Happy Anniversary to me. Yep, eight years and two months ago (May 1, 2010) I re-entered the world of entrepreneurship by starting Converse Digital with a mere two weeks notice, no money in the bank, no investors, no credit line, a wife, four kids, a big mortgage payment and lots of private school tuitions. I’ve [...]
In the last year, I boarded a plane at least once 48 weeks out of 52. And I’m not alone in my travel habits: In 2016, Americans went on close to 460 million business trips. I used to be convinced there was no way to get actual work done between the noise, the close quarters, [...]
Most agency owners are visionaries – able to see the future and come up with idea after idea to keep their agency on top of things. But most agency owners struggle to move those ideas forward on their own. They need an integrator to help them get things done – to wade through the details [...]
Agencies are beautiful, chaotic places to work. The nature of creative client work means the agency is always in a state of flux, growing and pivoting as clients do. The ability to adjust quickly is critical to survival, but it makes it all too easy for the agency vision to get lost in the daily [...]
For many unemployed young people, the job hunt is a dismal pursuit. Books about resume writing state the importance of “standing out,” but it’s hard to showcase your achievements when everyone around you has comparable triumphs. Even that stellar academic history becomes a minimum requirement when colleges are handing out As at record highs. You’ve listed [...]
From Match.com and OkCupid to Hinge and Tinder, online and mobile applications are taking the dating world by storm, however, the algorithm-driven processes used by these sites don’t work for finding agency relationships. Data-centric tools such as Sortlist claim to help marketers find their “soul mate” agency, much like what Match.com promises to do for [...]
Some things creep up slowly in life, like global warming and receding hairlines. Now you can add to that list: The reign of a digital team in agencies. As digital advertising continues its double-digit growth, more and more agencies routinely rely on tech-driven campaigns to keep the lights on. And as web, mobile, and social [...]
We make many choices that mold our personalities, but none are quite as important as the people we choose to be around. As motivational speaker Jim Rohn put it, we are the average of the five people we spend the most time with. This doesn’t mean you’re not the architect of your personality — you just [...]
We all want to do good in the world. Agencies have a strong tradition of taking on pro bono work for nonprofits -- this sometimes means designing a logo or creating a brochure; other times it's sponsoring an event, or even just simply offering advice. Those things serve an immediate need, but they don't necessarily make [...]
During a recent trip to San Diego, I was reminded of the importance of deliberately chasing your dream life. On an early morning stroll on the beach, I walked past a surfer and said, Gosh, it’s early to be out here. He replied, I have to get it in early because I have to be [...]
