Clear the Air with RPA

Today, brands are challenged to build equity in an industry infatuated with newness. RPA’s experts reveal the key to long-lasting campaigns: brand icons. Join Joe Baratelli, EVP / Chief Creative Officer; Mia von Sadovszky, SVP / Group Strategic Planning Director; Patrick Armitage, VP / Experience Strategy Director; Abe Diaz, VP / Group Media Director; and Adam Lowrey, SVP / Creative Director, to learn how brands can utilize this powerful tool to stand out in an era of novelty.

RPA is no stranger to advertising on Super Bowl Sunday. With multiple successful Big Game campaigns under our belt, we’ve learned a thing or two about winning on advertising’s grandest stage. Join RPA’s very own Joe Baratelli, EVP / Chief Creative Officer; Lisa Herdman, SVP / Executive Director Strategic Investments; Nargis Pirani, SVP / Group Strategic Planning Director; Dr. Hillary Haley, SVP / Executive Director of Behavioral Science; and David Berne, EVP / Chief Strategy Officer, to discover

In a constantly shifting advertising landscape, the pivotal task of ensuring that your campaigns resonate effectively with the right audience is key. Join RPA’s leading strategists, Abe Diaz, VP / Group Media Director, and Muhammad Eldereiny, SVP / Group Director of National Video/Audio Investment, for their seasoned perspectives on how they navigate this dynamic terrain and optimize campaign messaging for maximum impact.

This year’s meeting of the Association of National Advertisers highlighted the proven brand building opportunities available through TikTok influencers, retail media networks, and even AI. RPA’s digital and social strategy expert, Tyler Sweeney, attended the conference and brings back his most urgent questions. Join Tyler and RPA Senior Strategist, Quinn Rufener; Director of Digital Media Strategy, Shane Haririan; and Chief Experience Officer, Mike Margolin, for an in-depth take on using these tools to connect brands with audiences and strengthen our client-agency partnerships. 

In this episode of Clear the Air, RPA’s Rebecca Mendelson, Senior Vice President and Group Account Director, sparks a lively discussion among agency leaders who – in collaboration with our client partners – helped furnish La-Z-Boy® with 21st century appeal through a big, new 21st- century idea. 

Covid upended the practice of digital analytics. Before the pandemic, trends held steady and anomalies were easy to identify. But nothing’s been easy about interpreting data in the aftermath. Join RPA’s David Tran, VP/Director of Research, Analytics and Insights, and Shawn Sias, Sr. Manager of Website Analytics, as they deliver insights. Forecasting trends has never been more challenging, but with challenge comes opportunity. Tune in to find opportunity located in a single word: W.A.T.C.H.

Aligning a brand promise with customer experience is not the singular job it once was. With so many digital touchpoints populating the space between brand awareness and a purchase decision, the job of unifying a customer's brand experience can get messy in the middle. Join RPA Chief Experience Officer, Mike Margolin, along with Strategy Director, Hanna Samad; Technology Director, Mark Bieschke and Creative Director, Liz Cordingley, as they discuss ways to ensure a cohesive brand experience for the customer, no matter how messy it gets along the way.

Working While Female | RPA is celebrating Women’s History Month with a panel featuring four outstanding women from RPA who share their own visions for the future of women in the ad industry and beyond. They discuss gender bias in the workforce, identify how discrimination occurs, and share strategies for empowering women at all levels of their careers. Tune in now to Clear the Air.

In this episode of CTA, four of RPA’s brightest strategists – David Berne, Christian Cocker, Elissa Murch, and Hillary Haley – discuss why marketers are feeling exceptionally anxious about a possible recession. Nothing is certain, forecasts are futile and, as Hillary Haley says, “The famous experts tend to be the most wrong.” It’s a crucial time for brands to develop strategies that will keep them relevant to their audiences, and even tap into new ones. With income inequality further striating different demographics, a recession will affect everyone very differently. The code every marketer will be trying to crack is how to answer each consumer’s “micro- recession” at a macro level. Keep calm and podcast on

The Streaming Revolution Will Not Be Televised: To kick off the second season of Clear the Air, RPA’s own SVP / Executive Director of Strategic Investments, Lisa Herdman, and VP / Director of Media Research, Claire Browne, sit down to discuss the past, present, and future of streaming and how it continues to dominate the media landscape. Together, they analyze why bundles are lucrative business models for streaming platforms to adopt, how ad dollars in the space are expected to increase this year despite the looming danger of a recession, and why we all work in Hollywood now. Sit back and enjoy the ride.

Season 1 has come to a close, but in case you missed our previous episodes, here is a recap of some of the key highlights. Tune in wherever you get your podcasts!

Quinn Rufener – Digital Strategy Specialist at RPA – joins CTA for a special two-segment episode for Mental Health Awareness month. Quin Rufener kicks off our time by sharing her journey with neurodivergence and the ERG she started at RPA, “Think Different.” She addresses the stigmas, learning more about her unique working style and how managers can empower neurodivergent employees to do their best work.

Segment two hosts a conversation with RPA’s People Generalist, Laura Zeidman, on the ways RPA partners with vendors and organizations to support its associates mental, physical and nutritional health. This is a timely discussion on a fascinating topic that you don’t want to miss. Tune in wherever you get your podcasts!

Tremor Video’s VP of Sales, Sarineh Croft and VP of Creative Solutions, Gabriela Maestre, join CTA to discuss Tremor Video – one of the leading and most innovative video advertising companies in North America. They discuss how they’re pushing the boundaries of video marketing, their unique approach for understanding client needs and user journeys, and a glimpse at the proprietary methods they’ve developed to captivate more audiences.

Speaker, author and business coach, Fred Joyal joins CTA for a rundown of his decades-long career. He chats about everything from his humble beginnings as a junior copywriter, to pioneering a completely new business model with 1-800-Dentist. Throughout it all he shares everything he learned from building a company, creating top notch cultures, and tips with building one’s confidence. Tune in wherever you get your podcasts!

RPA’s Pete Imwalle, Sarah May Bates, and Phil Irvine joined a roundtable at Loyola Marymount University about diversity in advertising moderated by former CNN anchor Carol Costello. They discussed the low statistics of representation in advertising, actionable ways the industry can change course and how RPA has addressed the matter across departments. For RPA, diversity is and continues to be so much more than tokenism. It’s about depicting different perspectives to empower people of every background with relevant products, services and opportunities as unique as they are.

Brittany Driscoll is a CEO, podcast host, and three-time cofounder. After cutting her teeth in the trenches at diverse, well-known marketing agencies, she immersed herself in the health and wellness space. She contributed to Drybar’s growth from 30 million in revenue to 100 million as VP of Marketing. She then sought a new challenge and co-founded Squeeze: A Way Better Massage Experience. On CTA, she shares everything from the big life lessons she’s learned along the way to the brand details that set Squeeze apart and ultimately what it takes to thrive in highly competitive industries.

Neil Hoyne – Chief Measurement Strategist at Google and Senior Fellow at Wharton previews his new book "Converted: The Data-Driven Way to Win Customer’s Hearts.” He talks about his career journey and provides expertise around utilizing customer lifetime value to guide organizational decisions. Sprinkled throughout are stories about the CIA, finding airport gates, and failing 36 times (give or take) to find employment with Google. This is an engaging episode you don’t want to miss.

Eli Winkler isn’t just another “thought leader”, he’s a marketing expert with decades of hands-on experience working his way up from coordinator to CEO. Drawing on his expansive experience in retail, he shares strategies for building brands that connect with people, how important it is for teams to have a chip on their shoulder and his learnings in his most recent role as President.

RPA wants people to be, well, people, and to have lives outside of work. That’s why we started “Beyond RPA,”an annual award honoring the Associates making an impact with their passions, hobbies and side hustles. RPA’s Talent Specialist, David Peña, chats with the two most recent winners ––Tyler Sweeney and Amanda Chavez –– about the inspiration for their projects, advice for getting into advertising and their favorite thing about working at RPA.

Look to the past to see the future. That’s the theme of CTA’s latest conversation with RPA’s Chief Marketing and Innovation Officer, Tim Leake. After years of leading his renowned “Future of Marketing” workshop at places like the Cannes Lions Festival, he’s discovered human behavior isn’t always predictable, but it is cyclical. By asking probing questions and understanding historical trends, he shows marketers and brands how to not just predict, but own, their futures.

What are these emerging technologies and how will they impact the future? At such an early stage, we’re all building the bridge as we cross it, but for Amy Seidner, RPA’s Executive Digital Producer, and David Tran, Director of Analytics, that’s what makes it such an exciting time. During this in-depth conversation, they discuss how blockchain will decentralize trading, what drives crypto valuations, how NFTs will provide new revenue streams for creators and investors, and many other revolutionary innovations.

Sundance Finalist and 30 for 30 Film Director, Patrick Creadon, joins CTA to discuss his career as a filmmaker and finding and elevating diverse voices in storytelling. This episode dives into his most recent work, "The Loyola Project" about the historic 1963 Loyola Ramblers.

How do agencies create some of their biggest, most visible work of the year? Four leaders from creative, strategy and media at RPA and Octillion Media weigh in and discuss Super Bowl commercials and the entire process from development to air time.

VP of Product Management at HBO Max, Lindsey Emerson, talks about her experience in eCommerce, being the first hire at Pluto TV, and the learnings she gained during her time there. Although she's now at a large enterprise, the fundamentals haven't changed. She shares the core principles she sticks with when testing that empower her team to build the brand moments and product people engage with and enjoy.

Kobie Fuller is a General Partner at Upfront Ventures – one of the largest Venture Capital companies in LA. After graduating from Harvard, he’s invested, built, and scaled several multi-billion-dollar organizations (09:05). As 20-year VC veteran, he provides insight into everything from developing high-performance teams (14:44), how the metaverse will change marketing (25:10), and how he grew Valence, a networking site and cross-industry management training program to promote Black economic empowerment (33:23).

Charles Thomas is the CEO of Clear Cloud and holds four degrees including a PhD in Organizational Dynamics & Leadership Studies. Drawing on his extensive research and work experience, he discusses how greater diversity leads to greater employee engagement and retention. After providing practical, real-world examples, he shares how intellectual humility and flexibility empower companies to build better products and – more importantly – build up people

Join guest host David Pena as he chats with RPA’s Sarah May Bates, Romeo Cervas, and Paul Fung as they dive into the conception of some of RPA’s greatest work from 2021. They deep dive into spots created for Honda (00:55) and Facebook Portal (35:36). Guest commentary as well from RPA’s Christian Cocker and Amanda Hough about the strategic thinking behind each ad.

RPA’s Phil Irvine, joined four other analytics veterans in a panel discussion hosted by UCLA Anderson titled “Starting and Advancing a Career in Analytics: A Minority Perspective.” Together, they share their nontraditional career paths, the personal and professional skills that have made them successful, and how organizations can create pipelines to foster greater diversity and representation in the industry. We also commemorate Martin Luther King Day with a special message from RPA’s Hanna Samad.

RPA’s very own SVP of People and ThinkLA’s 2021 “Agency Leader of the Year”, Laura Small, shares her unique approach to HR. Drawing on her time from both the client and agency side, she discusses the experiences that have shaped her process and philosophy. She discusses her leadership style, creating employee success, navigating Covid and realizing RPA’s one-of-a-kind “People First” culture.

Gabe Greenberg joins Clear the Air to discuss his extensive, 30-year career in the media buying space and how it positioned him to launch solution-oriented initiatives like GABBCON and Octillion – a platform as a service company that empowers organizations to execute programmatic marketing solutions. He addresses the challenges and wins they’ve experienced as they’ve brought it to market and scaled it. He then closes out his time addressing strategies, predictions and opportunities for the future of media buying in 2022.

Clear the Air hosts its first brand marketer, Mike Nascimento – Digital Marketing Manager at Monster Energy. He shares his story starting with overcoming serious injury as a teen, playing sports for BYU, saving lives in the medical field and how they all equipped him for where he’s at today. After navigating the curveballs along his career path, he dives into the lessons he's learned about strategy, campaign success, and leadership from his fast-paced, high-intensity roles.

Tune in for a short yet special message from host Phil Irvine and hear some exciting teases about upcoming content to look forward to after the new year. Happy Holidays from all of us here on the Clear the Air with RPA podcast, and we'll see you in 2022! 

Clear the Air welcomes Drew Breunig, EVP of Strategy at Placeiq to discuss the power of location data, and its critical role in every aspect of commerce. Drew dives into the industry’s growth from the early days of the iPhone and also considers its future evolution. They wrap up with their learnings about audience behavior during Covid spikes, as well as some of the strategies performance marketers have created to stay competitive and increase their market shares.

This week, RPA’s Clear the Air sits down with Tim Woo and Rachel Cowlishaw, two digital marketers at the forefront of one of the industry’s hottest topics – data privacy. Rachel is the Associate Director of Strategy for Retail at Movable Inc. – a marketing Saas Company. Tim Woo is the Senior Vice President, Executive Director of Marketing Intelligence Group at RPA.

Together, they discuss the high-level views and tactical ways they navigate this ever-changing space. Drawing on decades of combined experience, they rewrite the narrative that data collection is creepy. Instead, marketers can use the information they collect to provide relevant, highly-personalized communications. Tune in to learn more!

Today’s show features a sit down with Gabe Larsen, VP of Growth at Kustomer, to discuss the rapidly changing landscape of customer experience. Drawing on years of international, cross-industry expertise, Gabe explains that companies can differentiate themselves by executing new customer journey strategies. By evolving their execution of customer experience management from multichannel to omnichannel, they can empower their CX teams to turn their call centers into profit centers. Tune in to learn more!

RPA’s Clear the Air kicks off its inaugural episode with Chief Digital Officer, Mike Margolin, who shows us that unlocking human potential through technology, customer relationship management, and even improv is easier than you think. Navigating his storied career, Mike also shares the lessons he’s learned along the way for staying connected to your company’s bigger vision, and championing teamwork to build out best-in-class practices across the board. Tune in to learn more!

Clear the Air, brought to you by RPA, is here to do just that by taking a deep dive into the hottest topics and trends within advertising and marketing. With a lineup of fresh perspectives from internal agency employees and external marketers, Clear the Air brings plenty of depth. Get the inside scoop on issues like leadership during the pandemic, the big debate surrounding data privacy, and so much more. Every episode will be top-notch, and you won’t want to miss a single one!