Rogier Vijverberg founded the agency SuperHeroes in Amsterdam in 2009 with an ambitious mission to save the world from boring advertising. Nearly 15 years later, SuperHeroes is still an independent agency, but now with offices in New York (or Williamsburg Brooklyn to be precise) and most recently Singapore… driven by that same mission. A self-described “digitalist,” with the title of Chief Creative Hero, he calls SuperHeroes "a thumb-stopping agency that wins the attention game with digital natives with audience first creativity."

This year he also founded a new digital street art collective called JIMMY to work with global brands. The studio creates social content also known as ‘faux-out-of-home/ CGI-ads’ and is taking over cities around the world with fantastical digital storytelling.

Today we talk about a range of topics from ad avoidance to new realms of authenticity, from the demands of younger generations and to the global role of contemporary culture… as well as how digital street art may be the next frontier for brands.

Michel Quintas has the rare title of Director for Global Digital Strategy and Execution at Biogen, the Cambridge, Massachusetts multinational biotech company specializing in the treatment of neurological diseases. Not only has he helped lead an enterprise-wide transformation of Biogen’s digital customer engagement, but he has been instrumental in advocating omni-channel programs and a Digital Center of Excellence, founded on the concept that “innovation lives everywhere.” Today, he shares what he has learned from two decades of living a truly global life and what that experience means for marketing initiatives that leverage IT infrastructure and next-gen technology throughout the entire product lifecycle.

Jared Belsky, Founder & CEO of Acadia, the recently launched and highly successful Atlanta-based agency, has been on both the client and agency sides during his career. He believes that marketers often are trained in every aspect of their business except managing their ad agencies. His latest book, You Get the Agency You Deserve, offers both practical and emotional lessons on how to improve client-agency relationships.

He says, “Marketers are unwittingly causing their own destruction. The 18-month average agency tenure triggers an economic destruction that few executives appreciate or understand how to solve.”

Conversation with Leela Srinivasan, CEO of Parity
Parity was created in 2020 to close the pay gap in women’s sports, benefitting elite women athletes and their fans, as well as brands. Founded by former leaders on Wall Street, the company drives revenue to pro women athletes by curating sponsorship opportunities, as well as other aspects of brand ambassadorship, content creation and in-person appearances. With a current roster of more than 800 athletes from 70 sports, including Olympians and Paralympians, new CEO Leela Srinivasan aims to revolutionize the financial model for women athletes, while creating meaningful opportunities for brands-- large and small. Today we talk about Parity’s mission, Ms. Srinivasan’s goals for the organization, the athletes’ stories, and why brands should care about the new world of fandom for women’s sports.

Phil Rowley, Head of Futures for Omnicom Media Group UK, admits that the Metaverse is both overhyped and underappreciated. While a lot of marketer attention is now on the “shiny objects” of AI with products like ChatGPT, he has recently focused on “Avoiding the Regretaverse” or, perhaps better said, “how not to mess up in the Metaverse.” Beginning with definitions, we discuss how brands can best take advantage of the biggest change to the media landscape in decades.

Few would disagree that an agency’s greatest asset is its people. Tim Ringel, ad veteran, serial entrepreneur, and one of the founders of agency group-- Meet The People, is on a mission to ensure that an improved work culture is front and center for ad agency employees.

He describes Meet the People as the world’s first people-centric agency group, based on a better work/life balance, no glass ceilings, and a commitment to DEI. Today he talks about the evolution of the ad agency, as well as how a better employee experience leads to stronger work and greater efficiency for clients.

Kate Goodall has spent a good portion of her adult life supporting women and women-led companies. As Co-Founder and CEO of Halcyon, an incubator for early-stage impact ventures, she has formed several strong opinions about business. Kate often talks about “the inevitable impact-driven future of business” and “the rise of values-driven consumer behavior.”

An advocate for startup accountability through determining the right metrics and continually measuring progress, she also believes that marketing needs to improve by moving beyond promises and optics to having a more deliverable role in brand building and ensuring that all actions live up to mission statements.

Eric Feinberg is a leading expert on cyber information warfare and is Vice President of content moderation for the Washington, DC based nonprofit, Coalition for a Safer Web. There, he works alongside former Ambassador to Morocco, Marc Ginsberg, to shed light on terrorist extremist content, hate speech, violent activity, and illegal drug sales on social media.

Eric has also invented a unique cyber research tool called Ai2, for which he received a patent. He describes it as an evolution of artificial intelligence or “anticipatory intelligence” that enables a user to observe social media posts and identify trends that can better anticipate activities from bad actors, malevolent organizations, or extremist groups.

Joanne Davis of Joanne Davis Consulting has a reputation for helping to find a still point in the constantly churning world of client – ​​agency relationships. From concepts like Can This Agency-Client Marriage Be Saved to specific ideas on how to repair relationships, she has proven that while change may be constant, it doesn't have to break industry partnerships.

We asked her to make sense of these times—from the departure of top talent to new ways of working, from the rise of highly specialized agencies with focuses on Web3 and AI-powered Media to layoffs, combining creative shops, and suggestions that the agency business may no longer be about creating ads…

Joanne shares her thoughts.

A well-known drinks marketer for much of his career, Colin Westcott-Pitt turned his attention several years ago to the global development of the Glanbia Performance Nutrition Brand Portfolio, which includes Optimum Nutrition, Slimfast, Body & Fit, Isopure, among others. Its flagship global brand, Optimum Nutrition, has just been certified as the world’s #1 sports nutrition brand, according to Euromonitor, and has achieved the extraordinary milestone of becoming a Billion Dollar brand.

Today Colin discusses the marketing of the brand and how it was driven by a purpose of helping consumers everywhere to achieve their performance and healthy lifestyle goals. Plus, he shares the lessons he learned along the way.