Paul Levine

Paul Levine entered the media world in 1988 with International Thomson's online division. In 1990 he launched and published a marketing newsletter for top agency and corporate marketing executives with the former editor-in-chief of the Adweek Magazine Group. He was then recruited in 1993 by advertising agency Warwick Baker & Fiore to manage business development and corporate communications. Due to his overwhelming success at Warwick, Paul gained a strong industry reputation as a change agent for growth and culture transformation.

In 1996, Paul was recruited by Mad Dogs & Englishmen as General Manager and Head of Client Service. During his tenure the agency experienced dramatic growth with a tripling of agency billings and more than doubling of revenue. This lead to Paul being made partner. Clients included: AOL's Moviefone, Acclaim Entertainment, Atari, BMG Entertainment, ESPN, Viacom, Time Warner Cable, Road Runner Internet Service, Coors’ Blue Moon Ale, Kobrand Corporation, Louis Jadot Wines, Alize Liquor, Fortant, St. Francis, Canadian Club Whiskey, Yoo-Hoo Chocolate Drink, Haribo Gummi Bears and Discovery Communications. The agency also received many creative and strategic industry accolades during his leadership including “agency of the year.”

In 1999 Bates Worldwide (Cordiant Communications Group acquired by WPP) recruited Paul as CMO for North America servings brands such as CVS, Wendy's, Pfizer, Sauza Tecquila, Estee Lauder, T Rowe Price, Certs, Dentyne, PacSun, Hyundai and Trojan. Paul spearheaded a global repositioning and development initiative for the agency, resulting in his promotion to CMO Worldwide, appointment to the worldwide management board, and responsibility for all of Cordiant’s marketing service holdings. A true champion of creative excellence, Paul established the first ever "Bates Student Portfolio Competition" to nurture the development of creative talent across the global network.

In 2004 Paul launched a marketing, advertising and emerging media consultancy serving clients such as LG Electronics, Hyundai, Panasonic, Bed Bath & Beyond, The Dux Bed, The Frick Collection, The Guggenheim Museum, The Apollo Theater, The American Ballet Theater and The RES Media Group.

Paul spearheaded a major brand development project with RES leadership, developing their positioning and tagline: "Emerging Culture Revealed". Which captured their unique ability to identify and leverage emerging trends on behalf of creators and brands alike in the areas of music, art, fashion, dance and film.

His work with RES lead to an appointment as President of Agent 16, where he transformed the agency's product and service offering by developing a series of strategic content partnerships with a group of young and influential trendsetters, developing multi-platform custom marketing solutions through partnerships between the brands and emerging artists, directors, musicians and technologists.

During this time, Paul developed a research concept designed to help marketers stay on the cutting edge of emerging urban trends. He formed a partnership with the Scratch DJ Academy to create a new type of research product. The “Scratch Monitor” as it was named was a quarterly syndicated trend report designed to tap into a collective of 400 plus leading cultural influencers. Within 6 months of launch a charter group of fortune-500 subscribers including Pepsi were secured.

Paul was soon retained by film start-up Factual Media (a collaboration between a multi-national media firm and award-winning documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock and other indie film executives). Paul lead the team charged with developing and codifying their brand positioning and assisting in the management of their initial strategic and creative development. This lead to the naming and brand ID as Cinelan – to be an international producer and distributer of authentic, insightful and inspiring short film programs.

In 2008 Paul launched Slightly Mad, a brand strategy and communications agency. Paul is a frequent guest lecturer and speaker on international marketing and strategy and serves on numerous corporate advisory boards, is a GLG Council Member, has been on the Board of Trustees of the Advertising Club of New York, a AAAA’s committee member and has served on the Board of the National Autism Coalition (which became Autism Speaks). In 2012 Paul was honored with the appointment of "Executive in Residence" at Hofstra University. As EIR Paul works closely with faculty at Hofstra’s Zarb Graduate School of Business developing curricula and programs as well as lecturing on the graduate and undergrad levels. Paul was also a recent recipient of the Advertising Club of New York’s President’s Award.