uh, story is an interesting one. Um, you know, it starts. It starts off with, I guess most, um, the lemons, once you're you enter university, is whether I do next. And, um, you know, or whether my studying during that time, you know, when you have these, you know what your passions are. Um, And during my undergrad time, I was discovering what What I'm good at? What? I'm not good at start. Really? Look at a macro view of what life is all about. Where, Where do I want to be in three years? Five years in 10 years. Um, and with that, you know, I figured that hearing one statistic to me was a winner was a less than 1% of the US population even applies to grad school, let alone graduates grad school to me that that shows, you know, that with a grad degree, you are one up, you know, And this is before the dot com boom happened in the late nineties. And, um so I went straight to grad school, and then from after graduating is the dilemma of that, You know, of two years later. Then where am I going to do now, with this degree, you know, you could go into finance. You could go into, you know, uh, you know, the more highly recruited for MBAs during the mid nineties and I chose music and entertainment, And that's why chose to do all my studies on and and my coursework was surrounding thean entertainment business in many different realms. You know that in your core structure, you know that you take, you know, from from finance to marketing to accounting every little bit was I used the topic of entertainment or music as the core subject. And then, once graduating, I found that it was very difficult. It was also during the tail end of the the recession of the, you know, early nineties that no one was hiring MBA or wanted to give me the money A deserved. But I started off, but knowing what I wanted to do and had a passion for and had a feeling I was going to be good at it and, uh, onboard went and try to enter the entertainment business and that if you don't have internships or mentors or um and then you really it's about Cole Cole. You're finding a way in and which, which I did, you know, And I found discovered that before, uh, the numerous integrations of Warner, you know, was at the Time Warner Communications before it was Time Warner. Before, you know, everything gets separated over the over the the nineties and zeros with the company. They had attempt department where people would just wait in the cafeteria and wait for their assignment. And I signed up for it, and I ended up being attempt, you know, every day, you know, here, you know that I would go in and try to get an assignment, ended up having a long term assignment at Atlantic Records And, um, learning and listening and not you know, the one thing I learned is not to say no. Whatever you want me to do, I'll dio and I did. And I learned. And, you know, in the mid nineties, I, uh my boss was retiring and it was time to find that next challenge. And I happened to, uh, interview for a head of a marketing position for alternative lifestyle magazine at the time, and with a with a well known brand that was underutilized, and it was around the cannabis culture. Yeah, you're familiar with cannabis on bond. During that time, it had a very big following. But it wasn't. It was more of an outlaw brand than a embraced brand. You could say it's the best way to put it. You know, we're sending magazines in, um, in envelopes because no one wanted to see the cover of the magazines called high Times. Um and, um, during the just say no times and the conservative right and all the drug laws here in the U. S. It was difficult. You know, we always joked around that the FBI is listening to our calls, but knowing what was going to happen in the long run, Um, there there's different Ling goes and I ended up trademarking a lot of their of the jogging around, uh, the process of cannabis smoking and for high times and now became a very profitable spot for them, you know, which is a term called for 20 Trademark that for them, the high times brand itself trademark that and, uh, and also utilize that brand to on record albums, T shirts, tours and built up Larry Revenue outside of just straight advertise um, so it was fascinating. And then I was, uh, asked to work for the Marley family, Bob Marley's family, to take care of the kids and their marketing and trademarking in Bob's properties of Tuff Gong, which is his record label. So I worked and toured with the Marley kids for three years, and during the high times and more league, uh, I started to see the power of the net the World Wide Web. I I was trying to do contests on on high times dot com and get a massive response. I'm going, Who are these people and how are they getting these message? And this is late nineties. So I understood the impact that World Wide Web II, the marketing and, um, and the messaging that you could get out there. Um, you know, by just in the upper contest and seeing that impact, um, and then launching, you know, the Marley brands and tough com dot coms and seeing that impact. And, um and, uh, you know, So I would start, you know? And then during probably 99 2000, I would start getting offers from these dot coms. Oh, I need you know, we need a music guy. We need this, You know, we need a branding guy. So I would get offers, and I ended up working for a company that was streaming video. But who knew streaming video during dialogue wouldn't be successful? Well, I did a little bit, but was this a great learning experience that you truly learn? The ins and outs of music streaming video streaming and the impact of it, you know, And then it was the height of Napster to so in 2000, I interviewed that Sony to run the be the new media guy person, Um, and, uh, new hire and I brought a whole new aspect to marketing, um, music online that, you know, everyone is all about C. D. S and selling CDs. And I said, Great, we can sell the but we need to build fan bases. We need to build audience. We need to give good content, you know, out there and and then follow the data. We're gonna get data and following the and and a lot. Some of it was experiments, some of happy accidents. But you start to put theory into practice of going well, if someone listens to an album they're going to go by. If it's that good and or or you know or you know Wait, hold it. There's millions of people going to Napster. Why aren't we gaining that audience and giving people what they want to hear? And so by by these theories that would put into practice? Because I had a boss at the time that wanted challenged me to do these types of experiments that to take the company from the the the 20th century into the 21st century from CD sales to download sales and, you know and challenged myself to it. And, you know, I grab the bull by its horns and and put it into practice, understand the power of message boards of listening to the audience, catering to the audience, understanding what fan bases are, you know, and messaging out to them and developing these thes unbelievable campaigns where you know it made the press, or you know, that people who go sit in meetings I want one of those campaigns that you just did, you know. And so it would build up over time that you know that if you use data you use um, you know the fans as your as your mouthpiece used, you know, at the time message boards before social media was even involved. You know, people are dialoguing to their passions on message boards and understanding and doing the right, you know, catering to them. I like to say to keep them and spreading the word, wearing the band's merchandise, buying the merchandise, buying your your whatever other brands that you're utilizing and understanding that there is a underlying power of the digital format. And then I was cast to help build the Sony system and the independent Sony system, where we would sign band's or artist's to to our distribution and get the music out digitally. You know, to the iTunes, the world of first and the other you knows rap, See? I mean, I play I I've done dealt with every single player of digital music, including, I was saying, but Napster. I made a deal with them. Um, you, too, should be my music. Just put it up there and legally, and that's how the Baja man happened. Who let the dogs out outside of the happening at the stadiums. At the time I was putting up on Napster. So it s so it'll blended all together that you know, that understanding that people aren't stealing. They just wanna listen to it. No. And then, you know, I was going to say and then helped build their system. And then in 2007, was recruited by Island Def Jam at Universal to do the similar job, then developing the same type of strategies of developing great content, putting it out there unique, utilizing the apple platform, the Amazon platform, that Spotify platform and what their strengths were. And each one of them had their different strengths and trying to create revenue and buzz and use them not only to create revenue, but also as marketing tools. So and then 2015 went out on my own, you know, So that Zeno and here I am today.

mine is that, you know, because I deal with different clients and have different partners on different businesses dealing with today, um is making sure that, you know, if it's a new business that, you know, everything is covered that everything is, you know, uh, you know, done the proper way legally, uh, you know, that everything is in place, comes to a campaign, um, mhm building out a strategy, Um, and also, you know, a budget that will be not Onley utilized, but optimized during that campaign. So it's the hand holding off of, you know, giving the client you know what they truly want on because it is reflected in your work on dwhite. Your goals are and also settle, you know, not give their expectations. Um, and making sure those aren't, you know, okay. Overblown. You could say you know what their expectations are and be realistic. Of what? What the goals on Ben continually being a student and keep researching and utilizing the subject matter. I do a lot of calls and consulting with the financial world around surrounding purchase of catalogs or utilization off the different streaming platforms or or content marketing. Yeah, And understand because the that landscape is constantly changing on a daily basis that you are up on the latest data, the latest news who the players are, uh, everything above that. That that you could see that someone could ask you and you're giving the best information because some of these companies are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in some certain properties. And you want, you know, again, it's about your reputation and what you serve up, and you know that too, May is the main thing is that you want repeat business. You want to sure that you are the best.my three. My three top priorities is listening. Number one is always listening to the client because sometimes it's in the undertone of what they're saying and not directly that that what they're looking for. So you can't be a mind reader, but if you listen, you know that that me is always a priority, because again, I am catering to what the customer wants. Um, again, Number two is being up to date, okay? On the latest in the greatest. And then on top of that, my priorities is what's next. What's on that fringe? What? What? What it can be, Um, what is tomorrow's fringe? Is it mean today's fringes tomorrow's mainstream and what you know? And that's something I have specialized in is to understand what that fringes and what is next, Um, and how to present it. And where is the opportunity within that, um, so that to me, is a huge part. And three is having a work ethic? Yeah, honesty, truthfully, delivering on time, you know, always a priority is the the is wearing your work on your sleeve. I like to say, um, for me, my work we week hours convey vary depending today is a busy day. You know, I have your call, and then I have two other calls with two different partners of mine, and one is a canvas company. Another one is a TV production company. So is to be on your game and, you know, and understand what your hours are. And then if you there's no off hours, you're always on, you know? So if you're if you're doing research, so you're doing the research, watching you know something or or in the background and it's, you know, midnight, you know? So it's Xcel 24 hours in the day. It depends how you utilize it.

I have to say my pain points that I found we're, um, challenges worm or in my past, that was dealing with the industry where, where money a lot of money was being made and all of a sudden it wasn't and in the generalization of how people were utilizing their music. So me being in digital music, I was the bad guy I was taking away, you know, their CD business. And so and also you're dealing with technology where people have this, this underlying fear of change and new. So again, you just know that you and you, uh, embrace that part and it's not you. It's Z them in the sense of what they're facing and an understanding of what their fears. And that's where the listening part. And that's how I gain that, that knowledge and practice of listening, because all the time I remember standing up in the meeting in 2000 and four and going, I was just on the New York City subway and all I saw was white headphones. What are we doing about that? And people didn't understand what I was saying, you know, And for me, it was all about the iPod and and some people didn't. Some people didn't, you know, gather and but it Zehner Otis ing and challenging. And then, you know, then being successful on the campaign that everyone else wants is like, you got to say, Well, some similar aspects of this campaign can work. But you are a different property. You know, you're not going to do the same thing that you do for toilet paper that you do for toothpaste. You know, they may be sold in the same place, but you're going to be doing it differently and the same thing with any other product. So you would say, You know, you don't want that and people look at you funny. You don't want a successful campaign like this one. You want your own campaign, you know, I'll utilize techniques. I used it, but I want, you know, especially an artist and music. They have their own brand. They're not like anything else out there. So, you know, it's that explanation of it that people may look at you like, What are you saying? Because they're not used to hearing that, and but then laying out to them that you don't want that you want this and then understanding that you you're dealing with that with with subject matters that people don't even know that they want yet, but when they do get it, they just want more of it.