169: From Airbnb to TwentyFirstCenturyBrand with Alexandra Dimiziani - a podcast by Alan B. Hart

During this episode of “Marketing Today,” hostAlan HartinterviewsAlexandra Dimiziani, co-founder and global managing partner of TwentyFirstCenturyBrand. Dimiziani's previous career experience includes working at Airbnb as first the head of marketing, EMEA based in London, and then as the global marketing director in the San Francisco Bay Area. Dimiziani's experience at Coca-Cola was as the global creative director for still beverages, new products, corporate social responsibility based in Atlanta and then as the marketing content director for Northwest Europe and the Nordics. Dimiziani talks about how her career has benefitted from shifting between advertising and marketing, as well as among other pursuits and interests like working in Rwanda and Burundi, getting her masters in investigative journalism, and writing a novel that led to death threats.  

Dimiziani discusses graduating from university at the young age of 19 with a bachelor's in business administration and working at the ad agencies Bozell and DDB. She learned about extreme poverty when backpacking by herself through Ecuador, East Africa, India, and Southeast Asia, gained global awareness and compassion for underprivileged communities, which coincided with her own feelings of being an outsider. Dimiziani shares the vast commercial marketing-meets-community responsibility insight she learned and applied while at Coca-Cola, Airbnb, and while launching TwentyFirstCenturyBrand.

She is driven by personal growth, by going past her limits, gaining an advantage by standing out from the crowd, and being a lateral thinker because she has had such varied real-life experiences. Dimiziani shares, “I believe that's when most innovation truly occurs in this sort of mash-up of insight and understanding across subject areas.” Why do companies need a tight brand narrative centered around purpose? “So, the world understands why it needs the brand, but also what it can hold the brand accountable for. And, so when that narrative goes out into the world and is molded, rightly so, by the community, it is still recognizable.” She discusses TwentyFirstCenturyBrand's most popular offering called the ‘brand blueprint,' which she articulates as, “what a brand aspires to stand for in the hearts and minds of its communities. And that results in a brand narrative that unites the vast and various stakeholder communities...from consumers to employees, to partners, to investors...and acts as the foundational reference that helps the workforce make better, faster decisions that deliver on-brand consistently.”

Highlights from this week's “Marketing Today”:

• When Alexandra Dimiziani isn't advising brands, does she work as a C.I.A. agent? (01:38)
• Alexandra introduces herself and her early work experience. (03:12)
• What was the novel about that Alexandra wrote? (08:50)
• What inspired her move to Coca-Cola? (09:25)
• Alexandra discusses moving to London to get her degree, meeting her husband, and joining Airbnb. (10:56)
• How was Alexandra shaped by getting her degree at 19? (14:28)
• In what ways does Alexandra take strength from her variety of experiences? (17:55)
• What did she learn while working for Airbnb? (21:45)
• How did TwentyFirstCenturyBrand get started and what does it offer? (29:28)
• What are the values of TwentyFirstCenturyBrand? (38:32)
• Is there an experience in Alexandra Dimiziani's life that has defined who she is today? (43:43)

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