I Learned Everything I Know About Marketing from Mad Magazine
Here’s a (factual, but tongue-in-cheek) biography, along with a touch of marketing philosophy, to give you a better sense of how I got to where I am today.
I didn’t realize growing up that AM radio was one of the original social networks. It had Top 40 formats (mashups), DJ shout outs (tweets), contests to win logo T-shirts (badges) and exclusive clubs to which everyone belonged (Facebook groups).
I got into late night talk shows, which had an intimacy and affinity with listeners that radio has lost and web social networks have yet to fully discover. My parents didn’t think I should be staying up late listening on school nights and, one night, they took away my TV privileges as punishment. That was the night of The Beatles’ first appearance on Ed Sullivan.
My luck with media improved over the years and I found myself marketing technology for media companies. My training was much like everyone else’s in the field: a box of Mad Magazine “best-of” books, learning how to touch-type and a brief career teaching emotionally disturbed junior high schoolers.
From start-up to IPO, solo inventor to Fortune 100 enterprise
In the beginning, I worked with startups, turning underdogs into wonderdogs. Recently I’ve helped a few companies work through their mid-life crisis — that is to say, when they have reached a level of success and require assistance reaching the next plateau.
Whatever my responsibilities for a particular project, my favorite part of marketing is finding ways to present solutions that result in the marketplace saying, “Ah-Ha!”
Successful marketing means thinking outside the box while delivering campaigns inside the box. I leaped on web-based and electronically delivered marketing platforms in their early days — and with good success. Now, I’m neck-deep in social media.
On the personal front, I’m a New Yorker with a hearty appetite for great songwriters and musicians of diverse genres. I’m told I’m a pretty good cook. Great microbrews make me say, “Ah-ha!”
