NextUP – Joe Laresca

Joe Laresca, Founder, CEO, and Creative Director of NOISE, gives advice to aspiring entrepreneurs. He discusses how his team navigates working on multiple projects at once. Laresca also shares exciting plans for the future of the agency.

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TRANSCRIPT:

 

KATY: I’m Katy Colón, the Client Service and Marketing Associate here at D S Simon Media.

 

ISIS: I’m Isis Simpson-Mersha, Conference Producer and Reporter at Ragan.

 

KATY: We’re here with Joe. Joe, it’s so good to have you.

 

JOE: Hello. Well, thanks for having me on. I’m Joe, I’m the founder, CEO, and creative director of a company called NOISE. We’re based here in New York City, and the best way to describe it is we have two sides of the company. One is our bread and butter, that’s our full-service agency. And then the other is a venture studio. So, on the agency side, we essentially sell marketing and creative services that range from strategy, design, social production, and experiential to companies and brands, and public figures who are looking to make noise.

We say we don’t we don’t sell services, we help, we sell noise, and then on the other side is the venture studio. So that’s where we use our agency to build our own brands in-house. And sometimes that’s an idea I had, or an employee had, and we think it’s, you know, it’s worth, you know, pouring resources into that. And other times it’s an actual, like a celebrity, public figure, what have you, who comes to us and may have a really good idea. And we’ll use our agency to build that and be co-owners with them.

 

ISIS: Your slogan, well, we sell noise I think that is so cool. Pretty creative. And so, imagine, you know, communications must be a really large role in your agency. So, you know, do you think it’s important to have a communications background when starting a business or do you think that’s something you can sort of learn along the way?

 

JOE: Sometimes newcomers will try really hard to say something super crazy and super contrarian so that they stick out. And I think that’s really important and we definitely do that. But I also think it’s really, really important to use the frameworks and processes that have been designed by industry professionals over the last several, several decades, you know, 100 years and take what’s really, really good from that and then insert your own flavor, your own approach. And so, because that’s your IP and if you just do what everyone else does and just tell someone like, you know, PR or comm and you just take the same framework or someone else, then you’re just like everyone else and probably really hard to stick out and grow your business. So, I think it’s yes, I think it’s important to have the background, not too much of it, because then you’re a little jaded, just a little bit, and then inserting your own approach to it.

 

KATY: How do you balance creative projects?

 

JOE: I get this question a lot. I don’t is the truth, and I’m still learning how to do it every single day. I’m not sure I’ll ever fully learn how to do the thing, but I’ve learned things throughout the process. I think it’s really important for people to figure out what works for themselves, you know, how are they that they’re their best self, you know, how are they the most productive, the most creative. And I think it’s very, very case by case. But for me, I need to be working on multiple things in order for me to be creative, and productive, and excited about the work that I get to do. So, I get to work on client projects and multiple industries, and that’s amazing. And I get to work on the brands that we’re launching in-house, which is also amazing. Every single year we set our goals for the next 12, to 18, to 24 months, and those goals have plans and details on how to hit those goals on a monthly, weekly, and daily basis. That’s how we figure out if we’re doing what we’re supposed to do. And then those are managed in a project management system, shout-out Notion. But I still definitely I’m a pen-to-paper guy, so I still have sticky notes and white pieces of paper all over the office and write all over the walls.  But yeah, that’s how, that’s how we do it.

 

ISIS: Yeah, I’d have to say that I do enjoy working on multiple things at once, but like you mentioned, sometimes it is difficult, right, because you have to balance and figure it all out. But I imagine that comes with the territory and your experience over time. But given Ragan’s Communications Week theme this year is Meet the Moment, how will you rise to the occasion over the next few months in your career journey?

 

JOE: It’s that we are we’re actually launching the Latin side of NOISE. It’s called NOISE Latin. And that’s probably one of the most exciting things that I’ve probably done in my career. We’re about to do my career, you know, so far. And essentially, it’s basically offering all of our services in Spanish and Spanglish because those are just as important. And it’s basically helping companies target not only a very significant part of the country, a very important part of the country, but a very underrepresented part of the country. A lot of people don’t know that there are 60 million, I’m also Latin, and there are 60 million of us in this country, which is about 20% of the country. And it’s continuously growing. And it’s really important to me it feels very authentic in terms of taking that a little step further, we’re also pledging $1 million worth of creative services for free to Latin-owned businesses. And third will be launching to Latin-inspired companies that we developed in-house in the next 12 months.

 

ISIS: Amazing. Thank you for sharing that. I love that you’re able to really, you know, match, you know, your background to, you know, your passion and work. That’s so cool. Well, thank you so much for joining us. So insightful.

 

JOE: Thanks, thanks for having me. You guys are great.