Kendall Ostrow

her and she was so knowledgeable about social media. But she told me this is September she was going to sell the first snapchat series, which she then did. Okay, so Kendall, good to have you here. Thanks. Okay, what exactly do you do at you t A. So my group sits across all the departments of the agency and we help our clients, you know, from every discipline, build their strategy for how they're going to talk to their fans. How do you build an audience, How do you talk

about yourself? How do you use all the best tools at your disposal, all the social media platforms to really a mass attention and uh control the crowd and figure out you know, how to use those things to your advantage in today's day and age, and then we use all the data and analytics from all those platforms to better sell them in the marketplace. So how do we make more money on every renegotiation for a television show or with every commercial endorsement deal based on the massive

influence and audience that our clients can bring to the table. Okay, you're young enough I can ask this question, and I'm asking for different reason. You are how old today? Two and a half and a half? And my point is, does anybody over forty really understand social media? Yeah? Absolutely? And who are those people? I don't mean by name? How do they know? I think that you know, there's a lot of stuff that social media is not completely new. You've got to be ahead of the times. You have

to trend, forecast and see what's coming. But people used to build grassroots audiences and street teams and and things like that. It's it's the the idea of amassing an audience and building that type of fan base isn't new. It's just the platforms by which we do it. And so how you communicate, Like if you're entrenched in old old business in old Hollywood, sometimes you want to bare your head in the sand and not think about these things.

But I don't think the mechanics are necessarily that new the idea of it, so you just have to learn the new tools to catch up today. What is the number one platform to build an audience depends on what your business goals are. Okay, what might my business goals be? Well, I think probably in general, most of my clients would say that they're spending the most time and attention on a platform like Instagram. That's that's where they're seeing a

lot of lift. But our YouTube stars are still amassing massive audiences and building out such robust businesses on that platform, and the interaction with the fans is so much deeper. Sometimes on platforms like that, where it's a little more long form, they have a little bit more of a community engagement. Um. But you can't be on one like you know, you can't just be on one platform and

think you're going to have a sustainable business. We saw people who invested every ounce of their time on platforms like Vine, and those people unless they diversified and also built how YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etcetera, they kind of disappeared from public eye. So you need to build a city of towers to build your audience. You can't just have one big skyscraper. Wow, you must have said that before. That's so good the turns of the analogy. But those

are people who started on vine. Let's assume now most of the clients you're working with U. T. A Are already established stars. Correct some, but let's let's just start with that. If I'm an established star, okay, and I for some reason, I've been enacting school or whatever, I've been making my celebrity and this is not really the case now because everybody is growing up in our social media and I have no social media presence. What would you tell me? What we'd sit down and we'd talk about,

you know, what are your long term goals? Okay, so let's just assume I could be an actor, I could be a musician. Let's say I'm an actor. What might give me an example what my long term goal would be? Well, do you want to win an Oscar? Do you want to be in a Blockbuster franchise? Are they mutually exclusive? But the one that's a little more complicated because Blockbuster is really where the world is. Say, let's say I want to win an Oscar? What would I do in

social media? You know, we we are fortunate to have a lot of incredible people who are you know, just nominated this year, and some have social media like Timothy shallow May like you know, he is on and active and posting great content on Instagram. And then Francis mcdormant, who you know, obviously chose not to and I don't you know with it, where like that do you need to be on social media? Probably not someone of that ilk okay, Francis McDorman. Uh, someone over fifty who is

a well established career. Would it benefit a person like that to be on social media? I think it depends on where they want to go in their career. So I've back. I no longer represent him. But in my previous career I worked with Patrick Stewart for a long time and I'm so proud of what we did with him, and he was not on social media, and uh, with the help of his incredible wife and I, we sat down and we taught him kind of how to do the whole thing. And he really want to be taken

seriously as a comedic actor. And you know, with someone sir Patrick's you know, credibility and all the awards and all the accolades. Do you think he needs to be on social But the way he was able to change his brand image and the way that he was able to get people to see this completely different side of

him through Twitter was amazing. He was the first person that Twitter reached out and actually invited to their headquarters instead of people saying I want to come by and come to you guys as a press stop when they were really doing a lot of those things at h Q and San Francisco, and he went, I was lucky enough to attend the opening bell ceremony when they you know, went the I p oed on the New York Stock Exchange because they wanted him there as one of their

most powerful and influential voices on the platform because they thought what he did to change his persona and connect with the community was just so incredible. So it depends on what the goals are. Like I said, like, you can't put the formula instead of something in front of someone and say it's een, here's what you have to do to succeed in this business. There's a lot of people, you know, even like Jennifer Lawrence, like you know she's

not completely active. I think she has an active Facebook page that you know, people will post news and trailers and stuff like that on. But it doesn't matter your age, it doesn't matter um kind of when you were born and what you should do. It depends on what you want to accomplish. Do you want to be more of a lifestyle brand. Do you want to really connect with

the audience. Do you want to be able to sell and drive and you know, produce your own projects and then distribute them through this fan base that you have, or do you want to stay a little more out of the public eye. So I think you have to really analyze and and go deep with a client, say

why are you even doing this? Because if you don't commit and really know why you're on and know what goals you're trying to reach, you're just gonna put out weird stuff that that's not going to build any type of sustainable strategy and it's not going to be effective for you long term. Let's stay with Patrick Stewart just so I know Twitter start in two thousand seven, I believe six six. When did he go on? Oh gosh, um uh must have been two thousand eleven or two

thousand twelves. Okay, so it was already deep into Twitter's popularity. Yeah. I would call two thousand ten like the summer of Twitter. Maybe maybe it was two thousand twelve. I think so at point many people were already on Twitter, and he specifically wanted to get more opportunities in the comedy field. So did you sit down and say, hey, make most of your tweets funny? How did you decide to do that? Well?

I was working at I D PR at the time, and Kelly Bush has been Patrick's publicists since the beginning of of of you know, I D I think he was client number one. Um, and she was the one who was like, we need to get you on It's it's time you need to be on social media. So she brought him in and I sat with him and

we figured out what are your goals? And then we sit down and um, you know, for most of my clients will sit down and we'll think, you know, what are the three things that someone can take away someone that you've met taught me uh Linda on uh she does a brand triangle, like what are the three things people can't wrap their head around? Million assets of your aspects of your personality? Do you boil it down to what are the three things you really want people to

know about you? And I use that in social media? Is like what are those six images that are before below the fold or above the fold on on your app on or on your nine images on Instagram? What are those nine things that people are going to take away? What's that first instinct, that first impression they're going to get when they type you into Google, when they pull up the first five tweets on your account? Like what is what is that big takeaway? And are you hitting

those three things that you want people to know? And if you are, we're being successful if I only take one thing away of who you are, or if it's all completely promotional and I have no idea why, Um, you know what drives you? What makes you want to be an artist? What are you here for? Like? Why are you even popping into my sphere of attention? If I can't figure out what those three things are, then

we have a problem. So a lot of times I'll google the heck out of my clients and I'll read every article, every interview, read tweets from a year ago, like really go deep, and I'll make a complete assumption on who they are, what they stand for, what drives them, what they believe, what are their hobbies before I ever

sit down with them. And then I'll talk to them and I'll see what alignes and I'll say, well, based on what I saw on Google, not knowing you, not knowing the business, not hearing from anyone in your inner circle, here's what I judge and here's what I assume. And if it doesn't match up with what you're telling me, then we have a problem. If your goals are to, uh, you know, launch a fitness company, and I see none of that activity anywhere on your channels, and obviously there's

a huge disconnect. How do you start to seed that information and seed that content into the stream and into people's consciousness before you want to launch that business so they can start to see you as an influencer or as a you know, notable person in that space. Okay, let's go back to the beginning. You grew up in the state of Washington, and what were your interests back then? UM, Entertainment. Always from a young age, you always wanted to be

in the entertainment business. When I had no self awareness and UM completely just did what I loved. I danced and took voice lessons for years. And why do you say when you had no self awareness? Well, I took voice lessons for eight years and can't carry a tune. My grandma once told me over breakfast with one of my best friends that one of the hardest experiences of her life was going as a grandma was going to my voice recitals because it was so painful. Um but

I danced competitively since I was eighteen. I did you know, community theater and you know, played every apart from Sunday except for the ones that required a lot of singing. The callbacks to Annie were just horrible because I can't carry it note at all. But it was a good actress. Um But I wanted to do, you know. I just wanted to be in the business I loved. I loved every aspect of performing and entertainment. I just wasn't great

at it. So I had to figure out a career that would allow me to be When did you I mean you said after eight years you realized you couldn't carry a tune? When did you decide you wanted to be behind the camera instead of in front of it? Um? I just think I wanted to be around it. I think I kind of knew I'd never be a performer. I always knew that. I knew that I was never that good, um or even close to it, even at like age nine or ten. I just loved the whole

process of it. And I would consume pop culture like a crazy person. My aunt, uh you know, subscribe to every people in Vogue and Vanity Fair. I'd read every single thing I could get my hands on. I just was a huge consumer of the world and I loved staying ahead of the trends and you know, seeing what was next. I never you know, Um, I don't know. I just I just always wanted to be a part of it. So in college, I majored in Before you

get to college, were your parents supportive of this interest? Yeah? Completely. I mean my mom would drive two hours every night for theater practice or you know, from my rehearsals and stuff, so I could, um be in different local productions around the state. And um, I think I was at dance practice from two o'clock after school until ten pm. And you know, they were very very supportive. Dance competitions, the whole thing, seven days a week, so you're talking about

going to college. So I went to college and I looked for a big school on the West coast that had a Greek system and a dance program. Okay, why did you want a Greek system? Everyone in my family had gone Greek. I don't know. I didn't. I didn't know much about what I like, what major even like, it wasn't even a consideration. It was like, there was these weird things that I wanted. I wanted a big school.

So I went to the University of Arizona, and uh ended up retrospect was at the right choice led me to where I am and I'm very happy. So who knows, you know, you could take a million different paths. You're gonna end up somewhere, and I'm really happy with where I ended up. And I had a great time there. So okay, so could I have challenged myself more based on my grades? And yeah? Probably? But what what was

your vision there? At the University of Arizona. So they had a major that was like the film, radio, and television. It was like a media arts degree, and I majored in producing so the behind the scenes of that business and UM took a couple of classes that were really instrumental and where I am very slowly. Because so many people talk about their educational experience not being helpful. What were those couple of classes that were so helpful? Uh?

There was this one class specifically that was called New Media Business or something like that, and it just studied new technologies and new advancements in the entertainment business and you know where things were going. Um, so just you know, really forward thinking, you know, wearable devices. And this was two thousand six, I think, so just kind of really digging into some of the new trends that were coming

around the pike. And one of my professors, BARRETTA. Ea S Smith SHOWMATI was such a force and I took every class that was uh on the schedule with her and I was really panicking senior year. I was like, I don't know what to do. I really want to go to the entertainment business, but I know no one. We're in Arizona. I have no idea what to do. She was like, sit in a dark room, be bored out of your mind for fifteen thirty minutes. Just be

as bored as you can. Don't do anything. I think it was before anyone knew it or anyone I knew knew what meditation was, but she was just like, clear your mind completely, sit down, and then when you snap out of it, when the alarm goes off, what are

the first things you want to do? And the first thing I did was pick up my computer and I went to this is embarrassing, uh, Mashable dot com and Perez Hilton dot com and it was like tech and entertainment and tech and pop culture really, and that's what I was interested in. I really wanted to be a talk show producer, and I had had internships in radio and film and television, and I loved the immediacy of radio.

I loved how fast it moved, that every day was different, that you'd come in and be able to make something up on the fly. You wouldn't have to sit around and wait for gatekeepers. Whatever you wanted to do you could do. And with that it was, you know, prior to social media and tech and you know a lot of that stuff becoming more mainstream. And back in the day I was working at Clear Channel, they had which I heart now obviously, but um they had text in.

It was like you text four seven three seven three to be part of the show. So it was almost like early Twitter in a way, and we would have people text into the show and we'd be able to change the programming and call people out and get fan feedback and completely adjust the show based on what people

People are unaware. You would text in and text in saying what we would ask a question, or people would just text in and say I want to talk about this, or um, you know, they would just whatever they wanted to say, and then we'd print out all these text messages like thousands per show and dive into those and adjust the content on the fly. And then when I was interning in film and TV, I was like, wait, I'm reading this. It's not going to be produced for

seven years, Like, I just don't understand. The pace of it was not appealing to me. Um, So that immediacy I loved. So instead of radio, I thought, well, let's let's move to l A and make a go at it and television. And so before you go, before you go to moving to l A, So how did you end up working at iHeart or then Clear Channel. Um, my dad is a corporate litigator, but for some reason met some sports radio guys on the golf course. I think and had done their deals, and he said, I'll

open a door for you. I don't know what's there, but you need to walk through it. And so he introduced me to the head of Clear Channel at the time in Seattle, and I interviewed and got an internship in the street team of the hip hop radio station there. And this was when you were in college my freshman year, freshman year. So how much did you work at the station? Um?

My freshman summer, I wore five days a week, I think like part of the day at the radio station and then part of the day at the Sonics, which were upstairs two floors, so they're in the same building. So I the SuperSonics the basketball team, right, Yeah, So I did both things. So I was a street team kind of marketing on both both companies. How did you

get the gig with the Sonics? My dad also my dad represented Kevin Collabra and so the voice the Sonics that he helped me there as well, So I was lucky. That was the last time anyone of my family helped me with the jobs. But those are the two doors I got open. Okay, So how many summers did you work for the Clear Channel station? Um, basically all three summers of college and throughout the year. How could you

work throughout the year if you're in Arizona. Well, I would call into the station to be on the air when I was away, and then I would work all Christmas break, spring break, summer breaks. Okay, so you're in Arizona, you're calling in to say what just check in. I was the intern for the morning show, so they would just call and check in a couple of times a week on what I was up to and how things were going at college. So when you by by time, you're deep into it and the people know you. What

is your role in the radio show? Kendle the intern? Kendle the intern. So it's like Howard Stern, it his internee plage on you talk and you're also doing roles when you're not on are Yeah okay. So you graduate from college, you have the epiphany that you want to be in the entertainment business. You pull up Paris, Hilton and Mashable. Ironically, you ended up marrying someone who was the number two a Mashable. Yeah, okay, so you graduate

from college. When you graduate from college, you have a job. Um, so I the same professor that told me to sit in a dark room. Um knew when she went to college with a producer on Jay Leno and I was told at the time there were a couple areas. There was only two ways to break into the entertainment business. You either did the mail room in an agency or you did the Page program NBC, and those were the two options. That's all you could do if you wanted

to get a foot in the door in Hollywood. And at the time, Entourage was on and I was like, oh lord, I don't want to be an agent. That seems horrible, just money hungry and crazy, and that that was my only, uh, you know, assumption of the business. So I was like, well, I'm going to do the Page program and I want to be in that. I want to do a talk show. I want to work and you know, daily produced entertainment television the way that you know, the next step from radio and what I

what I kind of was thinking. And so I did the Page program. I applied, Okay, can you apply specifically to be on a talk show. It's like a general program. So I applied. I didn't hear back. I reached out with follow up probably twice a week. Once a week, I'd call an email. I was I was relentless. Never got a call back because they it's a rolling program. They're not going to hire me ten months in advance. I didn't. I didn't really understand how it worked, but I was just a dog with a bone. I had

to get the page program. It was all I want it. And I finally got a call from Betty, who ran the program at the time. This was we're in your college career. I was two steps from walking across the stage at graduation and Betty called me and I said, Betty, I've been waiting for this call all my life. I really want to take it, but I've got to walk these fifty yards before i can take the job with you. Can I call you back on Monday? And she said absolutely. I was so upset. I was like, I may have

lost my chance, but I have to graduate. If I don't walk out there, I can't take this job. So I walked across and I called her, and I drove to l A that day. I think I called her on the way and I was like, Betty, I'm driving to you. Can I interview tomorrow? And I got went in and I got the job. Okay, we'll return to this conversation with Kendall Lostrow, head of i Q Strategy for U t A. In a moment. You're listening to the Bob Left Sets podcast recording you to tune In

studios in Venice, California. Each week, I interview a new guest to get their story. I want to find out what makes them tick, and I hope listening to these successful people makes you smart them. If you like the show, subscribe, rate and review it. Also, please check out earlier episodes. You can hear them all on tune in, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts now More with Kendal Astro, head of i Q Strategy for U t A. Okay, let's sue you hadn't got the job. What was your plan? So?

I had flown to l A a a month before to try to knock on her door and get it. And I'd also applied to a bunch of internships and jobs, and I went to I went to I had to I like, interviewed to MTV for an internship which I ended up taking for like a couple, you know, six weeks that summer before the page program opened up. Because

I just didn't want to have downtime. Um. And then I had my resume and I remember walking miles that day, just dropping it off at every door in Santa Monica, trying to get meetings, trying to like completely crazy, but I just I was going to make it somehow. In with Betty and the internship with MTV. Were there any other opportunities? There was pretty much a closed door at all these places. No. I interviewed all right, and Um. I also interned at Donald the Line Pictures and realized

that the film business was a little slow for me. Um. But I mean I moved out and I started, you know, within eight weeks. I think. So you drove out, you had your interview with Betty and she said, yes, but you gotta wait because it was a rolling program. I thought. She said, yes, eight people, nine people every um every two months. I think is closed her immediately, Yeah, okay,

Well where'd you where? Um? I lived with two roommates from college in Santa Monica until that commute to Burbank got a little crazy, and then I moved to I went on Craigslist, much to everyone in my family's horror, and moved in with two guys I didn't know much about anything. Um, But it was a great house and they had a recording studio in the back and when I was there, some people were showing up to start recording music. It turns out they were a band for

that Tattoo band, the girls back in the day. Oh yeah, of course. So I lived with that band for a couple of years. And that was where in Toluca Lake, Okay, very close to Burbank for those in l A and valley savvy. So you get the job in the pay per gram. When you get the job, how long is it supposed to last. You have to be out within a year. Have to be out within a year. Yeah, you have to find a job within a year. So

you do assignments and it's an apprenticeship program. So I did tours and I wore the peacock tie, you know, the Kenneth the Page suit. It was awesome. It was like a little mini uh college campus with all of us because we were all about the same age, all brand new, first time in l A. All became best friends. And how many of those people ended up in the entertainment business. Oh quite a lot of them. My best

friends still. Um, the couple you know, chose different paths, but from most part most of them are still okay. So you knew you wanted to work on a talk show, So did you get to work on a talk show? So it was the old NBC lot, the Bob Hope a lot. So I worked on you know, we did tours and we sat audience at Carson Daly at the time, and Leno and Ellen, and then I was at Ellen. Um and everyone wanted to work at Ellen and no,

I mean she is just she. It was the best, and I think there was not very much turnover at Leno. Most of his employees had been there for you know, fifteen years at that point there, everyone had been there for a really long time. Ellen, it was season five and it was still uh, you know, there was still some turnover and still some opportunity there. So Um, within two and a half months of being in the Page Program, I got the interview at Ellen for the executive producer's

assistant and got the job. And so within three months I was out of the Page Program and working at Ellen. So the Page Program is basically away. It's a wheel to try to spin yourself out to get a job, and was three months short or long relative to the other people. I was the first in my class to leave. And you're okay, your gig was the assistant to the executive producer. Was that a fulfilling job? It was great.

It was you know, grad school for the entertainment business. Oh, when you're a page, you're getting paid, yeah, kind of kind of okay. So then when you when you go to work for Ellen and getting paid a kind of but yes, you're still you know, it's still an assistant in Hollywood, you get um, you get experience more than you get money, probably until you hit that inflection point when you become a couple of years into being an exact maybe okay. So then when you work for Ellen,

how much of your time does it take up? Um? Self inflicted or self inflicted? Self inflicted? I probably left the house every day at six am and got home somewhere around eleven pm midnight. And did you work on the weekends, And what would you do on the weekends with with the studio will be dark with or you'd just be working at home. I'd be working at home. Sometimes I'd go in. But it again, self inflicted, like it wasn't that, it was it was demanding of course

you have. You know, there's no when you're in production, you have to be there, you have to be present. You were there as long as you know. You're the first one and the last one out in a job like that. But it was self inflicted. Like I read. I noticed that my boss got every magazine subscription and every newspaper in the world, and you know, was a he wanted to consume a ton of information but didn't

always have time. So I would read every single thing that would come into his desk and highlight and flag what I thought was relevant. So I was more informed than I've ever been in my life. And I would send him articles. I was a power Google Reader user, like I must have been in their top one percent of users. And I would go through every single dog and website and you know, magazine. What should we book

on the show? What I was so annoying, I'm sure to every producer because I'd be like, this is a brand new thing, this is a brand new thing. You guys should be on top of this, you guys. Have you guys have heard of Twitter? Have you heard of Facebook? Like this should be something that you guys are all over. It's free marketing. Have those website people in the corner

do it and kind of didn't get taken seriously. And I was so fresh out of college I thought that writing like thesis style essays about the future of how these social media platforms would be used and uh in the entertainment business was a good idea. And those thesis papers probably weren't received the way I intended them to be.

But um, I would write crazy essays on what I thought the future of the business would look like and how we went from sitting around, you know, the fireplace, to the electronic hearth with the radio, and then the television and the water cooler, and then social media was like the new gathering spot where people would talk about Ellen and I pitched that basically, you guys are producing

for one hour a day everyone in this building. Let me produce for twenty three hours a day, round the clock on her social media for all the hours that you know, you guys aren't on the air. And um, after a while, Diddy came on the show and told her about social media. Diddy, I don't know, this might have been two thousand and eight to early two thousand nine, and um, didd he told her about it and she was like, what the heck is this and they were like, Kendall,

get down to the control room. It was like everything is already set up, let's go. So it became my job overnight and so that launching all her social media and I had to figure out how to do it. So I was reading a lot of Mashable and tech Crunch, and there wasn't really a road map. There wasn't really a plan on how to do it. I just thought

about it a lot. And so we developed that strategy and UM to launch her and put up everything and I think CNN was number one, Ashton Kutcher was number two, and Ellen was number three on Twitter, So back in the day, back in the day. So how long did you work for Ellen um three? Around three years? And did they ultimately, as they say, once they saw that you were ahead and we're right, did they respect you

and give enough responsibility. I think when you work for one person like that, I ended up becoming kind of a community manager. You know, you launched, We launched Facebook and Twitter and YouTube and UM. She was one of the first to have four square badges, and you know, there was a lot of stuff that was really fun that we could do. We gave away a ton of tickets on the air, UM to have you know, we're going to tweet out that Ellen or her team is going to be at X location at this time, and

thousands of people would show up. We did a lot of like really cool community engagement live on air, hits, etcetera. UM. But at a certain point your community managing your you know, drafting tweets and really maintaining all those channels, and I wanted more of the strategic overall role. And so that is when I moved to I DPR and I worked. Okay, so you moved to I D p R. How did you get that gig? And what were you envisioning would happen? Um?

Through mutual friends. I got connected with a woman named Natalie bruss Lent at the time. Who UM I joined that team and and worked on a bunch of different UM. Now, PR is not exactly the same thing you were doing maybe what your role was, but working for Ellen and working for PR, that's actually radically different. Did you know that you wanted to work for a PR company? Not at all? And I didn't seem I wasn't a publicist, I wasn't doing any PR, I was doing social strategy,

digital strategy building. You know, if at ELLEN I was producing content, I thought of myself as a producer and I just executed that on social. At I d I was doing digital strategy, producing a persona, how do we drive media attention, how do we get our clients more into the cultural conversation? All through things I can own control the things that they you know, have power over. On social but in PR, you're in the retainer bit nous, and you got to teach your clients how to fish.

You can't do it for them otherwise they're never going to be successful. So I would just burn ensuring clients like crazy because hopefully within a month three months, they'd know everything that I needed to teach them and they could be set on their way. That doesn't work in publicity using that business model. So after three years before you get there, when you get the getting the gig at I DPR, were you checking, were you knocking on many doors or that opportunity to just come up? It

came up? Okay, So after three years at I DPR, you were telling saying, I recognized that so much of the value that I was bringing to clients for building their audiences to a place where they can monetize it in a million different ways. And I thought maybe being on the percentage side of the business was a little more It made more sense based on how I approached interacting with clients, building their audiences, the value that I could bring to their their careers. So how did the

next transition happen? Um, I, through room mutual friends, had coffee with um Brent Weinstein, who runs the digital team at U t A. Or maybe it wasn't even mutual friends, like we we just knew each other out Like I'd see him at south By and we'd always run into each other everywhere, and we just sat down and we were talking about the business. He was like, come work here. And at the time, was there anybody doing that gig

or in that department? Yeah, I mean the U t A has the longest I think the first digital the digital, first digital practice in the entertainment business, so there had been you know, they were the first assign YouTube stars and really they've have a long history and really being forward thinking and entrepreneurial in this space. And to Jeremy's ammers credit, like, I don't think anyone in my role exists I don't think anyone in my role exists at

any other agency. Is because I'm not completely transactional in any way, Like I don't come in every day and add things to my booking slip, Like I don't you know, do the final deals for clients. My value to them is long term and such a long tail effect, like we build their audiences so we can make them, you know, more successful and um on every deal they do. But it's not necessarily something that you can completely account for

at the end of the year. And uh, you know, Jeremy's really invested in this, and from the board and the partners, they'll all top down in really seeing the value and growing this. And ever since I've joined, it's just gotten bigger and bigger, and it's it's been amazing. Okay, let's go through the varying platforms and give me your take. Facebook essential, it's the yellow Pages. You amplify that a little bit. If you're not on Facebook, it's weird, like

you have to be on Facebook. Like if you meet someone out and you're like, you're not on Facebook, why, Like it's a it's a weird thing. It's the yellow Pages. Now, it's like how you know you're talking about from a person in general or from someone who might be a client of U T a person in general, person in general,

you have to be on Facebook for a client. It's one of the most powerful platforms because the art ad targeting is just insane, Like if the way that you can geo target and you know, the the add the way that Facebook's built out the ad platform, it's just it's such a powerful tool for our clients when they

can use it. Historically, it's not been easy for our clients to use, like it wasn't set up for public figures at all when it first launched, and so it's been a long road for them to get to a place where now, um, it's a little easier for our clients to manage. Some clients still kind of have the impressions from Facebook from two thousand and ten when it was um a little cumbersome to kind of go on

and post um, but we we definitely prioritize it. You have to be on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram if you're going to be on social media. If you're not going to be on social media, that's fine, but if you're gonna be on one, you have to be on all three okay, but a little bit slower. When you talk

about ad targeting, etcetera. Do you your clients, because you say they're in you know, they have multi uh desires, would they literally be buying ads um depending on the client and with like if they own their own business, yes, if they're musicians, it's incredible, But then the promoter and tour marketer and all that staff are taking it out. But they need to be able to have the platform the audience. Like our clients aren't usually manually pulling any

of those triggers. Okay, but do you supervise that in terms of, you know, we can help advise, but we don't. We don't do their advice. We're in the business and making my Bob spending it. Stay right there, We'll be back with more of my conversation with Kendel Astro, head of i Q Strategy for U t A. Here on the Bob Left Sets podcast. You're listening to the Bob Left Sets podcast recording at the two non studios in Venice, California. Each week, I interview a new guest to get their story.

While they're here, we take photos and shoot some videos. You can see what they really look like check us out on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Follow at tune in, let's dive right back in with my guest Kendall Astro, head of IQ Strategy for U t A. But talking about some of these platforms in society at large, Facebook said, you know, they have a lot of excuses saying they're not going to be news focused. But engagement dropped. Okay, so is Facebook? Uh for old people and young people

are not so much on Facebook. You need Facebook to sign in anywhere you go on the web. There o office everywhere. So I think everyone, like I said, everyone has Facebook. I found Facebook to be a lot more useful the last couple of months as they've gotten rid of a lot of Like everyone's complaining so hard about the engagement dropping, but the media is writing those stories and they're the ones who are losing most of their traffic.

When I go on Facebook now, I enjoy the experience more because I'm seeing stuff from my friends and family. And that's what Facebook was when it you know, I joined Facebook into I was in four when it came to Arizona UM and it was so fun. It was so enjoyable to see you know, friends and family and updates and photos and whatnot. And then the last year it's been all articles and weird viral videos and kind of people using exploiting the algorithm to to have their

business be served. It's getting I think it's getting so much more enjoyable. So the clients that we have that are really using it authentically, responding to comments, going in and like engaging and posting and putting things out there that have value are still seeing a lot of engagement and a lot of you know, great lift from their

content on Facebook. The people who are just posting an article and you know, some of those companies that we're using, um, you know, putting up just kind of generic articles and then giving clients a piece of the ad sense revenue or the ad revenue on those articles, they're failing. So just to hammer this one more time, if you want to reach a demo eighteen or younger, are they on Facebook? Probably not as much as they're on other platforms. Okay, but they all have a log in so they can

log in around the world. I can't say they all do, but yeah, I think most I think most people have Facebook accounts. Okay. Twitter. Twitter has gotten fun because politics, it's gotten fun again. Um, you know again, most of our a lot of clients, my clients used to love Twitter.

Twitter was where they broke news, where they controlled the narrative around their careers and their you know, their personal lives, and um, I think that maybe some fans went away from Twitter for a while, but I think the fans

have really come back over the past eighteen months. For my clients who are doubling down and engaging on Twitter, depending on what what area you sit in and how good you are at it, I think you can still have a lot of um, a lot of interaction, a lot of engagement, and see a lot of value from that community. Let's assume you're advising someone who's on Twitter. What is the strategy again depends on the Let's not talk about comedians, because certainly it's been a legendary platform comedians,

but for someone else. How much should someone tweet? You have to tweet multiple times a day otherwise you're gonna get lost. So like it depends like how much should you tweet? Well, what are your goals on the platform? Do you want to be Do you wanna have millions and millions of followers? Do you want to be driving your business through it, then you need to be on it, posting, you know, five times a day probably, And to what

degree should you worry about alienating people? Potentially if you're not standing for something, what are people going to rally around? So let's say we're in a divided political country. So let's assume you're either on the right or the left. And would you advise your clients to put their views out there or to hold it back for fear of fear of alienating some potential fans. I think it depends

on who your client is. If they just have a one off opinion that they feel like if they jump in on this conversation that they're going to um, they might get a ton of engagement. See some followers by saying this one thing, Probably not because that's not sustainable. You're not building an audience that believes in and can

follow you in that direction. But if it's your passion and it's something that you are fully committed to supporting, endorsing, it's what you believe, and it's super you know, true to everything you want for your career over the next couple of years, and you should speak your truth and you should you know, figure out what's the smart way to do that? But you have to again with every post,

with every piece of content you put into an interview. Uh, you know, anything you put online, it's got to it's got to drive to a larger mission, a larger goal. Otherwise it's throwaway content that can really hurt you. Well, I certainly have a human regular person standers, have a good number of followers on Twitter, and I find it's like pissing in the wind in that most people don't read it. Now, I'm in a unique position. I'm a

writer and I can reach my audience directly. But if I say the same thing on Twitter, where I have you know, seventy thousand followers, I find I get much less of reaction because it moves so quickly depends. I mean, we would have to dive in on the back end of your account to see what your engagement is. How many of those people are logging in every day? Where you did? You have a lot of early adopter fans that didn't that are no longer using the platform anymore.

I mean, I haven't gone that deep because I have a bandon it for other reasons, although I'm a very heavy Twitter reader. Okay, but um, general, as I say, I'm an unique position because I'm already reaching these people. Generally speaking, I would say it's people who subscribe to my newsletter already. I just wonder how many of those people because your audience is I had something on the podcast the other day. They were talking about Trump and they say, he's not tweeting, so people read it. He's

tweeting it, so the media reads it and amplifies it. Okay, So, and certainly people make news on Twitter all day long, but it's it's you know, this speaks the other thing? To what degree is Twitter a club that many people are outside because they find it incomprehensible. As much as Twitter has made changes, I think it's a lot more comprehensible than some of the other platforms that exist, Like what, well,

Snapchat is a lot harder for people over thirty. I think that that's a harder one for people to wrap their heads around. Like Twitter. I think, you know, Twitter, Twitter has always had a problem with onboarding, Like how do you if you don't curate your feed in a you know, in a great way with awesome content, it's going to keep you coming back and engaged and you have a community that's responding and really in it with

you all the time. It's going to be difficult to latch on and come back every day and find value in that community. Um but well, I'm just saying that in my you know, Okay, I'm reading Twitter all the time, but you still miss stuff. I mean, I you know, I can't follow everybody because it's too crazy. But let's go to Snapchat. So Snapchat is redo and redid their interface to make it easier for people. And there's been a huge backlash amongst the acolytes. What's your viewpoint on them?

There's so much backlash every time a major platform makes a change, Like when Facebook introduced the news feed, people thought the world was gonna end. Like people are so angry about the profile changes or the news feed changes. And you know, I kind of understand when Evans says, you know, it doesn't matter like you're gonna snap job. Yeah, so you know, people are going to get used to it. And I think what they're so in talking to them.

The algorithm on that right side, on the discover side, is supposed to get better and better every day as it learns what you've clicked on, what you've gone away from what other people who watch the same type of content as you do are looking at. Because they had the worst problem with Discover. It was so hard to

find anyone. And before they allounced you know, official stories, and before they started verifying, which is official stories is their version of verification, it was just so impossible to figure out who are famous people on the platform and who you should follow, and um, you know, they kind of shied away from having even celebrities on the platform at all early on. They wanted it to just be

about you and your friends. And so all of your unidirectional relationships are now on the right hand side and all of your bi directional relationships are on the left hand side. So we're playing to my audience what you mean by you in a directional If I'm following, um, you know, Kylie Jenners made a bunch of news. But like, if I'm following her and she's not following me back, she's on the right side. If we're following each other because we're friends in some alternate universe, she's on the

left side. So you're still seeing that content from your friends that you both followed. It's now calling out So you know, everyone that's not following you back, which is interesting and I wonder how that's playing out in high schools around the country, around the world on the right hand side. Um, but hopefully you'll see more important and influence figures that you want to follow based on those algorithms. So I'm not I'm a couple of years past being

core core Snapchat. But I know, you know, my younger brothers, like all of my cousins, like we text, we only talk through Snapchat. We don't use message, I message or SMS like that's how we communicate videos, photos text. Um. I think it's still very influential for a different demo. They just have had a really hard time creating multigenerational. And then how about you know, in terms of news and other stories on Snapchat, they a lot of companies

have come and gone. Is there a future there or not? Sorry? What was that? You know? With third parties, you know, media outlets who have a presence on Snapchat. I don't know, I don't, I don't I'm not in the mechanics of those deals. I don't know the actual usage on a lot of that stuff because they have been pretty you know, untransparent on um A lot of that the stats there, so I can't speak to how the media business is really gonna sustain and survive there. I don't think it's

going away. I think that the way they've innovated, they've made more progress, like with their A R filters and some of the stuff they're doing on the tech side is so much more progressive than any of the other platforms. They're still super nimble. Um, I just don't know about that long term media business with them. Okay. Then Instagram, which of course is owned by Facebook, and one would say stole some of the ideas of Snapchat, like Snapchat

stories where what's the status of Instagram? Why they it the visual content, the way that you can consume it so quickly, it's so easy to use the way that they took stories, and you know, everyone kind of everyone I know that felt like they had to be on Snapchat abandon it the second that stories launched because they loved the format, but it was so much easier to consume in their community, and their audience was already on

Instagram and so all their follower accounts. Um, you know, you get that endorphin rush when your friends and like and comment, and you know, get engaged in your content, and that was happening on Instagram, and they've really just adapted quickly and launched a bunch of really cool features. And I think most people I now use Instagram more than any other platform out there, most of my and my clients for sure. Okay, is the addiction, the endorphin rush.

I think it's all of it. I don't know. Yeah, I guess I think because you because you're talking about how you use Twitter and you don't. I think you can be a passive consumer on Instagram. But I think the barrier to entry is so low to post good content that people do really like that feedback loop, and you get it on Instagram. I guess with Instagram at first, and maybe it's because I'm a tech big guy, I said, you know, it's pictures, it's too simplistic, and then I

was wrong and it burgeons. Okay, But and also, but isn't it on some level Facebook just you know a few years later where everybody's basically advertising how great they are and their lives are, and that might I'm not talking about famous people, I'm talking about the average person, and that might burn out. Well, I think what will

explain to clients is like Facebook's your trophy case. You post the best of the best content, like you know, you post At least most of my clients will post the stuff they'd hang on a mantle or the stuff they really want to be known for. On Facebook. They because they post less on Facebook, and I think the normal person post less on Facebook than they do on most other platforms. On Instagram, it's like your glossy magazine. It's your aspirational lifestyle. It's what you want to be

known for. It's the the really premium content, the stuff that's just aesthetically pleasing, that is what you want, your mood board, your vision of who you are to stand for. Stories takes that down a little bit because it's so, you know, just of life and ephemeral and you don't have to put as much premium content on there, so people post more of just the mundane. But I think what's on your feet is really for most people highly curated.

And so what about the ones that used to get a lot of press, They're all a little bit different. But it seems like also rams now, Tumbler, Pinterest, Pinterest is still such a utility, like it doesn't get as much attention as I think it deserves. But I think when you have a project, when you're remodeling, when you want to plan a wedding, when you want to do something, you go to Pinterest. So for brands or for talent who want to build companies or have lifestyle brands, like

you're converting. That's like the highest shopping conversion is Pinterest. It's still amazing, and Tumbler is so interesting from like an artist community standpoint, Like on Tumbler, if you know, the conversation after a television show is going to go away within an hour, like we're going to see that sharp spike and then that sharp decline as soon as

the time's over. But on Tumbler for a week or two weeks, will continue to see like fan generated art and gifts, like people who spend time with your work and really care about the community and delve into those niche interests kind of areas are still posting a lot on Tumbler. So having like a really active fan base and curating that those are almost like you're like, what's the value of a fan? I think Tumbler still has

a lot of value in those areas. Okay, some of the things you know, a little clean up work in the area that we've talked about. Live broadcasting started out with miracat where's that going HQ. It's the first time I've seen any platform that I actually want to tune into. Live is so hard live for anyone live music you know on online, it's just not as well produced as seeing something you know well produced and curated and edited.

And I'd rather watch a five minute recap clip than sit through an hour and a half of just kind of bad angles and bad sound. So live was really interesting, and there's a lot of plat ms out there that were doing it and things like you now where you could just watch someone sleep and like you know, it was much more for the teens, but they were monetizing and making money on their interesting. HQ is amazing, and I think it's my audience and maybe unaware of what

HQ is. So HQ pings you at three pm and nine pm e s T. Every day and you get you know, it's a live Q and a game twelve questions, pot of money at the end split between whoever lasts, and it's so hard to win um, but it keeps you engaged, your participatory and the content. It's funny, it's I think that, you know, I'm surprised that something like Snapchat hasn't adopted it already. I'd be surprised if it doesn't launch within the next couple of months where they

try to put in their own version. But live participatory media that keeps you engaged, that brings you in, that allows you to participate in the content is fascinating. Well, it's also fascinating. We've grown from appointment TV to on Man to now hu Trivia, which is you know, appointment Internet. Well, when you and I first met, one of the things that we were talking about is, you know, back in the day radio, there's radio programs that we've never heard again.

You didn't make media to last forever. You didn't make media so you could DVR and tune into it and watch it whenever you wanted. You either had to be there or you were left out. And there's episodes of television that we've never seen again, you know, talk shows, episodes of I Love Lucy, I Read a Thing that

literally have never been seen after their original airing. But then the VCR was invented, and then the DVR, and all of a sudden, people just think that we have to have all this content forever, and every tweet you've ever posted is in the Library of Congress, and uh, you know, all these things that just are supposed to last forever. And then Snapchat came out and so many people were like, well, why would I participate in that? Why would I spend time making awesome content if it's

just going to disappear? And now that seems to last forever because it's twenty four hours. If you're not in that HQ game within the minute it launches, you missed out. You can't be part of it, you can't join it. So we went from you know, just literally we're almost back to with things like HQ back back in the day in the thirties and the forties and the fifties when you had to be there. Are you or to

what degree is there still opportunity? If you look at the Internet at large, we have four arguably five big companies show Amazon, Google, Facebook, Apple, and maybe Microsoft. So in the social media world, is there any room for entrance or is it really solidified along the lines of the companies that we just mentioned. I think it's harder and harder to break out. Uh, we're not seeing things pop out it We're talking about this this morning at work.

You know, we're not seeing things pop out at south By the way we were and two thousands six to two thou like, it's much harder to have an original idea, And I think when you do, uh, how much of it can't be replicated by the big majors. But I think interesting content is an interesting ideas are still going to champion. It's just what form is that going to take? So are we going to have a huge platform killer. I don't have a crystal ball, but I think you know,

innovation is still happening every day. Okay, left field here, we're the heyday of the me too movement? What do you personally feel about this? Um, let's let's break it down. Okay, do you feel limited in an opportunity by being a woman. I've definitely had roadbox because I'm a woman. A lot of times I used to I didn't really know it was because of my gender. I thought it was because of my age, because you know, I've been fortunate to be in some incredible rooms at an early age, I

thought that I was being limited by those things. And then I remember it was like a month after I got married, I was speaking at a conference and someone came up to my husband and I and said, isn't it so great that you get to come business trips with your husband? I was like, um, excuse me, he's my guest. I'm the keynote here, Like it was, it's just crazy. And then you start to recognize, well, maybe it's not because of my age. Maybe it's not because

of my lack of experience. Maybe it's because you know, I'm a woman. As you start to age and you get more experience, it's not you know, you realize what actually is holding me back. I don't think I was as conscious of it as I should have been growing up, because I was raised in a family where every woman was the leader of the house, like we were, you know,

every every woman. I was surrounded by my grandma's, my mom my, you know, aunts with you know, strong, independent, really brilliant women, and I didn't realize that that was something that, uh, I would have to contend with in the way that I ended up realizing later on, to what degree do you feel a responsibility to mentor or help other women climb the ladder? I think that the thing that drives me the most every day, Like, the

thing that I'm most about is teaching. I love teaching my clients how to be better visions themselves and how to use these platforms to help their careers. And I'm obsessed with mentoring. Like the more that I can teach others and bring them up and make them better, that's what gets me out of bed every day. Stay right there, We'll be back with more of my conversation with Kendall Astro, head of i Q Strategy for U t A here on the Bob left Sex podcast. This is Bob left Sex.

Do you like hearing from the heaviest I love talking to them and that's exactly what I'll be doing at my Music Media Summit and Santa Barbara at the end of April. Take your wallflower role to the next level by actually meeting the players, maneuvering and manipulating the chessboard. Go to Music Media Summit dot comfert tickets and more information. See you in Santa Barbara. Let's dive right back in with my guest Kendall Astra, head of IQ Strategy for

U t A. Okay, looking at entertainment at large? Uh, certainly there was a heyday of movie stars. There was a heyday of rock stars. Now we have YouTube stars who are going to be the stars of the future. I don't think people are being put in boxes anymore. I think you're a star when you are an entertainer. Like, do we have any great, great movie stars who only exist on the screen today? Maybe? But are more the people that we're talking about existing in six buckets and

six verticals? Are they multi hypen it's across multiple industries. Are they people who you almost identify more within a human level and you root for and no matter what they do, than you know, having them be isolated to one box of talent. That's on the talent side, But looking putting on your sear hat in terms of where you think it's going. Where will the stars of the future pe Will they be on in social media? Will they be in television? Movies? That's what I mean talent.

I think engineers are talent, voters are talent CEOs or talent. But if you are in one vertical, in one box, are you going to be as successful in today's day and age as if you are playing in multiple fields, touch multiple different demographics and multiple interest groups and you know, are more of a well rounded, uh, public presence. Let's I want to win an award. Okay, what might I do? What? Or what award? Let's say it's an Oscar dynamic. Uh,

I think that Emmy for sure. Social media, like I think that community is so much more conversation, so many more of the the voting members are, you know, looking at what's happening there and what you said earlier about Trump not doing it necessarily for fans to see, but to drive the media. If you want to be in those award conversations and you want to be taken seriously at that table, so much of that is driven by

social and what you're talking about online. And so why do you wake up every day and to do you want to be an actor? You want to win the award? Like what is it? Is it the prestige? Is that the storytelling? Is it your passion for the industry? Like? What is it about this career? It's so hard, the auditions and the grind and to get to a place where you could even be considered for an Emmy is such a long battle for most people. Why do you

do it? And if we start from that place, because if all you want to do is win an award and market your project. No one's going to follow you. How boring? Is that just self aggrandizing? It's horrible. But if you can go in and you can say I

did this project or I'm so proud of this. You know this show because of X, Y and Z and here's what it stands for and here's what I learned, and like, I'm so excited for you to come on the journey with me and we can create a real narrative over why you're enthused about it, and we kind of have to build it out, like what else are you interested in? You know? Do you have any of

that stuff? Are you even comfortable? And if we go through that whole exercise and you decide this is something you want to do, great, If it's still totally skieds you out, then we just have to figure out a way from maybe you to get great content to your co stars or the network for them to promote on your behalf without you having to be on. But you can't, you can't force anyone to do any of this stuff.

You just have to present all the options. Educate them on the landscape, Educate them honestly on you are literally going to not be successful unless you do these things. And in some cases it's almost better not to be on at all than to be on with a really horrible strategy and no engagement and no good content. To

what degree to self promotion work against clients? Uh? The million degrees of you know difference there being completely over self overly self promotional and blind to everything that's going on in the world, and you know reactions that your fans are giving you and just sell, sell, sell, You might as well just take out ads in magazines like that's not I'll give you an example more. And this is really sort of a unique But she's a writer

for the New York Times. She only tweets when she's advertising her own column, and it's like, that's a turn off to me. How many followers does she have? Do you know? Probably you know, high five figures engagement, I don't know, probably not working that well. If I'm a power fan of Marine Down and I have to read everything she puts out there, I probably want to follow. That just makes to make sure I don't miss anything. But is she having is she building a relationship? Is

she diving in? Is anyone learning more about who she is and what she stands for and why she wrote that article, what it meant to her? How long you know? What was her process? Can you tweet too much? Absolutely? So give us you know when does it start to become too much? Um? When I when your fans will log in and all they'll see is your stuff? Like you know, probably if you're live tweeting at television show or something like that, I'd probably say max for the

whole hour. And how about retweets? If you're not adding your own context, I usually don't understand why you do it. I want to hear from you if I'm following you. Okay, So we talked about clients who want to win awards. How about clients? What other desires might there be? They might be building a business. What else might they come to you wanted to do? They might want to change public's perception. There might be a bad story out there. There might be, um, you know, just something that they'd

rather people. You know, they want to change the conversation or they want to um be known in a different vertical they made okay a little bit slo I want to change the conversation. What would your strategy be? Depends on what the Well, let's use an example. John Mayor is not a client right now. John Mayor had the situation in Playboy. He said things there was negative public perception. What might and granted this years ago, but it hurt his career? What and he disappeared from Twitter, said he

was going to tumboy, disappeared from there. What would have been a strategy that you might have proposed. I think he did it right. Really we had to mute him. I'm a big Mayor fan. He was such an early

adopter on most of these platforms. I loved it when he went to Tumblr that remember what album it was, maybe it was Battle Studies, the when he really showed the process of making the album and there was like a time lapse of him setting up the studio, and he he was so early on some of those platforms, and you really got to know who he was, and you know, his comedy and his sense of humor and his interests and everything that kind of made him tick

outside of the music you fell in love with. But I think, you know, he got a little over exposed in that whole scenario, and he didn't know the line between I'm speaking as a fan, but between him as a you know, he was friends with all the stand up comics and I think he thought he was one maybe during that interview and it just did not play well.

I think he needed to go away for a little while and you know, and he came back and it's so fun to watch him now, like the way he uses Instagram live and um, you know, he was super early was at Periscope. I think he was. He was on Periscope, not Merecap. I would watch his live recordings on both of those, and he uses these platforms in a really interesting way, in a unique way. That's you know, he's been writing all these weird like just text on

Instagram stories like these weird thoughts and things lately. It's been fun to It's just fun to see how his mind works because I think he's such a unique genius in that way. Can he recover? Can you ever recover from something like that? Will women forgive you? I think he has well, he's been out with the debt. It's a slightly different audience. But I saw him three times on this last tour, but those are arena shows that were sold out. You know, I think he I think

he'll have a career for decades. Okay, so the point, let me go a little change a little bit. If you are someone in the me too era and you let's let's go totally different. These people, uh, Louis c K and other people who have been uh caught up in the me too thing? Can they rehabilitate their careers? It will be we will have to see how that goes. I think certain people have not maybe um approached the controversy in the correct way, and others, you know, it

seems like Louis c K is maybe Louis. I mean I think he, you know, without talking specific because we verge on some of your clients, He's addressed it totally different from everybody else. He said, I did it and I disappeared, And that seems to bring the right strategy. People don't talk. We're talking about him here, but generally speaking, he's not part of the conversation, and I think that will make it so his rehabilitation, uh will happen earlier

than other people that happens at all. But can are these a stain or can you be rehabilitated? I We're going to have to see. Okay, so then let's just go one other thing. I mean we have Jessica Alba. She a client, Okay, she started the Honest Company. Let's say you have a client who wants to start a business. What would you advise them. We have an incredible ventures

team that does this for clients. So they sit down and they build out the business plan and bring in advisors and raise capital and you know, help launch the launch the full business. We have a brand studio that does all the logo and design and you know where we are very well versed in that and do it daily. We have a full team dedicated businesses around clients. Once they wrap that up, they come to you and they say, how do I promote it? And how would you promote it?

So we'll build out marketing strategies and connect them with the right team and make sure that their audience kind of knows that this is coming without announcing it well in advance, because if all of a sudden, you wake up one day and you had you know, let's say Jessica Alba had no kids, had never talked about wanting to be a mom or you know, anything, and she

launches this company. It's like, where the hell that come from? Like, how do you start to see these ideas where a fan comes along for the journey with you and it doesn't seem like you just did it for the cash. And what if I'm a client and I say where I am as okay, but I want more opportunities. I

want more business opportunities. What might you say, we'd figure out what those business opportunities are, what those verticals are in, and then what platforms and what strategy using, what partnerships, what collaborations, what verticals we need to dive into there, what's the pr strategy, what's the career strategy? How do we ladder you up to those things? So is there anything that I've missed in the world of social media or in the world of agency business. I mean, we

could talk about it a million hours. There's a million things we missed. But yeah, we covered a lot today. And then personal goals beyond where you are now. I just want to keep being better every day. And you know, I've never plotted it out. I've never seen what's behind the other corner. I think if you have a direct path that you need to follow in order to be successful, you're gonna end up. You know, You're you're gonna miss every other detour that comes along. So I love what

I do. Every day I learned something new, and this business it's it's all about, especially with what I do, It's about staying ahead of the curve and seeing what other people are. You know, what technology, what try and what culture doing and how do we help our clients future proof against all of that and stay ahead of it? Um?

I Every day I just read forty fifty plus articles on the business and where cultures going and technology and you know, try to figure out how you connect those dots to make yourself and all your clients more successful. So well, I don't what are some of those trends for the people who don't look forward as you do? Where are things going to the degrees? Can see that? Um? I think? I think what some of the stuff you've been saying about politics driving the culture is so interesting?

I don't see you think we're seeing a ton of technology that's necessarily changing the game right now. There's nothing that I can't think of anything right now that I'm like, oh, no one else is seeing this, no one else is

covering it. But the way that things like me too are just skyrocketing out of nowhere, and the way that cultures latching on to UM some of the trends that are going on, and what you know, the the ability for people to really create movements and drive change something we really need to be conscious of and ahead of to keep I mean, I was reading I don't know when there is a layer, but I was reading today in the wake of the successful resolution of the West

Virginia teacher strike. Now the Kentucky teachers are protesting against cutting their pensions. Question is is there a role for entertainers in this world? Because so far park Land, etcetera. This has not been entertainment driven to any degree. I think we can. It's kind of interesting that so much of what happened before used to be entertainment driven and these personalities making a stand and it's incredible to watch with the students in Parkland are doing. And how do

we support that? How do we how do our clients, who you know, have strong opinions about that space, uh support and dive in with you know, different benefit things than and you know, just how do we stay ahead of that? How do we help our clients um support the things that they're passionate about. But I think it's needing to be driven by other things at the moment. And once again you said in social media, if you want to take a stand as part of your identity,

you can hammer that. But if it's a one off, you would not recommend that. Like, it depends on what the one off. You know what I'm trying to say, I'm really leading to a different question in terms of your clients aligning themselves with some of these causes, because certainly in the music business for a long time, everyone's afraid of alienating a potential audience member. What would you tell a client relative to that, Because if you take a stand, someone's always going to be angry about the

stand you have. Country music is interesting right now, they're fin like that's coming around. People are taking a stand, like Tim and Faith standing up for a gun control. I think the people who have no stand, and there's a couple of artists that we don't want to name, probably but who just like, what do you believe? How have you, with certain things you've said, been completely silent in all these issues. Um, I think you're getting in

trouble more for that than in stating your beliefs. And I also believe in a country of three plus million people, if you can reach twenty million people, you're like a billionaire. Okay, so these people are, you know, afraid of alienating people? I agree with your point. It's it's drawing the people close to you and solidifying that relationship. I think niche audiences are the only thing that matters today. Well, I

would say everything is niche other than uh politics. People believe you know, if you go to the number one record, the number one movie, number one television show, one would be stunned how many people have not experienced it. It's really crazy, completely Like I think you need to dial in and really know who your chorus. I think that's one of the things that people don't think about on social media at all. They post and they like all the likes and the but they have no idea who's

out there. It's like the same people that are liking and commenting. You think it's so weird that they're commenting on the internet. They're the ones that are paying for meet and grades, and they're the ones that are coming to all your shows, Like, look at them, pay attention. Know who is commenting back. You can understand your fan you know demographics, their affinities, what are they interested in what they care about. We have so many incredible, robust

analytics tools to look at these types of things. How do you understand who those people are and how do you help super super serve them, give them content? How do you dive in and create conversations and lead change on the things that you care about that also line up with what your audience cares about, Because just posting whatever you want just to satisfy your three tweets a

day or whatnot doesn't make any sense. People really need to spend more time thinking about those niche communities and how they serve them and how they use them to amplify their message and build their brands and achieve their career goals. Like it's, it's a lot more complicated, but the tools we have available and the way that you can do it is is so fun if you actually think about it and take time to consider it and really use it as a career builder as opposed to

just something you have to do. You've been listening to Kendall Astral on the Bob Left Set Spycast. If your head is not spinning, you're literally Kendall. She knows more about social media than anybody I know and she's not someone who is sitting at home just posting. She's in the thick of it. Over you, t A, you would only dream of being one of her clients. Kendall, thanks

so much for being here. Thanks for having that. Wraps up this week's episode of the Bob Left Sets podcast, recorded here at the tune In Studios in Venice, California. I hope you'd liked listening to the conversation with Kendall Ostrow, head of i Q Strategy for U t A. It's almost like you're at the dinner table with us, as we often get together and talk shop. I'd love to hear what you thought of the conversation in the podcast. In general, you can email me at Bob at left

sets dot com. Okay spains out out se