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Curtis Hougland, the founder and CEO of communications and strategy shop Main Street One, explains the social and political science behind voter/consumer persuasion, and why the time is right for campaigns and brands to leverage older (55+) influencers.

4A's Executive VP of Government Relations Alison Pepper discusses how she and other industry organizations fought a 3 percent tax on advertising services and the sale of "personal information" proposed by The Washington, D.C. City Council as part of a plan to combat a growing budget deficit, and won. She says the fight isn't over though.

Pernod Ricard North America CEO Ann Mukherjee describes why the liquor marketer will resume social media spending after pausing it in July. The longtime marketer also describes what it's like moving into the CEO job, and she explains her leadership style, which involves bringing your personal experiences to the job.

Christopher Carroll, director of digital engagement and marketing for the International Olympic Committee, joins the pod to talk about how the IOC is going about plugging the Tokyo games, which were delayed by a year due to the pandemic.

Ad lawyer Linda Goldstein joins to discuss what brands need to know about sponsorship contract changes during COVID-19, new 'Made in the USA,' ad regulations and what to expect at the FTC if Democrats take over. Plus, she explains how ad lawyers can co-exist with creatives.

The author of "Black on Madison Avenue" talks about what it was like getting a job in advertising 40 years ago and how much the industry has failed to change since that time.

Former LatinWorks chief creative Sergio Alcocer joins to talk about his 3-year-old cultural marketing shop Rest of the World and give his take on how brands and agencies should respond to new calls for diversity. He weighs in on other topics, like his love of jazz music and how he would rebrand the Catholic Church.

Justin Billingsley has one hell of a Lego set. Publicis Groupe's first global chief marketing officer used the famed building blocks in an analogy during the Ad Age Ad Lib podcast to explain how the holding company's Power of One works for clients. Billingsley said that for client Mercedes-Benz the company constructed a shop, Publicis Emil, composed of 650 people in 39 countries customized specifically to the automaker's needs.

Julie Tucker, global marketing director for the Associated Press, on the news wire service's new marketing and what separates it from the 'Truth' campaign she oversaw at The New York Times. We also discuss newsroom diversity and how the AP is preparing for the 2020 election. Plus, Tucker explains why she left agency life behind.

Portland Maine's Via agency CEO talks about the moral renaissance, directing a commercial with Jim Perdue via iPhone, her Catholic school education and the disco ball in her home.

Allyson Witherspoon, VP of marketing communications and media at Nissan North America, on how the automaker responded in the early days of the coronavirus outbreak and what it is doing now to restore buyer confidence. She also weighs in on online car-buying and why she thinks it's here to stay. Plus, she shares management tips she learned while working in Japan.

Anush Prabhu, chief strategy officer at Mediacom, talks about the new—and often contrasting—behaviors that have come about since COVID, and how smart marketers should navigate them as the world opens up.

Greg Butler, chief commercial officer at Cresco Labs, explains how the cannabis firm has pivoted during COVID-19, which has forced the firm to rely more on digital and less on retail and experiential activations that had been critical components of cannabis marketing. The former Molson Coors marketer also discusses Cresco's strategy on taking a brand portfolio approach with each offering geared for a specific set of consumers.

Goodby, Silverstein & Partners' Chief Creative Officer Margaret Johnson explains how the agency has created more than 30 campaigns for 80 percent of its clients remotely--and how working from home has opened up new avenues of inspiration.

Longtime agency exec Sarah Hofstetter joins to talk about her new role as president of e-commerce analytics firm Profitero, which serves more than 4,000 clients. We discuss the coronavirus-induced e-commerce surge and whether or not it's sustainable. She also talks about her career journey and why she took this job after previous stints at 360i and Comscore. And, Sarah shares some personal tips on how to stay calm during the pandemic.

Today's podcast guest is, well, me. After three wonderful, challenging, intense, stressful and exhilarating years, I'm sad to say I'm parting ways with this iconic institution. Friday was my last day. Working with the Ad Age newsroom in both good times and weird has been an honor. In a conversation with my colleagues Judy Pollack and Alfred Maskeroni, we take a look back on my time. Thank you for listening.

Ad Age is working from home, just like you. As the coronavirus has become the new reality for all of us, Jason DeLand has some thoughts about the likely lasting implications of the pandemic on all aspects of life and business, from brand behavior to consumer behavior, the environment, the cannabis industry and more. There will be no "returning" to life as it was, he says. Rather this is an opportunity to bounce forward. This conversation is a recording of a live video broadcast that was streamed online last week.

The U.S. restaurant industry is in a grim predicament, particularly high-end, dine-in restaurants that can't be open as the coronavirus pandemic grinds on. Chicago-based restaurant executive Nick Kokonas has helped prepared his restaurants as well as others to navigate the situation in creative ways. The moves include a shift to carryout, something that until now was unheard of for high-end eateries like his.

Mira Kaddoura grew up in Beirut, where she witnessed war firsthand. With a striking head of frizzy red hair, Kaddoura learned early on how to live life as someone who stands out: The themes of inclusion, representation and the other have all colored her work. Kaddoura joins the podcast to discuss the Red & Co. ethos. The agency has partnered with Google on an initiative to teach girls to code and developed global brand strategy for Netflix and created the "Make Room" campaign to boost representation of those missing in most mass media.

When Debra Lee stepped down as Chairman and CEO of BET in May of 2018, she put a cap on a 32-year run at the network. Today, we talk about her legacy—among other things, she took programming in a new direction, pivoting away from music videos and into original fare. We discuss life after BET and the media landscape today compared to three decades ago, including a look at the streaming wars. Lee also sits on a number of corporate boards and is a champion of diversity and inclusion, herself having paved the way for others like her.

Taylor Lorenz covers internet culture and trends for the Gray Lady--memes, yes, but also influencers, TikTok, YouTubers and more. She has a knack for identifying zeitgeisty moments just before they break through to mainstream consciousness. Her recent headlines include a look at the Bloomberg campaign's meme strategy, a visit to the so-called Hype House group home for LA Tok Tok influencers and more. She may be the reason you've heard the expression OK Boomer, quite possibly leveled directly at you.

The founder of the world's largest privately held media company joins us to look back on a career that flourished along with the rise of the modern media agency era. We talk about the explosion of data that digital has brought with it, and why he has chosen to rent rather than own data. We look at the streaming wars and talk about Horizon's loss of Disney as a client last year, plus where the company is growing today. Plus, a discussion of culture, talent, the pros and cons of remaining defiantly independent--and under what circumstances he'd ultimately sell.

For the first decade of her career, Louisa Wong worked at pioneering digital media outlets in the U.K., starting with CNET and then Skye. Today, as the chief operating officer at Carat, Dentsu Aegis Network's flagship media agency, Wong applies that background in media as she navigates at the intersection of tech and disruption. Here, we discuss addressable TV, data as the new currency, privacy and regulation, life in a post-cookie world, the coronavirus and more.

Today's guest needs no introduction. And yet, over the past 21 months, the financial wizard who built WPP into the world's largest advertising holding company has been busy reintroducing himself as the executive chairman of S4 capital. Days before his 75th birthday, we discuss everything from what motivates him today, why the holding company model he helped create is an "albatross," what the game plan is for S4 and why he bristles at the old criticism that he is not a creative person.

Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein, founders of Goodby Silverstein & Partners, worked on four Super Bowl brands this year, including Pepsi, Cheetos, Doritos and SodaStream. The team who created the infamous "Got, Milk?" slogan is taking their advertising expertise to the MasterClass platform where they will lead a series of classes, including one on Super Bowl advertising. In the podcast, the duo discuss some of their Big Game top hits, such as the E-Trade monkey and the Budweiser lizards. They also talk about Donald Trump and Michael Bloomberg advertising in the game, the inclusionary nature of many of the spots, the boundaries of taste in Super Bowl spots and the demise of Mr. Peanut.

In 2016 Astley, a Condé Nast lifer, inherited a stodgy brand and was tasked with brining a fresh voice and new vision to it. Architectural Digest, which turns 100 this month, had hardly any digital presence to speak of: No video footprint, fewer than a million followers on Instagram. Today it is coming up on 5 million Instagram followers and has more than 2.5 million subscribers on YouTube. Astley joins the podcast today to talk about modernizing the mag without losing touch with its DNA. And the ads. All those beautiful ads.

In a wide-ranging conversation on all things WPP, Read discusses his early moves, including merging agency brands VML with Y&R and JWT with Wunderman. In the past 18 months, WPP has shared more than 40 assets in a bid to become more streamlined. Read, the chief executive of the world's largest advertising holding company, talks about creativity, and examines what's holding WPP back in North America, the companies data play, his response to his feisty predecessor's potshots and more.

The founding Fugee has in recent years become a fixture at CES and at Cannes Lions, where he will be the president of the music jury this year. Here, he describes what brands can better understand about working with music and musicians. We talk about his childhood in Haiti, where he lived until he was 9 before emigrating to Brooklyn. He also shares a bit about his relationships with two very different mentors: Quincy Jones and, uh, Gary Vaynerchuk.

The industry's collective mind was blown when David Droga announced in April that his namesake agency, Droga5, would be acquired by Accenture Interactive. The consultants are coming for the creatives, the narrative went. Not so fast, says Droga. In this conversation, recorded in July, he discusses the three-year journey toward acquisition—and what comes next.

Andrew Robertson is by all accounts the longest-running agency CEO working today. And he's got a track record to back it up: Renowned for its creativity, you've seen BBDO Worldwide's imprint on work for Ford, for which it is the lead agency, Snickers, Macy's, M&Ms, Sandy Hook Promise, Avocados from Mexico and more. It's been named network of the year at the International Festival of Creativity in Cannes seven times in the last 12 years, including in 2017 and 2018. We discuss BBDO, the work, parent company Omnicom, Ford as a client and more.

In a conversation that ranges from the upcoming streaming wars to the ongoing direct-to-consumer trend to a look ahead at next month's CES, Terence Kawaja gives a general sense of the state of things from his vantage point of an investment banker obsessed with digital media and marketing. Oh, he is also, pretty funny. For an investment banker.

Now in their 24th year, the Webbys are currently accepting submissions for what's been called the Oscars of the internet. Joining the podcast today is David-Michel Davies, the CEO of the Webbys, presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. We discuss the trends he's been watching in the online space and what it even means to be a website in 2020. We also unpack the deeply critical viral speech comedian Sacha Baron Cohen made at the Anti-Defamation League last week about Facebook and the so-called "Silicon Six."

Last week in New York, Ad Age brought together executives from some of the best media brands in the world to explore the industry's challenges and, more interesting, opportunities. This podcast is a live recording of a conversation with three media execs about what they've learned from leaning into the subscription model. Joining us on stage were Pam Wasserstein, president of Vox Media, Scott Havens, global head of digital and media distribution for Bloomberg Media Group and Nina Lassam, executive director of ad innovation at the New York Times.

David & Goliath founder David Angelo looks back at a three decade career that started as a junior art director at DDB New York, followed by stints at Chiat/Day and Cliff Freeman & Partners. We talk about what prompted him to hang his own shingle 20 years ago and how the industry has changed in the past three decades. David & Goliath, a creative independent shop, was bought in 2017 by Innocean, the agency created by Hyundai. He talks about life after acquisition, life in LA and his cause célèbre: bravery.

In a space where the word "innovation" gets tossed around a lot, Jarrod Dicker seems to actually be building a better mousetrap. Dicker's remit is to make advertising, subscriptions and technology better at the Bezos-owned media giant. He'll discuss how media companies can no longer rely solely on advertiser and subscriber revenue alone, plus we get into his early career as a music blogger and Deadhead.

A three-time entrepreneur, Paul Woolmington is the founding CEO of media agency Canvas Worldwide and a keen observer of the marketing landscape. He is a former vet of holding companies IPG and WPP, founded and ran Media Kitchen, an MDC Partners agency, and he can rock a jaunty cravat. Paul joins us for a wide ranging conversation on just about everything in the media space—from the holding company existential crisis to the recent Disney media agency review and even to the rebate mishegoss of the past four years.

In October of last year, at just 32 Jessica Pels was named the youngest-ever editor in chief at Cosmopolitan. Now exactly one year into the gig, web traffic is through the roof, even as single issue print sales continue to decline (just as they do everywhere else). We dig into her web-driven, data-centric approach to content strategy as we discuss where she's taking the storied glossy.

A producer, composer and technologist, Barak Moffat heads UMG's content and strategy. UMG's massive catalog includes 40 percent of all of the world's music. He discusses that, and what it means to be creating new commercial opportunities for audio visual content across all of UMG's labels. Essentially tasked with charting the company's next chapters, he also discusses the rise of voice and smart sneakers, and how UMG thinks about both data and metadata.

It's been 15 years since "Super Size Me" came out. Today Spurlock is back with a sequel. With "Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken" Spurlock asks whether fast food has gotten any healthier in the intervening years. As the title suggests he focuses on industrial chicken farming—going so far as to open his own chicken farm to raise birds for a chicken sandwich shop. Along the way, Spurlock teamed up with David Littlejohn, founder and chief creative officer of the small agency Humanaut, to learn about the misleading ways fast food is marketed today.

Mark Penn, the president and managing partner of Stagwell Group, raised industry eyebrows six months ago when he plonked $100 million into the flailing agency holding company MDC Partners—and became its CEO in the process. Six months in, we take a look at what the polarizing pollster has been up to (both in the agency world and the political sphere), what he's learned and where he's taking the holding company.

Reddit is on a roll. The self-styled "front page of the internet" is on target to double its ad revenue in the U.S. from $100 million in 2019 to $200 million in 2021, according to eMarketer. This growth is the result of tightening moderation on the platform and building out its advertising business. To discuss Reddit's evolution, strengths and next steps, chief operating officer Jen Wong joins the "Ad Lib" podcast—and questions host Brian Braiker's faith in humanity.

What do you do after writing a book called "The End of Advertising?" If you're Andrew Essex, you co-found an advertising company. But Plan A, he says, is built on a different model than the traditional holding company. A former journalist and the co-founding CEO of Droga5, Essex brings with him an impressive pedigree. We get into that background, where the industry is going, consultancies, the breakdown of the traditional models and what's next for Plan A.

With a trade war brewing, there's a lot more focus on products Made in the USA—but don't believe everything you see. There are some cases of marketers blurring the lines when it comes to products actually made here, and the FTC rules enforcing truthful "Made in USA" claims lack teeth. But that could be changing.

Ryan Kutscher may have been a noted chef if he didn't decide to go into advertising. Today he is chief creative officer and founder of Circus Maximus, a New York shop which has won its fair share of Ad Age Small Agency awards over the years. In this Ad Lib podcast, he talks about everything from his early days at Crispin Porter & Bogusky and the creation of "Whopper Freakout" to where he and his agency fit into today's project-led world.

An associate operations director at the GroupM shop Essence by day, Lawson writes and podcasts extensively and candidly about diversity and inclusion issues on the side—on the Mixed Company podcast and her own blog. In an industry where young black women are too often unseen and unheard, she's making a point of speaking up.

The industry's collective mind was blown when David Droga announced in April that his namesake agency, Droga5, would be acquired by Accenture Interactive. The consultants are coming for the creatives, the narrative went. Not so fast, says Droga. Here, he discusses the three-year journey toward acquisition—and what comes next.

Lindsey Slaby is a one woman three ring circus: In one ring is her brand consultancy, Sunday Dinner, which coaches clients through various stages of organizational transformation. The second ring is networking on steroids, be it on her invite-only Slack channel or through the invite-only brainstorming dinners that gave Sunday Dinner its name. The third ring is, well, just any old conversation with her, like this one, which can ricochet into myriad directions at any moment.

Laurent Ezekiel has his work cut out for him: The Publicis vet joined WPP in May to serve as its first CMO and growth officer. It's a new position at the world's largest advertising holding company, which was the worst performing agency holding company in 2018. He discusses how WPP aims to dig out of its hole and explains what his new boss, WPP CEO Mark Read, means when he talks about becoming a "creative transformation company."

David Fischer started Highsnobiety in 2005 as personal blog dedicated to his passion for sneaker culture and fashion. Today it is a multi-pronged media brand, a magazine that prints twice a year and a creative agency. With 500 million social media impressions, and nine million unique visitors a month, Highsnobiety is about to enter a new phase: The company is partnering with Prada this month for a limited edition product launch this month as it rolls out its new commerce business.

In an industry with no shortage of Negative Nancies, Rob Reilly is a perpetual, evangelical optimist. But he wasn't always: He once had an employer require him to take a year's worth of classes to learn how to be more respectful of others. Reilly credits that work—among other things—with why he's having such a good run now: The Global Creative Chairman for McCann Worldgroup since 2014, Reilly and his team picked up network of the year for the first time in the agency's history.