Combating Ad Fraud And Brand Safety With Check My Ads’ Claire Atkin And Nandini Jammi

Claire Atkin and Nandini Jammi are the Co-founders of Check My Ads Institute, but you may have heard of them before. Claire writes the popular newsletter Branded, which breaks major stories about the advertising industry’s ties to disinformation and hate groups. Nandini previously Co-founded Sleeping Giants, the social media campaign that led advertisers to flee from Breitbart. Both are passionate about combating disinformation and marketing issues.

In this episode, Nandini, Claire, and I discuss the Check My Ads Institute, its importance, and its impact on marketers. Claire and Nandini are passionate about making marketers aware of the problem they face with ad fraud. It is in every one of our ecosystems, and marketers have to do the hard work to get out in front of it and stop supporting things like disinformation. Listen to learn much more about brand safety and how to become a member of their nonprofit.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Combating hate speech in ads
  • Where disinformation stems from
  • What is brand safety

Key Highlights:

  • [01:38] Where Nandini and Claire got their start
  • [03:00] Nandini and the Breitbart scandal 
  • [09:30] Claire’s crisis of inaction
  • [12:05] Why Claire and Nandini started Check My Ads
  • [14:04] The struggle with ad tech
  • [16:08] Facebook and disinformation 
  • [19:47] How Check My Ads combats disinformation 
  • [23:09] Partnering with Check My Ads 
  • [26:40] Where should marketers start? 
  • [27:37] Brand safety laundering
  • [30:45] Future plans for Check My Ads
  • [33:02] The experiences that define Nandini and Claire
  • [35:28] Advice to their younger selves 
  • [37:03] The biggest threat and opportunity for marketers

Resources Mentioned: 

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Connect with the Guest:

Connect with Marketing Today and Alan Hart:


Alan B. Hart is the creator and host of “Marketing Today with Alan Hart,” a weekly podcast where he interviews leading global marketing professionals and business leaders. Alan advises leading executives and marketing teams on brand, customer experience, innovation, and growth opportunities. He has consulted with Fortune 100 companies, but he is an entrepreneur at his core, having founded or served as an executive for nine companies.

Investing In Brand Experiences With AnyRoad’s Jonathan Yaffe

Jonathan Yaffe is the CEO and Co-founder of AnyRoad, a data and analytics platform that powers experiential marketing efforts for many of the Fortune 2000 companies.

In this episode, Jonathan and I discuss how his career started at RedBull and how it evolved into founding AnyRoad. Jonathan believes that experiential marketing is a pillar of any effective marketing strategy. He says, “experiential programs really change consumer behavior, which leads to revenue growth and increases of brand love.”

Listen to the full episode to learn more about why experiences matter so much in today’s environment and why brands are looking at experiential programs to build long-term brand loyalty and ultimately increase a customer’s lifetime value.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • The value of leaning into the experience
  • What makes personalization so powerful
  • Focus on lifetime value instead of conversion rates

Key Highlights:

  • [01:38] Working for RedBull
  • [02:43] Transforming from product to experience
  • [05:35] Examples of incorporating experience in brand
  • [08:32] Changes in the experiential marketing space
  • [12:54] What makes the personalized experience so powerful
  • [15:01] Getting better at capturing and using data 
  • [17:40] How data is being collected today
  • [19:35] What to do with data once you’ve got it 
  • [23:35] An experience that defines Jonathan makes him who he is today
  • [26:56] Jonathan’s advice to his younger self
  • [28:55] What marketers should be learning more about
  • [30:16] The brands and organization Jonathan follows
  • [33:51] The biggest threat and opportunity for marketers 

Resources Mentioned: 

Follow the podcast:

Connect with the Guest:

Connect with Marketing Today and Alan Hart:


Alan B. Hart is the creator and host of “Marketing Today with Alan Hart,” a weekly podcast where he interviews leading global marketing professionals and business leaders. Alan advises leading executives and marketing teams on brand, customer experience, innovation, and growth opportunities. He has consulted with Fortune 100 companies, but he is an entrepreneur at his core, having founded or served as an executive for nine companies.

What’s Trending For Marketers In 2022?

2022 is days away and we’re all looking ahead to that flip from ‘21 to ‘22. It feels in many ways like the first time we’re turning the page since March of 2020. What will this new year look like? We expect different, in many ways, and have explored what we see as the biggest trends presenting us as marketers.


#1. Deja-Vu.

Have you ever been on Instagram Reels for half an hour and realized you’re on TikTok? How many Tweets have you seen posted on your Instagram feed? YouTube Shorts now offer similar vertical, short-form content to Snap, TikTok and Reels. We’re not only noticing the same content posted across platforms, we also see a trend toward the growing appetite for quick-hitting, lo-fi video content and anticipate that social platforms will continue to look more and more alike with similar content and formats, at least in the immediate future

#2. Chime In

The desire for deeper human connection, the continued rise in hands-free tech and screen fatigue have given rise to the explosion of audio based social, with new platforms emerging and older ones adapting to offer audio-based functionality.​ The rise of podcasts over the last decade has contributed to comfortability with visual-less formats, and the ease and portability of listening-only has become a welcome convenience. The movement away from listening to interacting is the next iteration, leaning further into social than entertainment. We see this with Twitter Spaces, Instagram Live Rooms, and even dating apps, and expect audio-forward platforms to thrive as we come to demand their ease and ability to connect us.

#3. The Metaverse Unfolds

This growing crypto art space that reflects the best of people’s ingenuity, community building, and creativity and highlights the worst of our inequality, controversy, and patience, will see peak popularity in 2022. Brands have already opted in, but true accessibility for everyday people will heighten as the metaverse becomes a household word.

#4. In-House Advocates

As the shift from paid budgets to earned efforts continues and the return-to-work post-pandemic commences, companies are leaning into the benefits of employee activation on social. This strategy not only allows companies and brands to show up in a more authentic and human way, employee activation programs have also been proven to increase retention and satisfaction. Put simply, employees could serve as the most effective brand advocates of the future.

#5. Social Emotional Health

Brands are taking a hard stance to support emotional wellbeing. In the wake of Facebook’s whistleblower conundrum this fall, while platforms scramble to prove their ability to protect and promote safety, brands are stepping up. As consumers increasingly view self-care as a necessity and self-regulation on social as a means of self-care, brands have an opportunity to assist them by rethinking their product offering, platform presence and content mix.

Ayzenberg Interns Launch myCOLOR TikTok, Join Ayzenberg Group Full-Time

Do you know what color best represents your personality? Using two of its guiding principles—collaboration and innovation—Ayzenberg set out to answer that question, utilizing its Soulmates.AI technology to create myCOLOR, a tool that illustrates what the ‘color’ of a person’s personality reveals about them.

Developed by Dr. J. Galen Buckwalter, the myCOLOR quiz was developed to provide deeper insights into your personality traits as well as how to interact more effectively with others. As the quiz notes, having a better understanding of your quirks can lead to greater compatibility with co-workers resulting in more effective teamwork and collaboration.

Tasked with creating content for a myCOLOR social media campaign during the summer were Ayzenberg and space.camp creative interns, including Jennifer Chocolate and Olivia Gutierrez who we caught up with after the conclusion of their internship. The two worked together to develop TikTok content that drove back to the myCOLOR site. We spoke with Chocolate and Gutierrez about their learnings from the project and their advice to incoming Ayzenberg interns, including how they pivoted their internship into full-time positions as staff. We also talked with Ayzenberg VP of human resources Sara Michelson to find out how the agency nurtures interns to help build their careers and its response to the Great Resignation.


Profile: Jennifer Chocolate

Growing up in South Florida, Chocolate developed a passion for Graphic Design after discovering her Photoshop skills in high school. She went on to major in Graphic Design at the University of Central Florida, and later won the 4A’s 2021 Multicultural Advertising Intern Program (MAIP) Creative Fellow of the Year and later secured a spot as a 2021 FUTURE for the ADCOLOR Conference and Awards. She notes that all her hard work led to her becoming first a Creative Intern at Ayzenberg, then an employee.

Other than pitching ideas for videos on Xbox’s TikTok, Chocolate spent a great deal of her Ayzenberg internship developing myCOLOR-related content for TikTok. Despite not having previously used the TikTok app herself (Gen Z plot twist!) Jennifer absorbed everything she could find about the app’s algorithm, ideal posting times, proper tags to use and how to edit videos for the best results for the medium. The amount of creativity she was able to summon while developing videos according to the respective colors of the myCOLOR quiz was her favorite part of the internship.

Chocolate had to ask herself what a “purple” personality, for example, dresses like and spends their time doing. Chocolate and the other interns were the first to create TikTok videos around myCOLOR, also known as @TheColorOfMyPersonality, so they allowed their creativity to run wild. There was no precedent or creative blueprint to follow.

Chocolate’s main takeaway while interning at Ayzenberg: the realization that she would get the most out of her time there if she embraced the fact that she doesn’t know everything, a mindset that made her open to anything.

Chocolate isn’t sure what her professional goals are in the near term but she’s on the road to becoming a Creative Director. In the long term, Chocolate looks forward to potentially teaching as a professor and inspiring young creatives of color and women. In the meantime, she started freelancing for Ayzenberg as a Social Media Coordinator before accepting the same full-time position there. Most recently, Chocolate and her ADCOLOR team won the 2021 ADCOLOR Futures Hackathon, where teams have eight hours to come up with a creative solution to a critical issue that they thereafter present to a panel of judges.

“For me, it’s not really a matter of making revolutionary work or reinventing the wheel. I know that I will have fulfilled a part of my purpose if I can inspire any person who has ever been told that they can’t, or that there’s no way. If they’re able to see me or look at my work and that helps them get to whatever goal that they’re reaching, then that’s more than enough for me,” said Chocolate.


Profile: Olivia Gutierrez

A University of Oregon graduate, Gutierrez was a digital production intern at Ayzenberg for about four months, one month longer than anticipated so that she could work on the myCOLOR TikTok campaign.

Working alongside several other interns including Jennifer Chocolate, Gutierrez helped create the myCOLOR social campaign’s strategy brief, developed content ideas, pitched and finalized ideas, conducted research and gathered content for creation. She also produced TikTok videos, wrote copy for captions and posted final videos. Once the videos were uploaded, Gutierrez would monitor traction and engagement. In a nutshell, she learned how to be a creator on TikTok.

Gutierrez recommended that Ayzenberg assign a dedicated team to the myCOLOR project given that, according to her, consistency is key to any social media campaign. Any lapse in posting inevitably leads to irrelevance and potentially unfollows. Her favorite part of the internship was having total creative freedom to create the type of TikTok videos she felt would be most effective at building awareness and education.

When asked to identify a brand she thinks is killing it on social, Gutierrez named athleisurewear company Set Active, noting the company does “an amazing job at community engagement” via daily content posted to its Instagram story—from product drops and behind the scenes through the lens of its employees to “ask us” series and takeovers.

While Gutierrez doesn’t yet have a preference or specialty, she’s doing a little of everything within social media to find out her end goal. Her dream company for the past two years though? Ayzenberg. The agency hired her to work on a few projects as a freelance social media coordinator, including posting and managing content across several social media platforms for Ad Council’s ‘Sound It Out’ social campaign​​. In September, she accepted a full-time role at the agency as a production coordinator working mostly within the ‘a.OS’ group, or in-house video production studio.

“Some advice I would give incoming Ayzenberg interns is to get to know your intern group. They truly are incredible individuals and they will remain your friends even after your internship ends. You will also learn a lot from them. Secondly, work as hard as you can and don’t be afraid to ask questions and get to know the full-time senior workers in the office. They will have a lot of advice to share,” Gutierrez told AList.


Sara Michelson, VP Of Human Resources

Interns are an important recruiting tool for the agency, according to Sara Michelson, Ayzenberg vice president of human resources.

“Our people are our most important recruiting tool and make up who we are. So when we have an intern join, they become a part of the team and never feel like a typical intern. Team members treat them as equal team members,” Michelson told AList.

While the pandemic has widened the talent pool available to Ayzenberg and allowed it to hire people from all over the world, Michelson says the agency isn’t exempt from the Great Resignation, the ongoing trend of US employees quitting their jobs beginning in spring 2021. According to the latest JOLTS report, a record number of 4.4 million Americans left their jobs in September.

“We’re thinking of creative ways for people to gather so everyone can meet each other.”

Sara Michelson, VP of Human Resources

“Our greatest asset is our people so when we realized that they wouldn’t be going back to the office immediately, we started building programs to enable connection, help retain employees and enhance their experience. We’re thinking of creative ways for people to gather so everyone can meet each other,” she said.

For example, for every new hire during COVID, Michelson says the company hosted an on-site tour and lunch, which it will start doing every three months for new hires. New hires are also being paired with someone on a senior level so they have access to someone who’s not on their team to show them the ropes. According to Michelson, this is a boon to retention because if a new hire wants to move around in the agency, they can discuss the possibilities of doing so with that colleague.

Ayzenberg is also enhancing its orientation to have follow-up sessions, or deep dives to ensure the new hire is settled in and understands the different teams that comprise the agency. In October, it also hosted food trucks every Friday, which it will continue to do. More recently, an event at Dodger Stadium was hosted to encourage interaction among new hires. 

“We’re experiencing what every company is experiencing but we’re not having trouble recruiting people. So while we’re feeling the impact of the Great Resignation, we’re also really excited about all of the amazing talent we’ve brought on and we’re pleased how many people are excited to talk to us and join the company,” Michelson said.

Marketers And Consumers Don’t See Eye To Eye On Diversity In Influencer Content

According to Takumi’s latest white paper, “Influencer Marketing in the Post-Pandemic Era,” consumers and marketers are at odds about whether influencer content adequately represents diversity in society. While two-thirds of marketers (62 percent) believe there is adequate representation, less than one-third of consumers (28 percent) agree.

Studying 3,000 brands, creators and consumers in the US and UK, Takumi set out to understand the evolution of the relationship between brands and creators as marketers have amped up their influencer campaigns over the past 18 months. Its study found that roughly 70 percent of marketers are more likely to utilize influencers in their campaigns after the pandemic.


Diversity Perception Mismatch 

Takumi’s study revealed a similar disconnect exists in influencer content between consumers and marketers regarding the representation of underrepresented or marginalized communities. For example, 30 percent of US and UK consumers and 67 percent of marketers believe that influencer marketing content did a more adequate job at representing these communities as compared to traditional brand-owned channels. Forty percent of respondents between 16 and 24 years old and 43 percent of those between 25 and 34 years old believe there is adequate representation in influencer content of these marginalized communities.

Takumi managing director Sara Joy Madsen advises that diversity and inclusion be at the heart of any conversation between brands, agencies and influencers. She recommends that agencies employ diverse teams, introduce equal and fair pay for BIPOC influencers and improve disabled creators’ profiles.

According to UK creator Juliet Uzor, in order to improve diversity and inclusion, greater representation in influencer content can only come from brand decision-makers. Members of the public should be seeing people from all backgrounds, abilities, sizes and dispositions on their devices so that it becomes the norm, she notes.


Pandemic Boosts Influencer Marketing 

The pandemic and the subsequent decrease in opportunities to market through channels like out-of-home (OOH) and print forced brands to delve into influencer marketing. Seventy percent of marketers are now more likely to use influencers in brand campaigns as 69 percent reported that influencer marketing budgets have grown.

Additionally, 59 percent of marketers are now using more ecommerce tools in their influencer marketing activity as compared to 2020. The effectiveness of influencer marketing in converting 16- to 24-year olds rose to 57 percent, and 25- to 34-year-olds to 61 percent. Rates of conversions among individuals 55 and over almost doubled between 2019 (13 percent) and 2021 (24 percent), according to Takumi’s research.


The Most Effective Channel: YouTube

Fifty-six percent of US and UK consumers engaged more with YouTube than they did at the start of the pandemic, making the platform the most effective channel in the context of engagement. The next most-engaging platforms were Instagram (48 percent), TikTok (37 percent), Snapchat (32 percent), Pinterest (29 percent), Twitch (26 percent) and Triller (21 percent).

Takumi’s data show that branded content, engagement and consumer spending grew across a range of channels and sectors. One reason for this: a rise in consumers’ engagement with creators’ content, which as a result caused their confidence in those channels to grow. This also caused marketers’ faith in influencer marketing to increase as they diverted budgets away from traditional channels and into influencer marketing.

According to Jim Meadows, chief strategy officer at Takumi, as the influencer marketing industry continues to grow, it must address issues surrounding diversity and inclusion and trust and transparency in order to “cement its position as the most effective marketing channel,” he said.

Trend Set: Spoiler-Free Spider-Man

Ayzenberg Junior Strategist Ashley Otah recounts this week’s trends including TikTok’s new feature tests, Spider-man spoiler avoidance and Megan Thee Stallion’s graduation.


TikTok

Feature frenzy. TikTok is testing a desktop streaming software titled TikTok Live Studio to a select group. The streaming software allows users to stream to TikTok Live after login, akin to Twitch and other game streaming outlets. As users continue to crave essential attributes across different platforms, the testing of this feature highlights the benefit of having interfaces that allow users to utilize a single platform as a central hub. Previously, the act of cloning features or in-app experiences seemed more widespread. Still, TikTok’s ability to adjust accordingly as consumer habits change quickly further underscores that showing up uniquely as a brand natively is becoming necessary to cut through the noise.

Megan Thee Stallion

Thee graduate. Megan Jovon Ruth Pete, known professionally as Megan Thee Stallion, graduated from Texas Southern University on Saturday, December 11th. The Grammy-award winning rapper, songwriter, and now college graduate is schooling people on how to show up and show out. With a newly signed Netflix deal, among other accolades, there’s a reason she stays booked and busy. Celebrities, influencers, and partnerships don’t need to show up anyhow and everywhere. Instead, they must show up right. Companies, brands, and the like can better execute partnerships by having an accurate pulse on talent that is appropriately aligned and an eye for cultural moments that go beyond sales and marketing moments that the average consumer is not aware of.

Love Nwantiti

Music madness. A crazy year for the music industry is coming to an end, with notable moments across the chart. With recorded music revenue growth in the U.S. up 27% and TikTok citing more than 175 songs that trended on the platform also charting on the Billboard’s Hot 100, the future of music looks bright. A standout hit this year was Nigerian singer-songwriter Ckay’s ‘love nwantiti (ah ah ah)’ which garnered over a million video creations on TikTok and ranked #2 on Billboard’s Global 200 list. The song’s success reaffirms that the cross-cultural impact of music is undeniable and should not be an afterthought.

Audio-based Social

Audio, but make it social. In a study by Erin J. Newman and Norbert Schwarz, people rated a physicist 19.3% better when listening to him in high quality. The effects of different audio qualities shift how people judge the content which creates a new crossroads. Balancing the delicate line between high-quality yet not overly-produced work that consumers are leaning away from is a feat more will face as audio-based social booms.

Spider-man: No Way Home

No spoilers and no way home. Spider-man: No Way Home hits theaters, and fans are avoiding spoilers at all costs. A video released from the movie’s Twitter account has amassed five million-plus views and instructs viewers to stop reading comments, mute keywords, and even stay off social media. The highly anticipated release and subsequent directions about making the experience special for everyone indicate how marketing can move beyond just building upon promotion and into a community space.

2021 Clio Awards Recognize Ayzenberg’s Work With Xbox

This week, winners for the 2021 Clio Entertainment Awards were announced after a long wait for the ad world. With 175 jurors from 30 countries, this year’s program had the largest jury pool in its 61-year history. Judges had double the amount of entries to assess due to the pandemic canceling last year’s awards.

Ayzenberg Group’s submitted work for Microsoft Xbox led to numerous Clio awards. Among them, a silver win in the Games Product Innovation category and a silver award in the Games Social Content Campaign category, both for Xbox. Ahead, learn more about the award-winning work and those that made it possible.


Microsoft Xbox

Xbox Mini Fridge – World Premiere

What started as a viral meme turned into a reality as Microsoft responded to the internet’s request to make and sell a mini-fridge replica of the Xbox Series X console. The mini-fridge made its world premiere in a 60-second video, created by Ayzenberg Group, and racked up 1.6 million views within the first 24 hours of posting. The agency won a silver Clio in the Product Innovation category for the key art and video, which includes dramatic scenes of floating microscopic spheres, gameplay of popular Xbox games like Halo and a call to “Xbox and Chill” with a literal Xbox fridge.

Credits:

  • Director, Xbox Global Marketing Craig McNary, Microsoft Xbox
  • Chief Creative Officer Gary Goodman, Ayzenberg
  • VP, Executive Creative Director Joey Jones, Ayzenberg
  • Creative Director Allen Bey, Ayzenberg
  • Executive Producer Jonathan Clark, Ayzenberg
  • Creative Producer Karisa Callahan, Ayzenberg
  • Sr Design Director Aaron Frebowitz, Ayzenberg
  • Sr Art Director Kingsley Harden, Ayzenberg

Microsoft Xbox

Xbox Takes Over Social

Ayzenberg also won a silver Clio in the Games Social Content Campaign category for the video and key art it created for Microsoft’s “Xbox Takes Over Social” campaign. The video shares how Xbox overhauled its voice and tone on social media to transform itself from a corporate brand to an ambassador of genuine gaming fandom. The video explains how Xbox extended its attitudinal shift and cultural scope to encompass more than just gaming, including embracing difficult conversations around social issues all while making its gaming updates entertaining. Modifying its presence on social media and in the gaming community-led Xbox to earn 4.1 billion impressions, 6.8 million new followers, 107 million engagements and $137 million in total earned media value—breaking every social media record it ever held.

Credits:

  • Sr Marketing Manager Devin Moore, Microsoft Xbox
  • Sr Marketing Manager Kate Fisher, Microsoft Xbox
  • Social Media Manager Bardi Moradi, Microsoft Xbox
  • Account Director Shawn Hartwig, Ayzenberg
  • Associate Project Manager Bryant Vu, Ayzenberg
  • Art Director Vu Nguyen, Ayzenberg

Microsoft Xbox

Series S Reveal Video

Ayzenberg won a bronze Clio in the Games/Electronics category for the trailer and key art it created around Microsoft’s new Xbox Series S console launch. The computer-generated video begins with droplets of black fluid suspended in space before they assemble into a part of the console. White droplets follow suit as hip-hop music plays and the Xbox logo emerges from the white liquid. The fully constructed console stands before the viewer as facts and specs appear beside it. 

Credits:

  • Director, Xbox Global Marketing, Craig McNary, Microsoft Xbox
  • Sr Manager, Xbox Global Marketing, Josh Munsee, Microsoft Xbox
  • Chief Creative Officer, Gary Goodman, Ayzenberg
  • Creative Director, Allen Bey, Ayzenberg
  • Sr Producer Rebecca Breithaupt, Ayzenberg
  • Account Supervisor Chy Lin, Ayzenberg

Microsoft Xbox

Xbox Design Lab Relaunch

Ayzenberg won a second bronze Clio in the Games/Electronics category for the video and key art it produced for Microsoft’s “Xbox Design Lab Relaunch,” which announced Microsoft’s reopening of its Xbox Design Lab where gamers can customize their Xbox Series X or S controller with a variety of expressions. The 55-second spot shows the process a fan would go through to customize their controller online.

Credits:

  • Sr Manager, Xbox Global Marketing Josh Munsee, Microsoft Xbox
  • Integrated Marketing Manager Courtney Luk, Microsoft Xbox
  • Chief Creative Officer Gary Goodman, Ayzenberg
  • Creative Director Allen Bey, Ayzenberg
  • Executive Producer Jonathan Clark, Ayzenberg
  • Account Supervisor Chy Lin, Ayzenberg

Becoming A Transformation Agent With Onriva’s George Corbin

George Corbin is a Board Director at Edgewell Personal Care and is the COO of Onriva, a next-generation, AI-powered, travel marketplace.

In this episode, George and I talk about his career path, which includes consulting through the boom and bust of the internet, becoming Chief Digital Officer at Marriott, leading their digital transformation, and making his way to a position on Edgewell’s board.

Throughout our conversation, we discuss lessons learned through leading digital transformation, what that means for the marketing function, and marketers should think about leading a digital transformation. George says, “The best marketers are transformation agents,” and sometimes that means getting really good at being insightful with your customers and looking at the data. 

Listen in to hear more about digital transformations and the hot topics board members are currently discussing.


In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Getting digital transformation right
  • Making your company a growth engine 
  • Opportunities for marketers on a board

Key Highlights:

  • [02:00] George’s wrestling match with an octopus 
  • [04:10] George’s start in marketing
  • [10:34] Getting digital transformation right
  • [18:57] Becoming a board director
  • [21:48] Opportunities for marketers at the board level
  • [26:11] Shifting to a mind of governance 
  • [31:20] “Hot or not”—what boards are talking about
  • [38:55] George’s advice for CMOs
  • [45:26] An experience that defines George, makes him who he is today 
  • [48:33] George’s advice to his younger self 
  • [50:14] What marketers should be learning more about 
  • [52:07] The brands and organizations George follows
  • [55:42] The biggest threat or opportunity for marketers

Resources Mentioned: 

Follow the podcast:

Connect with the Guest:

Connect with Marketing Today and Alan Hart:


Alan B. Hart is the creator and host of “Marketing Today with Alan Hart,” a weekly podcast where he interviews leading global marketing professionals and business leaders. Alan advises leading executives and marketing teams on brand, customer experience, innovation, and growth opportunities. He has consulted with Fortune 100 companies, but he is an entrepreneur at his core, having founded or served as an executive for nine companies.

Meta Elevates Michelle Klein To Vice President, Global Business Marketing

This week in leadership updates, Meta has promoted Michelle Klein to vice president of global business marketing, Scripps Networks appoints Keisha Taylor Starr as chief marketing officer, Ironman Group hires Suzanne Cohen as chief marketing officer and more.


Meta Promotes Michelle Klein To Vice President, Global Business Marketing 

Meta has appointed Michelle Klein as vice president, global business marketing, according to Adweek.

Succeeding Mark D’Arcy—who left the company in August—Klein enters into the role after having served as Meta’s senior marketing director for North America and global.


Scripps Networks Hires Keisha Taylor Starr As Chief Marketing Officer

Scripps Networks has tapped Keisha Taylor Starr as chief marketing officer, effective January 3, 2022.

Starr joins from Recount Media where she served as senior vice president, marketing and public relations.


Ironman Group Taps Suzanne Cohen As Chief Marketing Officer

Ironman Group has named Suzanne Cohen chief marketing officer.

Previously, Cohen served as JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s head of branch and local experiences.


Dunelm Hires Ben Carter As First Chief Marketing Officer

Dunelm has appointed Ben Carter to the newly created role of chief marketing officer.

Carter most recently served as the chief marketing officer of Purplebricks.


Carolyn Everson Steps Down As Instacart President

Carolyn Everson has departed from her position as Instacart president due to “mismatched priorities,” reports Ad Age.

Everson is unsure of her next move, though she has previously served as vice president, global business group at Facebook and corporate vice president, global ad sales and strategy at Microsoft.


Laura Colona Named Executive Vice President, Commercial Marketing Officer For Out Of Home Advertising Association Of America (OAAA) 

The OAAA has recruited Laura Colona as its first executive vice president, commercial marketing officer.

Colona joins OAAA from MediaMath where she was vice president and head of global marketing and communications.

Reddit Launches Personalized Year-In-Review Recap Feature

Reddit has launched a new year-in-review feature that gives users a personalized snapshot of their activity from the past year, reminiscent of Spotify’s “Wrapped” compilation tool and Instagram’s recently announced “Playback” Stories feature.

Reddit has in years past analyzed global aggregate data to round up the year’s most popular threads, subreddits and “Ask Me Anything” interviews. This year marks the first time it’s giving users access to a fun slideshow that breaks down how far they’ve scrolled through subreddits—with bananas as the unit of measurement—whether they were among the first Redditors to engage with big trends, frequency of interaction and what niche topics resonated with them.

Additionally, similar to how Spotify’s “Wrapped” feature allocates a badge to premium subscribers based on their listening habits, Reddit will categorize users as a specific type of Redditor by allotting them a “secret ability.” Another similarity: Reddit’s personalized feature doesn’t take into account 100 percent of users’ activity in 2021, just usage between January 1 and November 30.

Redditors can then share these insights across Facebook and Twitter, with the option of showing or hiding their username. 

According to Reddit Recap 2021, in 2021 Redditors created 366 million posts, a 19 percent increase year over year. And as of November 9, the platform has seen 2.3 billion total comments, a 12 percent increase YOY and 46 billion total upvotes, a 1 percent increase YOY. The top seven most viewed topics of 2021 were cryptocurrency, gaming, sports, weddings, health and fitness, food and drink, and movies and television.