April 9, 2024 • 45 mins
Steven and Marisa are back, and kicking off season 2 with 2 great guests: actor and producer Wilmer Valderama and iHeart President and CMO Gayle Troberman. Together, the four talk about a landmark study on how American consumers think… compared to how marketers think. A teaser example: every marketer knows the show “Succession.” The rest of America? Not so much. With some important discussion led by Wilmer and Steven on cultural bias particularly when it comes to Hispanic Americans, come back for Brand New Season 2 and enjoy this wide-ranging conversation and play along during a speed round of: Cool, or Cringe?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hi, and welcome or welcome back to brand new season
two from the iHeart Podcast Network and Brand New Labs.
I'm Marisa Thalberg and I'm Stephen Wolfe. Well, it's good
to be back, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Stephen, It's awesome to be back, and it's so great
fresh start with all these incredible learnings and insights from
season one. I mean, what was your favorite part of
season one?
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Well, obviously doing it with you.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Come on.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
That flattery will get me everywhere, that's the fun part. Yes,
I think we got.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
More confident in our ability to I mean, you and
I have never been shy or reticent about our perspectives,
and we did this to be real about what's happening
in our industry. But I think when we really took
on things from a place of both insight and heart
and we're a bit fearless about tackling some subjects and
(00:57):
seeing how much are liststeners resonated to that, I think
it's very inspiring in terms of how we want to
take this next season forward.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
How about you?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
It was just so almost therapeutic being able to talk,
you know, on a regular basis with you, talk with
our guests. But what I found so fascinating was just
the response from the audience, and we had so many
folks reach out share, you know, kind of their questions,
their insights, and I think we're really hitting a chord
(01:25):
with folks that really are brand new in the industry
or brand new in a new position. I feel like
there's a real responsibility for us to continue this real
talk so that folks can continue to learn that we
can actually speak truth to power, that we could actually
have folks to be guests on this pod, so we
could really expose and shine a light to these different perspectives.
(01:47):
And I'm just really excited to do more of that.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
I couldn't agree more. And I think that was one
of the most thrilling findings for us. Gratifying findings is
that we're not just talking to people who are in
our particular stage of life, stage of career, but to
know that we're getting those rising executives or who knows,
maybe people who are just interested in media and marketing
(02:11):
as well. That is I think something that is such
a shared value between you and I is wanting to teach.
And we talked about this so much for a couple
of episodes. We talked about being a continuous learner, didn't
we slow We can teach lifelong learners. So to see
that playing out in the audience that was attracted to
Brand New, I think gives us new found sense of
(02:32):
purpose of making sure we carry that idea forward into
season two.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
And I just feel that there's this sense of urgency, right.
I mean, it is getting so difficult, the stakes are higher.
You know, it's an election year. There's still all this
angst in the economy, continued contraction in industries. Obviously, you
see big tech continue to just march forward, and you know,
software specifically AI continues to eat the world. I just
(03:00):
feel like we're at this really interesting inflection point with careers,
with jobs, with where we are in society. I want
us to really have this spirit of instead of folks
that are just know it all is, I want us
to learn it all and I want to really learn
from listeners, from new speakers, guests that we have here.
I'm very excited about some of the folks that we
have coming on the season.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Mers me too.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
And you know what people probably don't know when you
and I were first conceiving this and kicking this idea around,
one of the reasons why we felt compelled to do
it is not like there's never been a podcast or
programming talking about these industries in which we work, but
we felt like it's very easy for people to be
armchair critics.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
It's very rare for the people that are.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
True practitioners to come at it from a place of
genuine love and appreciation for what we do and the
people we do it with, and wanting to come at
it from that place of loving and protecting what we do,
but also being able to recognize where the issues are
and talk truth fully about them. And I think we're
poised to do that today in our first episode, because
(04:06):
we're starting the season talking about nothing less than the
American people and frankly how well we as marketers do
or don't get them. We thought that season two deserve
to be kicked off with two guests instead of one,
and we actually have two amazing ones.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
It's a true pleasure to have a dear friend, mister
Wilmer Valderrama, who is this incredible actor and producer and
activists and folks may know him from his big roles
on shows like That seventies Show to his continuing starring
role in ncis one of the biggest shows in the world.
You may also recognize his voice from the Disney film Encanto.
(04:49):
And he's also doing incredible work not just in front
of the camera, but more importantly behind the camera, and
it's some of them very proud of. He is doing
incredible work to really represent new and exhibit thing like
youmal voices across all types of media. And he also
has partnered with our friends at iHeartMedia to launch his
new podcast network called and.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
So I get to introduce our really good friend Gail Troberman,
who happens to be the president and Chief Marketing Officer
fellow COMO at iHeartMedia. So her job is to connect
all of Iheart's brands, products and platforms with consumers. And
of course we feel a special connection to iHeart as
long standing friends, partners and now of course partners in
(05:31):
brand new But you should know that Gail has been
such a player in this industry for so long. She
spent many years at Microsoft as chief CRADO Officer. She's
an early Internet innovator at MSN and Gail, you pioneered
some research that we're going to spend the majority of
our time talking about today and Steve and I have
had a chance to kick this around with you before.
(05:53):
Now we get to kick it around with you and Wilmer,
So it's going to be a lot of fun. This study,
I think is pretty juicy because what you had the
cleverness to realize is as much as we marketers, our
jobs are to get it get how people think. And
we're going to focus on America today, so we're talking
about the American consumer. But what you on earth is
(06:13):
that there are some cases where there's a pretty interesting
divide which we may not realize between what let's call
them like the middle of the country or across the country,
American consumers think and how marketers think. So to get
us started, Gail, give us a few of your favorite
findings from this research and some of the differences that
(06:34):
actually came up between how marketers think and how average
Americans actually think.
Speaker 5 (06:39):
Awesome, Thanks Marissa. We had this hypothesis. We were talking
to some of our partners and podcasting like Wilmer and
Malcolm Gladwell at Pushkin, and we had this hypothesis that
now that we have so much data, right, we've never
had more data in the history of marketing. We can
almost justify anything with data. The hypothesis we went into
this research study with was because data is so accessible,
(07:03):
we're actually bringing more human bias into marketing as we've
increased the flow of data. And we see that a
lot and the briefs that come across our desks at
iHeart from a lot of the brands out there listening today,
and so we said, let's do some research ourselves and
see if we can't justify our own hypothesis. We did
this study Q four of last year of what we
(07:25):
call new American consumers or real Americans out there living
real lives and real cities and towns around the country. Obviously,
at iHeart we talked to nine out of ten Americans
every day just on broadcast radio, so we know real America.
We have stations in the smallest towns and the biggest cities.
We did the exact same study. So we asked consumers
(07:45):
what they think and feel, what are their values, how
do they spend their time, what do they find cool
and cringey? And we asked marketers the exact same questions.
And that's where it gets really interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
So tell us some of the juicy ones, some of.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
The ones that really get people's attention. Are the fact
that fifty percent half of Americans have never heard of
an appaoll Sprits and only three percent of marketers have
never heard of an appaoll Sprits. I have yet to
meet those three percent.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
So does that mean marketers have a drinking problem or
or just bougie.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
A little bit of both?
Speaker 5 (08:18):
Maybe? I don't know. I don't draw the conclusions. I
just share the data. You're the experts, you take it
from me. There's another one. This was again, this research
was in the field last September October, and at that point,
sixty two percent of Americans had never heard of a
TV show called Succession. When I present that data point
to marketers, their heads explode. They think it was the
(08:41):
biggest show in the history of shows. But Wilmer, how
many more people does NCIS reach on a given week
than Succession?
Speaker 6 (08:50):
Well, on a given week, you can say, with a
stray phase and without any hesitation, that it's between twelve
to thirteen million people watch it a week. And we
can also say with this tre phase that last year alone,
NCIS franchise was watched by three hundred million people around.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
The Wow, that's amazing, right, that's reach that scale, and
as marketers, I think sometimes one of the conversations that's
come out of this that you know, we've been going
around into small conference rooms at AD agencies or client
side and we've been on big stages at Adweek in
Ces and it really blows people's minds when they dig
(09:29):
in on this and they realize, marketers, we live in
a bubble. Some of the stats that aren't even from
the study, they're just statistics and census data. Marketers make
about twice as much on average as the average American
household of about half of marketers live in the Northeast,
whereas thirty eight percent of Americans live in the South.
And I always say to marketers, I'm like, when was
(09:51):
the last time you wrote a brief that said I
want to win in the South because thirty eight percent
of my potential consumers are in the South. And we
just don't think about things that way. We think about
these big markets where we live, and a lot of
these briefs that we're responding to are getting written in
Brooklyn or Santa Monica, which might not be reflective of
(10:11):
the whole nation.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
I mean, Gail, you and I've talked about this the
fact that I now live in the South, which was
unimaginable to me. But it does create a different level
of insight and empathy and understanding when you take yourself
out of the bubble, as you said, or the marketer's bubble.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
It's true.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
But Gail, you know what I love about what you're
saying is it's just so interesting to see the bias
that most marketers have, and it has so many different
ramifications across lots of different dimensions, especially when it's really
who is the consumer? And you know when we're you
and I both know the power of the Latino market.
It's twenty percent of the total US population today, but
(10:49):
it's also thirty percent of gen Z almost fifty percent
of babies being born depending on the state.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
I mean, y'all are in.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Texas right now, it's fifty percent of Texas babies right
So I'm curious what we're some of the things that
surprise you from the research. You're a data guy, you
obviously see cultural bias.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
In so many different ways. But what was interesting for you, Gail.
Speaker 6 (11:08):
And I always are fascinated over the one section of
this study and when we partner to complement these journeys,
this categorical definition, the fact that sometimes they feel like
certain levels of interest among the majority have to be
segregated from one another and that they cannot be united
in one front. For example, how faith safety, military family.
(11:33):
It seemed to be categorized like if you're going to
do something within the military family, it has to be
just for that. You can't talk about safety. There is
a misunderstanding that the majority cannot have all for of
those words in one sentence, because we are so fearful
of telling a story that I alienate that somehow we're
creating too many categorical road maps and how to actually
(11:55):
get to fragmented versions of the conversation. Then, while we
did back, canaday really well with storytelling is that we
would invite people to enjoy a show as opposed to
having the pressure of being so specific. Now, to me,
specifically is the new mainstream because regardless whether you relate
to it or not, story narrative movies, if it's a
(12:17):
great story, you're going to enjoy it, no matter whether
you look like the character or not. Now, there's also
a level of responsibility that we have in telling the
stories and making sure that these characters feel authentic to
the universe that we're creating, and that comes the accurate
representation of cultural orientation.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
Right.
Speaker 6 (12:34):
But the thing that blew my mind is that the
majority of the country lives in the center, and that
we are advertising to the East coast and the West coast,
and there's tons of marketing dollars being spent in billboards
and targeting the New York and the Miami and the
La areas, when really the activation of the community really
(12:56):
needs to start in understanding what ties them together as
a majority and therefore allowing yourself to be specific in that.
The other thing I would say is that people have
this perception about what the middle of the country looks like.
And that's something that's very sobering, right because people think, oh,
middle of America pickup truck, cowboy hats and country music.
When you think about Texas, that's all you think about, right,
(13:19):
I mean, that's what the East Coast and the West
coast thinks about. Well, I will tell you this that
the South Texas and the Midwest, and you know, the
middle of the country is a lot browner than you think.
And when you assume that audience is not there, you're
fragmenting your audience by almost a third, and therefore the
majority of the country is no longer in the conversation
because again you don't know how to get these four
(13:40):
words in the same sentence.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
You know something that as marketers we talk a lot about,
and it shouldn't be conceptual, it actually has to be.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
I love what you said about specificity.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Is if you're going to get into people's hearts and minds,
you have to really understand the nuance there. And Gail,
you had shared with us one of the findings that
I've really thought about. And I don't know their laugh
cry combination or both, but I'll share this one out.
I want to hear what you both have to think
about this, Steve, and you too. So apparently from the research,
a key difference in beliefs that average American consumers are
(14:15):
motivated by family and friends two times as much as
marketers are, and marketers are motivated by fear, fame, and fortune. Yes,
two times as much as average consumers.
Speaker 5 (14:29):
Right, wow, that says a lot. I think about it.
As marketers, we are out there terrifying people all the time.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Right, Oh my god, you're going.
Speaker 5 (14:37):
To get some disease you've never heard of, and you're
going to see a ton of ads for that, and
you know you're not saving for retirement fast enough and
all of this fear based marketing. And it's so fascinating
to see that what motivates real people in their real
lives is the people around them. Those are the best influences.
(14:58):
What do my kids think about these genes I bought?
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Right?
Speaker 5 (15:01):
Did they think Dad's jeens are cool or they're not.
It's your friends and your family. You want to fit
in and belong Stephen, you said community right, And marketers
are creating all of these terrifying messages about you know
you're going to miss out, You've got to do this now,
at now, buy now, and you're creating this idea of
we sort of created Fomo, and we're seeing this whole
(15:21):
trend now on social media about.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Jomo joy of messing out Jomo.
Speaker 5 (15:26):
People are actually like, I want to opt out. I
don't need to be like the newest, the first, the next.
And I think it really speaks to and I say
this as a fully complicit marketer. I love new and next. Right,
That's why you go into marketing. You want to innovate
and break rules and try new things, and there's always
room for innovation. But I think as marketers we're so
(15:47):
over invested in new and next we're missing our consumers.
We're chasing trends so fast. One of the stats from
this study forty percent of consumers have still not heard
of an NFT and we mark went and spent how
much time and money on NFT strategies over the last
eighteen months and still not heard of them.
Speaker 4 (16:07):
But you're hitting on something.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
The famous quote if it bleeds, it leads that was
credited to William Randolph Hurst and that phrase was coined
at the end of the eighteen nineties. Okay, so this
is not new, right. I think there's something that is
really incessant in media and marketing because they need to
create this type of fear anxiety to really drive demand.
(16:34):
And I feel like when you think of where we
are with the creator economy, that's why I love everything
that Wilma's doing, because there is an authenticity, especially for
communities that have traditionally not had representation in media and marketing,
and that's why you see the creator economy booming. That's
why you see folks really looking for this authenticity. I
don't need to have millions of followers. I can actually
(16:55):
just have a few hundred. But that is my audience,
and they are engaged, they are fans, they are loyal,
and they trust me, and so I feel like this
is just the beginning of the creator economy. They're looking
for that authenticity and I just feel I don't know, Wilmer,
I'm curious at your perspective, but there is a real disconnect.
I think marketing is really at this existential crisis right now,
(17:17):
and for all those listening that are trying to figure
out how do I start my career or you know,
a mid level in the career. Again, there's always going
to be the need for marketing, but I just think
the way that it's being executed is going to be
radically different.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Yeah, because of the pressure from business. Right, So go ahead, Wilmer.
Speaker 6 (17:32):
No, No, to complement what you're saying, I think you're
saying something really valid, and I go back to reflecting
into my own perspective. Industry of television and film, You
know when you see that every quarter or every year,
you do the math and you see how much of
the content reflects on these by the way, very profitable
communities not being on screen, you start thinking about like
(17:55):
who's making those decisions? Right, So it's the same conversation
we're having about marketers, like how uncomfortable are you championing
something you don't relate to? And when you are holding
the green and red button, it's very uncomfortable to lose
to something you what's not necessarily in your strength.
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Right.
Speaker 6 (18:14):
So I think that's why creative collaborations is the future
of their new integration of marketing as well as content creation.
You know, in television and film, we've now finally admit
that we don't have all the answers, so we're able
to now create some kind of collaboration. We will say, Okay,
I understand the value of doing an adventure with the
(18:34):
land community as the forefront. How do we make this
while still being entertaining, well, still be in a movie
that invites most and being not only so specific with
the culture that it feels familiar to someone who's never
even met these individuals. So, and I say this for
a very specific reason. You know, when you think about
the crisis we're having on the how much we spend
(18:57):
for the return of investment all across the board and
I'm talking about entertainment and media and podcasting and radio
in general. It goes to tell you so much about
the collaborations that need to be established immediately before we
continue to bleed more marketing dollars into an obyss of
zero engagement. And it's not just as simple as getting
an influencer that and you know, Gail will tell you,
(19:19):
it's not about oh, this influencer has one hundred million
follers on TikTok, let's give them a podcast. I mean,
but if they're doing cookie tutorials, guess what it's not
going to translate? Right, So yeah, I also has to
really start betting on the genres that can cultivate audiences
and actually bring individuals that can really authentically invite and
allow to be discovered.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
You know.
Speaker 6 (19:40):
So going back to that same collaboration that we're talking
about with marketers and storytellers, we got to come together
as marketers and storytellers and understanding what are your needs
and how do we help you convey that information so
we can support each other. So therefore, your participation continues
to fund the amazing content that brings more healing, more
unity among multiple cultures. So without that collaboration. You have
(20:04):
unfortunate executives who are very uncomfortable green lighting something that
they feel might not be authentic coming from them, so
they might as well just not do it. So then
you have marketers saying, well, everybody likes Succession, so why
don't we just do something on succession, you know, or like,
I've never seen NCIS, so I don't know if it's
cool or it's not. You know, the full circle on
the NCIS thing is NCIS has been around for twenty
(20:26):
one years. We're still the number one show on prime
time no matter how you carve it. Succession season finale,
I think it was I don't know, something like six
hundred thousand viewers. We were about seven million live and
by the end with Live three and Live sevenths, by
the end of the week we're looking at thirteen fourteen
million live and then but the second week you're doubling
those numbers, right because people are catching up.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
You are a data guy. You're sharing very powerful stats.
Latinos in Hollywood. Report just came out from a They
had some really interesting data points and you know, as
we mentioned, you know, the Latino population in the US
is about twenty percent but US Latino's account for twenty
four percent of box office ticket sales, almost a quarter,
and about a quarter of all streaming subscribers.
Speaker 6 (21:15):
And steven to add to that, how much of that
is on the first weekend when it's released. That is
almost seventy percent of the box office. Every first weekend
of a movie release is almost two thirds Latino. And
nobody talks about it, but.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
It's actually in the begins of report they share US
Latinos see films three point three times a year per capita,
compared with two point nine for Asian Americans and two
point three for white Americans. And so my point is,
we have all the data in the world, you know,
it's kind of how you started again, Like all these
data points are out there, but still we're not moving
the needle.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
Yeah, why is that?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
That's a little bit of my question, right, because you
still have either gatekeepers, you still have the challenges. Someone
still needs to green lay and they need to be convinced.
But like, why is that? And I feel like you
have this traditional business model that is really a melting
ice cube if we're being honest, because the economics are
not there anymore. And again, I just contrasted with the
(22:10):
creator economy, which has its own challenges, but it is
growing in leaps and bounds. And so I'm just curious, like,
why are we still here? Because we have the data,
but it still doesn't cut through.
Speaker 6 (22:20):
I don't have the answers, but I have a very
inside baseball answer to this because I've experienced it internally.
It's literally a pandemic plus multiple industry strikes equals a
crazy amount of fear in losing more money for any company.
So getting it wrong is the most petrifying thing that
(22:42):
any executive who actually holds the key does. So guess
what you're going to see. Now, you're going to see
the next wave of content. It's going to be more
spin offs, more sequels, And if it's a show that's
mildly performing, how do we do a sequel or a
prequel to that? Because they cannot take new bets. So
we actually, if you really think about it, sadly to say,
we might have taken a couple of steps back because
(23:03):
now as every big studio and every big entertainment and
marketing company, they've now had to downsize to actually stay profitable.
So they've lost a lot of the departments that were
solution making departments. They've lost a lot of the executives
that understood the marketing or at the very least the
storytelling narrative for development on the audiences they need. So
right now, unfortunately, we're acting in a little bit of fear.
(23:25):
There's this little hyphenated word suspended in air a little bit,
and that's my experience, but I love to hear what
Gail thinks in her perspective too.
Speaker 5 (23:32):
Fear is a huge part of it, right, fear of failure.
I also think there's in marketing, at least there's Hollywood
that's lost sight of real Americans. I think Silicon Valley
is a big contributor to losing sight of real Americans.
Then you've got Wall Street, another bubble, another surreal world
where people are based in Manhattan and living in an
(23:54):
elite urban center. And so I think marketers Madison Avenue
have been just as guilty some of its fear of
making a mistake. But yet we're chasing NFTs and the
metaverse and the new and the next. So I think
there's something where we got so comfortable with this idea.
In the digital age of targeting, everything is about data,
(24:16):
and targets. And you see these briefs, Marissa Steven, You've
written them, you've received them. We were talking about when
it's cees. Somebody told me the Blazer bro that's a
target audience, right, and they've got tons of data to
go find the blazer bro and sell them things.
Speaker 4 (24:32):
Right.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
How many blazer bros Are there? And I think what
we've we've gotten so uncomfortable as digital marketers with the
idea of mass reach image just talking to people. Go
out there and tell them I make a cereal, I
make a snack food, I've got a new car, here's
a new cocktail. You might like, you know, we've got
these great boots, whatever it is. It's okay to just
(24:55):
try to tell people about your products and then you
know your point will Mr Stephen, you know you were saying, like,
do it on my terms. Right. If I'm in Miami
and I speak Spanish, maybe you want to have some
people who speak Spanish talking about the cereal or the
boots or the car. Right. Just it's not that hard
to be relevant to different communities. It's actually easier than
(25:16):
a lot of the hoops we go through to micro target.
So it's not that targeting's wrong, but it can't be
the only answer, because if every blazer bro buys your
new phone, you're not going to grow enough as a
big telcote.
Speaker 4 (25:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Yeah, so many things. I'm dying to jump in on it.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
I mean, from like following data off of a cliff
in that regard to Wilmer. Something you said at the
very beginning of the conversation that's just been sitting with me,
which is what I'm realizing is such a connective tissue.
And it goes back to the fear part that you
were saying, is you take the pressure of the economics
and compound that perhaps with fear of offending people or
(25:57):
the sensitivities. And you know, my husband, we're talking about
a show like All in the Family, remember that. I
know there's some listeners who won't even know that show,
But could that ever make it on TV today?
Speaker 2 (26:09):
No way?
Speaker 5 (26:09):
Right?
Speaker 3 (26:10):
And when you think of some of the humor, it's
so interesting, you think we've regrets.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
What about Mary with children? For those who actually would
remember that.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
One, So many of those you never get away with it.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
And I think that's the problem.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
And I hope something we're going to talk a lot
about the season is just the sort of lost art
of creativity, which is tied to taking risks as marketers too.
I mean, we're just I think there is a lot
of fear in being able to tell stories without having
it be so literal in the representation of everyone. And
that's the interesting maybe dichotomy in all this is how
(26:42):
do you get plugged in, how do you connect to
the specificity, like Wilmer said, but how do you also
open up to think what makes us human has a
lot of commonality if we just allow ourselves to go there.
Speaker 6 (26:53):
I mean, I think a lot of the narrative direction.
It's also really interesting. I mean, the racks to riches
is something that just doesn't work. Not everybody in this
country has gone from racks to riches, and not every
Latino has gone from the hardworking jobs in the fields
to being the CEO of something or being you know.
And so that's not the common experience of the majority
(27:13):
of Latino in the United States either. So you are
now expecting and putting the burden of fixing or creating
some kind of reflection through this content for the whole culture,
and the whole culture doesn't relate to that story.
Speaker 5 (27:27):
Well, That's one of the reasons we see in our
heart research all the time, like broadcast radio is still
so relevant and reaches so many people in cities and
towns across America because the people we give the mic
to right now while we're we're recording this podcast, we
have eight hundred and sixty plus broadcast radio stations that
are doing country and pop and hip hop and news
(27:50):
and talk and sports. And the people with the mic
look like the people in the community. They sound like
the people in the community. They've got the right accents,
they're low, they live there, they sat in the same
traffic as you. They're rooting for the same sports team.
Speaker 6 (28:05):
Yeah, they know the local donut spot. Yeah exactly.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (28:08):
Look, you know I'm not just saying this. I'm not
just saying this because it's you.
Speaker 5 (28:13):
Gail, because you're our favorite client.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Well well yes, but certainly I've been a committed client. Yes,
at least the last three major companies, including the one
I'm in now, because of that insight that you get
to really touch people in this one in one way.
So we're not making this a commercial for audio per se.
We're saying it's about real people connections and real voice
(28:36):
connections and sort of plunging into that in ways that
allow you, as we've been saying, to tell a story.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Gail, what was the stat around podcasts your research?
Speaker 5 (28:45):
Oh yeah, this is so interesting because we've been talking
a lot about marketers being too far ahead and innovating
too fast. This was actually the opposite. We asked people
what habits they would least want to give up, and
number one for both marketers and consumers was snacking. So
we do love our snacks. You're not going to pull
those out of our hands. However, we really split when
(29:07):
the average American consumer said they didn't want to give
up podcasting, that was the top five thing they didn't
want to give up, whereas marketers didn't want to give
up online shopping, which may speak to the income disparity
between the average marker and the average consumer. We're trying
to sell to.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
Reason why Wilmer's doing Mikultura, Yeah it is.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
We should talk about Michael Torre. It's a phenomenal example
of when you give the mic to more diverse people
and you let them find their audience, great things happen.
Speaker 6 (29:34):
I've always credited iHeart for being very much aware of
the climate, and most importantly the polls of the country.
It is a fact that I Heart as a company,
as a media company, touches about ninety percent of the
United States. I mean ninety percent of the country. It's
touched one way of another. Probably iHeartMedia. When you have
(29:55):
the ability to communicate, to understand, to see how the
country breathed beneath the land, you kind of know what's next.
You see how the country is growing and where it's
going and where it's heading. And a lot of industries
don't have the access to understanding the way that iHeart
has invested their time into understanding. So it was a
no brainer to Connell who's our CEO, and it was
(30:17):
a no brainer to Will Pearson who's our president. From
gael understanding that there is a fast and growing opportunity
to have a pioneering moment and being the first of
creating the destination that really gets it right. There can
be a chance, there's always been a chance of having
like you know, a lined channel, a lot of this
and all that, but the fact the matter is that
(30:38):
this has to be very thoughtfully crafted in order to
house all these localized experiences as well as mainstream experiences.
I'll talk to you guys a little bit about the
next phase. As Michael Tuda launched, we realized very quickly
that the Latino community was fast but early at adapting podcasting,
(30:59):
and we realize, oh wow, giving them a destination, this
will be a very interesting place because where do they
go for a curation of their voices where they can
see themselves and such and all that. So ultimately, Michael Tuda,
you know, was a great beautiful investment by iHeart, because
I think at this point you realized that there is
a new frontier to cross and there is a new
(31:20):
path to pave. As soon as it started being curated,
we started seeing the results. You know that it's fast
and growing really really quickly. Now, our job in the
next evolution of Mikeeltuda is in creating one strategical partnership
with our marketers and our clients and all our sponsors
and you know, all the companies that they want to
reach that audience. And two, what is the next phase
(31:41):
of Latino Mainstream. How do we continue to create stories
that not only speak to Latinos but speak to everyone.
Because at some point Latino Mainstream would lose the name
Latino and it would actually just be mainstream. It's just
how it's going to be, right. I mean, I think
you look at all the numbers and the predictions the
girl had talked to you about, and you know, and Steven,
(32:01):
you realize very quickly that at some point it has
to not just look like them, but it has to
actually feel like them. And that's very simple to do when,
like Steven and Gail said, you passed the mic to
the individuals that actually can take you there, as opposed
to thinking you have to solve the problem on your own,
which is where the fear thing comes right. You don't
want to let go, So Michael Tuda was a reaction
(32:23):
to that, that fast and growing pioneering moment. Can we
be the first ones to create a destination that gets
it right? And so far it's been a beautiful journey.
I could not be more proud to be a partner
with iHeart. They have been so thoughtful and I'm telling
you I've done this, doing this for thirty years. The
level of empowerment, the level of care, the level of
heart they've been putting into building this audience and giving
(32:45):
them a place where they can see themselves and be
unapologetically latinos is unbelievable, right, Like, we don't have a
place where we can tell our stories on this level.
And now the next phase, I'm bringing a bunch of
my friends and I'm elevating a lot of.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
We can't wait to talk to them too.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
Everything that you said, except you've been doing this for
thirty years, you look like like math like doesn't work,
you know, brown, don't frown so like you know?
Speaker 6 (33:13):
Okay, yeah, I pulled myself out of the game before
I you know, I did damage, you know.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
Okay, guys, we're gonna wrap this part of the conversation
by playing a little.
Speaker 3 (33:23):
Speed round the Gail.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
You inspired and you've been doing so we're going to
now turn the tables on you. And the game is
called cool or Cringe. And since so much of what
we've been talking about is being plugged into culture, but
it is about personal perspective too. Are you ready to
give us your hot takes. We're gonna throw some things
at you and you get to tell us if they're
cool or cringe?
Speaker 3 (33:44):
You ready, Steven.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Cool or cringe? And Gale than than woomer TikTok.
Speaker 5 (33:51):
I think it's pretty cool.
Speaker 6 (33:52):
I think it's cool, but a lot of what's in
it is pretty cringey.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
Media.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
It's got healthy Okay, well let's stay fifty, you know,
let's stay on a media front.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Chat GPT cooler cringe.
Speaker 5 (34:09):
I think it's terrifying and fascinating. I think it's super
cool as a as a user, right, Like, it's amazing
when you ask questions and the range and the quality
of content you can get back. But it's cringey when
you think about our lack of controls and policies and
our ability to use things for good and not evil.
(34:29):
Jury's still out, how about you, Wilmar.
Speaker 6 (34:31):
I could not agree with Gail even more in this one.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
Yeah, for sure, cool or cringe. Fast fashion Gale.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Oh you know, I'm a fan of the classics, the
whole idea of disposable. I've got to have the cool
thing this month, and I think it speaks to all
the problems we're talking about in marketing, which is I
love every once in a while shopping in my closet
and finding something fabulous from like ten years ago and
bringing it back merse.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I think we have to go shopping in Gale's cart them.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Ye, I have to admit I have become a big
secondhand shopper in the past few years, which is I
think is cool.
Speaker 3 (35:06):
I think it's cool.
Speaker 6 (35:08):
Well, I can't do the fast fashion. You are seeing major,
major influences of the past really really integrating themselves with
the fashion right now, and everybody thinks that this is new.
But when they do, like the pelbotomy big pants and
the big shoulder jackets, they think it's like, oh, that's
right now. No, that was about the eighties, okay, or
you know, it was the seventies. So like a lot
(35:29):
of the new fashion right now, they're just borrowing all
the influences that worked in the seventies, the eighties and
the nineties. I mean that's fact. Everybody mom jeans, mom jeans.
Everybody's wearing mom jeans. You can't wear mom jeans started,
I mean literally the eighties. Like it's just so to me.
I feel like everything, even music to me, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Mom jeans may have been my favorite Sarian Live sketch ever,
so good, all right, cooler cringe and this is a
legitimate one.
Speaker 3 (35:58):
Spending seven million on a Super Bowl ad.
Speaker 4 (36:00):
That's hit and where it hurts Marsa.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Yeah, I mean cool when it's done well. But I
dare say the majority of those seven million checks didn't
result in seven hundred million in value, So a lot
of cringey, a lot of cringey ads have been overinvested
in let's just say.
Speaker 6 (36:18):
One million percent. I would say that it depends on
the super Bowl, because not every super Bowl is worth
seven million. And I would also say, like, you have
to spend so much money to be noticed or be
talked about or go viral as a commercial, and most
of that money could be localized for audience detonation. And
(36:40):
actually we wear more long lasting than than actually being
part of a Sunday.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Night Absolutely, that's the thing every marketer's worst nightmare.
Speaker 4 (36:47):
Can you make this go viral? Right? Yes?
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (36:51):
All right, so core cringe the Tesla cybertruck out.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
You know, we did have a stat in the research
that I think it was marketers or five times as
likely to do and EV is the average American consumer.
But the average American consumer is like much more likely
to commute five days a week and probably spend a
lot more time in their car. So I am pro ev.
But it's another example of a big divide.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
About that cyber truck.
Speaker 5 (37:16):
Yeah, the cyber truck. I don't know if that's my stuff.
Speaker 6 (37:21):
So I thought it was a good idea. And then
I started seeing all the pictures and all the test
videos and all the stuff, and I was like, that
truck looks kind of weird. Video looks like, I don't know,
it doesn't look like a car. And I started having
this opinion. And then I stood in front of it
and I was like, whoa, that's like if Gi Joe
came to life. It's like a really impressive truck when
(37:41):
you're in front of it. But then this morning I
was at Joe's coffee just this morning with my friend
Freddie Rodriguez. We're building a podcast we're going to together.
But my point is we basically are standing for the
Joe's have another company, and cyber truck pulls up to
pick up their coffee, and there's now one person in
line that didn't say.
Speaker 4 (38:00):
Why, yeah, it is ugly.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Well, how about we say a big thank you to
our friends Gail and Wilmer. Couldn't ask for better guests
to get us going on season two. This is a
conversation that obviously will continue as we think about being
plugged in in realistic ways and thinking about fear, and
thinking about storytelling and taking risks. So we covered a
lot of ground. Thank you so much for joining us
(38:29):
on episode one. We really appreciate it, and we'll be
right back to talk about what's on your minds.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
We're back and now it's time for what's on your mind.
We want to hear from you, so please let us
know what you're wondering about. The questions you want us
to answer, please email us at ideas at brandashnew dot com.
And we're excited to have our first listener question from
Eli to kick off season two Marissa, and it's I
think a timely question. How can global brands stay authentic
(39:06):
in a world where everything is hyper sensitive, where sentiments
are really thickle.
Speaker 4 (39:13):
Mmm. Seems very timely, Merissa.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Timely and quite related to the conversation we wound up
having with Wilmer just now and Gale and talking about
how we can entertain and tell stories without fear of
completely offending people. At the same time, of course, it's
a good thing that our sensitivities are heightened, it's just
(39:36):
when they go to an extreme. So this is where
I always liken our work as brand leaders to our
work as humans and brands as personifications is when you
are when you are working on yourself to be your
best authentic self, you become stronger, You become more resilient
(40:00):
and even slightly more impervious to the criticisms or the
influence of others because you know who you are. And
of course not everyone gets to that state, but it's
a goal, it's a lifelong pursuit, I think, and as marketers,
I think that's actually our greatest goal in shaping and
nurturing brands is to make sure that we're thinking about
(40:24):
what their most authentic versions of themselves are. And when
you know that and you instinctively understand it. And this is,
by the way, where data only takes you so far.
I don't think this is a data thing, Steven. I
think this is about actually having the sharpness of instinct
and intuition, which is what we get paid for. And
it's not going to come off of chat GBT. It's
(40:46):
because you just genuinely understand how to keep a brand
on course that you then make good decisions about how
to navigate that so that you are making choices that
are appropriate. And if you have a brand that's really political,
then you can play there, and if you have a
brand that isn't political, you probably shouldn't. That is I
(41:07):
think more than ever, and to your point earlier, it's
getting harder out there. This is what I hope boards
and CEOs recognized. One of the greatest gifts of great
marketers is to understand how to keep a brand on
the right course of authenticity.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
It's bigger than a brand, right, It really is about leadership. Yes,
I feel that there are of course dangers right for
any brand, for any leader, for any individual when they
want to be authentic. It's really about having the judgment
as to when to be that authentic and do you
have the permission to be that authentic. The classic example
(41:44):
of feel what Nike did with Colin Kaepernick. It was
super controversial and maybe they lost some fans. You know,
people were burning their sneakers, but that was authentic to
their brand. That's right, and they should have stood up.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
And that was certainly incredibly controversial or dangerous. And I
think it's very easy to conflate something that is going
to be viewed as a gimmick, you know, something where
someone wants to participate because it's cool. It's in the now,
but you don't have to comment on everything. Sometimes you
just have to shut up. Sometimes you just need to listen.
(42:15):
And it really goes back to how are you going
to be a leader? You know, there's certain things that
you need to stand up for, and when you see
injustice or you see something that is just wrong, you.
Speaker 4 (42:25):
Do need to speak out.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
But at the same time, there are different ways to
speak out. It doesn't necessarily have to be if your brand,
and I have to believe in this day and age,
every single company has an employee base that is actually active,
that will go on social that will call out their leaders.
And so it's really understanding what type of leadership role
are you taking as an individual. If you are in
(42:48):
a marketing role, you could be you know, at the
beginning of your marketing journey, or you could be you know,
in the CMO suite. But I just feel like it
comes down to leadership and understanding, using good judgment when
to be authentic and when not to.
Speaker 3 (43:00):
I just couldn't agree more. Have lived these hard choices.
Speaker 1 (43:05):
And your Nike example, although not the most recent one,
stands out because who thought fear was going to be
a big topic of our episode today, and I am realizing
that just feels like a moment right now. That's a
long moment of talking about making choices as leaders that
are the right choices because they're the authentic choices, even
(43:27):
if there's some risk involved.
Speaker 2 (43:29):
But fear is going to be a theme this whole year, right,
I mean we're an election year, right, so there's going
to be fear around that. I think there's just this
constant fear of failure. And again, as a father to
two young kids, you know, my daughter just turned six
earlier this year, and you know my son is going
to be nine, you know, in July, which you know
is crazy, he's almost ten.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
I want them.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
To not be fearful. I'm trying to role model that.
I'm trying to figure out how do I show the
ability to take risk, calculated risk, and all of that
is overcoming fear. Like I don't have any fear of failing,
you know, I always joke that, you know, I'll take
any type of It's more about like what am I
(44:09):
learning from it? And this why idea of fear, I
feel like it's a red herring, right, So I would
love for folks to really be more bold more brave
and not let fear kind of take over. And if
you are afraid of something, you know, take it for
five seconds.
Speaker 4 (44:23):
Just breathe.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
But you got to move forward, always forward.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Bravery and fear maybe shouldn't have to go hand in hand,
but that might be something we have to pick apart
even further because more and more in business and brands
we talked about in entertainment marketing, and in this definitely
sensitive year and a year that does have fear, it's
going to be very very interesting and it's going to
be a more pressure environment for good leaders. As you said,
(44:49):
to stay on course. So on that note, and it's
a big note, that's it for episode one of season two.
We hope you enjoyed it. We're glad you're here. We're
glad you're and we hope you'll follow us at the
Brand New Podcast wherever you listen to your podcast so
you never miss an episode. Please connect with us as
well on social media. You can follow us all over
(45:11):
the place Instagram, x, Facebook, Friends and definitely LinkedIn as well.
Speaker 3 (45:16):
Steven, join us
Speaker 4 (45:17):
Next time for What's brand New
Hi, and welcome or welcome back to brand new season
two from the iHeart Podcast Network and Brand New Labs.
I'm Marisa Thalberg and I'm Stephen Wolfe. Well, it's good
to be back, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Stephen, It's awesome to be back, and it's so great
fresh start with all these incredible learnings and insights from
season one. I mean, what was your favorite part of
season one?
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Well, obviously doing it with you.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Come on.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
That flattery will get me everywhere, that's the fun part. Yes,
I think we got.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
More confident in our ability to I mean, you and
I have never been shy or reticent about our perspectives,
and we did this to be real about what's happening
in our industry. But I think when we really took
on things from a place of both insight and heart
and we're a bit fearless about tackling some subjects and
(00:57):
seeing how much are liststeners resonated to that, I think
it's very inspiring in terms of how we want to
take this next season forward.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
How about you?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
It was just so almost therapeutic being able to talk,
you know, on a regular basis with you, talk with
our guests. But what I found so fascinating was just
the response from the audience, and we had so many
folks reach out share, you know, kind of their questions,
their insights, and I think we're really hitting a chord
(01:25):
with folks that really are brand new in the industry
or brand new in a new position. I feel like
there's a real responsibility for us to continue this real
talk so that folks can continue to learn that we
can actually speak truth to power, that we could actually
have folks to be guests on this pod, so we
could really expose and shine a light to these different perspectives.
(01:47):
And I'm just really excited to do more of that.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
I couldn't agree more. And I think that was one
of the most thrilling findings for us. Gratifying findings is
that we're not just talking to people who are in
our particular stage of life, stage of career, but to
know that we're getting those rising executives or who knows,
maybe people who are just interested in media and marketing
(02:11):
as well. That is I think something that is such
a shared value between you and I is wanting to teach.
And we talked about this so much for a couple
of episodes. We talked about being a continuous learner, didn't
we slow We can teach lifelong learners. So to see
that playing out in the audience that was attracted to
Brand New, I think gives us new found sense of
(02:32):
purpose of making sure we carry that idea forward into
season two.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
And I just feel that there's this sense of urgency, right.
I mean, it is getting so difficult, the stakes are higher.
You know, it's an election year. There's still all this
angst in the economy, continued contraction in industries. Obviously, you
see big tech continue to just march forward, and you know,
software specifically AI continues to eat the world. I just
(03:00):
feel like we're at this really interesting inflection point with careers,
with jobs, with where we are in society. I want
us to really have this spirit of instead of folks
that are just know it all is, I want us
to learn it all and I want to really learn
from listeners, from new speakers, guests that we have here.
I'm very excited about some of the folks that we
have coming on the season.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Mers me too.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
And you know what people probably don't know when you
and I were first conceiving this and kicking this idea around,
one of the reasons why we felt compelled to do
it is not like there's never been a podcast or
programming talking about these industries in which we work, but
we felt like it's very easy for people to be
armchair critics.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
It's very rare for the people that are.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
True practitioners to come at it from a place of
genuine love and appreciation for what we do and the
people we do it with, and wanting to come at
it from that place of loving and protecting what we do,
but also being able to recognize where the issues are
and talk truth fully about them. And I think we're
poised to do that today in our first episode, because
(04:06):
we're starting the season talking about nothing less than the
American people and frankly how well we as marketers do
or don't get them. We thought that season two deserve
to be kicked off with two guests instead of one,
and we actually have two amazing ones.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
It's a true pleasure to have a dear friend, mister
Wilmer Valderrama, who is this incredible actor and producer and
activists and folks may know him from his big roles
on shows like That seventies Show to his continuing starring
role in ncis one of the biggest shows in the world.
You may also recognize his voice from the Disney film Encanto.
(04:49):
And he's also doing incredible work not just in front
of the camera, but more importantly behind the camera, and
it's some of them very proud of. He is doing
incredible work to really represent new and exhibit thing like
youmal voices across all types of media. And he also
has partnered with our friends at iHeartMedia to launch his
new podcast network called and.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
So I get to introduce our really good friend Gail Troberman,
who happens to be the president and Chief Marketing Officer
fellow COMO at iHeartMedia. So her job is to connect
all of Iheart's brands, products and platforms with consumers. And
of course we feel a special connection to iHeart as
long standing friends, partners and now of course partners in
(05:31):
brand new But you should know that Gail has been
such a player in this industry for so long. She
spent many years at Microsoft as chief CRADO Officer. She's
an early Internet innovator at MSN and Gail, you pioneered
some research that we're going to spend the majority of
our time talking about today and Steve and I have
had a chance to kick this around with you before.
(05:53):
Now we get to kick it around with you and Wilmer,
So it's going to be a lot of fun. This study,
I think is pretty juicy because what you had the
cleverness to realize is as much as we marketers, our
jobs are to get it get how people think. And
we're going to focus on America today, so we're talking
about the American consumer. But what you on earth is
(06:13):
that there are some cases where there's a pretty interesting
divide which we may not realize between what let's call
them like the middle of the country or across the country,
American consumers think and how marketers think. So to get
us started, Gail, give us a few of your favorite
findings from this research and some of the differences that
(06:34):
actually came up between how marketers think and how average
Americans actually think.
Speaker 5 (06:39):
Awesome, Thanks Marissa. We had this hypothesis. We were talking
to some of our partners and podcasting like Wilmer and
Malcolm Gladwell at Pushkin, and we had this hypothesis that
now that we have so much data, right, we've never
had more data in the history of marketing. We can
almost justify anything with data. The hypothesis we went into
this research study with was because data is so accessible,
(07:03):
we're actually bringing more human bias into marketing as we've
increased the flow of data. And we see that a
lot and the briefs that come across our desks at
iHeart from a lot of the brands out there listening today,
and so we said, let's do some research ourselves and
see if we can't justify our own hypothesis. We did
this study Q four of last year of what we
(07:25):
call new American consumers or real Americans out there living
real lives and real cities and towns around the country. Obviously,
at iHeart we talked to nine out of ten Americans
every day just on broadcast radio, so we know real America.
We have stations in the smallest towns and the biggest cities.
We did the exact same study. So we asked consumers
(07:45):
what they think and feel, what are their values, how
do they spend their time, what do they find cool
and cringey? And we asked marketers the exact same questions.
And that's where it gets really interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
So tell us some of the juicy ones, some of.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
The ones that really get people's attention. Are the fact
that fifty percent half of Americans have never heard of
an appaoll Sprits and only three percent of marketers have
never heard of an appaoll Sprits. I have yet to
meet those three percent.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
So does that mean marketers have a drinking problem or
or just bougie.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
A little bit of both?
Speaker 5 (08:18):
Maybe? I don't know. I don't draw the conclusions. I
just share the data. You're the experts, you take it
from me. There's another one. This was again, this research
was in the field last September October, and at that point,
sixty two percent of Americans had never heard of a
TV show called Succession. When I present that data point
to marketers, their heads explode. They think it was the
(08:41):
biggest show in the history of shows. But Wilmer, how
many more people does NCIS reach on a given week
than Succession?
Speaker 6 (08:50):
Well, on a given week, you can say, with a
stray phase and without any hesitation, that it's between twelve
to thirteen million people watch it a week. And we
can also say with this tre phase that last year alone,
NCIS franchise was watched by three hundred million people around.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
The Wow, that's amazing, right, that's reach that scale, and
as marketers, I think sometimes one of the conversations that's
come out of this that you know, we've been going
around into small conference rooms at AD agencies or client
side and we've been on big stages at Adweek in
Ces and it really blows people's minds when they dig
(09:29):
in on this and they realize, marketers, we live in
a bubble. Some of the stats that aren't even from
the study, they're just statistics and census data. Marketers make
about twice as much on average as the average American
household of about half of marketers live in the Northeast,
whereas thirty eight percent of Americans live in the South.
And I always say to marketers, I'm like, when was
(09:51):
the last time you wrote a brief that said I
want to win in the South because thirty eight percent
of my potential consumers are in the South. And we
just don't think about things that way. We think about
these big markets where we live, and a lot of
these briefs that we're responding to are getting written in
Brooklyn or Santa Monica, which might not be reflective of
(10:11):
the whole nation.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
I mean, Gail, you and I've talked about this the
fact that I now live in the South, which was
unimaginable to me. But it does create a different level
of insight and empathy and understanding when you take yourself
out of the bubble, as you said, or the marketer's bubble.
Speaker 5 (10:27):
It's true.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
But Gail, you know what I love about what you're
saying is it's just so interesting to see the bias
that most marketers have, and it has so many different
ramifications across lots of different dimensions, especially when it's really
who is the consumer? And you know when we're you
and I both know the power of the Latino market.
It's twenty percent of the total US population today, but
(10:49):
it's also thirty percent of gen Z almost fifty percent
of babies being born depending on the state.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
I mean, y'all are in.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Texas right now, it's fifty percent of Texas babies right
So I'm curious what we're some of the things that
surprise you from the research. You're a data guy, you
obviously see cultural bias.
Speaker 4 (11:05):
In so many different ways. But what was interesting for you, Gail.
Speaker 6 (11:08):
And I always are fascinated over the one section of
this study and when we partner to complement these journeys,
this categorical definition, the fact that sometimes they feel like
certain levels of interest among the majority have to be
segregated from one another and that they cannot be united
in one front. For example, how faith safety, military family.
(11:33):
It seemed to be categorized like if you're going to
do something within the military family, it has to be
just for that. You can't talk about safety. There is
a misunderstanding that the majority cannot have all for of
those words in one sentence, because we are so fearful
of telling a story that I alienate that somehow we're
creating too many categorical road maps and how to actually
(11:55):
get to fragmented versions of the conversation. Then, while we
did back, canaday really well with storytelling is that we
would invite people to enjoy a show as opposed to
having the pressure of being so specific. Now, to me,
specifically is the new mainstream because regardless whether you relate
to it or not, story narrative movies, if it's a
(12:17):
great story, you're going to enjoy it, no matter whether
you look like the character or not. Now, there's also
a level of responsibility that we have in telling the
stories and making sure that these characters feel authentic to
the universe that we're creating, and that comes the accurate
representation of cultural orientation.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
Right.
Speaker 6 (12:34):
But the thing that blew my mind is that the
majority of the country lives in the center, and that
we are advertising to the East coast and the West coast,
and there's tons of marketing dollars being spent in billboards
and targeting the New York and the Miami and the
La areas, when really the activation of the community really
(12:56):
needs to start in understanding what ties them together as
a majority and therefore allowing yourself to be specific in that.
The other thing I would say is that people have
this perception about what the middle of the country looks like.
And that's something that's very sobering, right because people think, oh,
middle of America pickup truck, cowboy hats and country music.
When you think about Texas, that's all you think about, right,
(13:19):
I mean, that's what the East Coast and the West
coast thinks about. Well, I will tell you this that
the South Texas and the Midwest, and you know, the
middle of the country is a lot browner than you think.
And when you assume that audience is not there, you're
fragmenting your audience by almost a third, and therefore the
majority of the country is no longer in the conversation
because again you don't know how to get these four
(13:40):
words in the same sentence.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
You know something that as marketers we talk a lot about,
and it shouldn't be conceptual, it actually has to be.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
I love what you said about specificity.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
Is if you're going to get into people's hearts and minds,
you have to really understand the nuance there. And Gail,
you had shared with us one of the findings that
I've really thought about. And I don't know their laugh
cry combination or both, but I'll share this one out.
I want to hear what you both have to think
about this, Steve, and you too. So apparently from the research,
a key difference in beliefs that average American consumers are
(14:15):
motivated by family and friends two times as much as
marketers are, and marketers are motivated by fear, fame, and fortune. Yes,
two times as much as average consumers.
Speaker 5 (14:29):
Right, wow, that says a lot. I think about it.
As marketers, we are out there terrifying people all the time.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Right, Oh my god, you're going.
Speaker 5 (14:37):
To get some disease you've never heard of, and you're
going to see a ton of ads for that, and
you know you're not saving for retirement fast enough and
all of this fear based marketing. And it's so fascinating
to see that what motivates real people in their real
lives is the people around them. Those are the best influences.
(14:58):
What do my kids think about these genes I bought?
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Right?
Speaker 5 (15:01):
Did they think Dad's jeens are cool or they're not.
It's your friends and your family. You want to fit
in and belong Stephen, you said community right, And marketers
are creating all of these terrifying messages about you know
you're going to miss out, You've got to do this now,
at now, buy now, and you're creating this idea of
we sort of created Fomo, and we're seeing this whole
(15:21):
trend now on social media about.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Jomo joy of messing out Jomo.
Speaker 5 (15:26):
People are actually like, I want to opt out. I
don't need to be like the newest, the first, the next.
And I think it really speaks to and I say
this as a fully complicit marketer. I love new and next. Right,
That's why you go into marketing. You want to innovate
and break rules and try new things, and there's always
room for innovation. But I think as marketers we're so
(15:47):
over invested in new and next we're missing our consumers.
We're chasing trends so fast. One of the stats from
this study forty percent of consumers have still not heard
of an NFT and we mark went and spent how
much time and money on NFT strategies over the last
eighteen months and still not heard of them.
Speaker 4 (16:07):
But you're hitting on something.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
The famous quote if it bleeds, it leads that was
credited to William Randolph Hurst and that phrase was coined
at the end of the eighteen nineties. Okay, so this
is not new, right. I think there's something that is
really incessant in media and marketing because they need to
create this type of fear anxiety to really drive demand.
(16:34):
And I feel like when you think of where we
are with the creator economy, that's why I love everything
that Wilma's doing, because there is an authenticity, especially for
communities that have traditionally not had representation in media and marketing,
and that's why you see the creator economy booming. That's
why you see folks really looking for this authenticity. I
don't need to have millions of followers. I can actually
(16:55):
just have a few hundred. But that is my audience,
and they are engaged, they are fans, they are loyal,
and they trust me, and so I feel like this
is just the beginning of the creator economy. They're looking
for that authenticity and I just feel I don't know, Wilmer,
I'm curious at your perspective, but there is a real disconnect.
I think marketing is really at this existential crisis right now,
(17:17):
and for all those listening that are trying to figure
out how do I start my career or you know,
a mid level in the career. Again, there's always going
to be the need for marketing, but I just think
the way that it's being executed is going to be
radically different.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Yeah, because of the pressure from business. Right, So go ahead, Wilmer.
Speaker 6 (17:32):
No, No, to complement what you're saying, I think you're
saying something really valid, and I go back to reflecting
into my own perspective. Industry of television and film, You
know when you see that every quarter or every year,
you do the math and you see how much of
the content reflects on these by the way, very profitable
communities not being on screen, you start thinking about like
(17:55):
who's making those decisions? Right, So it's the same conversation
we're having about marketers, like how uncomfortable are you championing
something you don't relate to? And when you are holding
the green and red button, it's very uncomfortable to lose
to something you what's not necessarily in your strength.
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Right.
Speaker 6 (18:14):
So I think that's why creative collaborations is the future
of their new integration of marketing as well as content creation.
You know, in television and film, we've now finally admit
that we don't have all the answers, so we're able
to now create some kind of collaboration. We will say, Okay,
I understand the value of doing an adventure with the
(18:34):
land community as the forefront. How do we make this
while still being entertaining, well, still be in a movie
that invites most and being not only so specific with
the culture that it feels familiar to someone who's never
even met these individuals. So, and I say this for
a very specific reason. You know, when you think about
the crisis we're having on the how much we spend
(18:57):
for the return of investment all across the board and
I'm talking about entertainment and media and podcasting and radio
in general. It goes to tell you so much about
the collaborations that need to be established immediately before we
continue to bleed more marketing dollars into an obyss of
zero engagement. And it's not just as simple as getting
an influencer that and you know, Gail will tell you,
(19:19):
it's not about oh, this influencer has one hundred million
follers on TikTok, let's give them a podcast. I mean,
but if they're doing cookie tutorials, guess what it's not
going to translate? Right, So yeah, I also has to
really start betting on the genres that can cultivate audiences
and actually bring individuals that can really authentically invite and
allow to be discovered.
Speaker 4 (19:40):
You know.
Speaker 6 (19:40):
So going back to that same collaboration that we're talking
about with marketers and storytellers, we got to come together
as marketers and storytellers and understanding what are your needs
and how do we help you convey that information so
we can support each other. So therefore, your participation continues
to fund the amazing content that brings more healing, more
unity among multiple cultures. So without that collaboration. You have
(20:04):
unfortunate executives who are very uncomfortable green lighting something that
they feel might not be authentic coming from them, so
they might as well just not do it. So then
you have marketers saying, well, everybody likes Succession, so why
don't we just do something on succession, you know, or like,
I've never seen NCIS, so I don't know if it's
cool or it's not. You know, the full circle on
the NCIS thing is NCIS has been around for twenty
(20:26):
one years. We're still the number one show on prime
time no matter how you carve it. Succession season finale,
I think it was I don't know, something like six
hundred thousand viewers. We were about seven million live and
by the end with Live three and Live sevenths, by
the end of the week we're looking at thirteen fourteen
million live and then but the second week you're doubling
those numbers, right because people are catching up.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
You are a data guy. You're sharing very powerful stats.
Latinos in Hollywood. Report just came out from a They
had some really interesting data points and you know, as
we mentioned, you know, the Latino population in the US
is about twenty percent but US Latino's account for twenty
four percent of box office ticket sales, almost a quarter,
and about a quarter of all streaming subscribers.
Speaker 6 (21:15):
And steven to add to that, how much of that
is on the first weekend when it's released. That is
almost seventy percent of the box office. Every first weekend
of a movie release is almost two thirds Latino. And
nobody talks about it, but.
Speaker 2 (21:29):
It's actually in the begins of report they share US
Latinos see films three point three times a year per capita,
compared with two point nine for Asian Americans and two
point three for white Americans. And so my point is,
we have all the data in the world, you know,
it's kind of how you started again, Like all these
data points are out there, but still we're not moving
the needle.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
Yeah, why is that?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
That's a little bit of my question, right, because you
still have either gatekeepers, you still have the challenges. Someone
still needs to green lay and they need to be convinced.
But like, why is that? And I feel like you
have this traditional business model that is really a melting
ice cube if we're being honest, because the economics are
not there anymore. And again, I just contrasted with the
(22:10):
creator economy, which has its own challenges, but it is
growing in leaps and bounds. And so I'm just curious, like,
why are we still here? Because we have the data,
but it still doesn't cut through.
Speaker 6 (22:20):
I don't have the answers, but I have a very
inside baseball answer to this because I've experienced it internally.
It's literally a pandemic plus multiple industry strikes equals a
crazy amount of fear in losing more money for any company.
So getting it wrong is the most petrifying thing that
(22:42):
any executive who actually holds the key does. So guess
what you're going to see. Now, you're going to see
the next wave of content. It's going to be more
spin offs, more sequels, And if it's a show that's
mildly performing, how do we do a sequel or a
prequel to that? Because they cannot take new bets. So
we actually, if you really think about it, sadly to say,
we might have taken a couple of steps back because
(23:03):
now as every big studio and every big entertainment and
marketing company, they've now had to downsize to actually stay profitable.
So they've lost a lot of the departments that were
solution making departments. They've lost a lot of the executives
that understood the marketing or at the very least the
storytelling narrative for development on the audiences they need. So
right now, unfortunately, we're acting in a little bit of fear.
(23:25):
There's this little hyphenated word suspended in air a little bit,
and that's my experience, but I love to hear what
Gail thinks in her perspective too.
Speaker 5 (23:32):
Fear is a huge part of it, right, fear of failure.
I also think there's in marketing, at least there's Hollywood
that's lost sight of real Americans. I think Silicon Valley
is a big contributor to losing sight of real Americans.
Then you've got Wall Street, another bubble, another surreal world
where people are based in Manhattan and living in an
(23:54):
elite urban center. And so I think marketers Madison Avenue
have been just as guilty some of its fear of
making a mistake. But yet we're chasing NFTs and the
metaverse and the new and the next. So I think
there's something where we got so comfortable with this idea.
In the digital age of targeting, everything is about data,
(24:16):
and targets. And you see these briefs, Marissa Steven, You've
written them, you've received them. We were talking about when
it's cees. Somebody told me the Blazer bro that's a
target audience, right, and they've got tons of data to
go find the blazer bro and sell them things.
Speaker 4 (24:32):
Right.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
How many blazer bros Are there? And I think what
we've we've gotten so uncomfortable as digital marketers with the
idea of mass reach image just talking to people. Go
out there and tell them I make a cereal, I
make a snack food, I've got a new car, here's
a new cocktail. You might like, you know, we've got
these great boots, whatever it is. It's okay to just
(24:55):
try to tell people about your products and then you
know your point will Mr Stephen, you know you were saying, like,
do it on my terms. Right. If I'm in Miami
and I speak Spanish, maybe you want to have some
people who speak Spanish talking about the cereal or the
boots or the car. Right. Just it's not that hard
to be relevant to different communities. It's actually easier than
(25:16):
a lot of the hoops we go through to micro target.
So it's not that targeting's wrong, but it can't be
the only answer, because if every blazer bro buys your
new phone, you're not going to grow enough as a
big telcote.
Speaker 4 (25:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
Yeah, so many things. I'm dying to jump in on it.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
I mean, from like following data off of a cliff
in that regard to Wilmer. Something you said at the
very beginning of the conversation that's just been sitting with me,
which is what I'm realizing is such a connective tissue.
And it goes back to the fear part that you
were saying, is you take the pressure of the economics
and compound that perhaps with fear of offending people or
(25:57):
the sensitivities. And you know, my husband, we're talking about
a show like All in the Family, remember that. I
know there's some listeners who won't even know that show,
But could that ever make it on TV today?
Speaker 2 (26:09):
No way?
Speaker 5 (26:09):
Right?
Speaker 3 (26:10):
And when you think of some of the humor, it's
so interesting, you think we've regrets.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
What about Mary with children? For those who actually would
remember that.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
One, So many of those you never get away with it.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
And I think that's the problem.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
And I hope something we're going to talk a lot
about the season is just the sort of lost art
of creativity, which is tied to taking risks as marketers too.
I mean, we're just I think there is a lot
of fear in being able to tell stories without having
it be so literal in the representation of everyone. And
that's the interesting maybe dichotomy in all this is how
(26:42):
do you get plugged in, how do you connect to
the specificity, like Wilmer said, but how do you also
open up to think what makes us human has a
lot of commonality if we just allow ourselves to go there.
Speaker 6 (26:53):
I mean, I think a lot of the narrative direction.
It's also really interesting. I mean, the racks to riches
is something that just doesn't work. Not everybody in this
country has gone from racks to riches, and not every
Latino has gone from the hardworking jobs in the fields
to being the CEO of something or being you know.
And so that's not the common experience of the majority
(27:13):
of Latino in the United States either. So you are
now expecting and putting the burden of fixing or creating
some kind of reflection through this content for the whole culture,
and the whole culture doesn't relate to that story.
Speaker 5 (27:27):
Well, That's one of the reasons we see in our
heart research all the time, like broadcast radio is still
so relevant and reaches so many people in cities and
towns across America because the people we give the mic
to right now while we're we're recording this podcast, we
have eight hundred and sixty plus broadcast radio stations that
are doing country and pop and hip hop and news
(27:50):
and talk and sports. And the people with the mic
look like the people in the community. They sound like
the people in the community. They've got the right accents,
they're low, they live there, they sat in the same
traffic as you. They're rooting for the same sports team.
Speaker 6 (28:05):
Yeah, they know the local donut spot. Yeah exactly.
Speaker 4 (28:08):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (28:08):
Look, you know I'm not just saying this. I'm not
just saying this because it's you.
Speaker 5 (28:13):
Gail, because you're our favorite client.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Well well yes, but certainly I've been a committed client. Yes,
at least the last three major companies, including the one
I'm in now, because of that insight that you get
to really touch people in this one in one way.
So we're not making this a commercial for audio per se.
We're saying it's about real people connections and real voice
(28:36):
connections and sort of plunging into that in ways that
allow you, as we've been saying, to tell a story.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Gail, what was the stat around podcasts your research?
Speaker 5 (28:45):
Oh yeah, this is so interesting because we've been talking
a lot about marketers being too far ahead and innovating
too fast. This was actually the opposite. We asked people
what habits they would least want to give up, and
number one for both marketers and consumers was snacking. So
we do love our snacks. You're not going to pull
those out of our hands. However, we really split when
(29:07):
the average American consumer said they didn't want to give
up podcasting, that was the top five thing they didn't
want to give up, whereas marketers didn't want to give
up online shopping, which may speak to the income disparity
between the average marker and the average consumer. We're trying
to sell to.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
Reason why Wilmer's doing Mikultura, Yeah it is.
Speaker 5 (29:24):
We should talk about Michael Torre. It's a phenomenal example
of when you give the mic to more diverse people
and you let them find their audience, great things happen.
Speaker 6 (29:34):
I've always credited iHeart for being very much aware of
the climate, and most importantly the polls of the country.
It is a fact that I Heart as a company,
as a media company, touches about ninety percent of the
United States. I mean ninety percent of the country. It's
touched one way of another. Probably iHeartMedia. When you have
(29:55):
the ability to communicate, to understand, to see how the
country breathed beneath the land, you kind of know what's next.
You see how the country is growing and where it's
going and where it's heading. And a lot of industries
don't have the access to understanding the way that iHeart
has invested their time into understanding. So it was a
no brainer to Connell who's our CEO, and it was
(30:17):
a no brainer to Will Pearson who's our president. From
gael understanding that there is a fast and growing opportunity
to have a pioneering moment and being the first of
creating the destination that really gets it right. There can
be a chance, there's always been a chance of having
like you know, a lined channel, a lot of this
and all that, but the fact the matter is that
(30:38):
this has to be very thoughtfully crafted in order to
house all these localized experiences as well as mainstream experiences.
I'll talk to you guys a little bit about the
next phase. As Michael Tuda launched, we realized very quickly
that the Latino community was fast but early at adapting podcasting,
(30:59):
and we realize, oh wow, giving them a destination, this
will be a very interesting place because where do they
go for a curation of their voices where they can
see themselves and such and all that. So ultimately, Michael Tuda,
you know, was a great beautiful investment by iHeart, because
I think at this point you realized that there is
a new frontier to cross and there is a new
(31:20):
path to pave. As soon as it started being curated,
we started seeing the results. You know that it's fast
and growing really really quickly. Now, our job in the
next evolution of Mikeeltuda is in creating one strategical partnership
with our marketers and our clients and all our sponsors
and you know, all the companies that they want to
reach that audience. And two, what is the next phase
(31:41):
of Latino Mainstream. How do we continue to create stories
that not only speak to Latinos but speak to everyone.
Because at some point Latino Mainstream would lose the name
Latino and it would actually just be mainstream. It's just
how it's going to be, right. I mean, I think
you look at all the numbers and the predictions the
girl had talked to you about, and you know, and Steven,
(32:01):
you realize very quickly that at some point it has
to not just look like them, but it has to
actually feel like them. And that's very simple to do when,
like Steven and Gail said, you passed the mic to
the individuals that actually can take you there, as opposed
to thinking you have to solve the problem on your own,
which is where the fear thing comes right. You don't
want to let go, So Michael Tuda was a reaction
(32:23):
to that, that fast and growing pioneering moment. Can we
be the first ones to create a destination that gets
it right? And so far it's been a beautiful journey.
I could not be more proud to be a partner
with iHeart. They have been so thoughtful and I'm telling
you I've done this, doing this for thirty years. The
level of empowerment, the level of care, the level of
heart they've been putting into building this audience and giving
(32:45):
them a place where they can see themselves and be
unapologetically latinos is unbelievable, right, Like, we don't have a
place where we can tell our stories on this level.
And now the next phase, I'm bringing a bunch of
my friends and I'm elevating a lot of.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
We can't wait to talk to them too.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
Everything that you said, except you've been doing this for
thirty years, you look like like math like doesn't work,
you know, brown, don't frown so like you know?
Speaker 6 (33:13):
Okay, yeah, I pulled myself out of the game before
I you know, I did damage, you know.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
Okay, guys, we're gonna wrap this part of the conversation
by playing a little.
Speaker 3 (33:23):
Speed round the Gail.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
You inspired and you've been doing so we're going to
now turn the tables on you. And the game is
called cool or Cringe. And since so much of what
we've been talking about is being plugged into culture, but
it is about personal perspective too. Are you ready to
give us your hot takes. We're gonna throw some things
at you and you get to tell us if they're
cool or cringe?
Speaker 3 (33:44):
You ready, Steven.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Cool or cringe? And Gale than than woomer TikTok.
Speaker 5 (33:51):
I think it's pretty cool.
Speaker 6 (33:52):
I think it's cool, but a lot of what's in
it is pretty cringey.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
Media.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
It's got healthy Okay, well let's stay fifty, you know,
let's stay on a media front.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Chat GPT cooler cringe.
Speaker 5 (34:09):
I think it's terrifying and fascinating. I think it's super
cool as a as a user, right, Like, it's amazing
when you ask questions and the range and the quality
of content you can get back. But it's cringey when
you think about our lack of controls and policies and
our ability to use things for good and not evil.
(34:29):
Jury's still out, how about you, Wilmar.
Speaker 6 (34:31):
I could not agree with Gail even more in this one.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
Yeah, for sure, cool or cringe. Fast fashion Gale.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
Oh you know, I'm a fan of the classics, the
whole idea of disposable. I've got to have the cool
thing this month, and I think it speaks to all
the problems we're talking about in marketing, which is I
love every once in a while shopping in my closet
and finding something fabulous from like ten years ago and
bringing it back merse.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I think we have to go shopping in Gale's cart them.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Ye, I have to admit I have become a big
secondhand shopper in the past few years, which is I
think is cool.
Speaker 3 (35:06):
I think it's cool.
Speaker 6 (35:08):
Well, I can't do the fast fashion. You are seeing major,
major influences of the past really really integrating themselves with
the fashion right now, and everybody thinks that this is new.
But when they do, like the pelbotomy big pants and
the big shoulder jackets, they think it's like, oh, that's
right now. No, that was about the eighties, okay, or
you know, it was the seventies. So like a lot
(35:29):
of the new fashion right now, they're just borrowing all
the influences that worked in the seventies, the eighties and
the nineties. I mean that's fact. Everybody mom jeans, mom jeans.
Everybody's wearing mom jeans. You can't wear mom jeans started,
I mean literally the eighties. Like it's just so to me.
I feel like everything, even music to me, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Mom jeans may have been my favorite Sarian Live sketch ever,
so good, all right, cooler cringe and this is a
legitimate one.
Speaker 3 (35:58):
Spending seven million on a Super Bowl ad.
Speaker 4 (36:00):
That's hit and where it hurts Marsa.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Yeah, I mean cool when it's done well. But I
dare say the majority of those seven million checks didn't
result in seven hundred million in value, So a lot
of cringey, a lot of cringey ads have been overinvested
in let's just say.
Speaker 6 (36:18):
One million percent. I would say that it depends on
the super Bowl, because not every super Bowl is worth
seven million. And I would also say, like, you have
to spend so much money to be noticed or be
talked about or go viral as a commercial, and most
of that money could be localized for audience detonation. And
(36:40):
actually we wear more long lasting than than actually being
part of a Sunday.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Night Absolutely, that's the thing every marketer's worst nightmare.
Speaker 4 (36:47):
Can you make this go viral? Right? Yes?
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (36:51):
All right, so core cringe the Tesla cybertruck out.
Speaker 5 (36:54):
You know, we did have a stat in the research
that I think it was marketers or five times as
likely to do and EV is the average American consumer.
But the average American consumer is like much more likely
to commute five days a week and probably spend a
lot more time in their car. So I am pro ev.
But it's another example of a big divide.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
About that cyber truck.
Speaker 5 (37:16):
Yeah, the cyber truck. I don't know if that's my stuff.
Speaker 6 (37:21):
So I thought it was a good idea. And then
I started seeing all the pictures and all the test
videos and all the stuff, and I was like, that
truck looks kind of weird. Video looks like, I don't know,
it doesn't look like a car. And I started having
this opinion. And then I stood in front of it
and I was like, whoa, that's like if Gi Joe
came to life. It's like a really impressive truck when
(37:41):
you're in front of it. But then this morning I
was at Joe's coffee just this morning with my friend
Freddie Rodriguez. We're building a podcast we're going to together.
But my point is we basically are standing for the
Joe's have another company, and cyber truck pulls up to
pick up their coffee, and there's now one person in
line that didn't say.
Speaker 4 (38:00):
Why, yeah, it is ugly.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Well, how about we say a big thank you to
our friends Gail and Wilmer. Couldn't ask for better guests
to get us going on season two. This is a
conversation that obviously will continue as we think about being
plugged in in realistic ways and thinking about fear, and
thinking about storytelling and taking risks. So we covered a
lot of ground. Thank you so much for joining us
(38:29):
on episode one. We really appreciate it, and we'll be
right back to talk about what's on your minds.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
We're back and now it's time for what's on your mind.
We want to hear from you, so please let us
know what you're wondering about. The questions you want us
to answer, please email us at ideas at brandashnew dot com.
And we're excited to have our first listener question from
Eli to kick off season two Marissa, and it's I
think a timely question. How can global brands stay authentic
(39:06):
in a world where everything is hyper sensitive, where sentiments
are really thickle.
Speaker 4 (39:13):
Mmm. Seems very timely, Merissa.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Timely and quite related to the conversation we wound up
having with Wilmer just now and Gale and talking about
how we can entertain and tell stories without fear of
completely offending people. At the same time, of course, it's
a good thing that our sensitivities are heightened, it's just
(39:36):
when they go to an extreme. So this is where
I always liken our work as brand leaders to our
work as humans and brands as personifications is when you
are when you are working on yourself to be your
best authentic self, you become stronger, You become more resilient
(40:00):
and even slightly more impervious to the criticisms or the
influence of others because you know who you are. And
of course not everyone gets to that state, but it's
a goal, it's a lifelong pursuit, I think, and as marketers,
I think that's actually our greatest goal in shaping and
nurturing brands is to make sure that we're thinking about
(40:24):
what their most authentic versions of themselves are. And when
you know that and you instinctively understand it. And this is,
by the way, where data only takes you so far.
I don't think this is a data thing, Steven. I
think this is about actually having the sharpness of instinct
and intuition, which is what we get paid for. And
it's not going to come off of chat GBT. It's
(40:46):
because you just genuinely understand how to keep a brand
on course that you then make good decisions about how
to navigate that so that you are making choices that
are appropriate. And if you have a brand that's really political,
then you can play there, and if you have a
brand that isn't political, you probably shouldn't. That is I
(41:07):
think more than ever, and to your point earlier, it's
getting harder out there. This is what I hope boards
and CEOs recognized. One of the greatest gifts of great
marketers is to understand how to keep a brand on
the right course of authenticity.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
It's bigger than a brand, right, It really is about leadership. Yes,
I feel that there are of course dangers right for
any brand, for any leader, for any individual when they
want to be authentic. It's really about having the judgment
as to when to be that authentic and do you
have the permission to be that authentic. The classic example
(41:44):
of feel what Nike did with Colin Kaepernick. It was
super controversial and maybe they lost some fans. You know,
people were burning their sneakers, but that was authentic to
their brand. That's right, and they should have stood up.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
And that was certainly incredibly controversial or dangerous. And I
think it's very easy to conflate something that is going
to be viewed as a gimmick, you know, something where
someone wants to participate because it's cool. It's in the now,
but you don't have to comment on everything. Sometimes you
just have to shut up. Sometimes you just need to listen.
(42:15):
And it really goes back to how are you going
to be a leader? You know, there's certain things that
you need to stand up for, and when you see
injustice or you see something that is just wrong, you.
Speaker 4 (42:25):
Do need to speak out.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
But at the same time, there are different ways to
speak out. It doesn't necessarily have to be if your brand,
and I have to believe in this day and age,
every single company has an employee base that is actually active,
that will go on social that will call out their leaders.
And so it's really understanding what type of leadership role
are you taking as an individual. If you are in
(42:48):
a marketing role, you could be you know, at the
beginning of your marketing journey, or you could be you know,
in the CMO suite. But I just feel like it
comes down to leadership and understanding, using good judgment when
to be authentic and when not to.
Speaker 3 (43:00):
I just couldn't agree more. Have lived these hard choices.
Speaker 1 (43:05):
And your Nike example, although not the most recent one,
stands out because who thought fear was going to be
a big topic of our episode today, and I am realizing
that just feels like a moment right now. That's a
long moment of talking about making choices as leaders that
are the right choices because they're the authentic choices, even
(43:27):
if there's some risk involved.
Speaker 2 (43:29):
But fear is going to be a theme this whole year, right,
I mean we're an election year, right, so there's going
to be fear around that. I think there's just this
constant fear of failure. And again, as a father to
two young kids, you know, my daughter just turned six
earlier this year, and you know my son is going
to be nine, you know, in July, which you know
is crazy, he's almost ten.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
I want them.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
To not be fearful. I'm trying to role model that.
I'm trying to figure out how do I show the
ability to take risk, calculated risk, and all of that
is overcoming fear. Like I don't have any fear of failing,
you know, I always joke that, you know, I'll take
any type of It's more about like what am I
(44:09):
learning from it? And this why idea of fear, I
feel like it's a red herring, right, So I would
love for folks to really be more bold more brave
and not let fear kind of take over. And if
you are afraid of something, you know, take it for
five seconds.
Speaker 4 (44:23):
Just breathe.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
But you got to move forward, always forward.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Bravery and fear maybe shouldn't have to go hand in hand,
but that might be something we have to pick apart
even further because more and more in business and brands
we talked about in entertainment marketing, and in this definitely
sensitive year and a year that does have fear, it's
going to be very very interesting and it's going to
be a more pressure environment for good leaders. As you said,
(44:49):
to stay on course. So on that note, and it's
a big note, that's it for episode one of season two.
We hope you enjoyed it. We're glad you're here. We're
glad you're and we hope you'll follow us at the
Brand New Podcast wherever you listen to your podcast so
you never miss an episode. Please connect with us as
well on social media. You can follow us all over
(45:11):
the place Instagram, x, Facebook, Friends and definitely LinkedIn as well.
Speaker 3 (45:16):
Steven, join us
Speaker 4 (45:17):
Next time for What's brand New
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