EP23 - The Future of Agencies is in Driving Total Customer Experience

02/15/21 • 31 min

Jeff Greenspoon thinks that the future of agencies is really in driving total customer experience. He says that this can be accomplished by bringing together the right people at the right time to solve the right problems, while being focused on the need for speed, agility and simplification. He is passionate about being client and idea first, and an agency second. This thought leadership has given Jeff a unique role in the Canadian agency landscape. Listen in as Jeff and I discuss the role of agencies in today's ever changing landscape, and how dentsu is adjusting to meet the needs of it's clients and the market as a whole.
Jeff is currently the President of the dentsu Solutions Group in the Americas and the CEO of dentsu Canada. Previous to joining dentsu, via a merge with Isobar, Jeff was co-founder and CEO of SPOKE, a leading digital creative firm based in Canada. He has managed international campaigns for clients including Nestle Nespresso, Entertainment One, General Motors, Coca-Cola, Hilton Hotels, Disney, and LEGO. He was awarded PROFIT Magazine’s Young Entrepreneur Award and has been nominated as Canadian Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst & Young. He is often called upon as a lecturer by the likes of Google, UofT, Ivey and several international business forums for his perspective on insight-led agency engagements and topics including Marketing, Advertising, Entrepreneurship and the Management of Professional Service Firms.

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EP22 - Solving Some of the Hardest Problems That Don't Really Exist Today

They say that lightning doesn't strike twice, but this time I think they might just have that wrong. Andrew Chau is a co-founder of SkipTheDishes, the largest food delivery network in Canada which he helped expand to over 110 markets and millions of customers, with over 2,500 employees headquartered in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Acquired by Just-Eat in 2016 for $200M and merged with Takeaway (2019) and Grubhub (2020), his startup helped to create one of the largest food delivery companies in the world.
Now, Andrew is on to his next venture, along with a strong team out of Calgary, Alberta, they are building Neo Financial from the ground up to give Canadians the most rewarding spending and saving experience - the way it should be. Focused on client experience and solving for the technology challenges other banks have, Neo Financial is being built to solve for Canadian's most challenging issues in banking, with great features, high interest rates and amazing experiences.
Listen in as Andrew talks about his experiences as a successful entrepreneur, tackling the needs of consumers with global leading technology solutions. He discusses what it takes to be successful, and why he is doing it all over again. Maybe lightning will strike twice for this incredible entrepreneur!

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EP24 - How to stay Relevant on Marketing, Technology and Other Stuff with Jed Schneiderman

Jed Schneiderman is a proven entrepreneur, and executive in the marketing, media and technology space. When I think of Jed, I think of someone who is known for his thought leadership on topics ranging from marketing and technology, to being an entrepreneur and building successful businesses in the mobile, streaming, broadcast and internet technology spaces, and in "connecting the dots" having been at the forefront of major consumer tech trends and events, and by leveraging strong marketing experience across multiple global brands.
Jed was the Co-Founder and President of Tapped Mobile, a leading North American mobile media company which was acquired by EQ Works in 2018 and before that, Jed was the On-Line Business Group Lead at Microsoft Canada where he was responsible for driving the business and marketing strategies for the Windows Live, Search and the Mobile Services businesses. This is where I met him - as the lead on his agency doing a bunch of cool and innovative digital marketing campaigns...
So - the reason I asked Jed to join me today is that I find he is the most tagged LinkedIn profile I know of when people want someone's opinion on a variety of topics...and so my big theme of the day is, how is anyone expected to stay on top of all the fast moving and developing information or marketing, technology, business and digital transformation...
People always ask me, how do I seem to stay abreast of the latest and greatest...FOLLOW JED ONLINE! Simple right....
Here are a few highlights of Jed's wisdom from our discussion and below, a list of the sources Jed referenced as his go to destinations for staying on top of our ever changing digital and marketing environments:
"We live in a world where there is so much content that at some point curation becomes one of the most important things"
"Machine learning is good for pattern recognition, but I don't think it's good for insight"
"Maintain curiosity"
"Don't underestimate the power of asking great questions"
General
The Message https://the-message.ca/
The Peak https://www.readthepeak.com/
Media in Canada https://mediaincanada.com/
Marketing
Mark Evans - https://www.marketingspark.co/
Tech
https://techcrunch.com/
Ad Tech
https://www.adexchanger.com/
Data / Charts
http://www.emarketer.com/
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/
https://www.chartr.co/
Fun
https://patentdrop.substack.com/ - shows new patent filings
Podcasts
How I built this - https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510313/how-i-built-this
Reid Hoffman Masters of Scale - https://mastersofscale.com/
Work Life with Adam Grant - Org Culture - https://www.adamgrant.net/podcast/
Fine Tune with Corby Fine - https://www.corbyfine.com/
Newsletters
Tim Dolan Kickframe - https://www.kickframe.com/blog/
Ben Evan - https://www.ben-evans.com/
Tomasz Tunguz - SaaS focused - https://tomtunguz.com/
Daniel Eckler - Sapcecadet - Innovation and