This episode is on making brands fun, finding your unique value, and the importance of great marketing with Tech Entrepreneur & Motivational Speaker, Jonny Shannon.

Jonny’s the CEO of Gamify, a marketing company that develop video games for some of the world’s biggest brands. He’s also Australia’s most requested speaker for schools, with talks on cybersafety, anti-bullying and mental health.

Jonny has presented over 3,000 times to over 370 schools and was recently awarded Australian Motivational Speaker of the Year 2020 by Corporate Vision Magazine.

In this epic 2hr episode we cover: 

Jonny Shannon is an International Tech entrepreneur and Motivational Speaker based in Sydney, Australia. He grew up in South Auckland, New Zealand and found school extremely difficult, having undiagnosed dyslexia and other disabilities which led him to failing all his subjects and being bullied. After overreacting too many times, Jonny was finally expelled for fighting too much and not showing up to school. It wasn’t until his last school that a counsellor took him aside to work through some of the key issues he was facing. The difference for Jonny was from “night to day”. He quickly turned his academic performance around and focused on his emotional wellbeing. Surprised in the difference seeing a counsellor made, he committed to doing youth work to help other students like him in the future. 

After a short time in the New Zealand Army, Jonny moved to Australia to become a qualified youth-worker. He later took some time off and co-started multiple companies including being a pioneer of ‘Pushpay’, an app that helps people give to charities, now on the ASX and one of the fastest growing SasS companies in Australian history, worth over $1 Billion. He took this success and resources to re-dedicate his life to full-time youth work, this time focusing on interviewing youth psychologists and speaking at schools on various health topics.

This episode is on Search Marketing and the Death of SEO with Ben Hirons.

Over the past 20 years, Ben has started and grown three successful businesses, researched over 1000 small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) and studied the great marketers of our generation. 

He is the founder of Due North, a boutique digital marketing agency specialising in search marketing. 

Ben has a refreshing take on SEO and shares great advice on what you can do to win on Google.

This episode is perfect for marketers and business owners looking to get more sales from their website. If you’re currently spending money outsourcing your SEO this episode is well worth your time. 

Ben Hirons is a Serial Entrepreneur, Rocket Scientist and explorer wannabe.

He is the founder of Due North, a team of marketing engineers collaborating with SMEs to drive revenue growth in the digital channels. He brings a unique and super-effective approach that combines his aerospace engineering skills with latest marketing techniques to design and build great marketing assets that stand the test of time.  

Over the past 20 years, Ben has started and grown three successful businesses, researched over 1000 SMEs and studied the great marketeers of our generation. He is considered to be one of the leading marketing minds in Australian business, not to mention he has quite an interesting superpower.

Hosted by former show guest Zoe Green, this episode has Dan Rowell discuss his focus on Building Extraordinary Brands. 

As well as being the regular host of this podcast, Dan is a Brand Strategist and the Founder of DSR Branding. He’s also the Co-Founder of Brill Coffee, a premium freeze-dried specialty coffee business.

Episode Contents:

Listen to episode 17 with Zoe Green. 

Dan Rowell is a Brand Strategist and the Founder of DSR Branding, an award-winning branding and design firm, specialising in rebrands for B2B companies. 

Dan started DSR Branding in 2015 so that he could focus on his true passion; working closely with company founders to focus and articulate their business vision and build remarkable brands.

With over a decade of experience in the advertising and marketing industry, Dan has worked across household brands including national retailers, Australia’s biggest universities, fashion labels, and beloved sporting teams.

Since 1998, Zoe has worked on some of the world’s most iconic brands with some of the industry’s most inspiring creatives, including Harry Pearce of Pentagram, Mary Lewis of Lewis Moberly, and Max Harkness with whom she founded Co-Partnership with in 2011.

Matthew Haynes is an Experience Designer and the driving force behind The Design Conference, an epic two-day event featuring critically acclaimed strategists, designers and some of the world’s most renowned commercial artists. With notable past speakers including Chris Do, Tea Uglow, Dean Poole and Christopher Doyle, as well as previous guests on this podcast — Ben Johnston and Craig Black.

Matt discusses the motivation behind starting The Design Conference 10 years ago, building it beyond an in person event and the expansion of their ecosystem.

We discuss brands like Louis Vuitton and Nike, Matt’s early career as a professional baseball player, meeting your idols and his quest to live a spectacular life.

Follow Matt on Instagram. 

“Matthew brings enormous positive energy and enthusiasm to everything he does and is passionate and genuine about promoting the strength of the Australian Creative and Design industry.”

Andy Sargent

Clive Ormerod is the CEO of Les Mills, a global fitness brand famous for their group fitness classes like BODYPUMP™, BODYCOMBAT™ and BODYATTACK™. 

Their workouts are licensed in 20,000 clubs worldwide, with a team of 140,000 instructors delivering group fitness classes to over six million people a week.

Before joining Les Mills, Clive ran his own retail business, worked across Europe with Nike, and with one of New Zealand’s largest companies, Spark.  

Clive shares his favourite brand, his personal purpose and how it aligns with the work he does, stepping up from CMO to CEO, and leading and adapting through COVID19.

Plus, we discuss the future of fitness, LES MILLS On Demand — their at-home workout app, and strategic partnerships.

Connect with Clive on LinkedIn. 

Clive’s love for building and developing teams comes through in the conversation we had. He is an experienced business leader, with a proven track record in delivering results across international businesses and building high-performing teams. Bringing his high energy and leadership expertise to the role of CEO, Clive is committed to shaping a world-leading team and strengthening Les Mills’ position as a top global fitness brand. Before joining Les Mills, Clive went from running his own business, working across Europe with Nike, to accepting a role with Spark, one of NZ’s largest businesses, which enabled his family to settle back into life in New Zealand.

Matthew Barram is CEO of Enspara, a technology company that develops energy efficiency software and hardware for enterprises. 

He’s led software projects for global brands like Rio Tinto and Chevron, and coaches people on how to develop their soft skills through experiential learning.

Leading a fully distributed workforce across three continents, Matthew shares great advice on how he keeps his team engaged, motivated and productive. 

We discuss:

Matthew is passionate about productivity and continuous learning, he shares some great tools, apps and advice on how we can achieve more. 

Plus, we dive into what he does outside of work, zen, geocaching and rites of passage programs.

Follow Matthew on Twitter. 

Hi 👋, I’m Matthew.

Me in 10 seconds:  

I’ve been exploring self expression through zen, psychodrama/sociodrama, rites of passage programs for the past 15 years. 

Spontaneous, enthusiastic, direct, and love exploring deep questions.

I am Australian and (used to) travel often for work.

Tony McGinn OAM is the Principal of The McGinn Partnership, a sales coaching business for CEOs and leaders of B2B SMEs, and a Chair of a CEO Peer Mentor Group with TEC.  

At 22, Tony founded MCM Entertainment Group, which he grew to a $50M global business. 

His sales and marketing experience includes working with enterprises like The Coca-Cola Company, Microsoft, Samsung and Disney, amongst many others.

We discuss:

Connect with Tony on LinkedIn.

Tony McGinn created MCM entertainment at 22 which he grew to a $50M global business across media, from radio, video to digital. He is also the brains behind the Million Dollar Lunch, who has strategically changed the game for fundraising to raise over 17.8 million for children’s cancer – which was the catalyst behind his OAM (Order of Australia Medal). Today Tony has continued giving back and is paying it forward as the Melbourne Chairman of TEC (The Executive Connection) and behind The McGinn Partnership focused on supporting CEOs and leaders to improve their sales and business development performance.

Dr Zac Fitz-Walter earned one of the world’s first PhDs in gamification design, and has since lectured and developed curriculum on gamification for universities.

He is the Co-Founder of Eat More Pixels an App Development company, and TBD Game Company, who have just published their first iOS game, Endless Runner X.

In this episode we discuss how to use gamification and motivation design to create engaging software that empowers your users.

We discuss Nintendo, PokemonGo, Foursquare, Duolingo, Zombies run, escape rooms, smart watches, Strava, Mailchimp, Black Mirror and more.

Learn more about Zac.

Dr Zac Fitz-Walter is an educator and designer with an expertise in gamification and motivation design. He earned one of the world’s first PhDs in gamification design, and has since lectured and developed curriculum on gamification for universities. He speaks and educates governments and companies around the world on effective gamification and engagement design. In his downtime he likes to live dangerously – racing cars, battling monsters and shooting aliens – all in virtual worlds of course.

Tash Menon is the Director and Founder of MASH Brands – a global community of independent brand strategists and creative problem solvers that offers a modern take on the traditional agency model. Tash works with a network of 80 freelancers, or ‘MASHers’, around the world, connecting them with brands and providing an agile, in-sourced solution.

We discuss:

Connect with Tash on LinkedIn.

After recognising the impact the freelance economy was having on the way we work around the globe, Tash launched MASH in 2018 as a more effective way to support businesses with their brand and creative strategies.

Tash draws on a unique combination of global, entrepreneurial and corporate experience to distill problems into workable challenges. With over 14 years’ professional experience, Tash has led and consulted on strategic brand, creative, partnership and event projects for luxury hotels, world renowned restaurants and high-end events across Australia, London, Singapore, Japan and Indonesia.

In 2016, she spearheaded an international brand strategy for a high-profile Australian chef, drawing attention from Sir Richard Branson and Jamie Oliver as well as seeing her shortlisted as one of Australia’s top 8 marketers in the Australian B&T Women in Media Awards. Her expansive top tier client experience includes the likes of Virgin Australia, Tourism Australia, P&O Cruises, Mulberry, Jaguar, Tom Ford, THG Global, London Fashion Week, Eastern and Oriental Express, and Mandarin Oriental.

Having graduated Dux from University of Sydney’s Master of Marketing program, Tash holds a Bachelor of Business, Marketing and Advertising from the Queensland University of Technology and University of London. She is also a regular guest lecturer for the University of Sydney MBA program and Queensland University of Technology.

Lee Crockford and William Smith-Stubbs are the Co-founders of spur: a strategy, design, and venture studio focused on positively affecting human actions—and measuring the outcome. ‍

Some of spur:’s projects have spanned sustainability, human rights, mental health, and more, with achievements including the world’s first global smartphone survey for mental health and a record breaking anti-loneliness volunteering program.

In this episode we discuss their first project, Soften the Fck Up, a mental health and suicide prevention project that looked to reshape the language around men’s mental health.

They explain #OLDMATE, a national campaign developed to reduce the social isolation of the elderly.

We discuss rebranding foster care, and their methodology on how to drive action in social movements.

Learn more about spur:.

Lee is a seasoned innovator and strategist with deep experience working on social impact projects around the world—particularly in mental health, equality, and education.

He has been recognised internationally for his ground-breaking work and approach to social change and impact measurement, and is a Global Laureate Fellow, UNLEASH Innovation Lab winner, representative to the G20 Youth Entrepreneurship Alliance, and D&F Academy Global Fellow.

Living by the motto “Creating awareness is for those that can’t get people to take action”, he is not only passionate about instigating social change, but ensuring that this change is both profound and measurable.

Connect with Lee on LinkedIn.

With a decade of experience in strategy, research and analysis, William has consulted to some of Australia’s largest governmental organisations and some of the world’s largest non-profits. An active social commentator, Will regularly speaks at conferences and on television and radio about social change and technology.

William is a World Economic Forum Global Shaper and Davos Annual Meeting panelist, a Gates Foundation Goalkeeper, G20 Young Entrepreneur Summit Australian Delegate and the Digital Brisbane Ambassador to Berlin. William was also a founding Global Talent for the UNLEASH Innovation Lab in Denmark 2017 and a Talent Facilitator in Singapore, 2018.

Connect with William on Linkedin.

spur: creates strategies that move people to action. We’re a strategy, design, and venture studio focused on positively affecting human actions—and measuring the outcome. ‍We work with organisations, governments, and communities to create a world that is fair, sustainable, and well.