Embracing Marketing Mistakes

A toxic hire nearly cost him his agency. Then he made a similar mistake again, this time trying to build his own AI instead of renting one.
In this episode, Roger Hurni, founder and Chief Brand Strategist of Off Madison Ave, whose client roster includes Nike, Wells Fargo, PetSmart, and P.F. Chang's, breaks down the culture-first hiring lesson he learned the hard way, why his team abandoned an in-house AI build for an off-the-shelf tool, and the AI philosophy he wrote for his own staff: expand your options, never let AI replace your judgment. Trained in behavior design under Stanford's BJ Fogg and the author of Outthink, Outperform, he also explains why he believes 90% of LinkedIn is now AI-generated content, and the test he runs on every new hire to separate real thinkers from people who copy and paste AI output.
You will learn why culture fit can matter more than raw talent, when renting beats building with a new technology, and how to use AI without letting it think for you.
Send us Fan Mail
Struggling to prove marketing's worth to your board? Grab our free one-page Board-Proof Scorecard: 👉 Download the scorecard 👈
Got a marketing problem you would rather not admit to? Reply to this and we will answer it anonymously on the show.
Subscribe to our newsletter
The mistakes we see marketers make, every fortnight. 👉 [Subscribe here] 👈
Follow Chris:
X, TikTok, LinkedIn

Follow Will:
LinkedIn

Follow The Show:
TikTok, YouTube

He ran creative for the world's biggest advertising group. Then his own recommendation to the board cost him the job, and he sold every share he owned the same week.
In this episode, John O'Keeffe explains how he took WPP from a "creative desert" to seven straight years as Creative Holding Company of the Decade, why recommending Mark Read to succeed Martin Sorrell as CEO turned out to be his biggest mistake, and what happened when Read undercut him in front of the entire company. He also makes the case for why AI can execute a creative idea at any scale but cannot originate one, using Compare the Market's meerkat campaign as proof, and reflects on the campaigns he's most proud of, including Keep Walking for Johnnie Walker and an Audi ad voted best in the world.
You will learn why creative leaders sometimes cost themselves their own jobs through the people they vouch for, what AI can and cannot do in marketing right now, and why standing for a specific idea beats chasing every trend.
Send us Fan Mail
Struggling to prove marketing's worth to your board? Grab our free one-page Board-Proof Scorecard: 👉 Download the scorecard 👈
Got a marketing problem you would rather not admit to? Reply to this and we will answer it anonymously on the show.
Subscribe to our newsletter
The mistakes we see marketers make, every fortnight. 👉 [Subscribe here] 👈
Follow Chris:
X, TikTok, LinkedIn

Follow Will:
LinkedIn

Follow The Show:
TikTok, YouTube

KFC and Weetabix both threw away the most famous slogans in their category, and had to fight their way back to them.
In this episode, Tom Roach explains how "Finger Lickin' Good" and "Have You Had Your Weetabix" both got dropped while each brand chased fresher creative, and the research and internal persuasion it took to bring them back. He also breaks down why the standard marketing sales funnel misreads how people actually buy, why the von Restorff effect explains why distinctive brands get remembered, and how a hundred-year-old rule about creative quality (95% of everything has always been rubbish) applies directly to the AI content panic gripping the industry today.
You will learn how to audit your own brand's forgotten assets, why B2B brands default to sameness and how to break out of it, and why "share of model" is becoming the new battleground for brand visibility in an AI-driven search world.
Send us Fan Mail
Struggling to prove marketing's worth to your board? Grab our free one-page Board-Proof Scorecard: 👉 Download the scorecard 👈
Got a marketing problem you would rather not admit to? Reply to this and we will answer it anonymously on the show.
Subscribe to our newsletter
The mistakes we see marketers make, every fortnight. 👉 [Subscribe here] 👈
Follow Chris:
X, TikTok, LinkedIn

Follow Will:
LinkedIn

Follow The Show:
TikTok, YouTube

Ben Branson invented an entirely new drinks category from his kitchen. Then a £1 million hole nearly took it all away.
In this episode, Ben explains how Seedlip, the world's first non-alcoholic spirit, grew twice as fast as the industry standard, and how that growth hid a working capital gap that surfaced mid-flight to Australia. He breaks down how the team traded their way out of the crisis in six months through relationships rather than financial engineering, why he launched straight into Selfridges instead of starting small, and why he chose to publicly embrace a review that called his product "witch's piss."
You will learn how to spot the hidden financial risk behind fast growth, why polarizing feedback beats indifference when you're creating a new category, and why genuine relationships with customers and suppliers are the real safety net in a crisis.
Send us Fan Mail
Struggling to prove marketing's worth to your board? Grab our free one-page Board-Proof Scorecard: 👉 Download the scorecard 👈
Got a marketing problem you would rather not admit to? Reply to this and we will answer it anonymously on the show.
Subscribe to our newsletter
The mistakes we see marketers make, every fortnight. 👉 [Subscribe here] 👈
Follow Chris:
X, TikTok, LinkedIn

Follow Will:
LinkedIn

Follow The Show:
TikTok, YouTube

A growth lead at a fast-scaling startup admits the truth: his old company cut a 30-person marketing and sales team, and sales didn't change at all.
In this episode, Hector Hughes explains why a year of growth work, SEO, conversion rate optimization, and endless website testing achieved almost nothing, and how that failure led him to build Unplugged, a digital detox retreat business now serving thousands of guests across the UK and Spain. He breaks down why "tracking everything results in tracking nothing," why most companies never answer the one question that matters, and how stepping away from constant distraction became the foundation of his marketing philosophy.
You will learn how trackable tactics replace the harder work of positioning without anyone noticing, what happens to your mind and body after three days offline, and why authenticity beats competing on someone else's terms.
Send us Fan Mail
Struggling to prove marketing's worth to your board? Grab our free one-page Board-Proof Scorecard: 👉 Download the scorecard 👈
Got a marketing problem you would rather not admit to? Reply to this and we will answer it anonymously on the show.
Subscribe to our newsletter
The mistakes we see marketers make, every fortnight. 👉 [Subscribe here] 👈
Follow Chris:
X, TikTok, LinkedIn

Follow Will:
LinkedIn

Follow The Show:
TikTok, YouTube