IAM828- Founder Helps Brands with Marketing and Advertising

Since founding Imagine in 2004, Patrick has helped brands from small, local companies to Fortune 500 brands like CenturyLink, Nestle, and Xfinity. His business and marketing advice has been published in Inc. Magazine, SmartCEO, Washington Business Journal, The Washington Post, Comcast Business, and Chief Marketer.

Patrick is currently the President of the American Marketing Association's Washington, DC chapter. He also serves on the Board of Trustees for CASA – a nonprofit that provides volunteer advocates for child victims of abuse and neglect.

• CEO Hack: Strong network of fellow business owners
• CEO Nugget: Be patient and enjoy the opportunity you have
• CEO Defined: Working on the top and bottom

Website: https://imaginedc.net/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thepatrickking/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMjbNNZYXjCjQEuCXc53KVg
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Patrick_King

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Transcription

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00:02 – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

00:30 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Patrick King of Imagine. Patrick, it's awesome to have you on the show.

00:38 – Patrick King

Hey, thanks for having me Gresh.

00:40 – Gresham Harkless:

No problem. Super excited to have you on and before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Patrick so you hear about all the awesome things that he's doing. Since founding Imagine in 2004, Patrick has helped brands from small local companies to Fortune 500 brands like CenturyLink, Nestle, and Xfinity. His business and marketing advice has been published in Inc Magazine, Smart CEO, Washington Business Journal, the Washington Post Comcast Business, and Chief Marketer. Patrick is currently the President of the American Marketing Association's Washington City Chapter. He also serves on the Board of Trustees for CASA, a nonprofit that provides volunteer advocates for child victims of abuse and neglect. Patrick, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:22 – Patrick King

Absolutely, let's do it.

01:23 – Gresham Harkless

Let's do it. So to kick everything off, I wanted to rewind the clock a little bit and hear a little bit more on how you got started. Could you take us through what I call your CEO story? Well, then, you get started with the business.

01:34 – Patrick King

Yeah, the CEOs, my story started when I was really, really young. My brother and I were at a family reunion. We were staying at an uncle's house. We were running through the house being crazy, you know, like kids that age do. And my uncle, to slow me down, maybe to preserve his house, was to sit me down at the kitchen table and go, look, how would you like to draw? Could you draw a logo for my company? I said. What's a logo we go into the kitchen and he starts showing me the, you know, the post cereal box, you know, the post logo, the Quaker logo Campbell's logo stuff like that. He said, basically, it's a way to stuff like that. Basically, it's a way to draw a name in a way people won't forget. So I spent about 2 or 3 hours at the dining room table and ended up creating the logo that he would use until he retired, which was maybe less than 10 years ago.

And that got me falling in love with how art can have such a great purpose. I was setting type in print shops and helping other relatives and their friends with you know business cards and flyers even like VHS sleeves and stuff and in my mid to late teens I started to fall in love with the way that the way that marketing works the way that you know a message Commercial a piece of print can alter somebody's behavior. And I thought, I don't know what type of black magic that is, but I'm going to learn it. So that set me on a path to learn all about marketing and advertising. And I freelanced through my 20s. Then when I was 26, and 27, my brother came to visit from DC. He'd just gotten out of the military and got the job up there.

And he said, you know, if you really want to make something out of this gig, you have to go where the clients are. So about 6 months later, I had a U-Haul going up 95 to DC and stayed with him for a little bit. And 6 months after that, I decided, hey, I've got 2 or 3 projects, not necessarily long-term clients, nothing to base a company on, but I'm going to do it anyway. And that was the end of 2004. And Imagine has been around ever since.

04:09 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I absolutely love that story. And it's so funny, you know, going back to, you know, running around the house, I always feel like sometimes our gifts and the things that were that are our passions or even our callings maybe might be a better word are often kind of placed to us early on in life and sometimes we ignore them but I'm glad to hear that obviously you took that opportunity to create that logo and you ran with it with everything you're doing with Imagine now?

04:32 – Patrick King

Yeah, it's funny how those things that you can look back and go, oh, well, why didn't I start this sooner? And I think it's something that we all have.

04:42 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. I would definitely agree with that. And so I know you touched on it a little bit. Could you take us through exactly what you're doing with Imagine and how exactly you serve the clients that you work with?

04:51 – Patrick King

Sure. We're full full-service marketing and branding agency. I would say we're a digital marketing agency, but really all marketing agencies are digital nowadays. Our work is mainly in the professional services, tourism hospitality spaces. And the tourism and hospitality work we do is usually with local governments. So we'll work with their tourism or economic development departments and come up with either reimagining their brain, developing long-term campaigns, or serving as just a consultative and execution arm to whatever they have in-house so that their campaigns can launch much sooner. They've got support for thinking big and having bigger ideas. A lot of our professional services work is in the digital space, a lot of social, a lot of email, and a lot of branding. So as I'm sure you know, a lot of brands are rebranding more often now, just as a way to try to stay top of mind. And that's something that we do a lot of.

06:08 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. Yeah, absolutely love that. And, you know, as you mentioned, especially, you know, during obviously disruptive times and nondisruptive times, I think you always have to have that kind of, I guess, pulse to your client and pulse to what's going on. And I love that you're able to help people, as you said, you know, imagine those, reimagine those things, because I think so many times, and I don't know, correct me if I'm wrong, clients don't necessarily know how to communicate some of those things and how they can kind of manifest themselves to, you know, everything that you all are creating.

06:35 – Patrick King

You're absolutely right. And it takes a process in order to be able to get it done right and get it done thoroughly. And sometimes it's really easy to go, yeah, I know our brand needs to be different in response to the way that our customers change or the way that the competitive landscape has changed. But to actually have a step-by-step process that gets it done right and make sure that the brand is authentic, it's something that, well, you have to, you sometimes need a partner to guide you through it.

07:04 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, and I feel like sometimes being too close, especially to the business or the organization, as you mentioned, sometimes it's better to exercise at the very least to kind of take a step away and be able to see exactly what might be those things that are or should be at the forefront when you're trying to create that brand and that foundation.

07:25 – Patrick King

Yeah, that's exactly right. And that's a good point. A lot of the clients are just too close to it and having a more objective set of eyes can be helpful.

07:32 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, and not to mention that experience you have as well. So I wanted to ask you now for what I call your secret sauce. This could be for you or your business or a combination of both, but what do you feel kind of sets you apart and makes you unique?

07:45 – Patrick King

I guess a couple of things. I guess when it comes to me personally, I have a different background than maybe a lot of agency owners. I created Imagine as I created without a prototype. I created without, I never worked in an agency. I never stepped foot in an agency. So I think my perspective is a little more unique. I spent a lot more time working with clients in more of a customer service capacity. So for me, client service is just as important as the work that we do.

And so I'm just as passionate about that as I am about being able to roll out a great campaign. What makes Imagine Unique, I think, is how deep our industry focus is. There aren't a lot of agencies out there that really hang their hat on being able to do local government, tourism, hospitality, that sort of stuff. And while there are some of course, you know it's a huge industry, you'll see that a lot of agencies will do that and like 7 or 8 other things. And I think for you to do it well, you have to spend your time staying on top of how trends are changing. You have to dive deep into what the industry is all about. So I think as far as imagination goes, I think it's really deep specialization.

09:11 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

09:24 – Patrick King

Well, as far as books and apps and things go, I tend to bounce like a pinball between being inspired by this book or being totally addicted to this app. But I think the 1 thing that's been helpful throughout the entire journey is the strength of your network. And it's not necessarily from a sales perspective, although that's helpful. It's having peers who are more successful at running their businesses than I am at mine. And that's a great way for me to learn because now I can ask questions. I can see it firsthand. So having a strong network of fellow business owners that I'm not selling to, they're not selling to me, so we're on equal footing, I think that's probably my biggest hack.

10:21 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. So now I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO nugget. And this could be a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. It might be something you would tell a client or if you have to do a time machine, you might tell your younger business self.

10:32 – Patrick King

Well, what I would tell my younger business self, and I probably still wouldn't listen to myself is to take your time, and be patient. You know I started the business thinking wow this thing is just gonna take off and you know I'll be retired in 3 years. I was such an idiot. But at the same time, you know, you don't have to, you don't have to rush it. If you're going to be successful in business, you know, Take your time at it. Make sure that you're really good at your craft. Make sure that you're enjoying the journey.

Because in my case, sure, I thought that I would be retired in 3 or 4 years, but you know, here I am in a year like 16 or 17 and I still would rather be doing nothing else. So enjoy the opportunity that you have. I guess another piece of advice I give to myself is, you know, while you're not doing it for money, having money does help. So learn to appreciate it. Yeah. I think the biggest thing is to take to the, take the time to enjoy it. It's, it's crazy. It's hectic. You'll spend most of your time feeling either on cloud 9 or wondering if you're gonna make it through the month but enjoy the opportunity to use the gift that you're given.

11:53 – Gresham Harkless:

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And so now I want to ask you my absolute favorite question which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO And we're hoping to have different quote-unquote CEOs on the show. So Patrick, what does being a CEO mean to you?

12:08 – Patrick King

So to me, being a CEO means working at the top and the bottom at the same time. So yes, it's your responsibility to set the vision. It's your responsibility to make sure that you know you're the you're true north. You're the 1 providing the direction, right? But you're also the one who needs to demonstrate leadership in the trenches. You're the one who needs to be on the front line also learning how the business is evolving, learning how it's growing, learning what changes need to be made to that vision that you set. So it's a matter of working up top, making sure that the C-suite runs fantastically. And it's also your job to work with the people who are really working day in and day out to make the company grow.

13:03 – Gresham Harkless

Nice, yeah, I love that definition, working at the top and the bottom at the exact same time. And like you said you want to make sure that you have that vision. You're setting that vision for yourself as a team. But I love how you, you talked about, you know, the bottom, so to speak, as well. And I feel like it also dials into your secret sauce and how you mentioned that not being in the industry sometimes gives you that different perspective. And I think so many times when you're in that industry or you have been doing it, sometimes you lose focus on the bottom, so to speak, and you lose sight of your customers, you lose sight of your team and the reason why you're ultimately doing what you're doing. So I love that kind of balance beam, so to speak, that you kind of articulate it.

13:42 – Patrick King

Yeah. Thank you.

13:44 – Gresham Harkless

You're very, very welcome. And I appreciate that. And I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is pass you the mic so to speak just see if there's anything additional you can let our readers and listeners know and of course how best they can get a hold of you, find out about all the awesome things you and your team are working on.

13:59 – Patrick King

Oh cool. Well I guess there is 1 last piece of advice I guess I'll leave with, and that is that right now I'm outside of Orlando, and our offices are in Northern Virginia. I'm taking some much-needed time off to spend time with some family down here. And I think that while all this crazy stuff is going on, we all feel like we need to be all hands on deck all the time and there's usually no 1 that we're harder on than ourselves. I think it's important for every CEO to make sure that you're getting some recharge time in because if you don't, you know, you deal with rapidly deteriorating results. And it's better for yourself, both short term and long term, and it's better for your team. Make sure that you're squeezing in, a bit of an escape.

15:06 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. And for people that wanna get a hold of you, what's the best way for them to do that?

15:11 – Patrick King

I think the best way is our website, it's imaginedc.net. And then you can find us on pretty much every other social channel by just going to the channel slash we fight ugly. That's our, our tagline is Doctors fight disease, lawyers fight justice, we fight ugly. So it'd be we fight ugly after pretty much any channel.

15:32 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I absolutely love that. And we will have the links and information in the show notes as well too, so that everybody can click through and find out about all the awesome things you and your team are working on. And I appreciate tremendously that reminder, because I think, as you said so many times, you know, especially if you're driven and you have a vision, you have a goal, you can beat yourselves up. We can beat ourselves up and we can treat ourselves worse than, you know, everybody. And I think if we don't keep our cup full, we don't take the time to recharge and realize the benefits of doing that and often how much more effective we can be by taking those, that time away and time to recharge. We're doing ourselves and we're doing our clients and even our team members of this service. So I appreciate that tremendously during times like this and other times as well.

16:16 – Patrick King

Thanks, man. Thank you.

16:18 – Gresham Harkless

You're very, very welcome. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:22 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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