By Jennifer Lawhead The biggest mistake I see businesses make with storytelling is they put it in a box. That box is assigned to the marketing team where they are responsible for caring for the stories and sharing them as they see fit. Why this is a mistake, you ask? After all, isn’t storytelling the job of the marketers in the building? No. No, it’s not. It’s a responsibility that ...
Why is marketing so hard right now?
Branding and marketing have never been easy. But throw in a pandemic, social and political unrest and a recession and that will complicate things a bit more. So no shame from us if you went into hunker-down mode. We get it! But we would also challenge you to consider this: the world needs you and your brand right now. So maybe it’s time to re-emerge. Maybe the reason it was ...
Bored of Marketing? Have More Fun! An Interview with Misty Megia
Q: Who are you and what do you do? I am Misty Megia, I am a CEO/Creative Producer and Business Strategist. Q: Do you have any nicknames you care to share? The only nickname I've heard people call me is Sunshine, which I will gladly take ;) Q: What do you love about marketing? I love the creative world of marketing and figuring out the solutions to consumer problems. I love the art, ...
When You Brand from Your Beliefs, Marketing Execution Reveals Itself
Sara Hertrampf, Sales & Marketing Manager, looked around in amazement at a packed house in October 2019. Filling the Alpine Communications event were business owners, community leaders and economic development champions throughout Iowa. As she marveled at the connectivity happening among local influencers before her eyes, she couldn’t help but remember a time when Alpine Communications was ...
Branding is Still a Performance
Authenticity. Vulnerability. Transparency. Being more human. These are the standards of a modern brand. Branding is still a performance, and a powerful one. But it’s not a performance built on pretense, on flimsy supposition or shallow projection. It’s a performance that rises from truth, integrity, and genuine emotion. It’s a performance because you, as a brand, always have an audience. ...
The Marketing Metric That Matters the Most
By Jennifer Lawhead When I was 16-years-old, I gave a friend a piece of advice that I don’t remember. How do I know it actually happened, you may ask, since I can’t recall it? I know because, 20 years later, sitting at brunch, the same friend told me something I said in a fleeting moment, for me, was something she’s carried with her, for years. At the time, my outgoing and ...
Doers v. Thinkers
By Cat Weise Freshmen year in college, I lived on the same floor with a bunch a young, smart women. One decided she had a new theory about the world as many young people do when they first exercise their independence muscle. Her theory was that the world could be divided into doers and thinkers. She rattled with authority who she believed was in each category. It was presumptuous, ...
Your audience is practicing attention curation. Are you?
Unless you intentionally live in a self-created bubble, everyone and everything is trying to get your attention at all times. Therefore, we don’t give our attention for any length of time to just anything. Our attention must be earned. It’s something we call attention curation, and it works two ways. For individuals, attention curation is the disciplined practice of consciously ...
This is who we are
Injustice in our country must be addressed. It begins, as all deep work does, by looking inward. This is precisely what Michelle Obama highlighted in her public statement May 30, “It's up to all of us—Black, white, everyone—no matter how well-meaning we think we might be, to do the honest, uncomfortable work of rooting it out. It starts with self-examination and listening to those whose ...
How Branding Led to a $8M Revenue Increase
By Jennifer Lawhead We always say, “a strong brand solves a thousand business problems.” When a business moves away from obsessing about bottom lines, profitability and ROI, and instead adopts a brand-centric mindset, it fundamentally changes the fabric of the business. Suddenly, financial milestones are reached; not because a CEO fixated on them, but because the quality of the brand became ...