andy, when they started DoorDash, walked down University Avenue in Palo Alto and they went from store to store asking every local business, how can I help you grow? That was the founding question. It wasn't can I build a logistics network, it wasn't, can I build an ad business? It was, “Hey, how can I help you grow?” And the opportunity they found was let's do a restaurant oriented delivery network for everybody across suburban markets. And that's what took off.Ilyse: How would you say that growth has like translated on the ads marketplace side of things? Toby: Yeah.The hard part about building something at the scale that DoorDash [00:05:00] operates is the consumer side. Building a consumer promise and then making that promise better and better and better every day, getting faster and cheaper, that is actually the harder part to find.Product market fit from a consumer perspective. Once we have that, and once we have that, we want to continue to compound that over and over and over againAbout four, four years ago, five years ago, our merchants and so stores within our ecosystem raised their hand and started to ask us, “Hey, do you have any tools to help me grow even faster?” That's how the ad business started. It was a it's very fundamental. It's a core to who we are. It's a growth business. We have customers who want to grow [00:06:00] faster. And what we then tried to figure out was how can we help serve this promise for these customers while also helping our marketplace continue to grow?So the best way to do that is to align incentives, uh, show us the incentive, and we'll show you the outcome that we're driving towards.Our AD team is incentivized both by driving incremental return from a spend perspective for advertisers, as well as driving incremental volume for our consumer marketplace, which is very different than most advertising platforms. Most advertising houses, you have product and tech on one side driving growth, and you have ads trying to monetize it on the other side. We wanted to bring those together to make sure we were able to continue to grow on both sides and serve our customers best. Damian: And cut to date to this rise of, spectacular rise of retail media, which of course is one of the hottest topics right now in our space. DoorDash of course has built its own retail media network in recent years. Could you talk a little bit about how you took some of those concepts you just talked about and built the network?Toby: Yeah, absolutely. So we, again we wanted to be completely aligned with the customer. So the first customer that we started to think about was the SMB owner operator restaurant that we all know, that's in our town.In San Francisco, it's Suvla. In New York, it's Electric Burrito. These places that, these brands [00:08:00] that we are absolutely in love with. What we quickly realize is that person, that customer, there's two fundamental things that are very difficult.The first is that they have to be an expert at 15 different things So, if we own a local restaurant, a local retailer, We have to be great at real estate. We have to be great at marketing. We have to be great at financials. We have to be great at accounting. We have to be great at customer service. We have to be great at creating a great product, which is food, right?And so when we look at this core customer, they're supposed to be an expert at 15 different things Our job is to go after one of those. And make sure that they don't have to think about that growth as [00:09:00] much as they used to by putting a little bit of the burden of that growth on our shoulders. What that means in practice when we launched the business for for SMB customers, we focused on building an economic model that worked for them. Last week, in San Francisco, I went and picked up a salad. at, at one of my favorite, favorite places. And there was a restaurant right next door that had just opened a month in. A month in, and nobody in his restaurant.Completely empty. Maybe three or four people in a, in, that could otherwise have a capacity of 50. And I went online and I looked. He was running advertising across a bunch of different channels that we all know. Snap, Google, Meta, etc.This person was in the red month day one of the month.It's one of the hardest things in this country. These small businesses that start [00:10:00] negative every single month. And on top of that, they also had to layer in more spend on Google and meta to try to get out of that hole.We took the premise of we want to be your growth assistant and we took the premise of it's really, really hard. for you to basically grow your business without having to also add more money into this negative cash cycle.And we said, let's build a product where you do not have to pay us unless you get an order.So unless we send you money, you do not have to pay us. And those two things together have helped us build one of the fastest growing retail media networks, particularly focused on a customer that was completely underserved. Damian: Could you talk about, a little bit more about how you [00:11:00] kind of expanded those relationships with both the national brands, tying that into the local, the business works at a local level fundamentally.Toby: So in the restaurant space. The vast, vast majority of restaurants on Main Street are local. Even if you are a McDonald's franchisee, so you have one of the largest brands, you're a, you're a small business owner.Really, the, the Starbucks, the Chipotles of the world that are corporately owned restaurants at scale are actually the smallest. They're the 10%, not the 90 percent in the U. S. And so our ad product designed on a CPA based level where we can be the growth assistant for all these owner operators is really for the 90.It's built for the majority. Um, that being said, we also just launched, uh, last week the our new product, which is our ad manager and our [00:12:00] ad manager for the enterprise restaurant segment is designed actually to help both the C. M. O. Of McDonald's and the owner operator franchisee within the system. And the way that we've done that is we've actually built the first of its kind way of buying or thinking about purchasing acrossA national media buyer, an agency at the national level, a district media buyer, most of these franchisees actually also have districts, or DMAs, where they have their own pools of funds that can be allocated for growth, and then also at the local level. Incremental to that, not only is if you're a franchisee and you own a couple McDonald's and a couple, uh, you know, a couple Subways and a couple other brands. Now you can also manage your business across brands. It's really the first of a kind product in its space, designed entirely to kind of work between local and national brand.We also, of course, support local. started to invest in larger CPGs. And there, you know, we really look at some of the other large retail media networks in the [00:13:00] space. You know, today I was reading the the amazing work that you all did with a woman who leads Kroger's retail media business and built it from scratch.We find a lot of inspiration from those folks learning, understanding how we can add an incremental service to folks that are already spending a lot of money at other retail media networks. And, um, and I think we found Uh, some very cool opportunities for us there, Ilyse: Very cool. You were saying how it's about 90 percent SMBs and 10 percent um, big business. Um, how does that play out within the DoorDash platform?Toby: yeah.yeah. So so it's really and when I meant that it's kind of think about where the dollars are coming from. So You might think of DoorDash Volume as large businesses. You know, a lot of people are ordering McDonald's. But the reality is the, the spender, the buyer of media could be a local franchisee.So the brand is national, but the spend is still local. That's kind of what I was saying there. On [00:14:00] the, as you know, also on the CPG side, uh, large brands like Pepsi and Coca Cola and P& G, those are large, national, entrenched franchises. Brands. Those are timeless, timeless brands that have been around for a very long time.And so the question there is, how do we build products that are timely to help the timeless? And that's been a very interesting journey for us over the last two and a half years. It's a, it's a new space for us again, as I said. Um, but it's going swimmingly well. And, and today we have the opportunity to sit on stage with, with Pernod Ricard, which is, of course, one of the storied alcohol manufacturers.Ilyse: Um, can you talk a little bit about the Partnerships and how you actually go about working with like those brands and retailers that are using your platform so much Toby: We, like I said, were founded as a growth helper. So built in our DNA is working with others to help them grow.We obviously have a [00:15:00] very large consumer marketplace that is that has helped those businesses grow. And so some of us think of in the same You know, uh, letters of other large consumer marketplaces like an Amazon, uh, like a Walmart e com.But we are fundamentally built in our DNA a partner oriented culture. What that means is first we get to partner with great local brands, mid market brands, national brands, add in the manufacturers, but that also means we get to do fun things like Add in Max, or add in Chase, or add in other folks where there are a lot of people, if given the opportunity, want to help local businesses grow.Our job is to help figure out a way to make that happen. Ilyse: would you say that is captured users I guess and they'reToby: It's a, no, it's a great question. The underlying thing is, how do we do it in a way that continues to compound our consumer promise, which is faster, better, cheaper. And, and, you know, we'll be the first to say there are some partnerships [00:16:00] where it doesn't necessarily help that much.And then there's other partnerships where it has been critical. Think about our Chase partnership and, and the depth in which we've built that partnership over time, where everybody that has a, you know, a Chase credit card has the opportunity to participate in one of the largest subscription, local subscription programs, uh, in the world.And so, some work quite well, others are challenging, and we're a first principled company that, that tries to get better every single day.Damian: Just to on that point are you very strategic about looking for new partnerships you know, that's an interesting one chase and of course there are many others but how do you think about it and go about building those different partnerships.Toby: Yeah it's a collaboration Internally within DoorDash, we have, uh, general managers that run different business units, just as myself. We have functional leaders like our incredible, uh, CMO Kofi, who has built one of the world's largest brands in a span of years, not decades, which is incredibly, incredibly amazing, and he is a celebrity. If you ever want to feel like a [00:17:00] celebrity, just walk with Kofi in Cannes for about 15 to 20 minutes and it'll be the coolest thing you'll ever experience.Um, next year, exactly, exactly. Um, but It's a collaboration across different functions, and then it's a collaboration with a partner. You know, one of the most interesting partnerships that we've launched in the last two years, from my vantage point, is we are a close partner with Amazon in Canada. Now, a lot of folks, when you think of DoorDash and Amazon would say, competitors, that, that doesn't work.Right. But we work really, really hard to try to figure out anywhere, if possible, with the largest businesses and brands that we look up to, is there a place that we can collaborate and again, help local businesses grow. That's the fundamental premise behind the whole thing Ilyse: very cool now what about when it comes to like an ad perspective. How are you working with these brands and partnering with them?Toby: Yeah, we are, I think in the ad ecosystem, you know, it's, it's, it's, there's a simple recipe that we're trying to follow. One is access. So can I [00:18:00] provide access for people to purchase? We, very early on, our first investment was in a self serve ad manager, so that local businesses could purchase our products, both promotions and our ad products, live themselves, without needing to talk to somebody.So that was first. So one is access. That's the news also from last week, where now we provide access to the largest restaurant brands, DMAs, and franchisees across the country. first of a kind product. Again, I know I keep saying that, but I'm very, very proud of it because not many people, not many technologists build for franchisees in this country.And they are one of the largest, um, one of the largest, most hardworking groups of individuals that that again, we look up to. Um, so one is access Two is providing the tools to get the best return possible. So that is, can I do better targeting? Can I? Are there new access points that I can, that I can get to?Along those lines, we've invested a lot in in better targeting again for those enterprise restaurants. [00:19:00] So today you can target new users, you can target lapsed users, you can do that if you're a brand, a small brand like a single owner operator, you can do it if you're a national restaurant, and you can also do it if you're one of the largest brands in the country.So one is better targeting tools and incrementality. And then the final is, is impressions. So, You know, DoorDash, again, we are humbly one of the favorite and largest marketplaces in the country. But we very well know there are other people that are hungry on a daily basis who are not eyes on DoorDash.And so, can we provide the ability for people, uh, for brands to reach those people using our data? And that was one of the announcements we made last week was as well.Ilyse: so one of the things I feel like DoorDash is almost known for in the advertising marketing space is it aligns itself to big occasions throughout the year.Ilyse: I know we saw [00:20:00] DoorDash for the Super Bowl, Mother's Day. Can you talk about how you plan for such occasions? And maybe what's your favorite one to work at on and be like presentToby: maybe what's Yeah We have learned over time that these occasions. Because we learned from our core customers, both the consumer and merchants that these occasions are important to them.So if you think of, if you think of Super Bowl, imagine you are a local owner operator of a wing restaurant in Tulsa. Super Bowl is your Super Bowl, right? It is the biggest day of the year where you sell out your entire inventory at the staff up, you have to build for it. We wanted to follow our customers into that moment.Mother's Day, huge moment.Both for folks where it's a special day to remember somebody or for folks that are trying to be a mother for the first time, right? So you have this both, both signs, [00:21:00] an incredible opportunity to reach consumersfrom an advertising perspective. Again, going back to partnerships, they're tricky.You have an advertiser who's excited to also follow you into that occasion. And what we try to do with these three way partnerships, we've done them with Wendy's, we've done them with Roku, we've done them with many others, trying to find three way alignment of incentives to, to again, drive local growth for our customers.Damian: I think one of the best gifts I ever got, was when my son was born somebody bought us a DoorDash gift card which was so helpful to have food delivered you know when you're at home with this tiny little baby.Ilyse: Showing up at those occasions, but also, you know, just ongoing brand campaigns. How does that proximity, why is it important for brand building? How does this, like, enable you to extend into new categories?Toby: Yeah, have you? Um, Our Super Bowl commercial is a great example of this. This past year, uh, the words were a door to more DoorDash went from again being a single vertical single product company to a multi vertical multi product company in a very, very, very fast time frame. Now, consumers are incredible.They learn very quickly. Habits are harder to change and harder to adapt and move over [00:23:00] time. And so we are in the earliest innings of our consumers really understanding that now you could actually get a pair of sneakers delivered to you on DoorDash when you need a new pair, like I did this weekend in order to go for a run.And in that moment, being able to kind of jump on these large consumer moments help from our vantage point.Our 37 million monthly active users start to understand that really DoorDash is here as an assistant in your life across all of these categories and verticals whenever you need us. We aren't just Thai food, now we're also the ability to get something, uh, to get something when you're feeling sick.And, um, and we're very, very proud to do that and very humbled to do that for our customers. Damian: Yeah. that's uh, expanding the whole concept of, of of DoorDash. Um, speaking of expanding the concept, you know, you've also cultivated good partnerships with streaming partners, and you [00:24:00] mentioned Max a little bit earlier. Why is it that streaming and delivery seem to kind of work in synchrony? Toby: it's again, I think it goes back to the moment. There's a very happy moment in my household when we finish work. And we have some, we get a little, a door, a little ring on our door, and there's a package outside, and it's filled with two burritos. And we get to turn on Max and watch industry. There's a sliver of moment in time where we're just feeling absolute happiness and joy.Now, that is a moment that a lot of consumers around the country and around the world feel. We're trying to give everybody a little bit of time back. Again, this concept of putting the weight of other things on our shoulders as a company to help people, to help local economies grow, to help [00:25:00] save consumers time, to help Dashers make a little bit of extra money.That is what we are trying to do at Dash. And so, aligning ourselves in this moment of peace. This moment of just absolute happiness with a streaming service, which all of us experience,is a very nice moment to be right next to, uh, to be right next to these brands from a consumer perspective. And so they've been, they've been very, they've been great partnerships so far.We're very excited, uh, about, about thinking about finding more of those opportunities as time goes Damian: about door dashes as a way to get time back, you know, but of course it does doesIlyse: There's too many things to worry about outside of that. Damian: we're going to ask the inevitable question about AI and how, you know, obviously door dash must be integrated with AI technology. But how do you think about it as we look ahead?Toby: We, as a company were very [00:26:00] data driven company. We have been from our founding. Again, we are riding on the backs of one of the largest technological revolutions of our time, the Internet and then the Internet plus mobile. And so to say that we want to be and continue to be students about how this next revolution will change, both from.from our merchants, consumers and dashers lives. We are in the very earliest innings and we're trying to learn as fast as possible. Um, I think what's very exciting if you kind of take a step back and you again put on the mindset of the shoes of we are trying to be an assistant for all of our customers across a bunch of different ways.Dasher Make, uh, from a financial services perspective, helping them make more money, helping them find more opportunities to make money, consumers saving time, and merchants making more. If you kind of put yourselves in all those shoes, and we're trying to be an assistant, AI as a technology will only help accelerate our mission of doing that and then unlocking growth for local.I think we're going to [00:27:00] see one of the largest increases in, in growth that we desperately, desperately need for those. Places that are our favorite coffee shop, Thai food place, uh, and, and, um, you know, and place to go pick up your, your, your meds when you're a little sick. And so it's, it's a pretty cool future.We're very excited for it.Damian: in his 50 seatToby: I, we are absolutely, we, to be, to be clear, we DoorDash. He's now using our ad product. So if we can send them any incremental customers, it'll help them. It'll help them grow his business. Damian: There's one more question, I guess. And it's a sort of like a forward looking question. And it's are there any innovations that you're thinking about into 2025 that can help with this growth mindset that you've been talking about? Toby: we, We've done an okay job. We've done a great job of the access point, which is opening up an ad manager, [00:28:00] opening up a self serve sponsored listing, allowing CPG brands to access our consumers. We've done it. We've done a great job at that. We've done an okay job at the second two, which is.once you open up a lot of this inventory and help find ways to grow, it gets complex.I think we've added incremental complexity so far to our customers' lives for most of our customers, our advertisers, and so our team is extremely excited, looking forward to continue to take more of the complexity out of our customer's lives as we layer in more complexity. On the product and engineering platform that we've built internally, and that is a very hard problem to solve, but I have one of the best teams to help us go solve that, and we're very excited to take it on.

The long-awaited third season kicks off with an episode about Faith. Recommended and referenced resources include: Quotations: Philip Melanchton, Capon, and Cave Books: Faith, Hope and Carnage by Nick Cave and Sean O'Hagan, Lancelot by Walker Percy, The Family Reunion by T.S. Eliot, The book of Genesis Movies: Leon Morin, Priest (1961), Prometheus (2012), The Rescue (2021), Field of Dreams (1989), The Book of Eli (2010), Wings of Desire (1987), Friendly Persuasion (1956), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) Songs: "Believe" by DMAs, "Do You Believe" by Poolside, "Faith" by The 8th Day, "I Trust" by The Byrds, "Someday" by Glass Tiger, "Faith in Something Bigger" by The Who, "It's Unbelievable (How You Control My Soul)" by Jeanne & The Darlings, "Lay All Your Love on Me" by ABBA, "Letting Go" by Wings, "No Doubt About It" by Hot Chocolate, "Happy Birthday" By Stevie Wonder, "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)" by ABBA, "I Went to Sleep" by The Beach Boys, "Do You Believe?" by Swamp Dogg, "I've Got Confidence" by Elvis Presley, "I Came to Believe" by Johnny Cash, "I Believe In You" by Bob Dylan

NBCUniversal's ad president talks upfronts, strategic audiences, brand storytelling, and the Paris Olympics.Episode TranscriptPlease note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.[00:00:00] Damian: I'm damian Fowler.[00:00:01] Ilyse: And I'm Eileen Sliffering.[00:00:02] Damian: Welcome to this edition of the Current Podcast.[00:00:05] Ilyse: This week, we're delighted to talk with Allison Levin, who joined NBCUniversal as the President of Advertising and Partnerships earlier this year.[00:00:15] Damian: Allison oversees all ad sales initiatives for NBCUniversal across national and local markets, as well as for the company's Peacock streaming service, which will be the streaming home 000 hours of Olympics coverage for the first time.[00:00:30] Ilyse: It's no doubt going to be a summer of sport for the legacy broadcaster which owns the media rights to the Olympics through 2032 and for the first time the slots on Peacock are open to programmatic buyers.[00:00:44] Damian: that's not all. Just this week, NBCUniversal returned to Radio City Music Hall in New York City for its annual Upfront presentation, celebrating the company's diverse slate of programming. We started by asking Alison about this year's [00:01:00] event.[00:01:00] Alison: Yeah, I mean, it's, this is such a, an incredible busy time of year for all of us. And it really is such a great, like forcing function to take a step back and to have these conversations with clients, both agencies and our brand partners about. What it is that they're excited for the next 12 months.[00:01:17] How do we want to partner together? And what does the future hold, right? there's so many conversations that are in quarter often, but this is the opportunity to really look ahead and talk about the future of our work together. and so I would say from the conversations we've been having, and we've been having, hundreds of conversations across clients and agencies, we're really hearing like.[00:01:36] Two big themes that are coming out. And the first is about strategic audiences. So for those of us that have been in, digital for a long time, this isn't a surprise that, you know, buying off of a more precise audience, like someone who's in market for a car or household income or leveraging. A client's first party data is just a more effective way to place [00:02:00] media than, buying adults 18 to 49.[00:02:03] Like someone had said to me once that adults 18 to 49 is a family reunion. It's not a buying And it's it stuck with me ever, since. And, We are hearing loud and clear from clients that they are really excited to move into more precise audiences, not just in streaming and across digital, but really looking at it on the linear side too, and having one buying tactic across the full portfolio.[00:02:27] And, when you think about Consumers like at the end of the day, we're all consumers. We're all viewers and viewers have a relationship with IP, not delivery mechanism, right? And so as marketers we're hearing from marketers, they want to have that same execution strategy and they really want to find their target audience.[00:02:46] Wherever they may be across a full portfolio in a more precise way. So I would say that's one key theme we're hearing a lot about. and of course that has great implications on programmatic. it has implications on our one [00:03:00] platform, total audience product, Opta, and how we, actually help leverage data to find our audience across our full portfolio. And then. Another really interesting conversation that's been coming up quite a bit. And we just were in a client meeting this morning where this was like front and center, but was how can we partner with our brands to tell stories within our stories? Right? Like, and if you just take a step back, like storytelling is, the fundamental part.[00:03:30] Of our foundation. It's how we have learned as human beings, how we've grown. It's our number one form of entertainment is being entertained by stories. And I include sports in that. Like there is a beginning, middle end of sports. And so as we talk to marketers, they really want to And work together to stand out, to tell stories within our stories.[00:03:50] Like even thinking about Jake from safe farm, that's a story, right? Like these brand, champions are storytellers too. So I'd say the combination of what we're hearing a lot in market is [00:04:00] strategic audiences. So moving to more precise audiences across linear and streaming, and then going deeper and big content moments, whether that be sports or Bravo or big live events, like Thanksgiving day parade and more.[00:04:15] Damian: That was really interesting. So it's actually getting quite granular and clients have to pay attention to what's actually happening in the programming. I'm[00:04:26] Alison: I mean, like that's really how these moments stand out is like taking IP together and helping infuse a brand into the IP.[00:04:36] Damian: going to switch a little bit, but related, but obviously it's going to be a big summer for NBCUniversal with the Paris Olympics, which, you have the media rights to in the US. And I've been hearing that you've been setting up major events like the opening ceremony, with the Paris Olympics.[00:04:51] record revenue. Maybe this is an obvious question, but why is this inventory so enticing for [00:05:00] advertisers?[00:05:01] Alison: Yeah. I'm four months into my time at NBCU and, just the, value and interest in this asset is even Stronger than I imagined truly. And I think, when you think about it, it makes complete sense of why this is so interesting for brands and so exciting for consumers.[00:05:18] But like, I think from a brand perspective, just even thinking about the state of mind that people are in when they're watching this, There, especially right now, in times when people are divided, like opportunities and places and content that bring people together that are really moments of joy and happiness and suspense.[00:05:38] so the mindset that you are reaching people in, in that moment is really just, So valuable from a marketer perspective. and then I'd say the second is just reach, like how much reach the Olympics actually drives the share of attention it drives. So from a marketer perspective, like you find this audience in this really engaged mindset in [00:06:00] moments of happiness and togetherness, we're all rooting for team USA.[00:06:04] And then it also has such incredible reach and share. Of attention during this timeframe, where everyone's talking about it, everyone's watching it. So what an opportunity from a marketer perspective to really break through. and then you add to that, like the consumer experience too. So thinking about Peacock and all we're doing on the Peacock side, on the Olympics that we're going to have thousands of hours of content.[00:06:27] All of the different games, like never before, different consumer experiences as well. And so that, that combination is just so powerful and we'reseeing such excitement from the market to surround the games and be in the games.[00:06:41] Damian: one of the great things about the Olympics is there's so many sports on offering it. people have so many different interests. And so you can go from surfing to track and field to soccer. So it's really an amazing opportunity.[00:06:54] Wanted to just also touch upon Talk about the fact that for the first time you're going [00:07:00] programmatic on your streaming service in terms of selling the inventory around the Olympics. Why is that so significant?[00:07:10] Alison: I mean, from our perspective, we believe deeply in the power of programmatic and strategic audience buying. and for brands programmatic access really democratizes access to these incredible events where Olympics is one of them, like just even taking a step back, our entire live sports inventory from the NFL to big 10 and more now programmatically Transacted and with that, the number of advertisers in 2023 actually grew 87 percent year over year and the sports revenue doubled, right?[00:07:45] So there's just incredible momentum on the number of advertisers that have access to these huge moments. Like they're huge from a reach perspective. They're huge from an attention perspective. And now we're adding Olympics to that. And so when you think about. What is the [00:08:00] television of today? what is the opportunity for today?[00:08:02] It's precise audiences. Bought in real time and measurable and the ability to optimize. Like now you can do that with Olympics and with all of live sports across Peacock, like it is amazing how much this really changed in the last few years. And so we're so excited to truly. Bring this opportunity to advertisers that historically have not been able to participate.[00:08:25] Um,[00:08:26] And we're just so excited to, to see, all the momentum and get some learnings from it as well.[00:08:32] Ilyse: Yeah, you know, we, always write about how, like, CTV, but now especially like live sports is like democratizing TV, as you say, when it comes to live sports and perhaps especially like now Olympics, are you seeing certain advertisers more interested or is interest really like spanning across sectors at this point?[00:08:54] Damian: point?[00:08:55] Alison: across. Sectors because, and I think the Olympics is a really interesting example because the point [00:09:00] that you made before, there's so many different sports to, so you might be really interested in, swimming or as a brand or rock climbing, you can be specialized, but really from a, taking a step back from a sports perspective, like it drives incredible reach.[00:09:17] And fandom, it's one of the greatest stories told, right? And there's such anticipation as you watch it and suspense. And so that's something that all brands of all different categories really have been interested in, and we've seen just an incredible momentum. And then from the consumer side, it's been tremendous, the ratings.[00:09:38] And I think one of the, the thoughts when streaming came out and we started to put live sports on Peacock was that would cannibalize ratings on linear, but we've not seen that come to life. Like in last year's rating on sports, actually on linear grew and streaming grew. So streaming is just bringing in a whole new audience of viewers that we weren't, that we weren't accessing before.[00:09:59] and so [00:10:00] it's such an opportunity from a consumer perspective. We're creating more ways for them to watch in different ways, but it's also creating and opening up a new door to advertisers that maybe have not been able to access the properties before.[00:10:13] Ilyse: It definitely seems like it's just Changing overall, evolving rather, including as what's happening with this week with upfronts. Really programmatic buys can happen at any time now and that's like altering the traditional upfront marketplace in a sense. Are you seeing this, are the upfronts basically shifting to that always on marketplace?[00:10:38] Alison: What we're seeing on our end is that there really is a finite amount of truly premium professionally produced content. and that is across the board in linear, but also in streaming. And so when you pair that with wanting to find strategic, more precise audiences, or you have a big sale coming up [00:11:00] on, weekend and you want to heavy up during that timeframe, like Locking in those audiences and reserving them is still incredibly important.[00:11:08] And so the role of the upfront and the fact that the upfront is a futures market and you lock in the inventory ahead of time is still. very important. And we're continuing to see that this year and for next year's upfront. But I think the ways that you want to place that upfront, the ways that you wantto say, I'm going to spend this amount and I want it for this audience, but what is the actual tool that you might use to run your campaign?[00:11:31] I think has changed. So if you want to run it as a PG deal through a DSP or PMP deal, that's certainly something that's. That brands have been interested in, and there's a lot of benefits to that too. So I think both things are happening where the upfront is still an important process, reserving inventory is still important, but the, underlying, tools you use to place that upfront, I think have been changing.[00:11:55] Ilyse: Now, when you first announced your Olympic programmatic effort [00:12:00] a few months ago, you stated, and I thought this was very interesting, we're taking back ownership of performance. We drive performance just as well, if not better, than your Metas and your Googles. Can you go into how investing with NBCU drives this performance for marketers?[00:12:17] Alison: Yeah, the team probably at NBCU is like, maybe you might be sick of me hearing, getting on my soapbox about this, but I just think the idea that there is, a media. Activation type called performance media drives me a little bit bonkers because it, it leads people to believe that the rest of it doesn't perform.[00:12:34] and someone had told me the other day, and I thought this was so interesting that I want, they, they said, I think that television advertising has a Branding problem, ironically. And I'm like, I actually think it does too. when you take a step back and you think about what drives performance for advertisers, what moves products off the shelf, what gets people into a dealership, what drives people to studios, it's massive [00:13:00] reach getting as many people as possible.[00:13:02] It's finding the right audience, leveraging first party data, connecting to third party data. It's tools that help you optimize to get smarter and smarter as you go. And then it's real time attribution. And when you take a step back, NBCU reaches 90 percent of us households in a given month.[00:13:22] We have massive reach. We deeply know who our consumers are. We have first party data on over 90 million households. We partner with ad tech to help with real time optimization. And we're getting smarter and going deeper on real time attribution. And so I think to me, the real, the real difference here and the one that we're really excited to work through with our clients is getting faster attribution and measurement in their hands so that they can understand performance and don't have to rely on MMM models that can take nine months to a year.[00:13:54] And it's not actually that the performance is any less than these other players. [00:14:00] It's the perception of the research and the attribution studies that they don't have as quickly as possible. Like we were just in this. Client meeting and she was telling us like all of these social platforms are all claiming incrementality on all this and yet They're not even selling as much as in aggregate They're all saying they're getting credit for right like there needs to be a reassessment of what does attribution?[00:14:23] actually mean how do you look at it holistically? And I think there's, leveraging NBCU's portfolio and understanding the power of the platform as quickly as possible is goal number one for us this year.[00:14:36] Now I know you think about the user experience a lot, on Peacock, on really all of your platforms. What about the ad experience?[00:14:48] Damian: TV[00:14:48] Ilyse: to me is, it seems to be just getting more and more personalized. Why do you think this is important to viewers? Peace.[00:14:56] Alison: Yeah, I personalization makes a better, experience for [00:15:00] consumers and it makes a better experience for brands, right? It drives performance for brands. And, I do think this is such an important element. If you think about the calculation of performance and what drives performance for an advertiser, how a consumer sees that ad, what is their mindset at, and what is the experience around seeing that ad is so So critical and I think sometimes underappreciated, for peacock, we take this so seriously.[00:15:27] Our ad load is the lowest, one of the lowest, if not the lowest of all the premium AVADS. When you are a buyer, you own the pod from a category perspective. So if you are a financial service brand, you own that pod and there's no one else that's near you for the minutes before you Between those breaks, like that is so powerful from a brand perspective and it drives results with the consumers they're trying to reach.[00:15:53] our pause ads that we run are beautiful and done creatively and it drives incredible impact for brands [00:16:00] too. And when you add that combination of, innovative ad units, a great consumer experience, we just see time and time again that it drives results. And we hear everyone's, people tell us all the time, like they are users of.[00:16:12] Peacock, but also other streaming channels and they feel the difference like, and if you feel it as a consumer, it also means that when anadvertiser shows up, you are feeling a different way about them and their products in that moment. So we just take that so seriously. And the fact matters, Peacock was built for advertisers first.[00:16:31] We didn't retrofit as in after the fact. And so it really allowed us to be really thoughtful about building both of these at the same exact time versus figuring one out and then trying to get the other one shoved in there after the fact.[00:16:44] Damian: I read that local markets have a really significant influence on audiences and that national brands can connect with audiences more effectively when they speak with a local voice. And I know that your remit is across national and local. as you oversee that, what's your observation, on that [00:17:00] point?[00:17:01] Alison: Yeah. we've been. I'd say it's really been exciting. working across the national and local teams and there's been so much momentum on the local business, around digital and our ad property called spot on. It's our offering that we have. That's basically allows you to find your audience across Peacock and other digital endpoints, in specific geos and DMAs.[00:17:25] and I think a great example of where we're going with this is the launch of spot on auto. So that product in particular actually syncs up with constellation, as a key partner there with tier three auto and let's see tier three auto in a seamless way, activate across our peacock inventory. And as you know, like there's.[00:17:46] Tremendous opportunity in that category, tremendous, growth from a digital standpoint. And so new tech products and innovations like that to go capture the tier three auto market, but also other local markets [00:18:00] has been really exciting for us. An area of opportunity. And then to your point, when you marry that with what is the, national, business doing right.[00:18:08] So the tier one and what is the impact of running tier one plus tier two auto plus tier three auto on driving people to a dealership. So we're really excited about the early findings we're seeing from spot on auto and a lot more to come there.[00:18:22] Damian: Goes back to driving performance. Thanks.[00:18:24] Alison: Exactly.[00:18:27] Ilyse: now one final question for you. As obviously we're going into this huge summer for NBCU with Olympics programmatic on Peacock. Looking into your crystal ball, what do you imagine for the future ahead of that? How can NBCU even top that?[00:18:43] Damian: didn't[00:18:44] Alison: excited for this summer and I'm so excited for Paris quite personally. Um, but I think one of the things I think that's underappreciated about NBCU, we talked about this a bit at 124, that we've been leading in television [00:19:00] and video innovation. For decades, right? The first NFL game ever aired on NBC was a hundred years ago.[00:19:07] The first viral clip ever on YouTube was SNL. The largest streaming day ever was on Peacock. And, I'm excited for us to take back that narrative a little bit in the market. We've been quietly leading an innovation for decades where you continue to do so. And we do it because brands have always been in our partners.[00:19:27] Number one for us, they're,what we think about when we wake up and we go to bed at night, like making their campaign successful. And we've been innovating to do that. And we are continuing to do that. So I just say like, just thinking about everything we've been doing on Peacock over the last, 12 months.[00:19:45] everything that we were doing on attribution and measurement, all of our work on strategic audiences and Opta, just imagine what we'll do in the next 12 months. Like we're just hitting our stride right now and there's just so much runway ahead for us. And, we've got [00:20:00] great partners that have been here testing and innovating and building alongside of us.[00:20:05] Ilyse:OUTRO[00:20:05] Damian: And that's it for this edition of The Current Podcast. We'll be back next week, so stay tuned.[00:20:11] Ilyse: The current podcast theme is by Love and Caliber. The current team includes Cat Vessey and Sydney Cairns.[00:20:17] Damian: And[00:20:17] remember I'm Damian.[00:20:19] Ilyse: I'm Elise.[00:20:20] Damian: And we'll see you next time. And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and leave us a review.[00:20:25] Also, tune in to our other podcast, The Current Report

Hearst Newspaper's Vice President of Programmatic, Mike Irenski, joins The Current Podcast to explore the value of local journalism and what advertisers need to know about it.  Episode TranscriptPlease note, this transcript  may contain minor inconsistencies compared to the episode audio.[00:00:00]Damian: I'm Damian Fowler. AndIlyse: I'm Ilyse Liffreing.Damian: welcome to this edition of The Current Podcast.Ilyse: This week, we're delighted to talk with Michael Eirenski, the Vice President of Programmatic Revenue at Hearst Newspapers.Damian: Now Hearst has a legacy that goes all the way back to 1887 when William Randolph Hearst acquired the San Francisco Daily Examiner and founded the Hearst Corporation.Ilyse: Only 137 years later, the legacy of the brand continues as the publisher of 24 dailies and 52 weeklies, including papers such as the Houston Chronicle and the San Francisco Chronicle.Damian: Hearst Newspapers has a unique insight into journalism in the U. S. at a local and a national level, even as publishers are under pressure to find fresh ways to fund their newsrooms.Ilyse: We talk with Mike about the value of local journalism and what advertisers need to know about it.Mike: Yeah, so Hearst newspapers has grown a lot. it's funny. I, most people don't know this, is actually 137 year old brand. We've been around, during the same amount of time as some of our friends, down the block or a couple but I think what's really differentiated us is, That, over the [00:02:00] years, we have thousands of employees.We have, award winning content. And, really unique our strong local presence. When people think of. being stale, and I think it's a little bit different here at Hearst Newspapers, is that we've always constantly been evolving. And we take pride in our core product. But I think what is particularly unique is that we have been actively engaging in our local communities over the past dozens of years. And, have really listened to our audiences. So some of the things that, come to light for us is that we are continuing to lean into And we've been [00:03:00] recently as of this year, expanding into, puzzles and gaming. We have, a big comics presence and own, several, large IPs, from Popeye to Betty Boop. And we've also been rethinking about the types of, long form content that we So it's been an evolution over time, but I think what we've really just, continued to lean into is, local community aspect. And we've seen the returns as a result.Ilyse: I had no idea that Hearst is in the IP game so much as it is.Mike: Oh my gosh. I, it's very funny when I first started here, the other side of the floor has a Popeye paraphernalia throughout the office. And I just thought people are really into Popeye. I didn't know that it was anything that we, But it is, one of many, which is fascinating. There's a large video game called Cuphead, which has a Netflix show that is actually something that we also own the IP for. So it's fascinating and [00:04:00] a growing part of our business.Ilyse: Ah, so interesting. Now, with so many, local publications, how does that affect Hearst Newspapers, approach to something like audience segmentation?Mike: Oh, my gosh. It's very funny because each market is completely different. Albany readers that relevant, accurate information that is happening, regardless of where they are.But something we like to say internally is, the national stories are conversations that are being had with everyone, but the local stories are conversations with your friends or your neighbor or your family. And as a result, I think that gives us some level of differentiation. I also joke around that we cover high school sports as if it's the NBA [00:05:00] finals.And while we might not say focus on the Royals, this came up recently, where I was curious in our newsrooms, are we talking about the Royals? Are we providing any content? And the newsrooms have been if the local community isn't really asking for it, that it really isn't, we'll cover it, but it's not just something that we lean into.And I think what I'm very proud of is we stay close to the zeitgeist, but we never follow the zeitgeist. We are really leaning into what our local communities want. And with those boots on the ground doing it, we have just amazing, journalists and, video content creators who are talking to the people.comes out in Ilyse: It's very much community first,Reader driven. Which I'm sure helps when it comes to advertising as well.Mike: Not only our readers react to our content, but also how they react to the adjacent advertising associated to it. And, with [00:06:00] that is something that we're constantly up leveling at the national level and talking to the big brands and agencies on, but just seeing that performance at the local level is a microcosm of the things we could do, but it's very inspiring when you're able to drive business to a small entrepreneur or local business.Damian: Mike, I feel really inspired by, local newspapers. I grew up in Britain and I remember getting the Yorkshire Evening Press. It used to be an evening paper and just that's how I got interested in journalism, just looking at all that.People are interested in what's happening, in their backyard.And at the same time, of course, you get the national stories and international stories in there too. As well as the TV listings that I was interested in. Anyway, I digress. But, that value of local journalism has been, of late, it's been under threat. It's been challenged. And local papers, we've, reported on have basically been, closing newsrooms and the like, across the United States and indeed other countries.But, how do you [00:07:00] think about that, in, in a world where people want local journalism, and how advertisers need those local audiences to advertise too? What's the inherent sort of like challenge and how do you think about that?Mike: Yes, I think about it often. I also think about, coming here is, it's very hard. I don't need to talk myself up or what we do here. but it's a very hard conversation that's being had, our industry touched upon it perfectly. There's a lot of threat and what we've, I think one of the things that makes us unique is that we do, across all of our properties and just Hearst brands, we have the reach. The reach play is not the challenge for us, but it's the ongoing, challenge that we have with advertisers who are looking not to run on it's very funny because people see the value of news, but then you'll talk to an advertiser and I've had advertisers say this to my face that, Hey, we don't run a news.I'm [00:08:00] sorry. We would love to run, but we can't. And, something as a case in point is, the recent eclipse, that, passed over the United We saw from our Eclipse content, when you think of the eclipse, the first thing I did was I went to my, local sites to see where, what time does it start here in New York?Where can I be? Where can I watch it? You can't get that everywhere. And those are the experiences that we are constantly trying to bring to advertisers is that there's a perception with news that it is not brand safe, that you do not want the right, alignment with the news.breaking news content. But the large majority of our content is informative to come, spend with us, we're also trying to challenge them [00:09:00] to think a little bit differently.because I think if we can get past that, I think we're actually going to be funding. The open internet, but also, quality journalism the industry will get there.Damian: That's interesting. Do you think that advertisers minds are being changed a little bit, or is it that there are new tools to offer more nuance in terms of what they can advertise against?Mike: addressability for them and their campaigns, but how do we get smarter about our contextual, And I think what [00:10:00] we're trying to do in partnership with our advertisers is show them that, an article about, again, our high school sports team shooting that basket that won the game is very different from, a gun shooting or some type of gun violence.So those are the parts that we're hoping we can get advertisers to lean into and build with us. But until some of the technology is there, it's gonna be really a very manual, open dialogue that we're having with them. But I think it's changing. I think especially with the cookie deprecating, it, this is my personal feeling is that it's gonna really spring back to the content, to the quality, and to the objectiveness of that content, that's gonna bring advertisers back to us.Damian: There's one more question. You mentioned at the top, the importance of content variety, and you mentioned long form. Journalism and that's another form that's been disappearing un unless it's in national magazines, why is that important and why is a variety of [00:11:00] content an important factor for, a newspaper, publisher, when it comes to finding advertisers to embrace that content and be next to it.Mike: Yeah, it's a great question. What we've seen is the long form content, especially as it relates to the weekends, people really are looking to understand what's happening at the local level, but they're looking for just, I think more than just the two or three paragraphs, about, what's happening there.[00:12:00] They're Spectrum of what is happening at home.And I think that's what's really important for us, is to just show, you can cover the breaking news all day, you can maybe get the hits from, search, and maybe everyone's curious about that advertisers might not want to run against, but the majority of what people are coming to read us on is, what happened yesterday and what should I be doing this weekend?And I think those are things that we can answer for them.Damian: Yeah.Ilyse: Totally, and outside of specific content, [00:13:00] There's been, like, a number of major publications, including the New York Times, that have leaned into the subscription model, especially as, they realize, cookies will be going away, we need to make sure our revenue model is still intact, we need people reading the news, should this be free, it's, we are providing a service, there's a whole list of reasons why, a subscription model has been implemented, and part of that is enlarging, also your footprint through podcasts and other apps, but as we've all seen, not everybody has that kind of scale to do that. What role should advertising play then versus that subscription model?Mike: Yes. Great question. I am a proponent of advertising helps fund the open internet. I will always champion that. And I also say that we have a phenomenal, customer engagement and consumer marketing team that is driving [00:14:00] an amazing subscription business. But I, Looking at the evolution of subscriptions, I think, especially in a market, economic market, that there's a lot of choice now, and especially with things like streaming. I think there's a lot more penny pinching, that is happening. In a past life, I've, really analyzed are people willing to have multiple newspaper subscriptions or are they really just leaning into one and Just have that brand loyalty and something that we've been really taking a hard look at is one, who's subscribing to our Publications but where are they and I think something that we've been taking that look at is it in DMA?Is it out of DMA? So we're catering to that subscription audience. But at the same time, we know there are going to be people that aren't going to subscribe. Maybe they don't have the budget to subscribe and we still want to provide them that same level of quality content and news and informative news.So we've [00:15:00] been a little bit different in that we have two types of, publication formats. We have a free model and a paid model are paid is exactly what it sounds like. It has a lot more of that long form, behind a paywall, investigative journalism, some of that content.  but there's a different type of content that we're sharing that is allowing, people to still stay informed and still, Be engaged in their local community.And what we're hoping is that it will have this flywheel effect where when people see the type of content that we're putting out there,  And that's how we've been thinking about it, and we have a lot of investment on our free model.Ilyse: that note, you mentioned this before that you guys have implemented like more games, and you're not the only ones, looking to gain or find more ways to really gain more first party data, especially as like cookies deprecate. Are there any other [00:16:00] strategies that Hearst is using?I guess looking into to create and build that free content model.Mike: We have a robust first party data set. It's very important to us. I just want to plug that everything the extreme, quality of being privacy compliant and really lean in. We take, we really value the first party data that we have. But with that being To your point, we've been really thinking of different types of experiences that we can unlock for our users., as we mentioned, we have a new site called Puzzmo that if anyone ever wants to play Spell Tower, I highly recommend it. It's an extremely fun game. But what's really great about the Puzzmo site is there's an interactive community aspect to it where you can play games. With your friends, you can time yourself.There's a bit more of a [00:17:00] social activation to it. That we've been really having a lot of fun with and we're seeing the returns back on the well.  And we have, other partnerships that are currently in the works as well that are gonna help, bring different forms of content, like that to, better just help people, understand what they're doing with their time, , with probably a little bit of free time that they have. We just want to help them relax a little bit more.Damian: like that, yeah. I know what you mean, though, about still feeling cooped up. Somehow that pandemic mentality didn't fully go away. I don't know. Mike: It's very true. It's very true. And it's, that's been the fun part. really trying to figure out, I, again, I got, I recently got into hiking because of our content. But just knowing that I can find something to do this weekend, and share it with, friends and family. And Google and there's just a choice. We [00:18:00] help narrow it down for you.Damian: Yeah. Speaking of Google, here's a little segue. We've already mentioned cookie deprecation several times in this conversation.I just wanted to zero in on how you think about that identity conundrum that publishers are facing right now. What are the sort of solves for it that you're thinking about?Mike: Yes. So we've been very leaned into, the identity, I'll call it ecosystem and identity resolution. We are. pretty lucky with that first party data that we do have. Being 137 year old brand and loyal readers we've been collecting this for quite some time. I think we've also been ready for the cookie to deprecate for quite some time.It's been a challenge when things keep getting pushed back, but what we'veIlyse: ready. Sorry. Sorry.Mike: but what really leaning into isMaking sure that, we understand how do we still provide [00:19:00] relevant advertising in a cookie less world. And as a result, we've been leaning into the deterministic side of the house.We have, millions of email email addresses and that we, that people have consented to give us. We're being very smart about it. We are creating opportunities. It's very funny. I think back on newsletters when I first got into this industry, and it was just static creatives that you see when you news.And, but we've been really thinking outside the box of how do we, Utilize these premium more. How do we lean into a newsletter strategy that isn't just, Hey, this is what happened, then I would go into, I would share that we're working really hard on the contextual end as well. because you guys are so local, I think you would be a great source to talk about DMAs. Where would you [00:20:00] say is your largest markets and how do you then incentivize readers?Yes I think about DMAs all the time. I will say that we, while we have, we provide that national reach, I would say our largest DMAs are typically Houston San Francisco and and, Albany, New York. Many, I would say all of Connecticut, just the entire state of Connecticut.We, we have a slam dunk in coverage. But I think what's really interesting, I'll use San Francisco Chronicle as a great example of. And I didn't know this until I really started here, which is people who are reading the San Francisco Chronicle, they're obviously reading it in San Francisco, but a lot of people travel to LA or work in Palo Alto or are traveling all throughout California and are actively reading the Chronicle.And then I have a bunch of friends who've told me this, who are Ex San Franciscans who now live in New York, [00:21:00] who are San Francisco Chronicle subscribers. And what we've been really trying to track is understanding people who have brain loyalty, who want to know what's happening in their community but maybe aren't there anymore.So we've market coverage. And in New York but we want to be there letting them know everything that's happening.So it's been a very fun project of mine, [00:22:00] which is just slicing and dicing the different parts of America to see where are our second, third, large, fourth largest DMAs as it relates to our core key markets. And how do we come up with a different strategy? I think going back to even the whole free, paid, what are we doing with cookies?Of it all is we've actively are looking into the DMA aspect as well to see, maybe paying for a subscription for the San Francisco Chronicle is tough when you're in New York and you're living a busy life. In which case, maybe we do something a little bit different for them. Maybe we provide them different incentives to come back to us.So that's been a something I've been working on actively on the back end, which has been a lot of fun.you see a big surge during an election year?Coincidentally this year has been, normally we do, this year's been a little different. I don't know if it's here in America, at least at a national level, People either have, [00:23:00] already. into the back half of the Damian: That makes sense. Given the fact that there wasn't so much hoopla around primary season, there was no real need for a primary this year, right? On either side.Mike: Exactly. It's, and it's very interesting too, because I think it's thrown some of the political agencies and trading desk for a loop a little bit. there are certain people that we can rely on and we actively are talking to, and even they're like, Hey, I got the money, [00:24:00] but We're doing it laterand uh, you when it comes to budgeting, we budgeted that it would be a little bit more of a stronger year, but I, I think we're hoping that over time, people are gonna pick it back up.Ilyse: Yeah not to resort back to the doom and gloom, but, and bring up a certain Company again. But, so Google recently threatened to remove links and pause investments for California publishers in response to the pending California Journalism Preservation Act, also known as CJPA, due to them having to basically pay a fee to link Californians to news articles. Is this concerning to Hearst at having, of course, properties in California, and if so, why?Mike: I'll say local news is always under pressure. Just over, even ongoing State law as it relates to privacy. I think these are just things that are going to [00:25:00] continue to happen and you know we have to remain steadfast in our position of what we do and forming people and communities as business as usual, but it's something that we are very close to and we are continue to work with a lot of our people Largest partners and the walled gardens to ensure that,But it's something that we just, we, again, it's an, it's another day and another challenge. And I firmly believe we're going to get through it.Ilyse: So Mike, how would you say news blockers are basically an impediment to advertisers? Mike: it does. And I would say it's really from these fourth parties. I think it's the way we're getting tagged, even at a keyword level, lot of our advertisers. Are running if they're not running against an allowless block list on the domain level, which we've had to unblock, we've had people spend with us and want to do a buy with us, and then we later find [00:26:00] out that they, we were on a block list for news.But I think the difficult part as it relates to is someone will not want to run against any type of Donald Trump content or Trump. And. That will get tagged as not brand safe as relates to their advertising buy. But in actuality, the content itself is not brand safe. It's just, I think the, like we, if we said, Hey Trump is the new Republican candidate who needs to is for the candidate that.Content is deemed not brand safe and we remove that we don't think advertiser would run on, but the challenge has been how an [00:27:00] article about Trump being the new candidate versus advertisers, both of those are equal, and we just need to figure out a better way to inform them of those types of things. I always, I again, I'll use shot block list, and we will talk about basketball shots and people shooting three pointers to win games.And that content will be tagged unbrand safe when it's probably the most brand safe community based content that you're going to get. So those are the challenges that we're actively engaging with people on. It's just informing them more about the contextual relevancy and [00:28:00] less on individual keywords and isolation.Ilyse: Awesome.Now, outside of your localized newspapers, how does Hearst newspapers overall market yourselves? Is there a national story you're trying to tell?Mike: Yes, there definitely is. so across newspapers I also will plug, I run a team called Hearst Mosaic we and sell across both newspapers and TV. We have about 86 million uniques monthly. We have a really large audience. We can give you national reach, we can give you local reach, but at the end of the day we can give you performance and we have an engaged audience who wants to hear from you.Ilyse: need to. Damian:and that's it for this edition of The Current Podcast. We'll be back [00:01:00] next week, so stay tuned.Ilyse: The current podcast's theme is by Love and Caliber. The current team includes Kat Vesey and Sydney Cairns.Damian: And remember, I'm Damian.Ilyse: I'm Ilyse,Damian: And we'll see you next time. Please subscribe and leave us a review. Also, tune in to our other podcast, The Current Report, a weekly roundup of what's happening in the world of digital media.

Manchmal da sind Pausen zwischen zwei Episoden einer Serie so lang, dass man komplett vergisst wie eigentlich der letzte Teil so war - und da sind da noch die Männer aus Saal 3! Sie vergessen niemals etwas und darum sind Batz und Diemen auch wieder zurück mit dem Film des Jahres, der euch allen komplett unter den Nägeln brennt: Dune 2! Ob der Film so gut wie der erste ist, ob es bei solch einem Monumentalwerk überhaupt noch etwas kritikwürdiges gibt und wann endlich DMAS wieder regelmässig erscheint: All das erfahrt ihr in diesem Podcast.

Guest: Linda Meyer, PhD, CCC-SLP - Dr. Meyer was an instrumental part of the team that advocated for insurance coverage for augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) services and devices and AAC training/therapy. We will discuss the historical development of AAC services and devices in our profession with adolescents and adults and the advocacy work done to achieve reimbursement for both devices and services through Medicaid and other insurers in Virginia. This model served as a template for other states. Further, we will discuss the continuing responsibility of SLPs to advocate for ongoing reimbursement as funding sources become more restrictive. Through collaboration, advocacy, and evidence-based practice, DMAS approved coverage for both items. In addition, Dr. Meyer has remained an advocate throughout her career, not only for patients but for issues at the state level.

Kita briefing pagi sebelum pasar buka di hari Senin, tanggal 30 Oktober 2023 Podcast kali ini bahas Fixed Income Securities a.k.a. efek pendapatan tetap US lagi ramai sell-off produk fixed income securities-nya, apa penyebabnya? Bagaimana dampaknya ke pasar saham Indonesia? Bagaimana dampaknya ke nilai tukar rupiah? Bagaimana kerangka analisisnya? Adakah efek ke perbankan Indonesia? Emiten yang kita bahas: #DMAS #BUKK #AMAN #IHSG #IDX #tbills #fixedincomesecurities #bonds

Guest: Linda Meyer, PhD, CCC-SLP - In this inaugural episode, Renee is joined by Dr. Linda Meyer, PhD, CCC-SLP. Dr. Meyer was an instrumental part of the team that advocated for insurance coverage for augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) services and devices and AAC training/therapy. We will discuss the historical development of AAC services and devices in our profession with adolescents and adults and the advocacy work done to achieve reimbursement for both devices and services through Medicaid and other insurers in Virginia. This model served as a template for other states. Further, we will discuss the continuing responsibility of SLPs to advocate for ongoing reimbursement as funding sources become more restrictive. Through collaboration, advocacy, and evidence-based practice, DMAS approved coverage for both items. In addition, Dr. Meyer has remained an advocate throughout her career, not only for patients but for issues at the state level.

In this episode of The Ecommerce Braintrust, Kiri Masters, shares updates and reminders related to peak season dates, including Prime Day and Black Friday Cyber Monday. She also discusses a fascinating update about Amazon Marketing Cloud, focusing on three key points: Day Parting Settings, Geotargeting, and AMC Custom Audiences. These best practices offer insights for optimizing advertising strategies and maximizing performance on Amazon. In today's episode, Kiri talks about: Important Dates for Ecommerce Sellers Reminder to send FBA and Multichannel Fulfillment Inventory to Amazon by October 26. Importance of shipping inventory early due to potential carrier backlogs. Example of inventory shortage in previous Q4 season. Ensuring inventory arrives before cutoff dates to maximize advertising strategy. Updates on Amazon Marketing Cloud Day Parting Settings: Report available in Amazon Marketing Cloud to view performance by hour. Testing showed slight increase in ROAS and Troas during non-midnight to 5 am hours. Geotargeting: Focusing on specific areas of states or DMAs can lead to more visibility and better performance. Test combining geotargeting and day parting for optimal results. AMC Custom Audiences: Creating an audience of customers who added products to cart but didn't make a purchase. Effective for reminding potential customers about the brand. Benefits of Amazon Marketing Cloud Overview dashboard for analyzing customer journey and conversion paths. Audience Insights for understanding shopper demographics, location data, and interests. Using AMC Insights to segment targeting and optimize performance. Success story of account's performance growth after incorporating AMC before Prime Day. Integration of DSP and PPC with AMC AMC as an advanced reporting package suitable for Amazon DSP users. Bringing together data from DSP and PPC to understand their impact on performance.

We needed a HUGE guest for episode 100 - and we smashed it. The incredible Johnny Took sat down with us at Truck Festival to celebrate episode 100!! We start the celebrations by blind eating our guests which gets controversial before we jump into the chat with Jonny! We finish with more Trippy band names and introduce Trippy cam - not to be missed! Thank you all for 100 episodes, here's to 100 more!! Xx

Content Marketing Series #12 The digital marketing world is evolving faster than you can say “ChatGPT” and as virtual assistants and DMAs, we gotta stay ahead of the game. In this episode, I talk all about how AI is changing the role of VAs and how embracing its potential can skyrocket your value as a digital marketing pro. AI Tools are shaking things up–  they're here to make our lives easier and more efficient. With these tools at our disposal, we can streamline our workflows and focus more on strategic tasks that can make our clients' (and our own) businesses thrive. Tune in to learn more about: Upgrading your strategies to match the fast pace of change. Providing unique, tailored services to carve out your niche. Using AI tools to make your design work faster. Becoming an AI manager and integrating chatbots into clients' businesses. Don't be threatened by AI. See it as an advantage and an opportunity to blow your clients away with what you know and how you're looking out for them. As you get the hang of these new tools, you'll totally crush it with better and faster results, making you an indispensable digital marketer and a real unicorn in the field!      Sponsored by the UDMA's Tool Kit: How would you like all the best techie and AI tools and recommended software to use in your marketing services and DMA business all in one easy place? Grab it here for just $7.99.   Connect with Emily: Facebook Community: Emily's Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant Lab Instagram: @emilyreaganpr  Facebook: @emilyreaganpr     3 ways we can work together:  Get on the waitlist for the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School. My signature course on digital marketing implementation will give you the confidence and teach you HOW to do the work that's in demand and highly marketable. This is the secret weapon to getting booked out Got the skills but need help getting your digital marketing services business to take off? I've got an advanced tight-knit referral and networking community that can help and I would love for you to apply here for the Digital Marketing Workgroup. You'll get the latest updates and trainings, networking opps and job leads from online business owners who are looking to hire digital marketing implementers and assistants. Looking for a fast way to get your foot in the door with up-to-date skills? Take my 2-hour Quickstart to Facebook Community Management workshop and learn how to help online business owners like course creators and membership site owners manage and engage their community    >>> Download my Top Ten Most Requested Digital Marketing Tasks & Services

Since her 2021 debut EP Don't Kiss Ur Friends, MAY-A has hit some incredible milestones, including the EP debuting at #31 on the ARIA album chart, collaborations with some of the best Australian artists including DMAs, Budjerah and of course on the Hottest 100 topping, ARIA-nominated, ARIA Platinum accredited ‘Say Nothing' with Flume. She's also played some of the world's biggest stages including Coachella and Gov Ball. MAY-A spent most of 2022 on the road – playing alongside Flume on his US tour, opening for 5 Seconds of Summer on their Australian tour and Wallows on their UK and European leg. 2023 is already off to a flying start – slaying the airwaves with her two fan favourite hits ‘Sweat You Out My System' and ‘Your Funeral'. This  MAY-A will take to the Splendour in the Grass stage in a warm-up for her national headline Never Going Back Tour, starting July 28. She's also opening for Tove Lo! Join the Whānau on Instagram, Facebook & Tik Tok.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Virginia Department of Medical Assistance Services recently released revised guidelines for state Medicaid disability waiver programs which would allow certain family members who provide caregiving services for their child or spouse with disabilities to be paid directly by the state. The move comes after outcry from hundreds of families and letters from state Democrats critical of the initial guidelines prohibiting this option that DMAS – which oversees the state's Developmental Disabilities Home and Community-Based Services waiver programs – submitted to the federal government in May. This option has been available in Virginia since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic,...Article LinkSupport the show

Sebelum Pasar Buka: Bagaimana sentiment pasar di hari senin? Strategi apa yang lagi ramai sekarang? Apakah dividend play atau IPO play? Kinerja Saham-saham yang baru #IPO, #SUNI dan #DMAS       Sebelum Pasar Buka  kembali lagi. Kita briefing pagi sebelum pasar buka di hari Senin, tanggal 17 April 2023.   Hari senin adalah hari untuk briefing apa yang akan terjadi satu minggu ke depan.   Di #podcast kali ini, kita bahas kondisi pasar global yang akan memberi sentiment ke IHSG di minggu ini. Kita juga diskusi tentang kenapa sektor energi terutama emiten batu bara downtrend minggu lalu. Kita juga bahas kinerja saham saham IPO. Lalu, apakah investor institusi menggunakan strategi dividend play? Atau mungkin kah institusi menggunakan IPO play? Dari sisi teknikal, kita bahas analisis teknikal #SUNI and #DMAS   Episode kali ini berdurasi 16 menit!   #Sebelumpasarbuka

The Clause are a four-piece from Birmingham who bring together the swagger of the 60s, the rolling groove of the 80s and the riotous verve and attitude of the 90s.  Pearce Macca (front man), Niall Fennell (drummer) Jonny Fyffe (bassist) and Liam Deakin (guitarist) effortlessly combine huge hooks with gritty verses, indie sensibilities and rhythm and blues groove and melodies to create an altogether different beast. The music defies categorisation, rolling seamlessly from crashing percussion to huge, swinging bass. There are epic singalong choruses destined for stadiums and packed festival main stages, and darker, edgier moments evoking late night cruises down dingy back streets. The band have been together since they were kids and they have matured into one of the UK's most exciting new bands. They have hit the road throughout the autumn and winter of 2022 supporting The Reytons, on their sold-out nationwide tour, following main support slots for the Pigeon Detectives, DMAs, The Enemy and The Snuts. The band completed a 16 date solo national tour in March 2022 and then embarked on a series of gigs to finish the year with a seven date solo tour culminating in a sold out 1300 capacity home town gig in Brum at the O2 Institute in late December. The live work now continues with a tour of major cities in spring 2023 including London, Glasgow, Liverpool, Leeds and Manchester. The band have been featured, to date, on Radio 1, 6, X and XS as well as Soccer AM & Clashmusic.com. They were also honoured to play on Radio 1's Big Weekend last year. In 2022 they have released the single ‘Electric', which has been played across BBC Radio Leicester, BBC Radio Derby, BBC Radio Nottingham, Student Music Network and more, and they followed this with their summer release ‘Forever Young' in July. Previous to this, two singles have reached No1 in the iTunes rock chart and just outside the Top 20 on the main chart and they have been playlisted by Spotify on All New Rock, Deezer's Hot New Rock and YouTube's Your New Alternative Playlist. The last three singles have witnessed real growth with over 4 million streams and 65k monthly listeners. There are plans for a release in early 2023 with a high-profile collaboration in the offing later in the spring. Watch this space! The Clause have had extensive support across all media – Soccer AM, BT Sports, This Feeling, Gigslutz, Band of the Day on Maximum Volume Music and Scottish Music Network among many others, plus a cover feature in the Sunday Mail and two-page interview on the Daily Record. They have also recently been awarded the BMA ‘Best Band' for the second year running, as well as ‘Best Indie and Alternative' act. #NewMusic #Interviews #Stories #SocialMedia

Buy a tee! https://www.10percenttrue.com/product-page/magnum-classic-teeSupport me with a coffee! https://www.buymeacoffee.com/10percenttrue Discussion on Discord: https://discord.gg/9vJ3hPYFQh00:00:00 Buy a Tee Shirt, God Damn it!00:00:50 Introduction00:03:05 Thoughts on the effectiveness of the Spang mixed F-4G/Viper teams00:05:45 What do you think of the F-15G concept?00:09:00 Thoughts on the transition from F-16CJ/CM to F-35A in the SEAD/DEAD role?00:18:38 Do you know *Redacted*? Also an ex wild Weasel?00:22:47 If you could have persuaded the top Brass to keep the F-4G into the Balkans and beyond, what upgrades would you say it needed to stay relevant?00:29:23 You mentioned something close to the F-15E being closer to the WW role...00:30:20 Are you aware of or do you believe the systems on the F-16CJ have gotten better since the last time you flew with them?00:31:31 Is Starbaby the GIB who started chewing out *Redacted* in his first deployment to Germany as described in his book?00:33:22 Is there still a big weasel mission to suppress or destroy AAA?00:36:50 I have a question about beam rider weapons, like the Ataka, or the Vikhr. Do they require a non-maneuvering platforms?00:37:58 What are military aviators thoughts on us "sim pilots"?00:40:47 At what point is this accurate simulation potentially going too far and bordering on giving potential adversaries maybe too much information too easily?00:42:07 How was the F-4E used alongside the F-4G? How does the Hunter Killer mission patrol work and what were their respective roles?00:44:48 Was it only F-4E with ARN-101/DMAS? 00:47:06 I've heard stories of G model phantom dudes saying “magnum” on the radio to trick the Iraqis into thinking they launched a HARM. How prevalent was this in weasel units? Do you know if the navy or marines ever did anything similar?00:48:13 Question stemming from DCS: Is it a realistic thing for the strikers to dedicate one pylon to having a HARM on hand just in case there's a pop-up threat?00:50:28 Starbaby is promoted to Supreme commander of Allied forces in Europe and  gets order from politicians to create "no-fly zone" over Ukraine.How would you go about it?00:54:25 What were your most task saturating cockpit tasks in two situations; 00:58:44 Best example of teamwork during a weasel mission? Worst? (This one might be better phrased as “Most bungled SEAD operation you were a part of, that had a good plan at the beginning”)01:01:11 Any good LPA stories? (or what ever the correct term is for AF JOPA)01:04:03 If we are interested in how EW, GBAD and so on is performing in the real world (as opposed to marketing brochures and air shows) but only have access to OSINT, what if anything would we be looking for? If it is really possible to say anything.01:06:22 Starbaby do you think the B-2 and F-117 were worth their investments?01:10:36 So is the very big investment into the F-35 worth it?01:11:29 "You know you're going to leave that in".01:12:00 In old HUD footage I noticed magnum callouts are suffixed with "golf" or "tango"...01:12:21 At the end of the F4G's service life SAMs that are capable of point defense...01:13:48 Reading again about the famous Strike Package Q...01:16:47 Starbaby, you briefly mentioned using the APR 40 to find air targets...01:19:49 Your opinion on the friendly fire incidents during OIF...01:22:00 What was your most frightening moment in F-4/F-15 in combat operations if there's any?01:25:10 Curious to know how did it feel when you mastered the APG-70?01:30:07 Would you rather conduct SEAD in a F-4G, armed only with a fencing foil, or a F-16CJ...01:30:58 Do you think that the other services, or even other airforce pilots and crew mSupport the show

DMA's join the Australian Made Ranks and Abbie sobs from joy while they perform.  Jordy Lambropoulous joins us in studio to chat about her journey with Crohn's Disease. And her call for Abbie to climb the Harbour Bridge with for her, for her birthday! Plus, Abbie reflects on her bike powered show!Subscribe on LiSTNR: https://play.listnr.com/podcasts/hot-nights-with-abbie-chatfieldSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hello and welcome back to ACPG podcast. Welcome to SEASON FIVE. Five season and 156 episodes we've been doing this.. mad. This is the first episode in season five and we have a wonderful guest in Jonny Took from the awesome DMA'S. Ben and Jonny catch up over zoom to discuss DMA'S new album, coming out at the end of March, How Many Dreams?, touring, the DNA of DMA'S (try saying that ten times fast), and having Liam Gallagher in your corner. It's great to be back and we have a great season coming up. It's going to be weekly and a little shorter. It's like a sprint of episodes. How exciting. See you in a week.

Hello and welcome back to ACPG podcast. Welcome to SEASON FIVE. Five season and 156 episodes we've been doing this.. mad. This is the first episode in season five and we have a wonderful guest in Jonny Took from the awesome DMA'S. Ben and Jonny catch up over zoom to discuss DMA'S new album, coming out at the end of March, How Many Dreams?, touring, the DNA of DMA'S (try saying that ten times fast), and having Liam Gallagher in your corner. It's great to be back and we have a great season coming up. It's going to be weekly and a little shorter. It's like a sprint of episodes. How exciting. See you in a week.

Big Smoke Music Weekly goes out with a bang! As Luke heads for the sights and sounds of Melbourne Town, he brings a host of top tier interviews to bring a close to 5 years and 5 seasons of BSMW. The feature interview for this curtain-closer is with the genius that is DMAs guitarist Johnny Took. He sits down with Luke, looking ahead to the band's forthcoming album, How Many Dreams. Johnny opens up on the band exploring new sounds, filling arenas in the UK and growing together as a band. Johnny tells all about how the new album needed to be something that "didn't stink of covid" as they look to maximise a newfound positivity and defiance within their tracks. He also serves up some tips on how to survive the flight to Oz and which snacks Luke should be stuffing his face with. Another Australian outfit with a big future - DICE - drop by for a chat about how their brand of surfer-rock has triggered their meteoric rise down under and what they can achieve moving forward...all whilst squeezing everything they can out of the process. Our last CloseUp 60 Seconds interview is with the brilliant London group, Pynch. And...the circle is complete as we catch up with a guest from Season 1, Charlie Vaughan. Charlie is on hand to chat about how things with his old band, Weird Milk, came to an end and how he came to step out from behind the drumkit! 5 seasons, over 60 artists interviewed, over 60 episodes, countless gigs and festivals and many happy memories made. Enjoy the last of BSMW! x

The DMA'S guitarist Johnny Took talks supporting Arctic Monkeys, ‘fessing up to an onstage boo boo, first coming to the UK after Liam from The Courteeners got them over for a tour from hearing one song, Neil Young cocaine nose, breaking down writing a heavily electronic song compared to writing on an acoustic, DMAs time off on tour schedule, playing drunk, Sonic Youth's influence on a song from the new album and getting married. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

European bourses are firmer, Euro Stoxx 50 +0.5%, but are currently still set to end the week with modest lossesStateside, futures are mixed/flat, ES +0.1% holding around 20 points above the 3900 mark, with the 100- & 21- DMAs at 3900 and 3904 respectively.DXY has struggled to make any meaningful headway thus far, though it has derived support from a marked pullback in the JPY while antipodeans lead.EGBs continue to slip as ECB's Lagarde maintains they will "stay the course" on policy, with Bunds down to a 138.49 low vs Thursday's 140.73 peak.Crude benchmarks are firmer on the session, taking advantage of the rosier demand outlook going into the Lunar New Year holiday.Looking ahead, highlights include US Existing Home Sales, Speeches from Fed's George, Harker & Waller and ECB's Elderson, earnings from State Street.Read the full report covering Equities, Forex, Fixed Income, Commodites and more on Newsquawk

The rescheduled Aus Music Month episode is here only a few weeks late! New friends of the pod Millie Perks and Lachy McGuffie from Gold Coast band Ivey are on the show this week to chat Parcels self-titled debut against 'The Glow' by DMA's. Cool bands all around with cool sounds and cool members. Enjoy!(0:00) - Intro(7:13) - Chat with Millie & Lachy(16:46) - The Facts(21:20) - The Elements(35:40) - Segments(1:00:30) - RatingsFollow Record Royale on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/recordroyale/Listen to Ivey here: https://spoti.fi/3iNVmaAFollow them on Instagram: https://bit.ly/2Kkv2lVFollow us on the socials:Will St Claire - https://www.instagram.com/willstclaire/Brad Mclean- https://www.instagram.com/bradbradnotgood_/Adam Lindsay - https://www.instagram.com/adamlindsay__/https://www.recordroyale.com.au/

What burns me? Those get-rich-quick Tiktok VA Coaches who sell the fact that new virtual assistants could be making $50-75/hr. They get them in the door selling them the dream and then don't actually teach the hard implementation skills. And that high rate is not at all what someone new on the scene is making. So back to reality and the world I live in. You gotta start in the mailroom and work your way up. So here's three tips for raising your rates as a digital marketing assistant.Inside this episode, you'll get tips on: Signs your rates and services are off What to say in discovery calls to communicate your worth Shifting into value-based pricing Creating your own credibility factor How to know when you're ready to specialize Why unicorns DMAs are different How to make admin skills more valuable   Plus a bonus tip that all the successful freelancers “get”.   Especially, listen if you're not booked out and wondering if your rates are on par, then this episode is for you!   Links Mentioned: Enroll now in the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School before midnight Oct. 19. Episode 112: How to Raise Your Rates as a Virtual Assistant 3 ways we can work together:  Get enrolled in the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School.  My signature course on digital marketing implementation will give you the confidence and teach you HOW to do the work that's in demand and highly marketable. This is the secret weapon to getting booked out Got the skills but need help getting your digital marketing services business to take off? I've got an advanced tight-knit referral and networking community that can help, apply here. You'll get the latest updates and trainings, networking opps and job leads from online business owners who are looking to hire digital marketing implementers and assistants. Looking for a fast way to get your foot in the door with up-to-date skills? Take my 2-hour Quickstart to Facebook Community Management Workshop and learn how to help online business owners like course creators and membership site owners manage and engage their community    >>> Download my Top Ten Most Requested Digital Marketing Tasks & Services  >>> Take the Quiz to Discover your Digital Dream Job  

Darcie Haven joins 'Breaking in the Making' this week to chat about her new songs, supporting the DMAs and handling the music industry.

Ready to quit your day job and start working from home? Listen to one unicorn's advice on how to set yourself up for success.  Marci Sanders is a member of my Digital Marketing Workgroup who also recently graduated from the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School. She's got a corporate background, loves to travel, and wanted a way to work remotely on her terms.  Instead of transforming her corporate skills (she wrote SOPs) into freelance work, Marci decided at age 48 to embark on a new path to achieve her goal of traveling full-time. She offered email marketing services as a side hustle to her full-time corporate job.  In this episode, Marci talks about her freelancer/business owner journey, how she got started, and how she markets herself to find more clients. She shares why even with her email marketing experience she knew she needed extra help if she wanted to go full-time remotely. That's when she realized she needed a mentor who could help her get to that level.  Listen closely to Marci's advice on: Finding the right mentor for you - why she picked UDMA School Advice on setting your quitting day deadline - and making it stick What she'd do differently if doing it again - learn from her mistakes Why the Digital Marketing Workgroup continues to support her success This is perfect for experienced and new DMAs who want to add to their current skillset, market to the right audience, and fast-track their path.  Enjoy! Connect with Marci: Instagram: @marci.r.sanders Facebook: @marcisanders Website: marcisanders.com   Connect with Emily: Facebook Community: Emily's Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant Lab  Instagram: @emilyreaganpr  Facebook: @emilyreaganpr 3 ways we can work together:  Get on the waitlist for the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School. My signature course on digital marketing implementation will give you the confidence and teach you HOW to do the work that's in demand and highly marketable. This is the secret weapon to getting booked out Got the skills but need help getting your digital marketing services business to take off? I've got an advanced tight-knit referral and networking community that can help and I would love for you to apply here for the Digital Marketing Workgroup. You'll get the latest updates and trainings, networking opps and job leads from online business owners who are looking to hire digital marketing implementers and assistants. Looking for a fast way to get your foot in the door with up-to-date skills? Take my 2-hour Quickstart to Facebook Community Management workshop and learn how to help online business owners like course creators and membership site owners manage and engage their community    >>> Download my Top Ten Most Requested Digital Marketing Tasks & Services 

What So Not is once again joining us on the pod! The electronic music songwriter and producer is well-loved around the globe and has collaborated with artists such as Daniel Johns, Killer Mike, and DMAs. We're very lucky to have him on the pod, as today he's releasing his brilliant second record Anomaly. In today's episode, we're speaking with Christopher Emerson (aka What So Not) about the sonic growth on this second record, how his creative process works, DJ-ing at a fan's house party, and why he and I spoke a few times over the last week.You can buy Anomaly here.You can listen to What So Not here.You can find watch his Tomorrowland set here.What So Not Instagram: @whatsonotWhat So Not Facebook: @whatsonotThanks again to What So Not for his time. We also want to give a special shout out to Emily from On The Map PR for her assistance with this episode.You can help support This Song Is Yours at our Patreon here.You can follow us on the socials below:TSIY Insta: @thissongisyoursTSIY FB: @thissongisyoursTSIY TikTok: @thissongisyours Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tim has been champing at the bit to speak to Chris, otherwise known as What So Not. Chris has worked with many Introducing alumni, including the Peking Duk boys and the DMAs. We chat about how this legend started What So Not - which began as a small project with Flume in 2010, before he went his own way in 2015. What So Not is now very close to releasing his next album, out September 16th. Collabing with artists like the DMAs, Oliver Tree and Evan Giia - it's a huge album, named 'Anomaly', and Tim gets to chat with Chris all about it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As freelancers, it's inevitable that we are going to reach some kind of client burnout. There are only so many hours in a day and there is only one of us. (Plus a lot of us struggle with people-pleasing and healthy boundaries that only add fuel to the burnout fire.)  The best way to mitigate this is to take your 1:1 services and find out how to help MORE people by working less. Something scalable. That's why all freelancers should consider building a digital course using our in-the-trenches expertise and knowledge. This diversifies our income streams, gives us options and so much more.  My guest today Amy Porterfield did the same thing. Early on in her freelance business she said YES to all the client work and learned very quickly that if she was going to remove her income earning cap and gain more lifestyle freedom, she needed to go all in with her courses. Today, Amy is a multi 7-figure business owner with a top-ranked business podcast and soon-to-be published author, founder of Digital Course Academy and my mentor. She's sharing her freelancer journey and how she came to be and her hard-earned launch lessons that you can learn from second-hand. But most importantly, Amy's sharing her best tips for freelancers to organize their ideas, own their expertise and build a digital course that will give them more freedom. Listen up freelancers, VAs and DMAs, today we're talking about: How to know if you're ready for a course  How to launch the right way Why live launching is a rite of passage What to do now to set yourself up for a course How to get out of the headtrash that keeps you stuck  Why you should learn courses and launches as a freelancer And lightbulb moment: how to make it through the rough patch of straddling client work and trying to build a course … while being short on time. And her #1 tip to still make money during this phase!   Be sure to sign up for her Course Confident Bootcamp and use my affiliate link if you decide to go all in with a course and learn from Amy. I'll be offering special bonuses for my referrals! Join the Waitlist for Digital Course Academy here. The Cart Opens Sept 7.   Connect with Amy: Sign up for Course Confident Bootcamp - Starts Aug 31, only $47 Listen to Amy's Business Blueprint private podcast  Freebie: 3 Steps to Uncover your Special Thing   Connect with Emily: Facebook Community: Emily's Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant Lab Instagram: @emilyreaganpr  Facebook: @emilyreaganpr 3 ways we can work together:  Get on the waitlist for the Unicorn Digital Marketing Assistant School. My signature course on digital marketing implementation will give you the confidence and teach you HOW to do the work that's in demand and highly marketable. This is the secret weapon to getting booked out Got the skills but need help getting your digital marketing services business to take off? I've got an advanced tight-knit referral and networking community that can help and I would love for you to apply here for the Digital Marketing Workgroup. You'll get the latest updates and trainings, networking opps and job leads from online business owners who are looking to hire digital marketing implementers and assistants. Looking for a fast way to get your foot in the door with up-to-date skills? Take my 2-hour Quickstart to Facebook Community Management workshop and learn how to help online business owners like course creators and membership site owners manage and engage their community    >>> Download my Top Ten Most Requested Digital Marketing Tasks & Services 

Tacking one of the the Big R&L boys today. From Sydney through to Richfield Av, DMAs have been catching the hearts and minds of Brit pop fans the world over.

This interview features Adam Rymer, CEO of OpTic Gaming. We discuss what he learned from running Harvard's campus store, adapting to Napster at Universal Music, why entertainment doesn't value innovation, being on Universal Pictures' greenlight committee, scaling Legendary Digital and working alongside Chris Hardwick and Amy Poehler, how to create communities for gamers, why he plays Fornite with his son, and how to follow your own roadmap.Subscribe to our newsletter. We explore the intersection of media, technology, and commerce: sign-up linkLearn more about our market research and executive advisory: RockWater websiteFollow us on LinkedIn: RockWater LinkedInEmail us: tcupod@wearerockwater.com Interview TranscriptThe interview was lightly edited for clarity.Chris Erwin:This week's episode features Adam Rymer, CEO of OpTic Gaming. So Adam was born in Fort Lauderdale and was a self-described '80s internet nerd. That meant hanging out on internet bulletin boards and attending internet meetups at bowling alleys. His online passions paid off and he ended up going to Harvard after writing an admission essay, comparing entertainment dollars versus grocery store dollars. Adam's early career included Universal Music where three months after beginning his new role Napster was launched. And Adam had to figure out questions like, "What now? And who do we sue?" After rising up to the exec ranks at Universal Adam then struck out on his own to co-founder production company that worked on projects like the Rover and sci-fi hit arrival. He then became president at nerd and legendary networks where he helped build a multi-platform media business alongside stars like Chris Hardwick and Amy Poehler today. Adam is the CEO of OpTic Gaming, where he is helping to grow and scale one of the world's most exciting companies operating at the intersection of gaming and entertainment.Chris Erwin:Adam, thanks for being on The Come Up Podcast.Adam Rymer:Great to be here, man. Good to see you.Chris Erwin:Yeah. So where are you calling in from?Adam Rymer:I am in Dallas, been here about two years now.Chris Erwin:Are you in the Envy offices right now?Adam Rymer:We are. I moved here in the middle of COVID and we've been, believe it or not, working mostly in the office since I got here.Chris Erwin:Like to hear that people getting back to the office environment. Well, we're going to talk about Envy more, but actually want to rewind a bit, Adam. So going back a few years here, I want to hear about where you grew up and a little bit of what your childhood was like to see if there's any kind of glimpses into this media and digital executive that you've become.Adam Rymer:I am a Florida man. I grew up in Fort Lauderdale. Born in Miami, grew up in Fort Lauderdale, '70s and '80s which whatever anybody thinks about Miami and south Florida now is not what it was like when I was there. It was retiree paradise. And then the occasional spring break debauchery but of course, I was too young to really understand and appreciate any of it. So I just saw all these college kids coming in and thinking that would be awesome. And then by the time I was actually old enough to enjoy spring break, that it all gotten kicked out of south Florida and moved to Daytona and Cancun and wherever else. So missed out on all the benefit of all of it. But Florida was an interesting place to grow up in the '70s and '80s. Left at 17, never really went back, but definitely helped shape my desire to stay someplace warm for the rest of my life.Chris Erwin:Okay. So I have to ask you, what was your household like growing up? Were your parents into the same things that you're into now, media entertainment, digital gaming, gaming, what that looked like back in the day was very different, but what did your parents do and what were some of your early inspirations?Adam Rymer:My dad was a physician. He was an immigrant. My mom helped run the household. I had a younger sister who was six years younger than I. And so we were not overly close partially because of the age difference. And partially because we were just into different things, I was probably what you would call a quintessential nerd back in the day when it was very, very uncool to be a nerd. I got an Apple 2e when I was, I don't know, probably like eight or 10 years old and was goofing around on that with floppy discs and playing Zork and all the text base games and whatever else I could get my hands on. I remember connecting to BBSs back in the day. That was how I spent a lot of my free time.Chris Erwin:But BBS?Adam Rymer:Yeah. BBS was a bulletin board system. It was the modern, the old precursor to, I guess what you'd call like a social media network today. It was dial-in multi-communication platform where you could type and talk to other people and play games with people online, text-based games for the most part and south Florida, believe it or not, was actually the hub of some of the biggest BBS companies in the .country every now and then we'd go to meetups with people who were on these, these services, but you'd get online and play trivia and you'd play just chat with each other. And I guess back in the day, you'd consider it pretty weird. And today you just call it WhatsApp.Chris Erwin:So question, you said we would go to meetups. How old are you and who is we? Are you going with your parents or friends?Adam Rymer:Yeah. I was like 13, 14, and I'd have friends that would drive me around. We'd meet at like bowling alleys and family entertainment centers like arcades and mini golf places. And there'd be people from 14 to 40, but everybody was just connected through these online environments of being... At the time, I guess we were outcast and ostracized. And like I said, we were big old nerds.Chris Erwin:Were your parents supportive of some of your interests here with these meetups and the BBSs?Adam Rymer:Yeah, I mean, they didn't really know what was going on. For me, it was just a way to meet people and make friends and met some really interesting folks. Met some really odd, strange folks through it. Some people went on to greatness and do some pretty cool things. Some people faded off into obscurity. I think it definitely helped define and set my career in motion from being part of something that was just on the cutting edge of interactivity and technology. And 'cause there was a lot of steps to it, right. We had to, you had to get a 300-baud modem. You had to connect a phone line to it. You had to pay for time on the service by dropping off some money at a house or sending something in somewhere else. And I mean, it was really complicated, but we made it work. It was a weird time. It was like during the days of war games, if you remember the movie War Games, it was like that sort of universe.Chris Erwin:I've known you for years now. This is the first time I've really asked about your upbringing in your childhood. And within one minute, learn something completely new, but it makes sense. Everyone nowadays talks about how do you build community? How do you build fandom amongst different media brands, participants, creators, and users, et cetera? And you have now three to four decades of experience of building fandom on the internet. It's all becoming much more clear. So as you go to high school and then you're applying for college, what did you think that you were going to do?Adam Rymer:It's funny so we used to go to Disney World a lot in Florida, right? Because it's only about two-hour drive from where I lived. And I was always, I guess, kind of a weird business-focused kid at a certain level. I remember writing my college essay about Disney, but not about the cool entertainment factor of Disney about the business of Disney and how I found it super interesting that when you would go to someplace like Disney World, that you would be totally open to spending $8 on a Mickey bar ice cream that if you were just at a grocery store, you would totally freak out about highway robbery. You would just never spend that kind of money. And, I wrote my essay about like entertainment dollars being different from regular dollars. I did, I guess-Chris Erwin:So precocious.Adam Rymer:... I was a weird kid and at the time I was like, "I want to be Michael Eisner." Michael Eisner was my idol at the time not knowing a whole lot about anything, but knowing Disney and seeing how that was working, I was like, "That's my aspiration." Right? So went off to college. And at the time I was focused on engineering because as a nerd, geeky kid, I thought I was going to be an engineer, but within a year of college, I shifted over to being an economics major and really focusing more on business and really put most of my efforts into pursuing kind of game theory and business and economics.Chris Erwin:You went to Harvard up in Cambridge, right?Adam Rymer:That's the one. Yeah.Chris Erwin:So your essay must have been something special to get into that school. Right?Adam Rymer:God. To this day, I don't know how I got in. I'll tell you, I mean, it's my 25th reunion this year. I look around and I see other people from my class and I see kids today and I mean the quality of students and applications is just phenomenal. And to this day I count my lucky stars that I went there and got in there and survived. It was the hardest experience in my life. I can't even tell you, I felt overwhelmed half the time, lucky half the time. I mean, it was something.Chris Erwin:Well, if you're going to a reunion, my dad, I think is Harvard '70. And I think he's going to his reunion this year as well. So maybe you guys can bump into one another there. So you're at Harvard, you're feeling overwhelmed, but feeling lucky and grateful. And do you think you get more clarity on what you want to do when you're graduating?Adam Rymer:Yeah. Well, look, while I was there, I had my first real work experience. So we had this thing called Harvard Student Agencies. And what that is a bunch of student-run businesses on campus that are sanctioned by the university. And they let students sort of operate businesses through a platform that the university puts together. And I started out running something called the Campus Store, which basically sold futons and refrigerators and class rings and all the stuff you need for dorm rooms. And then my second year I became vice president of the organization. And one of the things that organization also did was produce the Let's Go Travel Guides, which might be a sign of another era, but it was books that you would use to go travel abroad and low-budget travel through Europe and other places around the world.Adam Rymer:And it was a team of hundreds of students that would write these books and go out and travel and run these businesses. And I did that for two and a half years of my time at school. And I found my time working and helping to run these businesses to be maybe the best education that I got over my time there. So by the time that I was graduating, I was pretty dead set on being in the business world, operating, trying to figure out some way to be an executive in some way, shape or form. Didn't necessarily know exactly what type of business to run. So I ended up going into management consulting, coming out of school because to me that seemed like the best landing spot, where I could get a sense of a bunch of different industries, bunch of different businesses, try to solve some problems for different companies and then figure out what I wanted to do from there. Or just do that for the rest of my life. Because from what I heard, that was a pretty cool thing to do.Chris Erwin:Got it. You go to L.E.K. Consulting in the late '90s. Was the experience what you expected it to be?Adam Rymer:So, so late '90s, I got to take you back a minute. I mean, at the time computers were still relatively, they weren't new, but they were not as useful as they are today. Everything was hard. The internet was slow. The amount of data that you had access to wasn't quite there, Google wasn't quite there. So I was building a lot of financial models. It was hard to do the research. We were printing things out on overhead projector slides for client presentations. PowerPoint was not as user friendly as it is today. I think I, when I started there, we were using Lotus 1-2-3, not even Excel. I was working probably 80 to 100 hours. I found the work interesting. I found the rigor interesting. I found the type of things we were doing interesting. I did not find the clients. I was working on overly exciting, and that was a big epiphany for me.Adam Rymer:I found it really hard to stay focused working for industries that I didn't have a passion for. At one point I was no joke... People say these things as jokes, I was working for a vacuum cleaner manufacturer, literally a company that made vacuum cleaners and I was helping them reallocate their sales force across the country. It was just hard. I was on the road and I was looking through maps and I was looking at different DMAs and I was trying to help them figure this out. I also spent a lot of time working in the biotech space, trying to look at different drugs that were coming to market and how they should be priced and talking to a lot of doctors and physicians about whether they would use the product and whether they would get approved by the FDA.Adam Rymer:And look, it wasn't my background. I mean, I purposely stayed away from anything pre-med I don't think I took any biology classes past ninth grade. The work was fun. The hours were rough, but not being passionate about the day to day subject was a real challenge for me. So about a year in, I was trying to figure out what was next.Chris Erwin:I hear you. I mean, I was a banker, right when I graduated from school undergrad. I think from like 2005 to 2010. And yeah, we were able to pull down 10-Ks and SEC filings, from the internet and able to get a bunch of financial information using Excel to create models. And I just remember all my MDs being like, "We used to have to get the 10-K's physically mailed to us." They didn't have Excel and they were doing modeling by hand on paper or in these really basic computer systems. And I was like, "Either that sounds terrible or it was better because you could just focus and do less." Where when you have access to technology your bosses just expect, "Well, you can work on five assignments at the same time." Right? You're equipped. But anyway, I digress.Chris Erwin:So then, okay, you do that for a couple of years and then I think you make a decision that instead of being an advisor and consultant, you want to go work for a company. You go to the line, quote, unquote, "some people say." And you go to Universal Music. So how was that transition for you?Adam Rymer:I mean, it was a magical transition for me. I mean, it was a happenstance lucky break for me and my career and the whole rest of my career, to be honest with you. And it goes down in something I think about still on a regular basis is having been a nerd. I mean, this goes back to the BBS story is I had built a PC. I was living in Cambridge. I was downloading the first MP3 files off the internet from really obscure search engines, like web crawler and LICOs. And I bought the first MP3 player that was ever made. And I would take this MP3 player to the gym and the use case for a portable MP3 player I found fascinating. The other options available at the time were a Walkman with a tape that you had to make a mix tape for, or a CD player, which for those who don't remember them, trying to get a CD player not to skip when you're at the gym or on a treadmill is almost impossible.Adam Rymer:And so I, part of me just realized like this digital music universe is going to be the way to go. This is just going to completely take over the future as the technology gets better. And I went to the consulting company I was at, and I said, "Look, we should sell a project to the music business and help them figure out the future of digital music, because there's no doubt in my mind that this is going to change the whole face of how the music industry works." To their credit they let me help work on selling that project and they successfully did sell the project. To not their credit they didn't let me work on the project.Chris Erwin:You can be the idea, the inspiration, create the pitch. And then it's like, "And you're off the team."Adam Rymer:So I left and that was the impetus for me leaving. I applied for a job at Universal and I was very fortunate to get an interview and then ultimately get hired to go join the strategy group at Universal Music in New York in, I think it was 1999, early 1999. It was a life-changing moment because the beginning in 1999 MP3 files and digital music was starting to be a huge subject of conversation. It was on the front page of USA Today. I was quoted in a bunch of things. It was something that everybody was talking about and knew was coming. But what nobody saw coming was Napster and Napster happened about three months after I got to Universal.Chris Erwin:Oh wow.Adam Rymer:So all of a sudden I was thrown into the fire with, it wasn't just me we had a team of people. But it was the, "Okay. Piracy is real. It's not going anywhere. How do we solve this?" Do we start suing the companies? Do we start suing our customers? Do we create our own technology? Do we create a subscription service, which is no joke, an idea that we presented at the time in 1999. What do we do? How do we solve this problem? Because it's not going anywhere and technology isn't where it is today.Chris Erwin:Follow-up question on that. Adam, did you feel that the leadership, did they understand the weight of the situation? Were they really panicked, very concerned or it's like, "This is an issue we should sort this out over the next five years, but take your time and be thoughtful." What was that sense inside the building?Adam Rymer:I'm going to answer that in a couple ways. I mean, this is a problem that I have seen throughout my entire career, which is that at traditional entertainment companies, the leadership is rarely incentivized to try to really innovate solutions to the biggest challenges that are in front of them. There's a lot of reasons for that. And I don't necessarily blame the leadership that's at these companies. A lot of them are publicly traded. They need to hit their quarterly returns. They're incentivized to hit those quarterly returns. Innovation is very rarely valued at these companies the way that it needs to be. Oftentimes they can buy innovation when they need to. Right? They're big enough. They've got public stock and if there's a startup, they can often buy the company that's going to solve their innovation problem. The difficulty in these cases is when you're dealing with something that's inherently illegal or theoretically illegal, you can't just buy the illegal thing and make that part of your repertoire.Adam Rymer:So the answer that was given was essentially like, "Look, let's let the courts figure this out." It was somewhat of a, "Well, obviously this is illegal. So the government should just stop this and get in front of it and shut it down because we have the right to sell music on discs and all these other things." And I think there was an inherent unwillingness to accept the fact that the consumers get to decide these things. Consumers get to decide how they want to consume content, how they want to live their lives. And ultimately it's the entertainment companies and the media companies who have to answer to the consumers on these things. And that's where I saw the biggest disconnect. And it wasn't just at the music industry. I've seen that through most of my career.Chris Erwin:Yeah. You were at Universal Music for about one to two years. So, and clearly had some early exposure to digital, but we're seeing that this is a theme from very early on in your career and your childhood. But then shortly thereafter you go to Universal Pictures. Why'd you make that transition? Did you feel, "Hey, there's a lot of inertia here, things aren't changing and I want to go to another part of the house," or was it something else? What was that catalyst for change?Adam Rymer:Well, for anybody who remembers the advent of Napster and piracy, also the crash of 2000 from a tech standpoint, just really killed the entire music industry. I mean, the music industry was cratering at that point. People were losing their jobs. Revenue was cut more or less than half very quickly. And I had an opportunity to go to business school. So I jumped and I decided I was going to ride out the storm of 2000 and everything else while I was in business school. And if there was still a music industry to go back to, I loved the music business. I would've gone back to music after business school, but between 2000 and 2002, while I was in school, the music industry kept falling. They couldn't quite figure out the solution. And I spent my summer at Universal Pictures looking at a another side of entertainment.Adam Rymer:So after school that turned into a full-time offer. My thought on it was the biggest challenge the music industry had was technology hit them like a title wave because the technology at the time had already caught up to the feasibility for music, meaning you could download a song in a reasonable amount of time to make it useful for the end-user, right? It only took a couple minutes, 5, 10 minutes at most to download a song, if not an album based on where technology was in 1999. When I graduated from, from school and went off to film the technology, wasn't there to download a movie, right? We were still a long way off from maybe not that long, but technology hadn't quite hit the film business in terms of feasibility for the piracy and the not having enough time to get in front of.Adam Rymer:So the way I saw it was this is an opportunity to get into the film business and try to help them stave off the problems that the music industry faced. How do I take the learnings from music and apply it to the film business and try to do some things differently here that we couldn't do there?Chris Erwin:You go there and you have a seven-year run and you end up rising to become I think the SP of digital for Universal Pictures where you're managing an international staff of, I think over 20 people across the US as well as London and Tokyo, if I'm right. Did you feel that at that point that you were coming into your own as an executive where you have a vision, you know how to solve problems, you know how to build the teams? And did you feel like that was a transformational moment in your career?Adam Rymer:I thought so. I thought so. It was the, "Hey, this is great. My career's really advancing. I'm at the senior levels of a major studio. I'm getting to present to some really cool people." I'm continued to have some really lucky experiences. Got involved in some very cool projects. I was always very much on the business side of it. I was pretty far removed from I'd say the creative side. It wasn't until the very end of my stint at Universal that I got put on the green light committee at Universal, which is where you actually get to have a say over which films get made at the studio, which was a pretty cool experience. Although it didn't last very long.Chris Erwin:How big is that committee and how much weight did your particular vote from the digital strategy side count?Adam Rymer:I'm not sure how much weight anybody's individual vote has, except for a couple of people on those committees. There's about 10 people on that committee across the studio. You've got home entertainment and marketing and production and the head of the studio and those kinds of things. It's fascinating. I mean, it's very kind of closed-door sort of, sort of setting very private, almost Illuminati-ish, but it was pretty cool to be in the room for some of it. But my job was to weigh in on what the digital and alternative revenue streams could be for the titles that we were working on. So things like video games, YouTube content, ancillary products. At the time we were talking about things like ring tones. What's the other stuff that we can do out of these films to generate revenue.Adam Rymer:And then I would be on the hook for delivering those numbers against the P&L for that particular title. It was pretty neat. And I felt like things were going pretty well for my career at that point, for sure. Now the downside was during my time there, we kept getting acquired. And for most people getting acquired sounds like it's a pretty awesome thing. Usually, there's like, "Hey, you got paid out. That's a big success, big exit." Well, in the big giant corporate world, those kinds of acquisitions usually get met with, "Hey, we're just kind of sitting on our hands for a while." So Universal was a big company. And when I started working for them, it was owned by Seagram. Then it was owned by Vivendi. Then it was owned by GE. And when I left, it had been acquired by Comcast.Adam Rymer:And we were always the acquired company, which meant that the acquiring company was taking their people, having them learn about the business that they were buying, meeting with everybody trying to figure out what everybody did, which resulted in a whole lot of work for all of us to educate them. And usually, that met with a whole bunch of reorganization and strategy redesignChris Erwin:Hey listeners, this is Chris Erwin, your host of the Come Up. I have a quick ask for you. If you dig what we're putting down, if you like the show, if you like our guests, it would really mean a lot if you can give us a rating wherever you listen to our show. It helps other people discover our work. And it also really supports what we do here. All right, that's it everybody. Let's get back to the interview.Chris Erwin:So, Adam, I totally feel you on if you're always the target and you're being acquired the reeducation of the new leadership. It's a lot. I mean, I remember when Big Frame was bought by Awesomeness TV and then Verizon, and then Hearst then invested thereafter, and then Comcast NBC U came and bought Dreamworks, which had owned Awesomeness. And there's always the strategic goal shift, the mandate shift there's reorganizations. And there's a point where you're just like, "I just want to get to work." And look, that's the nature of the beast, but was that a reason why after your seven-year run, you then started to explore entrepreneurship? You were the co-founder and COO and CFO of Lava Bear Films. And you did that for a few years. Was that the reason why you made the switch?Adam Rymer:Yeah, look, I mean, there were management changes and to be honest, I had been part of a very big company where I was an employee number. I still remember my employee number to this day, which says a lot, and it was an eight-digit number. So I was just a little tired of being in that kind of structure and part of me who likes solving problems and actually making things happen and not having a whole lot of red tape. There was an opportunity in front of me. The chairman of Universal had left and had an opportunity to start a film production company and asked me to help him put the business plan together for it and raise some capital and go after it. So I thought it would be a great chance for me to not only learn how to start a company from scratch but also learn about the other side of the business, the creative side of the business. How do you actually make content from start to finish?Chris Erwin:Well, you must have been doing something right at universal if the chairman leaves and wants to bring you on board to his next venture, right?Adam Rymer:I would hope so. I would hope so.Chris Erwin:So you're there. You learned the creative side of the business, which I think is, I've talked about this on a few podcasts, right? Usually, in entertainment, you're either on the business side of the house or on the creative side of the house. It's rare for people to speak both those languages. I think of people maybe like Bob Iger or David Zaslav at Discovery in Warner Media. Right. So it's smart to build out that muscle and I think that you are an executive producer on The Rover and you helped finance the movie Arrival?Adam Rymer:That's right.Chris Erwin:Produced by FilmNation and [inaudible 00:28:25] and Glen Basner and they're good friends of ours.Adam Rymer:Great guys.Chris Erwin:Yeah. They're the best. And so you do that for four years and did you see like, "Hey, maybe there's a world where you stay in the creative side of entertainment?" Was that interesting to you?Adam Rymer:Look, it was an amazing experience. I always wanted to see how the whole sausages gets made from start to end and really got to do that. I was going around to film festivals. I was reading scripts. I was handling some of the talent deals. I was negotiating a lot of the financing for the films. We were selling the projects internationally. We were dealing with the studios. We were looking at the marketing for the films when they came out. But for I'm sure you've talked about this on some other podcasts the filmmaking process is very long and very slow. And so for me, it was I like being on the creative side of the business or having involvement on the creative side. But I don't know that filmmaking was the place for me to explore that in the long term, because I'm so used to being in areas where things move very quickly, right?Adam Rymer:Even the music business moves relatively quickly. And on the digital world, I was watching things happen. Snapchat was starting to happen and Twitch wasn't quite there yet, but YouTube was really starting to take off and there were all these other things that were happening in the background. And I just felt like I was missing some really cool, innovative opportunities that were going on. So I had an opportunity to go join Legendary, which was at the time a pretty cool independent studio started by Thomas Tull. They had made Godzilla and Hangover and King Kong and 300. And he asked me if I would help them build their digital businesses over there.Chris Erwin:Was it an immediate yes? Like, "Oh yeah, this makes sense. This is an incredible studio with some incredible IP. There's a lot I can do here. Let's get to work." Or were you evaluating other things too?Adam Rymer:I wasn't evaluating other things. And it was pretty hard decision because you this was a company that I had helped start and I was a pretty big piece of, but the opportunity and it was a blank slate. I was kind of handed a, "We don't know what the right answer is and we need somebody who's got enough experience on both sides of the equation here that understands making some content, understands distribution, understands the business side of it to really help us figure out what we should do with this asset that we have." They had just acquired Nerdist and just didn't have a solid business plan on how to start making real revenues out of it. So for me, it was a puzzle to solve right back to the things that I love, which is trying to put pieces together.Adam Rymer:At a certain level the film business has a very defined path, right? There's not much to solve in that. There's always new innovations that are getting made. There's new ways to finance a film. But for the most part, the business model of making movies is relatively defined. You might say that Netflix has changed that in some way, shape, or form, but there wasn't a whole lot of, "How am I going to do this for the next 20 years and innovate and do some neat things?" And at Legendary, it felt like there was a real chance to try all sorts of new ideas.Chris Erwin:When you enter their first year, they've acquired Nerdist and I think that was... Was that founded by Chris Hardwick?Adam Rymer:Correct? Yep.Chris Erwin:And so what did you think of, okay, these are the wins that I want to get in year one. I think that we are capable of doing this. It also feels innovative. And then I think it's going to set you up to have an exciting career overseeing digital at Legendary going forward. What was that first mandate for you?Adam Rymer:First thing was really figuring out how are we going to generate consistent revenue? Because at the time the video part of Nerdist was founded as one of the funded YouTube channels. Some people might remember that YouTube was putting a lot of money into funding channels for the purpose of creating more premium content on YouTube and right around 2014, they stopped funding those channels. And so a lot of these channels ended up in no man's land of figuring out how they were going to keep their business running. And so for me, the first step was okay, well, now that we don't have this stipend coming from YouTube every year, how are we going to find ways to just generate consistent revenue even if we're still operating at a little bit of loss, something that we can project to keep it all moving. So at the time we had the Nerdist podcast and we had some content that was existing on YouTube, and my first step was, well, how do we start monetizing podcasts in a better way?Adam Rymer:So I was able to take Chris's podcast and structure a deal with Midroll and that helped get us really kicked off with our first seven-figure deal, which let me hire some more staff and start to figure out some new lines of business.Chris Erwin:Did you feel like, "Hey, we figured out a digital revenue model here for media brands and fandoms built around big personalities"? And so did that then inspire you to say, "Well, let's start buying some other companies to add onto this roster"? Because I think you then acquired Geek and Sundry and then Amy Poehler's Smart Girls at the Party.Adam Rymer:That's right. So the idea was, well, if we can create enough of scale around these celebrity-driven community content businesses, then we can justify having an infrastructure that can support all of them the right way. So that allowed us to have a sales team that could support all of them, and start doing branded content deals that could leverage the communities that were built across all of them simultaneously bring some staff efficiencies together, and allow content production to be more efficient. So we had our entire... We had our own content production team. We had our own studio where we produced all of the content that we're making for the YouTube channels ourselves and for our branded content features. And ultimately that led us to start a Twitch channel with Geek and Sundry, which is where I started to learn quite a lot about Livestream.Chris Erwin:So do you feel at this point it's like, "All right." You're attached to a big studio, you have a lot of resources, you have incredible IP to work with, but you also, you're running your own division, which has its own P&L. It seems like you're on both the creative and the business sides of the house, where you have a real strong point of view of what content we're creating. How do we monetize it? What's getting green-lit? What new platforms are we experimenting with? You're building out a team against your vision. Did you feel like, "Hey, I feel like I have it all right now"? This is checking all the boxes for my career.Adam Rymer:In hindsight, I guess so. I mean, at time it felt very stressful. At the time it felt like we were building the plane while we were flying it. And there weren't a whole lot of examples for us to point to say, "Hey, we're doing it like these guys," or we've got somebody else that's done it in front of us. There were the MCNs out there that were aggregating a bunch of channels together. And they had a somewhat different business model, but there was nobody who was really trying to create more premium level content on a regular basis. And I mean, I had to answer to a pretty senior studio executive. So I had a lot of pressure from that side, but I did have the luxury of a good balance sheet. So I wasn't having to deal with trying to raise capital on a regular basis to keep the thing afloat.Adam Rymer:There was a couple years there where it really felt like the coolest, most fun job that I ever could have thought I've had. We were going down to ComicCon. Chris was moderating panels for us in Hall H. Got to go backstage and hang out with the cast of all the Marvel films before they got on Hall H. we had all sorts of fun people coming by the studio to be in the content, got to watch and be part of a lot of the content that was being filmed at our location. I think most of the people that were there at the time will tell you that it was a pretty magical place to be for a couple of years.Chris Erwin:I mean, I remember going to your offices a couple times during that period and just looking around at the different sets and the studios. And I was like, "This sounds like a pretty amazing gig, Adam." I knew that you were working really hard and that it was a lot and you were kind of figuring things out on the fly as you said, but I think everything in retrospect, you get some clarity of like, "Oh, that was a pretty cool moment." You know? And I think that was a very cool moment for you. And clearly, you learned a lot, which has bolstered your career. But I'm curious to hear you so you started experimenting with Twitch. I think that's just an interesting precursor to some of the channels and the partners that you work with today, particularly in gaming, similar to when you saw the power of MP3s when you were up in Cambridge.Chris Erwin:And then you saw how that was going to disrupt the music space. When you were first exposed to Twitch, did a light bulb go off on your head and say, "Hey, there's something incredibly exciting about the power of live?" What was that moment like for you?Adam Rymer:I'll be honest. I wasn't the biggest, "Hey, we're going to figure out how to monetize this immediately live streaming." I was the suit in the room on it. I had some people from Geek and Sundry come to me and they said, "We think that we can create a channel for Geek and Sundry and stream different kinds of content, just do some stuff out of our office. And we will minimize the cost that it takes for us to do it and we'll give it a shot. And they did it and they got it up and running and they spent as little as they could to create a set and livestream and got a bunch of equipment donated. And it was okay. And Felicia came on and streamed with it and that helped build an audience for it. And it was programmed. I mean, the thing that was most interesting about it was it actually had a schedule.Adam Rymer:There were shows that were on certain times of day, certain days of the week, it was a live-streamed TV network. Maybe one of the first of its kind. It started to gain some traction, but it was when Felicia brought in her friends at Critical Role to stream their Dungeons and Dragons game that we really started to see the magic of what live-streaming could be.Chris Erwin:What was unique about bringing Critical Role in live-streaming Dungeons and Dragons? What did you feel was special for the audience or to help amplify marketing? What was that?Adam Rymer:Well, I mean, what was amazing about it was it found a community that never had a place to call home. So most of Twitch was watching people play video games. There was some what you'd call today, just chatting going on, which is mostly what Geek and Sundry was. There was some game playing, but nobody was really streaming D and D at the time or doing things that were a little more creative like that in a meaningful, well-produced way. And all of a sudden this show found a home and started to spread by word of mouth and it had some great talent attached to it, right? Everybody who's on Critical Role is professional voice actors in their own right. And so they brought a level of confidence to it that don't think many people have seen before. And Matt Mercer's just a genius as a DM at the end of the day. So giving this community, which is spread out around the world a home one day a week, where they can all get together and share an experience at the same time, really became a magical place to be.Adam Rymer:So Twitch loved us because we were bringing in a community that wasn't necessarily there naturally again, because most of Twitch was more based around video gaming and the D and D community loved it because it was giving them a place that they had never had before. It was a little bit like lightning in a bottle.Chris Erwin:It just goes back to, I think I was listening to a podcast by Ben Thompson a couple weeks ago. And I think a point that was made is never underestimate the ability of the internet to reach these incredibly niche fandoms all around the world. There is interest in anything at a minimum, at least one person will be into something if you put it out there. But I think Dungeons and Dragons has this massive community and like you said, but they didn't really have a place to call home and you guys created that for them. I think that was just like so beautifully articulated. I love that. So you're doing your thing at Nerdist and Legendary you're there for five years, but then at the end of your five-year run, you go into this exploratory phase where you're advising a few different companies.Chris Erwin:I think you're reimagining cinema with a company called WeVu. And I remember being in your living room, having some brainstorm sessions around that with a few mutual friends, shout out to Adam Sachs. And then you end up as at the CEO, as of Envy Gaming, a big bet on the gaming space. How did that run come to an end? And then it kicked off. I'm going to make a bet on the gaming space. What did that look like for you?Adam Rymer:Sure. So Legendary sold to a big Chinese company called Wanda and I'll make it a short story. It was just the fit for me at the new version of the company wasn't quite the same as it was under the previous leadership. So I left and started advising companies that I just thought were really interesting and cool out there. Did some work with [inaudible 00:40:44]. Did some work with Participant. Did some work with ranker.com, other friends of mine that I had known over the years that I just had a chance to really help out here and there. And then out of the blue, right before COVID hit, I got a call from a recruiter about this position with NB Gaming. And as I've said, I've been a gamer geek nerd most of my life. And I've been paying attention to what's been going on in the gaming and Esports space for a long time.Adam Rymer:At Universal, I was responsible for all the video game work that was done. We had produced a couple games while I was there. We looked at buying a big video game publisher while I was there. So the video game space wasn't totally new to me, but the video game lifestyle space was a little bit new. And I had been following the growth of Twitch, the growth of what you'd call the celebrity influencers and creators that were emerging on the platform. And I had seen some of these Esports organizations. I hadn't necessarily known of Envy at the time, but I did know of a couple of the other ones that were out there. And I saw the potential, right? I saw the early days of a new form of brand and community entertainment, which was emerging on Twitch and other platforms because it was interactive. And when I started meeting the people that were here at Envy, it really felt like the next phase of innovation for me.Adam Rymer:And if you think about the path of my career, which has always been trying to find where's that edge of entertainment and technology and consumer behavior music with Napster and film with digital distribution and Nerdist with community-based content. This really feels like the edge of the universe at the moment, in terms of where the community is starting to emerge, where you've got a new generation of people who are not watching traditional television. It felt to me like this is a place to plant my flag for a while and see how I can help this develop.Chris Erwin:So you end up moving. You were based out of LA. Your family was in LA but the role was in Dallas. Did you just move there full-time in the beginning or were you commuting like four days a week in Dallas? And then back to LA on the weekends?Adam Rymer:I moved here to Dallas in the summer of 2020 having never met anybody at the company in person because we were all working from home. And my family stayed back in LA because of the pandemic. And I would fly back home every two weeks to see them. And we did that for about nine months while my kid was finishing the school year. It was an interesting time to be away from home and in a new city that I knew absolutely nothing about. I had never really been to Dallas before. I knew nothing about the city.Chris Erwin:Did you take on the role without ever meeting anyone from the founding team, the leadership, or the investor group in person? It was all Zoom calls and then you signed on the dotted line?Adam Rymer:Yes.Chris Erwin:Wow. That's a big decision.Adam Rymer:Yes. That's how convinced I was about the future of this space and also the people that were involved with it. So the interesting part about that period of time is I have a son who at the time was eight years old. And the way that he and I would stay in touch and I think this is telling to the future of this space, the way he and I would stay in touch while I was living in Dallas and he was in LA is we would play Fortnite together. Several times during the week I would get home from work, we'd both load up Fortnite and we'd put on the cameras. And while we were playing Fortnite, we'd catch up on how school was going and what his friends were up to and how he's doing. And that to me was the whole reason why I'm in this space.Adam Rymer:Because yes, we were playing a game and we were shooting people and we were like having a good time, but it was really just about us spending time together and talking to each other and interacting with each other. And that's what I think we're going to remember at the end of the day and not what skin we were wearing or any of that kind of thing, which to me shows how gaming is just the natural way of interacting and communicating for people today.Chris Erwin:That is so cool. I mean, I think about from our generations like Gen X and Millennials, oh, early memories of your father, it's like going fishing together, right. Going camping. And I think that your son, right, these like Gen Alpha, their memories will be like, "I remember when we used to play that old game Fortnight and we used to talk and catch up about our what was going on in school." It's just going to be a whole transformation of memories of childhood and with their parents, you know?Adam Rymer:Absolutely.Chris Erwin:I love that. We always say for us, you need to be where your clients are at. Tell our clients to don't resist or to be forceful. And I really like you're meeting your kid where he's at. If you look at the stats, we just did a big research project for a toy retailer of where are parents and kids independently and then also as a co-viewing unit spending their time online. It's on social media and it's in these big gaming environments, like Fortnite, like Roblox, like Minecraft. So I think that's pretty smart parenting, Adam. I am not a parent, but I think that it seems like smart parenting from afar.Adam Rymer:Absolutely. It's a new world. I keep trying to explain to people who are in a, I don't even want to say older generation, right because I don't feel like I'm old these days, but I'll just say anybody who's Gen X and older, we tend to use the word gamer, right? As like, "Oh, there's gamers." People are gamers and it's a misnomer now. It made sense for our generation because gaming was such a new thing for people to do. Not everybody had an Xbox, not everybody had an Atari. Gaming wasn't a natural course of business. But for this new generation, for the younger generations, asking somebody if they're a gamer is like asking people in our generations, if they listen to music or if they go to the movies.Adam Rymer:Well, you might talk to people and say, "Hey, what TV shows are you watching?" And there might be people who say, "I don't watch TV" and you're going to say, "Okay, well, that's strange. I mean, most people watch TV." But in this generation, I think we are increasingly reaching the stage of saying, "What games do you play?" Not, "Are you a gamer?" Because to me that is the given for this generation.Chris Erwin:I love that. Such a poignant point. Couple quick questions before we go onto our closing rapid fire. But when you got in there, I remember I'm like, "Adam, so what's your initial focus there?" And I think that you had a point of view like you've done at your other companies of what is the 360 monetization model? How do you take these teams, these players... How do you build media brands around them? How do you build fandoms? What is the talent-driven model to really take this business to the next level? If you could just tell our listeners what your initial re-imagination and growth vision for the company was in year one.Adam Rymer:A lot of it is applying principles to it at a certain level. What we do, isn't very different from other forms of media and entertainment that I've been involved with. And other people have been involved with in the past, which is we have a brand that has stature and meaning and association. It has a community around it. And through that brand and through the content that we create, we reach our users, we reach their eyeballs. It helps our brands and advertisers reach their eyeballs and it helps us connect with them. And so that's no different from any other form of media, whether that was magazines back in the day or television, or filmed entertainment, it is at a certain level. It is reach and it is scale. And so when I came in here first, it was really just understanding the dynamics of the industry.Adam Rymer:Where does monetization happen? What platforms does it happen on? How do we actually get in touch with these people? What kind of data is available? But then it was what are the assets that we actually have and what levers can we pull and what is our programming? So when you start thinking of the brand and your programming, you start saying to yourself, okay, well, I've got teams and I've got content creators, and I've got original programming that we put out. And you start looking at the pieces of your organization as what reach to each of those pieces have. So I've got this team and they play a certain game. Let's call it rocket league. Well, what audience does that rocket league team bring to me? Where are those people from? What demographic is that group of people? Are they mostly in the US or are they mostly international?Adam Rymer:What age are they? What states do they come from? What do they care about? What brands and industries are they interested in? And then I've got our call of duty team. Same thing. What reach do they have? Switch over to our content creator side. Okay. Well, if I'm going to bring on a new content creator, what's the audience that I'm getting from working with that content creator? It's not overly different. I mean, it is, there are differences in nuances, but if you are Discovery Channel and you're thinking about filling the 8:00 PM slot on Thursday, well, what are you going to put on in that 8:00 PM slot? You don't want to put on something that overlaps with another show that you already get that audience from. This is the whole definition of programming. It's the same reason why Game of Thrones and Westworld aren't on at the same time for HBO. They sequence those things because they want to optimize the programming and make sure that people stay subscribed to HBO for a longer period of time.Adam Rymer:So understanding your audience, understanding who's coming in, understanding the reach that you get with the assets that you have available starts to get the company thinking about us as a media property. And once you shift your mindset to thinking about it as a media property rather than necessarily a sports team, you start to build business processes around that in a different way. And that's what we're focused on at the moment.Chris Erwin:I don't think I've heard a smarter encapsulation of a media strategy than your past couple minutes, Adam. So very well done. So I'm curious in putting that strategy in place, just over the past almost two years, what are some of your favorite moments of some wins with the team? I was reading on LinkedIn. There's the Valorant Championships and the Green Wall, the Fandom really coming alive, having over a million concurrent viewers of the competition. Is that one of them? Are there others? What has that been for you?Adam Rymer:To start with our Call of Duty team won the CDL Championship within a month of me being here at Envy, which was mind-numbing. It's like, imagine joining the Chicago bulls five days before they won the NBA Championship, right? It's that kind of thing. And all of a sudden you've got a ring and you've got a trophy and you've got all this stuff and you barely started to understand what this world is all about. It was a pretty phenomenal moment. It was an amazing way to get indoctrinated into the space and get excited about it all. So now I've got a championship ring that's sitting in my office and that was a pretty fun, pretty fun moment. But yeah, about a year later, we merged with OpTic Gaming, which some of the listeners might know is one of the biggest, most passionate fan bases in the world when it comes to gaming and Esports.Adam Rymer:And that has been like wildfire for us. Hector Hex, just an amazing individual who's knows how to work with his audience and knows how to create content, and knows how to bring the audience into the brand in a really phenomenal way. And he's been educating us on a bunch of things that we didn't quite understand, and we've been working with him on some of the monetization things and just really couldn't have put two better organizations together. So within two months of bringing those organizations together, we won the Valorant Championship in Iceland, which is, as you were mentioning, had over a million people watching it. And just again, just another one of those too picture-perfect of a moment for us. Great memories that we're going to have forever.Chris Erwin:That's awesome. A final question for you is what's next for Envy gaming? What should people be watching for in some of the upcoming announcements, some new business initiatives? I think I was looking at from your team, there's some new virtual character immersion like CodeMiko. I'm pronouncing that right? Maybe some web three activations. What are you working on right now?Adam Rymer:What I think you're going to see out of us over the next year is really continued expansion of optic from a brand perspective, in terms of the areas that we're in. Just really trying to explore new ways to reach our fan base and build communities. I think the whole world of Web3, and I think a lot of people talk about Web3 without necessarily... I'm not saying I'm an expert in it, but I don't think a lot of people quite understand some of the dynamics of what makes Web3 different from Web2. And the biggest thing to me about Web3 that makes it different is community. If you don't have a community tied to some Web3 initiative, then you're missing it. I'll give you an perfect example. Web2 is about user acquisition on a one-to-one basis.Adam Rymer:So you've got a game like Candy Crush and you spend 50 cents to bring somebody in to Candy Crush and they spend a $1.50 on the game. You've made a dollar in profit and you can just keep doing that cycle all day. And you find new ways to bring more people in and you get a huge user base. There's a community that maybe gets formed online on Reddit boards and whatever else talking about Candy Crush, but the community is not an inherent part of what makes Candy Crush successful. In Web3 it's a little bit different. Web3 is if you bring somebody in, if you spend 50 cents to bring somebody to your Web3 platform and they get there and there isn't a whole community for them to connect to, they're going to leave. There's nothing for them to do. The community actually makes your project valuable.Adam Rymer:So in game terms, it's like bringing somebody in to play Fortnite, and they're just sitting in the queue, waiting for the game to start. And because there aren't 90 other people for you to play the game with, you're just sitting there and you're just waiting and waiting and nothing happens. And so it doesn't matter how much you spend on user acquisition, you didn't get your value for it. So we're going to be spending a lot of time on how do we build our community in new ways? How do we get the information about who our community is? Where do they live? What are they looking for us to do? How do we bring value to them? And how do we find partners that want to provide value back to our community? So how do we find those really interesting partnerships where we can take the Green Wall and OpTic and Envy and work together with those platforms to create really interesting dynamic opportunities together and not try to just have everything operate through our own vertical.Chris Erwin:Well said, something that we talk about at RockWater is the sense of valuing your community and communal ownership. I think that there's been a lot of literature over the past, call it year, particularly as you look at the building of different game franchises, where these users, their engagements, all the dollars that they spend on the games, all their engagement that can drive advertising revenues, right? And in-game purchases, the value that they create for a few stakeholders or investors or game owners, and it really gets siphoned to just a few. So the question then becomes, "Well, how do you reward the community for all the value that they're creating?" And I think there's actually a much bigger win there where if there's more of that two-way street, in terms of value sharing, the overall pie gets a lot bigger and everyone can win. And so I think that's a really, really smart mentality.Chris Erwin:Adam, I'll close it out with this before we get the rapid-fire. I just want to give you some kudos here. I think we were first introduced when I was probably at Big Frame and Awesomeness. So this is probably around maybe like 2015 to 2017 timeframe.Adam Rymer:Wow.Chris Erwin:And I know dating us a bit. And I just remember when I met you, you were running Nerdist and Legendary Networks at the time. I was like, "This is a guy who's a super sharp operator." He totally gets it. He's got both sides of his brain activating. I very much thought on the business side, on the creative side, I thought you really understood talent. You knew traditional entertainment, you knew digital. And I thought you were a very, very special mind and operator. And I remember when you were in your, what I call here in my notes, the exploration phase. So like after Nerdist and before you went to Envy Gaming, I think there was a period where you are wondering what really excites you. What's really going to get you going. And I think a lot of things that come across your plate that you weren't too thrilled about. And I just knew, I mean, I don't know if I ever shared this with you the right thing's going to come across Adam's desk and he's going to crush it. And it's going to be a really exciting moment for his career. Now I look back at all the success that you've had with Envy over the past, less than a couple years, and I am not surprised whatsoever. And I can't wait to see what you do there over the next two to three years. So I wanted to just share that with you.Adam Rymer:Thank you, my friend. It was definitely an adventure after leaving Legendary. There were points where I felt like I just needed to take something for the sake of taking something. I will wholeheartedly recommend people holding out for as long as you possibly can to find the right thing that feels right. If you can. Obviously don't sacrifice your family in your future and all those kinds of things. But if you can find the right thing, it definitely pays off.Chris Erwin:Very well said. All right, Adam. So we're going to get into the rapid-fire six questions. The rules are simple. It is short answer one sentence, or maybe just a couple of words. Do you understand the rules?Adam Rymer:I think so.Chris Erwin:All right. Proudest life moment?Adam Rymer:Birth of my child.Chris Erwin:What do you want to do less of in the second half of 2022?Adam Rymer:Less stress, more outside.Chris Erwin:Less stress, more outside. What one to two things, drive your success?Adam Rymer:Paying attention to everything going on out there.Chris Erwin:Advice for media gaming and Esports execs going into the remainder of this year?Adam Rymer:That's a tough one. Bear with the downside. There's still a huge opportunity in front of all of us, but manage this downside economy at the moment. And there's a bright light, but follow the path.Chris Erwin:Got it. All right. Last couple. Any future startup ambitions? Can you see yourself starting something from scratch in the future?Adam Rymer:For sure. Never a shortage of ideas that I've got. In fact, I think it's probably maybe a problem that I have. I am hopeful that I'll be launching something again sometime soon. We'll see. We'll see. if you got any ideas, send them my way, but yeah, definitely be starting some things soon.Chris Erwin:I think you got enough on your plate. I'm going to hold back on sending you too much, but maybe in a few years time. How can people get in contact with you?Adam Rymer:I'm pretty easy. It's Adam@Envy.ggChris Erwin:Adam. This was a delight. Thanks for being on the podcast.Adam Rymer:For sure. Great to be here. Let's do it again sometime.Chris Erwin:All right. That interview was just awesome. I don't think I've interviewed anyone in the gaming space yet to date. And I stand by my point that I think Adam is one of the sharpest minds that's operating at the intersection of content community in commerce. He's been in the business for a really long time who really understands the business fundamentals. And he's got an incredible set of stories. So a real gift to have him on the show, very excited for what he continues to build with OpTic Gaming. Okay. Also, as many of you know RockWater is market research and strategy advisory for the media technology and commerce industries. We've just introduced a new offering, which allows us to work with more partners. It's called RockWater Plus. It's an offering for companies who want an ongoing consulting partner at a low monthly retainer yet who might also need a partner who can flex up for bigger projects.Chris Erwin:So we've worked with a large range of companies from big and small. Big Fortune 50 like Google and YouTube and big cable networks and studios like Viacom, CBS, and Warner Media to a variety of digital publisher, upstarts and retail brands, and more. So with Plus, we do a variety of things. We can have weekly calls to address any immediate business concerns that you have. We can set up KPI dashboards that allow you to make database decisions around how to best operate and grow your business. We can do ad hoc research, ad hoc financial modeling. If you're doing market sizing need to do P&L forecasts or valuations to assess your business before you go out to investors and so much more. So if you're interested in this and you think it could be helpful shoot us a note at hello@wearerockwater.com. And then lastly, we always love any feedback on our show. If you have ideas for guests for just feedback on the format, shoot us a note at TCUpod@wearerockwater.com. All right, that's it. Everybody. Thanks for listening.The Come Up is written and hosted by me, Chris Erwin, and is a production of RockWater Industries. Please rate and review this show on Apple podcast and remember to subscribe wherever you listen to our show. And if you really dig us, feel free to forward The Come Up to a friend. You can sign up for our company newsletter at wearerockwater.com/newsletter. And you could follow us on Twitter @TCUPod. The Come Up is engineered by Daniel Tureck. Music is by Devon Bryant. Logo and branding is by Kevin Zazzali. And special thanks to Alex Zirin and Felicity Huang from the RockWater team.—Ping us anytime at hello@wearerockwater.com. We love to hear from our readers.

**Tourist loses his life during a trip to Isla Mujeres A tourist woman lost her life when she was on a trip to Isla Mujeres; Death was presumed to be due to natural causes. *Increases the demand for legal advice for migrants in Q. Roo Half of the attention given is to people who entered Mexico illegally. *Cancún: Balean taqueria in the Villas del Mar subdivision They shoot a taqueria in Villas del Mar and criminals are observed loitering in another business; it is presumed that they did not attack because there were many minors *Environmentalists against the Mayan Train: judge grants new suspension The protection, promoted by DMAS, forces Sedatu and Fonatur to provisionally stop the works of section 5 of the federal project. 3.5.22 --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cjr-news/support

★ Support the show by becoming a patron: https://www.patreon.com/atpercussion ★ Follow us on:  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/atperc Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/atpercussion/ PodBean: https://atpercussion.podbean.com/ Hosts: Ksenija Komljenović, Caleb Pickering, Ben Charles, Tracy Wiggins, Marco Schirripa Producer: Ksenija Komljenović Topic: University Job Pursuit – Search Committee Point of View Watch here  Listen below 00:00 Intro 02:43 Music History 03:27 Search Committee for Music Jobs 04:34 Application materials and search committee work on posting a job 08:41 Decoding the job posting and writing your cover letter 10:58 Marco Schirripa joins the room 17:57 Not fulfilling all job posting requirements 19:52 Too good for the job? 22:45 Applying for leverage 23:37 Red flags when reading cover letters 24:18 What are common mistakes that pull candidates out early? (Matt Nichols, FB) 31:18 Applied teaching/classroom teaching videos 33:20 Errors in teaching/videos 34:55 Who did you study with? 36:30 Cover letter: should you mention contacts at the university you are applying? 40:52 What are some red flags or things to avoid when a university job is your end goal? What can be considered beneficial, meaningful work for the portfolio vs a waste of time in regards to the hiring process. (Jade Hails, FB) 42:11 Why do they seem to prefer academics (people with 5 DMAs) instead of performers (Marcelina Suchocka, FB) 44:53 DMA needed to get a job 47:01 Accreditation agencies and degrees needed to be hired 50:34 How certifications impact departments 51:06 DMA or equivalent experience 53:08 Playing demonstration. Would be curious to see what committees actually value in a playing demonstration.... what they've been impressed by in the past. It's so hard to demonstrate appropriate musicianship on timpani and drum set, which function much better in an ensemble than as a solo instrument, that the college job search game seems like a marimba and multi-percussion contest sometimes. (Brady Spitz, FB) 1:03:58 Recital rep  

Dam-building beavers can have an outsized impact on their environment – here's how to gently deter them from making unwanted modifications to your pond. This is the audio version of an article from the April/May 2022 issue of Mother Earth News magazine. For more great articles on livestock and land management, large and small farming, and even bees, go to www.motherearthnew.com If you're interested in workshops about everything from cheesemaking to soil health to building around your property, you can take our online classes  and attend the Mother Earth News Fairs. Mother Earth News's sister publications are Grit, Backyard Poultry and Backyard Beekeeping.

Imogen is the Executive Creative Director at McCann Manchester.In this episode Imogen explains about the courage required to make difficult decisions in an industry that is always striving to find something new, something that has never been done before. She shares how she found the courage to remain authentic to herself, stand up for what she believed in and have her voice heard. Imogen bravely shares the fear she experienced when she became a leader. She questioned whether she would be the weakest link, but accessed her stubbornness and competitiveness to help her embrace her new role and build a confident team she led to success. Imogen began her career at McCann Manchester, before heading down to McCann London.There, Imogen worked with brands such as Subway, Bisto and MasterCard before moving over to Karmarama to create some of the most awarded, talked about and effective work in the UK for The British Army.Her work has been recognised at all the major award shows including Cannes Lions, D&AD, Creative Circle, Campaign Big, IPA Effectiveness and the DMAs. She also sits on the Global Creative Council for Snapchat, and was a recipient of Campaign's Female Frontiers award for Conquering Creativity in 2020.Imogen finally came full circle this year, returning to McCann Manchester to head up the creative department. Topics covered include:Making difficult decisionsBecoming a female leaderStaying true to yourself Feminist way of thinking in businessImpostor SyndromePassion at work Importance of being purpose drivenPower of LanguageFollow Joanna Howes and The Change Creators: website: https://www.thechangecreators.comlinkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joannahowes/LIVE LONDON EVENT: https://www.thecourageousleaderclub.com/For Leadership and team coaching and training, you can message me at joanna.howes@thechangecreators.com and we can book a call. website: https://www.thechangecreators.com linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joannahowes/youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2kZ-x8fDHKEVb222qpQ_NQ

Driving with Anto is here as the legend himself discusses a few of the gigs he went to over the weekend as well as Kasabian and Tom Meighan going head to head for the first time! The Talk Tonight Podcast - speaking to the biggest and brightest upcoming artists, about the greatest bands of all time and speaking about music news! ____________________________________________________________________ Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6Xto9VBTqW9XdCvfM0rDQw?si=r42d7rntQUKD_LM1FFVn9w____________________________________________________________________ Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-talk-tonight-podcast/id1515365511____________________________________________________________________

Get the latest Triple M Aussie Rock News with Cassie with this. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Matty Took is the frontman of Sydney based band PLANET. The guys released their second EP, ‘Maybe Someday', in April 2020, which heated up the airways with singles ‘Imaginary',‘ Never New' and ‘Reason Why'.I had the pleasure of meeting Matty face to face in June 2021, just a couple of weeks before we headed back into lockdown here in Sydney. We chat about some of Matty's favourite gigs, being part of Sydney's live scene, playing in bands with his brother Johnny, who many of you will know from the DMAs, and also what's next for Matty and PLANET.We also discuss why their unique sound has captured the attention of the U.K, which has been helped with support from “This Feeling" and Radio XFM.This episode is actually our last for series 1, it was always my intention to wrap up after 12 episodes, as I wanted the opportunity to reflect and take stock of all the incredible conversations to date. Don't worry, we will definitely be back for series 2, so would love to hear from you if there is anyone you would like me to interview next drop me a message on social media or via the website. A massive thank you to everyone who has helped book guests and also all of you lot for listening and supporting the show, it has been a huge passion project for me and it has been a true privilege to listen to, and share so many great live music stories.You can follow PLANET here:SpotifyInstagramFacebookHit follow/subscribe to be the first to know when new episodes are released and visit livelikeyouloveitpod.com for more information on the podcast.Enjoy

Tour news, an inside scoop on the Gang Of Youth's album, Jimmy Barnes' new album and more, this is all that matters in Triple M Aussie Rock News this week with Cassie Walker. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A special performance from Hoodoo Gurus, get your live music fix on Netflix, Counting Crows are working with Aussie rock band Gang Of Youths, Jimmy Barnes gives us an idea of what to expect on his coming tour, Lindsey Buckingham performs a Fleetwood Mac classic live, the AIR Music award nominations, Splendour In The Grass and more, this is all that matters in Triple M Rock News this week with Cassie Walker. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Steve Connelly started Connelly Partners (the defiantly human agency) in 1999 after he, as President of another agency, decided that the next time he got shot in the head, it would be by his own hand. For the first 6 months, his startup operated out of loaned office space in the backroom of another agency, Partners & Simons, Connelly Partners grew to cover all disciplines through acquisitions and organic divisional spinoffs. Today, the agency has a 42,000 square foot office in South Boston, and satellite offices in Dublin, Ireland and Vancouver. The broad, international range of the agency's B2B and B2C clients range in size from very small to large. The agency even supports low-cost or pro bono services for creative opportunities. The core values of the agency include all things anthropology, with subsets of empathy, studying human behavior, observing people and being able to “figure out what they're thinking, even if they don't know that's what they are thinking.” Steve refers to his team as “master translators of human behavior” . . . with the ability to “read minds.” He thinks the best way to understand how to sell a product to a customer is to understand the challenges of that customer's life. His priority is not to “get noticed.” He says, “Everyone notices a streaker, but no one wants to shake his hand” and then clarifies the thought by saying, “I'd rather understand a person, have them look at our work and say, “You know what? They get me.” In this interview, Steve talks about people's responses to market cycles and how, often, when things bottom out, people sit and wait for things to turn around.  He says, for him, that “the bottom” is the point: When you attack, when you invest, when you try to grow new practices, you try to bring new assets into your company, you take a really good look at your company as it sits, identify all your flaws . . . and try to fix them. I think the bottom of the market is when you get aggressive. But to do that . . . you have to have a lot of money saved. That funding is accrued when times are good. In this interview, Steve talks about the post-Covid business environment. As the world “opens up,” he expects to see a surge of “revenge tourism,” with people trying to “catch up” on experiences with their families after so many months in lockdown. He says, “Everyone is pissed off about everything right now” and acknowledges that, in the not-too-distant-future the “rules are going to be applied differently,” people will “choose to live differently, work differently, open . . . businesses differently going forward.”. He concludes, “Maybe we all just need to take a breath.” Steve believes that the next year is going to be a time of discovery. Management during Covid revealed a lot of good things about people as they worked from home, but everyone was operating by the same rules. Once restrictions are lifted, things will change. Steve believes that a unilateral “everyone will work from home” is an unrealistic money grab and notes that the office environment fosters a higher level and quality of spontaneity and organic exchange. He expects to develop a “hybrid” model to keep the best of both. Steve can be reached by email at: sconnelly@connellypartners.com. Transcript Follows: ROB: Welcome to the Marketing Agency Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Rob Kischuk, and I'm joined today by Steve Connelly, Founder of Connelly Partners, based in Boston, Massachusetts. Welcome to the podcast, Steve. STEVE: Great to be here, buddy. ROB: It is excellent to have you here. I think you've got a great story with your firm, so why don't you start off by telling us about Connelly Partners and the firm's superpowers? STEVE: Connelly Partners was founded in 1999. The way most great agencies were founded, I was shot in the head by the previous agency I was president of, and came to a moment of realization that, “Okay, well, I'm not going to get shot in the head again unless it's . . .” ROB: Self-inflicted. [laughs] STEVE: Yeah, self-inflicted. So, we started the company. I had some amazingly gracious help from people inside the industry where I got space loaned to me. I had opportunities. The thing started organically in the backroom of another agency at the time called Partners & Simons. The nicest guy in the world, one of the smartest as well. Started organically. Moved to the south end in Boston about 6 months later. Now we have 42,000 square feet of space here. We have an operation in Dublin, Ireland. We have an operation new in Vancouver. We're in all disciplines. We've either acquired firms or organically started divisions to make sure that we have all skillsets represented. And as it relates to our superpower, I think everybody probably wishes for powers other than they have. We're certainly very fast, but I would say our superpower is the ability to read minds, which is creepy, but I do think our focus on empathy, our focus on really observing people, the love of anthropology, the study of human behavior – I think we can look at people and spend enough time and we can figure out what they're thinking even if they don't know that's what they're thinking. I'd love to say we have super strength. I'd love to say I'm invisible. I'd love to say all these other cool, sexier powers that you see on The Boys or in The Avengers and stuff like that. But I think at the end of the day, because we're an empathy-based company, reading minds is something we are actually really, really good at. ROB: That's a good talent. And you can read the minds of the people with the other superpowers, so it works out all right. If we zoom out a little bit, give us a picture of, if there is such a thing, a typical client, a typical engagement, or maybe an example client or engagement that helps us understand how you engage and what it looks like. STEVE: The reality is – and you know this and everyone listening knows this – there's nothing typical anymore. We have projects, we have AOR, we have big, we have small. We have people that have creative opportunities and we do it for nothing or low bono. We have some really big clients, great clients. We have some really small clients. I'd say the typical engagement, though, is somebody would come to us and they'd say, in so many words, “Help us understand our customers a little bit better and more their lives.” I think so many times people in marketing jump right to trying to understand how your product can be sold, and really the best way to understand that is to understand the person's life that you're trying to sell to and their stresses, their ups, their downs. What are the holes they have in their life that you might be able to fill or retrofit your product's benefit or services to meet a need? I think we would be looked at as master translators of human behavior and where we can identify what we would call defiantly human insights that most clients can take advantage of – things that are true about humans in general that we can help our clients use to maybe better get a conversation going with a prospect. I have a saying I've used all the time in this business, which is everyone notices a streaker, but no one wants to shake his hand. Our business is filled with a lot of people that believe our job is to be streaking and to get noticed and for people to see us, and I don't have time to do juggling llamas or flame-throwing fish. I'd rather understand a person, have them look at our work and say, “You know what? They get me.” ROB: Sure. Are we able to talk about some of the brands that might've been mentioned in the booking notes? I think it's illustrative, potentially. And I do notice the list was largely consumer. Are you largely in the consumer space? Is there some B2B in your game as well? STEVE: Yeah, we have lots of B2B. It's just those aren't names people have heard of. Everybody's heard of Titleist. Certainly, on some level, most people have heard of Gorton's and the Gorton fisherman. I think those are both great client examples. With Titleist, there's the fact they're the number one ball in golf. More players who are not paid to play a ball play Titleist, and I think that says a lot about – and of course, some of the greatest golfers in the world play it. Gorton Seafood, which is traditionally thought of as a fish stick-only company, but they're actually much more of a seafood company. With deep respect and understanding for people's love of the sea, we've been able to use anthropology; that's dictated a couple paths for us to connect Gorton's to the sea rather than lift them out of maybe how they were seen in the past, which is more of a convenience seafood. We work with Williamsburg Tourism, which is actually one of the biggest tourism DMAs in the country, with Williamsburg, Yorktown, and Jamestown. I was just down there a week and a half ago. Good to report to everybody, tourism is coming back. People may be wearing masks, but they're being active and they're outside again, and hotel occupancy was at a nice level. There were a lot of people enjoying the outside. So that's another client. We work for Audi in Ireland. Just finished a piece for them, or we're just going to production there. We're going to prepare for the reopening of the country and get people to rally around that, which is a cool assignment. We work for a big insurance company in Ireland as well. We work for Pizzeria Uno, which is a recent client here. Those are all consumer brands. On the B2B side, we work for a company called Quiet Logistics. We have a fair amount of B2B clients, including a couple I can't mention yet because we're still finishing up some contract negotiations. But I think one of our biggest wins in the last year is actually a B2B medical category company that has been totally embracing our love of anthropology. One of the things that happens in B2B, Rob, and you know this, is that people begin to try to categorize B2B as a different animal, and it's not. You're still marketing to a person; it's just that person is in a work stage, work life, different stresses, and we try to figure out what's going on in their life from the “9-to-5.” B2B is still B2P. And we get hired a fair amount for clients in that space to help figure out how to sell to people in the 9-to-5 mentality. ROB: It's consistent when we hear a little bit about how you think about consumer, because those brands that you mentioned – the Gorton's world – you think about food, and there's the lane of the flashy new product, and then there's the very – I think you mentioned where they came from, kind of this utilitarian mode. But there's something deeper you've gone to with the ocean, and Boston is certainly a good place to do that. When you mentioned that, I want to go eat some seafood in Boston right now. There's sort of a steadiness to how you come at those consumer brands that seems necessary. You seem to handle consumer more in the way people handle B2B than how people think about consumer. It's so flashy. STEVE: I think one of the things you have to do if you're going to be marketing – actually, B2C certainly, but B2B as well – is you can't be stuck. Everything changes every 6 months. If you're not self-aware enough to constantly be looking at the way life shifts – I mean, we have a rather robust strategic practice here. I don't know the number, but our strategist per employee number is I would guess much higher than most other agencies' numbers. We have two other open to hires, so if anybody wants to passively send me some anthropology resumes, I'd love to look at them. But I think you've got to be invested in the world and seeing how things have shifted. We just finished, and we're in the process of presenting to all clients now, 9 core insights that have changed and evolved or elevated in importance over the last 6 months as you come out of COVID. Now, those are different than they were 6 months ago when we were in COVID. It's knowing where the mind is going. You think about the imagery of the ocean, the power and the attraction of the sea, how we are all hardwired to yearn for it – I mean, everybody wants to put their toes in the ocean, for whatever crazy reason that may be that's anthropologically validated. I don't know why, but everyone wants to put their feet in the ocean. Using that attraction right now, if you think about it, we've been locked up inside for so long, the imagery of the ocean, the imagery of the outdoors, the imagery of the air – and also, the need to protect the oceans. The oceans are under incredible assault right now. Our reverence for the ocean and respecting the attraction of the ocean, we can use all that stuff to sell seafood. There's a goodness to the food that comes from the sea that people inherently believe. I don't have to convince them. I just have to connect them to that part of themselves that acknowledges it. Everyone likes fish. ROB: Right. Steve, you mentioned starting the firm in 1999, which may have looked like a good idea for about a year or so, and then maybe seemed like kind of a bad idea from the dot-com bust and the echo of that. You've been through the 2007-2008 financial crisis, and this COVID thing as well. As you're looking at coming out, how does this situation rhyme with the past couple of times of duress, and how did you handle it differently coming from that lens? STEVE: There's a certain consistency that I have had in terms of dealing with any time you reach a market dip, a market bump, when the rollercoaster is at the bottom. Some people handle it and they sit on their hands and they wait for it to pass. They become exceptionally conservative. They become almost passive, and you're kind of waiting for things to open back up, and you just want to weather the storm. I would be in the opposite category, which is I think that's the point when you attack, when you invest, when you try to grow new practices, you try to bring new assets into your company you take a really good look at your company as it sits, identify all your flaws – because lord knows we all have tons of them – and try to fix them. I think the bottom of the market is when you get aggressive, but to do that, you have to be really conservative financially. You have to have a lot of money saved. You have to be very careful that when you're at the top of the rollercoaster, you don't go out and spend all your money on flashy cars and nice clothes. You've got to remember this is a long-term thing. Because we have been very well-managed financially, we're able to attack at the bottom when other people might not. Now, the difference here in this particular next 6 months is that the rules have been unilaterally applied to everybody. Everybody has had to wear a mask, stay inside, work from home. We've all been forced to compete by rules that are consistently applied. That wasn't the case in the previous blips. Certainly, the dot-com blip – I can go back and talk about what happened then. But the difference now is we all have to ask ourselves: What happens when we're all not playing by the same rules again in 4 months? When some people are going to work and some people aren't? When hybrid is becoming the reality and other people are going to want to stay home? When there's different requirements of people as they pursue revenge tourism, as they try to find different ways to have more experiences with their family because they feel like they have to make up for lost time? The rules are going to be – we're all competing and stuck in the same “COVID prison” right now. I'll say one other thing. I had a really good conversation with an employee here a couple of days ago. In an agency meeting, he asked me when I'm going to stop being so angry at COVID. I really didn't even know I was projecting that anger. I found that to be a really therapeutic, really good slap in the face of reality that I got, because I think we're all angry about it. But we can do nothing about it. I really took those words to heart. I think in the early parts of this, I thought the role of an agency leader or business leader, head of a household, head of any group, manager, coach, your job is to be positive and to get people to focus on the positivity in the long term. I think I and all of us have been beaten down to the point where we're angry and negative. [laughs] I found that to be a really good comment. As the rules are going to be applied differently and we choose to live differently, work differently, open our businesses differently going forward, I think positivity is something I'm going to try to amplify and get people to be a little less angry. Everyone is pissed off about everything right now, and maybe we all just need to take a breath. ROB: I think it will be good to have – you mentioned revenge tourism, and I hadn't heard that phrase. It's hilarious, but it's intuitive. I understand what you're getting at. Maybe that will be a bit cathartic. Everybody has 10 opinions about what to do each day, but some folks seem to be saying they're going to stay locked down, and maybe that's the hardest part. How do you get those people out and un-angry? We all need to see some people and do some things, I think. STEVE: Yeah, I don't know how we're going to – I think one of the things we have to do is acknowledge that we can only try so hard. Because of the way news is distributed, because of the way people are consuming news and they're gathering information, they are led down certain paths. For us, I think we'll go back to basic human instinct, which is the majority of people are going to want to get out. Here's an example. In Ireland they're still completely locked down. If I go to Ireland right now, I have to sit in an airport hotel for 2 weeks before I can get out, and then when I get out, everything's closed. The challenge as it relates to tourism in Ireland is that most people, when they take their holiday, go to Spain or to France or to Europe, other countries, and they explore the way we would explore other states here. They can't leave. So they are now making holiday plans to travel within Ireland, and if you think about it for context, that would be like me in Massachusetts – I can't go to Florida, as I would go every year; I have to go someplace within Massachusetts. There's a little bit of depression that comes from that. But I'm finding people are saying, “I'm going to make the best of it,” and there's a certain acceptance. In Massachusetts, there are amazing places to go visit and escape, and I can take some revenge on COVID. I think that's what's going to happen as different countries stay shut down. Revenge tourism is real, man. Our biggest piece of business when COVID started was Four Seasons in the Americas, and I lost that business in the first 2 weeks, for obvious reasons. But I think hotels are going to start – certainly, it's happening here in the States again, and some places, some hotel groups, destination groups that continue to spend and engage with customers at the bottom of the rollercoaster are going to see the benefit of it now that things are starting to pick up, where others are going to have to make up ground. From a marketing perspective, that's a little bit of an insight that's going to be fun to observe: how fast people can catch up. ROB: It's going to move. It's already moving pretty quickly. To your point about investing when things are down, I'm hearing that a lot of the rental car companies disinvested in their fleets and now, come July and August, you're looking at $100 a day for economy class cars in some places. If folks had kept it up, they'd have a fleet to sell. STEVE: I'll tell ya, man, I went to Naples this past weekend to golf. I'm in the Hertz Club Gold and I'm also in the National Emerald Club. I booked my car at National in the Emerald Club, landed at the hotel with my golf bag and my clothes, and there were no cars in the road except for one little teeny tiny clown car. I'm not a small human being, but this was my only choice. I was in a state of shock that every single car was gone, or, as you said, they've liquidated some of their fleets. I'm driving around Florida in this little teeny tiny thing, trying to figure out where all the cars went. They clearly didn't invest at the bottom. I get it; I think there are financial realities. But it doesn't change the fact that I'm driving with my knees up to my chin. ROB: [laughs] Sounds challenging. It's going to be interesting. I was ready to go to Ireland. I was ready to self-quarantine for 2 weeks when they were still open, I think last summer. It turned out our kids didn't have passports yet, so we didn't make that. But I was ready to do that drive around Massachusetts version of Ireland. Just pick a home base in the middle of the country and drive around and see it. STEVE: When you're ready to do it, give me a call. I followed my son some years back on a rugby tour around Ireland, and it's a spectacular country. The people are – for people that live in a country that has two seasons, cold and rainy and warm and rainy, man, they're happy, friendly, nice, accommodating. We had the greatest time ever, and you will too. But I could say the same thing about Massachusetts in terms of people that are driving to The Berkshires, or for me going to New Hampshire within 100 miles. There's so much that we haven't seen. I think at the end of the day, revenge tourism is about getting out of the house and reconnecting with some people, and you can do that driving 50 miles as well as flying 500 miles. ROB: Absolutely. I will look for those tips. Steve, with the journey you've been on, and really successfully running and growing a firm for over 20 years, I'd be remiss not to ask you about some other lessons you've learned along that journey and maybe some decisions you might advise yourself to do differently if you were going back in time. STEVE: I wear a lot of t-shirts. The people here would validate that. One of my t-shirts I wear is, “Often wrong but never in doubt.” I think that's a key categorization for people that lead firms. You're going to make mistakes; just make them quick and move on. Once you make a mistake, try to fix it. I see a fair amount of people that are suffering from analysis paralysis. I think that actually is because of data, too. There are so many different hunks of data out there that people can study. By the time you figure out what it is you want to do, it's too late. I think that's true with clients and that's certainly true with agencies. I trust my gut. I trust my eyes. I trust my instinct. I'm a coach by trade, too, and I think there are certain skillsets that come from coaching groups of kids and high school and college kids and getting a group of people to work as a team. Those are transferrable skillsets. The things I wish I could do over again – that's a trick question because everybody has a thousand of them, but I don't really think about them. I'll give you one, but I don't really think about them because you make a decision, you go with the decision, you do it based on what your gut and data tell you to do, and if you revisit it, you're going to drive yourself mad. I mean, I have a beautiful wife, I have great kids, I have a great company. Would I have gotten here if I had made other decisions? Who knows? But I'll tell you one thing. I'm sure no one's ever gone way back to when they were 12 years old, but when I was 12 going on 13, I was a really, really good baseball pitcher. I've told this story before. Stay with me; it's relevant. I had a choice at that time. I could've played on an elite team in my hometown that would've developed my skills, honed my skills. I would've found out how good I could've been. I stupidly at that point – perhaps not – chose not to play on that team. I chose to play on a lower level team because that's where my friends were. That one decision caused me to lose skills. I was never able to find out how good I was. I spent literally the next 8 years trying to find out how good I could've been as a baseball player, and I couldn't play in high school baseball. I wasn't good enough. I could've if I had made that choice. I did play in college, but it took me 5-6 years of training to catch up, and I was one of those athletes that the older I got, the better I was. I sat on the bench. I got on the team. But by the time I got into my mid-twenties and thirties and forties, and now as I'm 60, I can throw a baseball better than most at any other age, still. I love the game. The lesson is, if somebody presents an opportunity for you to explore and find out how good you can be, even if it's painful, even if it makes you uncomfortable, even if it pushes you outside your comfort zone, you take that shot and you go find out. Because if you don't, it's going to cost you years to find out how good you could be. It took me 8 years to undo one decision I made when I was 13 years old. I've never forgotten that. ROB: Yeah, and gladly, you do get to take that with you as you go. I wonder if it ties in a little bit – when I look at the sort of clients that you have and the way you've grown and the way you're still accelerating into acquisitions, I see the sort of firm that probably easily could have been acquired three times over, or you could've found somebody else to run it or something else. What keeps that fire burning in you to keep the gas going on the business, to not take a big check from some sort of ownership group that comes along, that sort of thing? STEVE: Well, to be clear, if anyone out there has a big check, please provide them with my email and contact information. No, I'll go back to when I was 13, man. That meant that I had a chip on my shoulder. I had something to prove. There was a certain anger and a fire in me that I think has gone to the point of where I am now at 60, where I'm like, I'm not done, man. I still want to try to compete at the highest level. I want to find out how good I can be. I think on a different level, I feel a responsibility as a company to defend the human right brain from the marginalization of it that's being caused by technology and data. I think I feel an obligation to be a defender of all things human at a time when we're trying to be algorithmically discounted. I think there's an opportunity for a company out there to have a good human soul, to be a non-arrogant, non-know-it-all marketing partner that is filled with confidence but not arrogance. And I don't think there are many companies like that. Meanwhile, I sit in a corner of the country where there's an opening for a firm like ours to provide a resource to a certain segment of clients that are interested in anthropology, that are interested in understanding their customers better, that are not interested in juggling llamas, that are interested in better connections. I always like to say, too, that we as a company are a terrible first date. We're awful. On your first date – it certainly was true with me – that's when you're at your absolute most artificial. You make yourself look as good as you can possibly make. You make sure that you say the right things. You're very measured. You prepare. The first date is an artificial presentation of who you aspire to be. You get down to second, third, fourth dates, then the real you is revealed. We're terrible at being artificial at that first thing. If somebody asks me a question, I'm going to give you an answer. I'm not going to bull anybody. I'm not going to try to shovel anything. If they ask me what I think, I'm going to tell them. That second, third, fourth date kind of stuff – when I put on a pair of pants and go to my wife now and say, “Do these pants make me look fat?”, my wife will say, “Sure, they do. So change them.” You have to get to a certain comfort level with a person, with a client, with an agency, where you have that kind of value conversation. I think there's need for that, and I don't see enough of it in the world or in our region. So I'm going to keep going till I don't. ROB: Sure. It's wonderful to see that burden on both sides to be a place that is worth working for and also one that's worth working with. There's certainly not enough of those. I don't talk to people with regular jobs that often anymore, but I think about the conversations complaining about them. STEVE: We'll see, too. One of the biggest struggles most agency leaders and most company leaders are going to have is the work from home discussion and the reality of how people like to work. Ours is a business, I believe, that's an organic exchange, but there's certain aspects to working from home that people have discovered, in terms of productivity, in terms of balance, that are good. How are you going to rebuild a corporate mentality and structure? I find it absolutely mind-boggling the amount of companies that are going to unilaterally embrace work from home all the time because they said that they have been productive during COVID. And we have been. All of us have been remarkably creative in figuring out ways to manage, but we've all been playing by the same rules. Now the rules are going to change, and I think some people are going to do it differently. A lot of people are going to move their companies to be unilaterally work from home, and it's a money grab. You're going to be able to cut out a bunch of operational expenses and put them in your pocket under the guise of work from home. And I don't know the answer, by the way. We're going to figure it out together here. But some sort of a hybrid model, certainly initially over the next year while we try to figure out how to keep the best of what COVID management has revealed in all human beings as we've worked from home – because surely some really good things came out of it – and combine that with the best of working together in an office environment where spontaneity and organic exchange can happen in ways that it can't when you work from home. That's going to be fascinating. Like I said, I wish I knew the answer, man. I don't, but I'm going to go on my rather substantive gut, and we'll see what happens. We'll be willing to change and adapt going forward. ROB: That'll be a great conversation going forward. Steve, when people want to get in touch with you and connect with Connelly Partners, where should they go to find you? STEVE: My email is sconnelly@connellypartners.com. I get a gazillion emails. I read them all; I don't respond to them all because I'm trying to get through them all. I think the easiest thing to do is just shoot me an email and I'll get back to you. I'm not a big social media guy, and one of the reasons for that – and I hope you and your audience understand – it's not that I'm a Luddite; it's just that I believe in honesty, and honesty is not unilaterally embraced in a lot of places. So I'm going to not expose myself in a position where somebody's going to misconstrue something. I have been in positions where I have said something innocuous and honest and some people want to take me to task for that. The debate is exhausting, so I choose not to have it. I'm big on LinkedIn. Our company is a big social participant. If you go to our website, to where we are on Instagram, on all social channels, you can get a feel for our culture and our people. You can get a feel for our approach and our philosophy. But if you want to talk to me, send me an email and I'll call you. ROB: Sounds excellent. Steve, thank you for coming on the podcast. You've really got a great deal of wonderful things to share. We could go on for three times this long, but we'll put that off to another time and wish you and Connelly Partners the absolute best as we all have our revenge tourism. STEVE: Thank you, man. I would just leave this parting thought with everybody: be as positive as you can going forward. Be a little less angry. I was reminded of that 3 days ago. It snuck up on me. I think it sneaks up on all of us. Let's go back to trying to be a little less angry and a little bit more huggable. ROB: [laughs] Perfect. Love it, Steve. Thank you so much. STEVE: Rock on. Take care, buddy. ROB: Take care. Bye. Thank you for listening. The Marketing Agency Leadership Podcast is presented by Converge. Converge helps digital marketing agencies and brands automate their reporting so they can be more profitable, accurate, and responsive. To learn more about how Converge can automate your marketing reporting, email info@convergehq.com, or visit us on the web at convergehq.com.

Guests: Pat Harrell, District Engineer,  Josh Gregory, Water Loss Analyst, and Kim Klotter, Wastewater Coordinator. Co-host: Gary Wong, Industry Principal, AVEVA.Industry: WaterBusiness Impact: Process ProductivityThe White House Utility District (WHUD) is the largest water utility in Tennessee by geography, serving consumers and businesses just north of Nashville. Since it started making better use of its sensor-based data using state-of-the-art IIoT (industrial internet of things) technologies in 2016, its infrastructure leakage index (ILI) decreased from 1.49 to 0.76. In this episode we talk about pressure management, leaks, and I&I with those who made the changes to improve their operation.Water Loss Analyst Josh Gregory explains how they view their sensor-based data on ArcGIS map displays, how they divide their service area into district measured areas (DMAs), and how calculations of the water flows within each DMA allows them to focus on the important locations to improve leak detection. District Engineer Pat Harrell describes using advanced pressure management to determine the causes of leaks and what changes this allows them to make to how their operate their equipment. Wastewater Coordinator Kim Klotter describes how more easily accessible flowmeter data and calculations allows her to better hone in on locations of inflow and infiltration (I&I). Co-hosting this episode is Gary Wong, industry principal for water at AVEVA. 

Brands are facing fierce competition in this ever-evolving ecommerce landscape. More often than not, shoppers do a general product search on Google or Amazon, where hundreds, if not thousands, of brands fight for the sale. It’s a hard arena to win in, and every company is trying to find shortcuts and strategies to give them an edge.You’ve probably seen some of those strategies — for example, the products with a bunch of random SEO words jammed into the title so that the item appears higher in search. There are plenty more wacky Amazon tricks of the trade that brands have tried. Goal Zero is one of those brands trying to figure out the secret sauce but approaching it in a much different manner. Patrick Keller, Head of Marketing and Ecommerce at Goal Zero, may have finally solved the mystery — but the answer is not what you might be expecting.On this episode of Up Next in Commerce, Patrick tells us that there are a few key strategies to unlocking more conversions on Amazon, and how they view authenticity and increasing brand awareness.TLDR: it takes great messaging, some big bets, and a lot of long-term thinking. Oh, and some pretty cool products, too. Hear all the details on this episode! Main Takeaways:Always Be Iterating: Producing marketing material is not a cut-and-dry process. Define your target market, set KPIs, and establish a timeline, then create a system that lends itself to AB testing and iteration. Don’t be afraid to create assets and then break them into pieces to test in different ways. You’ll learn more about your customers and the market in general that way, which you can then expand on when you embark on larger campaigns.Dream Big: Taking bigger advertising risks with a long tail is often a good way to get more bang for your buck. By investing in large-scale projects with a cinematic quality, you have more of a chance to use that content for much longer and build brand awareness with a larger audience that might miss a one-off campaign.Consider This: Figuring out a way to bypass the consideration phase on Amazon is one of the big challenges facing brands today. Because of the amount of options Amazon shoppers are presented with, companies that might have converted easily on their own site are losing out on Amazon. Whether through influencers or targeted campaigns, building brand awareness and loyalty is one of the methods brands are using to start bypassing that consideration phase and actually convert more.For an in-depth look at this episode, check out the full transcript below. Quotes have been edited for clarity and length.---Up Next in Commerce is brought to you by Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Respond quickly to changing customer needs with flexible Ecommerce connected to marketing, sales, and service. Deliver intelligent commerce experiences your customers can trust, across every channel. Together, we’re ready for what’s next in commerce. Learn more at salesforce.com/commerce---Transcript:Stephanie:Hi, everyone, and welcome back to Up Next in Commerce. I'm your host, Stephanie Postles, CEO over here at Mission.org. Today on the show we have Patrick Keller, Head of marketing and ecommerce at Goal Zero. Patrick, welcome to the show.Patrick:Hey, thanks for having me. It's fantastic to be here.Stephanie:I'm excited to have you on. I think I needed Goal Zero back in the snowstorm in Austin. So I'm in Austin, I forgot to tell you that. But we did not have power. We were struggling over here, and I did not have any products that I apparently needed. Now I went to Goal Zero's website, and I realized, this is all I needed. I just didn't know about it.Patrick:That's it. That's it.Stephanie:I'd love to start there. What is Goal Zero?Patrick:Yeah, exactly. Goal Zero makes portable power. It ranges from small portable power to use to back up your phone all the way to really massive energy storage that you can use to run key segments of your home for days. We play in that portable power. It's all battery based, so it's clean, renewable and really easy to use. That's it in a nutshell.Stephanie:Yeah. It also looks nice. I mean, I saw in some of the product pictures it's on your counter. You have this huge battery power portable battery station. I'm like, "Okay, I would have that around because it's not a big, huge thing like other energy sources," at least like backup generators and whatnot that I know my parents used to suggest that I get back in the day.Patrick:Yeah, no. It's new technology, but exactly right. I mean, I think that's one of our differentiators, and our industrial design is something we're proud of and we spent a lot of time working on.Stephanie:Yeah. That's great. Before we dive more into Goal Zero, I was hoping we could walk through your background a bit. Because I've seen you have had an interesting ecommerce journey, and I'd love to hear where you started and where you've been.Patrick:Oh, man. I hope we don't take up the whole interview with my background because it wasn't a straight shot, that's for sure. I left college with a marketing degree and became a fly fishing guide and then followed my passions to a company called Orvis based out of Vermont, where my first role was really analyzing the performance of catalogs. Now, do we give pants more square inches? Do we give shirts less? This product needs to be more heavily promoted. This was back in 2005, 2006, when ecom was still in its infancy. It was a lot of educational resource. Yeah, we should have a website, but we don't really know exactly what to do with it.Patrick:My next role really was, well geez, you're doing a good job of building the overall conversion rate on our catalogs. Can you do that with our website? So we started building out the early days of web merchandising. Can we promote products and boost and bury and use common metrics like sales per page view to actually drive a significant improvement in website conversion? Honestly, it was a huge success. That was big.Patrick:That led to eventually me taking a side step into catalog, and I managed the Orvis catalog business for a few years as well as their email. That was really good at understanding customer segmentation, how to go through and parse lists, how to find demographic overlays and psychographic overlays and just really use customer data to make sure your catalog was mailed to the right people and the right message was delivered. That set me up really well for a foray into digital advertising. How can we make sure that our digital ads are as focused as our catalog ads? Ran the digital advertising for Orvis for a few years.Patrick:Then I'm from Utah originally, and I wanted to move back out West to the Wasatch. So I took a job with Sundance catalog. Same thing, grew their whole ecom business and then eventually Goal Zero approached me after about four years at Sundance and said, "You want to come work for this scrappy startup down in Utah?" I said, "Yeah, let's give it a shot." It was absolutely awesome. It's been just a rollercoaster of a ride, and Goal Zero has in the last five years, has 4Xed their revenue, so really explosive growth and really fun.Stephanie:That's really fun. What does your best day in the office look like at Goal Zero? What are you doing these days versus when you first joined this scrappy startup?Patrick:Yeah. Well, I mean we're a lot bigger, so we have more resources and we're doing a lot of different techniques that we're just... We couldn't even imagine these types of techniques four years ago, mass media, television, some of those things that we're stepping into. A good day at Goal Zero we still like to be outside, like to be active people. So a couple of us will go and do a backcountry ski in the morning, come down to the office, have some meetings, talk strategy, talk about how we're going to deliver messages, who we're going to target, what's the best way to convey a message about this somewhat nascent product and category. And then finish it off with maybe a beer after work and call it a day.Stephanie:Man, this is the life. I need to come over and join you guys for-Patrick:It's not bad. I'm telling you, we have a lot of fun.Stephanie:... banging beers.Patrick:Yeah. We have a lot of fun.Stephanie:That's awesome. How does it differ? I mean you're at Orvis. I mean, I think they've been around for like 150 years or something.Patrick:Exactly right.Stephanie:Okay. You're selling a fun, leisurely fly fishing type products and all that, then moving to a utility product where you feel like you don't really need it until you need it, like my Austin experience. Did you have to shift your mindset to selling a product like that?Patrick:You know what that hardest part is, is everyone knows what a fly rod is. Everyone knows what a pair of khaki pants is. There's no explanation. You start at a certain just understanding and then you talk about benefits. With a portable power station, very few people in the US know what a portable power station is, so you actually have to start a step back and say, "Let me introduce you to something you have never heard about, and then let me convince you why you need this anywhere from $400 to $5,000 thing in your home."Patrick:It's a much longer burn and really, it's a lot more complicated in how we educate customers. It doesn't start with oh, do I buy an Apple iPhone or a Google Pixel? It's just not that simple. You have to say, "Hey, let me make you aware of this thing and that this thing exists and then walk you down the funnel for just a long consideration?" A few people will buy who have done research offline or through other various means will buy the day they come to the site. Most of them, it's a 90-plus day transaction.Stephanie:Wow.Patrick:We'll see a slow burn for 90 days and then a lot of conversions.Stephanie:What are you doing in those 90 days to bring them down the funnel? What do those tactics look like behind the scenes? Because I'm even thinking of me, me trying to explain the product at the very beginning. I'm like, I don't even know what you would call it and how do you even explain this, because it's just not something that I'm even used to buying and talking about. So I'd be interested to hear, what does that look like behind the scenes for you?Patrick:Yeah. We break it into two parts. There is the before you've come to the website, and that could be PR. That could be trade shows. That could be television, radio, podcasts, a variety of ways where we're just trying to say, "Here's something that could be really beneficial to you and your family and just all the things you like to do. Come to goalzero.com.Patrick:Once they've come to goalzero.com, then we can open up a whole host of opportunities of how do we get educational messaging? How do we do differentiation between us and our competitors? How do we do differentiation between us and gas generators? We'll spend a lot of time reviewing our website saying, "I'm not sure this is the best way to talk about home energy storage. Let's change that up." We'll put you through and try to get you to sign up for emails. We'll do a bend and browse. We'll do a marketing display. We'll try to find you on Amazon. We'll try to find you in retail stores and say, "Hey, if you want to actually see this thing in person, check out our retail finder."Patrick:We use a company called Locally, which actually does an inventory feed to us so that we know now what do they carry at Goal Zero in a blanket statement, but we know that this product specifically is in stock at this store at this time. So we can drive customers to go see it in person and give them a chance to touch, feel, pick it up, explore it a little bit before they transact.Stephanie:Yeah. That's really interesting. In talking about top of funnel, you're saying you guys are trying everything, like TV, mass media, podcasts. What are you exploring there and how do you view things like TV versus podcasting, which everyone is seeming to try and lean into that now? What are you guys seeing on that front?Patrick:Yeah. It's funny, we're definitely stepping our toes into it. We're not doing anything full scale national wise yet. I think the first one we're doing is probably a national podcast. Last year in 2020 we did a lot of TV commercials. We said, "Let's start with something that seems to have a high level of success, so there was two areas. Number one is California with the power shutdowns, right? Any time the winds get over 20 miles an hour, Northern California shuts the grid down to prevent fires.Stephanie:Oh, I know. I lived through that.Patrick:Yeah, exactly.Stephanie:I moved to Austin, and then a snowstorm hit. I'm like, "What the heck?"Patrick:Exactly right, right? We said, "Geez, if it's going to work, it's going to work in California first. Let's try that." So we did a really kind of cool TV commercial. We spent a lot of time walking customers through the versatility and just showcasing this product and saying, "Come to... " Then we hit them up with immediately social media messaging. We had a custom landing page where they could come to and just really say, "Chances are, you've never heard of this. Let me just explain and walk you through all the benefits this product provides."Patrick:We got them to sign up for emails. We were able to hit them with display. Then we mirrored some of that over on Amazon as well saying, "What we're doing at goalzero.com, should people choose to shop on Amazon because it's easy and convenient, let's make sure that a lot of that content is transferred over there as well." We also did the Gulf Coast, so Houston all the way down the Miami. We targeted a lot of TV ads there as well. It was a record year for storms, for things like tropical storms and hurricanes, and so we wanted to make sure that this is the people who are highly aware of power outages. Their power was out for a good portion of weeks on end in some cases for a good portion of the summer.Patrick:We targeted those two areas, and we had very specific metrics all the way through. Some of it was how much traffic are we going to drive to the website? Based on that traffic, what does the conversion rate and the AOV need to be in order for us to hit our sales goals? We worked closely with other agencies to say, "As we're planning this out, do you think we can drive this much traffic? What are the reasons or what do we need to do differently? What is the call to action?" Then we did a lot of AB testing.Patrick:We would have the full 30 second commercial, and then we'd cut that down into 10 and 15 second shorts that we can do a lot of YouTube and digital advertising with. We'd have five different variations that we could just go through and say, "This one seems to be driving the most traffic to the site. This one seems to have a higher conversion rate. Let's blend these two together and target those."Patrick:Long story, I think that it was a really cool experience. We learned a ton and I think the results were promising enough that we're excited to continue to push into broader audiences and more and more mainstream.Stephanie:Yeah. That's a really cool test. How did you think about attribution from TV, whereas YouTube, very easy running your 15 second clips on there, but did you have a certain CTA on the ads on TV to be able to go somewhere, or how did you think about tracking that? And what did that ROI look like versus just something anyone could get into, like a YouTube or yeah, direct advertising?Patrick:Yeah. We did a lot of it in just comparison saying, "Here's the geographic DMAs these things are running in. How does that compare to areas where it's not running? Do we see a lift over time?" And then just measure that. I'll give you an example. We took a look and said, "During the time these ads were running, what was the daily average traffic to goalzero.com from California?" Right? We said, "Oh, we saw a 300% increase." What was it on non-target DMAs? Oh, it was flat. We're down five. We can get some just basic looks at saying, yeah, it appears to have driven high levels of traffic.Patrick:From there, we went through and said, "How many of those people came specifically to our landing page that we had set up," which used power landing page. That was a good indicator of whether they were just randomly coming or were specifically coming because of this. In the case of the Gulf Coast campaign, it was nice because even within a specific state, there were some DMAs that got it and some that didn't. California was all of California. You had to make a few more assumptions about yeah, this appears to have really increased traffic over the control group.Patrick:But with the Gulf Coast we could say, "Well, geez. We hit Houston, but we didn't hit Austin. What are the differences between there?" We hit Houston but not San Antonio. So we could go through these specific DMAs and see lifts. It was a rudimentary kind of AB test that we learned a lot from.Stephanie:Yeah. That's great. What was your favorite campaign that you guys ran? Because I could see some really fun, creative ways to sell Goal Zero. So what kinds of things did you guys experiment with, or any fun campaigns that you're like, this is a good one?Patrick:No. I came from a highly analytical background, so when I took over the creative team, I was always like, "Well, we got to put numbers behind it, and we need to... " And that learning to embrace my creative side has been really cool. We ran a campaign for our 10-year anniversary called Ode to the Road where we went on a two-week road trip and stopped at all these cool places and produced a lot of really cool content. It was this traveling video blog, and we could follow along as you went. It was so much fun. I mean, you have to watch it.Patrick:It's just really cool people, really engaging content, and just again, it goes back to showing the versatility of what we can do and what our products could power. It's things like we set up Dometic fridges full of cold beer and ice cream in the middle of the Pacific Crest Trail. So people would be coming out of the desert after these long, arduous miles and they'd say, "Do you want ice cream? Do you want a cold beer?" It was like, "Oh my God, trail angels!" It was just fun, cool stuff. We had a massive outdoor dinner on the coast in Santa Barbara, and the entire thing, the grills, everything was powered by Goal Zero. Yeah, it's creative, cool, engaging content. It's a lot of fun.Stephanie:Wow. Yeah, that sounds really cool. I mean, that also just makes me think branded content, and it could be full on series, Netflix series is the way of the future. I mean we've heard from so many guests that organic and natural is definitely the way to sell nowadays, but also having your product integrated in a way that doesn't feel salesy. To me, branded content like that seems like the way of the future. Have you guys thought about exploring that even more? I mean, which also goes back to the whole companies turning into media companies and thinking that way now going forward. How are you thinking about that for the next couple years?Patrick:Yeah. Well, I think a lot of it is we're listening closely to the voice of the customer, right? One of the things I really like about Goal Zero and I really like about my job is it's just, there's surprises around every corner. Right? You'll hear these stories about, "Hey, I used Goal Zero to power this obscure, weird thing," that you just never even thought of. Suddenly, you hear that there's a ton of people doing this and you can start building campaigns and start building content around that.Patrick:One of the things we like to do is we'll run periodically a how do you Yeti. Yetis are portable power stations, it's been called. You get these great stories back of people being like, "You know what? I use it to power my insulin pump when I'm outside. Normally, it's prohibited. I can't be more than a couple of hours away from an outlet because I need the power for my insulin pump working. Now I can go backpacking."Patrick:We had a story on that Ode to the Road. A man was powering his prosthetic limb with some of our products to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. So I think you're right. I think there is a ton of stories that we look at and say, "How can we tell a story that aligns with our core values, that aligns with us as a brand, and then softly references some of our products in the background?"Patrick:It's mostly a question of is it authentic and is it engaging? And is it engaging to a mass of people? If we can answer those questions and then we can say, it has a loose tie to a specific product or to a group of Goal Zero products, then yeah, we're looking at producing higher quality content, more cinematic style content that we can then use on TV, we can use in a variety of ways. Then at a larger scale, we always partner with cinematic expeditions. So a lot of our ambassadors will go out and say, "We're climbing Everest. We need to power all of our RED cameras and power our drones and power all of the backup storage." Our stuff does that, and so we'll sponsor that movie or that Nat Geo episode or whatever.Stephanie:Yeah. I mean, I think that's also just much longer term thinking than quick hit campaigns and always having to think about adjusting ad units every single day and ad fatigue. I feel like sponsoring or creating content like that will have longer ROIs and could be relevant if you have them shot in an evergreen way for years to come, which I think is why it's such an exciting angle to be thinking that way.Patrick:I think for us, what we always look at is brand and category awareness. It's one of those things going back to what we discussed earlier, which is nobody knows what a portable power station is. It is a really long burn to get somebody to understand it, identify that they need it, and then pull the trigger on a very expensive item. We do, we go back and just realize that part of that brand building, part of that awareness is just, it's critical. We have a product that when people get it and they're like, "I need this," yeah, it clicks. But we have to continually get that word out there through really engaging, authentic content.Stephanie:Yep. Did you have to make any quick pivots when the pandemic hit? Because I could see in person, like you're mentioning, touching it, being able to pick it up, see how light or not light it is would be an important part of the sales process. Did you have to pivot to a different strategy when people could not as easily go in stores and maybe even now are still reluctant to go out and see it in person?Patrick:We saw a massive shift to online, for sure. Our partners were selling predominantly online. Our goalzero.com and Amazon increased dramatically. I think the biggest shift we had to make was just the unexpected surge in business. We didn't plan for 100% growth as a result of COVID, so our inventory was an issue. Kudos to our supply chain team. They were pulling in orders and doing whatever we could to actually get enough inventory to support it, and even then, we still ran out for periods of time, long periods of time.Patrick:I think that was probably the biggest thing we faced was it wasn't a lack of interest or people weren't willing to buy online. It was yeah, they easily transitioned and then we just managing inventory, managing expectations, how do we alert people that we're back in stock? Those are all things that we had to deal with as well as just managing growth internally as an organization.Stephanie:Yep. Did you have to change anything substantially around your inventory management and the logistics and the backend that now are completely different than what they were maybe a year ago?Patrick:Yeah. I think that we set up an allocation meeting between all the departments and just said, "Here's how we're going to look at this and make sure that we're trying to service all of our wholesale partners, make sure we're servicing our utility partners, make sure that when people come to goalzero.com, they can use Locally to find product or hopefully be able to buy it there as well."Patrick:I wouldn't say that it was a massive shift in how we did things, but it was a lot more focused. We would have meetings twice a week with the executive team specifically on that topic of are we servicing our customers to the best of our possible ability? I think that was just the amount of time spent, it used to be a monthly meeting, and now it was two times a week. So really, more than anything it was just the focus was always on, when's our next shipment coming? When will it arrive? When can we start selling it? When can we get this out to our wholesale partner? I mean those were very common conversations.Stephanie:Yeah. That definitely seems hard, especially when you're growing as quickly as you all were, to try and scramble. But I also think that now customers seem to be okay with things, inventory, maybe not having something in stock as long as it says it's going to be in stock this date. And you can buy it now and I'll ship when it's ready. It just seems like that messaging maybe was missing before all this where it's like, if I have clear expectations and I know when I could get it, I'm fine if it's not in stock right now. But a lot of times you would just try and order something a year ago and it just wouldn't be there and you wouldn't know why. And is it coming back? It was just kind of like a black box.Patrick:Yeah. We stubbed our toe a bit on customer service side of things. So Goal Zero, we measure NPS religious. It's just something that we really hold near and dear. We have best-in-class NPS. The last few years we've averaged about 70, which is Costco, Apple, in essence, leading NPS levels. A big portion of that is our solution center. People can call in, ask questions. And just the inundation of calls, it was taking half an hour to answer the phone. So having to rapidly staff up as well as just implement new technology, the ability to have customers leave their number and we would call them back when they finally met their queue.Stephanie:And changing...Patrick:Changing the verbiage on the website saying, hey, our call center's completely swamped. Can we chat with you here? Can we answer you in an email? There was just a whole bunch of things that we had to implement very quickly and very effectively because just the unexpected volume that came through was a bit shocking.Stephanie:Yeah. I mean that's cool to think about how you guys pivoted, though, to just send customer service requests in different directions depending on where the resources were strapped at, which I think a lot of companies still need to do that or even just a simple, "Let me call you back," type thing, as long as you call back.Stephanie:Now that you're out of scramble mode, what are some of your favorite things that you're testing out right now? It can be around the website. It can be around logistics. What are you most excited about where I think this could have big results on conversions on reducing the 90-day sales funnel, but we're not sure yet?Patrick:Oh, totally. Yeah. I think there is endless opportunity. I think it's not a matter of opportunity, it's how we prioritize it. What is the biggest bang for the buck? We're actually in the process of re-platforming right now as we speak. Patrick:I think the thought process there is we have the ability to... We're currently in a lockstep environment, so we have to outsource all of our dev work. It's just, it's slow. I think we want to be a lot faster, a lot more nimble, and the ability to go through our funnel and make sure that we are converting at the best possible rate is a key strategy for 2021. Right now we have a group of executives, my ecom director, and some of my senior staff all focused on how do we explain our home energy storage, right? Because, it's complicated.Patrick:I think, Stephanie, you said, "I was in Austin. I could've used your stuff." But if you would've come to the site, you would've been like, "Geez, there is 40 things I can choose from here. What's the right one for me?"Stephanie:Yep.Patrick:The questions we get all the time are, "What will it power and for how long?" On a singular item, that's easy. Oh, this will charge your cellphone three times. This will run your full-size fridge for a week. But when you start putting in mixes, hey, I want to run my fridge. I want to run my kitchen lights. I want to run my ceiling fan. There's all these circuits you can wire in or hard wire into your home. Now you start complicating things and making a very complex process.Patrick:So we'll go through that process of saying, here's all the things that a conservative user can power for how long and this is the kit for you, all the way to hey, if you want to just live high on the hog with power usage and not conserve at all, yeah, here's the kit for you. There's various myriad of things in between. It's a complex, complicated conversation that is very easy in store. It is very easy at a trade show. It's really hard online, and so we spend a lot of time thinking about how to best say that.Stephanie:Yeah. I mean, it brings me back to my Google days trying to think about how to explain how much storage people need on phones or what that looks like and talking more technical terms of how much storage you need. No one knows you need this many gigabytes, this many. Who the heck knows?Patrick:Totally.Stephanie:Versus you could say, "This'll hold 20,000 pictures and all the podcasts you could ever download," or whatever you want. That's when you're like, "Oh, okay. I'll just choose that," or I don't need that much. And putting it in more layman's terms or just pictures, I can imagine you just being like, "Steph, you can power your whole house if it's under this square feet and you have this many appliances and you're good."Patrick:That's it.Stephanie:I'm like, "Okay, great." I just want to just know that and nothing too technical.Patrick:That is absolutely it. On the flip side, there is absolutely people who want to get crazy in the weeds. Some of our engineers, because we bring them into the conversation, they're like, "Oh, this is not enough data. I need to know exactly the watts and the amps and the voltages." They're dissecting everything. Then there's me, who shows up, to your point, I'm like, "Just tell me what to buy. I want it and we're good to go." So we have to find that balance of providing both customer types, both shoppers the experience they're looking for.Stephanie:Yep. You're just like, "Will this run my kegerator?"Patrick:That's it, yeah. After I get done skiing, will my beer be cold?Stephanie:Yeah. That's all I need. That's all I need in life. That's cool. Are there any other big things like that that you're also focusing on other than the messaging? Which I think a lot of brands struggle with that, especially as they approach something more technical or when they're trying to... We've heard a lot of them talk about the difference between selling your mission and selling your product. How do you think about that and all that, so it's definitely a theme that I've heard. But is there anything else that you guys are working on that you're excited about?Patrick:Yeah. We've got a couple big initiatives. I think the next one is looking at how we target potential customers and really getting deep into the not just demographic but psychographic conversation. Our current customers I think we have a really good understanding of. And our ability to target them, to message them, to find out how and where they're shopping, why they buy our products, I think we do a reasonably good job of.Patrick:People who are not in our current sphere but are absolutely looking for our product, we got to get better at saying, how do we speak to these people who may not be on social media? They may not be Amazon customers. How do we find them, engage with them, speak to them? That's a big push for us and something that we're spending a lot of time on. Some of the other things we're looking at is, again, expanding our mass media campaign, doubling down there, continuing to push TV, podcasts, radio, billboards, just getting on a broader level again all through this kind of brand awareness.Patrick:Then lastly, we're coming out with a new content series, to your point. Super high-end cinematographic-type shooting and camera work and really robust, engaging stories that we're excited to share with our customers.Stephanie:How do you think about selling on Amazon? Because to me, people who are on there, they get a much different experience versus going on your website, they can go through all the video series and really get in with your brand and go from start to finish in probably a better way than when you're on Amazon. And you're clicking around and browsing, and you've got competing products all around you. How do you approach those two different platforms?Patrick:Yeah. That's a recent discussion for us. Historically, Amazon is always an afterthought like, hey, we're just going to throw our things up there and people who want to shop on Amazon could shop on Amazon. If they want to buy from Goal Zero, that's where they're going to find the rich content. That's where they're going to find all the great stories and the great videos. We're going to send them to retail stores where they've got experts. So Amazon was like, yeah, we'll put it up there. And for the people who want to just type in Goal Zero, buy our product, we're there.Patrick:We went and did a sizing exercise, and we said, "What is the size of the power station market on Amazon?" It's grown tremendously, significantly. We said, "Well, we got to start playing here meaningfully." So this year, specifically, we're doing a lot of work around top of funnel. Can we look at attracting customers and making them aware who are starting their shopping process on Amazon? Normally, what we're saying is, "Start it via TV, PR, trade shows, goalzero.com, and then eventually come and transact on Amazon."Patrick:We're saying, "We want to actually find people who their very first search for backup power or home resiliency is on Amazon." Attracting those people and then working them down the funnel, I think that we're a premium product. Amazon is a marketplace that really stresses on lower cost value products. So what we've seen is we're really good at driving the traffic and we're really good at converting the traffic. Where we get stuck is in that middle phase, consideration phase, where people are like, "Well, geez. There's 25 different power stations I can look at." And we convert some of them, but some of them get spun off into competitors.Patrick:I think one of the things we're looking at is saying, how do we actually take that middle consideration phase and almost eliminate it? Can we bring people back from Amazon to goalzero.com, where they learn without all the noise of the marketplace, the myriad of ads, and have them really get the full Goal Zero experience, see our differentiators, see why we as a brand have succeeded, and then bring them back to Amazon to convert.Patrick:I think that in conversations with Amazon and just around, I think that's one of the things that premium brands struggle with across the board is geez, we're really good. Our content's good enough to capture them. Then people who see the premium differentiators are going to buy. It's that consideration phase where just you lose a lot in the shuffle. That's our focus is make them Goal Zero diehards before they actually are ready to convert on Amazon.Stephanie:Yep. It does seem like Amazon's also changing when it comes to customer expectations of going there and being ready to buy more expensive products. I mean, I do think back in the day, like you said, you would just go there and just be like, "I just want the cheapest commodity type good. It's probably on Amazon." And now I mean Amazon's selling high-end furniture and live plants that are really expensive.Patrick:Totally.Stephanie:It seems like they're shifting their customers. They're adapting to their needs and being ready to sell higher end things, which to your point, is maybe a great place to start when it comes to getting the people right where they start searching in there and then targeting them afterwards to get them to convert in either place maybe, as long as they just don't lose sight of why they were looking for, potentially, your product to begin with.Patrick:Yeah, no. I agree. I think Amazon is making a concerted effort to not always be the budget brand or the value brand. I think that from my own personal experience and just talking to consumers, sometimes you get burned on Amazon. You'll go and you'll buy a product because it's the cheapest, and it's a knockoff or it doesn't work, or there's no instructions, or there's no customer services. It's just a poor experience.Patrick:I think Amazon is recognizing that and saying, let's make sure that it's not only price that's driving the flywheel, that service and that credibility and that it's going to be right the first time is there. Because they're super focused on customer service, and these bad experiences are bad for them and bad for the other brands on the marketplace. Yeah, we've had that engagement and that conversation with Amazon, and they seem like they're willing to help us as a premium brand reach our goals.Stephanie:Yep. Yeah. I think when talking about credibility, to me user-generated content is a big part of that, of being able to go on Amazon or on your website or social, literally wherever you are, seeing someone who looks like yourself maybe or reminds you of your situation. And being able to see them having that product is exactly what is needed, especially for a product that's maybe harder to sell, that's more technical.Stephanie:If I saw someone like me, single mom, three kids, living her best life, but then needs something like that, I'm like, "If it's good enough for her, it's good enough for me." I think that's the way of... Amazon, I think, is trying to head in that direction, but I still think needs more help when it comes to encouraging people to continue to post their organic photos in a way that's going to help your brand sell.Patrick:Yeah, no. I agree. We've just started dabbling into driving traffic to Amazon with influencers, right? Normally, we drive them to goalzero.com, again, going back to the fact that we just have a much better experience on goalzero.com than we do on Amazon. But if we can take people who have big followings of trusting people that say, hey, this is why I use Goal Zero, this is how I use Goal Zero. There's videos, there's content. It's real.Patrick:They're actually using it and then we drive the transaction to Amazon. That seemed to be a good way to bypass that consideration phase, like get them adapted in saying, yep, I'm absolutely buying Goal Zero because it reflects my core values, because it aligns with who I am as an individual, absolutely.Stephanie:Yep. Have you seen higher conversions or did you do any split testing between having an influencer drive to your site versus to Amazon? And did you just see higher conversions on Amazon, I guess, because that's a platform that everyone recognizes, you trust the shipping on there? Is that what you saw, or did you see something different?Patrick:No. The campaign is actually just starting, and so the early read is yes, we are seeing that we can effectively drive consumers at a less expensive rate to Amazon. They're going to convert at a higher level than what we've seen in the past. We're not doing an A/B test per se, but if our conversion was X percent, it's now gone up by three or four or five points.Stephanie:Yep. Yeah, okay. Very cool. Then how do you think about interacting with your customer if they came from Amazon versus if they came from your website and they are much more knowledgeable already about your brand and your mission? Do you approach those customers in different ways?Patrick:Yeah. That's a good question. I think that we definitely approach customers in an educational standpoint, meaning if you know exactly what you want, you're a lifelong Goal Zero fan, we're not going to talk to you and force you through this funnel of education and learning about the brand and all our differentiators. We're going to fast track you right to the buy box. But absolutely, we've increased the number of videos. We've increased a lot of our A-plus content, and we're actually going through and just really talking about our differentiators.Patrick:I think one of the things that we got caught up in was trying to play the Amazon game, right? As premium brand, we'd be like, "Well, let's keyword stuff our titles, and let's try to figure out how we're going to drive thousands of reviews," and all these things that you just felt you had to do on Amazon. We took a step back and said, "All of the stuff we do for goalzero.com is going to absolutely work on Amazon. We just have to do it the same way. We have to be ourselves and be authentic to our brand."Patrick:We stopped talking about keyword stuffing and started talking about hey, we're designed in the USA. Our offices are in Salt Lake City. We give back 5% of our profits to humanitarian efforts. Come check out our social impact and what we stand for as good citizens and stewards. We started talking about who we are, why we're premium, what we are and what makes us different from the rest of the competition, specifically on these budget brands on Amazon. And we're starting to see improvements to...Patrick:I think more than anything, I think just we're getting back to doing what we know how to do, which is really good marketing and just applying that really good marketing to Amazon versus trying to be like, "Let's say it completely different and be this whole and weird alter ego on Amazon," and just getting back to our roots. I think I'm proud and I'm happy of where we're heading.Stephanie:Yeah. That's a really good reminder, too. Yeah, get back to your roots and not get caught up in the frenzy of the platform. I mean yeah, I'm thinking about the certain listings on Amazon with the titles of so many keywords, and you're like, "Wait, is this the newest iPhone cover or not? I don't need to see every single iPhone that's ever existed since 2000." Yeah.Patrick:Totally.Stephanie:A good reminder for anyone, large or small companies, to stay grounded and focused on what your goals are and not get caught up in the platform.Patrick:Yeah. And it's easy. You're like, "It's Amazon." It's going to make or break you. What we found is Amazon, fortunately for us, Amazon has always been a small channel for us. It's never been a primary channel. Our wholesale, our utility, our goalzero.com are all significantly larger. The ability to come back to center on that is easier than if you are an Amazon brand and 90% of your revenue is flowing through there. I can imagine it's a very different conversation, but my recommendation is absolutely, stay true to your brand and do the things that got you there in the first place.Stephanie:Yeah, I love that. All right, let's shift over to the lightning round. The lightning round is brought to you by Salesforce Commerce Cloud. This is where I ask a question and you have a minute or less to answer. Are you read, Patrick?Patrick:I hope so.Stephanie:All right. What's the nicest thing anyone's ever done for you?Patrick:The nicest thing anyone ever did to me was early in my career I got a bit of advice that has helped me throughout my entire journey. It was the CEO at Orvis, and he said to me, "Success is easy when people want you to succeed." I've built my entire career around that saying, how do I add value to myself, to the organization, to everyone around me in a way that makes a lot of people's lives easier, makes people lives better? If I can do that, then yeah, success just comes naturally. That bit of advice has stuck with me for 20 years, and I still, I think about it daily.Stephanie:Okay, that's a good one. I like that answer. I'm going to start thinking about that too in my daily walks of life. No, that's great. What's one thing that you believe around ecommerce that many wouldn't agree with you on? It can be a trend. It can be something you're bullish on right now. Maybe you get pushback from your current CEO.Patrick:Yeah. Yeah, no. I don't know if a lot of people disagree with me, but I think there's a tendency to have a hard time differentiating between common practices and best practices. For me, a common practice is something that everybody does and it's just easy to say, "Oh, we should do that too. We should absolutely have an email signup box when the popup the second you come to the homepage." I hate those comments. I always say, "No, let's test it, make sure it's right for us." Sometimes they are and sometimes they're not. I think that making it a best practice means it has to be for you and your business and your company and the ability to differentiate is really critical to success.Patrick:Secondly, I would say there is no magic bullet. Success in ecommerce is a ton of elbow grease. It's a constant hustle and just always working a little bit harder and a little bit better. Because there's no technology, there's no new platform, there's no new nothing that's just going to solve all your financial troubles. It's elbow grease.Stephanie:Yep. Yeah, that's great. If you were to have a podcast, what would it be about and who would your first guest be?Patrick:If I were to have a podcast, it'd probably be something outdoors, skiing, fishing, whitewater rafting. Let's see. Yeah, I think my very first guest would probably be Steve Rinella, and we would talk about hunting. I think we would go and talk about the nuances of it. Not the harvesting of animals per se, but the higher level just headiness of it, like how you be able to get out there and become a true conservationist, to truly explore nature in a way that's just so much more intimate than going for a hike with your dog. It's a really cool experience, and I would love to just pick his thought on it because he aligns with me.Stephanie:That's great. I know nothing about hunting or any of that, so I would for sure listen to that episode. What's up next on your Netflix queue?Patrick:Oh, geez. I'm probably way late to the game, but we've been watching two shows. I think the first one is Outlander. It's like this woman travels through time in Scotland and it's a cool story. Then the other one is just more comic relief because it reminds me of my big Irish family. It's called Derry Girls.Stephanie:Okay. I have not checked out that one yet. That's great. All right. Then the last one, what one thing will have the biggest impact on ecommerce in the next year?Patrick:In the next year or long term? I think-Stephanie:In a year.Patrick:In the next year. In the next year, I think just the shift... The aftereffects of COVID are continually forcing customers who were brick and mortar to jump into the ecommerce space. I think that's going to drive competition. It's going to drive awareness. It's going to elevate the whole ecommerce world. I think that it's going to be a big push, and I think that we're going to see people realizing that you have to be on ecommerce. You can no longer be solely a brick and mortar. Now, you can do both, but I think that's going to be the biggest thing we see in 2021 is just the continued rapid growth of ecommerce as a whole.Stephanie:Great. Patrick, thanks so much for hopping on the show with me and spilling all your secrets. It's been really fun. Where can people find out more about you and Goal Zero?Patrick:Yeah. Go to goalzero.com. I have a bio on my management page, and you can also find me on LinkedIn. Yeah, I think that's the best way. Thank you for having me. This has been fantastic, and I really enjoyed the chat. Hopefully, we can, post-COVID, go skiing and have a beer.Stephanie:I hope so. I would be so down for that. I need that in my life right now. Thanks so much.Patrick:All right, thank you.

Catch the full interview with Johnny from DMA'S from Triple M Aussie with Matty O. Listen to Triple M Aussie nights on Triple M and catch up on the LiSTNR App. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Lynn Palmer lynnpalmer@clearchannel.com https://clearchanneloutdoor.com/ VP Sales/Market Manager San Diego, Clear Channel Outdoor Bio Lynn Started in Radio where she learned a lot about 5, 10, 15 second advertising clips that needed to get to the point quick with only a few words. That experience gave her a vast portfolio of knowledge and experience and helped her move from radio to billboard advertising where she was hired by Clear Channel Outdoor in 2015. Clear Channel Outdoor is a worldwide out of home advertising company offering a wide variety of outdoor signs across the U.S., in 43 of the top 50 DMAs. Their billboards, digital billboards, airport signs and other outdoor advertising options enable brands to connect with people in different environments.  Ms. Palmer is currently the VP Sales/Market Manager in San Diego, CA  Title Billboard Advertising: A New and Improved Way of Reaching a Mass Audience    Talking Points ◘ How Billboard Advertising has evolved ◘ “Out of Home” Mass Reach Medium ◘ Using Data in Aggregate to Identify Where the Customer is and What the Customer Wants ◘ Digital Ads: flexibility to change within Seconds Social Media https://www.linkedin.com/in/lynn-palmer-8a0b098/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week's Billboard Insider podcast features Lamar Advertising's Director of Digital Growth Ian Dallimore.  Ian talks about what needs to happen for programmatic buying to increase, how an out of home company can effectively use social media and a not-to-be-missed session at next week's OAAA 2019 show. Here are some excerpts from the 25 minute interview. Lamar CEO Sean Reilly thinks programmatic can contribute $8-10 million to revenues this year.  What has to happen for the programmatic buy to increase? Ian Dallimore, Director of Digitial Growth, Lamar Advertising Think about booking air travel years ago.  You started with a travel agent.  Then you had the likes of Obitz and other platforms.  Now you just go to delta.com.  That's where we're building towards…And we also put a heavy focus that we're not cannibalizing out of home budgets…We want to go after digital agencies that are buying mobile and online and search and we're complementing the existing purchases which are being made by our friends at the out of home agencies. The other thing that has to happen is there needs to be education of the out of home medium… Have we seen some 7 figure programmatic buys? We have…The perception that the industry has about programmatic is that its fake, it's really just automation.  We're truly living in a world where digital agencies are spending these six and seven figure campaigns and they're using real time bidding and real time data to show and play on out of home just as they do on the mobile device…The other misconception is that these buys are only being done top 5 DMA level.  As most of your listeners know Lamar goes deep into 200 DMAs.  We're seeing a ton of buys in the 100+ DMA's because the data shows that these are…the locations that index highest towards a specific plan… Lamar seems to be more willing to use programmatic out of home vendors than Outfront or Clear Channel.  How can an out of home company use vendors productively when developing automated out of home buying. Seven years ago Lamar became the first large out of home company to partner with a programmatic company…Vistar and Vistar is still a partner today.  The important thing is that it allowed us to learn a lot…we continue to to that today with our other partners Place Exchange, Hivestack and Broadsign/Reach…Today we take the approach that we have multiple partners and rather than building out our own platform we allow the sales reps at a lot of these great SSP (“Supply side providers”)…to be the expert at selling the medium.  We come in along side them at the media vendor days. How can an out of home company effectively use social media? Locally and nationally we're streaming live tweets to billboards. We've had a really cool campaign running with Cheetos where we're streaming live tweets in real time about people interacting.  The ability to continue the conversation with social media is important… My other favorite one is the use of Instagram.  Instagram is the social out of home…For digital out of home it's very simple, just like twitter.  You can have a specific promotion, whether it be coke and share a coke and you take a picture of yourself sharing a coke with a friend, streaming that live to the board…our friends at Colossal the hand paint company – I think that the way that they're doing it is phenomenal.  This is an old school classic company that's hand painting and they have so many of their campaigns that just go viral because people in New York are like, “this is a really cool paint job”… If you could communicate one thing to out of home clients and ad agencies what would it be. Our medium has the ability to tell a story every day.  And now even every minute of the day.  So brands are able to be more impactful…We're the only medium that can talk to consumers at a relevant real time, with creative.  Some recent research has shown that when digital out of home campaigns use dynamic creative i...

Angels are all around us. Do you have a friend who just seems to be tapped into the light? Tapped into the positive energy? Today Jill has just one of those energy angels as a guest Linda Lexy. She is co-founder of the 4 time Detroit Music Award Winning Record Label - Funky D Records, 7 time Detroit Music Award Winning DJ, Yogi and all around spiritual messenger.