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Meet Matthew O’Brien of MINT Social in Scottsdale

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Matthew O’Brien.

Matthew, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
In late 1997, I got married, quit my Fortune 500 job of 7 years and started a company…all in the same month. My wife is either a saint or someone that sees things in the long-term vision, like our marriage. Thankfully for me, it is all of the above. 😁

I was fascinated by the Internet and started a company building websites, but more so, teaching businesses about the future direction of their company’s growth. One month prior to the dot-com crash, my partner and I sold our business (on paper for a nice 7 figure deal). Our fate ended up being to push on, re-invent ourselves, and continue building upon the technology we developed. We were able to successfully exit three years later.

It was about 10 years ago that my years of Internet experience saw a paradigm shift happening and I realized that after years of building websites, digital strategies and a blog platform, that the business model needed to flip.

Big Idea: A digital strategy needed to deliver your message to where your prospects hang out vs. trying to get the user to your website first. Social media was just starting and this seemed like the perfect vehicle to make this happen. MINT Social was born.

I develop educational curriculum for Universities on social media for businesses, am a founding board member of the Arizona Innovation Marketing Association (AZIMA), a mentor with ASU Entrepreneurship and Innovation Group, a speaker on social media and digital strategy, and active with helping non-profits advance their mission in our community.

Has it been a smooth road?
Social media has contributed to making us a bit dumb, lazy and arrogant. Selfies did not exist before social media and now we have a new word in our dictionary.

As a business, we decided to take this same approach to our business and therefore, we too are Dumb, Lazy and Arrogant.

– We are Dumb…like Columbo. We don’t assume, we ask many questions, we learn your story and find the true path towards success.
– We are Lazy…with data loading to maximize speed and engagement of the “mobile first” web.
– We are Arrogant (after we play Dumb). We are confident in our approach to Digital Strategy but we are not the right fit for every business. We are also humble in that it is an honor to explore if we are a fit to help grow a business online.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
MINT Social launched in 2008 as a social media marketing and online branding company. Our commitment then remains true today… to streamline and simplify the digital marketing process with measurable and scalable results.

We use design thinking to solve business problems. Our blend of best-in-class digital marketing tools, talent and technology gives businesses the competitive edge and foresight to grow today and for years to come.

What Makes Us Different?
Our unique approach to online marketing is centered on accelerating successes and failures. Every business we work with is unique, but ultimately we need to create a model for predictive results that we call “truth” maps. How we get here is through an iterative process of failure hacking…fail fast to accelerate success. We learn from every digital campaign we launch to guide us to the true path of marketing success for a business.

Is our city a good place to do what you do?
As a digital strategy company that is layering business intelligence, machine learning and artificial intelligence into our business model, we know we are in a high demand space. The Phoenix area is a blend of the old West (who you know and where you came from) along with a bourgeoning entrepreneurial mindset that is creating a new way of doing business. I love what is happening in the technology sector with the growth of co-working spaces and incubators for launching vetted business models. I have been a mentor for many years with ASU’s Entrepreneur and Innovation Group that helps early stage businesses launch and succeed. This is one of many mentoring groups that are entrenched in our educational system and accelerating the path of businesses and our future leaders. It is early but the future looks bright for the Phoenix/Scottsdale area.

Pricing:

  • Free Digital Audit – The current state of digital for your business and its preparedness for the next few years. Email digitalaudit@mintsocial.com for an invite.

Contact Info:


Image Credit:
Mark Goldstein (presenting in blue shirt)

Getting in touch: VoyagePhoenix is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.

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