The Keys to Building a Successful Career in Media, Marketing, and Branding

0:00This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human Earners, what's up? Look, building wealth isn't just about making money. It's about knowing where your money is working for you. That's why we partnered with Empower. Empower is all about helping you invest well so you can go out and live a little. Their free Empower personal dashboard gives you a complete view of your financial life in one place. Track your net worth, monitor your budget, analyze your investments, set retirement goals, and more. You've worked hard for your money. Now make sure it's working hard for you. Download the Empower personal dashboard or visit Empower.com.

0:37Not an Empower client paid or sponsored. As a listener, you're looking for ways to help teams move faster, make sharper decisions and turn scattered context into work they can use. ChatGPT for Business can help. ChatGPT for Business gives teams a shared workspace with admin controls, permissions and access to work and codecs in ChatGPT. This means your business can move from question to answer and code to rollout quicker. Join over 10 million business and enterprise users worldwide already using ChatGPT for work. Download the ChatGPT desktop app or contact sales to learn more. They don't realize smart people use smartphones, huh?

1:19Seeing through BS they thought was going to slide. Download TextNow because it cuts out clownery. You can literally activate it from your couch. Nationwide 5G with the same towers the other companies use. Pay what you want or not at all. You're in control. Show these ridiculous carriers we ain't paying for stupid. Because we're way too smart to pay dumb. Free app-based talk and text via the TextNow app requires Wi-Fi or data connection. Data plans sold separately. 5G where available. When traveling for events or festivals throughout the country, every dollar matters. We compare flights, prices, hotel rates, and restaurant options.

1:54So why wouldn't we compare rides? Personally, I always check lift before booking a ride. Prices can change throughout the day depending on traffic, weather, and what's happening in the city. If you're headed to a concert, out to dinner, or catching up with your friends on a Friday night, taking a few seconds to check lift could leave you with more money to enjoy the experience. Save money. Check lift. Earners, what's up? Look, on Earn Your Leisure, we're all about smart money moves. Here's one most people skip, and it starts with Insurify. Most of us never shop our car insurance. The policy renews every year, the rate creeps up a little at a time, and nobody calls you to tell you.

2:30You stay with the same company because it's easy, and that convenience costs you real money. That's what Insurify fixes. Real quotes from more than 120 top insurance companies side by side. About two minutes, free, no phone calls, no pressure. And if there's nothing better for you right now, Insurify keeps watching and tells you when that changes, so you're never stuck overpaying. Millions of people have used Insurify to shop for their car insurance. So insure with Insurify. Go to Insurify.com. That's I-N-S-U-R-I-F-Y.com. Insurify.com. So let's get into this. So, all right. How do you start your career, right?

3:11Coming from East New York, what's your break into the industry and which industry do you start first? Was it music, fashion, liquor? Like, how did you actually, you know, get your stride? You know, it's funny. I started in media. So media is a big, big part of my, um, my expertise as well. So I started at a small internet company a long time ago, like a long time ago, mid nineties, long time ago. I've been in the game for a minute. I want to say it's 96. okay myself which is cool um but yeah i worked for a company called ivillage.com and they were like the first lifestyle website for women and i was the 35th employee i literally was just looking for a full-time job i was in college and wanted to make some money i was putting myself through college and wanted to work in advertising and they had a job opening and they hired me and amazing ride four years was a part of their ipo friends and family stock did really really well They ultimately got acquired by NBC.

4:08So I had experience in in that space very early on in my career, but loved advertising and marketing, but really needed something that was speaking to me culturally. And so I don't know if you guys know Keith Klinkscales. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So he he I believe he he created 30 for 30 with ESPN. he's one of the original pioneers in the culture also launched vibe magazine um keith started a company called vanguard media and they had three magazines honey heart and soul and savoy and honey magazine was like the essence for young black women right essence at the time was a little bit more mature and oh your man left you and you got a divorce i'm 20 i don't know anything about that life but honey was fashion forward and makeup and beauty and music and all things I loved.

4:56And I was like, you know what? I want to work at this magazine. So I literally wrote old school, wrote my letters and my resume, mailed it out, convinced them to sponsor a party at Howard University for Howard Homecoming. And they came in as a media partner and they loved the work that I did with my cohorts, DSMs, who I'm sure you guys have heard her name in the industry, also a Sean Combs alumni and genius in her own right. She and I had a company and we did an event with Mark Barnes in DC and got Honey to come down. They loved it. And they were so impressed that they hired me. And I went into sales for Honey, Heart and Soul and Savoy for about four or five years.

5:36Then ultimately heard about me at Time Inc. They brought me over to Time Inc. to work at their publications there. And then Glamour Magazine recruited me and then Vibe recruited me and then Giant recruited me. And I was finding this whole pattern of people seeing excellence in the marketplace and calling me like, hey, we're here doing great things in the market. We'd love for you to be a part of our team. So that went on for about 15 years. And ultimately I burned out, like I can't keep doing sales and teaching people how to spend money with black people. Cause it was a real challenge. It was like, no black people buy shampoo.

6:07No, we buy cars. And it was constantly educating people to allocate money to us. Allocate money inside of the publications and outside of the publications. What exactly are doing in sales? So I was selling advertising within the publication. So when you go into a magazine and you see a print ad, I was literally selling those ads. So I would go to companies, you know, major companies like L 'Oreal and some of the others. And they just really didn't understand the segment of the African-American audience in a way that made sense. And so they felt like they were capturing us if they ran a commercial on ABC, or if they ran an ad in a white magazine or general market magazine.

6:43And it's like, you need to be able to speak to us specifically. in order for us to be loyal to your brands. So that went on for over a decade of constantly teaching people about our value. And I realized that print was a dying industry at the time. And I was like, I need to do something different. And I'm really good at marketing. That's the reason why I'm selling the way that I'm selling and advertising. And I just started taking a bunch of informational interviews and I sat down with this woman. Her name is Amani Duncan. And at the time she was the CMO of Bad Boy Worldwide Entertainment Group.

7:17now Combs Enterprise, but it used to be BBWEG. Now it's actually it's Combs Global now, Combs Global. And she asked me what my dream job would look like. And I just told her what it was. It was this hybrid between, you know, marketing and strategy, but still monetizing paradigm and monetizing process. And she was like, this sounds exactly like what we're trying to create for our internal agency, Blue Flame. And would you ever consider working for Sean Combs? And I was like, absolutely not how come who will work for sean combs he makes people go get cheesecake he does all these things so this is like early 2000 this is make another band 2008 2009 and i'm like you know he's brilliant but he's also could be mercurical right like he's like really just like go get the cheesecake that's what we've seen right now i've known him in business and i've known his brilliance in business but i just thought our personalities wouldn't work Quick one before you jump back in.

8:13You're listening for ways to help teams move faster, make sharper decisions, and turn scattered context into work they can use. ChatGPT for Business can help. ChatGPT for Business gives teams a shared workspace with admin controls, permissions, and access to work and codecs in ChatGPT. This means your business can move from question to answer and code to rollout quicker. Join over 10 million business and enterprise users worldwide already using ChatGPT for work. Download the ChatGPT desktop app or contact sales to learn more. Earners, what's up? Look, on Earn Your Leisure, we're all about smart money moves.

8:50And here's one that most people skip. Car insurance renews on autopilot, the rates creep up, and nobody tells you. That's what Insurify fixes. In about two minutes, completely free, you can see rates from more than 120 top insurance companies. And if there's nothing better today, they keep watching and notify you when there's a better rate. So go to Insurify.com. That's I-N-S-U-R-I-F-Y.com. Insurify.com. When traveling for events or festivals throughout the country, every dollar matters. We compare flights, prices, hotel rates, and restaurant options. So why wouldn't we compare rides? Personally, I always check lift before booking a ride.

9:29Prices can change throughout the day depending on traffic, weather, and what's happening in the city. If you're headed to a concert, out to dinner, or catching up with your friends on a Friday night, taking a few seconds to check lift could leave you with more money to enjoy the experience. Save money. Check lift. Earners, what's up? Look, building wealth isn't just about making money. It's about knowing where your money is working for you. That's why we partnered with Empower. Empower is all about helping you invest well so you can go out and live a little. Their free Empower Personal Dashboard gives you a complete view of your financial life in one place.

10:04Track your net worth, monitor your budget, analyze your investments, set retirement goals, and more. You've worked hard for your money. Now make sure it's working hard for you. Download the Empower Personal Dashboard or visit Empower.com. Not an Empower client paid or sponsored. We talk a lot about ownership, and one of the most important assets you can own is your digital real estate. Too many entrepreneurs rely on social media platforms they don't control. Your website should be the center of your business. Framer helps you build a professional website without all the friction. It's more than a website builder.

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11:23That's framer.com slash earn for 30 % off. Framer.com slash earn. Rules and restrictions may apply. And, you know, upon further review and talking to a few colleagues, I realized there was a real opportunity here. What he was creating in the space, what the agency represented, and what my skill set could bring to the table. And I was like, let me just take a chance. And it literally was the best decision I've ever made in my life. ever hands down i actually was promoted eight times in nine and a half years at the time i was one of four people that worked on every piece of his business so like every piece that you see in the portfolio at the time there were eight or nine brands i believe when i was there derrick ferguson dsms a couple of other folks were privileged to have access at that level and i was so blessed to be a part of cultural definition, right?

12:17Like I literally was on the task force team to launch Revolt TV as we know it today. And when people were talking about it, they were like, oh, you know, Puff has a new show called Revolt. I said, no, Puff has a network, a television network like MTV. And people really couldn't wrap their minds around what Revolt even was because it was so big. And having that kind of access to creating culture, it's bar none. You can't wish for that in your biggest dreams. And I think also being that close to leadership at that level, like Sean Combs is brilliant as you guys saw experiencing him, I think people think his celebrity is the thing that has created so much success in business or his popularity or even his charisma and all those things are accurate, but it really is his brain he is a brilliant strategic marketer and cross category you know he can really look at the vision and see where things are going and so having that that level of access to talent at that that level and then also the the group of people that i worked with to build that company bar none best decision ever so you're at the the cusp of the beginning of revolt this is early early Maybe Ciroc, because we're talking like maybe 2006, up to 2009.

13:34So the early stages of Ciroc. What are those meetings like? Because this is an industry, again, that, especially in spirits at that time, that we hadn't really ventured in at the level of success that we see Ciroc now. And I think maybe Oprah is the only one that had a network. So what are these meetings like that you're taking? So a few timeline things. Ciroc actually happened quite a few years before Revolt happened. But I was not a part of the initial launch of CERAC, the 2007 alliance. That's a DSM story that I give people their flowers. We'll say the DSM is literally, she's the one. She is the one.

14:18I would never, ever, you know what I mean? Like take away the level of leadership and vision that she had in supporting Sean and where he was able to take his company. And it was because of her and a few other people, Derek Ferguson is another main one, that really helped to cement the infrastructure around all of the brands that sort of burgeoned after that Ciroc deal. I came in about two years after the Ciroc launch, or excuse me, partnership. so to be a part of for instance the innovations so red berry and coconut are that were the first two flavors to launch on the de sorak umbrella so i literally rooted a tutor part of that initial team launching bottle design flavor profiles strategy all of those things the idea of the flavors that you experience for Ciroc, Sean literally, he was the noser.

15:21He literally tasted every berry flavor. Apple came out. I had to literally source apples in Canada. This is a real story. Source apples in Canada because apple is one of his favorite flavors, he loves apple pie. So when we launched Ciroc Apple, we had to find apples from everywhere to make sure that we were really capturing the essence of what apple represents and literally work with research and development to create a liquid that mimicked his favorite apple. So when you're experiencing Ciroc as a flavor profile, these are literally things that he created from his mind. It's not like he was like, oh, let me taste this bubble gum or this cough medicine.

16:03He's like, no, I want the real mango fruit. And where's the best mango? You know, he's just a very best in class marketer. and to be able to be a part of that journey was really brilliant in building a brand. Ernest, what's up? Look, building wealth isn't just about making money. It's about knowing where your money is working for you. That's why we partnered with Empower. Empower is all about helping you invest well so you can go out and live a little. Their free Empower personal dashboard gives you a complete view of your financial life in one place. Track your net worth, monitor your budget, analyze your investments, set retirement goals, and more.

16:39You worked hard for your money. Now make sure it's working hard for you. Download the Empower personal dashboard or visit Empower.com. Not an Empower client paid or sponsored. Before you sign off, you tuned in for ways to help teams move faster, make sharper decisions and turn scattered context into work they can use. chat gpt for business can help chat gpt for business gives teams a shared workspace with admin controls permissions and access to work and codecs in chat gpt this means your business can move from question to answer and code to rollout quicker join over 10 million business and enterprise users worldwide already using chat gpt for work download the chat gpt desktop app or contact sales to learn more earners what's up look on earn your leisure we're all about smart money moves.

17:29Here's one most people skip and it starts with Insurify. Most of us never shop our car insurance. The policy renews every year, the rate creeps up a little at a time, and nobody calls you to tell you. You stay with the same company because it's easy and that convenience costs you real money. That's what Insurify fixes. Real quotes from more than 120 top insurance companies side by side. About two minutes free, no phone calls, no pressure. And if there's nothing better for you right now, Insurify keeps watching and tells you when that changes so you're never stuck overpaying. Millions of people have used Insurify to shop for their car insurance.

18:06So insure with Insurify. Go to Insurify.com. That's I-N-S-U-R-I-F-Y.com. Insurify.com. When traveling for events or festivals throughout the country, every dollar matters. We compare flights, prices, hotel rates, and restaurant options. So why wouldn't we compare rides? Personally, I always check lift before booking a ride. Prices can change throughout the day depending on traffic, weather, and what's happening in the city. If you're headed to a concert, out to dinner, or catching up with your friends on a Friday night, taking a few seconds to check lift could leave you with more money to enjoy the experience.

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19:48This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.