Today we’d like to introduce you to Erik Huberman.
Erik, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I graduated in 2008 and became a commercial real estate agent exactly one week to the day before the entire banking industry collapsed. I made $350 my first year out of college.
After this, I started working on side projects and ended up launching my first ecommerce company which was an online music company built to teach musicians the business side of the industry. Ran that for two years, got it to profitability and then hired a CEO to take over.
I then consecutively built and sold two ecommerce subscription fashion companies. After this, I started advising and consulting with a lot of large and small brands on how to leverage different marketing channels to drive revenue growth. Anywhere from Fortune 500s, down to startups.
During my entire career up to that point, I was consistently frustrated when it came to getting things done in marketing. Every company has two options, you hire in house, or hire an agency. The problem with hiring in house is that it is not cost-effective, that is if you can find and attract quality talent, and even if you solve those two problems, you are then operating in a vacuum and 90% of the time, your results will decline in six-nine months as they don’t have a touch with what is changing in the market.
That is why agencies exist, but the problem is 99% of them have NO clue what they are doing and the few that are any good become really expensive, want long contracts, high minimums or something else that makes them hard to work with. The end result is a lot of frustrated entrepreneurs trying to get their name out there and drive growth.
After getting sick of this, I decided to hire my own swat team to help. We started with seven people, each with their own expertise, like a Facebook marketer, email marketer, web designer, overall marketing strategist, etc. and went back to the brands I was helping and said, “Everything is a la carte, month-to-month, and cheaper than hiring in house.
The idea is you can spin up a team that fits your needs based on a menu of services.” So that is how Hawke Media was born, and five years later, with no debt or outside funding, we have grown from 7 to over 150 people.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It is never smooth. Our issues are always going to be with people, but people also make our business great.
We have had employees steal, flake on obligations, literally give no notice to go on vacation and not show up for any of their clients, threaten us to try to get money, sue us on no grounds and lose, executives that spend double their budget when we were relying on them, the list goes on, but it is all part of doing business.
Hawke Media – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
We are the fastest growing marketing consultancy in the country. We have built a business that has become the best partner to help other companies grow. We really pride ourselves on doing the right thing for the right reasons, and that reputation has proceeded us.
Most of our business is word of mouth, and that comes from doing things well. We also are one of the few marketing companies that look at the full marketing picture, but then allows companies to just plug in their needs and nothing more.
Most marketing companies either are very myopic and just do one thing, or they force companies to do too much and go behind what is best.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
When our employees started creating new business units and startups. It is one thing to create something, it is another thing to create an environment where others can create. It feels really good.
Pricing:
- $2000-$6000 per head per month is our general pricing
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.hawkemedia.com
- Phone: 3104517295
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: instagram.com/hawkemedia
- Facebook: facebook.com/hawkemedia
- Twitter: twitter.com/gohawke
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/hawke-media-santa-monica
Image Credit:
Joan Allen Photography
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
