The A-List Podcast

🎙️ Get ready for a dose of pure inspiration! 🌟

In this episode of ALP, Tom Christmann speaks with creative, hip hop artist and activist, Roshmond "Sum" Patten, Creative Director at creative agency GLOW. 🔥 Discover how his unique journey from music journalism to advertising has shaped his creative prowess and provided a fresh perspective in the industry.

Sum comes from a long line of educators and graduated from Morehouse College with a Biology degree. But his passion for music and knack for writing led him to break into the advertising world through a social agency at a music magazine. 🎵

From there, he embarked on an exciting freelancing career, taking on various roles as a social media manager, deal-maker for hip-hop artists, and even training the genre AI on streaming services. Talk about versatility! 🎧

But Sum's quest for a life of experimentation and creating his own sources of revenue didn't stop there. Sum's music has made waves too, being featured in numerous TV shows and video games. 🎮

In this conversation, Sum shares his insights into crafting award-winning social media campaigns, including his work on the acclaimed Donald Glover show "Atlanta" while at Cashmere Agency. 🏆

If you're an ad student or creative professional seeking inspiration, this episode is a must-listen. Gain valuable insights from Sum's journey, his unconventional career choices, and his unique approach to creativity. 🚀

The A-List Podcast is proudly sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School, where you can unlock your creative potential and take your skills to the next level. You get 10 weeks of zoom classes with a working ad pro for just $699. Register now at adhousenyc.com! 🎓

Enjoy the episode!

This is the A-List, the podcast that asks the world's top advertising professionals how they got started in the business.

In this episode, our host Tom Christmann talks with Mike Manheimer, Chief Marketing Officer at Postscript.io. Mike ditched his pre-law plan to join a software startup where he learned every aspect of marketing before a random meeting on an elevator led to his CMO job at SMS company Postscript. If you want to learn how to craft an SMS campaign like Mr. Beast, this is the episode for you.

The A-List is sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School, where we’ve got three classes this session (starts week of June 12!), including one called PHARMA FOR NONHACKS where you’ll learn all the special pharma rules and then learn how to break them.

GOT ANY BEANS?!

In this episode of the A-List podcast, sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School, Tom Christmann talks with Jaime Cabrera, Group Creative Director on Hyundai at Innocean USA in Los Angeles, California.

Jaime’s focus at Innocean is what’s called “Experiential marketing”. It’s sometimes called "engagement marketing" and “event marketing". Encompassing everything from car shows to virtual in-car experiences, experiential is a marketing strategy that directly engages consumers and invites and encourages them to participate in the evolution of a brand or a brand experience. To experiential marketers, the audience isn’t just a passive receiver of messages. Rather, the audience is actively involved in the production and co-creation of marketing programs, developing a relationship with the brand.

Jaime (pronounced HY’-may) was born in El Paso, Texas to Mexican immigrant parents and he went to the University of Texas Austin where he studied broadcast and film. A talented musician, Jaime headed to L.A. to record some albums. He’s got some excellent music on Spotify under the name J Cabrera. While he was pursuing his musical dreams, he started working at a small agency in El Paso called The Laster Group (now known as CultureSpan) creating 360 campaigns for car dealerships. He was even the star of his very first ad.

Jaime is, at his core, a storyteller. In addition to his music and his ad work, he’s also an author and podcaster. His book is called What’s The Big Idea?: An Indispensable Guide To Becoming A Kick-Ass Creative Director and his podcast, Confessions of a Creative Director, takes the ideas in that book and uses them as discussion points with Creative Directors from all over the world, including our very own Tom Christmann.

Samples of Jaime’s song about his mom, entitled “Hey Maria”, are used in this episode with permission from Jaime.

Enjoy the episode. And remember… ADHOUSE SUMMER ZOOM CLASSES WILL BE ANNOUNCED SOON. REGISTER NOW AT ADHOUSENYC.COM.

Another week, another A-List, the podcast that asks the world's top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. Sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School. Hosted by Tom Christmann, Executive Creative Director at Catch+Release and one of the head #adnerds at Adhouse, where zoom classes start FEBRUARY 15.

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In this episode, recorded in the fall of 2022, you’ll hear Tom’s chat with Matt Steinwald, Executive Creative Director at Big Village (formerly Engine Group) in New York City. Matt got a mechanical engineering degree at Cornell before pivoting to advertising where he uses that big brain to make smart work, including the Sopranos nickname thing on Twitter for HBO.

Matt and I discuss:

• Taking the legendary Sal Devito’s class at School of Visual Arts in NYC

• Getting “pigeonholed” into making ads for board games and toys

• Tom’s small cameo in Matt’s story.

• Jumping into a social agency without knowing what a KPI is

• Inventing the first Rube Goldberg Machine powered by dogs for Beneful

• Giving everyone Sopranos nicknames on Twitter for HBO (and winning a Webby)

• How to build a social media machine

• Why Engine is now Big Village

You can contact Matt on LinkedIn or at [email protected]. You can contact Tom on LinkedIn or at [email protected]. This is the original advertising origin story podcast. This is the A-List. Thanks for listening and please share this episode with your most adnerdy friend.

Hello and Welcome to the A-List Podcast, the podcast that asks the world's top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. Sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School. Hosted by Tom Christmann, Executive Creative Director at Catch+Release and one of the head adnerds at Adhouse.

In this episode, recorded in the fall of 2022, you’ll hear Tom's chat with Matt Vitou, Executive Creative Director at Mother in New York City. Matt and Tom talk about about:

• Growing up on video games and MTV in Cleveland

• Learning about advertising at Loyola New Orleans

• Burning every bridge in New Orleans with one email

• Discovering the Creative Circus in Atlanta

• Why every ad-hopeful should be on LinkedIn

• How he wound up losing his shirt at Wuhan prison in China

• Creativity diets

We'll also hear some great tips on staying inspired, including the Criterion Collection and the practice of wandering cities known as Dérive.

If you are curious about breaking into the ad business or want to be inspired to do your best work, you’re in the right place.

Music: Ross Hopman of Duotone Audio Group.

SPONSORED BY ADHOUSE ADVERTISING SCHOOL. AD CLASSES TAUGHT BY WORKING AD PROS ON ZOOM. ADHOUSENYC.COM

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Hello and welcome to The A-List, the podcast that asks the world's top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. This episode is a conversation between host Tom Christmann and Micöl Rankin, ACD and very first creative hire at Majority, an agency co-founded by Shaquille O'Neill, Omid Farhang, Asmirh Davis and Jorge Hernandez.

Micöl is the creator of #YouAreDopeShow on LinkedIN. He's also been named an Adweek Top Creative 100. And his "Vax That Thing Up" for the BLK dating app just won a lion at Cannes. But Micöl did not always dream of ad stardom. In fact, he is still working on a music career even as he pursues ad excellence at Majority.

In this episode, you'll hear how he followed his passions from Pittsburgh Technical Institute to the Disney College Program in Orlando to working on his performance chops in Atlanta as a contemporary of Wiz Khalifa. Until a job at iHeart Radio changed his life forever.

This is a story about breaking templates by being yourself. This is a story about doing what you feel. This is a story about vibing and letting success find you. And we hope you enjoy listening as much as we did making it. And if you do, please like and subscribe and share and talk us up.

Or don't. Either way, we're vibing. Thanks to Micöl Rankin.

Lisa Topol is a big believer in kindness. As she likes to say, “Good things follow it.” So it’s not surprising that she recently took the job of Managing Partner, Executive Creative Director at Oberland, the industry’s leading purpose-driven ad agency founded by Bill Oberlander and Drew Train.

In this episode of The A-List Podcast, Tom Christmann talks with Lisa about her over 20 years in advertising, which started when the late Chris Wall hired her out of his Adhouse class (oh, hello!) to work on IBM at Ogilvy. Lisa has been a copywriter, a CD and a CCO. She’s worked on Nike at Wieden + Kennedy and changed the way tampons a marketed at JWT. She managed teams with upwards of 200 people. She was named one of the 30 most creative women in advertising by Business Insider and was listed as one of the top 27 creative leaders in the country by Adweek. Her work won nearly every major industry award.

In her spare time, Lisa has taken her dogs to the highest levels of international competition in the sport of dog agility, becoming the 2 time Westminster Agility Champion and representing the United States team at the World Agility Championships. She’s also a board member of Time's Up Advertising, runs a Facebook group for progressive activists and cherishes being a mentor to women in advertising and seeing them rise up the ranks.

Oh, and her grandmother was a stand-up comic in the mold of Ms. Maisel, who worked with an accordion player on the temple circuit in Long Island. This episode is full of famous names and funny stories. Thanks for listening. Please rate, share and subscribe wherever you get podcasts.

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What are you doing this summer? Why not up your ad game by taking a class at Adhouse Advertising School? Classes are taught by working ad pros live on zoom so you can take them from anywhere. You get ten weeks of classes for just seven hundred ninety nine dollars. You’ll practice turning briefs into brilliance every week and you’ll meet some new friends along the way, including special A-List guests that can help you break into your dream agency. Adhouse students have gotten jobs at some of the top agencies in the world, including Wieden & Kennedy, Mischief, BBDO and McCann. Classes are first-come-first-served, so register today at adhousenyc.com. That’s adhousenyc.com. Adhouse Advertising School. Classes for Adnerds. Taught by Adnerds.

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Hello adnerds. And welcome to The A-List, the podcast that asks the world’s top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. Today we’ll head to the Great White North and you’ll hear our host Tom Christmann in conversation with Dan Nelken, a freelance creative who lives in Vancouver Canada. Dan is the author of a fabulous new book called A Self-Help Guide For Copywriters. You can buy a copy, and subscribe to his excellent free newsletter, at nelkencreative.com. Tom was surprised to hear that Dan started his career at 28 after he had had it with driving a forklift for a living. Eventually, Dan found himself at Chiat Day Vancouver, then went off on his own. Now he wants to help others find their confidence. This is a story about relentlessly doing what you love. And keeping at it until you win. Oh and Dan is coming out with an online course, too. You can find more information at Nelkencreative.com. So let’s listen in on this conversation with the very friendly Dan Nelken.

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This has been the A-List, sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School where summer zoom classes will be starting the week of June 13. You get ten weeks for just seven hundred and ninety nine dollars. Classes fill up fast and it’s first come first served, so register early at adhousenyc.com.

What are you doing this summer? Why not up your ad game by taking a class at Adhouse Advertising School? Classes are taught by working ad pros live on zoom so you can take them from anywhere. You get ten weeks of classes for just seven hundred ninety nine dollars. You’ll practice turning briefs into brilliance every week and you’ll meet some new friends along the way, including special A-List guests that can help you break into your dream agency. Adhouse students have gotten jobs at some of the top agencies in the world, including Wieden & Kennedy, Mischief, BBDO and McCann. Classes are first-come-first-served, so register today at adhousenyc.com. That’s adhousenyc.com. Adhouse Advertising School. Classes for Adnerds. Taught by Adnerds.

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Hello adnerds. And welcome to The A-List, the podcast that asks the world’s top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. In this episode, Tom Christmann talks with Matt MacDonald, who was just promoted to Chief Creative Officer of BBDO New York. His story starts in Peoria Illinois, where he was the first generation of his family NOT to work at the Caterpillar factory making tractors. His journey went from the high school speech team to working at a local Peoria ad agency to UT Austin and eventually New York City, where he arrived just in time for 9/11 and all the havoc it brought to the city. This is a story about adaptation, loving the process and doing whatever it takes to live your dream. With plenty of practical advice and funny stories along the way.

The A-List is sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School, where summer zoom classes will be starting the week of June 13. You get ten weeks for just $799 USD. Classes fill up fast and it’s first come first served, so register early at adhousenyc.com.

You can find Tom Christmann at tomchristmann.net and on most social platforms @ mongoindustries. Thanks for listening. And, as always, thanks to Ross Hopman at Duotone Audio for the music.

Hello adnerds! And welcome to another episode of The A-List, the podcast that asks the world’s top advertising professionals how they got started in the business. In this episode, Tom Christmann -- ECD at Vayner Media and co-dean at Adhouse Advertising School -- speaks with Analisa Goodin, Founder and CEO of Catch & Release.

After art school, Analisa started taking on side gigs to fund her art. One of those gigs was helping Goodby Silverstein & Partners source found content for a Sprint campaign. That side job led her to starting her own company to help agencies and brands source, clear, and license found content from across the internet for their campaigns.

This episode of The A-List podcast is all about being nimble, curious, and saying YES. So let’s say YES… to Analisa Goodin.

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The A-List is sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School. You get 10 weeks of classes for just $699. Our latest class starts March 17, 2022 on zoom with our newest ad pro: creative director Rich Wakefield. Sign up now at adhousenyc.com.