Will The Real Emcee Please Stand Up

Being an emcee requires a certain kind of magic. Think of a night club, for example. The lights are low, the crowd is silent and mid-motion patiently waiting for the next surprise to be revealed, or that beat to drop. In comes the emcee, they are in full control, taking the crowd on a journey, introducing and building the hype from beat to beat, getting everyone to jump up and down in unison, and mixing in their own personal touch with the latest and greatest that culture has deemed “cool.” They’ve created a narrative and a vibe for the evening, and everyone is here 👏 for 👏 it 👏.

That is what marketing needs to look like today. A brand needs to show up and be mixed into culture with the perfect artistry to make people follow along. And while historical aspects of brand management are still needed to manage the budgets, people, creative pitches/strategies, and media buys – what a modern brand needs is who Listen has dubbed: a Brand MC… a Brand Marketer and Creator.

Sit back and ask yourself – who is keeping their ear to the ground and who is making sure the Instagrams get grammed, the Blog posts get blogged and the experiences get experienced?

Yes, yes and yes – the Brand MC role has never been so needed to help brands carry that beat and make the crowd go wild.

The platform team at Listen is currently made up of former advertising account managers. When we worked in advertising, we ended up doing a little bit of all the things short of actually opening up Adobe and creating a piece of creative that goes to the client. We were juggling all the balls and unveiling awesome things happening in culture that we thought could be relevant for the brand. We were dropping into influencer’s DM’s that may have been talking about a competitor and saying things like “Imma let you finish but have you tried ____ (insert current client here).” We were stalking all the brand hashtags, waiting for that one celebrity call out or retweet where we could insert ourselves into that conversation. We were wearing the brand colors with pride and yelling from the rooftops “I LOVE THIS BRAND”. And on the other hand we were managing multiple projects, acting like an assistant producer to the producer and helping create integrated marketing campaigns to create the most brand noise possible.

We are, in simplest terms, brand hype people. In Listen’s terms – the Brand MC.

It’s a dynamic role, and the benefits for the brand are unmatched. So as you’re thinking about this role, here are a couple of tips on how to be, or how you know someone is being a great Brand MC:

So brands everywhere, look for this person, put them on your roster, trust their instinct, and watch the magic happen.