March 7, 2025 • 46 mins
Bruno Gralpois captivates with an inspiring journey from barely speaking English as a French immigrant to becoming a marketing powerhouse managing billion-dollar budgets for Microsoft and co-founding Agency Mania Solutions. His remarkable story weaves through Seattle's tech boom, experiencing IPOs, acquisitions, and eventually receiving Steve Ballmer's marketing excellence award at Microsoft.
The conversation reveals fascinating insights about the global marketing landscape, including the milestone that advertising spending surpassed $1 trillion in 2024. Bruno breaks down how major corporations allocate marketing budgets—typically 12% of revenue—dividing funds between media placement (60%), production (20%), and agency fees (20%). This expertise comes from years of working with Fortune 500 brands like Nestlé, American Express, and Toyota.
Bruno shares thought-provoking perspectives on artificial intelligence in marketing, noting the tension between agencies eagerly adopting AI tools and more regulated client industries approaching them cautiously. His balanced view highlights AI's transformative potential for production costs while acknowledging the complex governance issues surrounding its implementation.
The most compelling moments come when Bruno discusses his book "Success Freak: Kick Ass in Seven Days," challenging conventional definitions of success. Rather than focusing solely on wealth, fame, and power, he advocates for developing a personal definition as the essential first step toward fulfillment. This philosophy, combined with his emphasis on choosing willingness over aptitude when hiring, offers listeners actionable wisdom relevant to both entrepreneurs and corporate leaders.
Ready to redefine your own success? Listen now and discover how Bruno's unique blend of European perspective, American entrepreneurship, and global marketing expertise can transform your approach to business and life.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Vegas Circle Podcast with your hosts,
paki and Chris.
We are people who arepassionate about business,
success and culture and this isour platform to showcase to
people in our city who make ithappen.
And on today's podcast we'vegot a really special guest.
We've been trying to set thisup for many years now, man, so
we've actually got a friend inthe circle with us who's a
powerhouse in the marketingindustry.
He's worked with businesseslike Microsoft, visa.
(00:22):
Now he's built out his owncompany.
Originally from Paris, so we'regoing to get into that, but
he's actually the co-founder ofAgency Mania Solutions.
We got Mr Bruno Grospois.
I got to say it the right way,did.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I say it the right way you did, you did.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Perfect man Got to get you a proper introduction 10
out of 10.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Chris is going to give me a negative 10.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
I know that's funny, I don't know.
He obviously knows the namebetter than I do, but I thought
you missed the mark there.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Oh here we go.
But my man, bruno man, so it'san absolute pleasure to have you
, man, so let's dive right in.
So you've got a credible story.
Where did you kind of get yourfirst break, man?
I know you've done a lot thatwe'll actually get into.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
but where did your actual journey start, like?
Where did so good to be here?
It's been a few years since wetalked about doing this so great
to be here.
So I started within tech.
I started in probably what'sconsidered the birthplace of
cloud-based computing software,which is Seattle.
So Mecca basically yeah,exactly, and that's where I
(01:21):
started.
Worked for a startup, didactually work for two startups
there that ended up goingthrough an IPO.
Eventually, both of them gotacquired by Microsoft.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Oh nice.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So I was kind of going through the crazy ride of
software companies going IPO andeventually being acquired by
the big guys.
That's very exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Everybody wishes for that.
I know the big guys.
That's very exciting.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Everybody wishes for that, I know, I know.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
That's excellent.
So you kind of started offworking for different companies,
kind of learning the wholespace of the industry.
I did, did they kind of likerecruit you, did you get in, did
you apply, like how did thatall work?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
The way?
I started, being French, bornand raised, you know.
First, you know, went tocollege in France.
Barely spoke English, stillworking on that, but moved to
study in the Bay Area and get apostgraduate degree.
That's where I really learnedto speak the language.
I had no choice.
Found me to graduate and thenfell in love, you know, with the
(02:21):
country and fell in love withthe space I was eventually going
to spend my career in, which ismarketing, advertising and
brand building.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
And then, just through acquaintances, I got an
opportunity to meet people inthe software business.
They were like that's probablygoing to date me, aldo
Spagemaker software engineers,people that started very early
on and started a new companythat ended up being called Visio
not the one with a Z but theone with an S which was doing
(02:51):
these float charting softwarewhich now you can find in
Microsoft Office.
So if you do any float charting, that's what they acquired for
like $3.5 billion.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
And they ended up just building that in and so
that was kind of the way Istarted and entry level.
I got lucky enough to be partof a company that was growing
fast, so that was kind ofexciting and, as you know, when
you're in the right place at theright time, things happen.
And so I got to be able to do alot more than I would have
probably hoped for.
(03:23):
And then I was kind of in thatcorporate environment, started
jumping a little bit, went onthe agency side, so the medicine
avenue side of things, and thenjoined another company that was
pre-IPO.
I knew that about a year beforethe IPO called Equiniv.
(03:45):
That was probably the strongest, largest IPO in the Northwest.
At the time we had the strikeprice of $12.
We're trading at $80 withinlike three weeks.
It was crazy, very successful.
And then that was before theinternet bubble bursted so a lot
happened, but Microsoft boughtthem eventually for like $12
(04:07):
billion, which was a very decentacquisition.
Microsoft has done bigger onessince then, but at the time that
was the biggest one, I think.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And you won an award for Microsoft.
I did Steve Ballmer.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Yeah, I think he still owns the Lakers oh the
Clippers?
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, the Clippers, sorry.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
And he's been around tech for a long time.
He started the company withBill Gates and when Bill became
chairman of the board, steppedaway as CEO.
Steve kind of stepped in andthey were both, I think, harvard
guide rates and Steve was kindof a crazy madman, if you will,
(04:46):
in the company.
But he did a lot of good thingsand I ended up working on a
special project for them took ayear of my life, it was kind of
a global initiative and then Igot the marketing excellence
award from him.
So that was that was really abig, a big celebration for me
for a lot of the work I put intothis company, which I where I
stayed about 10 years and youknow type A personality, you
(05:06):
know just company, you knowcould, could afford to recruit
the best of the best, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
So it was a very intense, very competitive
environment, but yeah, as you'rekind of going through that like
IPO process, right, andeverybody hopes for that.
They see these companies,they'd like to be a part of that
.
Cause, to your point, there's alot of benefits of being able
to get on an IPO early, buildthe success with their.
I'm sure most of the time whenyou're at early level stages you
get some equity.
You get some benefit from beingable to be a part of that.
(05:32):
When you're doing that, throughthe IPO transition process,
what was the most exciting partfor you?
Was it the want to get acquiredor was it really the growth of
building that business fromscratch or from a smaller space?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Most of the companies really, before they get
acquired, don't reallycontemplate that.
When they're on the IPO stagethey're all about raising
capital.
Oh, raising capital so theydon't actually need capital from
other companies.
So that question typicallytakes place years later.
Initially they're reallyfocused on building scale,
getting investment in and reallystart growing the company.
(06:06):
So there's a lot of excitement,I think.
For me, you know, it was reallyjust the pure adrenaline rush
that you felt every day going tothe office and feel like you
were changing the world and yougot to be ridiculous.
It's crazy and you know, and toyour point, on paper, you know,
sometime, depending on whereyou are like the second time
around, I was an executive ofthe company.
(06:27):
So that sounds great because Igot a lot of shares and a lot of
equity, if you will.
But then the internet bubbleagain, bursted stocks starting
depressing, and as an executiveyou're kind of tied up.
You can't actually sell.
That's an FTC rule, so theexecutive don't cash out and
leave the company after it goespublic and leave the investors.
So there was a lot of so atthat point that's where I went
(06:51):
on the corporate side.
That's where I joined Microsoft, not through the acquisition,
but later on got hired byMicrosoft.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Oh, so it wasn't part of the acquisition that you
have to stay on for a certainnumber of years.
No, and I was ready forstability at that point I was
ready for stability.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
At that point I was like, okay, I've done the crazy
stuff, it's all good.
You know, like I'm bruised abit.
You know I loved it, but nowI'm like I want to go to a
company that's stable,especially Microsoft.
Yeah, there are about 90,000employees, you know, billion in
marketing, with about 5,000marketers.
(07:23):
At the time he was a big, bigcompany and at the time I
managed a budget that wasprobably near like a billion
dollars.
So it was a lot of money anddoing a lot of cool stuff.
But it was through that projectwith Steve Ballmer I ended up
working with a lot of basicallyon the global scale, building a
capability.
And then, as I was learningabout this new role I was
(07:43):
playing, I went and talked toall these amazing companies like
the big names you know the Parkand Gamble, the Unilever, the
McDonald's, the Coca-Cola, thebig brands wanted to find out
how they did it and learned somuch through that process that I
realized nobody should gothrough what I went through to
learn and build a team and builda function.
So I decided to write my firstbook based on that.
(08:06):
All these best practices Iended up putting in a book I'm
like somebody at least will beable to read it and benefit from
it, All the nuggets of whatyou've learned over the years.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, Excellent man.
So then you ended up.
So Agency Mania, when did youstart that?
Speaker 2 (08:19):
with your partners.
We started about 12 years agonow, okay, so thank you yeah
we're like bootstrap startup,and they were in that space too,
right.
They were in the space.
Yeah, one of them actuallypartnered with me.
That's Terry and Sean.
Right, yeah, terry was a goodfriend of mine, long-time friend
.
I did a lot of consulting forme in different companies I
(08:39):
worked for, including Visa,where I worked for a while.
So we knew each other very welland we always talked about
doing something together.
And then sean was kind of a anew, uh, a new, um, a new entity
for me.
Uh, extremely successful ceo ofa mid-size 120 150 million
dollar company called wrq gotacquired by another company
(09:02):
called.
So he had a lot of techbackground and then it was very
clear that, although peopleliked the book about best
practices, the passion that wesaw in the marketplace was
actually to take these bestpractices and bring them to life
using software, and CloudBasewas exploding Again, the
birthplace with Amazon AWS,microsoft Azure, cielo was the
(09:23):
best place to do that and westarted and our first client I
actually introduced Terry tothis company that wanted to hire
me and I wasn't ready to jumpfrom Visa, but I was in the
Silicon Valley and the companywas HP and HP Inc at the time
before they split.
Now they're HPE Enterprise andHP Inc printer and laptop.
(09:44):
They were one big entity andthey offered me a job and I said
no, but I know somebody who canhelp you.
So I introduced Terry.
Terry said hey, I'm not goingto go there alone, I don't know
any of these guys.
Can you come with me?
And it was a short ride fromVisa to HP.
So I went with her and then,after the meeting, they're like
(10:06):
wow, we really like the two ofthe two of you and we're like
interesting, we talked aboutdoing something, so maybe that's
it.
And so hp became our firstclient and that's how we started
that's excellent, and now wehave about 22 clients, the
largest companies in the world,like company, like nestle,
american express, toyota, youknow, like big brands, big
brands, like multi-billiondollar companies.
So that's Klontz, so he's beena great journey.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah, kind of like separate back a little bit, so
you have a you know, for us,marketing to me is like I spend
$50 on PPC campaigns right,that's me marketing, but
obviously when you start $5billion budget, $5 billion
budget, it's a very differentdynamic.
What is kind of the biggestnuance that you see from
managing a marketing budget forsome of these larger companies
versus, like a small business?
Because really when you'rehiring an agency at a large
(10:49):
company like that, you'regetting a much different level
of value than what you would beas hiring a PPC manager or
social media manager online.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
That's very different .
Well, there's two things thatcome to mind scalability and
sophistication, because we're asmall business, too, servicing
these amazing companies, butthose companies.
To give you a sense of scale,in 2024, for the first time, the
advertising industry surpasseda trillion dollars.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Oh wow.
Speaker 1 (11:16):
It just passed in 2024?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, it's over a trillion dollars.
That's how much money is beingspent in advertising.
Now, if you look at advertising, it obviously correlates very
closely to GDP growth, meaningadvertising fuel the economy.
The economy rewards advertisingby giving them more money to
spend.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
And we all watch the Super Bowl.
We know how much people spendon these things.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
So it's a big part of how you grow as an organization
.
So traditionally, mostorganizations spend about 12% of
their revenue in sales andadvertising.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Oh, wow 12%, 12%.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
So for every dollar a company makes in revenue any
large company about 12 cents isreinvested in that kind of
activity.
And then you split your moneytypically in three different
ways Media, so placement, whichis about 60%, all the stuff you
saw in the Super Bowl.
Sure Production, which is doingthe TV spot you may have seen
Again, all the actors, celebritytalent, all that good stuff
(12:12):
like producing those amazingshots, those videos, those
commercials.
That's a lot of production.
And the remaining 20% is spendreally with the advertising
agencies that make magic happenthe copywriters, the creative
directors, the you know, the youknow the uh and financial
marketing agencies, the PR firmsthat you know.
(12:34):
There's a an amazing portfolio.
There's about 350,000 agenciesin the U S alone advertising
agencies of all sizes that helpthese companies, these big
brands, go to market and that'show they do it.
So the sophistication and thescale I mentioned is like that's
a lot of money that theseagencies are being given and
(12:56):
tasked really to help thiscompany either drive brand
equity and brand value or dowhat we like to refer as
performance marketing, which isreally driving Demand okay, this
is this so many layers.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Yeah, I don't even know if I want to go down this
rabbit hole yet, but but um, AI,yeah, I know you and I have
talked about a lot.
How do you feel about AI?
Do you do people stop hiring alot?
How do you feel about AI?
Do people stop hiring companieslike agency and all these
things?
You have to come pivot and doother things, or what do you
think happens with AI?
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Yeah Well, first, we are all in that's what I like to
think about AI as an acronym,not artificial intelligence, but
all in meaning that it'sobviously penetrating basically
every aspect of what we do, andthe agency world has been really
leveraging and investing a lotinto AI because they need to
(13:51):
leverage that technology to doanything from media buying and
planning and optimization andwhat they call programmatic
buying, which is this algorithmthat just go and automatically
buy and optimize whatever yousee on the web or on TV.
And also on the creative side.
You know like I may be able tocome up with concept, creative
(14:12):
concept, far quicker using or Ican really define an audience a
lot better using AI.
So there's a lot of tools thatagencies are using to get better
and they're investing heavilyin doing that.
Now the big guys the Google,the OpenAI those guys have been
building obviously incrediblemaking huge investment in
(14:33):
building capabilities that theagencies are leveraging.
And then clients are alsoinvesting in AI.
Now clients or brands, brandadvertisers, are a little bit
more cautious because we see it.
We use AI in our platform.
So AI technology, we apply itto different tools that we have.
We have a platform and many ofour tools rely on AI for certain
(14:54):
components, but the challengefor brands is the sensitivities
around using AI, aroundconsumer-facing communications,
making sure that there's a lotof regulation coming up.
You know you would think the EUhas been really aggressive with
that.
The US has been a little bitless so, but you know it's
(15:17):
likely to kind of eventually, alot of it is self-regulation.
Right now, advertisers say, well, if we use AI, we should
probably disclose it.
Good idea you don't wantconsumers to find out that
whatever they just saw, whateverthey think they were being
talked to, was with a real humanor whatever, when it was
actually AI.
So disclosure is one thing.
And then there's a lot of datasensitivities on privacy,
(15:39):
personally identifiedinformation, pii.
So all these things arerequiring a lot of companies to
step back a bit.
So they have to be verytransparent and they have to
regulate it.
They have to regulateinternally, and so we have
clients who are like, hey, useAI, go for it.
And we have a lot of highlyregulated industry clients, like
in pharmaceutical, financialservices, and there's a lot more
(16:03):
sensitivity around using AI.
They have, like, thesegovernance rules and you have to
go through a government bodyinside a company to get approved
to use AI.
You have to make a case, theyhave to review it and approve it
before they start using it.
Everybody's very worried aboutwhere AI is going to go, and so
it's funny.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
We still got time, it's still got jobs, for the
most part, to your point.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
I think, a lot of time.
What you're seeing is that thisis supplemental to what you
already do.
Right, it helps you give betterplacements.
It helps you give better.
You know uh, concepts, demands,but even with something as
simple as that, like, hey, I'mgonna place this or utilize this
ai to help in placement, youhave to get those approved as
well through different uh,different clients.
Why don't you get that?
Speaker 2 (16:42):
approved as well.
They do, they do.
They are very, very particularabout that, um, and agencies are
obviously don't have the samelevel of concern, so they're a
little bit more aggressive,experimenting a little bit more
with it.
But again, they have todisclose to the client, they
have to make sure the client iscomfortable with it, otherwise
they could expose themselves andexpose the client and the
liability could be huge.
(17:02):
So there's sensitivities aroundthat, which is interesting.
I think that's why the US haschosen not to put too much
regulation in place, becausethey feel it would be a
competitive threat.
They would not be able tocompete with China and other
countries that are very fast onAI.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So, even like really right now, like, even if AI does
develop the way we think it'sgoing to, really the thought is
it's going to cut down onproduction costs, it's going to
increase placement.
So in reality, the marketingbudgets, they're more likely to
be actionable and penetrable tothe market and increase shares.
Right, it really doesn't feellike it's a huge burden or a
negative to an agency standpoint.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
It's really maybe the people who are producing it,
the actors and people of thatnature, may lose sight of that,
the big impact I think I've seenhas been on production yeah
they used to be like you used tolike a flyer crew around the
world to go shoot in an exoticplace, and you have all these
massive budgets and you know,and you're shooting for three
days or five days or whatever.
And now with ai, you know they,they are doing a lot of using a
(18:03):
lot of you know kind of um, youknow just a lot of technology.
We need to replace physicallocations and where they shoot
and how they use talent.
So it's kind of a new game thatway.
But, to your point, they're notlooking at oh, we're going to
do less of it, we're just goingto do more or better, and so
it's fueling, I think, just alot of excitement around what's
possible.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Yeah, because they're not going to lower their
budgets.
But now, instead of losing 30%on production, you can get 90%
on placement, which is obviouslywhere we see the higher
penetration rates come in.
So that makes a lot more sense.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
You said it was a trillion dollars.
I don't even imagine what it'sgoing to continue to go over the
next 10 years of advertisement.
So a lot of money to be made.
I know you split your timebetween Paris and France in
general.
I know we were talking aboutthis too, but I'm just curious
to see your perspective about,business-wise, like, the
difference that you see in thestates versus like a paris or
europe.
Um, what do you see as thedifferences, just business-wise?
Speaker 2 (18:54):
well, there's, there's quite a few profound
ones, obviously culturally, andyou know there's entrepreneurial
spirit in the us which actuallyled me here, which I love yes
yeah, and it's a little bit moretraditional, a little bit more
conservative in europe.
Um, and I'm to set asidepolitics because there's a lot
of stuff going on about.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Europe and the US.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
And you can see those differences really come to life
lately, like you know, peoplemaking statements, politically
speaking, around a number oftopics, but if you think about
just really from a businessperspective, the US is about, I
think, gdp is about $30 trillionor something.
France is about $3 trillion GDP.
(19:34):
So I think if you compare thetwo, there's about tenfold
difference between the two interms of size.
What's interesting and I sawthis statistic which I think is
in the book Success Freak,success freak the productivity
index, which is a GDP per hourworked, is actually equal,
despite the tenfold differencebetween.
(19:55):
So the French actually happento be hyperproductive, despite
the fact that they take a lot oftime off.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, they take vacation.
How much is a vacation?
The holiday they call it.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
It's about.
So there's about five weekspaid vacation, but really when
you add the additional time it'sabout.
So there's about five weekspaid vacation, but really, when
you add the additional times,about seven weeks vacation.
So it's a lot.
And you know I like to jokewith friends.
You know people say you know,obviously, being french, you
know I get a lot of that.
But they say you know, likefrench fries, your contribution,
french toast.
You know, like french kiss.
You know we did that one.
(20:25):
That's a longer story, but yeah, but the one I like is actually
in 1936, I don't know if youknew that, but the French went
on strike and because of thatthey managed to get what we know
today as pet vacation.
The French did.
I never knew this, so it neverexisted until then.
So pet vacation was actuallycreated by the French in 1936.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
I'll thank them for that.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
So now I mean Wow, I never knew this.
Yeah, the US, I think, is maybethe only country in the world
where, at the federal level,you're not obligated to provide
pedification.
I think most countries are, butit's a best practice and that's
why people see it everywhere.
But the French, actually, yeah,that was one of their big
contribution to the world.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Man salute to the French.
That's the best one you likethat one.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I like the French kiss too, though.
Oh yeah, that's a good one too.
You said French kiss too.
Yo, that's amazing.
Let's talk about your book then, yeah, so this one really
caught my attention.
The Success Freak Kick Ass inSeven Days.
What is this actual book about?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
So you know, I've always been really passionate
about topics that are a littlebit nebulous, like you know.
So I wrote books, you know,about beauty and business
partnerships, and success wasone of those very interesting,
almost obsessional topic for alot of people, like everybody's
obsessed.
You know, there's a fine linesometimes between obsession and
addiction.
You know, like, we're alladdicted to success, obsessed
(21:43):
about success, and there'ssomething healthy about it.
Well, you know, I, for me, um,there's a healthy obsession
about success, so it's not anoxymoron uh, not to me at least.
I think you can actually beobsessed and and do good, lead
to really good, positiveoutcomes when, when you put the
right amount of energy.
But a lot of people, I think,um, are struggling with it.
(22:07):
Success, for me, is another wayof what is our definition of
happiness right?
How do we reach that state?
And in a dopamine culture youknow that we live in where, you
know, for a lot of people,happiness is really about
seeking pleasure and avoidingpain, and sometimes, you know,
(22:28):
in my opinion, it's a lot morethan that.
It's finding kind of what Ilike.
Oliver Twist has a great quoteI love.
He says there's two importantmoments in life.
I don't know if you heard thatquote, but he says it's the
moment you're born and themoment you find that why.
And for me, success is reallyabout finding your why, and
people really spend yearssometimes feeling that void, not
(22:50):
knowing their why, and so Iwanted to write a book that
would be digestible for mostpeople.
Most of the books people readare thick.
They're like full of stories ofpeople that maybe they can
relate to, maybe they can't.
You know this biography fromthese highly successful people
they may never be able toreplicate.
So I wanted to write somethingvery pragmatic, something you
(23:11):
could consume in a reasonableamount of time, so you don't put
that book on your bookshelvesor on your nightstand, read it
and remind yourself to finishthe chapter you never finished
and go back to it six monthslater.
So that's why I wrote it in away that was digestible.
Again, in seven days.
I wanted to really identify andextract what I thought, through
(23:32):
countless interviews andsuccessful people I've met over
the years.
What are those seven mostessential skills that will
really propel you forward?
And then, how can I give youthose skills?
To acquire one skill per day,one chapter per day, so within
one week you can actually bringthis to life.
It's not seven years, this iseasy, yeah, yeah fantastic Can
(23:57):
you give us one Can you give usone of those, I'll give you one.
I'll give you the first one.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Which one, as you're researching through the book to
try to create the book, what wasthe experience that you found
or learned that maybe you didn'talready know, that you thought
was, you know, pretty profoundor insightful?
Speaker 2 (24:11):
So if I, if I were to ask you every, every one of you
just, you know what's your whatdo you think are those
essential skills for success?
We may all come with adifferent set of skills, and
it's okay, um, and you know, ifwe ask 20 people we'll probably
get 20 different things.
What I was interested in iswhat are those again that are
common to most of these stories?
(24:32):
So I really wanted to kind ofextract the one that I'm most
telling.
And there's an usual suspect,you know you might think okay,
well, tenacity, you know, like,you know the expression, like we
fail to remember sometimes that98% of people give up too early
work for the 2% who neverstopped, you know type of thing.
So give up too early work forthe 2% who never stopped, you
(24:52):
know type of thing.
So all these kind of clichesand stereotypes around what
makes success true, and a lot ofit working hard, you know, like
applying yourself, you know,and all these things are true.
But the first chapter I pickedthat I'm very passionate about
because to me it's at the coreof challenging some preconceived
notions we have in our society,the social norm around what
success is like wealth, fame,power, which those are the most
(25:17):
common ones and we idealize themin our culture, right Like in
everything we do.
We're like that's what we lookup to, that's what we again, we
world.
And I wanted to introduce theconcept that success is very
personal.
All definitions of successshould be personal.
So the first chapter is aboutreally coming up with your own
personal definition of success,because if you don't have it,
(25:41):
you'll never really truly besuccessful in your own terms.
You'll be successful maybe onthe terms of, maybe what your
parents think success should be,or your friends or society, or
again, you know, in yourenvironment.
But it's a very personal questfor first to define that, and so
I give some examples of that ofpeople and ask them you know,
how do you think?
(26:01):
You know, do you think theirfame or their wealth is their
means of definition of success?
And when you start thinkingabout it you realize there's a
lot more than those, really, inmy mind, primitive concept, and
so that's the first chapter isreally exploring that.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Setting a foundation for yourself.
I mean kicking off strong.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Yeah, that's solid.
That's solid man, man, my kidsread this man.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, that's excellent.
I don't even know where else togo with this.
I've got so many questions foryou, that's definitely a great
insight.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
I think for us one kind of kick off with the book.
What it's about specifically.
What about the process ofrating a book?
I think that's one thing to gothrough.
Now you're on multiple books.
You've gone through thisprocess a few different times.
Does every time get a littleeasier?
Is every time the samechallenge?
Speaker 1 (26:46):
And before I forget too, you had an audio book
coming out.
I'm going to share that too.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, thank, frickies , actually will be available as
an audiobook on March 11th.
You'll be first available onone of the major audio
distributors and then, I think,within a week, you'll be
available on Spotify and Appleand Amazon.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
I'm going to get that .
I'm an audio person.
I haven't read in a long time.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
And it's not my voice .
Speaker 3 (27:12):
We need your voice.
No, we do a passion.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
We need your voice.
I would love to hear your voice.
No, I do a passion.
We need your voice.
I would have loved to hear yourvoice.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
I love what I do and I am truly passionate.
But yeah, I ended up hiring avoice talent.
When they sent me samples topick out of nine different
voices, I listened to it and Ilistened to the voice.
I was listening to what thevoice was reading.
It was a male voice and I'mlike this is good stuff.
(27:39):
I'm like I wonder what he'sreading.
Like what book is it?
I didn't realize it was my ownbook?
No way, because I never heard itfrom that perspective, Like I
wrote it.
I could see in writing, butjust hearing it.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
You could hear it in your head and I'm like I had a
little moment of pride.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I was like what is this?
This is my doing.
So I was very excited.
No, so the book is coming out.
It will be just another way forpeople to digest the book.
To answer your question, theprocess of writing a book.
I meet a lot of people thatfeel like they have a book in
them and the way I you know, andit's inspiring to me that so
(28:19):
many people have so much toshare to the world and I wish
more people did it.
A lot of people say it, neverreally follow through with it,
and it's unfortunate because Ican tell you again.
When I moved to the US, I was inmy little dorm studying to get
my degree in the US, didn'tspeak English.
(28:39):
Every night I tell that storyin the book.
Every night I was writing on apiece of paper.
I had one piece of paper forevery letter of the alphabet and
every day I learned a new wordand I would write it down and my
wall was covered with paper andthat's how I learned really
quickly to speak well enough tobe able to graduate.
And the reason I mentioned thatis because I would have never
(29:00):
thought that one day I wouldactually be writing books.
I'm actually writing on myanother book yeah, that's coming
up next year, called the clientof choice, but I'm so I'm
working on that.
But the point is, you know, ifme, an immigrant, if you will,
barely speaking English, canwrite a book, my take on it is
(29:21):
everyone can and maybe shouldconsider writing a book.
So that's my first thing, butit takes a long time.
You have to be reallypassionate about what you do,
you have to be consistent, youhave to apply yourself and I
think the most important thingfor me, because we all have, we
all have our own artistic band.
I cannot sing.
Don't ask me to sing.
I cannot play an instrument,but writing is something I enjoy
(29:44):
doing and I think you get goodat what you enjoy doing.
Yeah, and it's also doesn'tfeel like you're working at it.
If you're writing a book andnever you don't like writing,
I'll say forget it, like Maybehire somebody to do that, but
just don't, don't, please, it'sgoing to be brutal.
So, because it took me aboutfour years my first book, I'm
getting a little better now.
(30:04):
The next one is going to takeme about a year to write it, so
it's much more efficient, andthen it takes another year, I
think, to get it ready.
So I work with my publisher.
I have a literary agent.
I'm probably going to work withthe same publisher again.
Then they have their ownprocess where they do their own
editing.
Then you have to print it, youknow, and then you have to get
(30:26):
it distributed and then you haveto market it.
So all these things areimportant steps in a multi-year
process really.
So it takes a lot of dedication.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
That's a lot.
Yeah, I didn't know all that.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
And I was curious do you have a journal where you
just write notes in and justlike what's your process like?
Do you voice it with your phoneand reference?
Speaker 2 (30:44):
it.
I can't even write down with apen very well.
My handwriting is awful thesedays.
So because I live in tech, I'mjust I just, yeah, I use tech
tools and I've always kind ofdone that.
It's much easier for me toorganize it on, you know, that
(31:05):
way.
So, yeah, no, no handwriting,no notebook, but it's finding
the time really to do that.
Like I'm writing I think Imentioned to you I'm writing.
I'm trying to finish ascreenplay, my first one, first
time I'm doing fiction.
Most of my writing isnonfiction, but I'm so I'm
challenging myself.
It's actually a vaudeville, youknow so, comedy type of thing.
(31:28):
I'm almost done with it.
Very challenging for me becauseI'm not a fictional writer and
certainly writing humor, youknow like, and it's.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
But you have a very good sense of humor, so I know
that yeah, it would do well.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Well, that's very nice of you, but you have to be
in the right mindset to writethat kind of stuff.
And it's true for any writing.
You know like I write.
When I'm inspired, I'm not.
I can't say I'm going to writeMondays and Tuesdays between 6
and 8.
It doesn't work that way.
The energy is right.
Yeah, If I'm like, oh, this ismy time, I feel it.
I'm like, leave me alone, I'mwriting, that's my time to write
(32:01):
.
Speaker 1 (32:02):
That's good, and I think any artist is like that.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
I don't think painters will.
I don't think Picasso wassaying, hey, from 6 to 8, I'm
going to go and start painting.
He's like suddenly he probablywill close his door and do this
for three days without eatingbecause he failed the calling.
So I think you have to followyour calling.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
That makes sense.
You never know when it's goingto come up either.
I think that's why they'd say alot of writers write like the
first thing is because they wakeup in the morning, because
they're just randomly inspiredby something.
Speaker 1 (32:26):
People just leave notebooks as a journal method,
like writing on a bedside, justbe able to write up once it pops
up.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
So I up, you know, once it pops up so in the mind.
And those who do, I admire them.
Yeah, I'm just not one of them.
I I just can't.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Yeah, like stephen king I think he did raid for
every single day for the rest ofhis life and be mine.
But so you were a frenchforeign trade advisor, right,
yes, for period.
Can you kind of share justbuilding relationships is your
thing and being able to break itdown simplistically, you know,
through your books and differentnuggets and things.
Can you kind of share with usjust how our listeners could
build better relationships?
Maybe it's in business-wise orpersonal.
(33:03):
You know what's one tip thatyou can actually share for them.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Yeah, so first I did some work, as you mentioned, as
an economic advisor for the.
French Ministry of Commerce,really helping French companies
and American companiescollaborate better.
So whether they were looking toattract talent or export talent
or export technology or importtechnology, but finding ways to
work.
(33:26):
So I did that for a number ofyears and it was very rewarding
to be really this kind of superconnector to the world of
business.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
And it felt very natural to me because, to your
point, I dedicated really mycareer to help companies
collaborate better and that'sbeen really the journey I've
been on ever since.
So but your point about how doyou go about doing that?
What's fascinating aboutbusiness partnerships is that
there are a lot of similaritieswith personal relationships.
Right, a lot of the concept andprinciples about trust, you
(33:59):
know, and transparency andcommunication and you know,
respect, and you know a lot ofthese concepts are really
naturally expandable to thebusiness world.
Now, it's not that simple inbusiness, in the business world,
no, it's not that simple inbusiness.
In the business world, you havethese commercial relationships
and you have these additionallayers, multidimensional layers
(34:21):
of complexity that you have toaccount for.
And I would say the level ofloyalty sometimes is not as
strong, hopefully, as you wouldexpect in a personal
relationship, because you knowonce a partner doesn't really
cut it anymore.
You know you might be veryquick to look if the grass is
greener somewhere else 1,000%yeah and maybe explore other
(34:41):
partnerships and so on, andsometimes not in the most, you
know, obvious or direct way.
So but I think the you know, Ithink if you are naturally
inclined to build a relationshipwith people.
You do that naturally withinyour family environment, within
your community of friends, andyou know, I think there's a lot
of these personality traits thatapply to the business world
(35:04):
that you can use, and then therest you just have to learn.
You know, by again practicing,and there's a lot of resources
online, seminars, online.
You know great shows like yours, you know where you can pick up
a lot of these skills, andthat's a journey we're all on.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
That's interesting Very much so I wanted to touch
just a little bit about yourfoundation.
Right, this thing TraffickingAgers was huge.
It's taken over the world a lotof times.
You want to share a little bitabout your foundation.
Speaker 2 (35:32):
Yeah, you want to share a little bit about your
foundation.
Yeah, I had the opportunityyears ago to meet Emma Thompson,
the Two Times Academy winner.
Emma was at the time thechairman of the Ellen Bomber
Foundation, which was EllenBomber was a Holocaust survivor,
really big on you know, bighuman activist, yeah, and she
(35:53):
started a foundation calledEllen Bomer Foundation that was
really helping victim of sextrafficking recover from the
traumatic experience they hadand so and Emma got involved
through these and that's a storyshe shared with me because she
lives in London and and you know, a lot of time you think about
sex trafficking as these, Idon't know, maybe Middle, middle
(36:14):
Eastern or like Eastern Europeor like South Asia kind of
phenomenon, and it's in the US.
It was in London and she met avictim of sex trafficking.
Somebody was abducted a blockaway where Emma lives and that
was kind of the opening momentfor Emma to really think about
it.
So they started a number ofprojects.
(36:36):
They started one in Amsterdamwhere they did kind of a sort of
art display, if you will, wherethey put these amazing
containers, these shippingcontainers, and they connected
them almost like as you walkthrough them, and it was the
journey of somebody being sextrafficked.
Every container was a segmentof a as you walk through them
and it was the journey ofsomebody being sex trafficked.
(36:57):
Every container was a segmentof that life and what it looked
like and it was very, very deepand.
But that was a challenge becauseto move these they tried they.
I think they moved it to acouple of locations, but it was
a logistical nightmare really tomove these containers and do
that.
So they pivoted and then Iended up meeting another
(37:19):
gentleman that is a well-knownphotographer for Vogue and you
know British as well, scottishactually, but living in London,
and he started taking picturesof Emma's friends, city buddies,
women in their safe place, andthe project got called Safe and
so they were taking pictures ofwhere women felt the safest and
(37:40):
it could be.
I feel like that blew up.
I felt like I saw Safe.
Yeah, it became kind of asensational thing.
So I went to London they did anauction where they were
auctioning pictures at theDewberry kind of auction house
and then I got involved reallyhelping you know the work they
were doing, trying to raiseawareness for, for the cause and
learning in the process thatsex trafficking, which is we
(38:03):
human slavery, is one of themost lucrative, sadly, form of
you know um that's crazy, youknow illegal activity if you
will, and and you know thataffects, you know women.
You know illegal activity if youwill, and you know that affects
, you know women.
You know men, children, in sucha profound way and to your
point I wouldn't be.
I know that it comes up fromtime to time.
(38:23):
Vegas is only another spot.
Yeah, part of the triangle.
Yeah, so to me, I became verypassionate about that.
I have a lot of you know.
I have a daughter, I have a son.
I always felt like you know.
The stories of these peoplethat were impacted by it were so
(38:44):
incredibly touching and it'ssuch a tragedy that in today's
world that doesn't get more of apriority.
So I love to be able to getinvolved and support that.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yeah, that was great.
It's too much to ask you.
The Bruno movie is going to becoming out soon.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
We will produce that man.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
You got too much that you do man too many layers to
you, which is excellent Businessadvice, I have to have you to
say something.
As far as a nugget, I know yourbook.
I know all they need to do isread one of your books to get
the nuggets.
But what can you share?
Just business advice maybe,with somebody that wants to
start their own business, Maybethey want to follow the career
with tech space.
But what would you share withthem that could be helpful?
Speaker 2 (39:24):
Well, starting your business.
I can think of a lot ofdifferent things you could do.
I mean, clearly, the first oneI mentioned in the first chapter
is really finding your why.
I think once you do that,everything seems much easier.
For sure I think when you don'thave that, I think that's where
you struggle.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
Get lost yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
So you want to start there.
Secondly, you there's always alot of unknown.
You know, when we started ourcompany, I remember I was I
downsized, I was working at Visaat the time.
I had a good job in the Bay,beautiful place, exotic life a
little bit and I moved toSeattle.
I had to make some adjustments.
(40:00):
I sold my car, got a small car,got a small footprint, the
place where I was living and Iwas like I didn't know where I
was going to get the nextpaycheck.
That's true entrepreneurship,right.
And so there's a lot of unknownand fear associated with that.
And you have to be ready forexperiencing that unknown and
(40:22):
that fear and face it, you know,heads on, and there's nothing
that will prepare for it.
You know a lot of people say,oh, I'll do it when I'm ready.
You're never ready.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
Yeah, you know we want to do this podcast.
My wife kept making fun of mefor two years.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
But yeah, that's true , you have to throw yourself in
it and if you love what you do,it's going to feel very
instinctive and very natural,and I think things will.
What you don't know I always.
People come to me all the timeand they ask me what I value
most in people.
When I hire people, we we workwith, and there's two things
(40:59):
that come to mind is aptitudeand willingness, and if I have
to choose, I will takewillingness of aptitude every
day, because what you don't knowyou can learn.
But I'm not in the business andI said, say that all the time
to motivate people.
Speaker 3 (41:15):
Yeah, that's tough If you're not motivated.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
I'm not your cheerleader.
If you're not excited to dowhat you do, you know you got to
do something else.
But if you don't know what youdon't know, you know.
If you're curious enough andyou want to apply yourself,
things will come your way.
And I'm far I would wantanything else.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
I love, that that's great insights.
I was just talking to my kidsabout that.
Speaker 3 (41:37):
You sound like you're in our study.
Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
You know I got to ask you this.
We talk about restaurants and Ilove hearing from you where you
eat at, but what is yourfavorite restaurant in Vegas?
Or maybe not favorite, becauseyou eat a lot?
Speaker 2 (41:52):
I do Give us a of of where you would recommend I do,
I, I do, um what you would think, I would pick a french
restaurant.
So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'mgonna surprise you and not pick
one um.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
The one I like is wally's wally's, I'd raise all
the world and you introduced meto one of the guys from wally's
at your party.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Yeah, I have a good friend of mine that works there.
That was the place where I hadmy first date with my girl, but
what I like is really a niceblend of sophistication and
casual.
Great wine, right yeah, it's awine bar restaurant, but it also
has a market in the back whereyou can actually buy some cheese
(42:33):
and amazing things, Say yourfriend's name.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
I apologize, serge Serge.
I'm coming to your friend'sname.
I apologize, serge Serge.
I'm coming to see you, sergeGreat man, serge Jules.
Speaker 2 (42:40):
Yeah, and he's a maître d' there, great guy, and
if you go there he'll give you atour.
There's an amazing selection ofwine, probably the largest
selection of wine in Vegas, andthey have over 100 wines,
choices by the glass.
This is in Resorts World, right, yeah?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
it's Resorts.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
World.
So one of my favorite spotsbecause again it's a good blend
of sophistication but alsocasual.
There's a lot of seating,different options for seating
and again the wine selection is.
I mean, you would have expectedthat from me a little bit.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Well, it's amazing because you're the only person
to bring up Wallace.
Nobody else has brought upWallace.
Speaker 3 (43:17):
Give us something from a restaurant.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
Yeah, it's good.
I heard great things about it,so I'm going to check it out.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Awesome, okay, yeah, wine has been a passion of mine
for, obviously, being French, Ihave no choice French yeah.
Y'all got some of the best winein the world, france.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
If I didn't say that.
That's awesome, man.
What else man?
What else anything?
We forgot to ask you that youwant to maybe leave us out on.
I know you got another book.
You're working on Screenplay.
What's something else?
The?
Speaker 2 (43:43):
Screenplay yeah, that new book that's going to be a
business book coming up soon.
I publish a lot because I likewriting Again.
It comes naturally to me.
I publish in Forbes on a regularbasis and I like to share.
You know I like to again it'svery impulse writing, like
something come to me.
But I also like to inspiremyself from things around the
(44:09):
world and I bring them intocontext, if you will, in ideas
that I want to share.
So that's why, again in SuccessFreak, I love, and even in my
book Agency Mania, I love theconcept I start with like things
you would not expect, like youknow what's, for example, one of
the chapters I start is I talkabout sweating sweat and how
it's a multi-billion industryand how we spend billions trying
(44:32):
not to sweat, and yet it's oneof the most natural thing and
probably one of the most healthything you need to do.
That's funny.
Get rid of toxins, you know.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
moisturize your body all these things you want to
actually sweat.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah, and to me that was a chapter to introduce how
it's important, like failure, toaccept that failure is a good
thing too, because that's howyou learn.
So I take a lot of these ideasand concepts and introduce new
concepts and make it interestingalong the way hopefully, Bruno.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
I could talk to you for hours, man.
You do a great job we need tohave you come on every year, man
.
Just give us a breakdown ofwhat you're doing.
Man, you're motivating, butorganically.
It's not just pep talk, it'sactually real stuff.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
So I appreciate you, it's your passion.
You can definitely tell yeah,pep talk it's actually real
stuff, so I appreciate yourpassion.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
You can definitely tell you yeah, yeah, for sure,
man, I do I do.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
Um, what's your social handles, man?
People can reach out to you onhere.
Speaker 2 (45:20):
So it's my name.
So if you, bruno Galpois um youcan find me on Instagram.
Yeah, I post quite a bit.
You're too kind, james.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
Bond man, james Bond, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (45:34):
You're too kind, I wish Although we all, we do, we
all do.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
We'll work on that, but an absolute pleasure to hang
out with you, man.
Seriously, Thanks for having me, I love everything that you're
doing, man, and the impactyou're making on the world.
So check us out atthevegascirclecom.
I appreciate your We'll see younext time.
Welcome to Vegas Circle Podcast with your hosts,
paki and Chris.
We are people who arepassionate about business,
success and culture and this isour platform to showcase to
people in our city who make ithappen.
And on today's podcast we'vegot a really special guest.
We've been trying to set thisup for many years now, man, so
we've actually got a friend inthe circle with us who's a
powerhouse in the marketingindustry.
He's worked with businesseslike Microsoft, visa.
(00:22):
Now he's built out his owncompany.
Originally from Paris, so we'regoing to get into that, but
he's actually the co-founder ofAgency Mania Solutions.
We got Mr Bruno Grospois.
I got to say it the right way,did.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
I say it the right way you did, you did.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Perfect man Got to get you a proper introduction 10
out of 10.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Chris is going to give me a negative 10.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
I know that's funny, I don't know.
He obviously knows the namebetter than I do, but I thought
you missed the mark there.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Oh here we go.
But my man, bruno man, so it'san absolute pleasure to have you
, man, so let's dive right in.
So you've got a credible story.
Where did you kind of get yourfirst break, man?
I know you've done a lot thatwe'll actually get into.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
but where did your actual journey start, like?
Where did so good to be here?
It's been a few years since wetalked about doing this so great
to be here.
So I started within tech.
I started in probably what'sconsidered the birthplace of
cloud-based computing software,which is Seattle.
So Mecca basically yeah,exactly, and that's where I
(01:21):
started.
Worked for a startup, didactually work for two startups
there that ended up goingthrough an IPO.
Eventually, both of them gotacquired by Microsoft.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Oh nice.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So I was kind of going through the crazy ride of
software companies going IPO andeventually being acquired by
the big guys.
That's very exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Everybody wishes for that.
I know the big guys.
That's very exciting.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Everybody wishes for that, I know, I know.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
That's excellent.
So you kind of started offworking for different companies,
kind of learning the wholespace of the industry.
I did, did they kind of likerecruit you, did you get in, did
you apply, like how did thatall work?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
The way?
I started, being French, bornand raised, you know.
First, you know, went tocollege in France.
Barely spoke English, stillworking on that, but moved to
study in the Bay Area and get apostgraduate degree.
That's where I really learnedto speak the language.
I had no choice.
Found me to graduate and thenfell in love, you know, with the
(02:21):
country and fell in love withthe space I was eventually going
to spend my career in, which ismarketing, advertising and
brand building.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
And then, just through acquaintances, I got an
opportunity to meet people inthe software business.
They were like that's probablygoing to date me, aldo
Spagemaker software engineers,people that started very early
on and started a new companythat ended up being called Visio
not the one with a Z but theone with an S which was doing
(02:51):
these float charting softwarewhich now you can find in
Microsoft Office.
So if you do any float charting, that's what they acquired for
like $3.5 billion.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
And they ended up just building that in and so
that was kind of the way Istarted and entry level.
I got lucky enough to be partof a company that was growing
fast, so that was kind ofexciting and, as you know, when
you're in the right place at theright time, things happen.
And so I got to be able to do alot more than I would have
probably hoped for.
(03:23):
And then I was kind of in thatcorporate environment, started
jumping a little bit, went onthe agency side, so the medicine
avenue side of things, and thenjoined another company that was
pre-IPO.
I knew that about a year beforethe IPO called Equiniv.
(03:45):
That was probably the strongest, largest IPO in the Northwest.
At the time we had the strikeprice of $12.
We're trading at $80 withinlike three weeks.
It was crazy, very successful.
And then that was before theinternet bubble bursted so a lot
happened, but Microsoft boughtthem eventually for like $12
(04:07):
billion, which was a very decentacquisition.
Microsoft has done bigger onessince then, but at the time that
was the biggest one, I think.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
And you won an award for Microsoft.
I did Steve Ballmer.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Yeah, I think he still owns the Lakers oh the
Clippers?
Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, the Clippers, sorry.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
And he's been around tech for a long time.
He started the company withBill Gates and when Bill became
chairman of the board, steppedaway as CEO.
Steve kind of stepped in andthey were both, I think, harvard
guide rates and Steve was kindof a crazy madman, if you will,
(04:46):
in the company.
But he did a lot of good thingsand I ended up working on a
special project for them took ayear of my life, it was kind of
a global initiative and then Igot the marketing excellence
award from him.
So that was that was really abig, a big celebration for me
for a lot of the work I put intothis company, which I where I
stayed about 10 years and youknow type A personality, you
(05:06):
know just company, you knowcould, could afford to recruit
the best of the best, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
So it was a very intense, very competitive
environment, but yeah, as you'rekind of going through that like
IPO process, right, andeverybody hopes for that.
They see these companies,they'd like to be a part of that
.
Cause, to your point, there's alot of benefits of being able
to get on an IPO early, buildthe success with their.
I'm sure most of the time whenyou're at early level stages you
get some equity.
You get some benefit from beingable to be a part of that.
(05:32):
When you're doing that, throughthe IPO transition process,
what was the most exciting partfor you?
Was it the want to get acquiredor was it really the growth of
building that business fromscratch or from a smaller space?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Most of the companies really, before they get
acquired, don't reallycontemplate that.
When they're on the IPO stagethey're all about raising
capital.
Oh, raising capital so theydon't actually need capital from
other companies.
So that question typicallytakes place years later.
Initially they're reallyfocused on building scale,
getting investment in and reallystart growing the company.
(06:06):
So there's a lot of excitement,I think.
For me, you know, it was reallyjust the pure adrenaline rush
that you felt every day going tothe office and feel like you
were changing the world and yougot to be ridiculous.
It's crazy and you know, and toyour point, on paper, you know,
sometime, depending on whereyou are like the second time
around, I was an executive ofthe company.
(06:27):
So that sounds great because Igot a lot of shares and a lot of
equity, if you will.
But then the internet bubbleagain, bursted stocks starting
depressing, and as an executiveyou're kind of tied up.
You can't actually sell.
That's an FTC rule, so theexecutive don't cash out and
leave the company after it goespublic and leave the investors.
So there was a lot of so atthat point that's where I went
(06:51):
on the corporate side.
That's where I joined Microsoft, not through the acquisition,
but later on got hired byMicrosoft.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Oh, so it wasn't part of the acquisition that you
have to stay on for a certainnumber of years.
No, and I was ready forstability at that point I was
ready for stability.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
At that point I was like, okay, I've done the crazy
stuff, it's all good.
You know, like I'm bruised abit.
You know I loved it, but nowI'm like I want to go to a
company that's stable,especially Microsoft.
Yeah, there are about 90,000employees, you know, billion in
marketing, with about 5,000marketers.
(07:23):
At the time he was a big, bigcompany and at the time I
managed a budget that wasprobably near like a billion
dollars.
So it was a lot of money anddoing a lot of cool stuff.
But it was through that projectwith Steve Ballmer I ended up
working with a lot of basicallyon the global scale, building a
capability.
And then, as I was learningabout this new role I was
(07:43):
playing, I went and talked toall these amazing companies like
the big names you know the Parkand Gamble, the Unilever, the
McDonald's, the Coca-Cola, thebig brands wanted to find out
how they did it and learned somuch through that process that I
realized nobody should gothrough what I went through to
learn and build a team and builda function.
So I decided to write my firstbook based on that.
(08:06):
All these best practices Iended up putting in a book I'm
like somebody at least will beable to read it and benefit from
it, All the nuggets of whatyou've learned over the years.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, Excellent man.
So then you ended up.
So Agency Mania, when did youstart that?
Speaker 2 (08:19):
with your partners.
We started about 12 years agonow, okay, so thank you yeah
we're like bootstrap startup,and they were in that space too,
right.
They were in the space.
Yeah, one of them actuallypartnered with me.
That's Terry and Sean.
Right, yeah, terry was a goodfriend of mine, long-time friend
.
I did a lot of consulting forme in different companies I
(08:39):
worked for, including Visa,where I worked for a while.
So we knew each other very welland we always talked about
doing something together.
And then sean was kind of a anew, uh, a new, um, a new entity
for me.
Uh, extremely successful ceo ofa mid-size 120 150 million
dollar company called wrq gotacquired by another company
(09:02):
called.
So he had a lot of techbackground and then it was very
clear that, although peopleliked the book about best
practices, the passion that wesaw in the marketplace was
actually to take these bestpractices and bring them to life
using software, and CloudBasewas exploding Again, the
birthplace with Amazon AWS,microsoft Azure, cielo was the
(09:23):
best place to do that and westarted and our first client I
actually introduced Terry tothis company that wanted to hire
me and I wasn't ready to jumpfrom Visa, but I was in the
Silicon Valley and the companywas HP and HP Inc at the time
before they split.
Now they're HPE Enterprise andHP Inc printer and laptop.
(09:44):
They were one big entity andthey offered me a job and I said
no, but I know somebody who canhelp you.
So I introduced Terry.
Terry said hey, I'm not goingto go there alone, I don't know
any of these guys.
Can you come with me?
And it was a short ride fromVisa to HP.
So I went with her and then,after the meeting, they're like
(10:06):
wow, we really like the two ofthe two of you and we're like
interesting, we talked aboutdoing something, so maybe that's
it.
And so hp became our firstclient and that's how we started
that's excellent, and now wehave about 22 clients, the
largest companies in the world,like company, like nestle,
american express, toyota, youknow, like big brands, big
brands, like multi-billiondollar companies.
So that's Klontz, so he's beena great journey.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah, kind of like separate back a little bit, so
you have a you know, for us,marketing to me is like I spend
$50 on PPC campaigns right,that's me marketing, but
obviously when you start $5billion budget, $5 billion
budget, it's a very differentdynamic.
What is kind of the biggestnuance that you see from
managing a marketing budget forsome of these larger companies
versus, like a small business?
Because really when you'rehiring an agency at a large
(10:49):
company like that, you'regetting a much different level
of value than what you would beas hiring a PPC manager or
social media manager online.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
That's very different .
Well, there's two things thatcome to mind scalability and
sophistication, because we're asmall business, too, servicing
these amazing companies, butthose companies.
To give you a sense of scale,in 2024, for the first time, the
advertising industry surpasseda trillion dollars.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Oh wow.
Speaker 1 (11:16):
It just passed in 2024?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, it's over a trillion dollars.
That's how much money is beingspent in advertising.
Now, if you look at advertising, it obviously correlates very
closely to GDP growth, meaningadvertising fuel the economy.
The economy rewards advertisingby giving them more money to
spend.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
And we all watch the Super Bowl.
We know how much people spendon these things.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
So it's a big part of how you grow as an organization
.
So traditionally, mostorganizations spend about 12% of
their revenue in sales andadvertising.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Oh, wow 12%, 12%.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
So for every dollar a company makes in revenue any
large company about 12 cents isreinvested in that kind of
activity.
And then you split your moneytypically in three different
ways Media, so placement, whichis about 60%, all the stuff you
saw in the Super Bowl.
Sure Production, which is doingthe TV spot you may have seen
Again, all the actors, celebritytalent, all that good stuff
(12:12):
like producing those amazingshots, those videos, those
commercials.
That's a lot of production.
And the remaining 20% is spendreally with the advertising
agencies that make magic happenthe copywriters, the creative
directors, the you know, the youknow the uh and financial
marketing agencies, the PR firmsthat you know.
(12:34):
There's a an amazing portfolio.
There's about 350,000 agenciesin the U S alone advertising
agencies of all sizes that helpthese companies, these big
brands, go to market and that'show they do it.
So the sophistication and thescale I mentioned is like that's
a lot of money that theseagencies are being given and
(12:56):
tasked really to help thiscompany either drive brand
equity and brand value or dowhat we like to refer as
performance marketing, which isreally driving Demand okay, this
is this so many layers.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Yeah, I don't even know if I want to go down this
rabbit hole yet, but but um, AI,yeah, I know you and I have
talked about a lot.
How do you feel about AI?
Do you do people stop hiring alot?
How do you feel about AI?
Do people stop hiring companieslike agency and all these
things?
You have to come pivot and doother things, or what do you
think happens with AI?
Speaker 2 (13:31):
Yeah Well, first, we are all in that's what I like to
think about AI as an acronym,not artificial intelligence, but
all in meaning that it'sobviously penetrating basically
every aspect of what we do, andthe agency world has been really
leveraging and investing a lotinto AI because they need to
(13:51):
leverage that technology to doanything from media buying and
planning and optimization andwhat they call programmatic
buying, which is this algorithmthat just go and automatically
buy and optimize whatever yousee on the web or on TV.
And also on the creative side.
You know like I may be able tocome up with concept, creative
(14:12):
concept, far quicker using or Ican really define an audience a
lot better using AI.
So there's a lot of tools thatagencies are using to get better
and they're investing heavilyin doing that.
Now the big guys the Google,the OpenAI those guys have been
building obviously incrediblemaking huge investment in
(14:33):
building capabilities that theagencies are leveraging.
And then clients are alsoinvesting in AI.
Now clients or brands, brandadvertisers, are a little bit
more cautious because we see it.
We use AI in our platform.
So AI technology, we apply itto different tools that we have.
We have a platform and many ofour tools rely on AI for certain
(14:54):
components, but the challengefor brands is the sensitivities
around using AI, aroundconsumer-facing communications,
making sure that there's a lotof regulation coming up.
You know you would think the EUhas been really aggressive with
that.
The US has been a little bitless so, but you know it's
(15:17):
likely to kind of eventually, alot of it is self-regulation.
Right now, advertisers say, well, if we use AI, we should
probably disclose it.
Good idea you don't wantconsumers to find out that
whatever they just saw, whateverthey think they were being
talked to, was with a real humanor whatever, when it was
actually AI.
So disclosure is one thing.
And then there's a lot of datasensitivities on privacy,
(15:39):
personally identifiedinformation, pii.
So all these things arerequiring a lot of companies to
step back a bit.
So they have to be verytransparent and they have to
regulate it.
They have to regulateinternally, and so we have
clients who are like, hey, useAI, go for it.
And we have a lot of highlyregulated industry clients, like
in pharmaceutical, financialservices, and there's a lot more
(16:03):
sensitivity around using AI.
They have, like, thesegovernance rules and you have to
go through a government bodyinside a company to get approved
to use AI.
You have to make a case, theyhave to review it and approve it
before they start using it.
Everybody's very worried aboutwhere AI is going to go, and so
it's funny.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
We still got time, it's still got jobs, for the
most part, to your point.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
I think, a lot of time.
What you're seeing is that thisis supplemental to what you
already do.
Right, it helps you give betterplacements.
It helps you give better.
You know uh, concepts, demands,but even with something as
simple as that, like, hey, I'mgonna place this or utilize this
ai to help in placement, youhave to get those approved as
well through different uh,different clients.
Why don't you get that?
Speaker 2 (16:42):
approved as well.
They do, they do.
They are very, very particularabout that, um, and agencies are
obviously don't have the samelevel of concern, so they're a
little bit more aggressive,experimenting a little bit more
with it.
But again, they have todisclose to the client, they
have to make sure the client iscomfortable with it, otherwise
they could expose themselves andexpose the client and the
liability could be huge.
(17:02):
So there's sensitivities aroundthat, which is interesting.
I think that's why the US haschosen not to put too much
regulation in place, becausethey feel it would be a
competitive threat.
They would not be able tocompete with China and other
countries that are very fast onAI.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So, even like really right now, like, even if AI does
develop the way we think it'sgoing to, really the thought is
it's going to cut down onproduction costs, it's going to
increase placement.
So in reality, the marketingbudgets, they're more likely to
be actionable and penetrable tothe market and increase shares.
Right, it really doesn't feellike it's a huge burden or a
negative to an agency standpoint.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
It's really maybe the people who are producing it,
the actors and people of thatnature, may lose sight of that,
the big impact I think I've seenhas been on production yeah
they used to be like you used tolike a flyer crew around the
world to go shoot in an exoticplace, and you have all these
massive budgets and you know,and you're shooting for three
days or five days or whatever.
And now with ai, you know they,they are doing a lot of using a
(18:03):
lot of you know kind of um, youknow just a lot of technology.
We need to replace physicallocations and where they shoot
and how they use talent.
So it's kind of a new game thatway.
But, to your point, they're notlooking at oh, we're going to
do less of it, we're just goingto do more or better, and so
it's fueling, I think, just alot of excitement around what's
possible.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Yeah, because they're not going to lower their
budgets.
But now, instead of losing 30%on production, you can get 90%
on placement, which is obviouslywhere we see the higher
penetration rates come in.
So that makes a lot more sense.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
You said it was a trillion dollars.
I don't even imagine what it'sgoing to continue to go over the
next 10 years of advertisement.
So a lot of money to be made.
I know you split your timebetween Paris and France in
general.
I know we were talking aboutthis too, but I'm just curious
to see your perspective about,business-wise, like, the
difference that you see in thestates versus like a paris or
europe.
Um, what do you see as thedifferences, just business-wise?
Speaker 2 (18:54):
well, there's, there's quite a few profound
ones, obviously culturally, andyou know there's entrepreneurial
spirit in the us which actuallyled me here, which I love yes
yeah, and it's a little bit moretraditional, a little bit more
conservative in europe.
Um, and I'm to set asidepolitics because there's a lot
of stuff going on about.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Europe and the US.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
And you can see those differences really come to life
lately, like you know, peoplemaking statements, politically
speaking, around a number oftopics, but if you think about
just really from a businessperspective, the US is about, I
think, gdp is about $30 trillionor something.
France is about $3 trillion GDP.
(19:34):
So I think if you compare thetwo, there's about tenfold
difference between the two interms of size.
What's interesting and I sawthis statistic which I think is
in the book Success Freak,success freak the productivity
index, which is a GDP per hourworked, is actually equal,
despite the tenfold differencebetween.
(19:55):
So the French actually happento be hyperproductive, despite
the fact that they take a lot oftime off.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, they take vacation.
How much is a vacation?
The holiday they call it.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
It's about.
So there's about five weekspaid vacation, but really when
you add the additional time it'sabout.
So there's about five weekspaid vacation, but really, when
you add the additional times,about seven weeks vacation.
So it's a lot.
And you know I like to jokewith friends.
You know people say you know,obviously, being french, you
know I get a lot of that.
But they say you know, likefrench fries, your contribution,
french toast.
You know, like french kiss.
You know we did that one.
(20:25):
That's a longer story, but yeah, but the one I like is actually
in 1936, I don't know if youknew that, but the French went
on strike and because of thatthey managed to get what we know
today as pet vacation.
The French did.
I never knew this, so it neverexisted until then.
So pet vacation was actuallycreated by the French in 1936.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
I'll thank them for that.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
So now I mean Wow, I never knew this.
Yeah, the US, I think, is maybethe only country in the world
where, at the federal level,you're not obligated to provide
pedification.
I think most countries are, butit's a best practice and that's
why people see it everywhere.
But the French, actually, yeah,that was one of their big
contribution to the world.
Speaker 3 (21:04):
Man salute to the French.
That's the best one you likethat one.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I like the French kiss too, though.
Oh yeah, that's a good one too.
You said French kiss too.
Yo, that's amazing.
Let's talk about your book then, yeah, so this one really
caught my attention.
The Success Freak Kick Ass inSeven Days.
What is this actual book about?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
So you know, I've always been really passionate
about topics that are a littlebit nebulous, like you know.
So I wrote books, you know,about beauty and business
partnerships, and success wasone of those very interesting,
almost obsessional topic for alot of people, like everybody's
obsessed.
You know, there's a fine linesometimes between obsession and
addiction.
You know, like, we're alladdicted to success, obsessed
(21:43):
about success, and there'ssomething healthy about it.
Well, you know, I, for me, um,there's a healthy obsession
about success, so it's not anoxymoron uh, not to me at least.
I think you can actually beobsessed and and do good, lead
to really good, positiveoutcomes when, when you put the
right amount of energy.
But a lot of people, I think,um, are struggling with it.
(22:07):
Success, for me, is another wayof what is our definition of
happiness right?
How do we reach that state?
And in a dopamine culture youknow that we live in where, you
know, for a lot of people,happiness is really about
seeking pleasure and avoidingpain, and sometimes, you know,
(22:28):
in my opinion, it's a lot morethan that.
It's finding kind of what Ilike.
Oliver Twist has a great quoteI love.
He says there's two importantmoments in life.
I don't know if you heard thatquote, but he says it's the
moment you're born and themoment you find that why.
And for me, success is reallyabout finding your why, and
people really spend yearssometimes feeling that void, not
(22:50):
knowing their why, and so Iwanted to write a book that
would be digestible for mostpeople.
Most of the books people readare thick.
They're like full of stories ofpeople that maybe they can
relate to, maybe they can't.
You know this biography fromthese highly successful people
they may never be able toreplicate.
So I wanted to write somethingvery pragmatic, something you
(23:11):
could consume in a reasonableamount of time, so you don't put
that book on your bookshelvesor on your nightstand, read it
and remind yourself to finishthe chapter you never finished
and go back to it six monthslater.
So that's why I wrote it in away that was digestible.
Again, in seven days.
I wanted to really identify andextract what I thought, through
(23:32):
countless interviews andsuccessful people I've met over
the years.
What are those seven mostessential skills that will
really propel you forward?
And then, how can I give youthose skills?
To acquire one skill per day,one chapter per day, so within
one week you can actually bringthis to life.
It's not seven years, this iseasy, yeah, yeah fantastic Can
(23:57):
you give us one Can you give usone of those, I'll give you one.
I'll give you the first one.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Which one, as you're researching through the book to
try to create the book, what wasthe experience that you found
or learned that maybe you didn'talready know, that you thought
was, you know, pretty profoundor insightful?
Speaker 2 (24:11):
So if I, if I were to ask you every, every one of you
just, you know what's your whatdo you think are those
essential skills for success?
We may all come with adifferent set of skills, and
it's okay, um, and you know, ifwe ask 20 people we'll probably
get 20 different things.
What I was interested in iswhat are those again that are
common to most of these stories?
(24:32):
So I really wanted to kind ofextract the one that I'm most
telling.
And there's an usual suspect,you know you might think okay,
well, tenacity, you know, like,you know the expression, like we
fail to remember sometimes that98% of people give up too early
work for the 2% who neverstopped, you know type of thing.
So give up too early work forthe 2% who never stopped, you
(24:52):
know type of thing.
So all these kind of clichesand stereotypes around what
makes success true, and a lot ofit working hard, you know, like
applying yourself, you know,and all these things are true.
But the first chapter I pickedthat I'm very passionate about
because to me it's at the coreof challenging some preconceived
notions we have in our society,the social norm around what
success is like wealth, fame,power, which those are the most
(25:17):
common ones and we idealize themin our culture, right Like in
everything we do.
We're like that's what we lookup to, that's what we again, we
world.
And I wanted to introduce theconcept that success is very
personal.
All definitions of successshould be personal.
So the first chapter is aboutreally coming up with your own
personal definition of success,because if you don't have it,
(25:41):
you'll never really truly besuccessful in your own terms.
You'll be successful maybe onthe terms of, maybe what your
parents think success should be,or your friends or society, or
again, you know, in yourenvironment.
But it's a very personal questfor first to define that, and so
I give some examples of that ofpeople and ask them you know,
how do you think?
(26:01):
You know, do you think theirfame or their wealth is their
means of definition of success?
And when you start thinkingabout it you realize there's a
lot more than those, really, inmy mind, primitive concept, and
so that's the first chapter isreally exploring that.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Setting a foundation for yourself.
I mean kicking off strong.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Yeah, that's solid.
That's solid man, man, my kidsread this man.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, that's excellent.
I don't even know where else togo with this.
I've got so many questions foryou, that's definitely a great
insight.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
I think for us one kind of kick off with the book.
What it's about specifically.
What about the process ofrating a book?
I think that's one thing to gothrough.
Now you're on multiple books.
You've gone through thisprocess a few different times.
Does every time get a littleeasier?
Is every time the samechallenge?
Speaker 1 (26:46):
And before I forget too, you had an audio book
coming out.
I'm going to share that too.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah, thank, frickies , actually will be available as
an audiobook on March 11th.
You'll be first available onone of the major audio
distributors and then, I think,within a week, you'll be
available on Spotify and Appleand Amazon.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
I'm going to get that .
I'm an audio person.
I haven't read in a long time.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
And it's not my voice .
Speaker 3 (27:12):
We need your voice.
No, we do a passion.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
We need your voice.
I would love to hear your voice.
No, I do a passion.
We need your voice.
I would have loved to hear yourvoice.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
I love what I do and I am truly passionate.
But yeah, I ended up hiring avoice talent.
When they sent me samples topick out of nine different
voices, I listened to it and Ilistened to the voice.
I was listening to what thevoice was reading.
It was a male voice and I'mlike this is good stuff.
(27:39):
I'm like I wonder what he'sreading.
Like what book is it?
I didn't realize it was my ownbook?
No way, because I never heard itfrom that perspective, Like I
wrote it.
I could see in writing, butjust hearing it.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
You could hear it in your head and I'm like I had a
little moment of pride.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I was like what is this?
This is my doing.
So I was very excited.
No, so the book is coming out.
It will be just another way forpeople to digest the book.
To answer your question, theprocess of writing a book.
I meet a lot of people thatfeel like they have a book in
them and the way I you know, andit's inspiring to me that so
(28:19):
many people have so much toshare to the world and I wish
more people did it.
A lot of people say it, neverreally follow through with it,
and it's unfortunate because Ican tell you again.
When I moved to the US, I was inmy little dorm studying to get
my degree in the US, didn'tspeak English.
(28:39):
Every night I tell that storyin the book.
Every night I was writing on apiece of paper.
I had one piece of paper forevery letter of the alphabet and
every day I learned a new wordand I would write it down and my
wall was covered with paper andthat's how I learned really
quickly to speak well enough tobe able to graduate.
And the reason I mentioned thatis because I would have never
(29:00):
thought that one day I wouldactually be writing books.
I'm actually writing on myanother book yeah, that's coming
up next year, called the clientof choice, but I'm so I'm
working on that.
But the point is, you know, ifme, an immigrant, if you will,
barely speaking English, canwrite a book, my take on it is
(29:21):
everyone can and maybe shouldconsider writing a book.
So that's my first thing, butit takes a long time.
You have to be reallypassionate about what you do,
you have to be consistent, youhave to apply yourself and I
think the most important thingfor me, because we all have, we
all have our own artistic band.
I cannot sing.
Don't ask me to sing.
I cannot play an instrument,but writing is something I enjoy
(29:44):
doing and I think you get goodat what you enjoy doing.
Yeah, and it's also doesn'tfeel like you're working at it.
If you're writing a book andnever you don't like writing,
I'll say forget it, like Maybehire somebody to do that, but
just don't, don't, please, it'sgoing to be brutal.
So, because it took me aboutfour years my first book, I'm
getting a little better now.
(30:04):
The next one is going to takeme about a year to write it, so
it's much more efficient, andthen it takes another year, I
think, to get it ready.
So I work with my publisher.
I have a literary agent.
I'm probably going to work withthe same publisher again.
Then they have their ownprocess where they do their own
editing.
Then you have to print it, youknow, and then you have to get
(30:26):
it distributed and then you haveto market it.
So all these things areimportant steps in a multi-year
process really.
So it takes a lot of dedication.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
That's a lot.
Yeah, I didn't know all that.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
And I was curious do you have a journal where you
just write notes in and justlike what's your process like?
Do you voice it with your phoneand reference?
Speaker 2 (30:44):
it.
I can't even write down with apen very well.
My handwriting is awful thesedays.
So because I live in tech, I'mjust I just, yeah, I use tech
tools and I've always kind ofdone that.
It's much easier for me toorganize it on, you know, that
(31:05):
way.
So, yeah, no, no handwriting,no notebook, but it's finding
the time really to do that.
Like I'm writing I think Imentioned to you I'm writing.
I'm trying to finish ascreenplay, my first one, first
time I'm doing fiction.
Most of my writing isnonfiction, but I'm so I'm
challenging myself.
It's actually a vaudeville, youknow so, comedy type of thing.
(31:28):
I'm almost done with it.
Very challenging for me becauseI'm not a fictional writer and
certainly writing humor, youknow like, and it's.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
But you have a very good sense of humor, so I know
that yeah, it would do well.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Well, that's very nice of you, but you have to be
in the right mindset to writethat kind of stuff.
And it's true for any writing.
You know like I write.
When I'm inspired, I'm not.
I can't say I'm going to writeMondays and Tuesdays between 6
and 8.
It doesn't work that way.
The energy is right.
Yeah, If I'm like, oh, this ismy time, I feel it.
I'm like, leave me alone, I'mwriting, that's my time to write
(32:01):
.
Speaker 1 (32:02):
That's good, and I think any artist is like that.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
I don't think painters will.
I don't think Picasso wassaying, hey, from 6 to 8, I'm
going to go and start painting.
He's like suddenly he probablywill close his door and do this
for three days without eatingbecause he failed the calling.
So I think you have to followyour calling.
Speaker 3 (32:19):
That makes sense.
You never know when it's goingto come up either.
I think that's why they'd say alot of writers write like the
first thing is because they wakeup in the morning, because
they're just randomly inspiredby something.
Speaker 1 (32:26):
People just leave notebooks as a journal method,
like writing on a bedside, justbe able to write up once it pops
up.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
So I up, you know, once it pops up so in the mind.
And those who do, I admire them.
Yeah, I'm just not one of them.
I I just can't.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Yeah, like stephen king I think he did raid for
every single day for the rest ofhis life and be mine.
But so you were a frenchforeign trade advisor, right,
yes, for period.
Can you kind of share justbuilding relationships is your
thing and being able to break itdown simplistically, you know,
through your books and differentnuggets and things.
Can you kind of share with usjust how our listeners could
build better relationships?
Maybe it's in business-wise orpersonal.
(33:03):
You know what's one tip thatyou can actually share for them.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Yeah, so first I did some work, as you mentioned, as
an economic advisor for the.
French Ministry of Commerce,really helping French companies
and American companiescollaborate better.
So whether they were looking toattract talent or export talent
or export technology or importtechnology, but finding ways to
work.
(33:26):
So I did that for a number ofyears and it was very rewarding
to be really this kind of superconnector to the world of
business.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
And it felt very natural to me because, to your
point, I dedicated really mycareer to help companies
collaborate better and that'sbeen really the journey I've
been on ever since.
So but your point about how doyou go about doing that?
What's fascinating aboutbusiness partnerships is that
there are a lot of similaritieswith personal relationships.
Right, a lot of the concept andprinciples about trust, you
(33:59):
know, and transparency andcommunication and you know,
respect, and you know a lot ofthese concepts are really
naturally expandable to thebusiness world.
Now, it's not that simple inbusiness, in the business world,
no, it's not that simple inbusiness.
In the business world, you havethese commercial relationships
and you have these additionallayers, multidimensional layers
(34:21):
of complexity that you have toaccount for.
And I would say the level ofloyalty sometimes is not as
strong, hopefully, as you wouldexpect in a personal
relationship, because you knowonce a partner doesn't really
cut it anymore.
You know you might be veryquick to look if the grass is
greener somewhere else 1,000%yeah and maybe explore other
(34:41):
partnerships and so on, andsometimes not in the most, you
know, obvious or direct way.
So but I think the you know, Ithink if you are naturally
inclined to build a relationshipwith people.
You do that naturally withinyour family environment, within
your community of friends, andyou know, I think there's a lot
of these personality traits thatapply to the business world
(35:04):
that you can use, and then therest you just have to learn.
You know, by again practicing,and there's a lot of resources
online, seminars, online.
You know great shows like yours, you know where you can pick up
a lot of these skills, andthat's a journey we're all on.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
That's interesting Very much so I wanted to touch
just a little bit about yourfoundation.
Right, this thing TraffickingAgers was huge.
It's taken over the world a lotof times.
You want to share a little bitabout your foundation.
Speaker 2 (35:32):
Yeah, you want to share a little bit about your
foundation.
Yeah, I had the opportunityyears ago to meet Emma Thompson,
the Two Times Academy winner.
Emma was at the time thechairman of the Ellen Bomber
Foundation, which was EllenBomber was a Holocaust survivor,
really big on you know, bighuman activist, yeah, and she
(35:53):
started a foundation calledEllen Bomer Foundation that was
really helping victim of sextrafficking recover from the
traumatic experience they hadand so and Emma got involved
through these and that's a storyshe shared with me because she
lives in London and and you know, a lot of time you think about
sex trafficking as these, Idon't know, maybe Middle, middle
(36:14):
Eastern or like Eastern Europeor like South Asia kind of
phenomenon, and it's in the US.
It was in London and she met avictim of sex trafficking.
Somebody was abducted a blockaway where Emma lives and that
was kind of the opening momentfor Emma to really think about
it.
So they started a number ofprojects.
(36:36):
They started one in Amsterdamwhere they did kind of a sort of
art display, if you will, wherethey put these amazing
containers, these shippingcontainers, and they connected
them almost like as you walkthrough them, and it was the
journey of somebody being sextrafficked.
Every container was a segmentof a as you walk through them
and it was the journey ofsomebody being sex trafficked.
(36:57):
Every container was a segmentof that life and what it looked
like and it was very, very deepand.
But that was a challenge becauseto move these they tried they.
I think they moved it to acouple of locations, but it was
a logistical nightmare really tomove these containers and do
that.
So they pivoted and then Iended up meeting another
(37:19):
gentleman that is a well-knownphotographer for Vogue and you
know British as well, scottishactually, but living in London,
and he started taking picturesof Emma's friends, city buddies,
women in their safe place, andthe project got called Safe and
so they were taking pictures ofwhere women felt the safest and
(37:40):
it could be.
I feel like that blew up.
I felt like I saw Safe.
Yeah, it became kind of asensational thing.
So I went to London they did anauction where they were
auctioning pictures at theDewberry kind of auction house
and then I got involved reallyhelping you know the work they
were doing, trying to raiseawareness for, for the cause and
learning in the process thatsex trafficking, which is we
(38:03):
human slavery, is one of themost lucrative, sadly, form of
you know um that's crazy, youknow illegal activity if you
will, and and you know thataffects, you know women.
You know illegal activity if youwill, and you know that affects
, you know women.
You know men, children, in sucha profound way and to your
point I wouldn't be.
I know that it comes up fromtime to time.
(38:23):
Vegas is only another spot.
Yeah, part of the triangle.
Yeah, so to me, I became verypassionate about that.
I have a lot of you know.
I have a daughter, I have a son.
I always felt like you know.
The stories of these peoplethat were impacted by it were so
(38:44):
incredibly touching and it'ssuch a tragedy that in today's
world that doesn't get more of apriority.
So I love to be able to getinvolved and support that.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yeah, that was great.
It's too much to ask you.
The Bruno movie is going to becoming out soon.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
We will produce that man.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
You got too much that you do man too many layers to
you, which is excellent Businessadvice, I have to have you to
say something.
As far as a nugget, I know yourbook.
I know all they need to do isread one of your books to get
the nuggets.
But what can you share?
Just business advice maybe,with somebody that wants to
start their own business, Maybethey want to follow the career
with tech space.
But what would you share withthem that could be helpful?
Speaker 2 (39:24):
Well, starting your business.
I can think of a lot ofdifferent things you could do.
I mean, clearly, the first oneI mentioned in the first chapter
is really finding your why.
I think once you do that,everything seems much easier.
For sure I think when you don'thave that, I think that's where
you struggle.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
Get lost yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
So you want to start there.
Secondly, you there's always alot of unknown.
You know, when we started ourcompany, I remember I was I
downsized, I was working at Visaat the time.
I had a good job in the Bay,beautiful place, exotic life a
little bit and I moved toSeattle.
I had to make some adjustments.
(40:00):
I sold my car, got a small car,got a small footprint, the
place where I was living and Iwas like I didn't know where I
was going to get the nextpaycheck.
That's true entrepreneurship,right.
And so there's a lot of unknownand fear associated with that.
And you have to be ready forexperiencing that unknown and
(40:22):
that fear and face it, you know,heads on, and there's nothing
that will prepare for it.
You know a lot of people say,oh, I'll do it when I'm ready.
You're never ready.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
Yeah, you know we want to do this podcast.
My wife kept making fun of mefor two years.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
But yeah, that's true , you have to throw yourself in
it and if you love what you do,it's going to feel very
instinctive and very natural,and I think things will.
What you don't know I always.
People come to me all the timeand they ask me what I value
most in people.
When I hire people, we we workwith, and there's two things
(40:59):
that come to mind is aptitudeand willingness, and if I have
to choose, I will takewillingness of aptitude every
day, because what you don't knowyou can learn.
But I'm not in the business andI said, say that all the time
to motivate people.
Speaker 3 (41:15):
Yeah, that's tough If you're not motivated.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
I'm not your cheerleader.
If you're not excited to dowhat you do, you know you got to
do something else.
But if you don't know what youdon't know, you know.
If you're curious enough andyou want to apply yourself,
things will come your way.
And I'm far I would wantanything else.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
I love, that that's great insights.
I was just talking to my kidsabout that.
Speaker 3 (41:37):
You sound like you're in our study.
Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
You know I got to ask you this.
We talk about restaurants and Ilove hearing from you where you
eat at, but what is yourfavorite restaurant in Vegas?
Or maybe not favorite, becauseyou eat a lot?
Speaker 2 (41:52):
I do Give us a of of where you would recommend I do,
I, I do, um what you would think, I would pick a french
restaurant.
So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'mgonna surprise you and not pick
one um.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
The one I like is wally's wally's, I'd raise all
the world and you introduced meto one of the guys from wally's
at your party.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Yeah, I have a good friend of mine that works there.
That was the place where I hadmy first date with my girl, but
what I like is really a niceblend of sophistication and
casual.
Great wine, right yeah, it's awine bar restaurant, but it also
has a market in the back whereyou can actually buy some cheese
(42:33):
and amazing things, Say yourfriend's name.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
I apologize, serge Serge.
I'm coming to your friend'sname.
I apologize, serge Serge.
I'm coming to see you, sergeGreat man, serge Jules.
Speaker 2 (42:40):
Yeah, and he's a maître d' there, great guy, and
if you go there he'll give you atour.
There's an amazing selection ofwine, probably the largest
selection of wine in Vegas, andthey have over 100 wines,
choices by the glass.
This is in Resorts World, right, yeah?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
it's Resorts.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
World.
So one of my favorite spotsbecause again it's a good blend
of sophistication but alsocasual.
There's a lot of seating,different options for seating
and again the wine selection is.
I mean, you would have expectedthat from me a little bit.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Well, it's amazing because you're the only person
to bring up Wallace.
Nobody else has brought upWallace.
Speaker 3 (43:17):
Give us something from a restaurant.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
Yeah, it's good.
I heard great things about it,so I'm going to check it out.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Awesome, okay, yeah, wine has been a passion of mine
for, obviously, being French, Ihave no choice French yeah.
Y'all got some of the best winein the world, france.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
If I didn't say that.
That's awesome, man.
What else man?
What else anything?
We forgot to ask you that youwant to maybe leave us out on.
I know you got another book.
You're working on Screenplay.
What's something else?
The?
Speaker 2 (43:43):
Screenplay yeah, that new book that's going to be a
business book coming up soon.
I publish a lot because I likewriting Again.
It comes naturally to me.
I publish in Forbes on a regularbasis and I like to share.
You know I like to again it'svery impulse writing, like
something come to me.
But I also like to inspiremyself from things around the
(44:09):
world and I bring them intocontext, if you will, in ideas
that I want to share.
So that's why, again in SuccessFreak, I love, and even in my
book Agency Mania, I love theconcept I start with like things
you would not expect, like youknow what's, for example, one of
the chapters I start is I talkabout sweating sweat and how
it's a multi-billion industryand how we spend billions trying
(44:32):
not to sweat, and yet it's oneof the most natural thing and
probably one of the most healthything you need to do.
That's funny.
Get rid of toxins, you know.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
moisturize your body all these things you want to
actually sweat.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah, and to me that was a chapter to introduce how
it's important, like failure, toaccept that failure is a good
thing too, because that's howyou learn.
So I take a lot of these ideasand concepts and introduce new
concepts and make it interestingalong the way hopefully, Bruno.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
I could talk to you for hours, man.
You do a great job we need tohave you come on every year, man
.
Just give us a breakdown ofwhat you're doing.
Man, you're motivating, butorganically.
It's not just pep talk, it'sactually real stuff.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
So I appreciate you, it's your passion.
You can definitely tell yeah,pep talk it's actually real
stuff, so I appreciate yourpassion.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
You can definitely tell you yeah, yeah, for sure,
man, I do I do.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
Um, what's your social handles, man?
People can reach out to you onhere.
Speaker 2 (45:20):
So it's my name.
So if you, bruno Galpois um youcan find me on Instagram.
Yeah, I post quite a bit.
You're too kind, james.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
Bond man, james Bond, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (45:34):
You're too kind, I wish Although we all, we do, we
all do.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
We'll work on that, but an absolute pleasure to hang
out with you, man.
Seriously, Thanks for having me, I love everything that you're
doing, man, and the impactyou're making on the world.
So check us out atthevegascirclecom.
I appreciate your We'll see younext time.
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