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Follis began his career working for major advertising agencies such as FCB/Chicago and DDB Worldwide in New York. In the mid-1980s, his entrepreneurial career began with freelance work for such major New York shops as Chiat/Day, Della Femina and Kirshenbaum & Bond. His work on the Kenneth Cole account resulted in awards and national press.

In 1988, Follis co-founded Follis&Verdi, with clients such as The American Stock Exchange, No Excuses Jeans, Solgar Vitamins and Sorrell Ridge Fruit Spreads—a case taught at the Harvard Business School and featured in Forbes. In ‘93, Follis/DeVito/Verdi won 9 ADDY Awards making it the second most awarded agency in New York. That same year Follis formed Follis Inc to include a focus on non-traditional and online marketing. In 2003, in response to the shifting media landscape and to provide an alternative to the traditional ad agency model, Follis created "Follis Marketing Therapy". And, in 2006, Follis created "The Follis Marketing Report" blog and "The Marketing Show with John Follis" podcast syndicated on iTunes.

How did you get started in advertising and marketing all those years ago?

Well, first of all, thank you for having me on your show. Yeah, I'm looking forward to this. So yeah, I started a while ago and I was always good creatively growing up as a kid. The question was how to question was how do I apply that creative talent to a career? And I was probably halfway through college when I got pulled aside by an instructor who was teaching a graphic design class and she asked me what I wanted to do with my life. And when I said I wasn't sure if she said, Well, I think you are to really seriously consider pursuing something either in advertising or communication arts or some kind of media because you're really really talented. So had it not been for that instructor? I'm not sure I would have pursued that. But you know, that helped a lot. And after she gave me that idea, I transferred to a university Syracuse University that had one of the best advertising programs in the country. So that's how I started on that track.

Where are you in Chicago first or New York first.

John’s response:
So I grew up in Connecticut, and I was I was going to school in upstate New York and Syracuse and then after graduation, I didn't feel I was ready for New York City, even though that is the mecca of advertising as some of your listeners may know. They call it Madison Avenue. But I was I was a little intimidated by New York so did not go there. Like many of my classmates did it and started out my career in Atlanta, Georgia, two years in Atlanta. Then I got felt that wasn't fast enough for me. So I moved up to Chicago, spent three years there and after that, I felt like I was ready for the for the big leagues and moved to New York


https://www.follisinc.com/therapy.htm
https://www.youtube.com/c/JohnFollisBIV