Paulo Ribeiro is the founder of Two Things, a transformative agency for active lifestyle brands. With clients like The North Face, Timberland, and more, Paulo’s expertise in brand advertising and global brand strategy has shaped industry leaders like Nike and Electronic Arts. We discussed all of this and more this week on the On Brand podcast.

About Paulo Ribiero

Paulo Ribeiro is the founder of Two Things, a brand transformation agency that focuses on the active lifestyle category. Two Things serves clients such as The North Face, Timberland, Visit Sun Valley, Mad Hippie, Converse, and Arc’teryx.

Paulo began his career in brand advertising first in NYC and then in SF at Hal Riney+Partners, the first creatively led agency, during the dot com boom. At Wieden + Kennedy, he was head of global brand strategy for Nike and Electronic Arts through the era of digital transformation. He led the evolution of innovation agency Redscout to better serve Silicon Valley, working with Reid Hoffman on LinkedIn’s positioning and expanding Gatorade’s portfolio from beverages to food and digital products.

Paulo was the Managing Director of one of the first Venture Studios-West SF, which was founded by Jack Dorsey to accelerate the growth of many of the world’s most disruptive startups. His portfolio included Venmo, Jawbone, Twitter, Braintree, Square, Tumblr, and many others. More recently he led the creation of the Wieden + Kennedy Lodge the innovation agency, within the W+K Network, working with Nike’s secretive Innovation Kitchen, Samsung, and Verizon as clients. The fruits of that labor contributed significantly to W+K earning Global Agency of the Year two years in a row.

Paulo’s work has been discussed in the New York Times, Fast Company, The Wall Street Journal, Ad Age, Adweek, Techcrunch, Monocle, The Guardian, Communication Arts, LA Times, Business Insider, and many other publications.

Episode Highlights

What is a lifestyle brand? Paulo and his team define it as, “any brand that encourages an active lifestyle” including both athletics and travel.

What are the Two Things? The name of Paulo’s agency comes from “the art of combining two unrelated things in an interesting way” to stand out in the crowded, distracted world we find ourselves in.

The role of tension. Paulo and I spent a lot of our conversation talking about tension. Tension between the advertising industry and the Silicon Valley innovation mindset. Tension between scale and experimentation. This tension can play an important role in standing out today.

What brand has made Paulo smile recently? First, Paulo threw it back to the EA and Nike collaboration, Dot Swoosh, that he referenced earlier. He then shared the amazing activation the Barbie team did with Ken and the Dream House. “Actions speak louder than words.”

To learn more, check out the agency’s website at TwoThings.co.

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Until next week, I’ll see you on the Internet!

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