Hello and welcome to Knight Talk The University of Florida College of Journalism and Commun Talk Show produced by students for students.

I'm Alexis Carson, a junior studying Journalism.

And our guest today is Cheryl Lu a 2021 CJC Hall of Famer who graduated with her Bachelor' in Journalism.

She has gone on to have a very successful career as Senior Vice President of Advertising Sales at Pandora and now serves as an Advisor at SoundHound.

Cheryl, thank you so much for be Thank you for inviting me.

Now, I've always known that I wa to study Journalism and work in the media field; Is that the same for you?

What was the earliest moment you that this was an industry that y had an interest in?

I grew up in a family that watch almost devoured, news and sort of events and we discussed There was dialogue constantly going on in our family about new so I wanted to be a reporter.

Sort of,.

the idea was to be an investigative reporter.

So when I went to college, I wanted to be in Journalism.

And I was very excited about the opportunity to go to the CJC for Journalism.

What was it about Journalism that excited you the most?

Was that your dream job?

When you were in my shoes, a student at U.F., to be an investigative reporter?

Originally it was, because to me journalism is finding the truth finding the audience to educate them and inspire them about that What happened, though, is when I got to college, I started getting excited about content development and I had a magazine course, which really sort of thrilled me It got me — I was fascinated by t process of putting a magazine to Then doing a business plan to find the audience, you know, develop every single part of the Then I got very excited about th content development and sort of how then do you find way or find the revenue to actually make this project su So I sort of started thinking — a change in career, that this might be more fun, mor interesting, and more compelling I have a love for magazines.

I'm the president of the Florida Magazine Student Associa So, I'm curious — what was your t like at Upside Magazine?

It was very fun because Upside was a small publication.

It was the first time I got to d much more hands-on, every part o Prior to that, I had sort of moved into selling and advertising for print magazines.

When I got to Upside, it was abo emerging technology industry and the people in the companies sort of driving that growth.

And when I got there, it was a small publication, so I had to build the Ad Team, I had to develop the story that was going to be compelling advertisers to purchase ad space And because I was at the small publication, I also was pl doing sort of the layout with th It was a lot of fun.

It was also very risky because we were small and it was a new type of magazin that we had to go out and really find advertisers that were willing to take a risk.

But it was an excitement for me that drove me as I went forward to more entrepreneurial companie Oh, wow, so you kind of got to o multiple different areas of how a magazine operates.

Yes.

And that is probably — you can have that when you go to a small company because it's much more hands-on.

And it's sort of been — it was very passionate for me be liked the content, I was excited I had just moved to California, which was very oriented toward these new emerging technology co So I get to deal with the compan but then also come back to the o and work with the editors on how find ways to present without — the editors were in their own ar but we had to find ways to place ads, build stories around what the content was.

It was a lot of fun.

It was very interesting.

I'm sure, that sounds like a dre Now, I love to hold an actual print magazine, but magazines nowadays have switched to a digital format.

What do you think about the grow and change in the magazine indus Well, I mean, I think what you want to do is you want to ge if you believe in your content, you want to find ways to get tha the reader, the user, the listen whatever it might be in whatever type of environment going to consume your editorial or your content.

So for me, it was exciting that not only did you have a print ma but there was also the opportuni on digital platforms to expand the audience, reach more people, and have a bigger impact.

So I was excited about digital.

Yeah, exactly, you kind of shift what the times are.

And then you went on to become t Founding Vice President of Sales and Marketing of Industry Standard Magazine, which grew rapidly in a short period of time.

That must have been such an adve It was definitely an adventure.

IDG, which was a huge technology publishing company was launching a new magazine or newspaper, is what they were cal because it was a weekly.

And they were looking for a new way to talk about what was which was digital, which was the Internet economy.

So we were a business magazine about the Internet.

And it was very — I mean I got th I was employee number three.

And within three years we grew t three thousand employees.

We opened an office in London, we did conferences in Barcelona because the Internet economy bec global phenomenon, not just in t So we were covering it on a worldwide basis.

But, I got to be there from conc and it was very fun.

We built, in addition to working with the editors on how we were actually present the publication we also then had to find — build the ad staff in multiple cities, you know, from New York, So the clients are not just in o We were based in San Francisco, but at the same time, we had a major office in New York.

So I had a staff there, had a st Detroit because you have the aut We had staff in Chicago because have all the consumer products.

We had offices in Dallas.

We had offices in L.A. L.A. is a used market as well fo consumer products.

So it was a very — you had to go where the advertis And at the same time, we also — to cover the stories more effect we put editors in those places a So, students often struggle with their degree focus.

And yet you work in a slightly d area than your major.

With a degree in Journalism, how you end up working more in the advertising field?

It's as I mentioned to you in th beginning when I was talking about building a magazin what I recognized was that I was very excited about the whole process of content development.

So there's more to journalism th the news reporting as well as the news writing.

And what I learned was that my e and my fascination was really wi the whole process.

And when you put the process tog do have to find revenue to pay for building the process.

So I got very excited about putt the story together that dealt with the audience and helped brands and consumers get for example, find advertisers th want to be part of this content and want to reach their ideal audience by advertis pages or the digital platforms o wherever it might be, where this content was.

That to me was a very compelling opportunity.

And so I sort of slowly moved ov from thinking I wanted to be a r to wanting to be a publisher.

That's really cool that you brin content creation is so huge now, and it seems like you were kind on the bleeding edge before this Well, you know, one of the thing excites me and what fascinates m was I got really involved in entrepreneurial companies tha doing things differently.

They were finding ways to tell stories differently.

So for me, I always looked for a that was going to change the wor or talk about the changes in the and I was very excited about tha So I was attracted to those type property, that type of content.

And I guess that puts me on the bleeding edge.

Yes.

To be a part of a company t truly passionate about.

I always had to believe in the c I had to believe that they were doing the right thing for me to be able to build a story and sell it.

Many students hope to simply wor existing media companies.

What was your experience like as Founding Publisher of Edutopia?

It was very exciting, we were — the idea — George Lucas has an educational that is about transforming educa using innovation and technology, and he tries to, in his definiti is looking for creating lifelong And when I was approached with t idea of being the publisher ther it was an idea that I believed i and I felt very excited about it I got to work with an editor that I knew from previous working at the Industry Standard were able to build on that idea and create a — it was an every ot six times a year issue magazine about transforming educ And it was written for educators So for me, it wasn't for consume much as it was for the actual ed And it was very, very exciting b we were part of first of all, George Lucas's fou But beyond that, we had to build a team from scratch.

We had to create a look and feel And then we had to create the ma that would help us sell the cont to the advertising market.

And it was very, very — the first year was very risky because it was a whole new to get to an educator audience.

But it did very well.

We actually won an award the fir for not only our media kit, whic is part of selling — the selling concepts and the mission of the that you use to go into the mark but we also won for the best new magazine from the Western Publishers Association.

So it was a very exciting opport On top of that, we also got to m with George Lucas like every six weeks to tell him what we were doing and what things were happening, what we were having successes wi what we needed.

And he was a good listener and h many, many ideas, so it was fun working with him.

So you met George Lucas.

Many times.

He's a really good guy.

Oh, that's so good to hear.

Are you a Star Wars fan yourself Of course; and isn't everybody?

They better be — one of the best series ever.

It was fun because we worked at Skywalker Ranch, which was his, where he had a film production c they did sound.

So we got to go to film screenin there was a lot of perks that went with this particular j But it was a nonprofit, so it ha a different mission than a lot of the publications I had worked for in the past.

And Edutopia is such a unique na could you tell me the story behi There was a lot of back and fort what to call this, but we wanted it to be about the future and a where everyone is educated in the right way and teachers are creating lifelong l So it was the combination of utopia with education.

And so that's where the name cam Okay so you worked there in 2005 which is around the time that that Star Wars episode three cam So I have to ask, did you get to Hayden Christensen?

No, I did not.

But I did meet Chewbacca.

They had a big party where it wa on the grounds of Skywalker Ranc and we got to meet several of the characters.

But the one I remember distinctl Chewbacca.

And then you became Senior Vice President of Adverti in 2005 to the company that woul be later known as Pandora Radio.

What was the original name and h go about developing their advertising model?

Pandora was originally a product not for consumers, but it was sold to companies lik where you could go in and find m If you liked one song, you could music you loved.

And originally it was called Savage Beast Technologies, which is about, I guess, music soothes the Savage Beast.

But it was a very different conc And there was a very small team and I was brought on early on because they decided to become what they call Internet radio.

They discovered Internet radio, and the idea was people were on their computers and they wanted that they could listen to music without the typical ads running for twenty minutes during a sess of listening to music.

So I was brought on because they find a way to pay for it because every time a song plays, there is a — there's money that has to be pai out to the artists and there had to be a way to pay So advertising in a subtle way w didn't interrupt the listener ex was the original concept of what I was brought in to do.

And in coming in, it was just a web product.

So when you turned on Pandora, I should send you some photos of originally looked like, but it w very much of a web-based product and we created an ad where we ba to put digital ads on the page.

But then for advertisers to know that people were still look because when sometimes they go on to do other work while you music is playing — how did you guarantee that that would get that guaranteed view a get the opportunity to engage with the listener?

We had to create an opportunity they were looking at the screen and engaged.

So we started changing advertising every time someone i So, for example, if you skipped if you started a new station if you thumbed up or thumbed dow a variety of things that happene when the visual advertising woul As the company grew, we had to find new ways to engag the user with the advertising th actually paying for the content to be displayed.

And we created something called branded radio.

Where branded radio was, we woul with an advertiser and create so playlist or a group of songs tha sort of embody the brand as well as engage their ideal cu And they would then add that to their station list.

And while they were listening to that station, they would only see ads from that particular bra Our first brand that risked it a to come along with us on this program of branded radio was Honda.

And then Burger King came along, Dunkin' Donuts, and then it was like the company with advertising and more and mo users came along.

It was a very, very wonderful op to really change the radio advertising industry a radio in general.

Since you worked in streaming mu before many of us adopted to pla like Pandora, is the streaming i where you envisioned it would be Did it disrupt the music and rad industry as much as some thought maybe ten to fifteen years ago.

When things really turned around happened for Internet radio was iPhone or Apple opened the App S we were one of the first apps that you could adopt on your iPh And in the process of having tha all of a sudden millions of people were download Pandora, listening on the go.

And all of a sudden, there was n you didn't have to just be in front of your computer to to music, but you could listen wherever you were.

And it was that moment when that that our whole model changed com because then the majority of our users were on-the-go, they were on mobile.

And then from there we went into we went into cars.

Pandora is even on some refriger but anywhere there's a connected Pandora became an opportunity fo to listen to music, to choose when you listen to mus So we actually had to change our entire model and find ways to create revenue from this new on-the-go behavio Because you weren't just on your computer anymore, you were listening across multiple areas.

So, you know, Internet radio — it was a dramatic change for the whole industry.

And I think it continues to be there because it's about every connected device there is.

What kinds of innovation made Pandora marketable?

Were there any challenges?

There were lots of challenges.

I mean, part of it is the way you pay for music.

The minute a song starts playing a money meter clicking that you have to pay an artist.

And it was — we had to find ways to monetize that.

So that was one of the most difficult parts of the company: how to actually make sure that t average the musicians were beign because it's very different than buying a record.

You're just listening to it for So we had to find ways that the musician and the artist was paid And there were processes that were already in place for that.

We had to definitely cover those but we were also changing the whole advertising model on radio, and that was something really unique because initially we were not us audio ads because we didn't want disrupt the listener experience.

We have added audio ads into the process, but they're quite different.

They aren't as long and they are taking as much time.

So it's a different process beca know you're on-the-go when you're listening, so we've changed that process.

So we dramatically changed the radio industry compl And you're now an Advisor for SoundHound, which you previously served as t Vice President of Advertising Strategy and Sales.

Tell us about those roles within the company.

Well, if you're not familiar wit SoundHound, it started as a music identity where if you list something and you wanted to know what it was, you ask SoundHound to basically figure out what that song was.

But, it is now a new and exciting AI technology and it's really about being a voice assistant where they're connecting people brands through conversational te So it's a very exciting place to because I think voice assistance voice enabling is going to be th of probably everything we do.

What about the roles within the Initially, my role was to find w once again similar to what I did at Pandora, find ways forward, because it was on a mobile devic to create opportunities for bran to connect with the consumers that were searching for music ch or finding out what that music w and learning more about that song, that artist.

So we were trying to find ways t those brands with our consumer a And so we were creating lots of different ways for advertisers to be present as someone was discovering the music they were looking for.

And it was very exciting beacuse a whole new way of discovery.

And we were finding ways to plac advertisers' messages in front of our consumers.

As the company was changing and they were doing more of a consumer brand, they were c their business model to go after brands where they could voice assistant within that bran For example, within a Hyundai ca within a Mercedes car, where when you're talking in the you're asking your questions, they became that voice assistant in those cars.

So they're on a different path r in a different — advertising is not as important at this point because of the new products that developing as voice assistants.

What do you think the future of enabling the world looks like?

How do you strategize for someth so cutting edge?

I think one of the things that's happening right now is voice assistants are going to be ubiquitous in the world and that they're going to be everywhere.

They're going to be improving customer service, they're going to be — you know, if you think about a variety of things you do, and sitting there and typing in a qu you're going to just ask whatever device or whatever connected device you're working So they're going to be everywher The strategy behind that is: how do you do that without disru giving people the most accurate answer they can.

So, there's a whole technology behind accuracy, giving you just everything you n So you become dependent on that.

And that's a whole new future that we're going to.

And there's a lot of companies that are involved in that, SoundHound being one.

Of course, Amazon, Google, there's numerous companies.

But right now, too, there's a th where you have to say, "Okay, Google, tell me this," "Okay, Alexa."

What SoundHound has done is allo to put your own brand there.

So, for example, when you're in Hyundai car, you don't have to put in those, what they call "wa or words that wake up the system to actually answer your question So instead of Siri, you're askin brand to give you the answer.

And that to me is much more of a future to have it be ubiquitous everywhere you can.

Since you've worked in this busi for so many years, how do you fe seeing that this industry has ch so much over the years?

I'm glad to have been part of it because I kept learning.

No matter what opportunity came there was something that was disrupting the previous part.

And yes, it was changing, and things were disappearing or I got to be part of it and try t with ideas, concepts that would allow that part of the industry in new ways and then had to educate the people w are working with me how to do things differently.

So it was actually very, very compe very powerful, very exciting to be part of the industry changing all the time.

So, for students graduating soon what do we need to know to be su in the media industry?

I think the communication skills are probably the most imp Whatever path you take — writing The University of Florida taught a lot about writing and I feel that that is probably the most important thing because writing — because of texting and of other things has fallen — I think is a priority for a lot of students.

And writing is still so importan And to be able to speak to any a whether it's in writing or speak it is so important to be successful in a career.

And to me, those are the most important skills that you s as you take into the job world.

Thank you, Cheryl.

It was so inspiring to hear that you followed what you were passi about and then you became succes And thank you to our viewers for joining us.

Until next time, goodnight.