World's Top 30 Brand Professionals for 2021

Guru #1

Brenda Bence

Brenda Bence is passionate about two things: branding and leadership—and how the two work together. After earning her MBA from Harvard Business School, she spent 20 years building billion-dollar mega brands across four continents for Fortune 100 consumer giants like Procter & Gamble and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Brenda then started her own business to help companies and individuals define and grow their own successful leadership brands.

Brenda combined her years of expertise in brand-building along with her passion and experience in corporate leadership to create a unique, step-by-step personal leadership branding system that is based on the same methods used by household name brands.

Now sought after as a speaker and coach across six continents, Bence is one of only a handful of professional speakers worldwide who have earned the coveted Global Certified Speaking Professional title from the Global Speakers Federation, reflecting her mastery in addressing diverse, multi-cultural, and multi-generational audiences around the world.  Brenda is also a Certified Executive Leadership Coach who has coached almost 1,000 leaders to help them build their brands, leaders who hail from 60 nationalities and 70 industries.

An avid writer, Bence has authored 11 books that have won almost 50 book awards. In 2021, she released her latest bestseller, The Forgotten Choice: Shift Your Inner Mindset, Shape Your Outer World.

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Guru #2

Sally Hogshead

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Sally Hogshead is a New York Times bestselling author, Hall of Fame® speaker, and the CEO of How to Fascinate, helping companies develop messages that persuade and captivate. By age 24, she became the most award-winning copywriter in the United States, and she’s been described by the press as “an advertising mastermind” who “changed the face of North American advertising.” Her campaigns for brands such as MINI Cooper, Nike, and Coca-Cola have fascinated millions of consumers. To develop the science of fascination, Hogshead measured over one million professionals over the course of a decade. Using this research, she built a marketing system that now lives inside organizations such as IBM, Twitter, and Porsche. Her two most recent books, Fascinate, and How the World Sees You, are both national bestsellers.

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Guru #3

Jerome Joseph

Dr. Jerome Joseph is an award-winning Brand Strategist, Global Speaker and Thought Leader focused on Brand Strategy, Digital Branding, Internal Branding & Personal Branding. With his past experience as a CEO & Board Member of a public listed brand agency & global group, he brings real life brand expertise through keynotes, workshops and consulting.

He is a bestselling Author of 8 books on Branding including the acclaimed “Internal BrandingGrowing your Brand from Within” & “The Brand Playbook”. Dr. Jerome has over 25 years of experience and has impacted over 1000 brands, majority of which are Fortune 500 companies, in 35 countries. The combination of real-life consulting experience, global expertise and proven speaking skills, makes Jerome a highly sought-after speaker in the market. Some of the brands that Jerome has worked with include: Hitachi, Novo Nordisk, Dell, SAP, Pfizer, Prudential, BASF, HSBC, OCBC, DHL, LEXUS and many more.

He delivers compelling brand driven programs based on proven methodology, matched by his highly infectious personality, practical experience and interactive style of speaking. He is dedicated to transforming and creating brands with the result that audiences can expect to be engaged while attaining a wealth of great insights.

Dr Jerome Joseph holds the Certified Speaking Professional (CSP) designation which is held by only the top 12% speakers in the world. He was awarded the prestigious Global Speaking Fellow in 2015 for speakers with global reach & expertise and is the 30th speaker in the world to achieve this. Dr. Jerome is also an accredited Professional Management Consultant (PMC) a designation for top tier proven management consultants.

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Guru #4

William Arruda

William Arruda is a motivational speaker, entrepreneur and the world’s leading authority on the topic of personal branding. He’s the bestselling author of the definitive books on the topic: Career Distinction and Ditch. Dare. Do! His latest book, Digital YOU helps readers translate their real-world brands for the virtual world. William is the CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer) of Reach Personal Branding and the co-founder of CareerBlast.TV – a personal and digital branding video learning platform for innovative organizations. His products have been used by over a million people across the globe. He’s honored to work with many of the world’s most revered brands, including 20% of the Fortune 100. William regularly shares his thoughts on workplace trends and branding in his Forbes column. He holds a Master’s degree in Education.

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Guru #5

David Brier

A Fast Company expert blogger and the subject of numerous articles in Forbes, ADWEEK, Huffington Post and Business Insider, David Brier is the recipient of the Presidential Ambassador for Global Entrepreneurship medallion, presented to David by Shark Tank star and NY Times bestseller Daymond John.

An award-winning veteran (recipient of over 330 international industry recognitions) in branding, rebrands, design and brand strategy, David has designed and transformed global brands, regional and local brands, and brands for startups and even cities.

David also wrote the new “branding bible” and Amazon bestseller, Brand Intervention, 33 Steps to Transform the Brand You Have into the Brand Need, with a Foreword written by Daymond John of Shark Tank and FUBU.

David is also a highly sought-after guest on podcasts and live streams on the topic of branding, and his popular One Minute Wednesday series found on YouTube.

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Guru #6

Richard Sauerman

Richard is The Brand Guy. He co-runs a Brand Strategy & Design & Communication Company in Sydney called Brandcraft. He also delivers interactive workshops and keynote talks for in-house projects (Change Management, Employee Engagement, L&D), and at conferences and seminars across Australia as well as abroad.

After working in multi-national ad agencies on brands such as Coca-Cola and Microsoft, he left the ad industry to pioneer a new way to do branding where everything you DO and SAY as a business must be driven by and aligned to your brand strategy – your business strategy, your products and services, your culture and people, your customer service and trade relationships, your marketplace positioning as well as [and not just] your marketing communications. Companies he has branded with in this way include QBE, PwC, CSIRO, Clayton Utz, Bayer, NSW State Government, Mortgage Choice, Data 61, Steadfast, and Munich Re.

Big YOU is Richard’s most popular keynote/workshop. He believes everyone has potential that extends far beyond their actual day-to-day performance. Instead of living and working a 10/10 life, people settle for 7/10 because it gets the job done, it doesn’t require them taking any risks or chances, and it’s a safe bet. Ranging from 60 minutes to 8 hours, Big YOU explores the fears and personal agreements which are holding people back in life and at work. Big YOU then moves participants out of their safety zone as it gets them to see the potential and possibilities for themselves and their lives, and to make new agreements. (bigyou.com.au)

Richard has published two books; is a regular contributor to blogs and podcasts; does a few pro-bono and low-bono branding projects every year; and he occasionally appears in the media on brand-related stories.

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Guru #7

Jane Anderson

As Australia’s leading Personal Branding authority, Jane helps experts & organisations build trust-based, high-impact communication with their staff and customers. Having helped over 80,000 people she has been featured on Sky Business, The Today Show, The Age, Sydney Morning Herald and the BBC.

Jane holds one of the top 1% viewed LinkedIn profiles globally & is the host of the #1 ranked “Jane Anderson Brand You Show” Podcast in iTunes where she has interviewed world leading experts such as Seth GodinShe has also  been nominated for and won numerous industry awards for her expertise including:

■ International Stevie Awards for Coach & Entrepreneur of the Year 

■ nominated Telstra Business Awards 2014, 2016, 2018 & 2019

■ top 25 branding blogs globally

■ top 6 branding experts in Australia

The author of 7 books, she is one of 12 LinkedIn Influencers in Australia & New Zealand, she has interviewed over 1500 experts in their field and is also the creator of the Influencer Indicator, the world’s first diagnostic for experts to identify marketing gaps in their practice.

She typically helps her clients with Personal Brand Strategy, Content Creation and Lead Generation for Consultants. She is particularly passionate about building the capability of coaches and Business Managers who work with industry leaders.

She has also worked with some of the world’s leading brands such as Bluescope Steel, Amadeus, Virgin Australia, IKEA, LEGO, Mercedes-Benz, Telstra, International Rice Research Institute, University of Queensland, Wesfarmers, Australian Medical Association, Shell Energy.

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Guru #8

Martin Lindstrom

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Martin Lindstrom is sought after as a branding/marketing/keynote speaker and workshop leader by companies and organizations throughout the world. The rapid rise of his career has made him one of today’s most respected branding speakers in the world according to the Chartered Institute of Marketing. He sits on several boards globally, and his clients include Disney, Mars, Pepsi, American Express, Mercedes-Benz, Reuters, Visa, McDonald’s, Kellogg’s, Ericsson, Yellow Pages and Microsoft. He energizes audiences with his creative genius and dynamic, motivational style. Lindstrom’s reputation for earning “a guaranteed standing ovation” at his compelling lectures on branding accompanies his popularity as an Advertising Consultant, keynote speaker, Branding Consultant, workshop leader and in-house trainer. Martin Lindstrom is the author of 5 books, including collaborative works with industry icons such as Dr. Philip Koter Kotler on Marketing), Paco Underhill Why We Buy), Dr. Don Peppers, Martha Rogers 1to1 Marketing) and Patricia Seybold (Customer.com). Buyology – Truth and Lies About Why We Buy (Doubleday, New York), has been translated into over 40 languages.

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Guru #9

Donald Miller

Donald Miller is the CEO of StoryBrand and every year helps more than 3,000 business leaders clarify their brand message. Combined, Don’s books have spent more than a year on the New York Times Bestsellers list. His books include: Blue Like Jazz, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, and Scary Close.

Don is widely considered one of the most entertaining and informative speakers in the world. His audiences are challenged to lean into their own story, creatively develop and execute the story of their team, and understand the story of their customers so they can serve them with passion. Don’s thoughts on story have deeply influenced leaders and teams for Pantene, Chick-fil-A, Steelcase, Intel, Prime Lending, Zaxby’s, and thousands more.

Don lives in Nashville, Tennessee, with his wife, Betsy, and their chocolate lab, Lucy.

 

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Guru #10

David Avrin

One of the most in-demand international Marketing and Customer Experience speakers in the world today, David Avrin, CSP, GSF, helps organizations and audiences envisions, craft and delver customer experiences and marketing messages worth sharing. He has shared his content-rich, very entertaining and actionable presentations to enthusiastic audiences across North America and around the world. Recent presentations include: Singapore, Bangkok, Melbourne, Brisbane, Abu Dhabi, Buenos Aires, Sri Lanka, Manila, Rotterdam, Barcelona, Monte Carlo, London, Johannesburg and Dubai. David Avrin shows business owners and leaders, sales professionals, HR audiences and entrepreneurs how create compelling competitive advantages and legion of loyal fans.

David Avrin is one of a select group of international speaker to have earned the Global Speaking Fellow designation. His business insights have been featured on hundreds of broadcast media outlets and thousands of online and print publications around the world. He is also the author of three books including the acclaimed: It’s Not Who You Know, It’s Who Knows You!, Visibility Marketing, and his newest book: Why Customers Leave and How to Win Them Back.

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Guru #11

Joe Calloway

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Professional keynote speaker, business author and branding consultant Joe Calloway is an expert in developing customer focused teams. Joe’s approach is both innovative and compelling. He speaks frequently on business competition and is a straight talking expert on competition and continuous improvement. Joe Calloway is a performance expert who helps people and companies think competitively, improve constantly, and act decisively. He is the author of four ground-breaking business books including the best-selling Becoming A Category of One, which received rave reviews from The New York Times, Retailing Today, Publishers Weekly and many others. Joe is a partner in Engage Consulting Group and is also a partner in BizVideos, a company that produces short business videos for use in meetings and corporate events. Joe has been inducted into the Speakers Hall of Fame, but he doesn’t do “speeches.” Instead, Joe actively engages people in sessions that challenge assumptions and create new ways of thinking.

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Guru #12

Laura Ries

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Laura Ries is a leading marketing strategist, bestselling author,branding Guru and television personality. Since 1994, Laura has run Ries & Ries, a consulting firm with her partner, father and legendary Positioning pioneer Al Ries. Together they consult with Fortune 500 companies on brand strategy and are the authors of five books which have been bestsellers around the world. They have traveled to over 60 countries from Chile to China and India to Indonesia teaching the fundamental principles of marketing.

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Guru #13

Tim Halloran

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Tim Halloran has built and directed some of the world’s largest brands. With over 20 years of strategic consumer brand management, insights, and new product development experience, he speaks extensively to business professionals on ways to improve the relationships between their brands and consumers. Mr. Halloran is President of Atlanta’s Brand Illumination and has provided guidance to top marketing companies, including Coca-Cola, Home Depot, Kraft Foods, Glaceau (vitaminwater/ smartwater), Georgia Pacific (Consumer Package Group), Vita Coco, Sprout Organic Baby Food, the NBA, Intercontinental Hotels Group, Chico’s/White House Black Market, Atlanta’s Fox Theatre, Simon Malls, and Turner Broadcasting. Prior to consulting, Tim spent 10 years in the Coca-Cola brand management organization, leading multiple beverage brands and marketing innovations. His successes at Coke include the national launch of Powerade sports drink and its sponsorship of the Olympics, co-development of Dasani bottled water, development of Coke’s first Internet marketing initiative with his work on Cherry Coke, and the overhaul of Coca-Cola’s U.S. tea strategy, including the creation of Gold Peak Tea. Tim has been featured as a brand expert on numerous radio, television, and newspaper outlets. He was awarded Innovator of the Year by Coca-Cola and named Max Award Finalist for Innovation by Georgia State University.

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Guru #14

CB Bowman

CB has been a professional branding executive for many years. She began in a position with General Foods where she was responsible for the branding of ready-to-eat cereals, frozen foods, and stuffing. This included iconic brands such as Honey Bunches of Oats, Birdseye Frozen Foods, Grape-Nuts, Great Grains, Shredded Wheat, et al.

In 2014, CB created the brand that represents the highest level of skills and experience for the executive coaching space: The Association of Corporate Executive Coaches (ACEC). This is an association focused on increasing the quality of executive coaching by identifying and certifying executive coaches who align with being “enterprise-wide business partners” with their clients.

CB is also passionate about supporting the Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches junior coaches to identify and market their brand.

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Guru #15

Jeremy Miller

Jeremy Miller is a brand strategist and the #1 Globe and Mail bestselling author of Sticky Branding.

For Jeremy, branding is deeply personal. After watching his family’s business nearly hit rock bottom, he and his family were forced to take a long hard look at the way the company was run and at the industry as a whole.

Jeremy realized it wasn’t his company’s sales people or marketing processes that were failing, it was their brand. This caused him to regroup, revamp, and rebrand the business. And within a year the company turned the corner and rocketed into growth mode.

That experience inspired Jeremy to embark on a decade-long study of how companies grow recognizable, memorable brands — what he calls Sticky Brands.

Fast forward to today, Jeremy has interviewed thousands of CEOs and business owners and profiled hundreds of companies across dozens of sectors. He lives and breathes marketing, branding, and business development, and he knows what it takes to grow a Sticky Brand.

Jeremy works with companies to develop branding and marketing strategies that make them stand out and drive sales. He is a sought after speaker delivering entertaining and informative talks on branding and business development.

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Guru #16

Leonard Kim

Leonard Kim’s TEDx Talk, Why You Should Let Your Fears Guide You, has been internationally recognized as one of the best TED Talks by Forbes and Inc. Magazine.

Leonard is recognized by Forbes as a Top Marketing Influencer, Inc. Magazine as a Top Digital Marketer and Top Youth Marketer and by Entrepreneur as a Top Personal Branding Expert. Adweek recognized him as one of their Socially Strong Entrepreneurs Every VC Should Be Following. He went from being almost homeless to becoming a personal branding expert whose content has been read over 10 million times. He has amassed a social media following of well over 500,000 people. He’s been featured in a huge list of publications, including Mashable, Inc, Entrepreneur, Forbes, Fortune and more.

Leonard is managing partner of InfluenceTree. At InfluenceTree, Leonard and his team teach you how to build your brand, get featured in publications and growth hack your social media following.

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Guru #17

Rita Clifton

Rita Clifton CBE has been called ‘Brand guru’ by the Financial Times and ‘The doyenne of branding’ by Campaign magazine. She is a writer, keynote speaker, conference chair & practitioner on all aspects of brands, branding and business leadership.

Her career has included being a Vice Chairman at Saatchi & Saatchi, as London CEO and Chairman at the global brand consultancy Interbrand and as co-founder of BrandCap. She is also a portfolio chairman and non-executive director on the board of businesses including ASOS and Nationwide Building Society, and her non-profit boards have included WWF and the Sustainable Development Commission.

Rita is a regular columnist and media commentator, as well as author of ‘The Future of Brands’ and two editions of The Economist ‘Brands and Branding’. She is working on her new book as we speak!

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Guru #18

Simon Middleton

Simon Middleton is a brand strategist, manufacturing entrepreneur, business development adviser, keynote speaker, and author.

His books include the Amazon category bestseller Build A Brand In 30 Days, the definitive branding guide for small businesses.

Simon is creator of Blackshore: British Coastal Clothing and the original founder of outdoor brand Shackleton.

He has appeared on CNN, Bloomberg, Sky, Five and BBC (Today, Breakfast, BBC News, and Newsnight) as a brand commentator, and has been active in the made-in-Britain fashion sector as an entrepreneur and manufacturer.

Simon has substantial experience in business fundraising, both through angel investment and with crowdfunding campaigns.

He is frequently rated as top speaker at conferences, and is noted for his considered and compassionate approach to tackling business, brand, and personal development challenges.

Now Simon brings his experience and knowledge to brand leaders, including entrepreneurs and senior corporate executives.

You can work with Simon in a range of ways, including: mentoring, full consultancy projects, conference keynotes for your organisation, or workshop events that can transform how your people think and behave.

However you engage him, Simon will always take you further on your journey to create authentic meaning and purpose

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Guru #19

Debbie Millman

Named “one of the most influential designers working today” by Graphic Design USA, Debbie Millman is also an author, educator, brand strategist and host of the podcast Design Matters. Debbie is Chief Marketing Officer at Sterling Brands, where she has worked with over 200 of the world’s largest brands. As the founder and host of Design Matters, the first and longest running podcast about design, Millman has interviewed more than 250 design luminaries and cultural commentators, including Massimo Vignelli, Milton Glaser, Malcolm Gladwell, Dan Pink, Barbara Kruger, Seth Godin and more. In the ten years since its inception, the show has garnered millions of downloads and a Cooper Hewitt National Design Award.

Debbie is the author of six books, including two collections of interviews that have extended the ethos and editorial vision of Design Matters to the printed page: How to Think Like a Great Graphic Designer and Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits. Both books have been published in over 10 languages. In 2009 Debbie co-founded with Steven Heller the world’s first graduate program in branding at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Now in its sixth year, the program has achieved international acclaim. The inaugural class wrote and designed the Rockport book Brand Bible: The Complete Guide to Building, Designing and Sustaining Brands, in 2013 the students created branding for the Museum of Modern Art’s retail program, Destination: New York and the class of 2015 worked to reposition a Kappa Middle School in Harlem.

Debbie’s written and visual essays have appeared in publications such as The New York Times, New York Magazine, Print Magazine, Design Observer and Fast Company. She is the author of two books of illustrated essays: Look Both Ways and Self-Portrait As Your Traitor; the later of which has been awarded a Gold Mobius, a Print Typography Award, and a Bronze Medal from the Art Directors Club. Her artwork has been exhibited at the Chicago Design Museum, Anderson University, School of Visual Arts, Long Island University and The Wolfsonion Museum. She has been artist-in-residence at Cranbrook University, Old Dominion University and Notre Dame University, and has conducted visual storytelling workshops at Academy of Art University in San Francisco, the University of Utah, Hartford University and the High School of Art and Design in New York. She has designed wrapping paper and beach towels for One Kings Lane, greeting cards for Mohawk, MOO and Card-To-Art, playing cards for DeckStarter and sketchbooks for Shutterstock.

Debbie is President Emeritus of AIGA, one of five women to hold the position in the organization’s 100-year history. She is also a past board member and treasurer of the New York Chapter. She is a frequent speaker on design and branding and has moderated Design Yatra in India, presented keynote lectures at Rotman School of Management, Princeton University, Michigan Modern, the Melbourne Writers Festival in Australia, Design Thinkers in Toronto, the American Package Design Summit, the Festival of Art and Design in Barcelona, and many more. She has been a juror for competitions including Cannes Lions, The Art Directors Club, The Type Directors Club, Fast Company, HOW Magazine, Print Magazine, ID Magazine, AIGA, The Dieline, and more. You can see more of her work at www.debbiemillman.com

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Guru #20

Bernadette Jiwa

Bernadette Jiwa is a recognised global authority on the role of story in business, innovation and marketing and the author of six best-selling books on marketing and brand storytelling. Named by Smart Company as a Top Business Thinker 2018. She advises, consults and speaks to entrepreneurs and business leaders who want to build meaningful brands.

Bernadette’s blog, TheStoryofTelling.com was voted as the Best Australian Business Blog in 2012 and chosen by Smart Company as one of Australia’s Top 20 Business Blogs in 2013 and 2014. It topped that list in 2016. Bernadette’s book Meaningful featured on Inc Magazine’s Best Business Books of 2015.

She has been named as one of the Top 100 Branding Experts to Follow on Twitter and she spoke at TEDxPerth about ‘The Secret To Spreading Ideas’.

Her work sees her advising, consulting with and speaking to entrepreneurs, business leaders and global brands, (like EA, LinkedIn, Zappos and Adidas). Bernadette works with them to intentionally create products, services and marketing that help them to matter to their customers.

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Guru #21

Marty Neumeier

Marty Neumeier is an author, designer, and brand adviser whose mission is to bring the principles and processes of design to business. His series of “whiteboard” books includes ZAG, named one of the “top hundred business books of all time,” and THE DESIGNFUL COMPANY, a bestselling guide to nonstop innovation. An online presentation of his first book, THE BRAND GAP, has been viewed more than 22 million times since 2003. A sequel, THE BRAND FLIP, lays out a new process for building brands in the age of social media and customer dominance. His most recent book, SCRAMBLE, is a “business thriller” about how to build a brand quickly with a new process called agile strategy. In 1996, Neumeier founded Critique magazine, the first journal about design thinking. He has worked closely with innovative companies such as Apple, Netscape, Sun Microsystems, HP, Adobe, Google, and Microsoft to help advance their brands and cultures. Today he serves as Director of Transformation for Liquid Agency in Silicon Valley, and travels extensively as a workshop leader and speaker on the topics of design, brand, and innovation. He and his wife divide their time between California and southwest France.

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Guru #22

Karen Kang

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Karen Kang is the best-selling author of BrandingPays™: The Five-Step System to Reinvent Your Personal Brand.  Karen has more than 20 years of experience in brand strategy consulting.  She is the founder and CEO of BrandingPays LLC, a corporate and personal branding company. Karen has trained thousands of professionals on the unique BrandingPays System for personal branding, and has consulted to more than 200 organizations. Her clients have included AT&T, Adobe, AstraZeneca, Genentech, HP, Intel and UC Davis Health System.

Before starting her own brand strategy consulting firm in 1994, Karen was a partner and principal with Regis McKenna Inc., the Silicon Valley marketing firm that launched the Apple and Genentech brands, and a vice president with TFB/BBDO, a high technology advertising and public relations agency. Her book has been featured in BusinessWeek, Fast Company, Forbes, Fortune, More and Working Mother and was an Editor’s Pick on WSJ Radio. She has been interviewed as a branding expert on ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX network affiliates.

Karen’s marketing and communications background gives her a 360-degree view of branding. A former newspaper journalist on both the East and West Coasts, she has held executive positions in marketing consulting, advertising and public relations firms. She is a sought-after speaker at national organizations and leading business schools such as London Business School, Stanford, and Wharton (UPenn). A member of Phi Beta Kappa, she holds a B.A. degree from Mills College and an M.S. degree from Boston University.

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Guru #23

Karen McCullough

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Karen McCullough is the most energetic, positive and inspirational speaker in the business. She worked for respected brands. She studied high performing brands. And she built a successful brand from the ground up. Karen is an inspiring speaker who draws on her varied background as a highly successful educator, businesswoman, entrepreneur, and CEO to enlighten and entertain audiences from some of the world’s top companies, universities, and organizations. Karen McCullough knows people, knows trends, and she knows how things work. She is a master at opening people’s minds to the opportunities of change. Through her study of generational behavior, business relationships, social trends, and technology Karen has tapped into an innovative model that leads to positive action and drives desired results.

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Guru #24

Amber Hurdle

Most businesses make significant investments in their #1 asset: human capital, then experience costly business problems like ineffective recruiting, turnover, underperformance, threats to morale and leadership gaps. What’s usually missing is a clear connection between the people strategy and the business strategy to create measurable bottom line results. That’s where we come in.

Amber Hurdle Consulting is a multi-award-winning talent optimization firm that pioneers using both science and marketing principles to solve these problems by strengthening your brand from the inside out. As a Predictive Index (PI) Certified Partner, we teach you how to generate and use real data in the form of people analytics, and then we sit on your bench as analytics experts, bringing along almost 20 years of branding, marketing and public relations experience. With these tools, we partner with you to design a compelling internal relations strategy featuring three key areas:

#1 We work with your leaders on their personal brands, so they increase self awareness and see and harvest the greatness in others.

#2 We teach you to use a scientific, repeatable method to recruit, retain and inspire top talent, elevating your culture while crafting a world-class employer brand.

#3 We then help you leverage strong leaders and a “best places to work” environment so that happy employees are serving happy customers…ultimately elevating your business brand.

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Guru #25

Robin Fisher Roffer

Brand strategist and storyteller Robin Fisher Roffer provides the rocket fuel that has launched and evolved dozens of media brands all over the world such as A&E, Animal Planet, CNN, Comedy Central, Discovery, FX, Hallmark Channel, History, Lifetime, MTV, and TNT. As Founder and CEO of Big Fish Marketing, Inc., she leads an award-winning creative team adept at unearthing a brand’s essence and filter, its look, feel and tagline, market positioning, value proposition and key messaging to both consumers and the trade. Sought after for leading edge ad sales strategy, Robin is the go-to person for television networks, technology companies and content creators ready to bring audiences to brands across multiple platforms. Robin uses her rare combination of talents to craft persuasive sales narratives and has produced Upfront presentations for AMC, BET, Bloomberg, Food Network, Fox Networks Group, HGTV, Scripps Networks and Univision. She inspires sales leaders to give press-worthy keynotes, and trains their teams to take the story on the road. With a mission to inspire humanity to fearlessly embrace change, Robin has authored four books including Make A Name For Yourself, The Fearless Fish Out Of Water, Reinventing Yourself, and her latest book, Your No-Fear Career.  A speaker and frequent media guest on fearless leadership and personal branding, Robin keynotes corporate conferences at companies such as Walmart, Microsoft, AIG and Starwood Hotels and top business schools like Columbia, Wharton, USC and Northwestern.

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Guru #26

Alina Wheeler

Alina Wheeler engages enterprises in a dynamic process to build their brands and embrace best practices. Wheeler inspires the whole branding team to seize every opportunity to design compelling customer experiences at every touchpoint. Designing Brand Identity, now in its fifth edition, is the first book to deconstruct the branding process into a universal, five-phase methodology. Her signature mantra is “Who are you? Who needs to know? Why should they care? How will they find out?” Designing Brand Identity demystifies branding and gives practitioners a roadmap to create sustainable and successful brands. It is published in 7 languages, and is used by clients and their branding and design firms to educate their staffs.

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Guru #27

Bruce Turkel

Bruce is a branding expert who makes his clients’ brands more valuable.

As CEO of the successful brand management firm, TURKEL, Bruce Turkel has been creating and working with valuable brands for over 25 years.

Born and raised in Miami, Mr. Turkel studied design at the University of Florida and rushed to New York City to start his career. Preferring the sun to the subway, he returned to Miami and opened his own advertising agency built on the belief that marketing should be well-designed, simple, and should make a client’s products and services more valuable. Using this straightforward checklist, he has worked with hundreds of clients, written thousands of headlines, and designed even more print ads, television spots, websites, and campaigns.

Besides all that, Mr. Turkel is a husband, father of two and author of three books–his most recent is Building Brand Value. Oh, and he is an avid harmonica player. He tours extensively, spellbinding audiences with simple yet powerful brand building techniques.

When you book Bruce Turkel, you do not have to worry about a thing. Yes, your audience will be entertained and delighted. Of course, your audience will learn an uncomplicated and memorable way to excel in life as well as in business. Sure, his speech will be a much talked about part of your meeting. Most certainly, you will get the chance to hear Mr. Turkel play his harmonica. And, most importantly, you will know you have made the right choice the moment he starts speaking.

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Guru #28

Rob Frankel

Rob Frankel began his career in advertising, eventually evolving his practice to become “the best branding expert on the planet,” a moniker bestowed upon him not by his mother, but several of his peers and acknowledged in Jaclyn Easton’s now out-of-print book, “StrikingItRich.com”. His first book, “The Revenge of Brand X: How to Build a Big Time Brand on the Web or Anywhere Else,” was published in two editions, the second of which was updated and expanded.

Rob is also the author of “The Artist Who Loved Women,” a biography of artist Patrick Nagel, the most successful yet anonymous American artist of the 1980s. In addition to documenting Nagel’s dynamic, brief life (he died in 1984 at the age of 38), Rob is a collector of, and authority on many of Nagel’s pieces.

To find out more about Patrick Nagel, or to ask,buy and sell his work feel free to swing by PatrickNagelGroup (dot com) to meet and talk with other Nagel fans.

If you’re a movie producer, you can get the cost of your book 100% reimbursed as soon as your feature film about the book, “The Artist Who Loved Women,” is released. Seriously. No kidding. We all know how cheap Hollywood people can be.

You can find out more Rob and his books at the web sites that bear the same names.

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Guru #29

Luis Pedroza

Luis Pedroza is a global brand builder with real-world, international experience that comes from leading brands for iconic companies like General Mills, Nestle, and Kerry in markets all over the world such as North America, Europe, Asia, and Russia. Now based in California’s Silicon Valley to be at the epicenter of so much of today’s disruptive innovation, Luis has a long track record of helping emerging brands reach the next level of success.

His worldwide marketing journey has also given him the incredible opportunity to consult with numerous successful global brands such as YUM!, Meiji, Domino’s, and ASDA, helping brand builders use lean innovation techniques to grow their businesses. As a result, Luis is widely considered to be an expert at identifying global trends and assisting companies in developing the insights required to meet the needs of target consumers.

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Guru #30

Douglas Van Praet

Douglas Van Praet is the author of Unconscious Branding: How Neuroscience Can Empower (and Inspire) Marketing. He is also the founder of a marketing consultancy whose approach to advertising and marketing draws from unconscious behaviorism and applies neurobiology, evolutionary psychology, and behavioral economics to business problems. He has worked at agencies and corporations in N.Y. and L.A. and positioned many of the most iconic brands in advertising, most recently as executive vice president at Deutsch L.A., where his responsibilities included group planning director for the Volkswagen account.

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