November 19, 2025 • 39 mins
Michael sits down with Tim Armstrong - Google trailblazer, AOL reinventor, and Flowcode founder - to decode the next frontier of marketing: turning every real-world interaction into a high-impact, data-rich connection. It’s sharp, surprising, and packed with the kind of insights only a true transformation architect can deliver.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good Company is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
You know, I grew up in a lot of i'll
call it B two C businesses and then a lot
of B to B. But I think the world has
to go C to B. In my mind, there's the consumer,
there's a creative, there's the connection, there's a conversion, there's CRM,
there's communication, and all of those c's are wrapped in
(00:24):
your connectivity. And I think as a brand, growth starts
with the C. And I think one thing I see
in advertising right now in our industry, there is an
overload of B and AI is making the overload of
B a triple overload. And I think winning in the
future is you have to become an expert at the C.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
I'm Michael Casson and this is Good Company. Together we'll
explore the dynamic intersection of media, marketing, entertainment, sports and technology.
I'll be joined by visionaries, pioneer and yes, even a
couple of disruptors or 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
(01:13):
up a lesson or two along the way. As I
like to say it's all good. Welcome back to Good Company.
Today's guest has helped write some of the most defining
chapters in the story of modern media. As one of
the early leaders at Google, Tim Armstrong guided the company's
shift from a licensing model to an advertising powerhouse, launching
(01:35):
products that transformed the economics of the Internet. He later
led AOL through its reinvention during a content renaissance, and today,
as the founder and CEO of flow Code, Tim is
once again driving transformation. Flow Code is not just a
QR company. It is a bold reimagining of how brands
and people engage in the physical world in real time
(01:57):
with real data. When seventy percent of the four fortune
thousand rely on its technology to turn real world interactions
into measurable relationships, flow Code is not just changing marketing,
it's changing how connection itself occurs. Tim's career has always
lived at the intersection of innovation, creativity, and human behavior.
(02:20):
He is built at scale, led through disruption, and consistently
anticipated where audiences, attention, and opportunity are headed next. This
conversation goes far beyond platforms or campaigns. It is about
what comes after digital transformation. The new rules of leadership,
value creation, and growth because transformation isn't a phase of
(02:44):
Tim's career, it's his operating system. Tim R I'm strong.
I want to welcome you to good company.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Michael. I couldn't think about spending another hour or so
with somebody I like better in the industry, which that's
not how I started our relationship, but it's great to
see it long as you went there. Tim.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
I'll let our audience in on a secret. Back in
two thousand and six, I was invited by the company
that was then viewed as the evil Empire in Redmond, Washington,
Microsoft to get involved in their challenge and battle with
this little company in California called Google, and it erupted
first Tim when double click was in play. For our audience,
(03:24):
I'll remind those who don't know, Tim was leading revenue
and really created the revenue story at Google. And I guess, Tim,
you could say, if I'm right, I think I kind
of became the Antichrist for a while in Google terms.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
I will tell you this, I didn't know who you were,
but we kept getting called to Washington and we had
all these issues and letters coming in about you know,
why we shouldn't be able to buy Google a double click,
and you know, I was like, wow, it's incredible how
everyone seems to be against us now. And then someone
(04:01):
you and I both know well mentioned your name and said, oh,
you know, this is Michael Casson, right, I said, who
is Michael Casson? And then I looked you up and
I realized that you had a very deep media background,
but also you were like a power player with all
the power players. So from that time point I started
studying you. I am going to find out who Michael
Casson is end to end. And for a long time
(04:24):
we didn't meet, but I was watching everything you were doing,
and you individually caused us so much pain and so
much time I would I have to believe four weeks
a year of my time at Google was dedicated to
trying to undo what you were doing at Microscoft and I,
(04:45):
you know, it's like having a tennis partner that you
hate losing to but you love playing because they're so good.
And then we've became friends. But it was really incredible
how well.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
It's it's been almost twenty years. Tim, so I count
you and Nancy and the armstrong face Emily is people
that I have great affection and respect for and professionally,
obviously we've been able to you know, have the privilege
of working together so many times. But where we started
as a hell of a lot different than where we
are today. Jim, your professional history kind of reads like
(05:16):
the timeline of modern media, Google, AOL, Verizon, and now
flow Code. Every chapter has been about, as I said, transformation,
but each in a totally kind of different way. When
you look back at those chapters, search content connection, what
ties them together for you? Is there a thread through
(05:36):
the journey of the last twenty five plus years, you know, Michael, I.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Started out thinking I want to be an investment banking
and I went to go work at a bank when
I got out of college, and I hated it. And
actually the guy who sat next to me was amazing
at the job we were doing. So I went to
my boss and I'm like, you should fire me, and
you should promote this guy named Murph. The guy said
to me, I've never had somebody come to my office
and proactively asked to get fire and at the same
time trying to get somebody promoted, you know he works
(06:03):
with And I just said, I'm this is not my
not my life, my gig, not my gig.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was intensely interested in media growing up in technology
and I used to do programming. I worked at a
healthcare system one summer programming their entry forms UH to
put it on computers. The define moment for me is
I went and started a newspaper in Boston. And when
I did that, I didn't know anything about newspapers or media.
(06:28):
And I started it from scraps with my best friend
from high school. I did it for a couple of years,
and in that timeframe, I first of all learned the
basics of media. What is content is? What is ad sales?
You know, what are subscribers and users? And during that timeframe,
I was down at MIT when my friends called me
(06:50):
who was connected at MIT, and said, Hey, there's a
company here that you should come see. It end up
being Mozilla in Mosaic, and I went down and saw
the browser for the first time. When I saw the
browser come up on the screen and I saw a website,
I instantly was like, well, just change newspapers was so hard,
(07:10):
I said, you can just program this in like you
like I was programming at that healthcare company for their
admission system. They're like, yeah, it works just like that,
you can do it online. So I went back that
day and said, I'm selling, We're selling the newspaper, I'm
doing the Internet. And I ended up belonging. It's a
long story, but I ended up moving out working for
Paul Allen's company, star Wave, which was the first big
(07:31):
content company on the Internet. We did NBA dot com,
NFL dot com, ESPN dot com. That was my first
Silicon Valley type experience because Amazon was there, Jeff was there,
just getting off the ground. Amazon, Yahoo was kind of
cranking at the time, and all these companies were recruiting
from each other. So so my appreciation for media started
(07:51):
with the newspaper. I appreciated for the internets really started
at at Paul Allen's company, and then I basically made
a decision at that time period that I was going
to just go to the front edge of the Internet,
and that's how I ended up getting a Google. It's
a long story, you know. AOL was kind of like
going from all growth companies to seeing a company that
(08:11):
need to be turned around. So I was like that
that'd be another interesting thing to do. And after I
Soulditive Horizon, I really thought about the future of like
how to have direct brand connections in a world that's
all huge platforms. And that's really why I started flow code.
So that my journey has always been in a very
singular lane of focus.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
But the interesting connect there is, Yeah, flow code kind
of feels like a culmination of the journey, and certainly
not at the end of your journey, but a culmination
of the journey thus far. But in some way it's
also a pivot from you know, the next frontier being
more like not another platform, but the real worlds. You know,
(08:53):
you're going offline, you know, using the technology, So how
is that working out?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
I'll take a step back. The reason I'm doing flow
code is eighty one percent of the economy is in
the real world. You know, people forget that that they
when you wake up and read the newspaper or watch
you know, your favorite program on YouTube or CTV or television,
it talks about AI, the internet, you know, mobile, all
(09:18):
the things that are amazing about the world. The reality is, Michael,
eighty one percent of the economy and GDP is still
in the real world. And more important, when you ask
someone and I do this a lot to people, they say, oh,
why are you doing flow code? I said, let me
see the pictures on your phone, and I'll have people
scroll their pictures and I'll say, you know, it's interesting.
I don't see any pictures of technology on there. I
(09:40):
don't see you doing a lot of things other than
your experiences in life. So I look at the experience
economy the same way I look at the Internet, which
is lots of consumer decisions going on, lots of experiences,
almost no software. And I want to spend the rest
of my time in life really thinking about out how
to make human life on Earth better and more connected.
(10:04):
And I love the Internet, and I'm flow codes connected
to the Internet and AI and all those things. But
what I really want is I want people to get
off of infinite scroll, which I think is a black hole,
and I want them to use their phone more like
a lightsaber, and the real economy to have experiences and connections.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
So Tim bring that back to the mind of the
or the mindset of the CMO today. You know, the
senior marketers doesn't always have to be CMO. You meet
with those senior marketers pretty regularly. If you had to
distill their collective anxiety into kind of one headline, is
there something that would be a common thread that you're hearing.
(10:43):
Again from that senior level of marketers, I would say the.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Headline would be I just caught up to the internet
bus and another bus just went by me, which is AI.
I don't think it's one hundred percent the right focus,
but cmos are at the forefront right now now, with
standing in front of a consumer base that's gone from
zero to a billion users on AI in the last
two years or two and a half years, and it's
(11:10):
gone from the c speed knowing what worked, knowing how
it worked, and what was measurable in those things, to
the C suite asking the CMO, what's happening in the
consumer landscape and how do we things are changing quickly.
But also they're getting a second pressure, which is why
(11:31):
are we spending any money on marketing, creative data and
analytics when every headline I pick up, as the CEO
tells me, AI can do all of this. So I
think there's a the cmos. You and I have been
in some meetings together with cmos in the last six months.
I think they're fighting a two front battle, which is
what's happening on the consumer landscape and how quickly is
(11:54):
it changing. And I will give you one stat most
of our customers have flow code. Seven to forty percent
of traffic from search has changed because of the search
funnel changes in AI. And the second one is almost
every marketing department in the United States is either flat
or being cut right now. So you have a two
(12:14):
front war and you're basically asked to do with the
same amount of resources you had over the last couple
of years or a fewer.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I would say it might even be a three front war.
I'm not sure if it's a third front, but it's
a joint effort. You've got your CEO, you've got to
be your CIO, and you've also got your CFO now
much more interested and invested in marketing and trying to
understand ROI and the story look the way I tell it, Tim.
(12:43):
And I was asked this question frequently over the last
fifteen eighteen months about you know, Michael, as I went
through an interesting transition a year and a half ago.
People said, why do you need to do this? Go
play golf, and I say, well, I suck at golf,
so let's get that out there. But I'm fun to
play golf with because I'm fast and I've always got it,
(13:03):
and I've always got some good jokes, so you know,
I'll keep you laughing and I'll keep you moving. But
I said, in my career ARC, there's been three game
changing moments. The first was the introduction of mobile telephony
and all that came with that. The second was obviously
the Internet, and the third is AI. There's lots of
(13:25):
things that have happened in between, lots of shiny toys
over here or over there, you know, dot com, dot com,
we've been doing it all, but those three moments, mobile telephany,
the Internet, and AI. And I said, for me, I
couldn't be on the sidelines during this one. I had
to be I had to be in the game.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
And you're not programs to be out of a game, Michael,
You're not. You're not an out of the game player.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
You're an play well but but you know it. But
it's fun to be in the game at this moment
because we're watching this transformation. But the reason I brought
up the CFO, one of my CMO friends said to me,
they can't men to see their leadership. They laid out
their plan of what they think they could do through
the utilization of technology, AI, et cetera. And they showed
(14:09):
a twenty percent savings and the CEO and the CFO
nodded their heads apparently positively, and just as the guy
was leaving, his CEO said, and by the way, I
think you could do better than twenty You know that pressure.
That's combination CEO feeling it in the ether again and
CFO saying, oh, no, I know there's more there.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Yes. By the way, Michael, I think you're you more
than almost anyone else have been more involved in companies
transitioning their thinking on some of the ways they do business.
And whether that's been with your consulting stuff you guys
have done, or honestly, whether it's the work you've done
I think between clients and agencies over time, which I
think has been remarkable. Is you know that this year
(14:55):
and last year probably a little bit, but really this
year is one of those years that Kate is going
to change, especially in twenty twenty six, where I think
when you look up and I don't know if you
feel that it or not, but it's a year where
things are going to change dramatically, and I think the
reshuffling of the checkerboard or chessboard is underway right now,
and you can't cut if you don't redo your business.
(15:17):
At the same time, you.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Don't cut your way to growth. And so from that perspective,
let's talk about plan. As an English major, I love words.
You came up with a really interesting report which I'd
love you to shed some light on, tim and I
know our audience will like the name of it as
much as I did. The big ass CMO growth Plan.
Can you shed a little light on the big ass
(15:40):
CMO growth plan that flow Code has been putting out
into the market.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
First of all, the big ass calendar is part of that,
and it's really where it came from. And that's a good,
really close friend of mine, Jesse Itzler, who's I think
one of the best entrepreneurs in the US and has
done Zico Water and Marquee Jet and countless other brands,
really game changing thinker. Their CMO growth plan came from
(16:04):
flow Code, and it came directly from what we've been
hearing from both our partners and from people at the
bigger research companies like Gartner and other places. And the
center point of that is there's three big areas that
we wanted cmos to kind of understand. One is the
eighty one percent of the economy being in the real world.
And as part of that, you know, the growth plan
(16:26):
for cmos really has to be about their touch points.
And you know, most major fortune five hundred companies have
fourteen touch points. It could be their salesforce, their retail locations,
their channel partners, their website, and you know about five
or so of those touch points are highly digitized. Nine
or ten of them they have not digitized yet, and
(16:46):
they haven't even thought about the fact that all consumers
are in those channels with smartphones that they love. And
so bullet point number one on that is how do
you digitize your touch points in a world where everyone's
trying to eat your customer. The second one was really like,
how do you think about your data and how do
you how do you id the partners that you have
(17:09):
in all these channels. And I'll give you a great example.
Most companies actually don't keep track of their omnichannel consumers.
So they might keep tracking on the website, but they
don't really know if there are other experiences, stores, and partnerships,
you know those things. So the second thing we said
just to CMOS, was hey, really deep dive into how
(17:30):
you use data in your business and how do you
look at not first party data as a subject, first
party relationships and where those relationships are and what you're
what you're doing. And then the third piece is really
about what are the experiences you're bringing to those consumers
and how and when and why. Most consumers will go
(17:51):
much deeper in your brand if you give them a
chance to connect with you. And so our kind of
theory of the case and the CML growth plan is
your digital channels. You know, and you're measuring the nine
or ten channels that you have where you're not collecting
any information. Those are sometimes your best customers that they
travel to see you, paying money to come see you.
(18:13):
They're investing time and energy. And when you look at
some of our partners like Delta Airlines or Craft Times
or some of the other people that we do work with,
they have very big connectivity across their touch points and
they're enabling them. So we've opened up another growth channel
for them that you know, in many cases they haven't
really been thinking about the real world economy as a
(18:35):
as a digital funnel, but that's what we do for people,
and that's really what the CMO growth plan is about.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
We're going to hit pause for a moment, but stay
with us after the break. We've got more insights to share.
You know, you've been saying what I think gets home
for everybody in our into street experiences aren't a tactic,
(19:02):
they're basically the strategy, as you just said eighty one percent.
Is there something that you see culturally that's changed that behavior?
And you know the idea of experience and you talk
about Delta. I know Delta's a big believer in experience.
We have the good pleasure of working together with them
as well, and you know they've they've made that a
real part of their growth. Is there some particular thing
(19:25):
in culture or consumer behavior that's made that the case,
made it the currency.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Here's what I think, Michael, and I think honestly, I'm
not just saying this through on the podcast together. I
think you're one of the best real world people in
the real world. And I think that the relationships that
you've built and is that famous saying relationships run the
world is And I'm going to tell you where I
see it. In New York City, I have a place
in downtown and I walk to work and I go
(19:52):
run on the West Side Highway a few mornings a week.
Humans are getting together in the singles clubs and running together.
See humans, they all wear black, They're all dressed the same.
After work, there's philosophy classes and things where people are
getting together. And I think if you go to the airport,
you go out in the real world, you go to
(20:13):
all the experiences, you go to Coachella, you go to
any of the places that you and I have been
to in the past. CAN, by the way impossible the
program you started, more people are going to those more often.
And I think that as digital as the world is getting,
I think the world is desperate for relationships.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
And you know what, Tim, we saw it flashback five
years pandemic, and we wondered, and you mentioned CAN. We
wondered when CAN was closed for two years, when CES
didn't happen, were people going to come back? Did it
become the negative reinforcement? Gee, I lived without it, so
maybe I don't need it. Well, in fact, you know
the results, every one of those came back, you know,
(20:55):
not double, but they came back one and a half times. Yeah,
I mean, they really, really brought back the reality of
people want that connection. And so we had the option. Yes,
we all had the option. We all were, you know,
enveloped in the pandemic, and then we had the option
to stay that way or go back to in real life.
(21:17):
And I guess irl wins.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah. And then Michael, let me give you an example,
because you're you're tight with them, and I am too.
And this is not an infomercial for them, because we've
been partners for them for a long time. But if
you look at what ed Bastian, Dan Janky Alicia Tillman
have done at Delta, you think about the investments they
made in the middle of the pandemic where you come out.
(21:40):
I had a partner in office yesterday who's a very
very well known sports person, and he said to me, hey,
you're on the board of Wheels Up, which is part
of you know, basically part of Delta. I said, well,
there's a public company, but you know, yeah, the Delta
is a big investor in it. They said, you know,
I've been watching what they're doing. Delta is investing in
all the places where we have our experiences, and could
(22:00):
you introduce me to Delta because I want to see
if I can cut a partnership with them, and they
have all the conductivity to the places. And by the way,
I love their lounges and I love and we have
a high network group the Delta one Lounge. We want
to do those things. And I give a company like
Delta a lot of credit because it wasn't easy to
(22:21):
invest anywhere during the pandemic. It was twice as hard
for a travel company to do it. And not only
do they did it, but I would argue I think
they've been the furthest out on the chain.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
Thousand. Yeah, Tim, again we can suck up to our
mutual friends in ed Bastan and Alicia and Dan. I
have again had the good fortune of working with them
for quite some time. And yesterday I flew Delta and
the Delta one experience is so over the moon in
terms of in real life. They tick every box, they
(22:55):
anticipate everything, Tim, I want to switch. I want to
get the real world with you. You know, the idea
of turning moments into connections. We've talked a lot about
that already, and obviously you're the biggest proponent in the
market for the connection of physical and digital. You've recently
announced a real world example of that in your partnership
(23:15):
with the Milwaukee Bucks. Could you talk about that partnership
and what it means to the NBA and the Milwaukee
Bucks and what it means to flow Code.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I gotta I'm gonna have to name check somebody
else because he gets the credit for the NBA relationship
is Adam Silver And we have another investor from there,
David Lee, but they're investors in flow Code, and Adam
was the one who originally when we started flow Code,
said hey, wait a minute, I'm spending a lot of
(23:45):
money on w NBA dot com. W NBA dot com.
You know all the properties they have digital, their app,
and you know they do an extreme amount of real
world experiences. I think actually the NBA in person, just
there in person, if you added up all there and
gain time and people and all the things they do,
probably be a top five website in the United States.
So that's how big the NBA is offline in the
(24:06):
real world. Adam was like, Hey, this makes a ton
of flow Code makes a lot of sense to me.
Why don't we test it out and see if we
can make it work. And so today, if you flash forward.
You know, we're the front for the NBA I D.
We just did Abugabby with them at their event. We
did China with them a couple of weeks ago, and
I saw Adam at something I was at about a
week ago. But when you go to the Bucks, you know,
(24:28):
Peter the president of the Bucks is somebody who was
kind of interested in flow code, and we went out
to see him, you know, a while ago. And the
Bucks you know also have wes Etons and other owners.
There were incredible you know investors and really I think
groundbreaking thinkers on the economy. They were like, yeah, this
(24:48):
makes sense. I mean, why wouldn't we want to connect
more deeply with our fans. And so we rolled flow
codes out in their stadium and the results have been
have been tremendous. But more importantly, if if you think
about a fan, when a fan comes to a game,
you know, they really want to feel connected to the teams.
I mean that you like I always say religion in sports?
(25:09):
Are you know two out of the three things you
change your clothing for?
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Well, m Tim, I'm an interrupt to tell you, you know,
but my two sports are basketball and baseball. Yeah, Well,
I played baseball, and you know, I'm too short to
play basketball, but I was a decent baseball player. I
would marvel at the fact going to a Dodger game
or a Laker game, Yes, how many people in the stands.
(25:35):
Not as much now but used to be, but maybe
I'm not noticing it as much. Would be in the game,
and they'd have in the case of the Dodgers, they'd
have Vin Scully on the radio in the transistor radio
in their hand while they're at the game. And I
always would marvel at the people who would have Chick
Kurn on, you know, at a Laker game and they'd
(25:56):
be listening to the radio while they're at the game live.
So it always kind of interesting to me. That was
your offline online back then it wasn't online. But yeah,
but you know what was, Michael, a natural connection to passion.
You know, I was watching the game last night, the
Dodgers game in Toronto. If you've noticed, Terry Kowaja, who's Canadian,
(26:18):
has made it a pit he and I against one another,
because so yeah, seeing.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
That I've seen that. But but let me ask you
a question in terms of experiences in your life outside
of Ronnie and the family, What would you where would
you rank your sports memories against other other things? I mean,
it is it.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Let me let me give you Let me give you
the answer. Tip. I was live with my dad in
nineteen sixty three when Sandy Kofex pitched a perfect game.
Wow sixty six, Wow, sixty sixty three, perfect game. I
was at Kirk Gibson's home run. Really it was at
a Portland Trailblazers Lakers. I love that one, you know,
(27:02):
playoff game that was twenty points down the Lakers won
in the fourth. You know, I can go through life
like many people and say where were you when? Fortunately
I've been able to say was in the stadium on
a couple of those but wow, you know, respectively. But
you're right, those are the moments, your family moments and
sports moments. Yep.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
And by the way, Michael, I think this is what brands,
This is why sports is getting such traction right now.
Is you know, the brand. Your job is to bring
you know, the value in the ROI to the consumer.
Your job is also to make it. You know, people
people want engagement and excitement in their lives, and the
you know, sports is an unbelievable venue to do that
(27:42):
in and like the experience you have with your dad.
That's why I think things like sports and the things
that we see happening in sports with engagement levels, they're
off the charts. And I think a lot of it's because, honestly,
it's the emotional time period where you're doing something you
really care about in love and you know, brands are
integrated there and they know they have the Delta Lounge
at you know, MSG and Legends and I mean it's
(28:04):
just it all ties together, which is your best memories
are with some of your best your favorite brands.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
Also good company will be right back after the break.
So Tim, let's kind of bring the big picture together.
(28:31):
You've personally been a leader in the digital age, and
now you're a leader and clearly helping define what comes
next in the connection age. Interesting, you know transition for
you from online offline, but you started with offline as
we all did. How do you decide describe the connection
(28:52):
age because I know we're talking about in real life
and that, but is there is there something unique about
the connection age that you.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Yeah, I'll tell you what it is. My my viewpoint
has gone to the end of the earth. I want
we're about to tell you which is. You know, I
grew up in a lot of i'll call it B
two C businesses and then a lot of B to
B things that I've done over the years of ads,
the same stuff that you have done. But I think
the world has to go C to B and I
think that's one of the things I talk about with
(29:19):
flow code is and there's some really other than three C,
which I love because it has the C in it is.
You know, in my mind, there's the consumer, there's the creative,
there's the connection, there's a conversion, there's CRM, there's communication,
and all of those c's are wrapped in your your connectivity.
(29:41):
And I think as a brand, growth starts with the C.
And if you're staying with the C in the world today,
you have a couple choices. Meta in Google just announced
their results. Meta fifty billion dollars in revenue growing at
twenty six percent, Google one hundred billion dollars in revenue
growing at sixteen percent. Those two growth rates are bigger
(30:03):
than most of the Fortune five hundred brands in the
world by a long shot. Part of the reason their
growth rates are so big is those companies are amazing
at thinking about the C before they get to the B.
And I think one thing I see in advertising right
now in our industry, there is an overload of B,
and AI is making the overload of B a triple overload.
(30:27):
The Meta just announced they're going to spend seventy two
billion dollars on Capex. As a brand, you're not gonna
win in the Capex race, Okay, you probably might be
in marketing. Your marketing apartment might be getting cut right now,
like lower budgets, as we talked about. So the question
is how do you win in the future. And I
think winning in the future is you have to become
(30:49):
an expert at the C. You have to if you
went into someone's office, I mean, this is the meetings
I go to. I'm probably seen seventy or so cmos
or CEOs in the last four months. I would say
eighty percent of the meetings I've had with them are
about to beat and very few of them are about
(31:09):
to see. And if you want to watch me see
by the way, that's the opportunity. That's the opportunity. And
I always say this also, you know easy and known.
If something's easy and known, it's not an opportunity. If
it's hard and unknown, there's an opportunity there. And when
I go to you and I were both at the
same AD Council meeting yesterday, the seven out of the
(31:31):
first ten people I spoke to said to me retail
media network you know? I said, what you know that
retail media networks? You know? And that strikes me. If
it's not necessarily it's not easy because a lot of
people have to figure that out, but it's known. And
so the question is you have to win at retail
(31:52):
media networks as one of the things you do. And
there's financial services, retail media networks, all these things popping
up and and and that you have to figure out
how to do it. But you should start with out
of my when I focus on my C, where does
that fit into my strategy? And I think one thing
we see in business now is topics are coming up
in business and it's like a tsunami overwhelming the C.
(32:14):
It's all the B topics.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
I think you are spot on. It's just nomenclature. We've
been speaking about it more recently as B to H
business to human. So the human connection, I've been putting
H as human maybe in the sea of connection. Classically,
when people say B to B or B two C.
(32:37):
I've always said that's wrong because when you say B
to B, it's implying that there's not a person making
the decision on the other end. There's a procurement person,
there's a CFO, there's a somebody's making the decision. You're pitching.
You're not pitching to a widget. You're pitching to a person.
So there's where I go to the B to H.
It's business to human number one and number two. You've said,
(33:00):
and I've got to go back and give one more
flower to Delta. They're thinking of it, not necessarily like
most with common we've been calling commerce media, not retail media,
but commerce media networks and their believers in, as you
well know, experienced media networks. Yes, I love that, experiential
(33:20):
media networks. That's where they're going, and I know you're
going to be their partner on that journey. Tim. I
get to have fun now, not that this has not
been fun, but I get to do my lightning round. Well,
just throw you some some fast talking. If you could
give your younger self one piece of guidance, Tim.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
What would it be, Uh? Trust your gut.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
You know, when I've spoken over the years to people
in the entertainment business, and before excuse me, before the
democratization of content distribution that the Internet supplied, you know,
traditionally you had to wait till the head of a
network the proverbial green light, you know, who have the
ability to green light that content. Today, you have your
(34:10):
ability to green light your own content. I have my
ability to green light my own content. But those network
heads back in the day, whether it was a Brandon
Tartakov or Fred Silverman or the legends of television. I
had the good fortune of speaking to guys like that
over the years as technology crept into the decision making process,
(34:33):
and I'd look at them and say, you're famous for
your golden gut, that sense of I'm going to choose
this program with this cast, and it's going to work.
Now that you have the ability to overlay that with
so much data and predictive modeling and the things you
can do with data, how much of you how much
are you still relying on your gut versus the data?
(34:56):
I think the right answer was always I'm still using
my gut, but it's relaid with the data.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Yes, I think you have to you have to use
the data. But I will say this, Michael, this might
be a little contrarian. I think we're in the largest
time period with the smallest amount of ideas for two reasons.
One is people get over reliant on data, and they
get over reliant on micro pieces of content around that data.
(35:22):
And I think the golden gut informed by data, always
informed by data. That's what I meant by trust your
gut is when you see, when your gut tells you
something above the data, you should do it immediately.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
Well fail quickly.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
You know.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
That's the old joke. The best two answers in the
world are yes or no. Just given to me quickly.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Yes fast, you know what I mean. And I think
that gut is important.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
To that speaking fast. Let's go back to lightning. If
you weren't doing what you are now, Tim, what would
you be doing.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
I would probably either be an artist or be in
the military. And I always thought I grew up in
a military household. My dad was in the Navy and
he's my hero. But I thought I would do that.
But the other thing is like I have a very
very high creative side, which I didn't. I didn't grow
up in an environment where creates, but he was was
the first skill set and school wasn't great for creativity.
(36:21):
But I am huge into art.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
I love art, and I would probably I would probably
do that, Tim, what's the best book you've recently read?
Is there a particular book? I mean, what's got your attention?
Speaker 2 (36:33):
I would say to two of my friend's books. I'm
in love with nineteen twenty nine by Andrew ROSSI. I
just started it. Yeah, by the way, I'm like getting
to the end of it, and I'm slowing down reading
because I don't want it to finish to end.
Speaker 3 (36:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
And I have another friend, Doug Brunt, who wrote a
book called Diesel, which is the story of the founder
of the diesel engine, which I never I never, never knew.
But it's in the interesting time period in the early
nineteen hundreds where almost like today, like technology has been explosion,
the Industrial revolution is exploding. And I grew up thinking
(37:12):
diesel was just the name of the type of energy
you put into trucks and things like that. And it
turns out there was this amazing entrepreneur named Diesel who
started actually in coolance and refrigeration and actually I remember
he invented basically invented how to make ice cubes, but
then went in and did the diesel engine. And it's
(37:33):
just an incredible to who done it. He ended up
dying and they don't know how, really how he died.
I don't give the book away, but he disappeared off
a ship.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
See, in all these days, I thought he was the
guy who invented diesel g and Scopeco figure.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
I mean, yeah, those I've read a lot of books.
I read a lot, and those are two books recently
that I read that I like a lot.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Well, Tim Armstrong, I could spend not only an hour,
I could spend a day, a week, a month talking
to you, and you know, not only about the experiences
we've had, but those that we're about to have, because
I know you are somebody who in your career has
continually looked around the corner and identified things before others.
(38:18):
And I know you're continuing to do that with flow Code.
The same with you and that's why we're friends and
we're going to do more stuff together next year. You
got it, buddy, Tim Armstrong. I want to thank you
for joining us on good company.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Thanks and congrats on all the stuff at three C
Amazing to watch it.
Speaker 3 (38:37):
I'm Michael Cassen. Thanks for listening to Good Company.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Good Company is brought to you by three C Ventures
in iHeart Podcasts. Special thanks to Alexis Borgo Purdeo, our
executive producer and head of Content and Talent, and to
Carl Ketele, executive producer at iHeart Podcasts. Episodes are produced
and edited by Mary Doo. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
See you next time.
Good Company is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
You know, I grew up in a lot of i'll
call it B two C businesses and then a lot
of B to B. But I think the world has
to go C to B. In my mind, there's the consumer,
there's a creative, there's the connection, there's a conversion, there's CRM,
there's communication, and all of those c's are wrapped in
(00:24):
your connectivity. And I think as a brand, growth starts
with the C. And I think one thing I see
in advertising right now in our industry, there is an
overload of B and AI is making the overload of
B a triple overload. And I think winning in the
future is you have to become an expert at the C.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
I'm Michael Casson and this is Good Company. Together we'll
explore the dynamic intersection of media, marketing, entertainment, sports and technology.
I'll be joined by visionaries, pioneer and yes, even a
couple of disruptors or 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
(01:13):
up a lesson or two along the way. As I
like to say it's all good. Welcome back to Good Company.
Today's guest has helped write some of the most defining
chapters in the story of modern media. As one of
the early leaders at Google, Tim Armstrong guided the company's
shift from a licensing model to an advertising powerhouse, launching
(01:35):
products that transformed the economics of the Internet. He later
led AOL through its reinvention during a content renaissance, and today,
as the founder and CEO of flow Code, Tim is
once again driving transformation. Flow Code is not just a
QR company. It is a bold reimagining of how brands
and people engage in the physical world in real time
(01:57):
with real data. When seventy percent of the four fortune
thousand rely on its technology to turn real world interactions
into measurable relationships, flow Code is not just changing marketing,
it's changing how connection itself occurs. Tim's career has always
lived at the intersection of innovation, creativity, and human behavior.
(02:20):
He is built at scale, led through disruption, and consistently
anticipated where audiences, attention, and opportunity are headed next. This
conversation goes far beyond platforms or campaigns. It is about
what comes after digital transformation. The new rules of leadership,
value creation, and growth because transformation isn't a phase of
(02:44):
Tim's career, it's his operating system. Tim R I'm strong.
I want to welcome you to good company.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Michael. I couldn't think about spending another hour or so
with somebody I like better in the industry, which that's
not how I started our relationship, but it's great to
see it long as you went there. Tim.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
I'll let our audience in on a secret. Back in
two thousand and six, I was invited by the company
that was then viewed as the evil Empire in Redmond, Washington,
Microsoft to get involved in their challenge and battle with
this little company in California called Google, and it erupted
first Tim when double click was in play. For our audience,
(03:24):
I'll remind those who don't know, Tim was leading revenue
and really created the revenue story at Google. And I guess, Tim,
you could say, if I'm right, I think I kind
of became the Antichrist for a while in Google terms.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
I will tell you this, I didn't know who you were,
but we kept getting called to Washington and we had
all these issues and letters coming in about you know,
why we shouldn't be able to buy Google a double click,
and you know, I was like, wow, it's incredible how
everyone seems to be against us now. And then someone
(04:01):
you and I both know well mentioned your name and said, oh,
you know, this is Michael Casson, right, I said, who
is Michael Casson? And then I looked you up and
I realized that you had a very deep media background,
but also you were like a power player with all
the power players. So from that time point I started
studying you. I am going to find out who Michael
Casson is end to end. And for a long time
(04:24):
we didn't meet, but I was watching everything you were doing,
and you individually caused us so much pain and so
much time I would I have to believe four weeks
a year of my time at Google was dedicated to
trying to undo what you were doing at Microscoft and I,
(04:45):
you know, it's like having a tennis partner that you
hate losing to but you love playing because they're so good.
And then we've became friends. But it was really incredible
how well.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
It's it's been almost twenty years. Tim, so I count
you and Nancy and the armstrong face Emily is people
that I have great affection and respect for and professionally,
obviously we've been able to you know, have the privilege
of working together so many times. But where we started
as a hell of a lot different than where we
are today. Jim, your professional history kind of reads like
(05:16):
the timeline of modern media, Google, AOL, Verizon, and now
flow Code. Every chapter has been about, as I said, transformation,
but each in a totally kind of different way. When
you look back at those chapters, search content connection, what
ties them together for you? Is there a thread through
(05:36):
the journey of the last twenty five plus years, you know, Michael, I.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Started out thinking I want to be an investment banking
and I went to go work at a bank when
I got out of college, and I hated it. And
actually the guy who sat next to me was amazing
at the job we were doing. So I went to
my boss and I'm like, you should fire me, and
you should promote this guy named Murph. The guy said
to me, I've never had somebody come to my office
and proactively asked to get fire and at the same
time trying to get somebody promoted, you know he works
(06:03):
with And I just said, I'm this is not my
not my life, my gig, not my gig.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
I was intensely interested in media growing up in technology
and I used to do programming. I worked at a
healthcare system one summer programming their entry forms UH to
put it on computers. The define moment for me is
I went and started a newspaper in Boston. And when
I did that, I didn't know anything about newspapers or media.
(06:28):
And I started it from scraps with my best friend
from high school. I did it for a couple of years,
and in that timeframe, I first of all learned the
basics of media. What is content is? What is ad sales?
You know, what are subscribers and users? And during that timeframe,
I was down at MIT when my friends called me
(06:50):
who was connected at MIT, and said, Hey, there's a
company here that you should come see. It end up
being Mozilla in Mosaic, and I went down and saw
the browser for the first time. When I saw the
browser come up on the screen and I saw a website,
I instantly was like, well, just change newspapers was so hard,
(07:10):
I said, you can just program this in like you
like I was programming at that healthcare company for their
admission system. They're like, yeah, it works just like that,
you can do it online. So I went back that
day and said, I'm selling, We're selling the newspaper, I'm
doing the Internet. And I ended up belonging. It's a
long story, but I ended up moving out working for
Paul Allen's company, star Wave, which was the first big
(07:31):
content company on the Internet. We did NBA dot com,
NFL dot com, ESPN dot com. That was my first
Silicon Valley type experience because Amazon was there, Jeff was there,
just getting off the ground. Amazon, Yahoo was kind of
cranking at the time, and all these companies were recruiting
from each other. So so my appreciation for media started
(07:51):
with the newspaper. I appreciated for the internets really started
at at Paul Allen's company, and then I basically made
a decision at that time period that I was going
to just go to the front edge of the Internet,
and that's how I ended up getting a Google. It's
a long story, you know. AOL was kind of like
going from all growth companies to seeing a company that
(08:11):
need to be turned around. So I was like that
that'd be another interesting thing to do. And after I
Soulditive Horizon, I really thought about the future of like
how to have direct brand connections in a world that's
all huge platforms. And that's really why I started flow code.
So that my journey has always been in a very
singular lane of focus.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
But the interesting connect there is, Yeah, flow code kind
of feels like a culmination of the journey, and certainly
not at the end of your journey, but a culmination
of the journey thus far. But in some way it's
also a pivot from you know, the next frontier being
more like not another platform, but the real worlds. You know,
(08:53):
you're going offline, you know, using the technology, So how
is that working out?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
I'll take a step back. The reason I'm doing flow
code is eighty one percent of the economy is in
the real world. You know, people forget that that they
when you wake up and read the newspaper or watch
you know, your favorite program on YouTube or CTV or television,
it talks about AI, the internet, you know, mobile, all
(09:18):
the things that are amazing about the world. The reality is, Michael,
eighty one percent of the economy and GDP is still
in the real world. And more important, when you ask
someone and I do this a lot to people, they say, oh,
why are you doing flow code? I said, let me
see the pictures on your phone, and I'll have people
scroll their pictures and I'll say, you know, it's interesting.
I don't see any pictures of technology on there. I
(09:40):
don't see you doing a lot of things other than
your experiences in life. So I look at the experience
economy the same way I look at the Internet, which
is lots of consumer decisions going on, lots of experiences,
almost no software. And I want to spend the rest
of my time in life really thinking about out how
to make human life on Earth better and more connected.
(10:04):
And I love the Internet, and I'm flow codes connected
to the Internet and AI and all those things. But
what I really want is I want people to get
off of infinite scroll, which I think is a black hole,
and I want them to use their phone more like
a lightsaber, and the real economy to have experiences and connections.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
So Tim bring that back to the mind of the
or the mindset of the CMO today. You know, the
senior marketers doesn't always have to be CMO. You meet
with those senior marketers pretty regularly. If you had to
distill their collective anxiety into kind of one headline, is
there something that would be a common thread that you're hearing.
(10:43):
Again from that senior level of marketers, I would say the.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Headline would be I just caught up to the internet
bus and another bus just went by me, which is AI.
I don't think it's one hundred percent the right focus,
but cmos are at the forefront right now now, with
standing in front of a consumer base that's gone from
zero to a billion users on AI in the last
two years or two and a half years, and it's
(11:10):
gone from the c speed knowing what worked, knowing how
it worked, and what was measurable in those things, to
the C suite asking the CMO, what's happening in the
consumer landscape and how do we things are changing quickly.
But also they're getting a second pressure, which is why
(11:31):
are we spending any money on marketing, creative data and
analytics when every headline I pick up, as the CEO
tells me, AI can do all of this. So I
think there's a the cmos. You and I have been
in some meetings together with cmos in the last six months.
I think they're fighting a two front battle, which is
what's happening on the consumer landscape and how quickly is
(11:54):
it changing. And I will give you one stat most
of our customers have flow code. Seven to forty percent
of traffic from search has changed because of the search
funnel changes in AI. And the second one is almost
every marketing department in the United States is either flat
or being cut right now. So you have a two
(12:14):
front war and you're basically asked to do with the
same amount of resources you had over the last couple
of years or a fewer.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I would say it might even be a three front war.
I'm not sure if it's a third front, but it's
a joint effort. You've got your CEO, you've got to
be your CIO, and you've also got your CFO now
much more interested and invested in marketing and trying to
understand ROI and the story look the way I tell it, Tim.
(12:43):
And I was asked this question frequently over the last
fifteen eighteen months about you know, Michael, as I went
through an interesting transition a year and a half ago.
People said, why do you need to do this? Go
play golf, and I say, well, I suck at golf,
so let's get that out there. But I'm fun to
play golf with because I'm fast and I've always got it,
(13:03):
and I've always got some good jokes, so you know,
I'll keep you laughing and I'll keep you moving. But
I said, in my career ARC, there's been three game
changing moments. The first was the introduction of mobile telephony
and all that came with that. The second was obviously
the Internet, and the third is AI. There's lots of
(13:25):
things that have happened in between, lots of shiny toys
over here or over there, you know, dot com, dot com,
we've been doing it all, but those three moments, mobile telephany,
the Internet, and AI. And I said, for me, I
couldn't be on the sidelines during this one. I had
to be I had to be in the game.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
And you're not programs to be out of a game, Michael,
You're not. You're not an out of the game player.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
You're an play well but but you know it. But
it's fun to be in the game at this moment
because we're watching this transformation. But the reason I brought
up the CFO, one of my CMO friends said to me,
they can't men to see their leadership. They laid out
their plan of what they think they could do through
the utilization of technology, AI, et cetera. And they showed
(14:09):
a twenty percent savings and the CEO and the CFO
nodded their heads apparently positively, and just as the guy
was leaving, his CEO said, and by the way, I
think you could do better than twenty You know that pressure.
That's combination CEO feeling it in the ether again and
CFO saying, oh, no, I know there's more there.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Yes. By the way, Michael, I think you're you more
than almost anyone else have been more involved in companies
transitioning their thinking on some of the ways they do business.
And whether that's been with your consulting stuff you guys
have done, or honestly, whether it's the work you've done
I think between clients and agencies over time, which I
think has been remarkable. Is you know that this year
(14:55):
and last year probably a little bit, but really this
year is one of those years that Kate is going
to change, especially in twenty twenty six, where I think
when you look up and I don't know if you
feel that it or not, but it's a year where
things are going to change dramatically, and I think the
reshuffling of the checkerboard or chessboard is underway right now,
and you can't cut if you don't redo your business.
(15:17):
At the same time, you.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Don't cut your way to growth. And so from that perspective,
let's talk about plan. As an English major, I love words.
You came up with a really interesting report which I'd
love you to shed some light on, tim and I
know our audience will like the name of it as
much as I did. The big ass CMO growth Plan.
Can you shed a little light on the big ass
(15:40):
CMO growth plan that flow Code has been putting out
into the market.
Speaker 2 (15:43):
First of all, the big ass calendar is part of that,
and it's really where it came from. And that's a good,
really close friend of mine, Jesse Itzler, who's I think
one of the best entrepreneurs in the US and has
done Zico Water and Marquee Jet and countless other brands,
really game changing thinker. Their CMO growth plan came from
(16:04):
flow Code, and it came directly from what we've been
hearing from both our partners and from people at the
bigger research companies like Gartner and other places. And the
center point of that is there's three big areas that
we wanted cmos to kind of understand. One is the
eighty one percent of the economy being in the real world.
And as part of that, you know, the growth plan
(16:26):
for cmos really has to be about their touch points.
And you know, most major fortune five hundred companies have
fourteen touch points. It could be their salesforce, their retail locations,
their channel partners, their website, and you know about five
or so of those touch points are highly digitized. Nine
or ten of them they have not digitized yet, and
(16:46):
they haven't even thought about the fact that all consumers
are in those channels with smartphones that they love. And
so bullet point number one on that is how do
you digitize your touch points in a world where everyone's
trying to eat your customer. The second one was really like,
how do you think about your data and how do
you how do you id the partners that you have
(17:09):
in all these channels. And I'll give you a great example.
Most companies actually don't keep track of their omnichannel consumers.
So they might keep tracking on the website, but they
don't really know if there are other experiences, stores, and partnerships,
you know those things. So the second thing we said
just to CMOS, was hey, really deep dive into how
(17:30):
you use data in your business and how do you
look at not first party data as a subject, first
party relationships and where those relationships are and what you're
what you're doing. And then the third piece is really
about what are the experiences you're bringing to those consumers
and how and when and why. Most consumers will go
(17:51):
much deeper in your brand if you give them a
chance to connect with you. And so our kind of
theory of the case and the CML growth plan is
your digital channels. You know, and you're measuring the nine
or ten channels that you have where you're not collecting
any information. Those are sometimes your best customers that they
travel to see you, paying money to come see you.
(18:13):
They're investing time and energy. And when you look at
some of our partners like Delta Airlines or Craft Times
or some of the other people that we do work with,
they have very big connectivity across their touch points and
they're enabling them. So we've opened up another growth channel
for them that you know, in many cases they haven't
really been thinking about the real world economy as a
(18:35):
as a digital funnel, but that's what we do for people,
and that's really what the CMO growth plan is about.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
We're going to hit pause for a moment, but stay
with us after the break. We've got more insights to share.
You know, you've been saying what I think gets home
for everybody in our into street experiences aren't a tactic,
(19:02):
they're basically the strategy, as you just said eighty one percent.
Is there something that you see culturally that's changed that behavior?
And you know the idea of experience and you talk
about Delta. I know Delta's a big believer in experience.
We have the good pleasure of working together with them
as well, and you know they've they've made that a
real part of their growth. Is there some particular thing
(19:25):
in culture or consumer behavior that's made that the case,
made it the currency.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Here's what I think, Michael, and I think honestly, I'm
not just saying this through on the podcast together. I
think you're one of the best real world people in
the real world. And I think that the relationships that
you've built and is that famous saying relationships run the
world is And I'm going to tell you where I
see it. In New York City, I have a place
in downtown and I walk to work and I go
(19:52):
run on the West Side Highway a few mornings a week.
Humans are getting together in the singles clubs and running together.
See humans, they all wear black, They're all dressed the same.
After work, there's philosophy classes and things where people are
getting together. And I think if you go to the airport,
you go out in the real world, you go to
(20:13):
all the experiences, you go to Coachella, you go to
any of the places that you and I have been
to in the past. CAN, by the way impossible the
program you started, more people are going to those more often.
And I think that as digital as the world is getting,
I think the world is desperate for relationships.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
And you know what, Tim, we saw it flashback five
years pandemic, and we wondered, and you mentioned CAN. We
wondered when CAN was closed for two years, when CES
didn't happen, were people going to come back? Did it
become the negative reinforcement? Gee, I lived without it, so
maybe I don't need it. Well, in fact, you know
the results, every one of those came back, you know,
(20:55):
not double, but they came back one and a half times. Yeah,
I mean, they really, really brought back the reality of
people want that connection. And so we had the option. Yes,
we all had the option. We all were, you know,
enveloped in the pandemic, and then we had the option
to stay that way or go back to in real life.
(21:17):
And I guess irl wins.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah. And then Michael, let me give you an example,
because you're you're tight with them, and I am too.
And this is not an infomercial for them, because we've
been partners for them for a long time. But if
you look at what ed Bastian, Dan Janky Alicia Tillman
have done at Delta, you think about the investments they
made in the middle of the pandemic where you come out.
(21:40):
I had a partner in office yesterday who's a very
very well known sports person, and he said to me, hey,
you're on the board of Wheels Up, which is part
of you know, basically part of Delta. I said, well,
there's a public company, but you know, yeah, the Delta
is a big investor in it. They said, you know,
I've been watching what they're doing. Delta is investing in
all the places where we have our experiences, and could
(22:00):
you introduce me to Delta because I want to see
if I can cut a partnership with them, and they
have all the conductivity to the places. And by the way,
I love their lounges and I love and we have
a high network group the Delta one Lounge. We want
to do those things. And I give a company like
Delta a lot of credit because it wasn't easy to
(22:21):
invest anywhere during the pandemic. It was twice as hard
for a travel company to do it. And not only
do they did it, but I would argue I think
they've been the furthest out on the chain.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
Thousand. Yeah, Tim, again we can suck up to our
mutual friends in ed Bastan and Alicia and Dan. I
have again had the good fortune of working with them
for quite some time. And yesterday I flew Delta and
the Delta one experience is so over the moon in
terms of in real life. They tick every box, they
(22:55):
anticipate everything, Tim, I want to switch. I want to
get the real world with you. You know, the idea
of turning moments into connections. We've talked a lot about
that already, and obviously you're the biggest proponent in the
market for the connection of physical and digital. You've recently
announced a real world example of that in your partnership
(23:15):
with the Milwaukee Bucks. Could you talk about that partnership
and what it means to the NBA and the Milwaukee
Bucks and what it means to flow Code.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I gotta I'm gonna have to name check somebody
else because he gets the credit for the NBA relationship
is Adam Silver And we have another investor from there,
David Lee, but they're investors in flow Code, and Adam
was the one who originally when we started flow Code,
said hey, wait a minute, I'm spending a lot of
(23:45):
money on w NBA dot com. W NBA dot com.
You know all the properties they have digital, their app,
and you know they do an extreme amount of real
world experiences. I think actually the NBA in person, just
there in person, if you added up all there and
gain time and people and all the things they do,
probably be a top five website in the United States.
So that's how big the NBA is offline in the
(24:06):
real world. Adam was like, Hey, this makes a ton
of flow Code makes a lot of sense to me.
Why don't we test it out and see if we
can make it work. And so today, if you flash forward.
You know, we're the front for the NBA I D.
We just did Abugabby with them at their event. We
did China with them a couple of weeks ago, and
I saw Adam at something I was at about a
week ago. But when you go to the Bucks, you know,
(24:28):
Peter the president of the Bucks is somebody who was
kind of interested in flow code, and we went out
to see him, you know, a while ago. And the
Bucks you know also have wes Etons and other owners.
There were incredible you know investors and really I think
groundbreaking thinkers on the economy. They were like, yeah, this
(24:48):
makes sense. I mean, why wouldn't we want to connect
more deeply with our fans. And so we rolled flow
codes out in their stadium and the results have been
have been tremendous. But more importantly, if if you think
about a fan, when a fan comes to a game,
you know, they really want to feel connected to the teams.
I mean that you like I always say religion in sports?
(25:09):
Are you know two out of the three things you
change your clothing for?
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Well, m Tim, I'm an interrupt to tell you, you know,
but my two sports are basketball and baseball. Yeah, Well,
I played baseball, and you know, I'm too short to
play basketball, but I was a decent baseball player. I
would marvel at the fact going to a Dodger game
or a Laker game, Yes, how many people in the stands.
(25:35):
Not as much now but used to be, but maybe
I'm not noticing it as much. Would be in the game,
and they'd have in the case of the Dodgers, they'd
have Vin Scully on the radio in the transistor radio
in their hand while they're at the game. And I
always would marvel at the people who would have Chick
Kurn on, you know, at a Laker game and they'd
(25:56):
be listening to the radio while they're at the game live.
So it always kind of interesting to me. That was
your offline online back then it wasn't online. But yeah,
but you know what was, Michael, a natural connection to passion.
You know, I was watching the game last night, the
Dodgers game in Toronto. If you've noticed, Terry Kowaja, who's Canadian,
(26:18):
has made it a pit he and I against one another,
because so yeah, seeing.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
That I've seen that. But but let me ask you
a question in terms of experiences in your life outside
of Ronnie and the family, What would you where would
you rank your sports memories against other other things? I mean,
it is it.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Let me let me give you Let me give you
the answer. Tip. I was live with my dad in
nineteen sixty three when Sandy Kofex pitched a perfect game.
Wow sixty six, Wow, sixty sixty three, perfect game. I
was at Kirk Gibson's home run. Really it was at
a Portland Trailblazers Lakers. I love that one, you know,
(27:02):
playoff game that was twenty points down the Lakers won
in the fourth. You know, I can go through life
like many people and say where were you when? Fortunately
I've been able to say was in the stadium on
a couple of those but wow, you know, respectively. But
you're right, those are the moments, your family moments and
sports moments. Yep.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
And by the way, Michael, I think this is what brands,
This is why sports is getting such traction right now.
Is you know, the brand. Your job is to bring
you know, the value in the ROI to the consumer.
Your job is also to make it. You know, people
people want engagement and excitement in their lives, and the
you know, sports is an unbelievable venue to do that
(27:42):
in and like the experience you have with your dad.
That's why I think things like sports and the things
that we see happening in sports with engagement levels, they're
off the charts. And I think a lot of it's because, honestly,
it's the emotional time period where you're doing something you
really care about in love and you know, brands are
integrated there and they know they have the Delta Lounge
at you know, MSG and Legends and I mean it's
(28:04):
just it all ties together, which is your best memories
are with some of your best your favorite brands.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
Also good company will be right back after the break.
So Tim, let's kind of bring the big picture together.
(28:31):
You've personally been a leader in the digital age, and
now you're a leader and clearly helping define what comes
next in the connection age. Interesting, you know transition for
you from online offline, but you started with offline as
we all did. How do you decide describe the connection
(28:52):
age because I know we're talking about in real life
and that, but is there is there something unique about
the connection age that you.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Yeah, I'll tell you what it is. My my viewpoint
has gone to the end of the earth. I want
we're about to tell you which is. You know, I
grew up in a lot of i'll call it B
two C businesses and then a lot of B to
B things that I've done over the years of ads,
the same stuff that you have done. But I think
the world has to go C to B and I
think that's one of the things I talk about with
(29:19):
flow code is and there's some really other than three C,
which I love because it has the C in it is.
You know, in my mind, there's the consumer, there's the creative,
there's the connection, there's a conversion, there's CRM, there's communication,
and all of those c's are wrapped in your your connectivity.
(29:41):
And I think as a brand, growth starts with the C.
And if you're staying with the C in the world today,
you have a couple choices. Meta in Google just announced
their results. Meta fifty billion dollars in revenue growing at
twenty six percent, Google one hundred billion dollars in revenue
growing at sixteen percent. Those two growth rates are bigger
(30:03):
than most of the Fortune five hundred brands in the
world by a long shot. Part of the reason their
growth rates are so big is those companies are amazing
at thinking about the C before they get to the B.
And I think one thing I see in advertising right
now in our industry, there is an overload of B,
and AI is making the overload of B a triple overload.
(30:27):
The Meta just announced they're going to spend seventy two
billion dollars on Capex. As a brand, you're not gonna
win in the Capex race, Okay, you probably might be
in marketing. Your marketing apartment might be getting cut right now,
like lower budgets, as we talked about. So the question
is how do you win in the future. And I
think winning in the future is you have to become
(30:49):
an expert at the C. You have to if you
went into someone's office, I mean, this is the meetings
I go to. I'm probably seen seventy or so cmos
or CEOs in the last four months. I would say
eighty percent of the meetings I've had with them are
about to beat and very few of them are about
(31:09):
to see. And if you want to watch me see
by the way, that's the opportunity. That's the opportunity. And
I always say this also, you know easy and known.
If something's easy and known, it's not an opportunity. If
it's hard and unknown, there's an opportunity there. And when
I go to you and I were both at the
same AD Council meeting yesterday, the seven out of the
(31:31):
first ten people I spoke to said to me retail
media network you know? I said, what you know that
retail media networks? You know? And that strikes me. If
it's not necessarily it's not easy because a lot of
people have to figure that out, but it's known. And
so the question is you have to win at retail
(31:52):
media networks as one of the things you do. And
there's financial services, retail media networks, all these things popping
up and and and that you have to figure out
how to do it. But you should start with out
of my when I focus on my C, where does
that fit into my strategy? And I think one thing
we see in business now is topics are coming up
in business and it's like a tsunami overwhelming the C.
(32:14):
It's all the B topics.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
I think you are spot on. It's just nomenclature. We've
been speaking about it more recently as B to H
business to human. So the human connection, I've been putting
H as human maybe in the sea of connection. Classically,
when people say B to B or B two C.
(32:37):
I've always said that's wrong because when you say B
to B, it's implying that there's not a person making
the decision on the other end. There's a procurement person,
there's a CFO, there's a somebody's making the decision. You're pitching.
You're not pitching to a widget. You're pitching to a person.
So there's where I go to the B to H.
It's business to human number one and number two. You've said,
(33:00):
and I've got to go back and give one more
flower to Delta. They're thinking of it, not necessarily like
most with common we've been calling commerce media, not retail media,
but commerce media networks and their believers in, as you
well know, experienced media networks. Yes, I love that, experiential
(33:20):
media networks. That's where they're going, and I know you're
going to be their partner on that journey. Tim. I
get to have fun now, not that this has not
been fun, but I get to do my lightning round. Well,
just throw you some some fast talking. If you could
give your younger self one piece of guidance, Tim.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
What would it be, Uh? Trust your gut.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
You know, when I've spoken over the years to people
in the entertainment business, and before excuse me, before the
democratization of content distribution that the Internet supplied, you know,
traditionally you had to wait till the head of a
network the proverbial green light, you know, who have the
ability to green light that content. Today, you have your
(34:10):
ability to green light your own content. I have my
ability to green light my own content. But those network
heads back in the day, whether it was a Brandon
Tartakov or Fred Silverman or the legends of television. I
had the good fortune of speaking to guys like that
over the years as technology crept into the decision making process,
(34:33):
and I'd look at them and say, you're famous for
your golden gut, that sense of I'm going to choose
this program with this cast, and it's going to work.
Now that you have the ability to overlay that with
so much data and predictive modeling and the things you
can do with data, how much of you how much
are you still relying on your gut versus the data?
(34:56):
I think the right answer was always I'm still using
my gut, but it's relaid with the data.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Yes, I think you have to you have to use
the data. But I will say this, Michael, this might
be a little contrarian. I think we're in the largest
time period with the smallest amount of ideas for two reasons.
One is people get over reliant on data, and they
get over reliant on micro pieces of content around that data.
(35:22):
And I think the golden gut informed by data, always
informed by data. That's what I meant by trust your
gut is when you see, when your gut tells you
something above the data, you should do it immediately.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
Well fail quickly.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
You know.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
That's the old joke. The best two answers in the
world are yes or no. Just given to me quickly.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Yes fast, you know what I mean. And I think
that gut is important.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
To that speaking fast. Let's go back to lightning. If
you weren't doing what you are now, Tim, what would
you be doing.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
I would probably either be an artist or be in
the military. And I always thought I grew up in
a military household. My dad was in the Navy and
he's my hero. But I thought I would do that.
But the other thing is like I have a very
very high creative side, which I didn't. I didn't grow
up in an environment where creates, but he was was
the first skill set and school wasn't great for creativity.
(36:21):
But I am huge into art.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
I love art, and I would probably I would probably
do that, Tim, what's the best book you've recently read?
Is there a particular book? I mean, what's got your attention?
Speaker 2 (36:33):
I would say to two of my friend's books. I'm
in love with nineteen twenty nine by Andrew ROSSI. I
just started it. Yeah, by the way, I'm like getting
to the end of it, and I'm slowing down reading
because I don't want it to finish to end.
Speaker 3 (36:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
And I have another friend, Doug Brunt, who wrote a
book called Diesel, which is the story of the founder
of the diesel engine, which I never I never, never knew.
But it's in the interesting time period in the early
nineteen hundreds where almost like today, like technology has been explosion,
the Industrial revolution is exploding. And I grew up thinking
(37:12):
diesel was just the name of the type of energy
you put into trucks and things like that. And it
turns out there was this amazing entrepreneur named Diesel who
started actually in coolance and refrigeration and actually I remember
he invented basically invented how to make ice cubes, but
then went in and did the diesel engine. And it's
(37:33):
just an incredible to who done it. He ended up
dying and they don't know how, really how he died.
I don't give the book away, but he disappeared off
a ship.
Speaker 3 (37:43):
See, in all these days, I thought he was the
guy who invented diesel g and Scopeco figure.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
I mean, yeah, those I've read a lot of books.
I read a lot, and those are two books recently
that I read that I like a lot.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Well, Tim Armstrong, I could spend not only an hour,
I could spend a day, a week, a month talking
to you, and you know, not only about the experiences
we've had, but those that we're about to have, because
I know you are somebody who in your career has
continually looked around the corner and identified things before others.
(38:18):
And I know you're continuing to do that with flow Code.
The same with you and that's why we're friends and
we're going to do more stuff together next year. You
got it, buddy, Tim Armstrong. I want to thank you
for joining us on good company.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Thanks and congrats on all the stuff at three C
Amazing to watch it.
Speaker 3 (38:37):
I'm Michael Cassen. Thanks for listening to Good Company.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Good Company is brought to you by three C Ventures
in iHeart Podcasts. Special thanks to Alexis Borgo Purdeo, our
executive producer and head of Content and Talent, and to
Carl Ketele, executive producer at iHeart Podcasts. Episodes are produced
and edited by Mary Doo. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
See you next time.
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