The Art and Science of Building Impactful Campaigns and Lasting Client Relationships

Hey, hi everyone. Welcome to your show, E-Coffee with Experts. This is your host Ranmay here. Today we have Kevin Outland, who is the President and Creative Director at Pure Energy Advertising with us. Hey, Kevin, how’s it going?

Fantastic, Ranmay. Thanks for having me.

Brilliant. Kevin, before we move any forward, let’s spend the call clock back. Let’s talk about your journey, how were you growing up as a kid, and what made you land up in the digital marketing space, and also a bit about your agency, what you guys do, what you guys specialize in, your energy advertising, and we take it off from there.

All right. That’s a lot, but I’ll try to remember. Yeah, no. I, growing up, I was the youngest of four siblings. I had great siblings, great parents. As a kid, my mom and dad used to tell me I was quite a daydreamer. I wasn’t great at pulling weeds or doing chores because my mind would just be going and thinking about creative stories and interesting characters or whatever. That bled over into my schooling, especially in elementary. I recall often my math papers would get sent home because we’d have several math problems on the page. And what’s five plus six? And the answer would be 11. I would write 11, but I would turn each of those numbers into Monsters and other characters. And I wouldn’t finish all the problems because I put the answer down, and then I had to make these interesting characters out of the numbers. I just grew up with a creative mind. That’s just how God wired me, I guess you could say. That led into high school. I accelerated in classes like creative writing and things of that nature. I started playing music at an early age as well. Started playing the piano, and that turned into…

My parents got me a synthesizer and started playing that, and eventually started writing music, which led me into a band that we played around town. Had a great time with that, which led me into really my first job in advertising, which was writing music for commercials. I spent my days in a studio surrounded by synthesizers, looking at video footage and creating music to go along with what was happening on the screen. It was a great job. Loved it, very creative. But the owner of that company was more of a musician than a businessman. So check started coming late and stuff, and I had to find a plan B. So I had gone to college with an emphasis in marketing and graduated from that. I had been in sales and marketing for many companies over the years, which eventually led to me and my brother and some friends. We had a company that I as a VP of Sales and Marketing. That company grew, got bought out, and then that really, I’m giving you the accelerated version here, but that really gave me the opportunity to go on to the agency side of things. For all of my career in marketing marketing and everything.

I was always on the corporate side, not on the agency side. After the company was bought out, I had a friend who owned an ad agency, and we got to talk, and I started doing work for them. Then he really encouraged me to start my own agency, which I did 21 years ago now. That was my journey from childhood into starting an advertising agency all those many years ago. What do we do? We’re a full-service ad agency, so we do everything. Again, that’s full service. We develop the marketing strategies, develop the creative, execute the creative, shoot the commercials, radio spots, do all the graphic design, do the media buying and planning, which is very crucial. I always say, Hey, you can have the greatest commercial in the world, but if the wrong people see it, it’s not going to be effective. Media buying and planning is a crucial part of what we do as an agency, and we do that very well. I guess, in a nutshell, that’s how I got from A to B to see it.

Lovely. Quite a story. 21 years, long time, right? Yeah. You have been at the head of Pure Energy for, like you said, 21 years. Enough summers and ventures, enough seasons you must have seen with the firm. What would you say have been the highest point in your journey so far?

The highest point? I guess for any agency, when you win a big account, that’s something you really want to… You just feel like it’s going to be a game changer. We did that a few years ago. We had a client that was a REG bank in Michigan, and they got purchased by a much bigger bank that was in four states. I had probably 10 times the amount of locations as the bank we were working with. Big accounts, big budgets. Usually, when the big company buys a small company, they don’t take the small agency with them. They go, We’ve got our big agencies.

In fact, a lot of other vendors are kicked out.

Oh, yeah. No, 100%. But we had such success with the small bank we were working with that the president of that bank really pushed at the top levels of the new bank that they should at least talk to us. Because of our success, we really had an advocate to say, Just at least talk to these guys. In fact, we had a conversation, which led to another conversation, which led them asking us to pitch for the business, which we did. They are, not all clients do this, but this particular client took all their stuff to focus group testing, all the creative. That’s how they made their decision. They’re like, What does the focus group say about the creative? Our creative just hit it out of the park in the focus groups. We won the business, which was massive for us and super exciting. We’ve been doing great work for a long time, and you win a real huge account that just validates a lot of the things that you’ve been doing for a lot of years. That was a turning point. That was exciting.

Lovely. Obviously, you, as an agency, have won multiple awards over the years. What do you believe is the secret to consistently produce those award-winning work or performances, I would say, What impact does it have with your existing client relationships and also with the fresh pictures that you do? Does that create a positive energy there when you go out and do your sales?

Yeah, winning awards is great. Don’t get me wrong. It’s fantastic. To be honest, we don’t apply for a lot of awards. Again, we’ve won stuff for TV and radio and web. Again, it’s great because it’s like third-party people in the industry, again, validating the quality and the type of work that you do. But the biggest thing really is producing results for a client. If you wanted an award for a campaign, but the campaign failed for the client, What good is the award? To me, when we were younger and earlier in our agency life, winning awards was just important, and it was great that we were able to do that and everything else. But as you mature and you get older, we don’t look at those things as important anymore as they were when we were younger and really focus on, Hey, I’d rather have a great testimonial from a client of the success that we’ve had than an award. Because obviously, to other clients, that means a lot more. Here’s my trophy versus, Here’s my client saying how awesome we are. To me, that’s worth a lot more than an award at the end of the day.

We don’t focus on, Hey, we got to win an award. Our focus is on, Hey, how do we hit this out of the park for our client and drive results? The reason we won that big bank was because we did such excellent work for the small bank that they were willing to go to the mat for us. It’s a push hard for the big bank to talk to us, not because we won awards, but because we did such a great job and had such great results. They’re like, You got to talk to these guys. They’re knocking it out of the park. Again, obviously, that had nothing to do with an award and had everything to do with the results.

Absolutely. That is no good reference than a client talking about and vouching for the work you have done for them over a period of time. Yeah, absolutely. Nothing that explains that. Nothing can replace that.

Yeah, 100%.

Then talking about your journey, Kevin, you have helped launch new products, rebrand the existing ones. What are the challenges when it comes rebranding versus launching a new product? And how is the use case for each one of these different?

Yeah. So I’ll give an example. I helped a new company launch a product, and it was a new product, and it was Disney licensed. So it was a Disney licensed product. So we ended up working directly with Disney’s internal creative team to develop the packaging for the products. We were using all kinds of Disney creative assets, all kinds of characters and everything else. It was that as a brand guidelines. Talk about brand guidelines. You’re dealing with one of the top known creative companies in the world, Disney. Here we are working with their team, developing the packaging and the products with their guidelines. It was a little bit intimidating at first. You’re working with Disney now. This is big time. I remember when we first had our first talk with Disney directly, and then they sent us their creative assets. You’re seeing all these iconic figures and everything that Disney is sending you to use and to help their brand and come alive with this new product and packaging. It was exciting. But at the same time, it just goes back to how important following a customer’s brand guidelines and standards is. When you’re doing a brand or you’re doing a rebrand, part of a rebrand is providing that new branding guide, because you’ve created a new brand which has new guidelines and all that goes with that.

Certainly people in the industry understand what I’m saying with that. Rebranding can be a daunting task, but at the same time, using brand guidelines that a client like a Disney provides and creating a great product and still having your creative input using their guidelines is sometimes a little bit like threading a needle, but the end result is It was fantastic. It was an exciting time because we were with our kids at Disney in Florida, and we were walking through one of the Disney stores. After a ride, they always put you through a store where they have all the stuff you can buy. And so we’re walking through that Disney store and to see our products on the shelves sitting there in Disney in their stores was a surreal experience. It’s like, wow, we created that. And here they are in the Disney store sitting on the shelves. So that was certainly a fun experience, unique experience. My kids thought it was so cool. Oh, dad created that. Yeah. That was fun. Now, when it comes to changing a brand, which we’ve had companies that have outgrown their brand or the name, even the name, didn’t fit them anymore.

We had to create, change the name of the company, and it really start from scratch, and yet somehow tie that old brand, old name, to the new one and make that communication clear with their clientele. It’s not, Hey, we just changed our name. Yesterday, we were pure energy, and today we’re ABC advertising. That wouldn’t make any sense. In addition to creating the brand, you have to create a campaign that slowly walks their customer base from the old name to the new name so you don’t lose that loyalty. That’s not a piece of cake, but sometimes it’s very necessary where your name just… Because of how you’ve grown and so forth, sometimes your name just doesn’t make any sense anymore. You got to make that adjustment. We enjoy the challenge, so love doing it.

Lovely. Have you said no to a client ever? I’m sure you must have, Kevin.

No, as in, no, we don’t want your business?

Or- Yeah, after the initial interactions, the client was willing to work with you, but you weren’t. Yeah.

No, we’ve definitely had situations where we just felt that the client wasn’t a good fit for us. Just for whatever reason, it doesn’t really matter. But sometimes on both sides, we’ve got to fit within their company culture and mindset, and they got to fit within ours. We’re going to make sure it’s a good fit. Otherwise, it’s just going to be a struggle on both ends. And ultimately, we want our clients to be successful. So I’d rather say, Hey, this just isn’t a good fit. Maybe make some recommendations to some other agencies that might be a better fit for them than try to take on a client and try to cram a square peg in a round hole. That doesn’t do anybody any good. Absolutely. Sometimes knows the right answer.

Yeah, that makes sense. Coming to the dark side of the web, seminars, it sounds fascinating, right? How did this fashion project come about and how does it connect to your work in general?

Yeah, just for a little context. The The Dark Side of the Web Seminars is a seminar series I launched over 20 years ago about internet safety for parents. I think what the internet was 20 something years ago compared to what it is today. It’s different. But I had 20 years ago, my kids were younger. And through my work, through some other companies, I just realized that pornography on the internet and children getting access to that was a big deal. It’s It’s a shocking thing. I actually wrote down a couple of things here. In a study of fourth and sixth graders, 97% of them have reported exposure to pornography. Now, I don’t know how many parents of fourth and sixth graders want them looking at porn. That’s not a good idea. One in 10 visitors to porn sites are under the age of 10. Getting this data and realizing what a problem this was as a father, I just started really digging in, researching, realizing how big the problem was that this thing called the Internet, it’s in parents’ homes, and suddenly their kids can have access to all kinds of things on what I call the dark side of the web that parents generally don’t want their kids having access to.

It’s not good for their minds and their development and everything else. I created this seminar, and I really thought it was just going to be, I was going to speak. The first place I spoke was at my church, and I thought, I created the seminar, 300 and something parents came, which It was huge. It was all the time. Tell there’s a need. People aren’t getting this information. It was all about, okay, what are the dangers on the internet that can impact your kids? As a parent, how do you protect your family from those dangers? I covered those things in the seminar. I spoke there, and then I got a call from a local school, and they wanted me to come and speak. We had 200 and something parents show up at a local school meeting, and then I got asked to speak somewhere else, and it just grew. Since then, I’ve I’ve spoken from Alaska to New York City and places in between. So honestly, it’s not really related to advertising in any particular way, other than the fact that I think it’s important for people in general to give back in some way, to help people and use whatever talents and abilities you’ve been given to try to help other people.

And so, again, most people don’t want their kids looking at porn. Nor did I as a parent. And I just realized it was a big problem. I started this thing to try to address it, and 20 something years later, it’s still doing. Again, that’s my passion project and something I like to do to give back.

Lovely. That is the different side of it altogether. I really appreciate it. Putting an effort for this long time period to ensure that it is taken care of. Absolutely. Lovely, Kevin. You’re doing great, Kevin. Finally, given our experience in the niche and the industry, for our next test today, especially the young ones who are trying to make a mark in this digital marketing space, or let’s say, trying to venture out into entrepreneurship, so what is that piece of advice you’d want to give to them?

Yeah, a lot of pieces of advice, but one thing I would suggest is finding a really good mentor that has been there, done that. When I started Pure Energy 21 years ago, I I was fortunate to have some friends that were in the industry, one that already owned an ad agency. Another friend of mine owned an ad agency as well. I had people to go to to ask questions and to get some insight because I’d never owned an ad agency before. Trying to just figure it out on your own without any help would take you a lot longer to get to the growth you want. Having some strong mentors that can really help you in all kinds of ways. Simple as, how do I set up my business structure? Some people start their business on the wrong foundation, and then they got to try to fix it later, which can be a mess, and hiring practices and on. There’s just a lot of different things that… I’m an entrepreneur at heart, so I get it. Sometimes you just got to jump, take the plunge and go. I’m not against that, but man, if you can find a strong mentor, that’s really going to help you accelerate your growth and your success and help you avoid some of the landmines that It could really blow you up before you get started.

The other thing I would say, and I’ve seen this a lot in my career, is that a lot of creative people leave an agency and go start their own. They’re really good at creative, but they are terrible at the science and research part because that wasn’t anything that they did. They might be able to create a great-looking ad, but great-looking doesn’t equal You see what I’m saying there? You can have an ad that looks really good. It doesn’t mean it’s going to work just because it looks pretty. Pretty doesn’t equal results. Our tagline at Pure Energy Advertising is science plus art equals results. You’ve got to do your research side. You got to understand the target market and the messaging and the product and all those nuances there first before you do the creative. Again, Again, science plus art equals results. If all you have in that equation is art, and then you’re like this, hoping it works. It’s pretty and I hope it works. Boy, that’s clients don’t want. They want the science part, right? They want that research. They need it. But again, a lot of small agencies, they were started by a creative person, and they just don’t have the research and science part of it.

I would say if you’re young and you’re a creative and you want to start an agency, find somebody to partner with that understands the science side, the data, because that’s going to make you a much more valuable agency to a client than somebody who’s just, Oh, I can make stuff that looks pretty. Okay, is it going to work? I hope so. That’s not an answer you want. You want to know as much as possible that what you’re creating, your messaging, your creative is going to have success. You need that science piece. A lot of that is missing when somebody ventures out that’s a creative and says, I’m going to start my own agency. You got to have both pieces of that equation to be of true value to your clients.

Absolutely. Thank you so much, Kevin, for the insights and those wise words for our listeners today. One more thing, I mean, if they want to reach out to you, how do they do that?

Sure. They can go to our website, getpureenergy. Com. Getpurenergy. Com. You can contact me by email, keo@getpureenergy. Com. Or happy to take a phone call, not afraid of the phone, 248-835-9992. Any one of those ways, you can get to us, and we’ll be happy to chat with you.

All right, lovely. Thank you so much, Kevin, for sharing those details. And yes, taking out time to do this with us. Really appreciate it. Cheers, man.

All My pleasure. Thank you.