The Ad Podcast

Todd Irwin is a brand strategy veteran with over 30 years of experience who currently serves as the Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Fazer, a New York-based brand strategy and creative agency. He is widely recognized for pioneering the De-Positioning methodology, a strategy designed to turn a competitor's strengths into liabilities. Professional Background Industry Expertise: He has led l...

Travis McEwan is an entrepreneur and marketing strategist who serves as the CEO of 1 At Bat Media , a digital marketing agency specialized in high-growth strategies for modern brands. Under McEwan’s leadership, 1 At Bat Media focuses on performance marketing, customer acquisition, and the integration of emerging technologies into brand strategy. AI & Personalization: He is recognized in the in...

Jitesh Vaswani is a prominent breathwork teacher, transformational speaker, and marketing executive known for bridging corporate leadership with holistic wellness. Wellness & Meditation: He is a senior faculty member with the Art of Living Foundation , where he teaches SKY Breath Meditation. He is a frequent speaker on mindfulness and intuition, having delivered a TEDx talk ("Use Your Bre...

Sebastian Margaglio is the Senior Manager of Brand & Marketing for Long Weekend , a sustainable food and lifestyle brand operating under the Sumitomo Corporation of Americas (SCOA). Margaglio is a central figure in the launch and scaling of Long Weekend , which focuses on high-quality, plant-based products designed for modern, busy lifestyles. He is specifically noted for: Market Launch: Trans...

Simon Bruyn is a marketing and growth leader at SIGNIFICANT, where he focuses on helping brands scale through performance marketing, creative strategy, and modern digital channels. With a background spanning paid media, growth strategy, and brand building, he’s worked across a range of consumer and B2B clients to drive measurable business results. Known for his data-driven approach and sharp under...

R. Ethan Braden is a global marketing and brand executive, currently serving as Chief Marketing & Communications Officer at Texas A&M University. He oversees the university’s brand, marketing, communications, and digital strategy—helping position one of the largest institutions in the U.S. on a global stage. Prior to Texas A&M, Braden held senior leadership roles at Eli Lilly and Compa...

Alexander Hejazi is an entrepreneur and startup founder with a background in finance and technology. He is the founder and CEO of startups including Ballbox and Placement , companies focused on retail technology, smart kiosks, and innovative product distribution models. Hejazi began his career in finance, working with organizations such as Wells Fargo, NetSuite, and a boutique investment bank in D...

Dave Gulas is an American entrepreneur, logistics executive, and podcast host. He is the co-founder and president of EZDC 3PL , a third-party logistics company that provides warehousing, fulfillment, and transportation services for e-commerce and manufacturing brands. Before entering the logistics industry, Gulas spent more than 20 years in medical and pharmaceutical sales , where he developed a s...

Preeti Nadgar is a prominent media and communications strategy executive in the advertising industry. As of mid-2025, she serves as Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) for the United States at Starcom (a Publicis Media agency), marking her third tenure with the company—she first joined in 2004, returned in 2012 (rising to VP level), and rejoined after time away at other agencies. Prior to this, she was C...

Kyle Fleming (the one associated with Taha Kava) is a co-founder of Taha Kava, a Hawaii-based beverage brand specializing in sparkling kava drinks (e.g., flavors like Pineapple and Lilikoʻi/Passionfruit). Taha is a non-alcoholic, low-calorie "Polynesian social tonic" featuring noble Tongan kava (typically 500–800mg per can), positioned as a relaxing, social alternative with no sugar and...

Marc Sampogna is a seasoned entrepreneur, branding expert, and marketing leader with over 15–20 years of experience in the advertising, branding, and agency world. Born and raised in New York, he comes from a family background tied to advertising (his father and grandfather were involved in the field). He founded Canopy Brand Group (a branding and creative agency focused on strategy, design, innov...

Sarah Boyd is a marketing executive and entrepreneur best known as Co-CEO and CRO of The Digital Dept. , a leading influencer marketing and talent management firm. She originally founded Simply Stylist, a fashion and lifestyle platform that grew into a major conference series and digital network connecting creators, brands, and media. With a background in fashion PR, she’s built a reputation as a...

Myriah Castillo is a social media strategist and marketing executive, currently serving as President of Joybyte, one of the fastest-growing influencer-led social marketing agencies in the U.S. She played a key role in scaling the agency’s growth—helping drive major client partnerships and building innovative strategies across platforms like TikTok and TikTok Shop. With a background in creative wri...

Bryan Stewart is the Chief of Marketing and External Relations at Goodwill of Southern Nevada (GoodwillVegas.org), a nonprofit organization dedicated to workforce development, job training, and community support through retail operations and programs that help individuals overcome barriers to employment (often summarized as "saving the waste in people and things").He joined the organizat...

Rob Dawson is the Chief Strategy Officer at Creator.co, a Vancouver, Canada-based all-in-one influencer marketing platform (founded in 2016) that connects brands with creators for authentic collaborations, campaign management, performance tracking, and AI-powered tools like their "London" AI agent for matching, outreach, and scaling campaigns. In his role, he leads corporate strategy, gr...

Mark Connon is a seasoned executive in the adtech, martech, and data industry, currently serving as CEO of Bombora, a leading provider of B2B intent data and audience solutions that helps marketers identify in-market buyers through aggregated, privacy-compliant signals from publisher content consumption. He joined Bombora as President in May 2023 and assumed the CEO role around mid-2024, succeedin...

Ajay Gupta is the Founder and CEO of Stirista (often phonetically similar to "Sistra" in queries), a San Antonio, Texas-based data-driven marketing and identity solutions company specializing in combining identity-level data, email marketing, digital execution (including DSP ownership), and multichannel campaigns to help brands and agencies acquire, activate, and retain customers. He fou...

Domenic Venuto is a prominent executive in the advertising and media technology space, currently serving as EVP and Chief Product & Data Officer at Horizon Media, one of the world's largest independent media agencies (based in New York).In this role (appointed in late 2024), he oversees enterprise-wide product, data, and AI strategy, driving innovation through Horizon's AI-native Blue...

George Baker (often referred to as George Baker, Sr.) is an award-winning American entrepreneur, innovator, investor, and mentor based in Dallas, Texas. He is the Founder and Managing Partner of 2 the Moon Ventures, an investment vehicle he established to back early-stage companies and high-impact founders, particularly those needing an extra "boost" to scale—drawing from the playful &qu...

Nikos Iatropoulos is a venture capitalist and entrepreneur based in Austin, Texas. He currently serves as Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer at IA Global Ventures, a fund focused on supporting foreign-born founders and early-stage tech startups, where he leads investment strategy and operations. His career includes roles such as: Managing Partner of Rex Tech Ventures (joined in 2022). R...

Sanjoy Paul is an Indian-American computer scientist, engineer, and innovation leader (born January 22, 1962). He currently serves as Executive Director of Rice Nexus (Rice University's premier innovation and prototyping hub) and AI Houston, as well as Associate Vice President for Technology Development at Rice University, where he also lectures in Computer Science. He is a Fellow of the IEEE...

Sarah Romanko is a venture capital investor and startup ecosystem leader based in the United States. She serves as an Associate at Geek Ventures , where she focuses on sourcing, evaluating, and supporting early-stage technology startups, particularly those founded by immigrants in the U.S. Romanko has experience working with several venture capital firms and startups, including companies such as B...

Neal Bloom is a San Diego-based venture capitalist, entrepreneur, and ecosystem builder in the tech and startup space. A Southern California native, he studied mechanical engineering at UC San Diego (UCSD) and early in his career worked with NASA on the Space Shuttle Main Engines and aspects of the Artemis program. He co-founded the edtech startup Portfolium, which was acquired by Instructure. Thi...

Susan Akbarpour is an Iranian-American serial entrepreneur, investor, philanthropist, and venture capitalist based in Silicon Valley. She began her career as an investigative journalist in Iran before immigrating to the United States in 1997. With over 30 years of experience building innovative products and businesses in technology, media, advertising, finance, retail, and more, she is best known...

Scott Hess is a prominent executive in the advertising and media industry, currently serving as Chief Marketing Officer at Publicis Media (a division of Publicis Groupe), based in Chicago. He is a dynamic leader focused on branding, culture-building, human intelligence, and storytelling for people and brands. Hess has held key roles within the Publicis ecosystem, including CMO at Spark Foundry (a...