This Former Netflix Executive Is Starting His Own Ethnographic Marketing Agency

Myles Worthington never dreamed of starting a business. Raised by a single mother who had the same job for 35 years, the marketing executive felt he was never conditioned to be a business owner or entrepreneur. That all changed late last year. While he was at Netflix as head of global audiences, brand and editorial marketing, Worthington had grown less enthusiastic with his place at the streamer. "There's things that I'm just not feeling anymore at Netflix," he recalled saying to his wife. "I love my team and the work, but I feel like we're starting to not be a fit for each other anymore." After nearly six years at Netflix—and several years in the ad agency and public relations worlds—Worthington founded Worthi in January. He describes it as an "ethnographic marketing, communications and content agency." Ethnography is the scientific description of the customs of individual peoples and cultures. Worthi is monitoring the evolving trends and habits of people who identify as Black, Latinx, LGBTQIA+, AAPI, Indigenous and living with disabilities (both visible and invisible). Netflix’s Ad Tier Is Coming Soon—and Media Buyers Have Many Questions Ethnography was always going to be a part of Worthington's business. It was part of his job at Netflix, spearheading cultural social channels such as Strong Black Lead, Con Todo and Golden. "While I was at Netflix, I thought about how would this work," he told Adweek. "I would talk with folks I knew in various brands and got lots of positive feedback." Worthington's wife noticed how he developed a reputation as a trusted voice in the marketing sphere. She suggested that he start there. His inbox was full of requests asking for his insights. All Worthington needed was a formal business setup to connect with brands. The company was founded in April and launched in September. As an agency, Worthi offers clients audience identification, content creation, marketing and social media strategy, PR and external affairs capabilities, among other things. The agency's client list already includes Paramount+, Lionsgate, Peloton and Procter & Gamble. Worthington spoke with Adweek about why he founded the agency and what the marketing industry is missing when reaching out to underrepresented audiences. Adweek: How did you land on ethnography as the backbone of your agency's mission? Myles Worthington: When C-suite executives or mainstream media think multicultural, they think "small, niche and not for me." But really, it's about marketing. How do I make content relevant for these audiences? By understanding their unique culture and bringing things to them in a way that makes sense. It makes them excited and it makes them feel like they're being talked specifically to. That to me is base-level marketing. I reference Insecure all the time. [Series creator] Issa Rae made sure from every section that it is very intentionally Black—and for Black women. But Nielsen viewing shows that it overindexes in the white women demo. It's a great example of very specific execution and universal truths. The Ethical Challenge of AI Accent Neutralization vs. Sonic Diversity Larger audiences come through and that's what I really tried to push with my clients. These audiences need to be talked to. They are the future global majority. Let's be very honest with the changing demographics of the country and the world. To future-proof your business, you have to do this work now because soon there'll be no general market whatsoever, at least not in today's definition. What do the agency's day-to-day operations look like? For a lot of our clients, we help them with their larger business and marketing strategy. We focus on identifying, attracting and retaining audiences that, traditionally, have been historically underserved. The most exciting engagements with clients are when they have the desire to move in that direction of reaching underrepresented audiences, but don't know how. That malleability is the best because we can define everything for them. We can think through what audience brands should be going after; we look at how and what it means for the brand. We ask, "How can we reflect the brand in a way that makes sense to these audiences?" Lastly, we look to build a macro strategy, so that once [we've answered those questions], we can then build a social, PR and paid media strategy. The strongest space for Worthi is the earned- and owned media more so than the paid. I personally come from both a PR and then social and brand background. So I bring a strategic and functional lens with the work. Also, I personally feel more influenced when I read an article from an outlet or individual journalists that I trust. Do you think brands are missing something when trying to market to underrepresented audiences? On the whole, yes. Brands could be doing better. The thing I like to say a lot is you need both consistency and authenticity. You can't have one without the other, especially in this day and age where you could be showing up authentically during Black History Month or authentically during Pride. But Black people exist outside of February. Queer people exist outside of June, so you can't only show up there. Worthi looks to help brands serve underrepresented audiences. That used to be how brands would check the box. I don't know about you, but I don't call my grandmother and say, "Happy Black History Month, granny, how are you doing this month?" There's a conversation and an experience that happens 365 days of the year. That is where actual relationships are built between brand and consumer. That's the space where brands are missing. And that's where I want Worthi to help and create a spark and consistency. How far along is the marketing industry in terms of DEI efforts? One way to measure that is the demographics of the C-suite. How are people going to innately understand that these demos are important because they share similar lived experiences? We know those numbers are garbage. So that may take a long time if we used that as our barometer. Let's talk about the bottom line of your business, right? Sometimes people think this work is very corporate social responsibility, doing this for the "warm and fuzzies" as I like to say. Ultimately, a business would be doing this because it's going to help them succeed. We'll get more subscribers, get more acquisition, whatever their kind of metric is, as long as we can show the data that these audiences have buying power, which they do, they have influence outside of their own realm of demographic, which they do. To create mass conversation even without specificity doesn't silo. When I'm engaging with a potential new brand partner I'm like, "Look, we got to be in this for the same reason. This is to help protect the longevity of your business." Off Madison Podcast: How Ads Are Still Getting Disability Representation Wrong