We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Michael Murray. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Michael below.
Michael , appreciate you joining us today. Early in your career, how did you think through the decision of whether to start your own firm or join an established firm?
I started my own Digital Content creation firm in Detroit almost 7 years ago, wanting to craft a process for my clients that could be looked at as indisputably leading to the best experience in the industry. Without knowing the ins and outs of the industry and how Digital and Marketing content should be sold and fulfilled in the first place, I wouldn’t change a thing about the path I took. Starting off on my own in the Digital Marketing industry gave me the connections to larger, more established names in the space that eventually led to me accepting a position in a startup firm that had resources and platforms I couldn’t attain on my own at that point. I learned and grew in knowledge and experience with that first firm leading to more positions at other firms and growth beyond what I could have possibly expected to achieve wading into things solo.
Michael , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I grew up in a large family in Grand Blanc, Michigan, and started working at around 14 years old with my father building new homes and doing construction management. I was homeschooled through the end of high school, graduated early, and did my first two years of college during my last year of high school coursework, which set me up at 17 with work experience and a firm belief that further college coursework made no financial sense. I continued working in construction management and wound up getting involved in residential real estate with a friend of mine from the construction field. After getting my real estate license shortly after turning 18, I split my time between real estate sales and prospecting, and construction management and new home construction which became a natural crossover of industries. While doing real estate property sales, a family member of mine in video editing suggested I do some video marketing for real estate listings, and after completing a few projects, fellow agents started requesting similar work, which led to me forming my first Digital Marketing company and selling video creation and distribution services to real estate agents and similar companies. 12 months into that balance of work, a financial startup in Detroit saw some of our video creation work and we wound up discussing a role at the company working on video and content marketing for clients of the startup. I accepted a full time role at the company a year before COVID struck, and started a completely new career path in Financial Media and Asset Management partnerships. 5 years after working at the startup and managing 3,500+ client video projects, starting 3 Asset Management Marketing sales teams, and creating 4 new product suites for the ETF and Fund Management industry, I received an offer from a larger firm in the Asset Management Solutions space which led to my current position as Head of Sales, Digital Distribution, Data & Analytics, and Events at TMX VettaFi.
Where do you think you get most of your clients from?
Building relationships and having good contacts that will champion your services and make new connections for you will never be surpassed as the best way to generate new business. Reputation is everything.
Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?
High morale is impossible to maintain without creating the right space for the right people. Every personality and workings style is different and recognizing strong suits, as well as areas of growth that should be taken into consideration for the roles and responsibilities for each person on your team is key.
Image Credits
Gary Lusk Photography