Serge Matta, President of Global Ad Sales at LG Ad Solutions, is turning the TV from a passive box in the corner into the most valuable real estate in media - an interactive command center where content, data, and commerce meet in real time. In this episode, he joins Michael Kassan to talk candidly about making connected TV accountable to real business results, why independent measurement and true partnerships matter, how smarter TV operating systems could reshape how we shop and watch, and the same grounded values that drive his philanthropy off-screen.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good Company is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
You have to be honest with each other, right, I
think sometimes people know me it's like, please don't be
ask me, just tell me the way it is. I
don't have time for bs, I really don't. We just
need to be honest with each other. And I think
you also have to be transparent with your teams, good times,
bad times, and that's really really important. And then to me,
the other thing that's really important is I struggle with
(00:26):
what I call them empty suits of executives that actually
don't roll their sleeves and actually work, excuse my language,
work their asses off. To me, the best executives that
I've worked with other people that actually close deals because
that's what that's what actually builds trust. And people were like,
wait a second, he or she's in the trenches with
us and he's they're trying to actually make make sure
(00:49):
that we all hit our numbers.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I'm Michael Casson and this is Good Company. Together, we'll
explore their dynamic intersection media, marketing, entertainment, sports and technology.
I'll be joined by visionaries, pioneers, and yes, even a
couple of disruptors for candid conversations as we break down
how these masters of ingenuity are shaping the future of business,
culture and everything in between. My bet is you'll pick
(01:19):
up a lesson or two along the way. As I
like to say, it's all good, Welcome back to good company.
The TV used to be just another device in the
living room. Today it's the main stage where content, commerce
and technology collide, and my guest is right at the
center of it. Serge Mata, President of Global ad Sales
(01:41):
at LGAD Solutions, has consistently positioned himself at pivotal industry
turning points. His career spans mobile location, measurement, and the
television space, each step marked by practical innovation and strategic foresight.
At comScore, he spent more than a decade helping the
industry understand audience behavior and performance, shaping the measurement standards
(02:04):
that define digital value. Now at lg he's transforming smart
TVs from passive viewing experiences into interactive command centers of
our digital lives. Under his leadership, LGAD Solutions has expanded
across markets and secured a series of strategic partnerships that
are reshaping how brands connect with audiences. At the moment
(02:26):
of inspiration with international sensibilities and fluency across business functions,
Serge uniquely bridges the technical and commercial worlds. He's earned
a reputation as an artful deal maker, the person in
the room who starts what clients actually needs and keeps
that at the core of every partnership conversation and their
(02:47):
substance behind Serge's business decisions. His commitment to education, access
and philanthropy reveals a leader who applies the same discipline
thinking to community challenges as he does to market opportunities. Today,
we'll explore what happens when the most influential screen in
your home becomes the most valuable real estate and advertising,
(03:07):
and how that changes the game for marketers, content creators,
and viewers alike. It is my pleasure to welcome a
good friend, Serge Mata, to good company. Let's dive in, Hi,
Michael Ariel, Sarge, what I'd like to do is kind
of give our listeners a view of your professional journey.
Your professional journey kind of went from the measurement to
(03:28):
the living room. When you've gone from defining digital measurement
to shaping connected TV. When you look back, are there
key inflection points that change the way you think about
media and value creation. On that journey, there are I
think the biggest thing for me is as CTV has
grown in the past couple of years, it's become like
(03:51):
the mainstay. Obviously, everybody is investing in CTV, with linear
declining at a much rapid pace than anybody ever foresaw. Frankly,
with out the NFL and without sports. I don't know
what linear is these days.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
But not what it not what it used to be,
not what it used to be for sure. And I
think the thing about at least throughout my career has
been you can't have any of these mediums succeed without
independent third party measurement, right, And to me that's been
the most critical piece of it. Like you can have
first party measurement, you can have whatever, but without Actually
(04:27):
we used to say a saying at com scores, you
can't grade your own homework, right exactly. I strongly believe that,
and I remember having a lot of different executive meetings
with executives at NBC and others saying, how do we
make sure that this is not just measured by ourselves,
but measured by an independent third party provider. When you
(04:47):
have that as your basis then when we're trying to
make When I joined LG, the ADS business didn't exist.
We didn't have an ADS business. And when clients come
to us now and you know five years ago, there
was nothing. Now it's a massive global business. But the
reason why we've been able to grow so much, Yes,
it's all about it's about the brand, it's CTV and
(05:10):
all that. But we don't grade our own homework. We
are going in and going and telling clients measure us.
However you want to measure us. You want to measure
us through an MMP grade, You want to measure us
through a research firm like Nielsen, COMMSC great, you want
to measure us through your own foot traffic companies like
(05:30):
in market and ground. Fine, we don't care. We really
don't care. And clients see that amount of transparency and
that's why they flop to us, to you, you know,
from a media activation. One of the things that I'm
super excited about is the idea of how do we
(05:51):
make CTV now based on outcomes? Pay us only based
on outcomes, and outcomes is measured by you. It's heresy.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Search, it's heresy.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I know, it's talking. It really is shocking. It's like,
are you guys kidding me? This has not ever been done? No,
it has not been done? Why not really sure? Why?
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Well, I'll tell you why. I'll tell you I search
there's been gatekeepers in our industry for so long, and
gatekeepers are the ones who are making those decisions. And
you're so right about the you know, creating your own homework.
We banty around that term the walled gardens, but that
is exactly you know. I give credit to Martin Sorel
actually back in the day was the first person I
(06:33):
heard refer to it that way on a public stage
about creating your own homework. It's not okay. I want
to ask you, though, on your journey when you step
into a new business or a leadership role, what do
you diagnose first? Do you look at culture? Do you
look at data? Do you look at talent? Revenue? And
(06:53):
how does that first move shape you know, the journey.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
I think if everybody anyway that knows me, there's two
things that shape me the most. It's usually I'm very,
very driven by data. So nothing, we don't make any
decisions here without actual, reliable, actionable data that we can
then make. It just present me the data and then
let's look at it inside and out to make sure
that before we make any business issues. And that's how
(07:19):
we're going. And then obviously a revenue for me, revenue
has been always the key here is how do we
continue to grow not immediate quick revenue. How do we
actually go to this quality revenue. And that's what we've
built here at LG and what we build elsewhere throughout
the throughout the career. So those are the things. Obviously
(07:39):
culture is important on all of that. But at the
end of the day, how do you make a decision
without tangible, actionable, reliable data before we can move forward.
And that's when somebody comes in to me and says, hey,
I want to build X y Z, great, show me
the data before we can make it. And if it's support.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
And by the way, because you said revenue, show me
the data and then show me the money, show me
the money. One of my favorite movies you had me
at Hello Serge bringing us back here smart TVs and
I said it or you know, it's like smart money
and dumb money. Smart TVs used to be a device.
Now they behave more like an operating system. How does
(08:23):
that change? The way you think about advertising and the
role of advertising on that screen because it is now
a different device obviously.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Yeah, and I think we're also a massive NFL fan,
massive football fan. I think we're only in the first
quarter here, I really do. Even though we've seen massive,
incredible growth among all of the OEMs, US, Samsung, Roku, Visio,
all of us have grown significantly, But I still think
we're in the first quarter. The TV is used to
be a dumb device, let's be absolute. Used to be.
(08:54):
Then the and the OEMs all woke up and said, oh,
we need to go build something called an operating system,
and operating system should be smart and lo and behold.
LG goes ahead and creates a webOS actually acquired the
operating system back in the day from HP and then
rebranded it and now increase its functionality significantly. But the
(09:16):
first thing is, yes, you can have content, but the
way you get in So, for example, you turn on
the TV, we have intelligence first. There's ad units that
we can immediately serve you. And think of it. Back
in the day of Yeah, I think we're all dating ourselves.
Back in the day of Yahoo and AOL, people would
buy the homepage well, loan the same thing. We have
(09:39):
the home screen, we have the homepage. You turn on
the first thing, and we can then go ahead and
target you that way. Now, there's something called in each
of these OS's there's intelligence. There's something called acr ACR
is really a fancy word of software that sits on
the machine on the TV that privacy friendly. It's all
(09:59):
opted in and it tracks what people are watching, both
on content and on ads, and that way we can
serve you the most relevant ads. It doesn't have to
serve you ads that you don't care about. So that's
step one, that's really step on. Now that's been done
for a few years now. I think where we're going
(10:19):
with it is how do we make it even more smarter?
How do we make the OS? So let me give
you an example that we're not there yet, but this
is something that I'm very passionate about. It's something that
we're working on and I think it's something that the
industry needs to go as a whole. Look at all
the different crazy weather systems that we're in right now.
So if you have a thunderstorm or a crazy hurricane
(10:41):
that's about to hit your house and you're watching the
NFL on Fox. If you're watching that on linear, you're
going to get an alert that why don't you go
take cover? And there is and it's going to show
you the Doppler radar and it's going to tell you
where it is, and it's going to happen over your
house and you should go take great lineer is declining. Everybody,
(11:05):
the majority of homes is watching streaming. Now fast forward,
you're watching TV, you're watching Netflix, you're watching Amazon Prime.
That same hurricane is about to hit your house. Do
you get any sort of alert? The answer is no,
you don't. But you know what the operating system of
the TV can influence that and if there are places
(11:26):
And that's just a small example of how can the
OS on the TV become actually a lot smarter so
that you can as a user leverage its functionalities. Go
take cover. Now, there's massive advertising opportunities associated with that. Now,
I'm not telling you if there's a hurricane coming to
(11:48):
you or how about to hit your house, a sponsor
to you by home depot that probably would not be
very appropriate. But you know what pollen season is coming,
flu seasons. There's so many things that you can do
it's just how do we make these operating systems?
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Well, but Serge, what you're talking about is, you know
CTV really being the intersection of lean back and lean forward.
I mean, you know, I don't know if that makes
any sense, but I guess it does. You're kind of
in that pivot between lean back and lean forward. How
does that hybrid behavior force brands to think about the
(12:26):
stories they tell in the advertising realm?
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Wells, There is a lot of different ways the brands
can leverage this, right. They can leverage it through upper funnel.
They could leverage it through branding. They could leverage it
through performance based like we're going in it at so
as an example, the home screen, I really want to
focus a bit on the homeser. It's such a huge
unique identify differentiator. There's a lot of CTV thirty second
(12:53):
sixty second ads out there and we have it and
a lot of other companies have it. But the home
screen is really relevant to just a few handful companies,
LG being one of them. It used to be that
for we would allow only media and entertainment companies, so Amazon,
Prime Video, NBC, any of those guys, or Fox to
(13:14):
come in and just say, tune in to XYZ show
that's about to start, So the Olympics is starting on Friday,
or the Super Bowl is happening on Sunday. Tune in
a few hours and we can tell them great, that
was what it used to be two years ago. LG
was the first one to say, why does it have
to be just based on tune in? Why does it
have to be just for media entertainment. Why can't it
(13:36):
not just go to any general market advertiser and say
this is a prime real estate to go ahead and
advertise to a very unique audience. It's the first thing
that you can see. It can be video, it has
sound on It can be targeted. It can be based
on a performance or not performance. It doesn't matter. It
(13:57):
can be for branding. Think of a luxury vertical or
an advertiser like Cartier coming in and showing exactly their
amazing products that they sell in a three D format,
right in your face in the middle of the living room.
It's opened up so many opportunities and brands and cmos
(14:18):
are taking advantage of it. They're finally seeing that opportunity.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Now.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
With everything in life, these things take time. It doesn't
happen overnight, but that education we believe is there. I
was actually just in Dubai just last week. Advertisers in
the Middle East are leveraging it like the luxury vertical
over there. Automakers are leveraging it. It's really been such
a phenomenal way of looking at things, and it's such
(14:43):
an impactful medium for advertising.
Speaker 4 (14:47):
Good company will be right back after the break.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
There's another area that is obviously on fire in our industry,
and that's RMN or retail media. We've started calling it
commerce media more than retail media because it's not just
retailers who are playing that game obviously, but it's starting
to look crowded in the retail media space. I think
it's clear that CTV is becoming the premium billboard for
(15:23):
retail media. Talk about that, I mean, when we talk
about what Walmart and Visio did, play that out for
us in your view.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
First of all, I think it was an incredible move
for Walmart and Visio. And I know they're competitors on
the Visio side, but we all corroborate with each other,
but I think that was a fantastic move on their part.
We see it as two different ways from the commerce
and the retail media. I think we'll eventually get there,
but I don't see people going out there today and
(15:53):
actually using the TV for their main source of shopping.
It may or may not get there. We've I don't
know lot of companies have tried it where you can
go and actually do either through a QR code or
click here and take your to a website on the
TV and go buy our product. For that to become
a thing, the workflow of it has to be extremely easy.
(16:14):
What Amazon did a few a bunch of years ago
in terms of the one click that revolutionized everything. If
we want the TV platform, the smart TVs to become that,
it has to be easy for the consumer. I can
never imagine a consumer going in with the remote, going
in putting their name, address, letter by letter. They they're
(16:35):
shopping their credit card for me.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
If you can do it, great. If I have to
be punching you know, I agree with you, it'll never
It'll never happen.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Exactly it has. The workflow has to be first called
the second thing from a retail media perspective, and I
think that's where the OEMs have an advantage. What we
have seen over the past couple of months over a year,
is there is. It turns out there's a lot of
retailers out there that have, for some reason or another.
(17:07):
Don't ask me why, but for some reason or another
invested millions and millions of dollars creating their own white
label TVs. And for us, that's a bit of a
head scratcher. Why would you do that in the first place,
And how are you generating Because we all know the
economics of building TVs it's not great. Let's just say
(17:27):
that it's not good. And then the money is usually
all in the advertising instead of monetizing. The margins are
not in building TVs, that's for sure. So what we've
seen is all these retailers globally, I was, like I said,
we were in the Middle East. There's a retailer that
we met with that has actual white label TVs. They're
(17:50):
not generating any revenue. So it's literally they go ahead
and create any that they bring in a random operating system,
they stick it onto their TVs, and they sell their
TVs and it's a one time sale and that's it.
And the first question we asked them is, well, how
are you making recurring revenue out of this and they
were like, well you need like there's the way to
(18:12):
make recurring revenue Like what I wish? I Actually some
clients come on. It was actually pretty comical. We were like,
what the simplest solution is, what if we bring you
an operating system and we put it on the TVs
and then you will help you monetize the inventory and
(18:33):
literally write you a check. And they were like, this
is the easiest cell ever. Like we have never been
We've never been at least informed that that could be
a possibility. But that's where we from an OS and
from an operating system from a TV, that's where we're
going because at the end of the day, we can't
just rely on our growth by just organic growth from
(18:54):
the people going into Costco, Best Buy, Amazon and buying
our TVs. We just have to leverage other TV manufacturers.
And there is We're not talking hundreds of thousands, We're
talking tens and tens of millions of TVs globally that
people have manufacturers or retailers have created on their own
and zero monetization is happening on those TVs and this
(19:18):
would be a source of revenue for them that with
extremely high margin let's talk.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
About your partnership strategy. Surch on the heels of some
notable partnerships in twenty twenty five. I'd love to unpack
your partnership philosophy. What has to be true for you
to say this meaningfully advances the ecosystem? I mean, you know,
what's your your grading system, what's your hierarchical kind of approach?
Speaker 2 (19:46):
First and foremost, three is the It's all about the people.
At the end of the day, it's can I sit
there in front of this person and trust this individual.
We have have unbelievable partnerships. And I don't think that
I hate the word, for example, the reseller. That is
probably the worst world IQ you could ever use for me.
These are partners of ours and not resellers of ours.
(20:09):
But there are partners of ours that are so strategic
to our success. But I know when something happens, there's
always something that's going to happen. I can pick up
the phone and call the CEO or the head of
the cro at that company and say, hey, let's solve
this together. There's always going to be issues in any partnership,
(20:29):
and that to me is the first thing. Is there
The trust level that we've built over the past few years,
if not more. You know, A great example that I
will always state is the partnership that LG has with Magnite.
When I can go sit in front of Michael Barrett
every single day and Sean Buckley and just say, guys,
let's figure this thing out together. And this is why
(20:50):
we've we work together so well. We've trusted them, they
trust us, And at the end of the day, it's
all about relationships. The one thing that I keep on
saying AI is never going to replay is the power
of the human connection and the power of relationships. The
other thing that we have to also from a partnership
that I look at is it can't be one sided.
(21:10):
That's something that people always always seem to miss. It's like,
what's this in it for me? And I'm like, I
don't know. This doesn't work for it for everybody. It's like,
you want everybody has to be good for both parties,
and you just have to be transparent about it. They're
gonna make money and we're gonna make money. But at
the end of the day, let's let's be honest with
each other versus try to hide things from each another.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
How do you navigate that, you know, which really keeps
a clear focus on what, as you said, you need
something for both sides, what are both sides actually need.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Right, And that's something that it takes time, right, like
especially like you know, like when I have to go
talk to the folks in Korea, for example, and I
have to get a deal done, and they were like, wait,
what's in it for LG. And we'll have to explain
it that this is what's in it for LG. But
this is more importantly or equally important, this is what's
in it for the partner and for them to succeed,
because we can't do everything by ourselves. We literally cannot
(22:01):
do everything by ourselves. And we need to make sure
that our partners, our partners are reaping the benefits of
what we provide, but we're also succeeding. You know, when
we first started at LG, here we got into these
massive deals and people were hesitant. People were very very
hesitant into getting into some of these partnerships. After two
or three years, and when we renegotiate them and we
(22:23):
renew them, it's such a breeze because the past two
or three years it's been so easy and everybody's making money.
They're making money, we're making money.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
So it's a happy partnership. Let me let me, let
me switch gears geographically for a second surge. You've been
on a mission with global expansion, and obviously LG is
a global brand. But from your perspective, Brazil, Australia, you've
been moving and shaking and putting some miles on you know,
your frequent flyer account. What did each of those countries
(22:52):
teach you, pick one Brazil Australia about how people might
use this device differently the TV for me, LG.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
As you said, is a global partner, is a global
global company. We have two hundred million plus TVs globally.
There's not a single country in the world that does
not have access to lgtvs. It's really the size is insane.
It really is insane. But and we've our growth. You know,
while we've done really well in the United States, the
(23:21):
majority of the growth these days comes as a smaller denominator,
but the majority of our growth comes from overseas. It
to me, everything has to be it has to be
when we launch a product, everything has like what is
the global aspect of it? Everybody knows that. Internally, it's
like search is going to come in and ask what
is It cannot be a US centric thing. It has
to be a global, global offering as well. So that's
(23:46):
the most important thing for US now. In every single country,
we've noticed that things are different and what works in
the United States or what works in the UK doesn't
work elsewhere. Like give you a a small, small example.
We've seen in certain countries that the perception of free
(24:10):
advertising supported television so fast is not as great as
it is as it is in the United States. In
some cases they don't want anything to touch shoot it
with a fast, but they use it, but they call
it something else. And I had no idea, literally, I
had no idea going in that this is what's going on.
Like if you take examples, like in Australia. I was
(24:31):
just there we launched our Australia office. They when you
talk to them and the benefits are fast, they all
love it. But you mentioned the word fast. They all
want to run away. But when you talk about the
offering and what it is, they're like, oh, yeah, we
want that. I'm like, guys, that's called fast. They're like,
please don't call it that.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Call it's a search that's about storytelling and narrative because
the market is looking at it.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Yeah exactly, Yeah, but it's everywhere you go. There's also
these different quirks, and but you have to go in
thinking about it that again. If the worst thing you
can do is say what works in the United States
works everywhere, and a lot of companies have done that
and they have failed miserably. Now, the one thing that
I don't know why hasn't happened in CTV, which I
(25:15):
hope we can eventually get there from a global perspective,
is having campaigns and media bought globally sourced from like
across all the continent. For some reason, I think we're
going to get there. So still, I'm an optimist. I
think we can get there. I hope so too. But
like the US buys the US, the Middle East region
(25:35):
buys the Middleese region, It's like, when are we going
to actually all come together and just buy holistically on
a global basis. You and I could figure it out.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
We can change the world. When advertise a better time.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
It's exciting, it's exciting. Still, We're going to hit.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Pause for a moment, but stay with us after the break,
We've got more insights to share. In your career art,
you've been involved in major industry shifts, some with headwinds,
(26:12):
some with tailwinds. How do you keep your teams and
you know, the people that you need to motivate internally
focused when the environment is changing so damn fast. I mean,
it's like whack a mole, this that, the next thing,
move here, go there.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Yeah, I think it's a struggle. Right, it's a struggle.
But you have to be honest with each other, right.
I think sometimes people know me it's like, please, don't
be ask me, just tell me the way it is.
I don't have time for bs, I really don't. We
just need to be honest with each other. And I
think you also have to be transparent with your teams
good times, bad times, And that's really really important. And
(26:48):
then to me, the other thing that's really important is
I struggle with what I call them empty suits of
executives that actually don't roll their sleeves and actually work
excuse me, language work their asses off. To me, the
best executives that I've worked with are the people that
actually close deals, because that's what that's what actually builds
(27:08):
trust and people were like, wait a second, he or
she's in the trenches with us, and he's they're trying
to actually make make sure that we all hit our numbers.
That to me is the most important thing at the
end of the day. It's like, do we roll up
your sleeves and actually get stuff done versus just pontificating
saying you need to go work harder.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
Look, those are all lessons that people should listen to,
because what you said about closing the deal, obviously it's
it's a journey, but it always ends up that the
person at that end of it, the close end of it,
gets the glory. But I understand it's always a team
effort all the way through.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
It's a team effort. And you know what, I also
want to make sure that everybody understands, like, you know,
we mentioned this in terms. You know at LG all
the times it takes a villager and we're truly true
mean it, Yes, sales a lot of the times and
account rangement and always gets the glory. They close the
deals great, but you know what, without our engineering team,
without our product team, without our adults team, none of
(28:12):
this can happen.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
What I learned in the early days of my career
as a lawyer, when you'd sit around the partnership table
and you were doling out bonuses at the end of
the year, everybody would want to wait the value of
the rain maker as being most important. Who's making it
rain who's bringing in the revenue? And I would always say, yeah,
but a rain maker. If there aren't good umbrella carriers,
(28:36):
guess what happens. Everybody gets wet. So you need to
value your umbrella carriers equally with the rain maker. Now,
if I apply the other logic that you learn in
law school is the butt floor argument. I guess butt
for the rain maker. You don't need umbrella carriers, but
you need good umbrella carriers.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Need them both. You need them both equally important. We
can never forget yet about them, right like that is
the most important thing here.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
It's the unsung heroes, serge, I want, I want to
get very personal for a moment. Then I'm going to
have fun with my lightning round. But one of the
things you've done in the realm of how I grew up,
I was taught by my parents and my grandparents one
must split their life into thirds. A third for your family,
a third for your business and a third for your community.
(29:23):
However that works out and it's never equal at one
point of maybe ninety ten one way or the other,
but unbalanced when you look at the run of the show,
hopefully you break it out that way. You've got an
important partnership with add Good that opens up the CTV
space to nonprofits. Can you talk about that in the
Impact Yeah, at the.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
End of the day, I think the relationshsip that we
have with that good is where we're actually providing and
donating actual inventory to to you know, think of it
as it's our opportunity. We have a medium, we have TV,
we have inventory. Can we go and provide that there's
a medium and for free inventory out there and just
(30:05):
send whatever the impact or whatever the cause is to me.
The philanthropy and the community thing is extremely important. I
want to mention one. There was like two partnerships last
year was one that I got involved in. It's a
big one that's in the attech community. I don't know
if you have heard of the team Dyer guys, the
guys that go ahead Jay Sears and his team and we.
Speaker 5 (30:26):
Go with with and he's involved with obviously with Jeff
Green and others at the trade desk, and we actually
go build schools in impoverished countries like in Malawi or
in Guatemala and others.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It takes a lot of effort. I was not I
was this close in actually making it to Malawi. I
ended up getting to Kenya and then unfortunately world events
stopped me from going to Malawi. But it we were
able to raise a lot of money to get there,
and I'm hoping one day in the next few months
to actually go and I actually build a school for people.
(31:02):
Don't realize how good we have it here. They just
have no I another another one that we had. I'm
a massive, like I said, massive football fan, and my
team is used to be called the Redskins. Now they're
called the Commanders. Not our year, this past year, but
a few years ago I got involved in this project.
If you think about it, there was these this this idea.
(31:25):
You go to these schools and we're talking schools and
unfortunately not in the best of areas. We're talking. You
don't want to walk there during at night or during
the day. You just don't want to be in that community.
Don't want it. It's not safe. Let's just say it.
Just it's not safe. But what we realized is we
were talking to the principles and talking to the community saying,
what if through the team, we could just go ahead
(31:47):
and create a laundry center in the school, branded or
whatever you want to brand it, branded the Redskins, branded
the Commanders, whatever you put burgaining gold, put a bunch
of HVAC and put washers and dryers, and get get
students to bring in their school their dirty laundry every
single day and see what happens. We tried this. We're
now in eighty plus schools all over the Northern Virginia,
(32:11):
Virginia and DC area, and what ended up happening is
students would the people would actually students would actually come
to school. The attendance started increasing because and you started
asking them, why are you coming to school? They were like, well,
I have clean clothes. Before I didn't come to school
because I didn't have clean clothes. Next thing we did,
we opened it on the weekends. Now we have laundry
(32:33):
centers because if this kid doesn't have access to a
laundry machine, and you better believe the guardian, it's not
even the parent, but the guardian of that individual doesn't
have the ability to wash their clothes. And now we've
done that. It's again, simple, simple idea, but that can
make a massive, massive difference in the community.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Well, my hat's off to you for what you've accomplished
in your business career, but I double that in terms
of philanthropy because I think it's so important. Searge, We're
going to flip to the lightning round and I'm gonna
pick a couple of things and throw them your way, Sir.
It's your greatest professional fear losing.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
I don't like to lose.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
I like that, Serge. Was there a particular mentor early
in your career and what piece of advice did he
or she give you that that that inspired you.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Oh? Wow, there's been a lot. But I'm gonna be honest.
I'm gonna probably I lost my dad a year ago
and there's not been a single day since that day
that I haven't thought about him. And he taught me
one thing and just the level of trust and being
honest with people. I literally I never thought how difficult
(33:50):
that was that has been. I actually it was I
was during it was during Cees and I was in
Vegas and I got the word that all of a
sudden he suddenly passed, and I have to tell you
it was probably the most difficult thing ever. And literally
every day that has gone by, I don't I think
about it. And it's just it's not obviously as a
father figure, it's not your traditional mentor, but you learn
(34:12):
a lot from people, especially parents.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Well, I certainly agree with that, and I don't want
to make you depressed, but I lost my father forty
four years ago and I don't lose a day that
I don't think about him. So yeah, that's the bad
news for the good news, depending on how you look
at it. I know you're a big sports guy. What
are your favorite teams?
Speaker 2 (34:38):
You know, frankly, there's only one team for me, and
it's called the Washington Commanders. I bleed Burgundy and Gold.
I will do. I will watch every single game. I
usually go. I go there to every single NFL home game.
I will usually go to every three or four away games.
To me, the NFL is special. What they've done is amazing.
And we didn't have a great year last year, but
(35:02):
the year before was a magical season for us, and
the fact that we made it all the way to
the NFC Championship was something that I will never forget.
And I love the fact that my kids are also
die hard Commanders fans as well. We're building a generation
of Dieharts.
Speaker 3 (35:16):
So when was the last time you saw a person
or a company in our industry do something that you
thought was clever and forced yourself to say, damn, I
wish i'd thought of that.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
There's been quite a bit. I've started. I'm starting to
think of which one what comes top of mind. Obviously
there's definitely quite a bit. I'm just trying to figure
out which one. Would you got me on this one
for a second.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
Well, we'll come to another one. I'll give you some
time to think about it. I'll give you one more.
It's an easier one. If there's one industry buzzword you
could wish away forever, what would it.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Be right now? Any thing to do with AI. I
is such an overused word. I don't think most people
don't even know what that means. And I think it's
It's driving me a bit crazy right now, because I
love how somebody can come in and saying we've become
AI experts. Three months ago, they didn't know what the
heck it was. So I just want to. I think
(36:19):
obviously AI is the future, no doubt about it. But
I think for us it's how do we build more
efficiencies internally to to build that. Now back to your
original question, I just thought of this. I think the
there are I.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
Knew you would by the way, Surge, I knew you
probably example, But it is to have to do with
AI and it's a small little it's a startup that
I they're.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
They're onto something. I really do believe they're onto something.
The company called Swivel that Joe Hirsh has created him
and he used to He actually created spring Spring serve
of the company that ended up Magnete ended up buying.
They are building the and to end agentic workflow that
(37:03):
I think if somebody can go and I know there's
all these protocols that are being built and everybody's working
on it, but somebody is going to crack that code.
They seem to be the leaders in that space right now. Now.
Just to be very clear, no one's generating any revenue
out of it right now. I was actually meeting with
a major agency executive last night for dinner and I
(37:25):
was like, so, how much money are you generating out
of these things and they're like, come on, guys, there's
none of that is happening. But we're all testing it.
We all believe in two to three years it's going
to become a the thing. But I wish I was
able to solve that six to nine months ago. But
it's not too late, because I think we can still
get there.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
Well, Search, Mada. I love your I love your energy,
and you know, I love the fact that the word
you don't like is lose. Searge, I want to thank
you for joining Good Company. I know our audience will
enjoy this converse. I certainly did.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
Thanks, Cassin, appreciate it. Take care.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
I'm Michael Casson. Thanks for listening to Good Company.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Good Company is brought to you by Three C Ventures
and iHeart Podcasts. Special thanks to Alexis Borger Pudeo, our
executive producer and head of Content and Talent, and to
Carl Catle, executive producer at iHeart Podcasts. Episodes are produced
and edited by Mary Doo. Thanks for joining us. We'll
see you next time.
Good Company is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
You have to be honest with each other, right, I
think sometimes people know me it's like, please don't be
ask me, just tell me the way it is. I
don't have time for bs, I really don't. We just
need to be honest with each other. And I think
you also have to be transparent with your teams, good times,
bad times, and that's really really important. And then to me,
the other thing that's really important is I struggle with
(00:26):
what I call them empty suits of executives that actually
don't roll their sleeves and actually work, excuse my language,
work their asses off. To me, the best executives that
I've worked with other people that actually close deals because
that's what that's what actually builds trust. And people were like,
wait a second, he or she's in the trenches with
us and he's they're trying to actually make make sure
(00:49):
that we all hit our numbers.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I'm Michael Casson and this is Good Company. Together, we'll
explore their dynamic intersection media, marketing, entertainment, sports and technology.
I'll be joined by visionaries, pioneers, and yes, even a
couple of disruptors for candid conversations as we break down
how these masters of ingenuity are shaping the future of business,
culture and everything in between. My bet is you'll pick
(01:19):
up a lesson or two along the way. As I
like to say, it's all good, Welcome back to good company.
The TV used to be just another device in the
living room. Today it's the main stage where content, commerce
and technology collide, and my guest is right at the
center of it. Serge Mata, President of Global ad Sales
(01:41):
at LGAD Solutions, has consistently positioned himself at pivotal industry
turning points. His career spans mobile location, measurement, and the
television space, each step marked by practical innovation and strategic foresight.
At comScore, he spent more than a decade helping the
industry understand audience behavior and performance, shaping the measurement standards
(02:04):
that define digital value. Now at lg he's transforming smart
TVs from passive viewing experiences into interactive command centers of
our digital lives. Under his leadership, LGAD Solutions has expanded
across markets and secured a series of strategic partnerships that
are reshaping how brands connect with audiences. At the moment
(02:26):
of inspiration with international sensibilities and fluency across business functions,
Serge uniquely bridges the technical and commercial worlds. He's earned
a reputation as an artful deal maker, the person in
the room who starts what clients actually needs and keeps
that at the core of every partnership conversation and their
(02:47):
substance behind Serge's business decisions. His commitment to education, access
and philanthropy reveals a leader who applies the same discipline
thinking to community challenges as he does to market opportunities. Today,
we'll explore what happens when the most influential screen in
your home becomes the most valuable real estate and advertising,
(03:07):
and how that changes the game for marketers, content creators,
and viewers alike. It is my pleasure to welcome a
good friend, Serge Mata, to good company. Let's dive in, Hi,
Michael Ariel, Sarge, what I'd like to do is kind
of give our listeners a view of your professional journey.
Your professional journey kind of went from the measurement to
(03:28):
the living room. When you've gone from defining digital measurement
to shaping connected TV. When you look back, are there
key inflection points that change the way you think about
media and value creation. On that journey, there are I
think the biggest thing for me is as CTV has
grown in the past couple of years, it's become like
(03:51):
the mainstay. Obviously, everybody is investing in CTV, with linear
declining at a much rapid pace than anybody ever foresaw. Frankly,
with out the NFL and without sports. I don't know
what linear is these days.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
But not what it not what it used to be,
not what it used to be for sure. And I
think the thing about at least throughout my career has
been you can't have any of these mediums succeed without
independent third party measurement, right, And to me that's been
the most critical piece of it. Like you can have
first party measurement, you can have whatever, but without Actually
(04:27):
we used to say a saying at com scores, you
can't grade your own homework, right exactly. I strongly believe that,
and I remember having a lot of different executive meetings
with executives at NBC and others saying, how do we
make sure that this is not just measured by ourselves,
but measured by an independent third party provider. When you
(04:47):
have that as your basis then when we're trying to
make When I joined LG, the ADS business didn't exist.
We didn't have an ADS business. And when clients come
to us now and you know five years ago, there
was nothing. Now it's a massive global business. But the
reason why we've been able to grow so much, Yes,
it's all about it's about the brand, it's CTV and
(05:10):
all that. But we don't grade our own homework. We
are going in and going and telling clients measure us.
However you want to measure us. You want to measure
us through an MMP grade, You want to measure us
through a research firm like Nielsen, COMMSC great, you want
to measure us through your own foot traffic companies like
(05:30):
in market and ground. Fine, we don't care. We really
don't care. And clients see that amount of transparency and
that's why they flop to us, to you, you know,
from a media activation. One of the things that I'm
super excited about is the idea of how do we
(05:51):
make CTV now based on outcomes? Pay us only based
on outcomes, and outcomes is measured by you. It's heresy.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Search, it's heresy.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I know, it's talking. It really is shocking. It's like,
are you guys kidding me? This has not ever been done? No,
it has not been done? Why not really sure? Why?
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Well, I'll tell you why. I'll tell you I search
there's been gatekeepers in our industry for so long, and
gatekeepers are the ones who are making those decisions. And
you're so right about the you know, creating your own homework.
We banty around that term the walled gardens, but that
is exactly you know. I give credit to Martin Sorel
actually back in the day was the first person I
(06:33):
heard refer to it that way on a public stage
about creating your own homework. It's not okay. I want
to ask you, though, on your journey when you step
into a new business or a leadership role, what do
you diagnose first? Do you look at culture? Do you
look at data? Do you look at talent? Revenue? And
(06:53):
how does that first move shape you know, the journey.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
I think if everybody anyway that knows me, there's two
things that shape me the most. It's usually I'm very,
very driven by data. So nothing, we don't make any
decisions here without actual, reliable, actionable data that we can
then make. It just present me the data and then
let's look at it inside and out to make sure
that before we make any business issues. And that's how
(07:19):
we're going. And then obviously a revenue for me, revenue
has been always the key here is how do we
continue to grow not immediate quick revenue. How do we
actually go to this quality revenue. And that's what we've
built here at LG and what we build elsewhere throughout
the throughout the career. So those are the things. Obviously
(07:39):
culture is important on all of that. But at the
end of the day, how do you make a decision
without tangible, actionable, reliable data before we can move forward.
And that's when somebody comes in to me and says, hey,
I want to build X y Z, great, show me
the data before we can make it. And if it's support.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
And by the way, because you said revenue, show me
the data and then show me the money, show me
the money. One of my favorite movies you had me
at Hello Serge bringing us back here smart TVs and
I said it or you know, it's like smart money
and dumb money. Smart TVs used to be a device.
Now they behave more like an operating system. How does
(08:23):
that change? The way you think about advertising and the
role of advertising on that screen because it is now
a different device obviously.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Yeah, and I think we're also a massive NFL fan,
massive football fan. I think we're only in the first
quarter here, I really do. Even though we've seen massive,
incredible growth among all of the OEMs, US, Samsung, Roku, Visio,
all of us have grown significantly, But I still think
we're in the first quarter. The TV is used to
be a dumb device, let's be absolute. Used to be.
(08:54):
Then the and the OEMs all woke up and said, oh,
we need to go build something called an operating system,
and operating system should be smart and lo and behold.
LG goes ahead and creates a webOS actually acquired the
operating system back in the day from HP and then
rebranded it and now increase its functionality significantly. But the
(09:16):
first thing is, yes, you can have content, but the
way you get in So, for example, you turn on
the TV, we have intelligence first. There's ad units that
we can immediately serve you. And think of it. Back
in the day of Yeah, I think we're all dating ourselves.
Back in the day of Yahoo and AOL, people would
buy the homepage well, loan the same thing. We have
(09:39):
the home screen, we have the homepage. You turn on
the first thing, and we can then go ahead and
target you that way. Now, there's something called in each
of these OS's there's intelligence. There's something called acr ACR
is really a fancy word of software that sits on
the machine on the TV that privacy friendly. It's all
(09:59):
opted in and it tracks what people are watching, both
on content and on ads, and that way we can
serve you the most relevant ads. It doesn't have to
serve you ads that you don't care about. So that's
step one, that's really step on. Now that's been done
for a few years now. I think where we're going
(10:19):
with it is how do we make it even more smarter?
How do we make the OS? So let me give
you an example that we're not there yet, but this
is something that I'm very passionate about. It's something that
we're working on and I think it's something that the
industry needs to go as a whole. Look at all
the different crazy weather systems that we're in right now.
So if you have a thunderstorm or a crazy hurricane
(10:41):
that's about to hit your house and you're watching the
NFL on Fox. If you're watching that on linear, you're
going to get an alert that why don't you go
take cover? And there is and it's going to show
you the Doppler radar and it's going to tell you
where it is, and it's going to happen over your
house and you should go take great lineer is declining. Everybody,
(11:05):
the majority of homes is watching streaming. Now fast forward,
you're watching TV, you're watching Netflix, you're watching Amazon Prime.
That same hurricane is about to hit your house. Do
you get any sort of alert? The answer is no,
you don't. But you know what the operating system of
the TV can influence that and if there are places
(11:26):
And that's just a small example of how can the
OS on the TV become actually a lot smarter so
that you can as a user leverage its functionalities. Go
take cover. Now, there's massive advertising opportunities associated with that. Now,
I'm not telling you if there's a hurricane coming to
(11:48):
you or how about to hit your house, a sponsor
to you by home depot that probably would not be
very appropriate. But you know what pollen season is coming,
flu seasons. There's so many things that you can do
it's just how do we make these operating systems?
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Well, but Serge, what you're talking about is, you know
CTV really being the intersection of lean back and lean forward.
I mean, you know, I don't know if that makes
any sense, but I guess it does. You're kind of
in that pivot between lean back and lean forward. How
does that hybrid behavior force brands to think about the
(12:26):
stories they tell in the advertising realm?
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Wells, There is a lot of different ways the brands
can leverage this, right. They can leverage it through upper funnel.
They could leverage it through branding. They could leverage it
through performance based like we're going in it at so
as an example, the home screen, I really want to
focus a bit on the homeser. It's such a huge
unique identify differentiator. There's a lot of CTV thirty second
(12:53):
sixty second ads out there and we have it and
a lot of other companies have it. But the home
screen is really relevant to just a few handful companies,
LG being one of them. It used to be that
for we would allow only media and entertainment companies, so Amazon,
Prime Video, NBC, any of those guys, or Fox to
(13:14):
come in and just say, tune in to XYZ show
that's about to start, So the Olympics is starting on Friday,
or the Super Bowl is happening on Sunday. Tune in
a few hours and we can tell them great, that
was what it used to be two years ago. LG
was the first one to say, why does it have
to be just based on tune in? Why does it
have to be just for media entertainment. Why can't it
(13:36):
not just go to any general market advertiser and say
this is a prime real estate to go ahead and
advertise to a very unique audience. It's the first thing
that you can see. It can be video, it has
sound on It can be targeted. It can be based
on a performance or not performance. It doesn't matter. It
(13:57):
can be for branding. Think of a luxury vertical or
an advertiser like Cartier coming in and showing exactly their
amazing products that they sell in a three D format,
right in your face in the middle of the living room.
It's opened up so many opportunities and brands and cmos
(14:18):
are taking advantage of it. They're finally seeing that opportunity.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Now.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
With everything in life, these things take time. It doesn't
happen overnight, but that education we believe is there. I
was actually just in Dubai just last week. Advertisers in
the Middle East are leveraging it like the luxury vertical
over there. Automakers are leveraging it. It's really been such
a phenomenal way of looking at things, and it's such
(14:43):
an impactful medium for advertising.
Speaker 4 (14:47):
Good company will be right back after the break.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
There's another area that is obviously on fire in our industry,
and that's RMN or retail media. We've started calling it
commerce media more than retail media because it's not just
retailers who are playing that game obviously, but it's starting
to look crowded in the retail media space. I think
it's clear that CTV is becoming the premium billboard for
(15:23):
retail media. Talk about that, I mean, when we talk
about what Walmart and Visio did, play that out for
us in your view.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
First of all, I think it was an incredible move
for Walmart and Visio. And I know they're competitors on
the Visio side, but we all corroborate with each other,
but I think that was a fantastic move on their part.
We see it as two different ways from the commerce
and the retail media. I think we'll eventually get there,
but I don't see people going out there today and
(15:53):
actually using the TV for their main source of shopping.
It may or may not get there. We've I don't
know lot of companies have tried it where you can
go and actually do either through a QR code or
click here and take your to a website on the
TV and go buy our product. For that to become
a thing, the workflow of it has to be extremely easy.
(16:14):
What Amazon did a few a bunch of years ago
in terms of the one click that revolutionized everything. If
we want the TV platform, the smart TVs to become that,
it has to be easy for the consumer. I can
never imagine a consumer going in with the remote, going
in putting their name, address, letter by letter. They they're
(16:35):
shopping their credit card for me.
Speaker 3 (16:36):
If you can do it, great. If I have to
be punching you know, I agree with you, it'll never
It'll never happen.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Exactly it has. The workflow has to be first called
the second thing from a retail media perspective, and I
think that's where the OEMs have an advantage. What we
have seen over the past couple of months over a year,
is there is. It turns out there's a lot of
retailers out there that have, for some reason or another.
(17:07):
Don't ask me why, but for some reason or another
invested millions and millions of dollars creating their own white
label TVs. And for us, that's a bit of a
head scratcher. Why would you do that in the first place,
And how are you generating Because we all know the
economics of building TVs it's not great. Let's just say
(17:27):
that it's not good. And then the money is usually
all in the advertising instead of monetizing. The margins are
not in building TVs, that's for sure. So what we've
seen is all these retailers globally, I was, like I said,
we were in the Middle East. There's a retailer that
we met with that has actual white label TVs. They're
(17:50):
not generating any revenue. So it's literally they go ahead
and create any that they bring in a random operating system,
they stick it onto their TVs, and they sell their
TVs and it's a one time sale and that's it.
And the first question we asked them is, well, how
are you making recurring revenue out of this and they
were like, well you need like there's the way to
(18:12):
make recurring revenue Like what I wish? I Actually some
clients come on. It was actually pretty comical. We were like,
what the simplest solution is, what if we bring you
an operating system and we put it on the TVs
and then you will help you monetize the inventory and
(18:33):
literally write you a check. And they were like, this
is the easiest cell ever. Like we have never been
We've never been at least informed that that could be
a possibility. But that's where we from an OS and
from an operating system from a TV, that's where we're
going because at the end of the day, we can't
just rely on our growth by just organic growth from
(18:54):
the people going into Costco, Best Buy, Amazon and buying
our TVs. We just have to leverage other TV manufacturers.
And there is We're not talking hundreds of thousands, We're
talking tens and tens of millions of TVs globally that
people have manufacturers or retailers have created on their own
and zero monetization is happening on those TVs and this
(19:18):
would be a source of revenue for them that with
extremely high margin let's talk.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
About your partnership strategy. Surch on the heels of some
notable partnerships in twenty twenty five. I'd love to unpack
your partnership philosophy. What has to be true for you
to say this meaningfully advances the ecosystem? I mean, you know,
what's your your grading system, what's your hierarchical kind of approach?
Speaker 2 (19:46):
First and foremost, three is the It's all about the people.
At the end of the day, it's can I sit
there in front of this person and trust this individual.
We have have unbelievable partnerships. And I don't think that
I hate the word, for example, the reseller. That is
probably the worst world IQ you could ever use for me.
These are partners of ours and not resellers of ours.
(20:09):
But there are partners of ours that are so strategic
to our success. But I know when something happens, there's
always something that's going to happen. I can pick up
the phone and call the CEO or the head of
the cro at that company and say, hey, let's solve
this together. There's always going to be issues in any partnership,
(20:29):
and that to me is the first thing. Is there
The trust level that we've built over the past few years,
if not more. You know, A great example that I
will always state is the partnership that LG has with Magnite.
When I can go sit in front of Michael Barrett
every single day and Sean Buckley and just say, guys,
let's figure this thing out together. And this is why
(20:50):
we've we work together so well. We've trusted them, they
trust us, And at the end of the day, it's
all about relationships. The one thing that I keep on
saying AI is never going to replay is the power
of the human connection and the power of relationships. The
other thing that we have to also from a partnership
that I look at is it can't be one sided.
(21:10):
That's something that people always always seem to miss. It's like,
what's this in it for me? And I'm like, I
don't know. This doesn't work for it for everybody. It's like,
you want everybody has to be good for both parties,
and you just have to be transparent about it. They're
gonna make money and we're gonna make money. But at
the end of the day, let's let's be honest with
each other versus try to hide things from each another.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
How do you navigate that, you know, which really keeps
a clear focus on what, as you said, you need
something for both sides, what are both sides actually need.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Right, And that's something that it takes time, right, like
especially like you know, like when I have to go
talk to the folks in Korea, for example, and I
have to get a deal done, and they were like, wait,
what's in it for LG. And we'll have to explain
it that this is what's in it for LG. But
this is more importantly or equally important, this is what's
in it for the partner and for them to succeed,
because we can't do everything by ourselves. We literally cannot
(22:01):
do everything by ourselves. And we need to make sure
that our partners, our partners are reaping the benefits of
what we provide, but we're also succeeding. You know, when
we first started at LG, here we got into these
massive deals and people were hesitant. People were very very
hesitant into getting into some of these partnerships. After two
or three years, and when we renegotiate them and we
(22:23):
renew them, it's such a breeze because the past two
or three years it's been so easy and everybody's making money.
They're making money, we're making money.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
So it's a happy partnership. Let me let me, let
me switch gears geographically for a second surge. You've been
on a mission with global expansion, and obviously LG is
a global brand. But from your perspective, Brazil, Australia, you've
been moving and shaking and putting some miles on you know,
your frequent flyer account. What did each of those countries
(22:52):
teach you, pick one Brazil Australia about how people might
use this device differently the TV for me, LG.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
As you said, is a global partner, is a global
global company. We have two hundred million plus TVs globally.
There's not a single country in the world that does
not have access to lgtvs. It's really the size is insane.
It really is insane. But and we've our growth. You know,
while we've done really well in the United States, the
(23:21):
majority of the growth these days comes as a smaller denominator,
but the majority of our growth comes from overseas. It
to me, everything has to be it has to be
when we launch a product, everything has like what is
the global aspect of it? Everybody knows that. Internally, it's
like search is going to come in and ask what
is It cannot be a US centric thing. It has
to be a global, global offering as well. So that's
(23:46):
the most important thing for US now. In every single country,
we've noticed that things are different and what works in
the United States or what works in the UK doesn't
work elsewhere. Like give you a a small, small example.
We've seen in certain countries that the perception of free
(24:10):
advertising supported television so fast is not as great as
it is as it is in the United States. In
some cases they don't want anything to touch shoot it
with a fast, but they use it, but they call
it something else. And I had no idea, literally, I
had no idea going in that this is what's going on.
Like if you take examples, like in Australia. I was
(24:31):
just there we launched our Australia office. They when you
talk to them and the benefits are fast, they all
love it. But you mentioned the word fast. They all
want to run away. But when you talk about the
offering and what it is, they're like, oh, yeah, we
want that. I'm like, guys, that's called fast. They're like,
please don't call it that.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Call it's a search that's about storytelling and narrative because
the market is looking at it.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Yeah exactly, Yeah, but it's everywhere you go. There's also
these different quirks, and but you have to go in
thinking about it that again. If the worst thing you
can do is say what works in the United States
works everywhere, and a lot of companies have done that
and they have failed miserably. Now, the one thing that
I don't know why hasn't happened in CTV, which I
(25:15):
hope we can eventually get there from a global perspective,
is having campaigns and media bought globally sourced from like
across all the continent. For some reason, I think we're
going to get there. So still, I'm an optimist. I
think we can get there. I hope so too. But
like the US buys the US, the Middle East region
(25:35):
buys the Middleese region, It's like, when are we going
to actually all come together and just buy holistically on
a global basis. You and I could figure it out.
Speaker 3 (25:45):
We can change the world. When advertise a better time.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
It's exciting, it's exciting. Still, We're going to hit.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
Pause for a moment, but stay with us after the break,
We've got more insights to share. In your career art,
you've been involved in major industry shifts, some with headwinds,
(26:12):
some with tailwinds. How do you keep your teams and
you know, the people that you need to motivate internally
focused when the environment is changing so damn fast. I mean,
it's like whack a mole, this that, the next thing,
move here, go there.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Yeah, I think it's a struggle. Right, it's a struggle.
But you have to be honest with each other, right.
I think sometimes people know me it's like, please, don't
be ask me, just tell me the way it is.
I don't have time for bs, I really don't. We
just need to be honest with each other. And I
think you also have to be transparent with your teams
good times, bad times, And that's really really important. And
(26:48):
then to me, the other thing that's really important is
I struggle with what I call them empty suits of
executives that actually don't roll their sleeves and actually work
excuse me, language work their asses off. To me, the
best executives that I've worked with are the people that
actually close deals, because that's what that's what actually builds
(27:08):
trust and people were like, wait a second, he or
she's in the trenches with us, and he's they're trying
to actually make make sure that we all hit our numbers.
That to me is the most important thing at the
end of the day. It's like, do we roll up
your sleeves and actually get stuff done versus just pontificating
saying you need to go work harder.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
Look, those are all lessons that people should listen to,
because what you said about closing the deal, obviously it's
it's a journey, but it always ends up that the
person at that end of it, the close end of it,
gets the glory. But I understand it's always a team
effort all the way through.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
It's a team effort. And you know what, I also
want to make sure that everybody understands, like, you know,
we mentioned this in terms. You know at LG all
the times it takes a villager and we're truly true
mean it, Yes, sales a lot of the times and
account rangement and always gets the glory. They close the
deals great, but you know what, without our engineering team,
without our product team, without our adults team, none of
(28:12):
this can happen.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
What I learned in the early days of my career
as a lawyer, when you'd sit around the partnership table
and you were doling out bonuses at the end of
the year, everybody would want to wait the value of
the rain maker as being most important. Who's making it
rain who's bringing in the revenue? And I would always say, yeah,
but a rain maker. If there aren't good umbrella carriers,
(28:36):
guess what happens. Everybody gets wet. So you need to
value your umbrella carriers equally with the rain maker. Now,
if I apply the other logic that you learn in
law school is the butt floor argument. I guess butt
for the rain maker. You don't need umbrella carriers, but
you need good umbrella carriers.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
Need them both. You need them both equally important. We
can never forget yet about them, right like that is
the most important thing here.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
It's the unsung heroes, serge, I want, I want to
get very personal for a moment. Then I'm going to
have fun with my lightning round. But one of the
things you've done in the realm of how I grew up,
I was taught by my parents and my grandparents one
must split their life into thirds. A third for your family,
a third for your business and a third for your community.
(29:23):
However that works out and it's never equal at one
point of maybe ninety ten one way or the other,
but unbalanced when you look at the run of the show,
hopefully you break it out that way. You've got an
important partnership with add Good that opens up the CTV
space to nonprofits. Can you talk about that in the
Impact Yeah, at the.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
End of the day, I think the relationshsip that we
have with that good is where we're actually providing and
donating actual inventory to to you know, think of it
as it's our opportunity. We have a medium, we have TV,
we have inventory. Can we go and provide that there's
a medium and for free inventory out there and just
(30:05):
send whatever the impact or whatever the cause is to me.
The philanthropy and the community thing is extremely important. I
want to mention one. There was like two partnerships last
year was one that I got involved in. It's a
big one that's in the attech community. I don't know
if you have heard of the team Dyer guys, the
guys that go ahead Jay Sears and his team and we.
Speaker 5 (30:26):
Go with with and he's involved with obviously with Jeff
Green and others at the trade desk, and we actually
go build schools in impoverished countries like in Malawi or
in Guatemala and others.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It takes a lot of effort. I was not I
was this close in actually making it to Malawi. I
ended up getting to Kenya and then unfortunately world events
stopped me from going to Malawi. But it we were
able to raise a lot of money to get there,
and I'm hoping one day in the next few months
to actually go and I actually build a school for people.
(31:02):
Don't realize how good we have it here. They just
have no I another another one that we had. I'm
a massive, like I said, massive football fan, and my
team is used to be called the Redskins. Now they're
called the Commanders. Not our year, this past year, but
a few years ago I got involved in this project.
If you think about it, there was these this this idea.
(31:25):
You go to these schools and we're talking schools and
unfortunately not in the best of areas. We're talking. You
don't want to walk there during at night or during
the day. You just don't want to be in that community.
Don't want it. It's not safe. Let's just say it.
Just it's not safe. But what we realized is we
were talking to the principles and talking to the community saying,
what if through the team, we could just go ahead
(31:47):
and create a laundry center in the school, branded or
whatever you want to brand it, branded the Redskins, branded
the Commanders, whatever you put burgaining gold, put a bunch
of HVAC and put washers and dryers, and get get
students to bring in their school their dirty laundry every
single day and see what happens. We tried this. We're
now in eighty plus schools all over the Northern Virginia,
(32:11):
Virginia and DC area, and what ended up happening is
students would the people would actually students would actually come
to school. The attendance started increasing because and you started
asking them, why are you coming to school? They were like, well,
I have clean clothes. Before I didn't come to school
because I didn't have clean clothes. Next thing we did,
we opened it on the weekends. Now we have laundry
(32:33):
centers because if this kid doesn't have access to a
laundry machine, and you better believe the guardian, it's not
even the parent, but the guardian of that individual doesn't
have the ability to wash their clothes. And now we've
done that. It's again, simple, simple idea, but that can
make a massive, massive difference in the community.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Well, my hat's off to you for what you've accomplished
in your business career, but I double that in terms
of philanthropy because I think it's so important. Searge, We're
going to flip to the lightning round and I'm gonna
pick a couple of things and throw them your way, Sir.
It's your greatest professional fear losing.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
I don't like to lose.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
I like that, Serge. Was there a particular mentor early
in your career and what piece of advice did he
or she give you that that that inspired you.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Oh? Wow, there's been a lot. But I'm gonna be honest.
I'm gonna probably I lost my dad a year ago
and there's not been a single day since that day
that I haven't thought about him. And he taught me
one thing and just the level of trust and being
honest with people. I literally I never thought how difficult
(33:50):
that was that has been. I actually it was I
was during it was during Cees and I was in
Vegas and I got the word that all of a
sudden he suddenly passed, and I have to tell you
it was probably the most difficult thing ever. And literally
every day that has gone by, I don't I think
about it. And it's just it's not obviously as a
father figure, it's not your traditional mentor, but you learn
(34:12):
a lot from people, especially parents.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Well, I certainly agree with that, and I don't want
to make you depressed, but I lost my father forty
four years ago and I don't lose a day that
I don't think about him. So yeah, that's the bad
news for the good news, depending on how you look
at it. I know you're a big sports guy. What
are your favorite teams?
Speaker 2 (34:38):
You know, frankly, there's only one team for me, and
it's called the Washington Commanders. I bleed Burgundy and Gold.
I will do. I will watch every single game. I
usually go. I go there to every single NFL home game.
I will usually go to every three or four away games.
To me, the NFL is special. What they've done is amazing.
And we didn't have a great year last year, but
(35:02):
the year before was a magical season for us, and
the fact that we made it all the way to
the NFC Championship was something that I will never forget.
And I love the fact that my kids are also
die hard Commanders fans as well. We're building a generation
of Dieharts.
Speaker 3 (35:16):
So when was the last time you saw a person
or a company in our industry do something that you
thought was clever and forced yourself to say, damn, I
wish i'd thought of that.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
There's been quite a bit. I've started. I'm starting to
think of which one what comes top of mind. Obviously
there's definitely quite a bit. I'm just trying to figure
out which one. Would you got me on this one
for a second.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
Well, we'll come to another one. I'll give you some
time to think about it. I'll give you one more.
It's an easier one. If there's one industry buzzword you
could wish away forever, what would it.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Be right now? Any thing to do with AI. I
is such an overused word. I don't think most people
don't even know what that means. And I think it's
It's driving me a bit crazy right now, because I
love how somebody can come in and saying we've become
AI experts. Three months ago, they didn't know what the
heck it was. So I just want to. I think
(36:19):
obviously AI is the future, no doubt about it. But
I think for us it's how do we build more
efficiencies internally to to build that. Now back to your
original question, I just thought of this. I think the
there are I.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
Knew you would by the way, Surge, I knew you
probably example, But it is to have to do with
AI and it's a small little it's a startup that
I they're.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
They're onto something. I really do believe they're onto something.
The company called Swivel that Joe Hirsh has created him
and he used to He actually created spring Spring serve
of the company that ended up Magnete ended up buying.
They are building the and to end agentic workflow that
(37:03):
I think if somebody can go and I know there's
all these protocols that are being built and everybody's working
on it, but somebody is going to crack that code.
They seem to be the leaders in that space right now. Now.
Just to be very clear, no one's generating any revenue
out of it right now. I was actually meeting with
a major agency executive last night for dinner and I
(37:25):
was like, so, how much money are you generating out
of these things and they're like, come on, guys, there's
none of that is happening. But we're all testing it.
We all believe in two to three years it's going
to become a the thing. But I wish I was
able to solve that six to nine months ago. But
it's not too late, because I think we can still
get there.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
Well, Search, Mada. I love your I love your energy,
and you know, I love the fact that the word
you don't like is lose. Searge, I want to thank
you for joining Good Company. I know our audience will
enjoy this converse. I certainly did.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
Thanks, Cassin, appreciate it. Take care.
Speaker 3 (38:08):
I'm Michael Casson. Thanks for listening to Good Company.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Good Company is brought to you by Three C Ventures
and iHeart Podcasts. Special thanks to Alexis Borger Pudeo, our
executive producer and head of Content and Talent, and to
Carl Catle, executive producer at iHeart Podcasts. Episodes are produced
and edited by Mary Doo. Thanks for joining us. We'll
see you next time.
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