Brand Manager

INTERVIEW:Meet the man behind the careers of many of Ireland's top performers, Noel Kelly, who is now setting up media courses using his A-list as instructors, writes Kate Holmquist.

NOBODY BELIEVES IN being self-effacing any more. "Years ago, when I was doing promotions, you'd set up a karaoke machine in a shopping centre and the young people all held back. Now, they're queuing up to perform," says Noel Kelly of NK Management. The days of Irish youths believing they were neither beautiful nor unique are over.

Brash young artists, personable young doctors, cooks, fashionistas, models, radio DJs, TV reporters and presenters are all flocking to get their name on Kelly's talent list. Kelly is the man known in the RTÉ canteen "as the centre of the inner circle" and "the only game in town".

If you've become a household name and have a personal crisis, he's the guy who will keep the tabloid dogs at bay and ensure you and your family have privacy. If you're stuck as a writer or painter, he might get a sponsorship deal to let you keep working. When the critics pan your radio show, he'll build you up and make sure you have the right talent around you, until your listenership increases.

But don't bother courting him. "If I want you, I'll go out and get you," says Kelly over coffee and sandwiches in the Merrion Hotel. "Celebrities are top brands and they need brand-focused management . . . They also need advice and confidence-building. We'll sit down and create two-, three- or five-year plans. We work on that, leaving the talent free to do what they do best."

Gerry Ryan, Ryan Tubridy, Gráinne Seoige, Craig Doyle, Dave Fanning, Glenda Gilson, Dr Mark Hamilton, Dr David Coleman, Eddie Hobbs, Lorraine Keane, Diarmuid Gavin, Adele King (Twink), Síle Seoige, Jenny Huston, Derry Clarke, Paul Rankin, the list goes on and on . . . who isn't represented by Noel Kelly? Which begs the question. Noel who? He started out in sales and marketing for Cadbury when the chocolate maker was one of the only games in town. Product placements in shops and promotions taught him how to get a brand into the public consciousness. So from chocolate brands, he gradually moved towards marketing people as brands, although the sexy new-media phrase "social branding" is not in his lexicon. "What's that? Never heard of it," he answers.

His own buzz-word is "360-degree global talent" - a creative individual who can do TV, radio, books, production, journalism, sponsorship, the whole enchilada, as pioneered by Oprah Winfrey. Transcending to that level is rare, but aspects of a multi-tasking career can be achieved, he says. Gerry Ryan, currently writing a book for Penguin Ireland about his career, got a €100,000 advance, despite his refusal to talk about his marriage break-up.

Graham Knuttel, Kelly's first client as a manager, now has a sponsorship deal with Aubusson carpets. The painter Rasher, Kelly's second client, also helped give the NK Management brand an artistic "cool" among the young and fashionable set and Kelly has recently taken on Chára Nagle - a brash and beautiful painter who may not appeal to the traditional art connoisseur, but whose work is distinctive and sells like hot cakes.

Honest almost to a fault, Kelly says that the painters he represents aren't necessarily the ones you'd hang on your walls at home, but that's not the point - "When you see a Knuttel, you know it's a Knuttel," and when your client is a brand, that distinctiveness is the holy grail.

A couple of years ago, a young unknown intern from the US came to work for him and, lo and behold, at the end-of-summer party, who should turn up but the lad's uncle, the president of Harpo Productions, who said that the US TV market was on the look-out for smart, attractive women with Irish accents. Kelly thinks he's already found the one: Gráinne Seoige.

Seoige is bemused by the suggestion, but appreciates the thought: "That's what Noel does for us. He keeps looking for new opportunities so we can focus on the job at hand."

Ask Ryan Tubridy if he'd consider a move to the US and he demurs, not willing to go with his manager's global view just yet. "I'm a home-bird. Give me the west of Ireland. I have two young children. I'm not going anywhere. But I respect Noel's vision. You know what he calls RTÉ? 'The incubator'."

The individuals Kelly represents are just one aspect of his business. On the other side of the house, he advises L'Oréal, Samsung, Nivea, Playstation, Irish Distillers, Vodafone, GE Money, Pod, McConnells Advertising, Hughes & Hughes Bookstore, The Blue Haven Hotel, EMI Records, Mercedes, AIB and too many PR and marketing companies to mention.

Bringing the two sides of the house together, the brand-name people with the brand-name companies, is where the commercial deals are made. He doesn't manage clients' finances, or send them to red-carpet events, or design their images. "All our people very much have a sense of self," he says. But he does father them, says Seoige. "He's very protective. He takes a personal interest - it's almost familial. We're all with him now, he's brought us together and we'll discuss the business among ourselves."

The individual performer/presenter/artist may have talent to burn, but as Tubridy says: "We're bad with money. We hate having to go into management and say 'I'm great. This is why I'm great. You should be paying me more.' Noel does that for us."

Kelly's latest venture is Media Now, a two-day hands-on media workshop designed to give participants an insight into TV production skills and techniques. Practical workshops will include on-camera recordings with Tubridy, Seoige, Ryan and others, a chance to practise interview skills and workshops on writing for TV. Each participant will receive a DVD showreel of their work from the course. The cost: €1,100. That's right. €1,100. Mam and Dad, get your chequebook out.

Having confidence isn't enough, though. How do you really know that a person has talent? "I would look for something that stands out," says Kelly. "Personality, intelligence, great communication skills, willingness to learn, not afraid of hard work, having taken relevant courses, relevant degrees, experience, a sense of get up and go and, most importantly, a sense of self."

The problem with most media courses is that they're taught by people who haven't fronted top-rated programmes, he asserts: "The coulda, woulda, shouldas who may know the theory but haven't done the job." While the many dedicated people teaching media courses would no doubt challenge this assertion, Kelly is adamant that the best teachers have done the job successfully, a view shared by his teachers - Seoige, Ryan and Craig Doyle. Other teachers on the course will include Ryan, Mooney, John Kelly, Dave Fanning and Tom Dunne.

The man overseeing these celebrities will be facilitator Garret Daly (32), who started in Radio Kerry and has made several successful radio and TV programmes for RTÉ, while also teaching part-time at the Dundalk Institute of Technology.

Taking time from the set of a corporate video he is making, Daly sells the course: "All the teachers on the course are industry professionals, which is unusual in itself. We're raising the bar and bringing real insight into what it is to be a presenter, producer or researcher. Media Now will be a stepping stone for people."

The course won't be an easy ride. The participants will get show-reels but seeing and hearing yourself is gut-churning if you are as self-critical as you need to be, warns Seoige.

Every successful media name needs a good team, so the course will also be a training ground for producers and researchers, says Kelly. "I'm looking for people who are bright and well-educated. . . There are lots of pretty girls who have had people telling them, 'you should be on TV', but the first question will always be: 'Why?' People saying you're gorgeous isn't enough . . . If someone isn't suited to presenting, maybe they belong behind the camera, producing or researching. I'll help them find where their real talents lie."

Irish Academy of Media, 40 Fitzwilliam Street Upper, Dublin 2. Tel. 01-4607573.

[ www.medianow.ie ]

RYAN TUBRIDY

Ryan Tubridy has a degree in classical studies and he has always wanted to teach. "It's my latent vocation. I would have been a teacher in another life. Everyone has had a Mr Chips in their life, one of those teachers who can make learning interesting. The imparting of knowledge on radio and TV by being a communicator is a big part of what I do. Never assume knowledge on the part of the audience. Be plain-speaking and keep it accessible."

Tubridy says there's no such thing as overnight success. "I started as a runner making coffee on Crimeline, then I went on to making coffee for Gerry Ryan, knowing what I wanted to do and having to feel my way around. I worked hard. I wasn't lucky. I earned all my luck.

"I do a lot of going around to schools talking to students and I tell them, RTÉ is the only game in town. RTÉ is the mothership and there's very few presenting jobs going. I'm very hard on myself. I'm still shocked I'm doing Saturday nights. The last two weeks of this season, we got between 700,000 and 800,000 viewers - a share of 42 per cent. I always thought I didn't have the face for TV but clearly people see beyond that."

If you're in secondary school now and are thinking about a career in the media, don't study journalism, he advises. "Get a general arts degree, enjoy learning, learn to do research, have fun. You can only learn broadcasting by actually doing it." And be ready to make coffee.

GRÁINNE SEOIGE

Gráinne Seoige was a 21-year-old graduate in English, sociology and politics who had done her post-graduate degree through Irish when she became the ultimate 21st-century cailín - the new face of Irish language programming on Teilifís na Gaeilge (now TG4) in 1996. She was armed with a higher diploma in communications from UCG, fierce intelligence and amazing looks. But it was still an unreal dream to be a TV presenter because she was a Connemara girl and Dublin 4 seemed very far away. The local response to anyone who dared speak their dream aloud in those days was "cop on to yourself", she says.

These days, as a TV veteran and the woman so many girls want to be, she's always ready with a bit of firm advice. "When I'm in town, I'll sometimes see a gang of girls hovering nearby. You know when they want to meet you, so I'll catch their eyes and smile. The bravest one will say, 'I want your job' and I'll say, 'Great, what are you thinking of doing at third level?' If they say journalism, I'll steer them clear. A more general degree is good for two reasons - an arts degree gives you a broad education, which you will need in the media, and the media isn't for everyone so it's good to have a degree you can build on in other ways."

Seoige has found that many girls have an idea that the media is for bright and beautiful people who don't have to work for a living, when the opposite is the case. "So often I hear girls saying that they think they can have my job by copying my hairstyle or buying the same jacket that I'm wearing. That's not the way it works at all."

When she moved to Sky News, Seoige's challenge was to present live TV with no rehearsal. "In that situation, you either do it or you don't. It's great. I'm open to learning new skills all the time, I've never stood still for very long. That's okay - there are no jobs for life any more. People change careers two or three times, on average."

Broadcast media is "a tough business", she warns. "You grow a very thick skin very quickly. If you took on board everything people said about you, you'd would never leave the house." One of the hardest tasks being in front of the camera is being able to stomach listening to your own voice and seeing your own image, since good presenters are acutely self-critical, yet must still have the confidence to work with a team that expects you to do the business on live TV. "It's awful hearing the Chinese whispers that turn into something that gets printed," she says.

CRAIG DOYLE

Craig Doyle works three days a week in London, where he stays with his brother, Keith Doyle, a BBC news reporter. The rest of the time he's in muddy wellies in Co Wicklow, where he and his interior designer wife, Doon, have just finished building a house for their three young children. He has his own production company, Boxer, which produced Ireland's Richest, one of the top-rated programmes last Christmas.

He has been a Capital Radio DJ, presented Tomorrow's World and travelled the world for the BBC while presenting Holiday (his second travel book is on the way). On top of all that, he now gets to watch football for a living. A dream life? You betcha.

So when you ask Craig Doyle (37) what his absolute wildest career dream is, he takes a moment before answering in an embarrassed tone. "I don't want to sound smug, but I'm doing what I always wanted to do. The BBC offered me a contract to stay on for the 2012 Olympics in London." One suspects he makes this point because the criticism of his performance in the 2004 Olympics was fierce. But that's behind him now. "ITV is the FA Cup, the Champions League, the World Cup. I grew up watching football on Granada. So this is my dream."

He first discovered Noel Kelly "by accident" at a wedding. His first impression was that he was "down to earth, nice . . . I've dealt with a lot of agents in the UK so I think I know what I'm talking about. Noel is very pragmatic, very organised, he knows the stages you have to go through to get a project off the ground. As a presenter, you may be creative but you need others working with you who can make things happen."

Doyle grew up in Stillorgan and went to Blackrock College. He then studied history and sociology at NUI Maynooth, where he says his greatest achievement was learning to talk to girls, considering how shy he'd been. He then followed his elder brother Keith to the highly regarded London College of Printing, which functions as a sort of feeder school for the BBC.

Doyle's next project, apart from presenting football, is "something else entirely, hugely exciting, a bit mad and out there and it's going to be worldwide. Every idea starts in someone's head."