Latest / The Marketing Brief / Social Fabric Sessions: E7 Michael Heller
Transcript
- Brian: Hello and welcome back to the Marketing Brief Podcast. I am your host, Brian Aquan, and this is the podcast where we explore the marketing landscape. This is another special edition, a subset of the Marketing Brief podcast called the Social Fabric Sessions, where we get to meet the members of the Social Fabric. So today, as a guest, I have Michael Heller all the way from Phoenix. Welcome into the podcast, Michael. Michael: Thank you. Thanks for having me, Brian. I'm really excited to be here and be chatting with you today. Brian: And we're happy to have you. It's always better to have someone to talk to than to just talk to myself. How Michael: This is true. Brian: it's so true, right? how would you introduce yourself to the listeners? Michael: man, I I heard somebody say a joke once in my original profession, which was that I'm a recovering attorney, so I love to use that joke Brian: Okay. Michael: to set the stage. no, my training formally is is in in law and intellectual property. I had the the wonderful privilege of working under a woman who represented the Ohio players, if you can remember them. They sang like good to the last drop for Maxwell Brian: Wow. Michael: House. and did some stuff with the Wu Tang clan and and no doubt before kind of realizing that other areas of the law were a little better for me and and so yeah, but but but from there I really just kind of found found different parts of media and entertainment and and my career has has kind of jumped all over mediums from finance to to entertainment and marketing and and now back again to entertainment. So it's exciting. Brian: Yeah. And have you been in Phoenix for a while? Has that been home for a while? Michael: Gosh, you know, it's so funny. My my parents tell the story of going to the Boulders, which is a lovely place to visit, here just north of of Scottsdale and and falling in love with it and and then decided deciding to stay. And I remember when when I came and visited, and my dad and I s decided to go into business together, and that was almost sixteen years ago now. So I thought I might only stay eighteen months, but here I am and And it's a beautiful place to live and and and much like California where I lived previously, you know, you got some stuff north and some stuff south and so you get to have a lot of different environments and ecosystems that you can play in, a lot of great places to hike and travel and so I love Brian: Nice. Michael: it. It's great. Brian: Yeah. Is the boulders I I remember camelback. Like I've hiked Camelback when I've gone Michael: Yeah. Brian: to Sky. Is that close to the boulders? Michael: The boulders is just outside of Scot Sales North. It's in Cave Creek, I wanna say. Brian: Okay. Yeah. Michael: and so it's just a lovely resort and and and golfing. you know, I think I think, you know, it's just kinda nestled in those rocks. And if you've never really actually spent time in the desert, it can be quite surprising at how lovely and and and quiet and and Brian: Yes. Michael: just peaceful it is. It's really nice up there. Yeah. Brian: I actually have a good friend, shout out Josh Zitter, who lives in Cave Creek. So I've been there a couple of times and stayed with him. Michael: Nice. Ugh. Brian: And yeah, it's a really lovely place. And the cactus are just everywhere. Like you have to learn how to live with cactus in your neighborhood. Michael: You do, you do. You also gotta learn how to deal with coyotes. I'm still navigating that with my dogs, but and mountain lions too, which is a thing that we find on the the ring cameras quite often. Brian: I'm sure. Well, we've been having fun with this question. Michael: Mm. Brian: if you had to introduce yourself without saying what you do for a living, how would you introduce yourself? Michael: it's a great question. I would introduce myself as helping people solve problems through listening. Brian: Hmm. And is that something you've always gotten gratitude or or always felt fulfillment by doing? Michael: I think so. It's it's one of those things that I feel like in every profession there's a little bit of that cringe factor. You can be too markety, you can be too salesy, you can be too, you know, techy. But if you just listen to people talk about what they're trying to accomplish, you just go back to being a human being, which feels you know, like the stuff we're all just so desperate to be connected by. So I y you I just feel like you can never go wrong just by by doing the the basic skills we learn at five, you know. It's like Yeah. Being yeah. Brian: Yeah. Being being human. yeah, no, the reason I asked you is because I've I've definitely in my career seen myself change from being very competitive with even co-workers to then being like, it's actually very gratifying for me to see people succeed that I work with, that I work around. But it took me, you know, better part of my twenties to realize that that was something that I really did enjoy until Until I I actually did accept it. Michael: Yeah, and I I think as you I I think that's a perfect point. And also as you go through your career and take on larger things and more responsibility, I find you actually go back to the simplification of the most important things rather than trying to be more complex and more evolved in all these ways. It's it's almost better to just go back to being a good listener, seeing what other people's strengths are, you know, just just Brian: Mm-hmm. Michael: going back to the foundations. It's kind of Weird in that way. We're all like Benjamin Button, like it's just doing it in the reverse. Brian: Totally. I, you know, I've been reading a little bit about you know, if you really simplify our lives into two halves, the first Michael: Yeah. Brian: half is like, what do I want this vessel to kind of look like and and appear like? and and other people's opinions are very important to me at at a certain stage. And then a second stage, and we're just about the same age, we're a year apart, it's like, what do I want this vessel to represent? Like what do I want to leave behind? What do I want people to to think about me? and and that's really resonated with me as I I approach fifty and and think about, yeah, I guess I I am turning that corner of just like it's more important what I stand for and what I do than what I look like or where I am, or those kind of maybe super more superficial things. Michael: And to add one layer more to that since we're we're parents is what will my kids think of of what I did? I'm Brian: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Michael: I'm I'm so lucky in that way. My dad was an unbelievable and still is an unbelievable mentor and friend, and and just just a just a just a lighthouse Brian: Mm-hmm. Michael: of a person in my life. so like you know I I like every decision or thing I'm like, you know, I I I just remember somebody telling me, like, I wonder what it would be like to be a fly in the wall when others are like kind of like looking at how you navigate problems, complex or otherwise. And I like think about that and I'm like, ooh, like if my son was watching me now, would he be like, Dad, really? You Brian: Yep. Yeah. Michael: know, and I'm like, Ooh, okay, we gotta Brian: Yeah. It's it's absolutely apparent to me. And you have a very young child. my son's Michael: Yeah. Brian: six now, but I often call him the the tiny mirror because so many things that come out of him, I'm like, that's me. I I did like you were a mold, you were clay. and I put Michael: Mm-hmm. Brian: that on you and like the way he reacts to things or says things, and I'm just like, it totally makes you rethink about how you go through life. Michael: Yeah, it's interesting because yeah, my son is younger, so a lot of my thinking is is is how decisions I'm making now are are shaping such an early, you know, form of what that is. But man, you know, they just laugh at that age and you're just, you know, you just turn into a puddle. So it but but it's it it is interesting. I mean, I I I I felt that way when I became married about my decision making matrix. And and and I people would ask, like, what's different? You know, you are obviously with your person for some time and then you become married. I'm like, well, you know, you have all these other other responsibilities. But then you look at, you know, parenthood and man, that just like just changes the matrix completely, doesn't it? It's Brian: it does. Michael: it's and and what's interesting also is I think the motivation for your work becomes so different. And that's that's not to put to say that people who don't have kids don't have those same motivations, but I think there's lots of different inspirations. It can be children. It can be lots of different things. It can be legacy. It can be what you stand for. but yeah, I don't I don't know. I I you know, it's like there was some funny line, I can't remember, it was some famous comedian who said, like, you know, I'm I'm 40 now and I wake up and I'm like, what's broken today in my body? And it's just like You don't know when that happens, but it's also just kind of like you do wake up one day and you're later, you know, in your your other later stages of life and you're just kind of like, Well, I just make decisions differently now. So Brian: Yeah. Michael: Yeah. Brian: Absolutely. Well, having a young kid, has that impacted the communities that you're part of? Are there are there communities that you're with that are other parents of young kids or have kind of put you into different groups that you weren't in before? Michael: yeah, definitely. I think invariably I mean you're just you're just around people that, you know, kind of are in the same boat. It's interesting to me because we're older parents, so a lot of the a lot of the parents of the kids that are my son's age, you know, are younger. So they're at a different stage in their career. What's interesting though is how much you can learn. And again, there's another humbling, you know, level to it, which is you learn so much from other people that have kind of like done it before you, whether they're older or younger than you. And there's a bit of just kind of like level setting and humility you have to just kind of like let wash over you. So you're just kind of like, I don't know what I don't know. I'm here to learn a lot of it. But it's neat, yeah. And and and it is nice to have people kind of going through the same experiences, fumbling their way through figuring it all out as we all do. that's been nice. Yeah. Yeah. Brian: Yeah. It it wasn't like a conscious decision that I think my wife and I made. well, certainly moving to Colorado was a conscious decision. We moved to Colorado Michael: Yeah. Brian: during the pandemic when we had my son. But yeah, you do just find yourself in those groups that have kids the same age because you're going through all the same things. and then they can be sounding boards, they can be advice, they can just listen. But Michael: Yeah. Brian: and then your schedules are also on the same things, right? Like I'm sure you're still in the in the naps, and the naps are like, my gosh, like two two naps a day, you're like Michael: I'm praying. I'm always praying for the naps. I'm like, when Brian: Yeah. Michael: when might the nap the next nab be? Brian: Yeah. You w you want them, but then you're like, also my Saturday is built around a two to three nap schedule. So I've got Michael: Yeah. Brian: like an hour here. I used to like try to do my bike ride in the morning and then like I know there'll be an afternoon nap. Michael: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's amazing. I feel like one of the dads in like a Wendy's commercial where like late at night he's driving around the drive thru because the second I get my son in the car seat, he he knacks out, so I'm just kind of like if my wife needs a break, I'm like, I'm just gonna go for a car ride with little man. Just Yeah, it's great. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's awesome. Brian: It's it's always worked. That has always worked. And my son has always been great on road trips because of that, because he can just sit in the car seat. Michael: Nice, yeah. Brian: Well, I'd love to kind of talk about this subject we've been talking about, which is relationship shaping opportunity. and we talked a little bit before we started recording, and I know that's Michael: Hm, yeah, yeah. Brian: something that resonates with you. how has it impacted, I guess, your your career? Michael: I I I wouldn't have a career if it wasn't for it. I I and I think, you know, start at the beginning and my career exists because of the because of relationships in general, and then think through AI efication of everything. I I think I will be fine and anyone who does something that w focuses on harnessing and and nurturing personal relationships will also be okay too if That is a huge part of the value that you offer in in your work life. which is like a hopeful thing. Like Brian: Yes. Michael: the thing we're so afraid of, taking control of everything, becoming the one thing that we can control that protects it, that makes us kind of all come back to each other. In many ways, it's sort of symphonic that way. But you know, if I just back up historically, I mean I just I'm I'm obsessed with stories and storytelling and and I'm a scenophile through and through. So, you know, my I I c I just I mean I c any any job I've had, I could tell you a story about the person that I interacted with. I was just telling my business partners in Atlanta when I was there about this woman that I interviewed with from The Environmental Protection Agency, which was an internship I had when I was undergrad at Syracuse. And Brian: Nice. Michael: sh I I I you know, you're a kid, you don't have a lot of experience on your resume. I w she wro I wrote she said, Well, this is interesting. it says you here you were a product package manager at Safeway Foods. She goes, Tell me a little bit about that. And I said, I bag groceries. And she starts laughing, like, what a hilarious way to title what you did. you know, at a grocery store. And and you know, it was through that then relationship that I ended up working there and and became you know, good friends with this woman who was a wonderful attorney and became somebody that, you know, I I learned quite a bit from. And but yeah, I mean even even today, even transitioning out of law and into into media, happened serendipitously through through relationships. And then again, you know, to to today and what what me and my business partners have been building is we met at Sundance, much like like how you know I re I met our mutual friend Brett Lyons and many others. Brian: Nice. Yeah. Michael: is how I met Meg Wells, who's one of my business partners, and and we all met at at brand storytelling, which is you know how I now know you. And Brian: Nice. Yeah. Michael: and You know, the beautiful thing of that is like it in a way, relationships are your own little bit of intellectual property. They're they the value of them compounds over time, right? We we're Brian: Mm-hmm. Michael: we're seeing like businesses are starting to figure it out, but I think humans are too, that the greatest capital we have is those relationships. Not not so much how we monetize them, but Brian: Yeah. Michael: literally how we interact with them and take good care of them and are good stewards of them for the purpose of literally high tide raising all boats. And you just Brian: Yeah. Michael: see that happen the older you get and the more you lean into those relationships. Because if you don't, the converse is just being siloed and that's not bueno. Yeah. Brian: Right. I love the idea of them compounding over time as well, right? If you invest Michael: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Brian: in them, you make your you build your network over your career. And then it's something you can always go back to for support, for ideas. I like that idea. The social Michael: Thousand percent, yeah. Yeah. Brian: fabric, which we're both part of and Brett Lyons is part of, and you guys Michael: Yeah. Yeah. Brian: will be representing the Phoenix chapter down there. Michael: Yeah. Brian: what is it about the social fabric that appeals to you. Like why would you want to be part of this kind of IRL executive community? Michael: So I I it's such a great question. I think it goes back to what you said earlier. At some point in your career you know you're good. You know, you know that like what you're doing and what you're what you're building and who you're building it for, you feel good about. So now you start to figure out where can I do the most good and how that you know, it's it's It's as simple as being on an airplane and them saying, put your mask on before helping others. You know, you gotta kind of focus on, you know, building, you know, who you are and what what you represent, what your capabilities are. But the social fabric is such an interesting concept and you know, social experiment, if you will, where you're just and and that's what I loved about the group where I met Brett and Meg and so many others was we weren't. Competing with each other in that room. Sure, there's pitches and opportunities and clients we'd all love to work with. And sometimes, you know, one person comes out of the room and you're you're you're next in the waiting room to see if if if they like what you have to say. But really at that point, it's it's a community. You know, it's like its own little ecosystem of people that are like trying to learn from each other and help each other and say, You know, I know somebody who does that. You should speak to such and such. And and just the act of that alone is such a selfless gesture because and then when you think about a hundred people doing that, two hundred people, a thousand Brian: Yeah. Michael: people doing that, you know, the ripple effects of that are just, you know, magn I mean they're they're they're massive. I I mean just just to be a part of a solution for something is a wonderful thing and and and being able to help somebody else realize something or understand how they can make their own business better or do better for their clients becomes really I mean that just becomes really exciting. Brian: Yeah. That's lovely. I really like how you put that. Michael: Yeah, thanks. Brian: I I think we're we're seeing like a fractional future, right, for for how we do business and having these support communities, having these professional communities are gonna be really important because it's like just like you said, it's like, hey, I know someone who's doing that, or I know someone you can bounce this idea off of because they might have gone through this and might have some insight for you. I think that's gonna be really important as we go forward. Michael: Unbelievably so. And then if you look at the the the pyramid of the value of attention per hour, just like from a marketing standpoint, in person events conferences are at the top. I think I think I saw something from this study that came out of Europe which suggested that somewhere around it's like somewhere around thirty five to thirty seven dollars per hour per, you know, is is what the value of that is. And then you go all the way down to to To digital and social and it's in the cents, like twelve cents. So I mean, clearly we're all going back to that thing where it's just like, I need to hear you say it and understand what the value of it is and interact with you and get a feeling for that. And we're we're just gonna only see that continue to rise a thousand percent. Yeah. Brian: I agree. Well, I've been asking everyone this question, which has been fun for me. do you know the last time you danced was? Either in public or in private. Michael: It's so funny. it was two nights ago. Brian: Nice. Michael: We were having a meeting with a client and somebody said, Do we need a dance break? And I think they just meant to say break, but we all literally stood up in the room and started dancing. So Brian: Awesome. Michael: that happened. yeah, before that, I I probably my wife and I in the kitchen dancing around, our son being goofy. Is is probably a default normal for us. Brian: Love it. Well, I'll get you out on this question. what Michael: Yeah. Brian: who should who could you nominate or who would you nominate to come on the podcast with us? They can either be part of the social fabric already or someone we want to join. But is there anyone who comes to mind that you think would be good to talk to? Michael: There's so many wonderful people. I'm such a big fan of Meg and Wells. We've been friends a really long, long time. Brian: Yeah, you brought her up before, right? Mm-hmm. Michael: Meg speaks so poetically about entertainment and brands and and how storytelling impacts the social movement towards good. And how that weaves into non profits and and and businesses like the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and things like that. And I I I just every time she talks about something, I mean she you're you know, the room of people just, you know, lock in and put their hand on their face and you know are are just Brian: Yeah. good. Michael: fixated. She's great. gosh, there's there's so many other wonderful people. But yeah, yeah. Yeah. Brian: Yeah. We could tag more people when we when we post it, but that's great. We're coming for you, Meg Wells. Michael: Yeah, we're coming. That's great. Brian: Well, thank you so much for being a part of this brief conversation and joining us on Michael: Yeah. Brian: the Marketing Brief podcast as part of the social fabric sessions. It was really great to to better know a Michael. Michael: Appreciate you. Yeah, this has been a lot of fun and and I can't just wait to watch this thing grow into what I know it can be and and hopefully a live event series where everyone gets to hang out in person and and and and doing fun things and sharing great topics and learning from others. It's great. Yeah. Brian: Yeah, the chapters are coming and the events are coming. So it's going to get exciting. Right. Thank you for Michael: Great. Yeah, awesome. Thanks again. Brian: joining. And to all the listeners out there, stay curious. Find your community.