LOS ANGELES (CelebrityAccess) – Kobalt’s recording arm AWAL has hired Thomas Fiss as Vice President, Strategic Marketing, North America.
In this new role, Fiss will oversee creative multichannel marketing, including conceptualizing and producing content offerings and partner integrations for AWAL artists, to grow relationships with brands, media outlets and other external organizations.
Fiss joins AWAL with more than 10 years of music industry and partnership marketing experience. Most recently, he served as a department head at Life is Beautiful Music Festival, where he managed brand partnerships, including strategy and execution. He is also the co-founder of Partner.ly, a software platform that simplifies the artist and brand partnership process. Prior to beginning his marketing career, Fiss was a recording artist signed to Capitol Records in the US.
Commenting on their latest hire, AWAL President, North America Ron Cerrito said: “We are reimagining the construct and type of services artists and labels should have access to in the modern music industry. We sought someone with Thomas’ brand partnership expertise and agency approach to help us innovate what next chapter music marketing should look like and to help our artists create unique content offerings for their fans.”
Michael Pukownik, AWAL SVP Artist Marketing, North America, added: “Thomas is a highly creative, forward thinking, data-driven executive. His experience will be integral in helping shape our new-school marketing and brand integration strategies. The entire team is eager to work with him to deepen AWAL’s relationships with partners that can help take our artists’ careers to the next level.”
Fiss said: “I am honored to be joining Kobalt Music Group and would like to thank Willard Ahdritz, Lonny Olinick, Ron Cerrito, Michael Pukownik and the entire AWAL team for this incredible opportunity. My passion is to seek out and implement strategic partnerships and alliances that allow artists to target key audiences and create lasting impressions, supported by data and analytics. I cannot think of another company that further embraces win-win principles, creativity, and innovation more than AWAL. I look forward to crafting partnerships that impact cultural relevance and behavior.
Fiss will be based out of AWAL’s LA office.
