March 3, 2021 • 38 mins
This week kicks off a few new upcoming episodes spotlighting Founders and CEOs of independent agencies in the marketing/comms world.
First up, the formidable Jolie Hunt, Founder and CEO of Hunt & Gather. Hunt & Gather is a marketing and communications agency with a special ability to connect influential people and brands through all sorts of experiences - from analog to digital. Jolie shares how she started building relationships both in life and her career, including how selling cars at fifteen honed her ability to listen for the details and make personal connections - skills for which her business has become known. This episode has many simple gems to consider when building community and lasting relationships.
Also, we're back with the fourth segment of our four-part series on making attention actionable with our partners at Yieldmo, and share a few thoughts on media formats that we're currently interested in and thinking about.
Happy 4 Year Anniversary, Adlandia!
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
What's up on Laura Currency and I'm Alexa Kristen. The
next few episodes, we're gonna be bringing founders and CEOs
of independent agencies. Why because it's so important, especially since
this last year, that founders and CEOs of independent agencies
are found are found by the Atlantea community. These people
(00:30):
have in some cases bootstrapped their businesses for years, have
gone through amazing kind of links to do things like
become a b corp, to create completely new experiences for
emerging technologies that we all are experiencing, and to represent
(00:51):
a whole new wave of celebrity. So the next few episodes,
we're really going to be celebrating independent agency founders and
our first person up Julie Hunt, CEO and founder of
Hunt and Gather. But before we get into our interview
with Jolie, we've been thinking about a lot of things
and we just want to talk. You and I have
(01:12):
been having a number of conversations about what are the
bets that we'd make if we were sitting in the
conference room together, regardless of the brief, but really exploring
the formats and new opportunities that we're seeing in the market.
And one of the things that has me really thinking,
(01:33):
and I don't think anybody is prepared for what I'm
about to say. Um, but that's direct mail. You know,
this idea that we can use technology on analog formats
to break open a conversation. We've got smart speaker adoption,
uh increasing, you know, things streaming in the background, all
(01:55):
of these mediums for a piece of content to light
off of. And I am just waiting for somebody to
take a catalog, take a postcard, and turn it into
something more. It is so smart this idea and also
rebooting this idea of attribution data personalization specificity. You want
(02:19):
to blow the doors off brands, blow the doors off there.
I think there's been brands that have done tremendous jobs
of taking data and localizing the data to tell stories.
But if you get it down to the ZIP plus
four to my address, right, if I'm a customer who's
raising my hand and actively ordering things, and I'm ordering
things more than ever before, you know which, which kind
(02:40):
of leads me to to my next thought is in
home the new out of home. When you think about
all of the things that are coming be at Amazon,
packaging or otherwise, isn't it interesting to think about how
to deconstruct the box, to reverse engineer commerce, to tell
me a story, to pull me back in yes, or
to talk to other people bull. I think the boxes
(03:01):
that are showing up on our doorstep as as a
result of having to do more from home, the new
billboard your whole point about like in home is the
new at at home. I think in home is probably
the better at a home because you're literally physically holding
something you either purchased you may be interested in in
your hand. It's interesting to think about when a package
(03:24):
arrives at my door, it is not the end of
the journey. It is the beginning of the next step.
That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Okay, what's next on
your list? Well? In speaking of in home is the
new out of home? In home has also led to
many hours spent recently in the social audio space. So
(03:44):
I know, um, you and I have been talking quite
a bit about clubhouse. I was recently listening to Whitney
Wolf heard when when she I p o drop in
and talk about what that experience was like in what
would normally have required me to pack a bag by
a ticket, plane ticket, conference ticket and no opportunity to
actually join the conversation. That's exactly right. And I think,
(04:08):
you know, we talked about this early in the pandemic.
People are accessible right now in general, by the way,
they are quite literally mostly at home. And so I
think that the thing is now, this technology is allowing
people to have this actually tangibly have a sense of
that access to anyone. That's not going to go away
when we get past COVID and being at home all
(04:31):
the time. What I think though, is the one of
the driving forces behind this is actually the creator economy.
I mean, look at sub stack. Well, I was just
gonna say, these platforms are becoming the new discovery engine.
It's the new discovery engines for expertise, for i P
(04:52):
for talent, thought leadership, thought leadership, etcetera. But it's exciting
about social audio is that somebody's are sitting shoulder and
shoulder with nobody's well. And the thing I think is
interesting too write if you you start to look at
time spent just because we have attention and just because
consumers are spending time with our message, with our story,
(05:14):
with our product, is a time well spent. That's right.
Thing I think that's interesting a by the social audio
environment is will there be indicators that tell us that
it is time well spent and and starting to kind
of pull apart these new insights that are like, this
is what people really want to talk about. And I
(05:35):
think we've talked about the idea of like being an anthropologist, right,
Like you can go into these platforms and pull out
insights in real time that can be informing what you
do and how you show up as a brandom. I'm
seeing in the Twitter feed is collaboration over competition, right
A same we've we've been talking about for years. By
(05:55):
the way, happy for your anniversary at Landia. Happy, I
thought that was to me and to Atlantia to you
to my cost, Yeah, thank you, Happy anniversary anyway. So
I think what's really interesting is the thread that I'm
seeing under social audio. There is a ton of money
out there to be made tons at the same time,
(06:17):
tons of people are out of job. At the same time,
tons of people are starting to find what they love
and are good at and how to monetize it. So
there's really interesting kind of tension and all of this
access is going to be a grand accelerator. That's exciting,
you know, and talking about access. With access, there's influence
(06:37):
and our guest today has been a curator and convener
of influence um for quite some time in our industry,
and it is probably one of the best at it.
The thing that I think that is so interesting about
Jolie and Jolie's business is that Jolie is not someone
who is dealing with a bunch of reps for influencers.
(06:58):
She actually has the relationship ship with these people. So
whether it's from DC to publishing, to the government, to celebrity,
to chefs, to this to that, it's because she's actually
created her own universe, her own universe of relationships, and
she's connecting those people to interesting other relationships, whether that's
(07:20):
with brands or what that other celebrities or other people.
More brands, more marketers need to think about the relationship
not only with the consumer like this, but how what
can you do to connect your buyer, your consumer, your
customer with other relationships that are meaningful. The industry is
(07:41):
talking about n f t s non fungible tokens all
over the place. The industry is talking about new i
P accelerated by technology. We should be talking about new
I P created by relationships and how important it is
at this point and to Laura's point around direct mail,
(08:02):
we the industry has an opportunity now to take a
very broad channel and make it a personal experience, and
that includes access and relationships. Before we go into our
conversation with Jolie, we are going to check in with
our partners at yield MO for the fourth of our
four part discussion around making attention actionable. We are here
(08:25):
with Lisa Bradner, GM of Analytics and Teddy jot D,
head of Product. So, Lisa, we as an industry have
the opportunity to think about not just having people's attention,
but really thinking about retention and comprehension and understanding the
incremental long term impact of the work that we do.
Any thoughts on that, I would go back to why
(08:47):
I say you can't throw out reach and frequency. Frequency
still matters. The problem is as we've built everything in
our industry on averages. I mean I was in an
agency we say, oh, yeah, the average we could say
a seven. I mean that was just like kind of
pulled out a thin air, and then we apply it
to absolutely every brand, every campaign, every everything. Even though
that's a sixty second spot. That's a thirty second spot
(09:08):
that was an ad on social media. I mean, you know,
we've we've kind of, in my opinion, been lazy and
applied averages as opposed to individuating. And again, this is
where if you can process the data in real time,
I can start to see that. You know what Laura's
frequency for mac and cheese is three. She stops paying
(09:34):
attention after that, right, So don't serve her four or five,
six and seven because she's not paying any attention anymore. Um. Teddy,
he's more like five because he's distracted and he's doing
a lot of other things. So we'll cut Teddy off
at five. Right. Um? These are you know, are are
they perfect? No? I still go back to brand lifts
studies and brand affinity studies. We can do those in
(09:57):
our marketplace in real time. You don't have to wait
six months and spend a hundred thousand dollars to get
that study. Um. And I'd love to see people embrace
more of that real time learning, right. I think more
brands actually have to create hypotheses and then execute on
those hypotheses, and they have to be well formed. You know,
(10:18):
that's where data and gut come together, put it in
a hypothesis and run these tests and then start to
actually get back some response. Well, this is what I
think big brands can start to learn from the direct
to consumer companies, right, which is you know, very often
three people in a basement and a shoestring budget doing
exactly that. You've got a product, we've got an idea,
(10:40):
we've got a hypothesis about who it's for. Let's put
it out and see what that does and see what
it moves. Um, if taking more of those small risks,
right we used to talk about right sellars are tried
and true. Are you know some tests that you want
to scale and ten per cent is? I don't know? Um,
(11:02):
I would argue post COVID, it's probably you need to
take that ten to twenty five because the old ways
of working aren't gonna work. So take your budget and
put it behind those hypotheses. You still got seventy left
this idea that the the ecosystem of advertising, right, the
(11:23):
pipes that you were talking about have been so fragmented.
How do we bring it together? And I and I
think when you talk about the other sevent what we
do is we even frag meant this budget. Laura actually
has a great quote that I love. Someone asked um,
how much of my budget should go to innovation? She
(11:44):
was like, all of it, because if you're not innovating
and everything you do, I don't know why you're spending
money instead of putting in a bucket called TV. Say
what am I going to do differently in TV than
I did last year? That's exactly right, absolutely, because that's
when your reach and frequency, right, are actually turning into impact, right.
(12:05):
And so how do advertisers start to think about actually
smoothing smoothing these kind of fragmented and disparate you know,
activity and bubbles. How are you guys helping to kind
of create these smoother ecosystems. Some of the best advertisers
I've seen out there, some of the best marketers I've seen,
they approach advertising, you know, in a way that is
(12:26):
about experimentation and tests. It's not just about trying to
get incremental sales. They're they're really trying to learn more
about their customers, and they're trying are always experimenting with
these strategies and and and in doing this they get
a better return, They generate more sales. But that's like,
if you look at advertising as a way to innovate
(12:47):
and invest and then learn more about your customers, you
tend to be a better marketer and you tend to
get more out of your advertising. I completely agree with that,
and I think that we need to both of your points,
Lisa and Teddy. I think that as marketers we have
an opportunity to not think about advertising as a finite process.
(13:09):
Lisa Bradner, Teddy Jwadi from yield Mo, thank you for
being our partners. Thank you for coming on at Landia.
Thank you for having us. Welcome back at Landia. Our
guest this show. Laura and I quite literally met on
top of a mountain in during CES or in a canyon.
(13:32):
It was a canyon, Okay, to be clear, you're right, Okay, sorry,
girls with details in a canyon on a plateau, private
dinner with guitarist Lunch. Okay, sorry, okay, let's launch on
a plateau grand canyon during CES. I'll get the year right.
Julie Hunt, Welcome to the show. Jolie is the founder
(13:54):
and CEO of Hunt and Gather. Jolie, Ladies, we've been
about getting you on this show since I think we
like first fell in love on that plateau. I think
it's true, um although I think you just stopped calling
it a plateau. As a PR person and as brand people,
it's the actual Grand Canyon. We just I'm not trying
(14:16):
to brand it. I'm not trying to brand it. I
just want people to understand like we were in helicopters
and we didn't like go to the ridge. We were
in the so we met in Hunt Gather is a
marketing communications agency. But I think what's so special about
(14:38):
hung Gather is you are the influencer to the influencers
that influence. That is the truth, right. Alexa and I
were talking a little bit getting ready for this interview,
saying like, when you get an invite from Julie, you're
more focused on the fact that you got an invite
from Julie than what the invite is too. And I
(14:58):
think that just really speaks to the level of taste
maker that you are in our industry, putting together and
convening um thought leaders, influencers, experts to create these unforgettable
not just experiences, but conversations and connections. Where did you start.
Let's talk about that, Like before we get into the
how like, where did you start? Start at the beginning,
(15:21):
Start at the beginning. Well, look, I mean, I think
the simplest answer is that both of my parents could
talk to anyone, and they were both in sales jobs,
and there was always a vibe, there was always energy.
It was like, let's go do the thing, whether the
thing was, you know, motorcycle riding or catching crayfish or
my mom taking me to you know, haggle for a
(15:43):
very very tiny gemstone on street in the city. And
so I don't know. I think I think the simple
answer is other people give me energy. Right. I want
to be around people and it doesn't even really matter
what kind of ball as long as they are kind,
(16:03):
engaging and kind of down for whatever. Right. I think
we're living through a moment. I'm sure we'll come to it.
But there's so much conjecture about who you are in
this digital sphere. And I've always been a little bit
more analog in my taste, and and I like people
in real life, right. And my my little adage is,
(16:27):
you know, know if you're an energy giver or an
energy taker. And if you're not sure of the answer,
I'll tell you. How do you know, how do you know?
You know? Right? You know if you if you walk
into a room or you call someone and you're like,
you know, your posture is a little bit taller, like
you smile, you're not like like I don't want to
talk to this person. And so I do think that, um,
(16:50):
you got to pay attention to that. And so my, um,
the accolades you've kindly bestowed upon me, I don't I
don't know that there that they were as purpose full
as you may think. It was like I just I
liked who I liked, right, And it could be a chef,
it could be a model, it could be a marketer.
It really didn't matter to me. Um what people did.
(17:11):
It was like, well why do you do that? Right?
And so I think sometimes you know, some of my
closest friends are people that I invited to something because
I just thought they would be amazing. Um. And so
I don't know, it's it's been a gas. How did
that translate into a business, well but professional before we
(17:32):
get to hunt and gather? How did it translate into
your life as a I mean you were a chief
marketing officer and communications How did that all translate? Look,
my big break was when I started running communications for
the ft right. So if I look at people in
my life that are now I'm like, how did they
(17:52):
let me do that? And you know, I traveled all
over the world with the editor Lionel Barber, who remains
a dear friend to this a I'm actually helping him
launch his book, so you know, people come back. And
I just had this amazing uh front row seat to
um Global news and politics and so. And I really
(18:12):
had a champion. I think that's the big secret here.
And as somebody at a very tender age who said
you do what you do, I would go in and
you know, to the head of the Asia Society and
they were, you know, fifty years older than I was,
and I just did not want to see me, and uh,
you know, and I was always very polite, and I said, um,
you can dismiss me as much as you want. I'm
(18:33):
the one who's going to get the thing done that
we're trying to do. And I guarantee you you're gonna
want to hug me by the end of this meeting.
When I think, growing up in a newsroom, you just
get a nose for hey, that that is the kernel
in that whole story that is interesting, and I feel
like that has has had some transference in my life
for events or people or brands or partnerships were like
(18:54):
who woa woa waa, Like hold on that that thing
in line six that you has rolled over, that's actually
the money shot, right and so um from the FT,
I went to Reuters and so Reuter's and Thomson Reuters
became really the grown up version of the f T
job that I had, Right, I ran Global PR and
then I took on Brand. I moved to London for
(19:16):
a couple of years, and and that was the job.
I got that job at thirty, and that was the
job that really gave me a platform to bring people along, right,
And and I just never had an issue playing nice
with others. It was like, hey, there's there's enough, but
I just want to do the work. And I feel
like it was like the golden era of work being
(19:37):
about the results you can produce in about the politics.
And I was recruited to a O L. You know,
it was the first time I was a CMO at
a publicly traded company, and from like week three, it
was really not a fit. And look, it took me.
It took me the better part of a year to
get over that experience, and like, had I not had
(19:59):
such a support of husband and like home life to
kind of weather that moment um, and like a beautiful
thing happened. I know, you just had Malcolm on um
a few months ago, but I got I got a
call from Jacob Weisberg, who was running Slate, and I
got a call from Tina Brown, who was running The
Daily Beast, and and they said a version of the
(20:21):
same thing. Tina said, I love your fabulous I don't
know what the funk is going on over there, but
but I need you to come with me to Davos
and plan a dinner for Melinda Gates. Pack your bags.
And I was like, all right, um, great, I'm free.
And Jacob said, hey, we're doing this thing with Ge
and we're doing this road show around Middle America and
(20:42):
we need someone to like wrangle the mayor's and some
press and like a whole bunch of town halls. I
was like, oh, you know, you need a cruise director,
like perfect I can be your cruise director. And so
this this beautiful thing started happening where friends, mostly friends
from media, started calling and saying, hey, I've always wanted
to work with you. I could never really afford you
(21:05):
as a you know, full time all singing, all dancing,
So could we do this project? So, by the way,
full circle moment, I worked on the road show for Growth.
It's heard here that's amazing. So that just as I
was listening to you talk about it, I'm like, how
(21:25):
has it taken until this point to realize we were
always destined to be on the road show to something together? Jolie.
But I want to go back to something you said,
right You said you just know how to get in
an execute. And Alex and I talk a lot about
the conceptual side of the business, and there are so
many great ideas that exist in the world. But being
able to to land the plane, that's magic. And we've
(21:50):
just seen you consistently do that in all sorts of
capacities and clearly some of the the names and company
you were just talking about. I have to imagine the
pressure that comes of putting on some of those events,
but yet it seems like it just comes so natural.
So how do you know how to execute? What's the thing? Can?
Is there a secret formula that maybe is not so secret?
(22:13):
I mean, I am a bull um. I mean, I
just do not take no for an answer like ever.
And I don't mean that is am uh, I have
rough elbows. I actually feel like I am quite um
kind in the process, you know, Like I feel like
(22:34):
I'm I'm not I'm not a win at all costs
type of person, but I am a get it done
at all costs type of person. And I think it's
also and again it sounds cheesy, it's just like the
output is so important to me. It always has been
so like people that can write decks all day and
think big thoughts and strategize that like with literally like
(22:58):
it's like watching pain drive for me, I started a
business so I would never have to write a deck again.
Ps I failed, Um, But I think that, I mean,
I will, I will taunt you like a house until
I can get it done right. So I'm trying to
hire right now. And I have asked no less than
fifty people for recommendations, and I follow up with their recommendations.
(23:22):
I find them on LinkedIn, I find their emails, I
write to them. So I mean, I think it's a
I think it's like a pride thing. But I also
I'm like that in my real life anyway too. It's
like I sometimes don't even realize it, but I'm just
I always feel like if I'm not moving forward, I'm
moving backward. I love the fruits of people's labor standing
(23:44):
for something and um and look, I don't get it twisted.
I mean I've never I've never really thought there's like
this epic nobility to this work, right, Like it should
be fun, it should be light, it should be an experience.
You should you should leave happier than when you came, right,
And so I think for me, it's always been around like,
(24:05):
how can how can this work that I do be
a bright spot in someone's day? Right? And can they
make a new friend? Can that friend ten years from
now remind them of this this moment of generosity they
shared or a stupid little joke. And so I have
a lot of help, is the answer. Right. I have
people around me who pride themselves on like getting that
(24:29):
boulder up the hill, and they do it because they
care about the same thing. I think, if you can
have people on your side, they want to work hard
for you. And that's always been my mentality. It's like
the old you know, more bees with honey and and
I've never understood why people don't just put a dollar
(24:50):
of of something good in it. For others, You're thoughtful
in how you think about getting those connections made um
and where they're made. So how do you think about that?
Like is there any method to your madness? Right or
is it just a kind of natural inclination because you're not.
I just want the audience to know this put and
(25:10):
gather works for huge fashion houses to industrial companies like
GE and IBM two, massive publishers, vice media companies, etcetera.
It's not just brand and fluffy thought leadership. This is launching,
this is launching products technologies. The thing that the differentiates
(25:31):
people is like some people are just like that would
be fun, and I'm like, I'm gonna make six calls
right now and see if I could pull this off,
and like we're just gonna do it. So talk about
that that curation element of like do you go into
planning these um experiences looking for a particular outcome or
is there a general sense of feeling you try to
(25:52):
create or conversation you're trying to, you know, make happen.
I'd say fifty of the time I have a I
have a rough sense of the palette, right, So I
never have like this is what needs to happen. Um,
I feel like there's it's a lot more art and
science in that respect. I think I have, you know,
eight thousand people in my my phone contacts, and um,
(26:17):
I just have a weird brain for details and memories.
Um I remember what someone was wearing, I remember the
detail about their daughter, or you know what gave them
heartburn when they were pregnant. And it's it's not put
on rights, it's just sort of human nature for me now,
I think I had to learn that early on a
(26:38):
sidebars that I sold cars when I was in high school.
It's like the hardest job I was. I was fifteen,
I couldn't drive, I did not have a license, and
I worked for a car dealership in a state, New York.
And I swear this is what gave me this skill.
And you would need these people on the lot that
were coming to you know by a by a ner
used Dodge car truck, right, And so they would come
(27:02):
and they'd say their name and then three minutes later
you would forget their name and I would think, like,
how am I going to sell this person a car?
If I just literally am not addressing them by name,
and so I would I would ask for their license,
and I didn't even need their license, by the way,
and I would go and I would make a copy
(27:23):
of the license, and I would literally just sit there
and be liked red Red, Red, Red Fred, like I
would sing the names. And I think as a result,
I just got so good at remembering people's names and
faces and what they said. By the way, how many
cars yourself? How many cars as youself? Guys? I sold
three cars the first day I sold cars. Ye, I
(27:43):
knew it. I believe it. I got really good at
like learning people's Like people will tell you anything you
need to know about them, you just have to listen,
right and um and my right. But people that want
to network, right, which is I find such a weird
kind of crass word you're going in to learn? Right,
And it's like you could be in a room of
(28:05):
a hundred and there could be one interesting person and
like that to me is successful, Like that's a great
night if you walk out of a place with one
resonant relationship that didn't exist before you went there, Like,
how great is that? I want to know how all
of this it's a mindset. It's a mindset. It's a
mindset and his behavior. How does it relate to your business?
(28:27):
Do you think about taking on or not taking on clients? Yes, right,
with the same kind of criteria. I mean, we have
a really great range of clients and friends from birch
Box to dal Jones to A T and T to
Athleta to Universal Standard to Barry's boot Camp, UM to Amazon,
(28:48):
and there's some really cool emergent tech brands UM. So
I for me, it's never about the company. It's about
the people. And if I also then happen to love
the company, then I will consider it UM. And sometimes
I make myself like the company because I'm just so
obsessed with the person um. But you know, like like
(29:11):
I'm going to do something with the fertility business. I
literally know the like go to zero and then just
keep going down about fertility Like I don't know anything
about it, but I'm obsessed with the people behind it.
And I'm like, you know what, it's it's right for revolution,
and it's so important to women in our you know,
age group and peer groups. So okay, I can learn that.
(29:32):
And I think that the coolest thing about having your
own company, which I can't believe I learned in my
like mid late thirties, is like choice, right, I can
work on like a juice brand, a fashion company, a
big telco, like work with Kanye West. Like there's there's
no two plans that you're like, oh, just dust off
the plan for so and so and give it to
(29:54):
like it's all custom and and it's really hard to recruit.
And I'm recruiting. If anybody listening, what are you hiring for? Yeah,
I'm hiring for people for ACE. People who are grounded
in communications, who can instill confidence in clients and their teammates,
and who either are pillar project managers or have amazing
(30:16):
relationships in the world, just like ACE. Humans who are
hot shit of the work, right, and that can be
ten years experience, that can be twenty years experience, that
can be two years experience. Right. I just hired three
people last month, and so I'm really hiring sort of
account director, senior account director VP levels. I want to
talk about some of the things that you've said that
(30:36):
really resonated with me, and I want to turn them
into for brands how brand should think. So you were
talking about selling amazing but I mean such a simple lesson,
but selling and knowing something about them, caring and listening.
How do brand start connecting at a time where connection
has been completely right, bifurcated, demolished, It's confusing and now
(31:02):
it also feels in some In some cases, I think
a lot of brands feel like if they're trying to
connect with their audiences or trying to connect with their buyer,
did they can overstep but it can feel inauthentic and
finding that that that kind of not only unique place
where they can fill a role, but also real place
I'm not gonna say authentic, but real place they can
(31:24):
fill a role. How do you How do you think
about that? How should brands think about that? I think
I think we're in the in a moment where people
want to feel spoken to and seen right. So I
look at a project we just had the great pleasure
of working on with Athletic, which is part of Gapping
and an amazing b corps. You know, nineties percent women
(31:45):
UM employed and female run and it's a business that
really stands for something and they just expanded into truly
inclusive sizing and UM they're certainly not the first and
thinking about how they show up in that way. It
was it was so simple yet so powerful, and that
(32:06):
they decided to be truly inclusive and equal, so that
the mannequins are inclusive. Right, that you're not going to
Iraq in the back of the store on the you know,
the back right if you're a size to X right,
that is mixed in with the size xcess and um,
all employees are getting training on how to make sure
(32:26):
people feel welcome and seen and that it's a place
for them. And so I think, look, I'm no expert
at this, but I I think if you can just
really think about and be in the shoes of the
people that you are marketing to, selling to, understanding like
how does this fit into their life? Is this a necessity?
(32:47):
Is this a luxury? Like could you not buy clothes
before unless you bought them online? Like that's a that's
a major major breakthrough, right. It seems to also be
the moment of collaborations and also just where where um,
you know, two plus two equals five. I think about
everything in terms of customization and how can you It's like,
(33:09):
what's happening in the zeitgeist? What's the gut? What's like
what are people talking about and how do you immediately
catch that flame? And and how do you think about that? Right? Well,
we have a lot of collaborations coming out of this.
But before you go, we're gonna go to our game, Jolie.
What would you kill? What would you get rid of?
(33:31):
What would you buy? What would you do yourself? I
would kill reply all and about a third to a
half of all technologies right now that can reach me.
I feel like in any given day, I have LinkedIn
pings and people are texting me, people are slacking me.
I'm on the zoom calls, I'm getting email like I
(33:54):
just if anyone please don't invite me to clubhouse, Like
just just don't. I'm never gonna go there, like I
didn't go to Second Life, Like I just I feel
like it's just it's like too much, you know, it's
so so The thing that I would kill is like people,
people repeatedly but in different mediums, trying to reach you.
(34:17):
It's like, hey, I just slapped you on the text.
It's like, okay, well give me four minutes and maybe
I'll get back to It's so I don't know. For me,
it's like it's like too much. I can't have a
creative thought because I'm just like like batting away all
of these ridiculous messages. I love the delete reply all.
(34:37):
I love that. Okay, what would you what would you buy?
I buy a lot of stuff for my kids. Um
and my eBay habits like I am less lemon, like
I buy braws on eBay um so, like I genuinely do. Oh,
I love a good eBay purchase, like, by the way,
the thing to know about me? What was your like
(34:58):
eBay purchase? Um uh ug slippers for my husband and
a snowsuit for my son. And I think I'm Mandolin.
What would you do yourself that you're not already doing?
And I'm not already doing. I hate doing things myself.
Um my, my, I am a champion outsourcer um so
(35:22):
I don't want to do anything that I'm not already doing.
In fact, I want to do fewer things. If people
want to get in touch with you to talk all
things hunt and gather uh and or apply for these
open positions you have, or just to hear about your
latest purchases on eBay, how can they get in touch
with you? They can email me July at Hunt Gather
(35:44):
dot com we'll see you soon. Thanks jolly big, Thanks Julie.
I hope the next time we see you, we don't
have to wait to be in the middle of the
Grand Canyon during see I go back to the conversation
we had with Bob Pittman, what's the need you're filling?
(36:05):
When you look at how Jolie approaches putting people together
to inspire, encourage, there's a deliberate intent and how she
approaches it, and it's filling the need, that's right, not
just I think of what she's hired to do, but
also to ensure that the people who are participating are
also walking away with an experience, which, by the way,
(36:30):
I would imagine creates more business, you know. And so
it's interesting to think about not just the need of
what you are convening people for, but the need of
the people participating on the other side of that engagement. Yeah,
I agree, And I think going back to the very
top of the conversation with what we're talking about around
(36:50):
the greater economy, the passionate economy, this idea of individualism
that is starting to become really loud we lee loud.
I think it's so exciting and I think when you
put different voices together, collaborating on influence and point of
(37:11):
view that has completely diverse perspectives, it starts to become
really exciting. Around how do you start to cater to
your audience and how do you start again? Laura like
use a simple format like direct mail, right, And I
believe at one point at the top of the show,
(37:31):
there used to be a line that said, if you
program for everyone, you program for no one. Laura. You know,
people think that the show has been only around for
four years, but I gotta tell them it's been around
eight we just weren't on air. There are people, a
few in particular that I I am thinking about, who
say I don't need to listen to the podcast. I
(37:53):
get it every day, But Alexa, there's nobody I'd rather
be doing this with. So thank you for showing up
and challenging me all day in every way. Um, I
love doing this, I love talking with you and all
of our guests, and four years feels like a graduation,
but I have a feeling we're just getting started. So
(38:15):
thank you at Landia. Big thank you to Bob Donald, Carter, Andy,
Eric Gayle Val, Michael Jen. We appreciate you thank you
so much for this opportunity. We'll see you in two weeks, Okay,
What's up on Laura Currency and I'm Alexa Kristen. The
next few episodes, we're gonna be bringing founders and CEOs
of independent agencies. Why because it's so important, especially since
this last year, that founders and CEOs of independent agencies
are found are found by the Atlantea community. These people
(00:30):
have in some cases bootstrapped their businesses for years, have
gone through amazing kind of links to do things like
become a b corp, to create completely new experiences for
emerging technologies that we all are experiencing, and to represent
(00:51):
a whole new wave of celebrity. So the next few episodes,
we're really going to be celebrating independent agency founders and
our first person up Julie Hunt, CEO and founder of
Hunt and Gather. But before we get into our interview
with Jolie, we've been thinking about a lot of things
and we just want to talk. You and I have
(01:12):
been having a number of conversations about what are the
bets that we'd make if we were sitting in the
conference room together, regardless of the brief, but really exploring
the formats and new opportunities that we're seeing in the market.
And one of the things that has me really thinking,
(01:33):
and I don't think anybody is prepared for what I'm
about to say. Um, but that's direct mail. You know,
this idea that we can use technology on analog formats
to break open a conversation. We've got smart speaker adoption,
uh increasing, you know, things streaming in the background, all
(01:55):
of these mediums for a piece of content to light
off of. And I am just waiting for somebody to
take a catalog, take a postcard, and turn it into
something more. It is so smart this idea and also
rebooting this idea of attribution data personalization specificity. You want
(02:19):
to blow the doors off brands, blow the doors off there.
I think there's been brands that have done tremendous jobs
of taking data and localizing the data to tell stories.
But if you get it down to the ZIP plus
four to my address, right, if I'm a customer who's
raising my hand and actively ordering things, and I'm ordering
things more than ever before, you know which, which kind
(02:40):
of leads me to to my next thought is in
home the new out of home. When you think about
all of the things that are coming be at Amazon,
packaging or otherwise, isn't it interesting to think about how
to deconstruct the box, to reverse engineer commerce, to tell
me a story, to pull me back in yes, or
to talk to other people bull. I think the boxes
(03:01):
that are showing up on our doorstep as as a
result of having to do more from home, the new
billboard your whole point about like in home is the
new at at home. I think in home is probably
the better at a home because you're literally physically holding
something you either purchased you may be interested in in
your hand. It's interesting to think about when a package
(03:24):
arrives at my door, it is not the end of
the journey. It is the beginning of the next step.
That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Okay, what's next on
your list? Well? In speaking of in home is the
new out of home? In home has also led to
many hours spent recently in the social audio space. So
(03:44):
I know, um, you and I have been talking quite
a bit about clubhouse. I was recently listening to Whitney
Wolf heard when when she I p o drop in
and talk about what that experience was like in what
would normally have required me to pack a bag by
a ticket, plane ticket, conference ticket and no opportunity to
actually join the conversation. That's exactly right. And I think,
(04:08):
you know, we talked about this early in the pandemic.
People are accessible right now in general, by the way,
they are quite literally mostly at home. And so I
think that the thing is now, this technology is allowing
people to have this actually tangibly have a sense of
that access to anyone. That's not going to go away
when we get past COVID and being at home all
(04:31):
the time. What I think though, is the one of
the driving forces behind this is actually the creator economy.
I mean, look at sub stack. Well, I was just
gonna say, these platforms are becoming the new discovery engine.
It's the new discovery engines for expertise, for i P
(04:52):
for talent, thought leadership, thought leadership, etcetera. But it's exciting
about social audio is that somebody's are sitting shoulder and
shoulder with nobody's well. And the thing I think is
interesting too write if you you start to look at
time spent just because we have attention and just because
consumers are spending time with our message, with our story,
(05:14):
with our product, is a time well spent. That's right.
Thing I think that's interesting a by the social audio
environment is will there be indicators that tell us that
it is time well spent and and starting to kind
of pull apart these new insights that are like, this
is what people really want to talk about. And I
(05:35):
think we've talked about the idea of like being an anthropologist, right,
Like you can go into these platforms and pull out
insights in real time that can be informing what you
do and how you show up as a brandom. I'm
seeing in the Twitter feed is collaboration over competition, right
A same we've we've been talking about for years. By
(05:55):
the way, happy for your anniversary at Landia. Happy, I
thought that was to me and to Atlantia to you
to my cost, Yeah, thank you, Happy anniversary anyway. So
I think what's really interesting is the thread that I'm
seeing under social audio. There is a ton of money
out there to be made tons at the same time,
(06:17):
tons of people are out of job. At the same time,
tons of people are starting to find what they love
and are good at and how to monetize it. So
there's really interesting kind of tension and all of this
access is going to be a grand accelerator. That's exciting,
you know, and talking about access. With access, there's influence
(06:37):
and our guest today has been a curator and convener
of influence um for quite some time in our industry,
and it is probably one of the best at it.
The thing that I think that is so interesting about
Jolie and Jolie's business is that Jolie is not someone
who is dealing with a bunch of reps for influencers.
(06:58):
She actually has the relationship ship with these people. So
whether it's from DC to publishing, to the government, to celebrity,
to chefs, to this to that, it's because she's actually
created her own universe, her own universe of relationships, and
she's connecting those people to interesting other relationships, whether that's
(07:20):
with brands or what that other celebrities or other people.
More brands, more marketers need to think about the relationship
not only with the consumer like this, but how what
can you do to connect your buyer, your consumer, your
customer with other relationships that are meaningful. The industry is
(07:41):
talking about n f t s non fungible tokens all
over the place. The industry is talking about new i
P accelerated by technology. We should be talking about new
I P created by relationships and how important it is
at this point and to Laura's point around direct mail,
(08:02):
we the industry has an opportunity now to take a
very broad channel and make it a personal experience, and
that includes access and relationships. Before we go into our
conversation with Jolie, we are going to check in with
our partners at yield MO for the fourth of our
four part discussion around making attention actionable. We are here
(08:25):
with Lisa Bradner, GM of Analytics and Teddy jot D,
head of Product. So, Lisa, we as an industry have
the opportunity to think about not just having people's attention,
but really thinking about retention and comprehension and understanding the
incremental long term impact of the work that we do.
Any thoughts on that, I would go back to why
(08:47):
I say you can't throw out reach and frequency. Frequency
still matters. The problem is as we've built everything in
our industry on averages. I mean I was in an
agency we say, oh, yeah, the average we could say
a seven. I mean that was just like kind of
pulled out a thin air, and then we apply it
to absolutely every brand, every campaign, every everything. Even though
that's a sixty second spot. That's a thirty second spot
(09:08):
that was an ad on social media. I mean, you know,
we've we've kind of, in my opinion, been lazy and
applied averages as opposed to individuating. And again, this is
where if you can process the data in real time,
I can start to see that. You know what Laura's
frequency for mac and cheese is three. She stops paying
(09:34):
attention after that, right, So don't serve her four or five,
six and seven because she's not paying any attention anymore. Um. Teddy,
he's more like five because he's distracted and he's doing
a lot of other things. So we'll cut Teddy off
at five. Right. Um? These are you know, are are
they perfect? No? I still go back to brand lifts
studies and brand affinity studies. We can do those in
(09:57):
our marketplace in real time. You don't have to wait
six months and spend a hundred thousand dollars to get
that study. Um. And I'd love to see people embrace
more of that real time learning, right. I think more
brands actually have to create hypotheses and then execute on
those hypotheses, and they have to be well formed. You know,
(10:18):
that's where data and gut come together, put it in
a hypothesis and run these tests and then start to
actually get back some response. Well, this is what I
think big brands can start to learn from the direct
to consumer companies, right, which is you know, very often
three people in a basement and a shoestring budget doing
exactly that. You've got a product, we've got an idea,
(10:40):
we've got a hypothesis about who it's for. Let's put
it out and see what that does and see what
it moves. Um, if taking more of those small risks,
right we used to talk about right sellars are tried
and true. Are you know some tests that you want
to scale and ten per cent is? I don't know? Um,
(11:02):
I would argue post COVID, it's probably you need to
take that ten to twenty five because the old ways
of working aren't gonna work. So take your budget and
put it behind those hypotheses. You still got seventy left
this idea that the the ecosystem of advertising, right, the
(11:23):
pipes that you were talking about have been so fragmented.
How do we bring it together? And I and I
think when you talk about the other sevent what we
do is we even frag meant this budget. Laura actually
has a great quote that I love. Someone asked um,
how much of my budget should go to innovation? She
(11:44):
was like, all of it, because if you're not innovating
and everything you do, I don't know why you're spending
money instead of putting in a bucket called TV. Say
what am I going to do differently in TV than
I did last year? That's exactly right, absolutely, because that's
when your reach and frequency, right, are actually turning into impact, right.
(12:05):
And so how do advertisers start to think about actually
smoothing smoothing these kind of fragmented and disparate you know,
activity and bubbles. How are you guys helping to kind
of create these smoother ecosystems. Some of the best advertisers
I've seen out there, some of the best marketers I've seen,
they approach advertising, you know, in a way that is
(12:26):
about experimentation and tests. It's not just about trying to
get incremental sales. They're they're really trying to learn more
about their customers, and they're trying are always experimenting with
these strategies and and and in doing this they get
a better return, They generate more sales. But that's like,
if you look at advertising as a way to innovate
(12:47):
and invest and then learn more about your customers, you
tend to be a better marketer and you tend to
get more out of your advertising. I completely agree with that,
and I think that we need to both of your points,
Lisa and Teddy. I think that as marketers we have
an opportunity to not think about advertising as a finite process.
(13:09):
Lisa Bradner, Teddy Jwadi from yield Mo, thank you for
being our partners. Thank you for coming on at Landia.
Thank you for having us. Welcome back at Landia. Our
guest this show. Laura and I quite literally met on
top of a mountain in during CES or in a canyon.
(13:32):
It was a canyon, Okay, to be clear, you're right, Okay, sorry,
girls with details in a canyon on a plateau, private
dinner with guitarist Lunch. Okay, sorry, okay, let's launch on
a plateau grand canyon during CES. I'll get the year right.
Julie Hunt, Welcome to the show. Jolie is the founder
(13:54):
and CEO of Hunt and Gather. Jolie, Ladies, we've been
about getting you on this show since I think we
like first fell in love on that plateau. I think
it's true, um although I think you just stopped calling
it a plateau. As a PR person and as brand people,
it's the actual Grand Canyon. We just I'm not trying
(14:16):
to brand it. I'm not trying to brand it. I
just want people to understand like we were in helicopters
and we didn't like go to the ridge. We were
in the so we met in Hunt Gather is a
marketing communications agency. But I think what's so special about
(14:38):
hung Gather is you are the influencer to the influencers
that influence. That is the truth, right. Alexa and I
were talking a little bit getting ready for this interview,
saying like, when you get an invite from Julie, you're
more focused on the fact that you got an invite
from Julie than what the invite is too. And I
(14:58):
think that just really speaks to the level of taste
maker that you are in our industry, putting together and
convening um thought leaders, influencers, experts to create these unforgettable
not just experiences, but conversations and connections. Where did you start.
Let's talk about that, Like before we get into the
how like, where did you start? Start at the beginning,
(15:21):
Start at the beginning. Well, look, I mean, I think
the simplest answer is that both of my parents could
talk to anyone, and they were both in sales jobs,
and there was always a vibe, there was always energy.
It was like, let's go do the thing, whether the
thing was, you know, motorcycle riding or catching crayfish or
my mom taking me to you know, haggle for a
(15:43):
very very tiny gemstone on street in the city. And
so I don't know. I think I think the simple
answer is other people give me energy. Right. I want
to be around people and it doesn't even really matter
what kind of ball as long as they are kind,
(16:03):
engaging and kind of down for whatever. Right. I think
we're living through a moment. I'm sure we'll come to it.
But there's so much conjecture about who you are in
this digital sphere. And I've always been a little bit
more analog in my taste, and and I like people
in real life, right. And my my little adage is,
(16:27):
you know, know if you're an energy giver or an
energy taker. And if you're not sure of the answer,
I'll tell you. How do you know, how do you know?
You know? Right? You know if you if you walk
into a room or you call someone and you're like,
you know, your posture is a little bit taller, like
you smile, you're not like like I don't want to
talk to this person. And so I do think that, um,
(16:50):
you got to pay attention to that. And so my, um,
the accolades you've kindly bestowed upon me, I don't I
don't know that there that they were as purpose full
as you may think. It was like I just I
liked who I liked, right, And it could be a chef,
it could be a model, it could be a marketer.
It really didn't matter to me. Um what people did.
(17:11):
It was like, well why do you do that? Right?
And so I think sometimes you know, some of my
closest friends are people that I invited to something because
I just thought they would be amazing. Um. And so
I don't know, it's it's been a gas. How did
that translate into a business, well but professional before we
(17:32):
get to hunt and gather? How did it translate into
your life as a I mean you were a chief
marketing officer and communications How did that all translate? Look,
my big break was when I started running communications for
the ft right. So if I look at people in
my life that are now I'm like, how did they
(17:52):
let me do that? And you know, I traveled all
over the world with the editor Lionel Barber, who remains
a dear friend to this a I'm actually helping him
launch his book, so you know, people come back. And
I just had this amazing uh front row seat to
um Global news and politics and so. And I really
(18:12):
had a champion. I think that's the big secret here.
And as somebody at a very tender age who said
you do what you do, I would go in and
you know, to the head of the Asia Society and
they were, you know, fifty years older than I was,
and I just did not want to see me, and uh,
you know, and I was always very polite, and I said, um,
you can dismiss me as much as you want. I'm
(18:33):
the one who's going to get the thing done that
we're trying to do. And I guarantee you you're gonna
want to hug me by the end of this meeting.
When I think, growing up in a newsroom, you just
get a nose for hey, that that is the kernel
in that whole story that is interesting, and I feel
like that has has had some transference in my life
for events or people or brands or partnerships were like
(18:54):
who woa woa waa, Like hold on that that thing
in line six that you has rolled over, that's actually
the money shot, right and so um from the FT,
I went to Reuters and so Reuter's and Thomson Reuters
became really the grown up version of the f T
job that I had, Right, I ran Global PR and
then I took on Brand. I moved to London for
(19:16):
a couple of years, and and that was the job.
I got that job at thirty, and that was the
job that really gave me a platform to bring people along, right,
And and I just never had an issue playing nice
with others. It was like, hey, there's there's enough, but
I just want to do the work. And I feel
like it was like the golden era of work being
(19:37):
about the results you can produce in about the politics.
And I was recruited to a O L. You know,
it was the first time I was a CMO at
a publicly traded company, and from like week three, it
was really not a fit. And look, it took me.
It took me the better part of a year to
get over that experience, and like, had I not had
(19:59):
such a support of husband and like home life to
kind of weather that moment um, and like a beautiful
thing happened. I know, you just had Malcolm on um
a few months ago, but I got I got a
call from Jacob Weisberg, who was running Slate, and I
got a call from Tina Brown, who was running The
Daily Beast, and and they said a version of the
(20:21):
same thing. Tina said, I love your fabulous I don't
know what the funk is going on over there, but
but I need you to come with me to Davos
and plan a dinner for Melinda Gates. Pack your bags.
And I was like, all right, um, great, I'm free.
And Jacob said, hey, we're doing this thing with Ge
and we're doing this road show around Middle America and
(20:42):
we need someone to like wrangle the mayor's and some
press and like a whole bunch of town halls. I
was like, oh, you know, you need a cruise director,
like perfect I can be your cruise director. And so
this this beautiful thing started happening where friends, mostly friends
from media, started calling and saying, hey, I've always wanted
to work with you. I could never really afford you
(21:05):
as a you know, full time all singing, all dancing,
So could we do this project? So, by the way,
full circle moment, I worked on the road show for Growth.
It's heard here that's amazing. So that just as I
was listening to you talk about it, I'm like, how
(21:25):
has it taken until this point to realize we were
always destined to be on the road show to something together? Jolie.
But I want to go back to something you said,
right You said you just know how to get in
an execute. And Alex and I talk a lot about
the conceptual side of the business, and there are so
many great ideas that exist in the world. But being
able to to land the plane, that's magic. And we've
(21:50):
just seen you consistently do that in all sorts of
capacities and clearly some of the the names and company
you were just talking about. I have to imagine the
pressure that comes of putting on some of those events,
but yet it seems like it just comes so natural.
So how do you know how to execute? What's the thing? Can?
Is there a secret formula that maybe is not so secret?
(22:13):
I mean, I am a bull um. I mean, I
just do not take no for an answer like ever.
And I don't mean that is am uh, I have
rough elbows. I actually feel like I am quite um
kind in the process, you know, Like I feel like
(22:34):
I'm I'm not I'm not a win at all costs
type of person, but I am a get it done
at all costs type of person. And I think it's
also and again it sounds cheesy, it's just like the
output is so important to me. It always has been
so like people that can write decks all day and
think big thoughts and strategize that like with literally like
(22:58):
it's like watching pain drive for me, I started a
business so I would never have to write a deck again.
Ps I failed, Um, But I think that, I mean,
I will, I will taunt you like a house until
I can get it done right. So I'm trying to
hire right now. And I have asked no less than
fifty people for recommendations, and I follow up with their recommendations.
(23:22):
I find them on LinkedIn, I find their emails, I
write to them. So I mean, I think it's a
I think it's like a pride thing. But I also
I'm like that in my real life anyway too. It's
like I sometimes don't even realize it, but I'm just
I always feel like if I'm not moving forward, I'm
moving backward. I love the fruits of people's labor standing
(23:44):
for something and um and look, I don't get it twisted.
I mean I've never I've never really thought there's like
this epic nobility to this work, right, Like it should
be fun, it should be light, it should be an experience.
You should you should leave happier than when you came, right,
And so I think for me, it's always been around like,
(24:05):
how can how can this work that I do be
a bright spot in someone's day? Right? And can they
make a new friend? Can that friend ten years from
now remind them of this this moment of generosity they
shared or a stupid little joke. And so I have
a lot of help, is the answer. Right. I have
people around me who pride themselves on like getting that
(24:29):
boulder up the hill, and they do it because they
care about the same thing. I think, if you can
have people on your side, they want to work hard
for you. And that's always been my mentality. It's like
the old you know, more bees with honey and and
I've never understood why people don't just put a dollar
(24:50):
of of something good in it. For others, You're thoughtful
in how you think about getting those connections made um
and where they're made. So how do you think about that?
Like is there any method to your madness? Right or
is it just a kind of natural inclination because you're not.
I just want the audience to know this put and
(25:10):
gather works for huge fashion houses to industrial companies like
GE and IBM two, massive publishers, vice media companies, etcetera.
It's not just brand and fluffy thought leadership. This is launching,
this is launching products technologies. The thing that the differentiates
(25:31):
people is like some people are just like that would
be fun, and I'm like, I'm gonna make six calls
right now and see if I could pull this off,
and like we're just gonna do it. So talk about
that that curation element of like do you go into
planning these um experiences looking for a particular outcome or
is there a general sense of feeling you try to
(25:52):
create or conversation you're trying to, you know, make happen.
I'd say fifty of the time I have a I
have a rough sense of the palette, right, So I
never have like this is what needs to happen. Um,
I feel like there's it's a lot more art and
science in that respect. I think I have, you know,
eight thousand people in my my phone contacts, and um,
(26:17):
I just have a weird brain for details and memories.
Um I remember what someone was wearing, I remember the
detail about their daughter, or you know what gave them
heartburn when they were pregnant. And it's it's not put
on rights, it's just sort of human nature for me now,
I think I had to learn that early on a
(26:38):
sidebars that I sold cars when I was in high school.
It's like the hardest job I was. I was fifteen,
I couldn't drive, I did not have a license, and
I worked for a car dealership in a state, New York.
And I swear this is what gave me this skill.
And you would need these people on the lot that
were coming to you know by a by a ner
used Dodge car truck, right, And so they would come
(27:02):
and they'd say their name and then three minutes later
you would forget their name and I would think, like,
how am I going to sell this person a car?
If I just literally am not addressing them by name,
and so I would I would ask for their license,
and I didn't even need their license, by the way,
and I would go and I would make a copy
(27:23):
of the license, and I would literally just sit there
and be liked red Red, Red, Red Fred, like I
would sing the names. And I think as a result,
I just got so good at remembering people's names and
faces and what they said. By the way, how many
cars yourself? How many cars as youself? Guys? I sold
three cars the first day I sold cars. Ye, I
(27:43):
knew it. I believe it. I got really good at
like learning people's Like people will tell you anything you
need to know about them, you just have to listen,
right and um and my right. But people that want
to network, right, which is I find such a weird
kind of crass word you're going in to learn? Right,
And it's like you could be in a room of
(28:05):
a hundred and there could be one interesting person and
like that to me is successful, Like that's a great
night if you walk out of a place with one
resonant relationship that didn't exist before you went there, Like,
how great is that? I want to know how all
of this it's a mindset. It's a mindset. It's a
mindset and his behavior. How does it relate to your business?
(28:27):
Do you think about taking on or not taking on clients? Yes, right,
with the same kind of criteria. I mean, we have
a really great range of clients and friends from birch
Box to dal Jones to A T and T to
Athleta to Universal Standard to Barry's boot Camp, UM to Amazon,
(28:48):
and there's some really cool emergent tech brands UM. So
I for me, it's never about the company. It's about
the people. And if I also then happen to love
the company, then I will consider it UM. And sometimes
I make myself like the company because I'm just so
obsessed with the person um. But you know, like like
(29:11):
I'm going to do something with the fertility business. I
literally know the like go to zero and then just
keep going down about fertility Like I don't know anything
about it, but I'm obsessed with the people behind it.
And I'm like, you know what, it's it's right for revolution,
and it's so important to women in our you know,
age group and peer groups. So okay, I can learn that.
(29:32):
And I think that the coolest thing about having your
own company, which I can't believe I learned in my
like mid late thirties, is like choice, right, I can
work on like a juice brand, a fashion company, a
big telco, like work with Kanye West. Like there's there's
no two plans that you're like, oh, just dust off
the plan for so and so and give it to
(29:54):
like it's all custom and and it's really hard to recruit.
And I'm recruiting. If anybody listening, what are you hiring for? Yeah,
I'm hiring for people for ACE. People who are grounded
in communications, who can instill confidence in clients and their teammates,
and who either are pillar project managers or have amazing
(30:16):
relationships in the world, just like ACE. Humans who are
hot shit of the work, right, and that can be
ten years experience, that can be twenty years experience, that
can be two years experience. Right. I just hired three
people last month, and so I'm really hiring sort of
account director, senior account director VP levels. I want to
talk about some of the things that you've said that
(30:36):
really resonated with me, and I want to turn them
into for brands how brand should think. So you were
talking about selling amazing but I mean such a simple lesson,
but selling and knowing something about them, caring and listening.
How do brand start connecting at a time where connection
has been completely right, bifurcated, demolished, It's confusing and now
(31:02):
it also feels in some In some cases, I think
a lot of brands feel like if they're trying to
connect with their audiences or trying to connect with their buyer,
did they can overstep but it can feel inauthentic and
finding that that that kind of not only unique place
where they can fill a role, but also real place
I'm not gonna say authentic, but real place they can
(31:24):
fill a role. How do you How do you think
about that? How should brands think about that? I think
I think we're in the in a moment where people
want to feel spoken to and seen right. So I
look at a project we just had the great pleasure
of working on with Athletic, which is part of Gapping
and an amazing b corps. You know, nineties percent women
(31:45):
UM employed and female run and it's a business that
really stands for something and they just expanded into truly
inclusive sizing and UM they're certainly not the first and
thinking about how they show up in that way. It
was it was so simple yet so powerful, and that
(32:06):
they decided to be truly inclusive and equal, so that
the mannequins are inclusive. Right, that you're not going to
Iraq in the back of the store on the you know,
the back right if you're a size to X right,
that is mixed in with the size xcess and um,
all employees are getting training on how to make sure
(32:26):
people feel welcome and seen and that it's a place
for them. And so I think, look, I'm no expert
at this, but I I think if you can just
really think about and be in the shoes of the
people that you are marketing to, selling to, understanding like
how does this fit into their life? Is this a necessity?
(32:47):
Is this a luxury? Like could you not buy clothes
before unless you bought them online? Like that's a that's
a major major breakthrough, right. It seems to also be
the moment of collaborations and also just where where um,
you know, two plus two equals five. I think about
everything in terms of customization and how can you It's like,
(33:09):
what's happening in the zeitgeist? What's the gut? What's like
what are people talking about and how do you immediately
catch that flame? And and how do you think about that? Right? Well,
we have a lot of collaborations coming out of this.
But before you go, we're gonna go to our game, Jolie.
What would you kill? What would you get rid of?
(33:31):
What would you buy? What would you do yourself? I
would kill reply all and about a third to a
half of all technologies right now that can reach me.
I feel like in any given day, I have LinkedIn
pings and people are texting me, people are slacking me.
I'm on the zoom calls, I'm getting email like I
(33:54):
just if anyone please don't invite me to clubhouse, Like
just just don't. I'm never gonna go there, like I
didn't go to Second Life, Like I just I feel
like it's just it's like too much, you know, it's
so so The thing that I would kill is like people,
people repeatedly but in different mediums, trying to reach you.
(34:17):
It's like, hey, I just slapped you on the text.
It's like, okay, well give me four minutes and maybe
I'll get back to It's so I don't know. For me,
it's like it's like too much. I can't have a
creative thought because I'm just like like batting away all
of these ridiculous messages. I love the delete reply all.
(34:37):
I love that. Okay, what would you what would you buy?
I buy a lot of stuff for my kids. Um
and my eBay habits like I am less lemon, like
I buy braws on eBay um so, like I genuinely do. Oh,
I love a good eBay purchase, like, by the way,
the thing to know about me? What was your like
(34:58):
eBay purchase? Um uh ug slippers for my husband and
a snowsuit for my son. And I think I'm Mandolin.
What would you do yourself that you're not already doing?
And I'm not already doing. I hate doing things myself.
Um my, my, I am a champion outsourcer um so
(35:22):
I don't want to do anything that I'm not already doing.
In fact, I want to do fewer things. If people
want to get in touch with you to talk all
things hunt and gather uh and or apply for these
open positions you have, or just to hear about your
latest purchases on eBay, how can they get in touch
with you? They can email me July at Hunt Gather
(35:44):
dot com we'll see you soon. Thanks jolly big, Thanks Julie.
I hope the next time we see you, we don't
have to wait to be in the middle of the
Grand Canyon during see I go back to the conversation
we had with Bob Pittman, what's the need you're filling?
(36:05):
When you look at how Jolie approaches putting people together
to inspire, encourage, there's a deliberate intent and how she
approaches it, and it's filling the need, that's right, not
just I think of what she's hired to do, but
also to ensure that the people who are participating are
also walking away with an experience, which, by the way,
(36:30):
I would imagine creates more business, you know. And so
it's interesting to think about not just the need of
what you are convening people for, but the need of
the people participating on the other side of that engagement. Yeah,
I agree, And I think going back to the very
top of the conversation with what we're talking about around
(36:50):
the greater economy, the passionate economy, this idea of individualism
that is starting to become really loud we lee loud.
I think it's so exciting and I think when you
put different voices together, collaborating on influence and point of
(37:11):
view that has completely diverse perspectives, it starts to become
really exciting. Around how do you start to cater to
your audience and how do you start again? Laura like
use a simple format like direct mail, right, And I
believe at one point at the top of the show,
(37:31):
there used to be a line that said, if you
program for everyone, you program for no one. Laura. You know,
people think that the show has been only around for
four years, but I gotta tell them it's been around
eight we just weren't on air. There are people, a
few in particular that I I am thinking about, who
say I don't need to listen to the podcast. I
(37:53):
get it every day, But Alexa, there's nobody I'd rather
be doing this with. So thank you for showing up
and challenging me all day in every way. Um, I
love doing this, I love talking with you and all
of our guests, and four years feels like a graduation,
but I have a feeling we're just getting started. So
(38:15):
thank you at Landia. Big thank you to Bob Donald, Carter, Andy,
Eric Gayle Val, Michael Jen. We appreciate you thank you
so much for this opportunity. We'll see you in two weeks, Okay,
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