Ep 35 Aaron Edwards - If Everything Goes to S%#t Tomorrow, It’s OK as Long as You Have the Spirit to Fight.

The Marketing Marriage

We’re bringing you the other half of the sibling duo behind the NYC digital creative agency The Charles Group - Aaron Edwards. While his sister Sam (Ep 28) is known as a “right brain” person, Aaron complements the relationship with his self-proclaimed “left brain” approach. Originally hailing from Manchester, England - Aaron spent his early career working as a financial analyst at Barclays Capital in London, before moving to New York in 2010 to found The Charles Group. Aaron’s penchant for trends, data and analytics, made his transition from finance to creative relatively seamless, particularly as it was during the first wave of data driven design with marketing agencies flourishing in the creative and digital industry. In our unplugged chat, we discuss:

• His journey from a boring, yet well-paid corporate job to an unpaid internship at an ad agency.
• Why writing a business plan is the quickest way to find out if you know the industry.
• His thoughts on sales being the hardest skill to learn.
• Why he gets excited about the “non sexy” brands on their roster.
• Their agency’s breakthrough moment working on the Cocainenomics project with the Wall Street Journal.
• How he uses AI to arrive at results faster.
• Automation becoming a big focus in marketing in the uncertain economy ahead.

Aaron’s deep understanding of the relationship between creativity and commerce and attuned business strategy skill set has helped to solidify The Charles as ranking in the top 1000 of the INC5000 fastest growing creative marketing and digital agencies in the United States. The Charles’ current client roster includes corporate tech and lifestyle heavyweights IBM, Boston Consulting Group, Netflix and Bloomberg and time-honored luxury brands including Estée Lauder, Marriott, Cartier and Omega.