Winning as a Challenger Brand: Marketing Strategies from John Gumas

In this episode of Curve Ahead, host Brian Wiles interviews John Gumas, the CEO of Gumas Advertising and author of Challenger Brand Marketing. With over 40 years of experience, John has helped companies stand out and compete against industry leaders—without massive budgets.

Key Takeaways:
✅ What defines a Challenger Brand and how to compete against bigger competitors
✅ Why smart strategy beats big spending in marketing
✅ The role of leadership in shaping company culture and marketing success
✅ How AI is changing advertising—without replacing human creativity

Transcript

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Welcome back to Curve Ahead. That's where we uncover strategies and mindsets of top business leaders. Today, I'm joined by John Goomas, CEO of Goomas Advertising, the pioneer in challenger brand marketing. For over 40 years, John has helped brands break through competitive markets with smart, strategic and disruptive approaches. In this episode, we'll dive into Challenger Brands can compete against industry giants. John shares his proven formula for standing out against massive budgets. Why company culture starts at the top. How leadership energy impacts an entire team's motivation and success. If you're looking to grow your business without outspinning your competition, this episode will give you the insights you need to think differently and market smarter. John, welcome to the show. Hey John, welcome to the podcast. Do you mind introducing yourself? Hi, Brian. Good to be here. My name's John Gumas. I am the CEO of Goomas Advertising. How did you become the CEO of your own advertising company? This is our 40th year. I actually was always passionate about advertising and marketing. I got a degree in the subject from San Francisco State University. It was actually a business degree with a concentration in advertising and marketing. While I was in college, you know, I interned at big agencies and after college I was hired. There were a lot of times where sitting in this big ad agency and potential prospects, right, clients would come in with these great ideas, great products, great services, and the first thing that they would be asked by these ad agency owners or C level suites is how much money do you have to spend? And if they didn't say a number that would meet their requirements, they would essentially tell these folks, yeah, sorry, nothing we can do, nothing we do for you. So this happened time and time again. And one time there was this, this one person came in there, they had just started this business and it was really interesting. And same thing happened and as I usually do, I just escort these folks out and I said, wow, what are you going to do? We just started a conversation and one thing led to another and they ended up being my first client and I started my own company from there. So every business needs a niche, something different with the underdogs. It was working with, we now we coined and we trademarked the term called Challenger brands. So Challenger brand marketing, based on this concept of the underdogs, over 40 years we've perfected this methodology of how do you actually compete when there's all these bigger companies around you spending a lot more money than you are, how do you compete? So there is a way to do that very effectively. And We've, and we've created it. We've even written a book on the subject called Challenger Brand Marketing. Saw that. You actually wrote two books, isn't that correct? That's correct, yes. The first one was called Marketing Smart, which is the same concept of just how do you. It's not, it's not being traditional. It's not, it's not going head to head. Because I guarantee you go head to head against somebody and they have more resources. And I define resources as not only just marketing money, but sales forces, retail locations, brand recognition, the list goes on and on. If they have more of anything, then you cannot compete head to head. If you do, you will lose. So how do you carve a niche? How do you attack their weaknesses? What are the tactical elements you use? How do you position your brand and your message to really resonate and so you can grow a business with the resources you have. So how do you identify a challenger brand? The challenger brand is any company. Doesn't matter the industry they're in, doesn't matter how big or small they are. Pepsi is a challenger brand because they're up against Coke. It's. If you are competing with someone who is out resourcing you have to do things a little different. And that's what, that's how, that's what we do. Working with clients who are in that position and helping them turn things around, helping them launch businesses, helping them in all sorts of stages in their business life, help systematically grow business. Because we look at it from a business perspective and we use advertising, marketing, digital marketing, branding, all those tools to help implement business goals. And that's kind of the way we look. At the end of the day, it's got to grow a business. Because if you ask me, what I do is I help companies grow businesses. And we do that by using really smart and strategic marketing strategies to do that. You had mentioned that you've been in business now for 40 years. How has your approach evolved over the past four decades for supporting your challenger brands? Any successful business, it always has to anticipate the next change. If that next change hits you by surprise, it's too late. It's too late. And this is a business, as you know, right? It's a business of constant change. And it's the entire 40 years that I've had, this company is. It's always ebbing and flow and changing and adjusting. New technologies, new everything. And you have to be able to be ahead of the curve. And if you're not ahead of the curve, you're gonna have a really hard time catching up. So I always love learning about it. What's going on, what are the trends, what's happening? And I'm in different organizations that help me become, have access to some of these trends and information, and our clients benefit because I'm always bringing new ideas to clients, new ways of doing things, new ways to help their businesses grow. As they say, the only thing constant is change. Any business owner needs to always be prepared and always anticipate how their company is going to look. You know, six months from now, a year from now, five years from now. You had mentioned learning. I am a lifelong student of life. I try to absorb as much information as I can while I'm here and hopefully help others along the way. One of the reasons I started this. So what are three great learning resources that you typically lean on to stay ahead of the curve? Wow. In marketing or just in life? It could be both. Mix it up. All right. I would say first off, and it's not a resource, but it kind of is. I would say listening. Right, listening. I think a lot of people don't listen. You know, I read once, I'm sure you heard, you have, you know, God gave you two ears and one mouth for a reason. And, you know, so listen. And the marketing business is all about trends. It's all about what's going on. It's all about, you know, what's happening in the market. So everywhere I go, I listen. I just kind of watch and listen to see what people are doing, see how people are reacting, see how they're responding. So I would say that's the first thing. And it's not a resource, it's not a tool. But, you know, in the industry, I think you've got to find some trusted industry evangelists, if you will. The problem is, and again, this is over 40 years. There are a lot of people that talk a good game. I don't, I don't really follow people that talk. I follow people that have done and that have performed and have a track record to show because talking a game is very different than having been there, done that, executed something, made something happen. And so I, I, I look for folks that have actually done things and have been successful versus, you know, a lot of talkers in this industry. Lots and lots of talkers. So that would be the second thing. And you know what I think the third thing in terms of resources is your family because it's so easy to get caught up in your business. But you got to remember, you know, kind of your, who you are as a person because who you are as a person really makes up what you do as a business, right? How you treat people. So I'm always kind of, you know, my wife, my kids, my friends, you know, I listen to them, I learned from them how to be a better person. Okay, not necessarily how to be a better business person, but how to be a better person. Because when you're a better person, that just radiates into everything you do. So, yeah, I'm not sure if I answered your question to your liking, but that, you know, it's not three resources, but it's kind of three philosophies that I do follow and believe in. Definitely agree with that. Right. Listening, active listening specifically is one of the hardest skills to master. A lot of people, while someone is telling you something, you're already formulating what you want to respond back to them. So you're not actually listening to what they're saying to you. You are thinking of your response already taking a step back. And actively listening is such a challenge. If there's any skill to be learned in life, especially as a leader in a business, active listening is gotta be number one. Staying grounded is with your family. I know that you've listed that as number three. But like also super important, learning from the people around you every single day and having them kind of keep you humble, keep you who you are on a day to day basis is really important. And then, yeah, I would agree with you. There are a lot of people in marketing that have smaller or boutique firms that they've been around it, but they've never really done anything or they have a very strong opinion on how should be done, that they take to social media and that's kind of how they envelop and develop their brand is them being essentially a mouthpiece. And I guess at this point in time, as I am speaking to you, I realized the hypocrisy in that statement. No, it's not, you know what? But it's learning is one thing, right? When you, when you have conversations and learn and you're open to other ideas and what people have to say versus kind of pontificating, right? And this is what to do, how to do it, and when you've never really done it yourself or you've never really shown results because again, you know, like I know this is an industry of results. The one thing I always tell my clients is judge us by the results that we generate. Judge us by that because that's what we're looking to do. And because when you can deliver results, then you really know what you're doing. Right? I mean, versus kind of, you know, just, you know, giving people advice or being arrogant about that. And, and, but you know, what you do a really good job of is you induce from your guests, you induce knowledge or you ask them really good questions that get them to really open up and talk about something that would be valuable to your listeners. Right? You're not, you're not telling your, your guests what to say or how to say it. You're, you're really helping them, you know, and extract from them valuable knowledge. And, and I'm sure that's why your listeners follow you. I mean, I can only really hope that's what they take away from it. Right. I, you know, I, I started this as kind of a, a knowledge project for myself. Going back to being a lifetime learner and having these conversations with other leaders and kind of like understanding that everybody's path has some similarities, but they're so vastly different that it's just a great story to be told. I can't tell it for you. But the other thing that I get is kind of where you have seen, especially in a 40 year career, some definite defining stumbling blocks like in your organization and how you pivoted. And having those conversations is always fun to just understand. Yeah, you know, were doing this thing and like it just for some reason, upon execution, it wasn't working for client, this client or this client, but it was working for everybody else. And we had a realization that X, Y and Z wasn't happening. Like having those things, those insights is always fun to learn and have as great takeaways. So back to the questions list. As we've mentioned a couple of times, you've been in business for 40 years and not that you've got the awards behind you, but you keep producing award winning work. How do you continue to challenge your team to do that? You know, you got to keep things fun. All right, you got, and I'm going to answer that a few ways. I'm going to answer it first from a leader's perspective. Okay. As a, as a leader, right. Our job is to motivate our folks. Our job is to put them in a position to be successful. Our job is to understand what drives them and help Them, you know, and motivate them and let them succeed. And our job is to give them the credit and congratulate them, and then you go, and our ultimate job is to put the right people in the right seats. You know, I've got a bunch of baseballs behind me and think it's a baseball team, right? Our job, your job. My job is to get the best pitcher we can find, the best third baseman, best shortstop, but more importantly, the ones that work together as a team, right? The ones that understand your culture. Because, you know, I am the CEO, but a lot of times, you know, I think of myself as the Chief Culture Officer, right? My job is to keep everyone motivated, excited, informed. Because there's a funny thing I've Learned over the 40 years. Everyone's mood in the office is dependent on my mood. All right? So I walk in. This is, you know, for every CEO, you walk into the office in a bad, cranky mood. You know what happens? Everyone in your office is kind of, you know, cranky, scared. You walk in and with that, you know, in a good mood. Everyone's in a good mood. So it's. It's. It's those simple things in life, that human. The human connection. You know, just connecting with your employees, connecting with them and learning about them. And. Excuse me, but that's. That's how people, I think, deliver their best work, feel that they're part of something special. And if you can do that as a CEO, right? And I get it, all the other jobs we have, all right, we're running a business. We're doing all that. I mean, I get it, I understand it, but I'm just talking from a basic human. The human connection. And it's, you know, your title as CEO. People look up to you, right? People look up. They watch everything you do. They. They listen to every conversation you have. When they can hear. They see how you treat other people. They see how you treat other employees, and that rubs off. So, you know, I think that really critical. I was just taking a note because I think that you made a couple of really great points there. First being, I think that everybody, when you were saying that the CEO's mood kind of is reflected on the entire office, can visualize in their head where their CEO has walked through the office, and then people just kind of cowered in their cubicles or moved. Move their conversations elsewhere to just kind of avoid that tension with someone they didn't necessarily want to have an interaction with. But the other thing that I heard there was that you are A lead by example person, right? You want people to see your leadership style, that you are in charge of the culture, right? You're in charge of the mood. Treat people with kindness regardless of who they are. That's just a generalization. I would assume that's true. Yeah, you're right on, Brian. And I would say then what happens is then they treat our clients the same way, right? They go above and beyond to help our clients because it's not, you know, it's not a business relationship. It's almost like a family relationship where we really care. And that shows, it shows our clients and it shows in our work and it shows in our results. But again, that happens, right? That happens at the top and it trickles down. And I think most CEOs, a lot of times they're so busy, so stressed, they forget that. But that's got to be at the top, in my opinion. It's got to be at the top of what they do every day is, you know, people have to feel comfortable enough to come up and talk to you. They really do. You, you as a CEO, as a leader, you set that. And you know, it's, I, I, I, I, I've never, like, we've all seen people that manage by, through fear. And I, I couldn't disagree with that more in terms of not getting, you know, the results out of people or not getting, you know, the overall results out of a company. Because you have folks that maybe you're just there because they get a paycheck and that's the worst thing that can happen. Can you, what advice would you give to like a younger leader in an organization who's still trying to figure out that lead by example thing? Especially when it comes to a dynamic where there's like an inverse in age. So it's a younger person in a power position and they're trying to lead by example. For someone who may be older than them, like, what advice do you have there? Yeah, I think that comes down to a personality versus personality, you know, thing. And sometimes as a leader, you know, there's just folks that just don't fit in. Right? They just don't fit in. I hate to sound crude here, but sometimes you just gotta cut the cord. And, you know, because the one thing that I've learned over 40 years, there's only one thing you cannot teach somebody, and that's an attitude, right? And a work ethic. That's the one thing you cannot teach them if they don't come to you with that. If you don't hire with that, you will most likely have issues like you, what you just described. And that person, if they have an issue with a younger CEO or in my opinion that's is not necessarily a work professional issue. That is a, that is a, you know, an attitude issue. And that person, you should probably do them a favor and let them go and bring on somebody that, that understands and is willing to be part of the team. Because it's folks like that can really set you off track as a CEO. Folks like that can make your job really hard and hurt your company and ultimately hurt your clients as well. So that's the advice I would have, you know, is you try and try, but if that person is not going to budge and they're, then you got to move on. You got to make the tough decision to move on. That's the hardest thing to do for most CEOs. I know it's the hardest thing for me to do because you know, you tend to give people the benefit of the doubt over and over again. But sometimes there's a guy by the name of Jack Walsh, you remember he was a CEO of GE and Jack used to fire the bottom performing 10% of his sales force every year. And his rationale was, I'm doing them a favor because they don't like their job if they're in the bottom 10%. And it was kind of interesting, it was kind of hard and cruel, but it was just an interesting way of looking at things. I'm doing them a favor. Yeah, I would agree. I mean sometimes there are just instances where people don't necessarily fit into the organization. But I also see a lot of myself in you just through the short time we've interacted. From the fact that I try to lead by example and I always try to give people the benefit of the doubt and foster human to human relationship. I think that's probably the, as a leader and in a service based industry is the most important thing you can do because people have good days and bad days and just understand that their moods sometimes fluctuate and that's okay. You need to, you know, look kind of beyond that. Sometimes if they're having a bad day and just be like, okay, they're having a bad day. If it's an attitude thing, then yeah, obviously there needs to be some sort of corrective action. And everyone around you sees that every, everyone around you. If, you know, if this, let's say the individual you were describing, if he's like that, everyone in the company knows that. They see, you know, they're not stupid. They see what's going on and then, you know, they see how you deal with that person. And most people, when it comes to letting them go, if that were the case like that, most people understand and actually kind of applaud you for doing that because they get it. You know, it's. At the end of the day, you've got to be a leader. You gotta have to do what's best for the company. And you need people on board that have your vision, have your work ethic, have your compassion, right. And are all together because this is rowing a boat. It's as you know, we're all in a boat rowing together, right. If there's one person in the back that doesn't want to row in sequence, well, you know, at some point your boat's not going to row as fast as it can and you need to get a new rower. Let's talk about technology in your business. Right. I think that the biggest impact we've seen in the marketing realm in the last five years has to be the emergence of AI. How do you embrace those new technologies? Here's the hard part about it. It's changing so quickly. By the time you embrace something, it's already changed. We've embraced it is, you know, our ability to do really extensive background data gathering really allowed us, you know, at a level never before from a content development perspective, being able to write and. But here's the caveat. I would say that you got to be really careful, especially when it comes to content development. AI pulls from a lot of places. You don't know where it pulls from. From a perspective of creativity, just coming up with ideas and it certainly has done that. But again, what makes us really cautious where it is now is you just don't know where that is coming from. So all I'm, I'm saying it has really good characteristics about speed and thoroughness, but it also has this gray area of you got to be really careful that it will change the industry. And you know, we, it really closely, but it will change the industry. And I, if I predict now, I guarantee you my prediction is going to be wrong in a month or two. It's hard for me to imagine how the human touch in marketing, the human touch is going to affect it because here's. I have a prediction that consumers, you and I as consumers, if we find out someone has created an ad or written you a thank you letter or a note or something very personal that was generated by AI. I think consumers are going to get very upset at that. You know, it's not sincere, it's not truth, it's not believable. It's not. It was created by. By, you know, by AI. It wasn't created by you, Brian, or me, John, you know what? Because when you write a note or there's an ad, there's a connection. And I just predict that at some point consumers are going to say, no, no, I want, I don't want a machine. Although it's not a machine, but, you know, technically writing it. For me, there's two things that I want to dive in there, right? Is the source of information. I think some platforms do a better job than others identifying where the information is coming from. It's coming from here and here. Great. Those are great platforms to use when it comes to things like that because they do have a source attached. I love the idea of using it for data exploration as well as processing and analysis because it does those things so much more quickly than a human could. As well as creating idea generation, you can ask it to generate 25 new ideas every couple of seconds and you just have this huge list and you can kind of mix and match what works best with the brand or the approach that you're trying to take. Back to the scary aspects of AI, I don't know if you are familiar. I think there was a case last year around this time where Volvo did that entire AI generated ad. Do you remember that? I do remember. And it had like the entire ad age community like an uproar because they're like, holy crap, this whole thing is all AI driven. What are we doing now? Is this the future to not see more marketers kind of jump on that entire AI? Because it one did a great job from a campaign perspective, because you didn't really know it was generated from AI, but the press and media surrounding that one ad did so much more than that ad itself. So, like, why haven't there been more agencies or, you know, just singular campaigns that have done that? Because it garners a lot of attention. That's true. Out of here, the current ad that's out for Coca Cola, their holiday ad, was generated 100% by AI who was in an uproar were the illustrators, the creative people in the industry were the ones who were in complete uproar that they're taking their jobs away. And that was recently in one of the trade publications. But yeah, if you see the current ad for Coca Cola, that's 100% generated. AI, no human. You typically have illustrators and copywriters, etc. Etc. So yeah, that'll be something I have to check out. I haven't seen that one yet. Yeah, it's an interesting dilemma. And what tends to happen though, what tends to win out is the financial aspect of it all. So you know, agencies, instead of having a 20 person creative shop or creative department, now have maybe a five or six person department. Well, you know what, that's a big, big cost savings and it's hard to convince many, especially these big agencies who, you know, that are public companies and it's all about profit and hard to convince them otherwise. So I think you're going to find some of the, you know, the mid to small agencies like are going to have, you know, are going to care about the people they have and use it as a tool to help versus a tool to replace. And I think what you're going to see in the bigger agencies is the opposite. A tool to replace versus the tool to help. And that's kind of where I see it most likely going. I think that's a great perspective. I would hop on board and I would say that we, I would agree. I think that's the direction it will ultimately go. So John, you've been a great sport, no pun intended, with all the baseballs. This is where I allow you 90 seconds to kind of pitch whatever thing you're passionate about, whether it be your organization or some other passion project that you're working on. So without further ado, the floo is yours. Thanks, Brian. Well, you know, I'm passionate about my company and I'm passionate about what we do for our clients. And you know, we have a challenger brand marketing process that is unique to us and it generates incredible results for our clients and we're just passionate about it. We're passionate about educating people on how to think differently when it comes to branding and advertising and how it actually works. But it only works if you know that you're a challenger brand and you understand what it means to be a challenger brand. Now all of a sudden, you know, with that understanding, it works, I mean your marketing and advertising and your results. Because at the end of the day, right, this is about building a business. So how do you strategically build a business by using challenger brand marketing? That's what I'M really passionate about and still after 40 years, so excited about, you know, just helping companies grow and, you know, go to the next level or become as big as they want to be. Awesome. John, well, it's been a pleasure. I really appreciate your time. Thanks, Brian. I really enjoyed it as well. Thanks so much.