Tom Szaky

TV stations, newspapers, radio stations and even blogs are in the business of disseminating great content, to entice us to tune in and spend time watching their channel or reading their copy. But content costs money to create, and so the media outlets turn to advertisers who buy up adspace to place their marketing messages. This has been the daily dance, many times played out in a “church vs. state” kind of manner - where editorial content and advertising content are kept religiously separate.

But what if we took a step back and changed the paradigm? Instead of paying for the advertising, why not get paid to be the content?

Negative-Cost Marketing is an exploration of this very question through the lens of Tom Szaky, who did it himself with no agencies, no advertising, and most importantly no budget. He has built a marketing platform around his unique global recycling company, TerraCycle, that today generates over 21 media placements per day, blogs for dozens of major media outlets from the New York Times to Huffington Post, has published multiple books, has its logo on over 60 billion products per year, holds major licensing deals, and is even the center of its own reality TV show series (now in its fourth season). Most of these projects generate more revenue than cost and have helped to establish a decade of year over year growth for their business.

The ideas in this talk topic can be applied to any organization small or large, and have helped TerraCycle to become a global company with over $20 million dollars of annual sales, all while generating revenue through its marketing department.