Michael Allen, CMO at Masimo Consumer – The Importance of Creative Partnerships

Michael Allen is Chief Marketing Officer at Masimo Consumer, home to a wide range of audio, home entertainment, and personal healthcare brands.

During his career, Michael has led ad agencies, including 180 globally and TBWA/Chiat/Day, San Francisco, and was a marketing director at Nike. He has deep experience across consumer categories, including electronics, athletic footwear and apparel, automotive, fashion, technology (as well as health tech), travel and retail.

Christian sat down with Mike to discuss his experiences at Nike and what it’s like to take a health tech company into the consumer space.

Where to find Michael Allen: LinkedIn

Where to find Christian Banach: LinkedIn

Allen’s path to CMO

Banach:

Tell us a little more about yourself. How did you find yourself at Masimo now?

Allen:

I always loved the advertising I would see on television. Even things I saw from the 1950s, like the Dick Van Dyke show—a lot of those programs focused on people in the advertising industry. I grew up in a rural part of San Diego County and went to school at UCLA, so I felt close to that world. I originally wanted to be an attorney, and chose to advertise as my “backup” when I first started college.

Banach:

You landed at BBDO after school and then moved on to 180, helping build it from the ground up. Walk us through that.

Allen:

I was working at BBDO and worked with Apple, and I actually applied to law school. I was recruited to go to  Rubin Postaer and work with Honda. Cars was a category I liked more than Apple at the time, and it reignited my love for advertising. 

When I was working there, I saw an ad from Nike looking for category ad managers in Portland. I really loved Nike as a brand, so I jumped at the opportunity. After that, I was eventually recruited by TBWA/Chiat/Day.

Before Omnicom bought 180, I was at TBWA/Chiat/Day, and they came to me and asked if I would help an agency in Amsterdam, 180, pitch Adidas. I actually worked at Adidas globally for 13 years—almost twice as long as I worked at Nike. . 

Banach:

Wow what great brands you were blessed to be involved with!

You’ve seen the business from the client side, then the agency side, and now back on the client side. I’m curious: what are the pros and cons to each? What are the primary differences?

Allen:

That’s a great question.  The thing I loved about running agencies is that you spend most of your day around creativity and creative people. 

On the client side, you’re drawn into the business side as well—which is good once you feel you can contribute—but you don’t get to do the creative stuff as much. One of the things that inspired me about Masimo is that I’m going to be balancing both of those sides in my role now. 

Transforming Masimo with a Consumer Focus

Banach:

We’ve talked a bit about your path, let’s talk about where you are today: Masimo Consumer has a really exciting lineup of wearable and hearable products. Some people may not be familiar with the company, even if they know some of the brands. Tell us more about it.

Allen:

Masimo is a B2B brand that’s grown up in hospitals and healthcare. We make amazing sensors, and that technology has improved and saved a lot of lives over the years. I love that I get to be part of a brand that really exists to improve lives and help people. That’s important for me, especially at this stage in my career.

As we shift into the consumer space, the ideas and product pipelines we have coming out are things I really couldn’t imagine before. And it helps people not just from a health perspective—so our world-class audio brands like in-home speakers, headphones, and earbuds are part of our products too.

I’m loving being able to help imagine how to change the landscape of how people can take control of their home health and make their lives better through technology.

Banach:

What products are you especially excited about?

Allen:

We just launched the Denon PerL, which is an earbud that uses adaptive acoustic technology. It customizes the sound for your personal listening based on tech that measures the soundwaves and how you hear them. It’s your own personal audio profile.

I’m excited about it because it’s one of the first times we’re marrying the heritage of the tech of Masimo with an audio brand with a similar heritage.

Banach:

How does one tackle a portfolio of brands, as opposed to your experience in a place like Nike?

Allen:

Working with agencies through the years helps. It takes work to get your IQ level up within different categories and brands, and it takes a lot of work to be able to wear a lot of different kinds of hats. Being a good listener is important, so I developed that as one of my skills, too. 

Banach:

Is this a new role for Masimo? What are your main objectives as you’re coming in?

Allen:

It’s a new role for Masimo Consumer, though we have a CMO on the healthcare side. So it’s new as we’re building awareness for Masimo as a consumer brand. We want to get out there and tell our story while we’re bringing in brands that can help build that reputation.

Ultimately, we measure our success by how well we can get the Masimo name out there and how we can grow the great reputations of these great brands, too. I feel we’re just on the front edge of what’s happening in consumer health at this moment, too. After the pandemic, people have been empowered to take care of their health and more willing to use technology like telehealth to help maintain their well-being. 

Putting the Team Together

Banach:

It’s a good moment in time, no doubt. Tell me a little about your internal team—are you building an in-house team? Working with agencies?

“I’m a huge believer that the best agencies in the world have the best creative talent.”

Allen:

We have an internal creative services team—we handle most of the mid- to lower-funnel things and retail execution like in-store promotions. We run projects for all the audio and consumer health brands. 

We employ agencies around the world for bigger launches to assist with upper and mid-funnel projects, too. I’m a huge believer that the best agencies in the world have the best creative talent.  A few brands have been successful in building great internal teams, but there’s a great combination of talent you can get when you work with agencies. 

Banach:

You mentioned the creative side—what attributes do you look for in an agency partner?

Allen:

I don’t want any assholes—can I say that?

Banach:

Haha, you can say whatever you want…

Allen:

The best experience of my career has been working with talented people who are also good people—people who are in it because they are passionate about the work. People like that are fun to work with; they push for what they believe in, but they aren’t arrogant about it. I look for that in creative partners. 

Banach:

Any final thoughts you’d like to add?

Allen:

For me, when you take on a role like this where you’re responsible for leading a lot of people, I sat down and made it clear: “These are the principles and values that have guided me throughout my career.” I think that was a great handshake. It clarified for people, “I know what this guy is about and what he expects.” 

That’s something I would encourage other people to do, too, especially for roles like this. 

Allen and Banach discussed more about Allen’s experiences with Nike, his passion for mentorship, and cold calling to get his first interview at BBDO. You can view the complete interview here.

Edited for Clarity