Latest / Frap Rap with GDogggggggg / Ep 14: Tim Hanlon (TimHanlon)

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Ep 14: Tim Hanlon (TimHanlon) · Frap Rap with GDogggggggg

• The Mediaocean Podcast Network: Welcome to Frap Rap. I'm your host, Aaron Goldman, aka G, and the artist formerly known on AOL Instant Messenger as G Dog with Hs. Yes, one through seven were taken. Twenty-five years ago, I was an AE in an ad network called L90, and my biggest client was StarCom IP. Every Thursday, I'd invite everyone in Chicago at 35 West Wacker to meet me at the cozy across the street for coffee. And for each person that came, I'd do a freestyle rap about them. Hence the name for Rap Rap. Each episode I tracked down another OGIP here to reminisce about the good old days and see what they're up to now. My guest today is Tim Hanlon. Tim, welcome to Fraprack. I can't believe you're having me. Thank you so much. This is great. ⁓ you're definitely the most ⁓ professional podcaster ⁓ that I've had on. ⁓ your microphone is exquisite. ⁓ and so your audio is super crisp and you look great. So thanks for coming on. My background game needs a little upgrade, but I've been moving stuff around my office. So next time, which will be never, but whatever. Well, ⁓ season so we've already decided now season two is gonna be ⁓ rep strike back. ⁓ and so we'll talk to all the reps and vendors ⁓ who called on StarCom IP to get their perspective. Season three-ish might be we'll we'll dive deep into another one of the agencies of the time. ⁓ there's been some votes for OMD Digital, ⁓ which of course in Chicago had a number of StarCom IP people move over to. So there was some ⁓ in ⁓ intermixing there. And then ⁓ of course there's also the ⁓ the thread around if we went into all the ad tech, we could just take a whole ad tech spin-off of this. I ⁓ on my last ⁓ chat with with Margaret Bell, ⁓ we ran through some of the old names like seismic and there was rocket fuel and so we can kind of trace all that. So I've got my next like eight years ⁓ planned out in for the pod. ⁓ but but here we are starting. Hope you're getting paid for it. I mean, you know, come on. I get paid in in ⁓ Nachas, which is a a Yiddish word ⁓ for just ⁓ actually don't know what it means. Something like good good good feelings, good energy, good karma. So you go that's fine. But t touche. ⁓ not touche, but touche. Thank you. ⁓ all right, so ⁓ we got the dad jokes out of the way. ⁓ let's teleport back to the IP days. ⁓ so when did you join and how did you join and and what was your role? Yeah, so my journey actually starts in, if you believe it, nineteen eighty-nine, when I actually my first job out of college, ⁓ after six months of waiting because there was a a downturn in the economy in Leo Burnett, where I was hired to be a media buyer planner, a little baby media buyer planner when they had those back in the day in the media department of Leo Burnett, when that was a thing. ⁓ started in January of ⁓ of nineteen eighty nine as that. ⁓ I spent about a year and a half there and then left, did a bunch of other things, cup ⁓ a couple of grad degrees business school, et cetera, and ⁓ was in the ⁓ the the journalism space for a while and clawed my clawed my way back into the ad space. So circa now two thousand, actually nineteen ninety nine, when I was getting married without a job, because I just graduated ⁓ my MBA at ⁓ at University of Chicago booth, I ⁓ started pestering this guy named Rashad Tabacawala and knew he had started ⁓ a quote unquote digital thing over at 35 West Whacker, whatever that was called at that point, I forgot. And I I I ⁓ just the Leo Burnett building. Yeah, I mean, but I convinced him that ⁓ he could use some help, not just in the digital front, but like things beyond just quote unquote digital, as that was becoming kind of a mainstream, at least for StarCum IP, kind of thing. ⁓ I browbeat him enough. he looked into the records. I I was previously employed there, so that didn't hurt apparently. And ⁓ he said yes to my crazy proposition of trying to focus on things that are just not just pure play digital stuff, but all the other things around the corner. and it was the best ⁓ nine, ten years of my career, frankly. So so what what gave you the conviction to want to kind of specialize in that area? And what made you think that ⁓ StarCom and and working with Rashad and team was the place to do that? Well, look, hi th his whole mantra, right, ⁓ from from day one to even in the past, right, is about sort of looking around corners, future stuff, right? It actually became there was a ⁓ a unit once Publicis kind of got its claws on us. ⁓ and that's all story two, because I was there from the you know, Leo Burnett, then BCOM three, and then all that sort of so I rode that for ten years, that corporatization route. ⁓ we created a thing called Genuo, which you probably have heard of already. Which was this idea about future stuff, right? It was I I don't want to say it was sexy, it kinda was, but it was also if digital is like gonna be the next big thing, which is the proposition, and clients are starting to get used to the idea of it beingcome a big thing and we hopefully get hired, ⁓ what are the next big things? You know, and that that's a little bit more scout like, that's a little bit more looking around the horizon and stuff. And I don't know, I think he kind of entertained the idea like, okay, he he he's a I don't know, he's a he's a court jester type fool who we could, you know, kind of subsidize for a while and see maybe it helps generate some ⁓ interest in business. And I will tell you, and I don't I don't know, I mean, who gets credit for that? It did because what it we were this idea, we called it emerging contacts. I was director of emerging contacts. What the hell does that mean? A lot of people still don't know what that means. I didn't even know what it meant, but I do know it meant not the day to day, right? Yeah. And I will tell you it became such, or at least for a period of time, a really great differentiator because I was the odd guy that When people had weird ideas or media companies had this new had a new concept that they wanted to get sponsored, but there was no proof that's gonna work. ⁓ television and Ti-Vo and DVRs and all that stuff, all that stuff was starting to percolate in the early aughts. And it was just easy for people to throw all that stuff to me, and I made ⁓ made a meal out of it. And that was could not do that without a boss who gave me enough freedom and crayons to play with to do that. To build something without a pure play pathway upon entering the company. It was great. Yeah. Well you were you were definitely ⁓ an outlier, ⁓ in in terms of ⁓ the f even on the org chart here, I I've been referencing this one from two thousand five where you do have your own sort of role. Yeah. Yeah. At the bottom here, ⁓ where, you know, we've got ⁓ IP emerging contacts director, Tim Hamlin. You have two asterisk ⁓ next to your name, ⁓ which I don't know if the camera's gonna be able to focus enough. For you to see, so I'll just read it to you. ⁓ Tim Hamlin's email address is Timothy.hamlon at SMVgroup.com. I guess because you broke the convention, everyone else had I'm guessing it was at Starcom IP.com, first not last. So Aaron, that's kind of part of the story for what it's worth, right? So Starcom IP, and and you probably have heard you've heard this from other folks, I know. ⁓ one of the first things you do once you get ⁓ chosen, if you will, to join this ⁓ illustrious crowd, which for Rashad would say for many years. We've never fired anybody. We've only got the right people in there, all that kind of stuff, right? prove your existence ⁓ or or or defend your existence, right? And I I kind of had to hamana hamana like nobody's business, right? Because it's like nobody knew what the hell I was here for, right? Yeah. ⁓ but I will tell you, as the emerging contacts thing gained some steam, it actually started to kind of creep into what was going on in the rest of the company, which was this McManus group and Leo group. Merging together, Densu buying a third of that, and then becoming this thing called BCOM3, and then Publicis in the later part of the decade kind of buying that. And then we all sort of went to that publicis mothership. I got dragged into there was a period of time in the in the from 2000 to 2000, I don't know, frankly, the my entire decade there. I'm I might I there was a time where I at least had two or three, or maybe sometimes even four viable business cards. That depending on who was asking, I would use, right? So the Media Vest people would say, Tim, use these Media Vest cards when we're going to our client at GM. Okay. you know, ⁓ the the the Viva key thing, like all these right, there you go. So there are, yeah. I I I must tell you, I must in my drawer at home, I must have at least eleven or twelve different cards that I had just in the span of nine years or ten years there. Yeah. Well, I've I've saved ⁓ my Rolodex's ⁓ from the day. I actually have two of them, ⁓ but I keep this one close because it's got ⁓ it it's the back half of the alphabet, so it's got my S's and I've I've been talking to folks from Starcom. I've been going through to see who I still have. I did flip through the whole thing and you're not in here. And I think that goes back to what you were kind of saying because you were the one you were looking around the corner, right? You were putting together, you know, th things that were sort of bleeding edge, whereas I was a rep you know, just chasing IOs for, you know, banner ads and and emails and pop-ups. That was not your domain. ⁓ you know, there was the folks like Network Solutions who were, you know, writing millions of dollars in in ⁓ RFPs in in in business each month. And it it seems like you you helped kind of balance that portfolio a little bit because there were the sort of ⁓ bread and butter clients and and you can make your, you know, fifteen percent media commission as an agency. But you also in order to win new business and keep new business, you had to be preparing clients for what was coming next, or as you put it sort of around the corner. So maybe perhaps by being off on your own part here, not getting inundated by reps like me, you were able to, you know, focus and and and think and build and and that sort of compliment seemed together come together nicely. is that a good capture? And then when you think, I mean Danu probably and by the way, did you pronounce it did with was the O with Danu O? Dinu, I think there might be some ⁓ discrepancy here. ⁓ And there's a story there too. How you make a business out of ⁓ you know looking around the corner? So Yeah. So I that's the old sort of like, ⁓ you cost center guy, right? so again, that again, you have to give the credit to a boss in Rashad, right, that recognizes that we've got a bunch of people here, not only within mainstream IP, but also ancillarily now that don't sort of, you know, color within the lines and That's maybe okay because there's probably some there there, right? Because this is not happening in a vacuum, right? TiVo is coming or what's this TiVo thing, right? ⁓ and there's the whole backstory on how we got sort of relationships with them and stuff, the first advertisers on that platform, which was designed to actually skip ads, right? Which was like a whole ⁓ but interactive television, all these kinds of things. That's kind of where other people in the organization beyond IP got curious. And frankly started to hear like, ⁓ my God, this is TiVo thing or replay TV thing. We got a guy, right? And they just sent him to me. And then that became part of the pitch process, right? So I I don't want to say it was all sort of show and tell, right? It's all about pitching and stuff, but there is an element there of kind of at least showcasing that we we're thinking ahead here. And if you're going to give us your I don't know, GM plan works business for the next five years. You should feel feel a little safe to have maybe a 20 minute conversation with this guy from the other floor, right? Who's saying, here's what we're thinking, here's what we're anticipating coming through, right? So you guys will be covered, so to speak. Now, the de nuovo thing, I need to c kind of clarify. So I say de nuovo. Now, I took Latin in in high school. Okay. So, and as Rashad will tell you, and as I have since continued in my my current ⁓ ⁓ consulting firm is called the Verter Group, V-E-R-T-E-R-E, which means to turn, to change, to evolve, to spin. ⁓ When in doubt, ⁓ from a trademark perspective, go to Latin because you you know those words that, you know, the hundreds of millions, you know, thousands of years ago. So Danu was the way that the don't take this the wrong way, but there was a certain cadre of folk there who would at 35 West Whacker who would call the the the publicist folks the Frenchies, right? Because they buy in the company, right? And I don't mean that derogatorily. It just, you know, ⁓ they we teased because we loved, I guess, right, was the sort of the mindset. The point is that I I I maybe Maurice was calling it Dinu or somebody they latched onto it. And then Rashad started saying Dinu as well. And I said, wait a minute, who in this room is like taking Latin? It's like and I was the only hand raised. And if you look at it denuo, and there's an O. It's an O. O is not something that's silent in any language that I la that I've checked. So whatever. But that's that that's that's where all the misfit toys, the true misfit toys, sort of emanated and went to. ⁓ I I wouldn't say I was the flag bearer of that, but you know, there was no no question that that was a probably a more comfortable place because that was literally all denou or denuo was, was exactly that when clients literally wanted to know. What's coming around and then what can we do about it? Yeah. ⁓ I don't if it was Sunil, but it was it was always told to me as Danu rhymes with Pooh, ⁓ which was my ⁓ mnemonic device for remembering it. Speaking of pronunciations, let's put this to to rest ⁓ once and for all. Is it publicists or publicists? I went with the publicist because that at least was a nod to you know, that this was an internationally owned company now, headquartered in Paris. And I you know, I That to me is I I you know, I can or con, right? I'm I think that there's th there's an answer to that. I think the the answer is that, but I'll fight people, I guess, in the pub. Yeah, ⁓ can versus con is is funny too. ⁓ I I've come around to can. ⁓ but the funniest is you hear someone pronounce the S at the end like they would like Illinois or ⁓ or Cannes. ⁓ I actually ⁓ Yeah. I w I was I was there at the at the festival one year and ⁓ Omnicom had ⁓ ⁓ Flow Ryder, ⁓ the rapper, ⁓ doing a a set, you know, on their beach ⁓ installation. This is probably 10 years ago. ⁓ and ⁓ Daryl Sim was ⁓ the ⁓ CEO and he announced ⁓ Flow Rider, Flow Ryder gets up there and he's like, it's great to be here in Cannes, you know, hard S. And I want to thank my guy Daryl Sims. He added an S there too. ⁓ it was just like the the funniest thing. It became a callback for us. ⁓ While we're talking about Omnicom for a second, and I'm the subject of of business cards and as you put it, having all the different email addresses. So my experience, ⁓ so post ⁓ L90 Max Online ended up ⁓ starting with the founding crew at Resolution, ⁓ which got bought by Omnicom. So I've got my resolution card, then we got bought by Omnicom, and I was one of the pitch people. So I would come in and do like the search engine marketing pitch. And so I got an Omnicom card, and then I remember we were pitching ATT, I think it was. Yeah. And we had a conflict with another ⁓ telecom at the time. So we created a whole new agency called OMG Connect, ⁓ to be like the conflict brand. And you know, you just, yeah, I ended up with probably in my time at Omnicom, probably 18 different email addresses, all still redirecting to the same place. And that's the madness of the holding company thing. So I I yeah, you have to understand my journey from StarCom IP all the way to Publicist group media, whatever it was when I left in at the end of the decade, ⁓ Viva Key, whatever that I mean, literally it's just it was it's it's brand conflict internally. And you know, the the the idea the the the and it still kind of exists today as the, I think, holding company model starts to crumble and give into something new, something new-ish that's not that. But literally the decade of the aughts, right, was all about. Everybody consolidating into the biggest holding company entities. And the conflicts would j would not just be limited to business cards, right? You had internal business models that depended on being resold, right, for higher prices that maybe the client didn't want to take, but you had to because you were part of the the who pays your check, right? I I you know, I mean, of course that we call that now we call that principal media. Sure. That's a whole nother And you're s and you're still seeing, you know, I mean, there was the ⁓ the whole Coke ⁓ review and and and Pepsi as well, and and you know, the the shuffling of of the chairs with the hold codes ⁓ assigned to those accounts and and publicists, I think in the end, ⁓ stepping away. And so here you are now seeing it from an outside lens, ⁓ outside of like the the whole co structure. You've got your consulting practice, you're still kind of seeing around corners, ⁓ but but How how how would you characterize it sort of, you know, and and and what drove you to go from sort of big hold co world into ⁓ consulting practice world? Yeah, so I went on afterwards after I left Publicists to IPG for a couple of years, ⁓ and then sort of went into the ⁓ the the bespoke sort of smaller ⁓ consultative speedboat realm ⁓ with Verter Group, which we've been doing since I don't know, twenty thirteen or so. ⁓ but the last job I had within the Publicist family as the sort of the amalgamations went on. Was founding and running a ventures practice, right? And that literally was me convincing Rashad that, hey, we can go one step further in our future stuff by maybe taking stakes in andor maybe doing little investments in or partnerships with for equity, in a whole bunch of things that are sort of percolating in media, advertising, technology, that kind of stuff. So venture capitalists love that. We had a bunch of interesting exits too. I will tell you the f we the first one was a company called Sling, which Dish Network bought for about three hundred and eighty million dollars. We got a little coin for that. And Microsoft bought two of the of their next ones and stuff. So it actually became kind of a model. I won't wasn't ⁓ was Innovat in the mix too? Yes, it was. ⁓ we were Innovid but took took a longer time, right? Innovat was something a relationship that had began, I want to say in the two thousand seven, two thousand eight or so. Mm-hmm. Back in the VIG days, probably, right? They only went public a few years ago, right? So it's like sometimes these things, you know, and I won't. And we just ⁓ and we just took them private, by the way. Now they're part of Media Ocean. And interestingly, we just launched ⁓ Media Ocean AI Ventures, ⁓ where we're investing in startups in the AI space. So kind of similar ⁓ thesis to to I'm sure what what you had back then was was like we want to actually take a position in the growth here. We get it's a great way to learn about new companies, stay on that ⁓ front edge and and see what's coming while also ⁓ deliver some ⁓ some additional enterprise value. There there's a whole backstory as to the value of it. And frankly when an economy decides to have a hiccup, that, you know, that's that's the ventures tends to be the ex exquisite example of cost, right, in an organization when you're trying to win new business, right? So it it it holding companies and and bigger entities and and ventures tend to be ⁓ an interesting sometimes flammable mix. But my my point though is that ⁓ that's like a third of the activity we do today with Verteir. I still work with a ton of of startups. We had a couple that ⁓ exited just recently this year after a five, six, one was a 10 year run. ⁓ these these are sometimes often steak dinners maybe in terms of value, sometimes they're a little bit more. ⁓ but i i it's just a a belief that early stage stuff still exists. AI is certainly part of that mix now too. But that's a third. The other third, ⁓ second third is The bigger companies, right? Bigger traditional, s certainly television in particular, ⁓ or traditional kind of media companies that are, for whatever reason, still struggling with the digital thing or all these n ankle biters from the startup world. What should we buy them? Should we kill them? Should we whatever to them? ⁓ and then in the middle is the other third, which is basically people who want to know between these two, right? A lot of those are investor types. Sometimes those are legal folks. ⁓ so it's a more of an analytical and strategist kind of role. Depending on who's asking. Shake vigorously, that's been our model, but it's still rooted in like where things are going. ⁓ but it's also frankly, I would I could argue that little bit more tempered because I kind of been a that been there, done that now. And I you sort of see cycles. Like AI to me feels like a big hype cycle. Not saying that it's not unimportant, but we do remember in the early aughts, right, when there was a downturn in in all things digital and IP for a brief spell. And then it came roaring back, right? I think we need I think there's a flush out that still has to happen. That Gartner curve where that's Tropha dissolute, whatever that is. ⁓ I think I just that feels like we're repeating itself. So I think I'm a little I think I'm a little bit older and more mature. I'm working on that every day, ⁓ to be a little bit more calm about sort of where stuff is going versus like the house is on fire, which is kind of where I was about twenty years ago, but that's okay. People loved it at the time and I was more than happy to play that role. And I I again forever thankful because those ten years or so within the Burnett andor StarCom IP andor whatever those derivations were were the were just a tremendous time. And ⁓ i the people there and it was fun. It was fun to be there because we were challenged, no one's looking about new stuff. I'm sure you got that dynamic or that feeling when you walked in the into the office. There's just always people buzzing around. I mean, it was like there was energy there and It was great to be part of. It was it was energizing. It was we wanted to go to work. You wanted to go. Yeah. And ⁓ the even just the the layout of the floor, you know, the cubes, ⁓ you know, and and Rashad himself sitting in a cube, kind of s you know, set set that tone. You you go through other floors in the building. You'd, you know, have to ⁓ if you're on the Philip Morris floor, you'd have to sort of fan your way ⁓ through the smoke ⁓ as you're moving through. But it was, you know, it was big offices, it was, you know, an ivory tower sort of model, ⁓ but but not on ⁓ n nineteen. Was it 19? I think it was. Yeah. Something like that. I think reception was ⁓ you would you would kind of go in the lobby, go up ⁓ to well, yeah, to ⁓ to reception ⁓ maybe it was four fourteen. All right, we're gonna need our maybe fourteen. I don't know. We moved around too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. all right, so ⁓ before we get into ⁓ the cooler round, I we have to of course, ⁓ as we're rounding out kind of where you're spending your time now. We have to address ⁓ the ⁓ eight hundred pound ⁓ not gorilla but but microphone in the room. ⁓ so clearly this is not your ⁓ first podcast. ⁓ in fact, I I know you have at least one, maybe two others ⁓ that that you're doing. So tell us about those and and we can give some plugs too and and hopefully get you a few extra listeners. So Aaron, you should go into marketing. ⁓ this is the ⁓ the time where we say time to promote. All right. Number one, I do a ⁓ I read a column for T V Rev. ⁓ ⁓ on it's called ⁓ proximity we focus on local media i've doing that for about two years some people read it it's great folks asked me if i wanted to also do a podcast around sort of local media as well started that about half a year ago that's called in the vicinity wherever you podcast people conversations about that ⁓ things that people aren't really talking about about like what's wrong with local media how it's gonna either improve or go away or something in between ⁓ The night job, though, is another passion project. It's how I got into podcasting in the first place because I wanted to prove to myself I could do it. ⁓ it's focused on something completely tangential, not related to this world. It's about ⁓ defunct sports teams and leagues. So it's a niche of a niche. We do hot takes on teams that don't exist anymore and haven't for 30, 40 years. It's called Good Seats Still Available. And if you were a if you remember the Chicago Sting, for example, if you remember, you know, the ⁓ the old USFL, ⁓ if you remember the ABA basketball. That's your place. This is your place. You'll find a home at Good Seat Still Available. I I listened to the last one on the ⁓ original ASL, ⁓ the soccer league my my daughter's a ⁓ a soccer player and and so you head on the guest who runs you know, who's who's ⁓ teaches at ⁓ a school that's part of the MLS that's built for, you know, ⁓ talent talent and they actually attend that, you know, full time. And then he wrote the book, which was interesting on on the ASL. But ⁓ as my daughter's kind of going working her way through the program, and I would say, at least from ⁓ ⁓ both both a professional soccer and United States soccer perspective, there's still some disparity between how ⁓ the men and women are are are treated through the ranks, but but she's working her way through on on the women's side. And it there is a lot of energy around the sport. And what was so interesting to hear the story ⁓ that you unpacked on that episode was how big soccer was in this country back at at the turn of the century. And you know, here we are thinking you we've always been behind and people are just discovering the sport. And no, no, it's actually at one point we had the best team in the world. ⁓ if it to to to believe ⁓ your guest as he told the story. Yeah, yeah. ⁓ and and and at any rate, ⁓ so yes, I I I'll plug that and and I'm a big fan, just like this pod. You know, it's not about ⁓ Matt, the beauty the beauty of the podcast world is you can you know focus on your passion, focus on your niche. You may not get, you know, millions of listeners, but the ones who do listen are there for a reason. And ⁓ I I enjoyed yours and and I've now subscribed and hopefully others will too. Well, I appreciate it. I also thank you for a asking me and and or having me at least. I think ma I might have pestered you a little, for this, because I think this is great too, because I I will tell you, and I'm sure others feel similarly. my time at StarCom IP and what that became for a bunch of years thereafter, ⁓ we're just great memories. ⁓ and Good boss, good people, intelligent, fun, you know, pursuing things, like for reasons. ⁓ you don't you rarely get that in your in your work career. and I was blessed to have that for at least nine, ten years at least. So, ⁓ you know, I I appreciate you backhandedly ⁓ allowing us and others in this mix to kind of remember this stuff and and call it out for what it was because it was a great time. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. By the way. Yeah. ⁓ Sineal, ⁓ when I had him on, ⁓ joked that, you know, the entire addressable market for the podcast is the people on the org chart. Like that's really who our listenership is. ⁓ you know what? That's fine, that's great because it it's a special group and a chance for us to reconnect. ⁓ speaking of ⁓ the special times and connections from back then, there was this thing called the apartment crawl where we would go around from apartment to apartment, different ⁓ people would host. And ⁓ I've turned that now into the speed round for the pod. I I did notice you had a solo cup on your end, so you came prepared. And this is just gonna be short answers, first thing that comes to mind. So cheers, let's get into it. All right, so Tim, ⁓ what was your AOL instant messenger handle? Tim Hanlin, all one word. Wow, okay. So you must have gotten there ⁓ early and and claimed your ⁓ claimed your domain. Well done. ⁓ first boss at IP. The almighty Rashad Zabakawala. And did you stay you I assume you just reported to him the all way through? Pretty much. Yes. Until I was kinda handed off near the end there and and people didn't know what to do with me. And that's okay because they you know, I didn't know what to do with them either. So just fine. ⁓ favorite client? I hard. ⁓ all of them who said yes to whatever craziness I was throwing their way, but I have to probably put Walt Disney attractions only because number one, travel was great 'cause you go to a d different hotel ⁓ property of theirs r ⁓ w whenever that ⁓ happened, and it was frequently. But number two, they also said yes, against all the odds, to how do we deal with D VRs and people skipping ads and we've got ⁓ tape that we send to people and how do we get that in the mix? And they were very progressive despite their very conservative ways. I'd like to think we kind of chipped away at a little of that to make that happen. So probably them, I believe it or not. Yeah. Speaking of the skippables, I think did you mention TiVo earlier? Were they one of the companies that was part of the in investment portfolio? ⁓ no, but we ⁓ for a period of time ⁓ I I tried extremely hard to get Jack Clues ⁓ on the board there or at least the advisory board. I I don't remember how it netted out. I think we kind of got him in the mix because we were one of the first agencies to ever approach TiVo. ⁓ but let's put it this way we ⁓ and and some of my ⁓ colleagues that who succeeded me afterwards, Tracy Shapak, for example, We actually helped quite a bit with ⁓ helping TiVo at the time get into actual businesses aside from just selling boxes to skip commercials and perhaps help helping advertisers figure out how to utilize the platform for time shifted video and that kind of stuff, which is what what Disney kind of grabbed onto, which was terrific. It was great. Yeah. ⁓ yeah, it reminds me, ⁓ so so in my parallel world going in in the Omnicom universe, ⁓ our version of emerging contacts was I think it was called Next, ⁓ OMG Next. Jeff Minsky ⁓ was sort of the you know the the person who who was similarly trying to look around the corners and and and bring you know. Imitation is the highest form of flattery. Jeff will tell you that too. So yes, ⁓ Jeff's Jeff's good people, but I wanna like to think we were a little OG on that one, okay? Let's put the record straight. Fair enough. I yeah, fair enough. ⁓ and and ⁓ I remember both with with TiVo and then ⁓ As we ended up ⁓ at some point, the first ⁓ wearables ⁓ started to come out. And so we kinda like there was this whole thread from like where it all, you know, and and now we're seeing it play out again, whether it was like Netflix or even now Chat GPT. Like these platforms always start ad free. Like that's always the model. Like we're just gonna be able to monetize off of hardware or subscriptions or what have you. Everything always comes back around ⁓ to advertising. You you mentioned sort of patterns ⁓ repeating and and ⁓ I call it colonization inevitable. I call it I I call that colonization, right? Advertising always seems to colonize stuff. I remember near the end of the decade, right? Social was becoming a thing. And I remember I went out there and and and and did presentations and stuff and said, now this social thing, like then showed a Twitter page or whatever, and like, how do you monetize social? I don't know. A and in two thousand eight, I don't think anybody knew, right? But now right. So you're absolutely right. And and by the way, things from twenty years ago now are even surfacing a new. We don't have to get into it's a whole nother conversation. But You ain't seen nothing yet when it comes to some other technologies when it comes to video and and that kind of stuff. So that keeps me going. You ain't seen nothing yet. That's your your that should be your LinkedIn ⁓ subheadline. They'll put it on your tombstone. That was Tim. You ain't seen nothing yet. He was looking around the corner for what was what was coming next. ⁓ all right, let's ⁓ back to the speed round. ⁓ so ⁓ we hit ⁓ favorite client. If you could have worked on any ⁓ account other than ones you got, or may or maybe there was something you pitched that got away. ⁓ can you think of anything there? One thing that pi I pitched that that never materialized, and I think it was just a matter of people around me not sort of recognizing how to pitch it. ⁓ back in the early days, talking about the aughts, right? ⁓ discovered this thing called Shazam and ⁓ there's a sort of there's a couple of companies that were doing that. I think Grace Note was the technology. Grace Note, right. So Grace Note was the technology, and I w I basically said, Look, let's pitch this as the Coca Cola music machine. They were totally into music sponsorship, that kind of stuff. They could own it, they can brand it, it could be synonymous, it could be the band aid, if you will. ⁓ and I try to get it up the food chain and just nobody had the whatever. They didn't have the the the the the oomph to kind of get it over the I think it would have been brilliant. They could have done packaging for it, it would have been so great. And ahead of its time. Yeah. Yeah. Gumption, I was ⁓ was ⁓ was coming to mind for me. But I like oomph too. ⁓ that's that's another ⁓ underused ⁓ we were so big on our buzzwords. ⁓ let's just go back to ⁓ the basics to the all right so ⁓ press so so I've asked everyone who their favorite vendor was. ⁓ and I'm getting in your world, you know, you weren't working in the same sort of transactional way with like, you know, sales reps and stuff, but but was there one company or partner ⁓ that you remember ⁓ being your your your favorite at the time? ⁓ yeah ⁓ hard to say really, because you're right. I mean, it wasn't like it was being pitched, but then there were companies that were pitching us, right? I there was a company called Wink. I don't know if you remember that was an interactive television platform, ⁓ which went public for a while and actually is where I found Tracy Chipak, the person that took my p my role in in the future of TV thing, ⁓ when I moved on to DeNuo and stuff. yeah, it's hard it's kind of hard to say. I would say probably it's more programmers, right? Because it was nestled in the media indust ⁓ media buying space. So people like the Discovery Channel and and ⁓ the Turner folks and just others that were leaning forward as well and were like, ⁓ my god, we got a guy, you got a guy, let's connect these two because we don't know what they're talking about, but So it's it's probably some of those the television type vendors that were eager to figure out how to do stuff on cable and battle D VRs. Did you get wind and dine as much as like the media planners and soups and and directors did? I mean, for especially for I mean, y y you you would come in, ⁓ you weren't, you know, ⁓ fresh out of school, you know, trying to scratch a couple of bucks together. You could probably afford your own lunch. But for a lot of the other folks who, you know, this was like ⁓ you know, in addition to the p the pittance that that StarCon paid, they relied on, you know, vendor lunches and and dinners ⁓ to to make ends meet. ⁓ but like did you did you get wined and dined by the rep community? ⁓ a little, yes. Usually and frankly at senior levels, because this was such a the tend to be more strategic stuff. By the way, I ate lunch by I usually took out lunch a lot from Kosi, by the way. So I may have seen you holding court on certain Thursdays there. ⁓ but no I yeah, there was a Super Bowl here and there. There was, you know, I mean ⁓ you know, ⁓ but it was mostly folks who were like direct TV or or folks that were like pushing the envelope on tech and that kind of stuff and wanted validation because nobody in the ad community I'll leave you with sort of this. When I started in two thousand, I was one of on four or five people in the ad space that was at the consumer electronic show, two thousand, two thousand one. Then the media link bus started to pull up. Yeah. Now it Now it's like its own island there. So there's an O genus to that too. I you know, there's who who's gonna compensate me for that, for that originality. But I will tell you, that's that's kind of the story of my whatever career is this is has been seeing stuff beforehand and trying to colonize it before others do. You ain't seen nothing yet. ⁓ we skipped this at the beginning, ⁓ but we'll close the the speed round with this. ⁓ Where are you actually, where are you located? Where am I reaching you? Where's home? ⁓ family, pets, anything you want to share? ⁓ yes, I'm in Lake Forest, Illinois, thirty miles north due due north of office overlooking ⁓ downtown the the fountain here. and ⁓ wife, two kids, ⁓ met my wife in the ⁓ she worked at Frankel, so there was a little intraagency ⁓ thing going on there. ⁓ and just happy to frankly still be in the Chicago area. And I think that's another one last thing I guess I'll leave you with is that I think we all maybe take for granted, some of us do do, I think, but ⁓ that we were able to do the media agency thing, ⁓ IP or otherwise, in the great city of and area of Chicago versus having to live in you know, scratch for a living in New York. ⁓ and I I that to me is also a blessing sort of somewhat in disguise. I grew up in the New York area and ⁓ you always thought that, you know, that's where the media world is and stuff. But I fell in love with Chicago a couple of times. And this was my first job out of college back in the day. ⁓ and I wound up always coming back and I've been here ever since. So Yeah, right on. ⁓ great community we have here. And it's been great ⁓ catching up with you. ⁓ Tim, just like you did on the org chart, ⁓ you broke the model on the ⁓ speed round. We took some tangents, but it was fun ⁓ to unpack. So thanks for playing along. ⁓ to close the show now, we get into this is the frap rap, the freestyle round. ⁓ I've had people ⁓ hold up props ⁓ on screen. I've had people write down keywords that I can work into the rap. ⁓ what's you why don't you pick your pleasure and cue some stuff up and I'll have my producer in post production add the beats and we'll just sort of like get into it. So do you do you have something ⁓ ready for me to work with? You want some props? I'll give you some props. Yeah? Great. I love it. ⁓ yep and and and for to yeah, ⁓ we can just start it anytime you're ready. Why don't you hold it up and and I'll get going. Okay. This is this is a an award I got from back in two thousand four from ITVT for future what is it? Award for leadership in interactive television back in the day. Wow, all right. And I won it in that's good fodder. And the other person ⁓ other people who were in that class included Rupert Murdoch, but whatever. ⁓ and then I've got here's the other stuff. So that's that's the past. The today though, look. My ⁓ my podcasting stuff that I do on the side besides what I do today. Look, you wanna r see the the California Golden Seals of the old NHL of the NHL? If you care about the roof in Dallas Texas Stadium back in the day before the current Jerry World, if you if you ever heard of the the pit the the Steagles, the the combination team between the Pittsburgh ⁓ Steelers and the the Philadelphia Eagles back during the war years and then in World War Two, that's what I obsess about in my Off hours and that's scary, but there you go. Wow, all right. So that's definitely the ⁓ most motley crew ⁓ that I've been presented yet ⁓ for for the Frap Rap. But I appreciate the inspiration and let's ⁓ let's see where it takes. So start with a little beatbox. Hey, hey, AG, in the place to be. We going back to school, back to IT TV. He won an award when he was at IP. He was a star and everybody knew he'd go far. He went from emerging on the contracts to sign in all the contracts. He brought in the deals. He got a free meal. He went to Cozy. He was the real deal. He held up some books. I got another look. They were teams from the old days, and everybody wants to. Take them back to the old school, cause I'm an old fool who's so cool. If you are the real deal, then it's the something seals. I think they were from Cali. I don't even know, but I got my boys there too. I got Snoop Doggy Dog hold the prop back at you. Hey, we're gonna look my way. We gotta raise the roof. There was a hole in one. I think that's what the book said. This rap's almost done. There was one more team that was a combo of two. And what you gonna do when they come for you? It was the Eagles and the Steelers. Together they were the Steagles. I don't even know why I feel like the eagles and I'm gonna fly like an eagle, I'ma soar away, and we gotta take this rap to another day. Yay! Very nice Tim. Appreciate you. Thanks for coming on Frap Rap. ⁓ and we'll look forward to seeing everybody next Thursday with our next guest. You're listening to the Media Ocean Podcast Network. For more of our shows, visit www.mediaocean.comslash podcasts.