Executive Creative Director & Writer
Hi, I'm Bill. A few things about me:
00 — The Work at a Glance
01 — Who I Am
Humor, humanity and other powerful H words.
I've spent over (cough) years in advertising and more than 20 years doing live improv comedy – which probably explains why I can't resist bringing energy, humanity, and a little joyful chaos to things that normally feel corporate and lifeless.
Whether it's comedy or emotion, I love uncovering a human truth that makes people stop, laugh, feel, care or just say...Ha! (H word).
Oh, and for what it's worth, my philosophy on work and life can all be distilled down to my favorite bumper sticker.
Less snarky resume here →
02 — Portfolio
Social video work for one of the country's most recognized battery brands. Reminding people that in a world full of idiots "outrageously undependable people", Interstate Batteries remains an "Outrageously Dependable" choice. Driving improvements of 35% in gross profit ROI, 13% in unaided brand awareness, and 60% in marketing contribution to sales — the most successful campaign in the brand's 70+ year history.
— The Work
Soup
Seat Belt
Packing Skills
Holiday Lights (Winter Social)
Flea Market (Social)
Gas Pump (Social)
Tight Spot (Social)
Flea Market (CTV)
Gas Pump (CTV)
Holiday Lights (CTV)
— The Results
Whether we had a spot in the game or not, Avocados From Mexico loved to insert themselves into Super Bowl conversation — with spots, live social pivots, and a jingle that refuses to leave your head.
— The Work
You probably know the Avocados From Mexico jingle (it's in your head now, isn't it). You probably also know that adding avocados to just about anything makes it better. So, we had a simple thought. Why not combine those truths and let the tune of our jingle help make things better?
Benched
Water Main
— Super Bowl
Helped build Avocados From Mexico into a cultural phenomenon — winning the Super Bowl on social year after year, delivering a nearly 5x unaided awareness increase, all on a fraction of competitors' budgets.
AFM Live Social / War Room
Adam & Eve Super Bowl
— What People Said
Whoever is running social for @AvosFromMexico deserves a raise as possibly a Pulitzer (do they give those for Tweets yet?)
@AvosFromMexico I love your comments about the other commercials… your marketing team is genius and obviously working during the Super Bowl. Whoever they are, give them a raise ASAP! Sincerely, former marketer turned RN
— The AvoFans Collab
AvoFans took to the stands at the Georgia–Georgia Tech game, disrupting the action and earning tons of organic conversation. Turns out, avocados at a football game is a thing people really want to talk about.
AvoFans / University of Georgia Collab
— What People Were Saying
why are there avocados walking around Sanford Stadium right now??? asking for a me who is very confused 😂
Georgia Georgia Tech and the most talked about thing is definitely the three avocados in the stands. Peak college football.
whoever decided to put avocados at a football game is a genius. I'm literally tweeting about avocados instead of the game. @AvosFromMexico
my roommate just called to ask why there are avocados at the Georgia game. I have no answers but I respect it so much.
Inspired by 2 Corinthians 9:7 — "God loves a cheerful giver." Give with Joy celebrates the energy that comes from generosity. It was a joy to present, a joy to produce, and our friends at Shindig Music helped us create a catchy song to boot. Oh, and Post Malone was involved.
— The Work
Give With Joy :60
Joy to the World :30
Give With Joy (Social)
— The Social
— Oh, And Post Malone Was Involved
Every Thanksgiving, the Salvation Army sponsors the halftime of the Dallas Cowboys game. It's their joyful kickoff to the giving season. This year's headliner was Post Malone. And he brought the joy in a big way.
Post Malone — Give with Joy
Sure, there was a brief. Sure, this was a campaign to help a brewery come out of Covid with a smile on their face. But, at the end of the day, if the name of your business is Braindead, we had to lean into it.
— The Posters
Mouth Is Good
This Is Ad
Glass Goes Here
— The Concept
Braindead Teleprompter
The world's least helpful teleprompter.
Real people. Real teleprompter. Scripts designed to feel just coherent enough to follow — but just disorienting enough to make their brains short-circuit a little. Voilà. The braindead effect.
— Be More Braindead
More Delicious Beer
Use Hand
Beer Go In
Hurray
That Was Fun
Yum
Vivus makes Qsymia — a weight loss drug that isn't a GLP-1, but delivers similar (if not better) efficacy with none of the common side effects. The catch: they're wildly outspent. So we built a social campaign designed to break through on personality alone.
Qsymia works by helping your brain fall out of love with food. So "The Love Affair Is Over" imagines how food might respond to being rejected. Conceived for the US — currently running in Poland (yes, 🇵🇱 Poland), where early breakthrough data is looking great.
Every spot was produced entirely with AI. When you're wildly outspent, you use every tool available to punch above your weight class. As it turns out, that's a pretty good brief.
— The Concept
US versions — because we're guessing you don't speak Polish.
Burger
Pizza
Tandem — Pierogi
Aloha — Musubi
— Running in Poland
The campaign is live on Polish social media — and showing great early breakthrough data.
Pizza — Polish
Pączku — Polish
— Social Mockup
Facebook ad running in Poland — "Pożegnanie z Burgerem" (Farewell to the Burger)
Bridgestone ran Super Bowl spots for a few years, and I was fortunate enough to sell two of them. There's a heck of a story behind Reply All — check out the ABC 20/20 segment.
— The Work
Whale of a Tale (Super Bowl)
Reply All (Super Bowl)
Reply All on 20/20
A deep run across the NA beverage portfolio. Snapple had been around for years before anyone pointed out their fruit flavors actually taste like real fruit — we brought that story to life through digital and social. Also worked on Dr Pepper, 7Up, and Straight Up Tea.
Four brands. Four tabs. ↓ Browse them all below.
Straight Up Tea is a tea so natural and good that you would never want to throw it into any harbor. Unless it was to make a point about how pure it is. Which is basically what we did.
Throw It In The Harbor
Give Me Straight Up Tea
Straight Up Tea (Social)
All Natural (Social)
Yes. This spot is a spec spot. A certain company that boasts adding "nothing" to their product turned it down. So, there. I have nothing to hide.
— The Work
Nothing
TXU Energy is the leading energy provider in the state of Texas. It's been a great ride helping their advertising evolve from purely rational to the kind of work that gets talked about in sports bars — and well, other bars. I like that kind of energy.
— The Work
Haunted House
Scary Movie
Hot Towels
Sun and Moon Living Room
Sun and Moon: Dance
Social - Moonwalk
Moon Walk Social
Grandpa's Tractor Pull
Stellantis looks at a gazillion spots and only airs a small handful. I worked on Jeep and Ram Trucks, and both of my spots were called to the starting line but neither made it to broadcast. That tiny detail doesn't change how much I love them. Also included an internal brand video, because who doesn't love a good X and Y axis chart?
— The Work
Jeep — Will
Ram — Candle
FCA Matrix
Chuck E Cheese came to us saying they needed a total refresh. We handled everything from redesigning the character to developing his new "voice" — a fully rendered rock star with a big heart. That voice turned out to be the lead singer of Grammy-nominated band Bowling for Soup. A highlight for me was hanging out in lead singer Jaret Reddick's studio and co-writing all the songs we ended up using.
— The Evolution of Chuck E
— The New Face of Chuck E
Guitar magazine even picked up on how authentic new rock star Chuck E was in an article about his new guitar.
— The Work
Follow Me to Fun
Locking Up
Cleaning Up
Holiday
— Snapshot
One challenge we faced when launching an entirely new character was, you couldn't see him inside their stores. We created an AR app that allowed customers to take pictures with the "new" Chuck E at various locations throughout their stores.
Snapshot
— Jeopardy
Who is Chuck E Cheese?
It was a fun surprise to see the Chuck E backstory that I had written as part of a Jeopardy answer.
— Oh, and by the way...
If you weren't familiar with Bowling For Soup, this is them. And now you know!
Bowling for Soup
Work for the leading online tire retailer, helping consumers make confident decisions on one of their most important vehicle investments. From character-driven spots to a Dude Perfect collab to tire reviews that were, shall we say, dramatically "elevated." The work runs the full range of TireRack's brand voice.
— The Work
First Date
Proposal
Mina Bird
Autocross
Searches
A Brief History of Tires
Dude Perfect Collab
— Elevated Reviews
TireRack.com is known for being a repository of insider and user reviews for all the tires they sell. We recently started a program where different brands could have their online tire reviews — dramatically "elevated."
Spy Style
03 — Beyond the Brief
Yep — published children's book author. My first book, The Forever Dog, deals with the death of a beloved pet. HarperCollins wanted me to be "the guy who writes about tough topics," so my next book tackled divorce. I wrote The Forever Dog after my golden retriever Mo died while she was still very young. I also met my wife at a book signing at Barnes & Noble. I have much more fun writing advertising than books about tough topics, but the letters from grateful parents are pretty tough to beat.
— What Readers Are Saying
Go to book on the timelessness of any meaningful relationship
Meltemi · Verified Purchase
Ever since first discovering The Forever Dog, I have shared or given it to more adults than children. I am writing this review today as I purchase it for a married couple who just lost their 20-year-old cat. I cannot recommend this book enough for anyone who has ever loved...well...anything!
Grief helping
Amazon Customer · Verified Purchase
This tearjerker is exactly what we were looking for after our beloved pet passed away. A friend who is a counselor recommended this to us and I could not be happier to deal with the grief and our five-year-old.
Great read for pre-K boys
Amazon Customer · Verified Purchase
My 5-year-old really responded to this book well. He loves reading it, and it does a great job reinforcing what the divorce means for him.
An outstanding, realistic addition to books about death and dying
Booklist · Editorial Review
"An outstanding, realistic addition to books about death and dying." — Booklist
I combined my borderline freak-show obsession for track & field with my love of writing by launching a track & field T-shirt website. I sold shirts all over the world, but closed the shop because I was making far too much money. (Okay — I closed because Covid shut down the entire world of track and field.)
— Some Designs
Bit Putts
Boing Boing
Get Over Yourself
Pass on the Curve
That Other Field
— The Videos
TNS Montage
Hotel Laps
I helped develop The Whynauts — an original, award-winning, live-action educational television series for the Perot Museum of Nature and Science. We shot eleven episodes based in STEM education for elementary school children, with code-switching Spanish language throughout. All these years, I finally felt ready to take my 8th grade science exams.
— The Trailer
Whynauts Trailer
— Full Episodes
Energy is Everywhere
Engineer It
Staying Alive
What happens when you've created award-winning Super Bowl commercials and your son plays on a travel hockey team? You make sizzle videos. A lot of them. The first is riddled with inside jokes — every team probably has their version of Arnie. The Dallas Penguins sure do love ours. Also an amazing excuse to work on AI filmmaking chops.
— The Videos
Pens Go to South Bend — The Arnie Story
Level Up — Ain't Takin' the Day Off
These Are the Names
CCM Dallas Hype
Fight to the Finish
Dallas Penguins Films — Jackalopes Hype
Stick Together
Presidents Day Tournament
↑ Presidents Day Tournament: I took one parent's text from a group text and turned it into this President's Day video. It all became rather controversial when one of our parents shared it with the other team. Whoopsie.
An initiative to stop pissing off our planet during Super Bowl halftime. Also known as the Super Flush, when millions of people use their facilities at once, overwhelming water processing plants and creating algal blooms. Our rivers don't have a Plan B, but we had a Plan P. Pee on a Plant. We even sold custom-made Pee Pots.
— The Work
Problem
Super Flush
Social Campaign
And what kind of copywriter would I be if I didn't dabble in voiceover. I've read for hundreds of spots. But here is my demo reel, for fun.
— The Reel
Demo Reel