The Opportunities Are EVERYWHERE
How Adjusting Your View Will Show You The Way Out Of Anything.
Bumping My Head To Find What’s Next
After I left the music business in the ’90s, I had the good fortune of building SoulPurpose.com, an early tech startup in which a lot of my music industry friends thought I was “crazy” for leaving the trajectory I was on in “the industry.” I could have worked at any of the major labels, I had had massive success at Columbia Records with Destiny’s Child, Fugees, Nas, and several others as a senior marketer at one of the hottest major labels in the business. In my post record label, “hangover” was a stint as SVP Marketing at Ecko Unlimited next to the genius designer and futurist Marc Ecko. However, instead of pursuing a continued path in the record business, I decided that I would move to Atlanta, GA, and “start over” forging a new career in digital advertising. I didn’t have any prior experience in the traditional agency business, didn’t know a ton of people in advertising agencies but had the incredible hustle and the ability to get into any room. Through a few connections (thank you Nadja White) I landed a job at Isobar / Carat in London and began to work in my first “real” advertising role as a Global Account Director on the Sprite account in Atlanta. That gig couldn’t have come at a better time as the shift into a new industry meant a huge loss in income, and I was not “balling” anymore, in fact, times were lean. As a part of the “unashamedly well-spoiled culture executive” set of the “Roaring 90’s” I had made minimally $250k + for several years in a row starting at age 25. Venturing into the advertising agency world meant I would learn an entirely new language and most importantly I would become deeply acquainted with how Fortune 100’s procure vendors, marketers, and contractors. Working in a Global Account role on the Coca-Cola business had me sitting in both an office in Atlanta and in London building out a mobile technology product for Sprite that gave me the opportunity to flex both my tech skills and culture relationships. I brought in friends like “Big Jon” Platt and Chaka Zulu from the music industry to help me reimagine digital currency and culture on behalf of Sprite. Ultimately our agency never launched the mobile project for Sprite, but I did get a multimillion-dollar education on how to build and sell something fresh and creative inside of a massive conglomerate like Coca-Cola. Sometimes (actually “all the time”) you learn from the failures.
With a resume that now included Columbia Records, Ecko, and most importantly a deep understanding of streetwear and brand building combined with global mobile technology experience I was able to land a job at Omnicom running a digital group at powerhouse PR firm Ketchum. Corner office, great salary, and the ability to wear my Nike AF1’s unashamedly I was feeling like Anthony Anderson in “Blackish” and definitely seeing a salary that resembled my early 20’s in the music biz. On the heels of an Illinois Senator named Barack Obama, I convinced Ketchum to allow me to build out a new practice area with the foresight that I felt brands were going to be marketing to consumers the same way Barack was selling his brand using digital platforms to America. With a green light from the top, I was able to build out a practice that focused solely on educating our big brands on Social Media in 2007. This was all I needed and all of a sudden my 90’s hustle and spirit was back. The same way I built an entire tech company (Soulpurpose.com) from my Columbia Records office with an assistant and a fax machine, I was able to create a new service offering within Ketchum. After visiting Ketchum Brazil and seeing the wave of social media in the country via Orkut, I knew after working globally that building bridges internationally in the digital space was imperative. I forged relationships with global offices and had “inside moles” helping me sell this new thing called “social media marketing” and the rest was history.
Everywhere: A Social Media Love Story
My Ketchum career was wonderful until it wasn’t. There was a moment in “black Twitter history” that I intentionally created after running into a few racist incidents that I am sure Ketchum executives wish had gone differently. I will write more about this in detail on another issue. Ultimately I knew after 3 years of making Ketchum more money and their clients smarter that the best bet for my black a** to create wealth was to launch my next entrepreneurial business which would be a digital agency that would need to be small, talented, and culturally connected. Nothing like this existed in the social media agency market and I wanted to build a shop that could go and win major clients competing against the big agencies who I knew for a fact didn’t know social media as well as I did. Because I knew how to build, sell, and innovate culture on technology I felt there were very few agencies that could do what we could do. Through an incredible Atlanta network I had built by now, I had a chance meeting with Joey Reiman who at the time was the “Godfather of Atlanta advertising” and had a knack for creating great names. Within 30 minutes of our first meeting and him hearing my vision, he bestowed upon me and my then partner Danica Kombol the name “Everywhere” because as Joey would say, “this social media thing is going to be everywhere and that’s what you are going to sell to brands.” I would ultimately leave Everywhere to start a data-driven, digital culture agency called True Story and lockdown clients like Jane Fonda, CNN, Nike, Beats By Dre, Equinox, and 23andMe but the name Everywhere has always stuck with me. It wasn’t just a name, it spoke to a time period, a moment, a Kairos moment in culture.
2009 would be a year I would never forget. After being a part of winning teams in my career a shining moment occurred was when inspired by my Aunt Micki life and bout with cancer my firm created the first-ever social media Guinness World Record.
The Kairos Moment
12 years later I believe we find ourselves at another Kairos moment. We are likely headed into our darkest moment in history. Depression-like economic predictions don’t just sound like crazy talk anymore, looking at the data they look very real. The only difference is there is no “hope and change” Presidential candidate coming to save us. We have 1 clear choice in President unless you want 4 more years of insanity and even if the current president loses we expect not just voting to be the most dangerous time this country has seen but also November - Jan Innaugaration doesn’t look cute either. This requires most of us to dig deep and ask the following questions:
Do I really stand for equity, reconciliation, and reparations to people who have been marginalized?
Is this what I’m supposed to be doing in my career?
Do I need to live in the city that I’m currently in?
Can I get further ahead financially by investing, building, and creating in a tribe or syndicate?
Am I really taking care of my body, my mind, and my soul
These are the questions we have been asking since March of Quarantine 1 and the fist pandemic and will likely be the answers we hope to gain before too many more pandemics hit.
To get there we have decided to bring our network The Authenticated together to discuss this. One of the benefits of having lived a good life with lots of networks and nodes around the world is that I get fresh, new, and diverse perspectives. Not sure about your table, but my kitchen table looks better when there is a colorful, different, fresh set of people around it.
So we bring to you a new way to look at a dark and unexplainable time. For the next 2 weeks, we will begin to look at cities, ideas, entrepreneurs, systems, and culture through a new lens and with a wide set of players at the table. If you are a member of The Authenticated expect unparalleled access to my robust network. If you are not in my network or new to my world we have ways for you to also be involved. We are also always looking for new members who we believe are an additive to the community, can bring their gifts, resources, and relationships to our syndicate, and are curious enough to be in the rocket ship.
Culture And Code EVERYWHERE: A Series Available Everywhere
Broadcasting Live EVERYWHERE. Authenticated members will have a chance to meet other members and speakers.
You can find us on
Content & Sessions From
Bevy Smith
Ana Andjelic, Strategy Executive, Author “The Business of Aspiration”
Lisa Cortes, Filmmaker, “Hip Hop Remixed”
John Boyd, National Association of Black Farmers
DJ Rich Medina
Vivian Chew
and many many more surprises.
Text “cultureandcode” to 415-843-8100 and stay tuned for more information.