Learning About What Drives a Company With Roger Hurni of Off Madison Ave
Roger Hurni is the Managing Partner and Chief Creative Officer at Off Madison Ave. He brings a unique perspective as a behavior strategist, creative visionary, and branding expert to the clients he serves. Roger knows that unprecedented results are achieved by optimizing the three variables of human behavior. This basis is the foundation he uses to develop behavior-changing results for organizations of all sizes. Currently, Roger serves as a member of the prestigious Walter Cronkite Endowment Board. And he serves on the global board for the Worldcom Public Relations Group, where he was its past Global Chair.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
Roger Hurni talks about what led to the creation of Off Madison Ave
Why clients choose to work with Off Madison Ave
What it means to lead with empathy and the effect it has on team members
How to help clients by telling them what not to do
What topics are in store on the Persona to Personal podcast
What you’ll learn in this episode:
Does your brand’s communication stimulate your desired behavior from its audience? Have you ever thought about unlocking your brand’s full potential by tapping into your audiences’ desires and motivations?
Off Madison Ave is a behavioral marketing and communications firm powered by behavior design. According to Managing Partner and Chief Creative Officer Roger Hurni, who founded the company over 23 years ago, changing people’s behavior is a blend of problem-solving, creativity, and strategic thinking. He built Off Madison Ave around a culture of continual learning and collaboration. For over two decades, they have provided compelling solutions impacting how people engage with brands.
In this episode of From Persona to Personal, Roger Hurni, Managing Partner and Chief Creative Officer at Off Madison Ave joins Chad Franzen of Rise25 to talk about how this marketing agency came about. He talks about the collaborative nature of the agency’s work, what makes it unique, leading with empathy, and how a particular client benefited from working with his agency. Roger also shares why affecting behavior is critical to a brand’s success. Tune in to hear a marketing expert’s unique perspective!
Resources mentioned in this episode:
This episode’s sponsor:
Today’s episode is brought to you by Off Madison Ave. At Off Madison Ave, we create meaningful moments of brand trust and influence how people interact and engage with brands.
There is a science behind tapping into your audiences’ desires and motivation. After all, if you’re not changing your audiences’ behaviors, you can’t truly unlock all of your brand’s potential.
The proven models and methods of Behavior Design is the strategic foundation for your brands’ success.
Episode Transcript
Roger Hurni 0:06
Hello everyone, Roger Hurni here. I am the host of From Persona to Personal, where I talk with top leaders in travel and tourism, food and beverage and sometimes in the other industries. Today I have with me Chad Franzen, who is with Rise25, and has done just thousands of interviews with successful entrepreneurs, investors and CEOs. Well, today we flip the script a little bit and he's gonna be interviewing me, so we'll see how that goes, Chad.
Chad Franzen 0:33
Hey, Roger, thank you so much. I look forward to talking to you. Before we get started, I will let everybody know that today's episode is brought to you by Off Madison Ave. At Off Madison Ave, they create meaningful moments of brand trust and influence how people interact and engage with brands. There's a science behind tapping into your audience's desires and motivation. After all, if you're not changing your audience's behaviors, you can't truly unlock all of your brand's potential. The proven models and methods of behavior design is the strategic foundation for your brand's success. Hey, Roger, thank you so much. I appreciate you allowing me to talk to you today. Hey, as we get started here, just tell me a little bit about Off Madison Ave, and why you started the company.
Roger Hurni 1:18
Well, the agency started about 23 years ago. And at that time, I had come from a lot of large traditional agencies, a couple of global agencies and I recognized there was a lot of fragmentation or silos within the agency themselves, and impeded people really working together in concert. And so instead of trying to duplicate that traditional agency model, we looked at ways for the team to come together in unique ways and that sometimes that manifested itself in a physical environment where there's no offices, no doors, which by today's standards, you sit there and go done, but back then it was very unique. In other ways, it's cross training and utilizing people from different skill sets, so that they can participate and collaborate in a more proactive kind of way. And it's proven to be pretty successful, I would say after 23 years.
Chad Franzen 2:14
Was there something that happened that helped you kind of come up with the idea?
Roger Hurni 2:49
My business partner, David Anderson, and I were working together at another agency running it. And there was this shift over about a year to 18 month period where we went from all of us, sort of being in the same room together. And I mean, I'm almost have literally like, with, with terrible partitions, we were growing so fast, we didn't have time to like build out an office. But it was fun, everyone, everyone, it was about all the work. And it just created this very, extremely great creative atmosphere and collaborative atmosphere. And because it was so successful, of course, you know, you get bigger offices. And once we got actual offices with doors, and, you know, people on different floors, the communication nearly shut down, and so did the collaboration. And we recognize that as a hey, you know, what, if we could find a way to get back to what we had on a permanent basis, we think there's an opportunity here, philosophically, to structure an agency around that physical environment that is also led with some very strong core values around collaboration and entrepreneurship and respecting each other's talents. And, and that really became the catalyst for starting the agency.
Chad Franzen 4:07
Great. Hey, tell me, what is the reason that maybe your clients or your clients in the past have chosen you over the years? You know, what, what's the big benefit or uniqueness about working with you guys as opposed to somebody else?
Roger Hurni 4:20
Well, to start, we really think like operators of our clients' business. And hopefully, we're always providing them alternative thinking, lateral thinking to their problems, because we're close enough where we know enough about the industry, but far enough away to still be objective. And we're not afraid to tell our clients like hey, here's what you should be doing. To the tune of, even if it doesn't mean we drive revenue. And so if, if we find the right solution to help a client, even if we don't make money at it, that's okay with us. And so we've always been fortunate enough to have this strategic seat at the table with our clients, we can provide that kind of guidance. And so we don't necessarily sell services actually don't really sell services at all. We look at solving those problems through behavior modification in marketing. And that has proven to be a successful formula with clients want to come to us.
Chad Franzen 5:21
Can you tell me about one of your mentors? Maybe mention one of your mentors, and tell me a story about the impact that they had on you.
Roger Hurni 5:29
Yeah, there's this gentleman who I plan to interview on this podcast, his name is Winn Holden, who is now since retired, he was my first boss at an agency called Phillips Ramsey. And Winn, even though there's only like a 12 year difference between us 15 year difference between good there's a kind of very much like a father figure to me. He really embraced people's problems at the agency, whether they were work or whether they were personal. He used to do this thing where he would go around on a hot summer day, because I live in Phoenix, you know, and it's 115 out once, so a month, he would walk around with popsicles or ice cream. And he would like, you know, toss it out to people. And I know that that might sound trivial, but it was his way of just embracing everyone working together. And hopefully, I don't shed a tear here, but I've told Winn on multiple occasions that his philosophies and approaches are woven into the fabric of Off Madison Ave. And that is, we still do those kinds of things. So he had a big impact, not necessarily from a skill set standpoint, but truly from a leadership standpoint, and how you lead with empathy, and you embrace everybody inside the organization.
Chad Franzen 6:47
What does it mean to lead with empathy?
Roger Hurni 6:51
It's about caring first. And I know again, these are sometimes trivial things I think leaders don't do. It's one thing for a leader of an organization, I don't just mean the owner, but like a director level, or anybody that might report to you to come in in the morning, or get on a zoom call with someone and say, Hey, good morning, how you doing? How you doing as a greeting in this country, but in a lot of other countries, it's like a legitimate question. And when we say that here, we look at getting an actual response. How's your mom doing? Heard you move your mom this weekend, or, Oh, my gosh, your kids going to this, it just happened this morning, your kids going to Spain on a soccer thing. He's only like 12 years old, because he's that good. And now you're trying to figure out how to make that happen. And you spend those few minutes really connecting with the staff first, and then work come second. Although that does, as an business owner tell you, I will tell you that work, the work becomes better because of that. But that's not, that's not the reason to do it. The reason to do it is to really engage with people. And you will find that it yields its own rewards beyond just the professional atmosphere.
Chad Franzen 8:03
And when you ask them, if you ask an employee or you know, a member of your staff, how they're doing, and they're, they're not doing that great. And they recognize your empathy, how does that affect them?
Roger Hurni 8:14
Oh, it's a positive impact. Because the next question is, what can I do to help it? The answer may be nothing. But the mere fact that you're asking them, they are willing to, even if they're not willing to share anything, the fact that you ask, demonstrate some level of care. And it's, it's, I don't think it's ever not been received well, because it's not disingenuous. It's not offhand. It's, it's just looking somebody in the eye and and saying, like, Yeah, wow, that really sucks is, is there anything I can do? Even if it's getting work off your shoulder, right? It may not have to do anything with that situation, but it's trying to provide other avenues for them to solve that problem.
Chad Franzen 9:00
So in terms of the the work that you guys do with Off Madison Ave, what kind of inspired you? Was there an experience from your childhood or something or that inspired you to do the work that you're doing today?
Roger Hurni 9:12
You know, this is gonna, again, sound kind of dumb, but I had a stepfather whose son was a was an art director for an agency in New York. And he was much older than I was, I think he was probably in his early 30s When I was 10 or 11 years old. And he came over the house one day and he saw me drawing and doodling and stuff like that. And he goes wow, you're a pretty good artist because you know, you can make money at that. I'm like, What? What are you doodling? I'm all in like, and he he gave me my first entree into what advertising was all about and as a teacher in high school that taught me about typography and how to spec type and some basic layout stuff and, and I decided that when I graduated high school at 17 graduated early, I could either flip burgers trying to go through college or I could try and find my way into the business, I ended up at the age of 19, getting my first agency job. And I just I fell in love, not just what the art direction part of it like, there's that creative side, I fell in love with solving problems, you know. And in all honesty, I was never the greatest art director, I was never the greatest copywriter, I was generally the person that people came to the pitching account or to save an account, you know, to help figure out where this client should go and why. And I always found that very exciting. Little bit verbose here, but I didn't know how I did that, like creative people or people that do that we always talk about, he or she gets it. Like it's this thing in the ether that you're able to pull out. And then 2017, 2016, 2017, I ended up getting certified in Behavior Design from Dr. Fogg at Stanford University, who runs the behavior persuasive lab there. And in about 20 minutes, I was like, Oh, so that's what I do. Like, he gave me a language and a set of tools and models and methods that allow me to explain what I did to someone who doesn't do that. And it was the moment like, late in my career where I was like, I've been changing people's behavior all my life. I just didn't realize what I was doing. It wasn't methodical. It was just pure talent at that point, and maybe luck. So yeah, so it's, it's been a journey. I don't do that kind of creative work anymore. But I still do that kind of strategic thinking.
Chad Franzen 11:40
So let's talk about the origin, the origin of your company, how did you kind of get the ball rolling? And what were the early over the early days, like, what were the first few clients like?
Roger Hurni 11:50
Cold Calls, it was cold calls. No, I tell people all the time, I think so much agency business is just dumb luck, and being at their sort of the right place at the right time. When we, when David and I started the agency, the first three months, while we were literally making calls, and it was, it wasn't like, hey, we want to pitch you or we'd love to have your business it was we'd like just introduce ourselves, we want to kind of tell you what we're doing and why it's unique and different. If you if if there's work, that's great. If there's no work, that's, that's perfectly fine. Because one day there might be or where you might find someone down the road are you willing to do just to a non pitch kind of call like that. And we spent three months just sort of doing that trying to find a client. During that time, though, I was actually freelancing under Off Madison ave, and for like every other agency in this market, and then some in San Francisco in Dallas, and that was that was driving our initial revenue. And then 90 days or so into it, one of those one of those conversations turned into, we need help our back is against the wall, there's this deadline, we were unprepared for it. And, and we quite frankly, just sort of saved that marketing issue at the last minute, and that just snowballed into more and more work. And then you know, when I know honestly, you know, it's one of those businesses where you build really great relationships. And within a few months, I had clients from past agencies and past relationships saying, Hey, I heard what you're doing, I'd love you to work on this project or that project. We we I told my wife at the time that we're going to get this thing one year. And if if it doesn't have traction, then you know, we'll probably move and I'll go back to San Francisco or New York and go work for another large agency. But no, it by the end of the first year, we had five staff and it doubled in size every year for the first four years. And then it sort of plateaued a little bit. And then it grew and shrank and other sort of businesses go. But yeah, to our surprise, it was great work yields great clients and yields more work.
Chad Franzen 14:02
Sure. Hey, so let's talk about maybe one of your clients. If you can think of a client that you guys that you guys have helped in some way. Let's talk a little bit about that client. First, kind of give me a give me an idea as to, you know, the industry they're in and then how they found you.
Roger Hurni 14:20
So when I talked about business being done, like they're in the auto service industry, and this was like, there's there's types of times in this business when you pitch accounts with like, request for proposals, right? And then there's, there's other times this has happened where clients will call you up and say, Hey, do for me what you did for so and so because they recognize the great work, or it's a past client said, Hey, I know it was eight years ago or 10 years ago that we work together. I'm in a different situation. Now. I'd love to hire you back. Right? Those are the typical situations. I have a friend who has a Christmas party every year and for like three or four years in a row you just get to know everybody. And I got to know this one gentleman. And then it got to a point in his business where he was really looking for some help and counsel, and they just called, because they're like, Hey, I know this guy, Roger, you know, he, we met at this Christmas party, this mutual friend's Christmas party. And and, and so it was sort of that little dumb luck getting in, although they were looking at like two or three different other agencies. So we had to talk about what we what we could do for them. And they were having, they were having some website stuff and some SEO stuff, issues. But mostly they were, they were thinking tactically about what they had and trying to get it done. versus not just getting it done better. But where's the real opportunity from an advantage standpoint, and we've had the client now for four years now five years, and they had I know, they doubled, but I think that they're ready to do something to where they'll probably almost tripled within the next 18 months. So it's been successful from that standpoint, and we've been a part of it, because we've been able to help them grow. But what I'm proud of from a case study standpoint is what we told them not to do. You know it I know, that's an unusual kind of a key study. But so many agencies look at budgets and what the client is asking for. And then they jump in. And they say, “Hey, this is this is where we can make money on the thinking of themselves first. And this is what the client wants to do. So let's just go off and do that, where we've had a couple of opportunities.” And what I'm thinking of in particular, is to say well let's stop for a second, you want to do what you want to do this geofencing campaign. And with what you do, let's run that through our behavior models. And when we when I did that, and there's this thing called this ability chain that can stop a behavior, when we couldn't overcome all the issues in that model, that ability model to, to make this successful. And to give it a chance of being successful, we said you're going to waste a lot of time, money and treasure, like going after something that you're never going to associate a behavior change on the way this is structured. And so instead of spending money on it, let's go off and look at what behavior you're really trying to change here. And what's the best way to get people the ability to make that change happen. And that's led to not just a strong relationship and greater sales for them. But they really think of us as a part of their organization, not some vendor, not even just their agency, like we're really we're integrated, you know, and that was even strengthened when they asked us to do this campaign during COVID, about how they have this five point, you know, protection cleaning program, you know, and I went and field tested, and I had some of my staff field test, and they weren't living up to that. And you know, we called and said, Hey, you guys, we can't do this campaign next week, we can't launch it. This and you don't have your act together operationally, we just, we're going to help you fail faster. And that's not what we want to do. So if you want to launch his campaign, it's not going to be with us. And the fact that we stopped and thought about their business in that way, endeared them to us even greater, because it wasn't about making money. It was about doing right by that.
Chad Franzen 18:21
Nice, great. That's, that's huge. Hey, let's talk about your podcast, and what made you decide to start it.
Roger Hurni 18:28
Um, you know, I've been asked for a lot of advice and counsel, I've been fortunate to be a part of an organization called Worldcom Public Relations Group. And we have, like 90 partners and 50 or so countries, and I'm constantly meeting people in the C suite. And we're talking about how behavior is really critical today, and how we have to get to a level of personalization. And just in those conversations, I've had people say that this would be great if I could hear this kind of information, because it's not really being spoken about, like people are driving down into specific leadership kinds of things, or specific kinds of marketing. But that that strategy around personalization, and how we can facilitate behavior changes, and not just in our customers, but with our own staff and how we can make operations smoother. That just, I had enough people say that seems really interesting. I'd like I'd like to hear about that. And so a little pen to paper, looking at organizations like Rise25, you know, it became, alright, here's a way that we can structure doing this, that's not going to take away from my time with clients and provide the kind of thought leadership that I can't speak to everybody, right? So if I can put something out there where people can gain these kinds of insights, to me that sort of paying it back and it's just, you know, I've had a great career of doing that and I can just get that sort of message out to more people now.
Chad Franzen 20:19
Last question for you, who do you think might benefit from hearing the show or enjoy hearing the show the most?
Roger Hurni 20:26
Typically, I think CMOs would get a lot out of it from a strategy execution standpoint, when it comes to, you know, how you look at behavior and how you can shift that. But founders and CEOs of companies that focus around marketing, its implications to how that company can function has some really keen insights. And I believe it's going to be the kind of insight you're not going to get from a traditional leadership type of conference or type of interview podcast.
Chad Franzen 21:00
Okay, well, I'll look forward to hearing it. Hey, Roger, it's been great talking to you. And thank you so much for your time and best wishes on the podcast.
Roger Hurni 21:09
Oh, thank you very much. I really appreciate it. You have a wonderful day and you've been great thank you.
Chad Franzen 21:14
Thank you so much, so long everybody.
