Why 2021 is a great time to be a marketer in Dallas-Fort Worth
Why 2021 is a great time to be a marketer in Dallas-Fort Worth
As a marketing solutions and talent company, Freeman+Leonard is in the business of matching great marketers and creatives with the companies who need them. To achieve that, our team works closely with marketing talent and hiring managers to find the right fit based on evolving market realities and business priorities.
Often, our own internal data and placement history combined with these conversations allows us to see interesting trends in real time.
This is particularly true of the marketing and advertising industry in north Texas. Though we serve clients and talent across the U.S., we’re based in Dallas and have deep roots here.
So, it is with the benefit of this experience (20+ years, in fact) that we make the following claim:
We believe it is quite the auspicious time to be a marketing and advertising professional working in Dallas-Fort Worth. Perhaps even the most promising.
You might say we’re a bit biased when it comes to the field of marketing, and even the Dallas area, but the data backs us up. Let’s review the findings:
Marketing talent is in demand more than ever before, though some roles are increasing in number more than others.
Though marketing budgets are often among the first to be slashed during financial downturns, the worst of the pandemic’s economic impact seems behind us. Marketing departments are hiring and spending again.
But many eyes have been opened by the events of the past 12 months, and business priorities have shifted. As a result, at Freeman+Leonard we’re seeing demand for certain marketing roles increasing at faster rates than others.
In particular, we’re seeing growth in digital/analytics roles, PR and crisis communications, social media strategy and content, email marketing and eCommerce.
For more details, read: "Here are the marketing roles in highest demand in 2021.”
Contract rates and salaries are rising — especially for marketers with strong digital experience.
Before the pandemic, salary and employment data for the Dallas area already told a pretty favorable story. We were leading the nation’s metro areas in job creation for multiple years in a row, particularly for white-collar professional jobs.
Though the virus certainly took its toll, that trend seems to be holding — or at least, buoying us through the storm. In February, the Dallas Morning News reported that Dallas had regained almost all of the jobs it lost over the past year, excluding leisure and hospitality.
And as of February 2021, starting salaries in Dallas were a comfortable 12% above the national average. Meanwhile, DFW is a relatively affordable place to live, with a cost of living just 2% higher than the national average.
More experienced marketers are also finding higher average compensation in Dallas, and an upward trend.
According to Freeman+Leonard’s database and placement history, digital, UX and eCommerce expert contract rates are increasing 1-3% per hour each quarter.
This is causing an increase in full-time salaries for these roles approximately every 12 months above the 3+% cost of living increase.
The significant growth of new companies moving to the Dallas area has played a role in dramatically increasing marketing salary averages. And fortunately, these higher salaries are holding, even during the pandemic.
Working from home is here to stay.
Though the employers we talked with had been nervous about managing a remote workforce, they’ve become less so over the past year.
Most employers plan to head back into the office at some point, but we often hear that it likely won’t look the same as it had. Many expect to have their workforces back in the office only part of the time, and to have them work remotely at least a few days a week.
In addition to the potential for better work-life balance, the shift towards remote work offers Dallas marketing and advertising professionals a greater geographic range of opportunities, even as they enjoy DFW’s near-average cost of living.
Dallas-Fort Worth is only getting better.
Over the past few years, local news sites have been splashed with headline after headline announcing yet another corporation relocating to Dallas-Fort Worth. The talent pool in this area is frequently cited as one of the draws.
It’s interesting that the trend didn’t slow for COVID.
As more companies awaken to the benefits of headquartering in north Texas, the area should become an even more lively, diverse and cosmopolitan area rich with opportunity.
At Freeman+Leonard, though our arms stretch over Texas and well beyond, we couldn’t imagine a better headquarters than Dallas for our own firm. And as our community emerges fully from this pandemic, we can’t wait to see what comes next for the area we love to call home.
Here are the marketing roles in highest demand in 2021
Here are the marketing roles in highest demand in 2021
Though marketing budgets are often among the first to be slashed during financial downturns, the worst of the pandemic’s economic impact seems to be behind us.
Marketing departments are hiring and spending again.
At Freeman+Leonard, we’re seeing dramatic increases in new orders for talent placements from clients compared to three to six months ago, across a wide range of employers in a variety of categories.
Marketing talent is more in demand than ever before, but business priorities have shifted — and therefore, so have the roles employers are hiring for.
Demand for certain marketing roles is increasing more than others.
The following four areas are showing the greatest growth among our clients:
Digital/Analytical
Many companies were forced by the pandemic to expedite their digital transformation plans, or even pivot to new business models. Quick decisions were required despite incredible uncertainty.
So, it’s little wonder that digital expertise, with an emphasis on the analytical, would now be prized by marketing hiring managers. Armed with technology and current data, informed decisions can be made quickly, powering greater agility no matter what the future holds.
Job titles for these roles include the following disciplines: Digital Strategy, Digital Analytics, Web Analytics, Data Analytics, Business Intelligence, Marketing Analytics, Paid Social Strategy, Paid Search, Media Planning, UX/UI Design.
PR and Crisis Communications
There’s nothing quite like being thrust into a 12-month-long crisis, including the deepest economic slide since the Great Depression, to highlight any gaps in a company’s communications skillset.
Managing a brand’s reputation with the public and its relationships with the media requires a delicate touch and specialized expertise even in the best of times. Public relations pros with crisis communications experience are in demand more than ever.
Job titles for these roles include the following disciplines: Corporate Communications, Marketing Communications, Media Relations, Public Relations, Publicity, Investor Relations, Account Management (PR agencies).
Social Media Strategy and Content
Even before the pandemic, most companies recognized that a relevant and current social media presence was no longer optional. In the months since, social platforms have become more significant, with more customers even turning to them first for up-to-date information about the businesses they intend to visit or buy from.
Meanwhile over the past year, time spent online and on social media has skyrocketed. Video-first platforms like TikTok provide more creative opportunities to connect with consumers and reach them where they are: on their phones.
Strategic social media experts who can connect the dots between business goals, consumer expectations and these social media trends are in high demand among our clients, as are the content creators who bring those strategies to life.
Job titles for these roles include these disciplines: Social Strategy, Content Marketing, Community Management, Social Media Management, Creative Strategy, Design, Copywriting.
Email Marketing and Ecommerce
Email marketing is no longer about sending one-off newsletters or campaigns; it’s about managing an entire customer relationship via advanced marketing automation platforms.
For ecommerce, whose sales growth was apparently accelerated by pandemic restrictions rather than hindered by them, marketing automation platforms can be powerful tools for driving sales and revenue.
Demand for marketers with strong expertise in this area (and a scientific approach to attribution and measurement) is still growing among our client base, even as restrictions ease.
These job titles are likely to be in these areas, among others: CRM, eCommerce, Marketing Automation, Demand Generation, Marketing Operations, Email Marketing, Web Development, Performance Marketing, Revenue Marketing
Contract rates and salaries are also rising for marketers with strong digital experience.
According to Freeman+Leonard’s database and placement history, digital, UX and eCommerce expert contract rates are increasing 1-3% per hour each quarter.
This is causing an increase in full-time salaries for these roles approximately every 12 months above the 3+% cost of living increase.
We’re seeing dramatically increased marketing salary averages especially in our home base of Dallas, which has seen significant growth of new companies relocating their headquarters to the area. And fortunately, these higher salaries are holding, even during the pandemic.
Marketers are increasingly expected to be data-driven, multi-skilled, and able to think quickly on their feet.
Based on the demand we’re seeing for roles focused heavily on digital marketing, analytics, crisis communications and ecommerce, it seems clear that the pandemic has only sped up an existing trend:
More and more, marketing teams are expected to be able to confidently make quick, informed, data-driven decisions, and to connect the dots from their own work to real revenue and business results.
Fortunately, this is more possible than ever before thanks to marketing technology with robust analytics capabilities.
We predict that marketing’s strengthened role in driving attributable revenue (and protecting brand reputations in volatile times) will elevate its perceived importance among business leaders and other internal departments. That can only bode well for the next time the economy forces companies to take a hard look at their budgets.
In this latest surge in demand, we’re also seeing an increase in hybrid requests, with companies seeking candidates who offer multiple skills.
For instance, we’re seeing more requests for UX/UI designers-in-one, or project managers with design skills. This could also look like an account director with extensive video knowledge, or a creative director who can hands-on design and write full copy.
Many of the marketers we know are already multi-passionate and multi-talented, so consider this your cue to bring your full talents to the table!
And for those less analytically or digitally inclined, keep in mind that marketers of all focus areas and backgrounds — even creatives — can use these insights to stay competitive in today’s marketplace:
Document your wins early and often, and focus your résumés on quantified results, rather than on regurgitated job descriptions.
Ready to make your next move? Submit your résumé or portfolio to jobs.freemanleonard.com today.
8 essential post-pandemic marketing strategies for small nonprofits and startups
8 essential post-pandemic marketing strategies for small nonprofits and startups
Like many nonprofits of its size, Live Pura Vida, a 501(c)(3) based in Arlington and Fort Worth, has been hit hard by the pandemic. Revenue from for-profit arms of the organization — which typically funded the nonprofit side — had almost completely dried up.
And that meant the array of services and programming they offered — ranging from after-school programs and cultural education to dance classes and culinary instruction — could no longer be accessed by the communities and children of color who needed them.
But executive director Juleon Lewis has still worked tirelessly to reach those in his community who needed critical services like food assistance more than ever.
Then, Live Pura Vida was nominated for a special opportunity to brainstorm new strategies with some of the Dallas-Fort Worth area’s top marketing minds.
A Time for Heroes, Freeman+Leonard’s community-driven response to the COVID-19 pandemic, pairs a struggling small business owner or nonprofit leader with some of the firm’s top marketing and advertising talent for a complimentary one-hour panel and discussion. The goal: to develop new strategies and ideas to help the organization drive revenue and growth in our new economy.
“The question and the challenge that I’d like to bring to you all today,” Juleon prompted as his strategy session began, “is how can we share the message of what we’re doing in an effective and digestible manner so that we can get more awareness of our brand and what we’re doing?”
After a brief review of the Live Pura Vida brand and its current marketing, our panelists began their brainstorm.
They shared the following eight recommendations for the nonprofit, many of which could be applied to any organization in need of a post-pandemic boost, despite limited resources.
1. Leverage email marketing platforms to connect directly with your community.
Social media may be at the top of many marketers’ minds, but the real gold is in your email list. After all, it’s the only digital audience you truly own — and it allows nonprofits with even the smallest budgets to have a direct line of communication with their donors, volunteers and constituents.
“One of the easiest and most time-efficient things to do is to get an email blast going, whatever your message is,” recommended agency executive Sophia Johnson.
“If you want everybody to switch over to smile.amazon.com, that’s a quick email to your entire database. If you need volunteers, that’s an email: ‘I need volunteers in these three areas.’ I would encourage you to put together an email strategy. You can do that in a couple of hours. And it’s just about putting everybody in your database.”
2. Partner with more-established, complementary nonprofits and organizations.
For smaller organizations, collaboration is often key to reaching larger audiences and broadening awareness and reach.
Marketing executive Dorothy Jones asked, “Are you open to complementary nonprofits or groups of artists in the vocal field or the visual arts that have existing, successful curriculum?”
“You’re making such a meaningful difference in broader communities, through youth, with the focus on Latin culture and African-American culture,” shared marketing executive Jennifer Fomin. “Looking at all of those programs and channels, there might be similar organizations to reach out to to amplify what you’re already doing.”
Other nonprofits aren’t the only potential collaborators. Think beyond immediate competitors to any organization or body that reaches the same populations in other ways.
“I have to ask about partnerships with schools,” said Lisa Foster, a marketing talent specialist. “You clearly partner with after-school programs, but do you have any partnerships with schools more broadly to tap for volunteers and donations?”
There are many ways to make partnerships and collaborations work, as long as the relationship is mutually beneficial in some way. In both nonprofit and for-profit businesses, it can pay to partner up and share both resources and audiences.
3. Make sure your messaging leads with what you do.
With so many worthy causes out there competing for volunteers and donors, every nonprofit must fight to win hearts and minds and position themselves as the one to back. It’s not enough simply to exist as a 501(c)(3) — you must demonstrate results.
At every opportunity, lead with your impact when describing your organization, emphasizing what you do and who you help, rather than a boilerplate description of who you are.
This can be as simple a shift as rearranging information on a website. As Sophia Johnson pointed out, moving the “What We Do” section of the homepage to above the “Who We Are” section on Live Pura Vida’s website could help the true message sink in:
“It’s not as important who you are; it’s more important what you do.”
4. Embrace your niche and local impact.
And to that end, don’t think you need to seem bigger than you are in order to win over supporters.
Many individual and corporate donors are more focused than ever on organizations that can make a real, tangible difference in specific, targeted communities, rather than on broad, globally-focused charities.
Sophia Johnson again suggested a simple messaging shift for Live Pura Vida’s homepage, encouraging the organization to emphasize the difference it makes for children and communities of color in the Arlington and Fort Worth areas specifically.
5. Get creative with video on TikTok and Instagram Reels.
Emerging social media platforms and video formats like TikTok videos and Instagram Reels also present a fresh opportunity to creatively spread your organization’s message to new people.
And because an everyday, less polished aesthetic reigns supreme on those platforms, they also take very little production investment to create. All you need is an idea and a smartphone.
Agency executive Rob Howe explained how this could work for an organization like Live Pura Vida, whose sheer variety of programs and services for communities of color presents a messaging challenge that may be familiar to many nonprofits:
“It struck me, on TikTok and Instagram Reels, that there are dancers who are also educators and use their videos to point to different things and share information and facts,” shared Rob, suggesting that Live Pura Vida could do the same, using fun video content to share information, “be it about your nonprofit or about the people that you serve.”
After all, said Rob, “what better way to really encapsulate the entire experience, than to integrate dance with messages about the impact you have?”
6. Invest small amounts of advertising for your most important content.
Unfortunately for budget-strapped nonprofits everywhere, social media platforms — especially larger and more established ones like Facebook — are now ‘pay to play.’ Without paid amplification of some kind, it’s difficult if not impossible to widen awareness of your organization on these platforms.
“Part of the challenge of growing your social media is that a lot of the platforms continue to diminish organic reach. And so what I’d consider is, ‘What is a proper investment to simply increase your awareness?’” suggested marketing executive John Lods.
He continued, “If you’re creating content and you’re investing 5 or 10 hours to do that, very few people are able to see that content because Facebook doesn’t promote it organically.”
Thankfully, it doesn’t take a large budget to distribute that content to your intended audience with self-service social media advertising tools. Even $25 to $50 here and there can help ensure your posts are seen by the right people.
And not every post will merit the investment. Set aside a modest fund for Facebook or Instagram ads and divide it among your most significant or strategic content, messages or campaigns.
7. Create an internship program for marketing students.
It’s probably fair to say that most nonprofits are shorter on manpower than they are on ideas.
However, for new nonprofit founders especially, the idea of training junior talent can feel too time-consuming or risky to pursue. But it’s important to push past this conception to scale your organization’s impact beyond your existing team, especially if marketing has fallen by the wayside.
“We get a lot of students in marketing degree programs who are looking for internships for both summer and full-time and ongoing,” said Kathy Leonard, President & CMO of Freeman+Leonard.
“And some of those young people are in marketing and others are in social media. I’m wondering if there are unpaid internships for college credit that you could create with local universities.”
8. Get comfortable being the face of your organization, and make sharing to social media a habitual part of your day.
The best laid marketing strategy won’t take any organization very far if it isn’t implemented. For the leaders of small businesses and nonprofits alike, marketing should be approached less as a carefully crafted plan and more as a daily habit.
Furthermore, people care about people, not organizations, and they want to see the humans behind the scenes making it all happen.
For small nonprofit founders and executive directors, few strategies will take you further in reaching and engaging your audiences than embracing your role as spokesperson for your organization.
“You’ve got a great smile. I think you could be more front-and-center as the face of this organization,” social strategist Megan Van Groll suggested to Juleon. “As you go about your daily activities supporting the nonprofit and for-profit sides of your brand, you can be the face telling that story on Instagram — via selfie-style videos, explaining what you’re doing, taking people along for ‘a day in the life.’”
Shared on Instagram Stories, these behind-the-scenes vignettes can be both ephemeral and lasting, living proof of the work your organization is doing for anyone to later come along and see.
“You don’t currently have any Instagram Stories highlights,” Megan pointed out, “so you could start saving those stories to the highlights at the top of the profile.” There, they’ll always be available for future supporters to discover.
Watch the full brainstorm session here:
Though our economy is recovering from COVID-19 and we can now see the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel, many nonprofits and small businesses are still struggling to drive donations and revenue. Resources, both time and money, are strained.
Investing those precious resources in only the highest-impact, most strategic marketing and revenue-driving activities is never more critical than it is right now.
If you know of another small business or nonprofit that could use an injection of strategic ideas from our marketing and advertising experts, nominate them to be the next beneficiary of Time for Heroes.
“I am blown away by everyone on the call,” said Juleon at the end of the brainstorm. “The amount of experience and talent on the call is almost overwhelming. What a pleasant surprise.”
Thanks to Juleon Lewis for sharing his story so openly with us and with our community. If you’d like to support Live Pura Vida and the local communities of color they serve, you can make a donation online at livepuravida.org.
Marketers: Here’s how to get started as a freelancer
Marketers: Here’s how to get started as a freelancer
By Megan Van Groll, Freeman+Leonard talent
For independent thinkers, marketers and creatives, taking the leap into freelance work is often a natural and fortuitous move — even if the circumstances that inspire it are anything but.
How do I know? I was one of them.
In 2018, after being laid off by a global B2B tech company, I knew I had a choice to make: Keep working for other people, or make my own way.
As a fiercely independent artist, writer and digital strategist who for a long time had molded my skills to fit the roles available, I was burned out, restless, and ready to try something new.
So I took the leap into freelancing. And I was pretty good at it, despite not having much of a plan.
As it turned out, most of what I knew about freelancing and running a services business I’d actually already learned, even without realizing it — and perhaps from some of the best.
Before taking the role that would eventually see me laid off, my career had led me to The Richards Group. During my time there, I learned how real agencies were run, how to apply my skills and expertise effectively, and how to manage client relationships.
Those learnings translated easily to the freelance work I embarked on later, allowing me to find clients, get results that would keep them happy, and make money doing it.
In case it helps other marketers who find themselves at a similar professional crossroads, I’m sharing the first steps I took and the lessons I learned along the way. After all, the year 2020 has wrought many flavors of chaos. Likely none of us are where we thought we’d be at the start of the year.
The playbook has been scrapped. It’s time to write our own.
That starts with deciding what kind of work we’ll do, and for whom.
Step 1: Create packages that eliminate pain points.
Before you do anything else, you’ll need to decide which services to offer your clients. Ideally, this will be a marketing or creative specialty you’ve been working in already, so you can easily sell-through your past client experience and results.
Hopefully, that’s the easy part. Perhaps less intuitive is determining how to package those services in a way that solves a specific problem your clients have.
Offer painless solutions to specific problems
Ideally, your services solve a problem that is truly pivotal to your clients’ success. Your solutions should serve the metaphorical function of a fast-acting pain relief medicine, rather than a merely nice-to-have nutritional supplement.
That distinction may mean the difference between tepid, short-term success that evaporates with the next economic hit, and truly meaningful, stable growth.
Determine your pricing
Pricing is the final stage. Though it helps to have market research or your own prior knowledge as a guidepost, this is a highly personal calculation. Why?
As a fellow marketer, I know that we like to wax poetic about selling our expertise or results.
But practically and operationally speaking, as a services business owner, we’re trading time for dollars.
The only way to generate the annual income you’d like is to determine your preferred hourly rate. Whether you ever opt to share this number with your clients is up to you; there are pros and cons to an hourly rate vs. flat-rate packages based on an estimate of hours.
There are a number of ways to calculate your hourly rate, but the method I found most helpful is to take the annual salary I wanted to earn, add my expected expenses onto that number (including new ones like self-employment healthcare costs and higher taxes), and then divide by the number of billable hours I was likely to work in a year.
Click here to see a helpful infographic on calculating your hourly rate from CreativeLive.
That number of hours should account not only for your vacation days and sick time, but also for the fact that as a business owner, you’re doing the operations, bookkeeping, business development, marketing, everything — so, not every hour can be billable.
Personally, I know that if I work about 45-50 hours in a week, roughly 25-35 of those will be billable client hours, and this tracks with other agency founders, consultants and freelancers I’ve spoken with.
Step 2: Find your first paying client.
Now that you’ve clarified what you’ll offer, getting your first paying client is your most important move.
Even if you don’t have the perfect package or service, move forward anyway, as that can work itself out over time.
When you alone are responsible for your own success (and your own paycheck), cash is king and imperfect action beats indecision every time.
Tell the world what you’re up to
Finding your first client may come more easily than you’d think — but you have to be willing to make a public splash about your venture. Treat it as a true launch, and share it with your network. Tell everyone you know what you’re doing now, and update your online presence.
When I made the decision to go out on my own, among the very first things I did was update my LinkedIn profile. I created a company page for my consulting venture so that I could display my logo on my profile, and added a new position. I first called that position “Social Media Consultant,” knowing this was a term someone might type into LinkedIn if they were seeking my services.
It worked. My very first client found me just a week or two later, having searched “social media consultant” on LinkedIn and seeing the number of connections we had in common.
Collaborate with other service providers
Another surprisingly effective avenue for finding clients? Other agencies, freelancers and consultants who lack your specific expertise, and are seeking a white-label solution.
Some of my best clients are other marketers!
Similarly, don’t overlook marketing solutions and staffing companies like Freeman+Leonard.
They don’t just place talent into full-time or contract roles — they can also connect you with clients seeking freelancers for a variety of marketing needs on an ongoing or project basis.
Many on the Freeman+Leonard team are former marketers and agency folks themselves, so they’re uniquely equipped to understand your marketing and creative skill set and match you with right-fit opportunities.
You may even find yourself working on a team with other freelancers, collaborating with other creative minds to solve client problems while maintaining your independence and freedom.
For marketers recently laid off, finding work through a partner like Freeman+Leonard can also be a great launching pad while figuring out their next move, whether that’s freelancing full-time or otherwise.
No matter how you get the word out about your availability for projects, remember that no one can pay you if they don’t know about you.
You have to let people know you’re open for business, and make it easy for clients to find and connect with you.
And if networking or putting yourself into the spotlight makes you uncomfortable, reframe it: You’re not promoting yourself; you’re helping as many clients as you can.
Find your niche
As you navigate this part of your freelancing journey, avoid the temptation to get hung up on who you’re serving. Advice about “niching down” is everywhere. It’s true that the more specific you are about the client industries you serve, the more likely you are to be an easy yes for those clients.
But when you’re just getting started, it’s unlikely you’ll have enough information to make a confident decision, without future regret, about who you provide your marketing services to. Instead, learn your own preferences over time and arrive at a gut-check list for your ideal client.
I struggled with this initially, because my own client experience spanned multiple industries, and I found a reason to enjoy all of them. Today, I clearly know who’s an ideal client and who isn’t, but it’s more about a company’s vision, culture and customers than what industry they’re in.
Until you arrive at a particular niche over time, use your testimonials, case studies, and original thoughts to differentiate yourself instead of your client industries or categories.
Step 3: Establish systems and processes that lead to profitable client success.
At The Richards Group, I learned that time was money, and how it was spent (and by whom) determined profitability. One piece of evidence for this was the daily timesheet requirement. Every day by noon, our previous day’s time had to be entered and accounted for. Annoying as I found it at the time, this requirement instilled a habit I now find incredibly effective.
Once I secured my first client as a freelancer, I immediately focused on time tracking and using that information to scope hours more accurately going forward.
I quickly invested in a time tracking platform (we use Harvest) to track both my time and the time of any long-term contractors I employ. Later, I began using the same app to send invoices, which provided me with even more visibility into the profitability of each client project.
I also began building out tools, templates and frameworks for my clients that create consistent, repeatable results.
Even if you plan to stay solo forever, creating intellectual property around your unique approach to serving clients builds your reputation and puts you in higher demand.
Creating consistency and clarity around client touchpoints and boundaries has also contributed to happier clients and better relationships over the long-term.
You don’t have to have any of this figured out immediately, but starting your freelance career with an eye towards systemizing your operations will make everything easier down the line.
If you do nothing else, track your time. Trust me, you’ll need the information it provides in order to make strategic decisions in the future.
Entering the world of freelancing is a lot more straightforward than you may think.
Contrary to what I used to believe, you don’t need to have everything figured out before you begin.
This perfectionist thinking held me back from my entrepreneurial dreams for too long before a layoff forced my hand.
If the volatility of this year has found you similarly unemployed and considering your next move, know that a job loss can become one of the best and even most profitable catalysts of your career — if you decide to make the most of your newfound freedom.
In fact, few things will ensure the success of a new venture as much as the lit fire of sudden unemployment.
So get out there, spread the word, land your first paying client or two, and the rest will often work itself out via force of momentum.
From there, take it one day at a time.
You’ve got this.
About the Author
Megan Van Groll is an award-winning social media strategist and digital creative director serving B2B and B2C clients across healthcare, technology, financial services, education, nonprofits, and more.
Interested in working with Megan? Click here to get in touch with a Freeman+Leonard consultant.
A Time for Heroes
A Time for Heroes
Since our company’s inception we have recognized Labor Day as a special holiday ˗ a time to thank and honor American workers and especially our own clients and talent.
Our mission is to match the right talent to each client’s work opportunity for the success of both. This year is no different. On the other hand, this year is the most different and difficult year we’ve experienced.
The Freeman+Leonard team believes it is time to pitch in and help each other out. It is time to share encouragement, to support each other in every way possible and to keep moving forward, if only an inch at a time.
We believe it is a Time for Heroes.
This Labor Day we are kicking off our Time for Heroes program.
We are offering small business owners the opportunity to meet virtually with a team of Freeman+Leonard marketing and advertising specialists. We will provide the platform for this brain trust of marketers to solve a problem, address an issue or suggest an idea to help a small business deal with an issue brought on by this difficult economic time. These recorded exchanges will be shared with you throughout the upcoming year.
If you would like to join us in this Time for Heroes, here are some ideas for being a Hero for others:
- Surprise someone with an unsolicited endorsement on LinkedIn. It’ll stay on their profile and help them win opportunities for years to come.
- Create a post on LinkedIn singing the praises of a co-worker, an out-of-work colleague or a company where you had a positive experience.
- Send a note to someone who has impacted your career and share how much it has meant to you.
- Be a mentor to new graduates looking to join our industry. Offer to have a 30-minute meeting or two each week to share advice and ideas. Calendar scheduling tools like Acuity and Calendly make this easier than ever.
- Attend virtual networking events and conferences. That helps keep our great organizations and industry groups intact and strong.
Please join us in honoring each other this Labor Day and in helping each other during this challenging time with encouragement and support.
With Labor Day thanks to all the real heroes — our clients and talent,
The Freeman+Leonard Team
Breaking the rules: Why I left advertising in search of something better, by Kathy Leonard
Breaking the rules: Why I left advertising in search of something better
By Kathy Leonard
I’m not really a rule breaker.
In fact, I think rules are generally good, even though I’m occasionally compelled to push the edges of the ones that annoy me.
So when I began to question the status quo of how advertising agencies and marketing departments are structured, I was stepping outside of my own norm.
Because although agencies (and marketers in general) like to think of themselves as creative rule-breakers, the fact is, for decades these organizations ran on a set of tacitly accepted, unquestioned practices.
Enter: the Great Recession.
Until, of course, 2008 and what’s known today as the Great Recession.
It’s generally understood that marketing budgets are the first to be slashed when a business or industry experiences a financial downturn. This happens even though all evidence indicates that in times of crisis or change, communicating with customers is most critical.
The fall-out of the decision to pull back on marketing, of course, is that agency partners lose important income, necessitating layoffs. Then, in-house marketing departments begin their cuts, ultimately trimming not just ad spending, but their own staff as well.
Experiencing the Great Recession firsthand, I remember being surprised at the depth of job losses suffered by my peers in marketing and advertising.
But this was not the only change taking place.
At the time, digital had just begun to make its mark in the Marketing Communications space. Clients liked digital media because of its speed-to-market and ability to reach targets with custom messaging at relatively low cost.
Agencies, on the other hand, had a tough time monetizing digital while illustrating to clients they knew the medium and could do it better. So while a new technology was arriving on the scene with massive impact on our industry, agencies were slow to realize the financial value.
As a result, the beginning of 2009 saw arguably more experienced marketers, advertising executives and talented creative people in the market for work than ever before.
And, oddly, many of them weren’t eager to go back to traditional offices and agency roles. They enjoyed working from home and, if they could make it work financially, freelance and contract roles suited them well.
This spawned what became known as the Gig Economy.
The perfect storm. The perfect partnership.
As an ad agency executive myself, I was both horrified by the number of out-of-work MarCom people and intrigued by the resilience of many in finding ways to deliver their skills and talent outside of traditional on-site, in-office, department-led, hierarchic-structured organizations.
What if, I began to wonder, all of these factors were converging to create a perfect storm?
What if the time were right for a new approach, one that solved multiple challenges:
- Access to talent: Clients could access highly experienced and talented marketing and advertising professionals they could never hire nor find on their own;
- Flexible, scalable solutions: Cost-effective and right-sized marketing solutions could be delivered to clients of all sizes by creating on-demand resources that could be scaled up or down as needed.
By removing the costly overhead of traditional on-site staffing and retained agencies, it ultimately could be possible to create interesting and unique approaches to getting the work done.
But having an innovative idea or approach is one thing; executing it, as always, is quite another.
Creating a new way to deliver MarCom services required breaking from the traditional agency model, and embracing a model that is uniquely attuned to identifying and managing talent: Staffing.
Applying an experienced marketing and advertising team to a staffing business model became our vehicle to deliver marketing solutions in an infinitely more flexible, scalable and creative way.
And thus Freeman+Leonard was born.
Longtime staffing entrepreneur Valerie Freeman brought the staffing business experience. As co-founder and CEO of Imprimis Group, Valerie had built one of the largest independently owned staffing companies in Texas, serving over 1,000 customers a year.
And I brought the marketing acumen with my 25+ years in advertising, including executive leadership roles at TracyLocke and The Integer Group.
With this combination of background and skills, we set off to create something new.
Building the solutions I always wish I had.
We began thinking about marketing services as a series of products.
With access to talent at every skill level, background and experience, we had the opportunity to be extremely creative with how we would provide that talent and those services to clients large and small, in B2B and B2C and almost any category or industry.
And so, we built the solutions that, as an advertising executive, I always wish I’d had.
You want an executive-level marketer? We can provide an on-demand CMO for a day, for a month or interim full-time, or available annually, quarterly, or however often suits you.
When you’re challenged with strategic direction, business/product innovation and C-Suite leadership, our Game Changers are ready with marketing consulting expertise from brands the likes of P&G, PepsiCo, Disney and Microsoft.
You’d like to access a stable of writers, art directors and illustrators? We can identify them, pre-vet them and train them on your brand standards and have them on-call as the need exists.
We can even put experienced producers onsite to manage your in-house production team.
Need a big idea? We built Imagine Nation™, a group of creative ideators from around the country experienced with every major ad agency and every major brand. They quite literally “knock your socks off” with everything from brand positioning and ad campaign ideas, to promotion concepts and more.
These award-winning creative thinkers and brand-savvy professionals will provide a fresh approach to creatively market your brand.
Want your own customized agency resource? Freeman+Leonard builds a team exactly as any top-caliber agency in the country would. The only difference: You aren’t paying the retainer nor the overhead of such an agency, though you get the same skills, experience, leadership and better-than-great creative.
Need this custom agency to work alongside and cooperatively with your other retained agencies? We’ll happily do that, too.
You’ve never had it so easy!
Freeman+Leonard will even payroll your own in-house staff so you keep your own team but don’t have to carry that expense as overhead.
The options are endless, customized and scalable. The quality of work is amazing, exactly as you’d expect from the experience and backgrounds of the talent.
Déjà vu, all over again.
What began out of necessity — as most new ideas and business concepts seem to do — easily became part of a comfortable routine as the economy improved after the free-fall of 2008.
Companies rehired and traditional staffing seemed the acceptable norm. Freeman+Leonard provided their clients with on-demand staffing solutions: generally on-site talent to fill permanent positions and contract roles.
And, occasionally, a risk-taking CMO would tap into the on-demand talent options that delivered amazing creative solutions for brand positioning assignments and advertising messaging.
But this year has brought stunning events, most significantly a global pandemic that sent so many home to work from bedrooms and kitchens and in other creative home-office solutions.
Again, the economic fallout has cost many marketers their full-time jobs.
This time around, however, hiring managers realize that marketing and advertising resources can be customized more than ever before to fit not only their brand and messaging but also their operational needs.
Making the pivot to a more successful business strategy has become such a focus for companies these past few months that the term itself has begun to produce eyerolls.
But no matter the buzzword du jour, finding new and innovative ways to deliver marketing services should always be in vogue.
And the creative opportunities on the delivery side of the MarCom field are what truly have always fascinated me. So in that sense, it was probably inevitable that I would find myself here, on the cusp of a new era in marketing, breaking old rules and making new ones.
As our industry, economy and lifestyles continue to evolve and change, Freeman+Leonard will be here to help clients and talent find more creative and mutually beneficial ways to get the work done.
Use the contact form below to reach out and start a conversation. We can show you more ways to find and use the nation’s best marketing and advertising minds.
And it costs you nothing to explore that opportunity.
Get in touch with a Freeman+Leonard consultant today:
Marketing leaders: 5 smart moves to make now for post-COVID success
Marketing leaders: 5 smart moves to make now for post-COVID success
By Kathy Leonard
It's a different world.
When I think back to January of this year I am often fascinated by my own stunning naiveté. Or call it blissful ignorance. Either way, nothing could quite prepare me, or any of us, for what was to come.
In early March, we were all thrust into a world that has caused virtually every organization to rethink what they do and how they work. It’s likely forever changed the way we all do business, not to mention live our lives and perform our individual jobs.
That is, those who still have one.
What had been one of the lowest unemployment levels in years has climbed – with unprecedented speed – to 14.7%. Millions of Americans have been laid off, furloughed or hit with significant compensation reductions.
As is often the case during times of economic uncertainty and turmoil, marketing departments and agencies are some of the first and most significantly impacted.
While we’ve yet to see COVID-19’s ultimate effect on the industry, most experts predict an overall decline in ad spending for 2020 between 10% and 15%. And that doesn’t even address all other marketing cuts.
It’s not surprising that brands and agencies have had to adjust their staffing models to compensate for lost revenues.
While all of this certainly is devastating for our industry, it does provide a unique opportunity to rethink the future of work in a fast-evolving world and the makeup of the workforce that will best position all of us for success.
Consider these ways to turn this disaster into a positive for your organization.
1. Deepen your bench strength.
As you reevaluate how to move forward with fewer resources, think about what skills are missing from your team and how different talent or experience would enhance your marketing effort and message.
Treat this as if you were creating a wish list of talent and MarCom and MarTech resources. Then use this time to line up those resources.
You or your colleagues may be able to identify individuals from your own past jobs and experience. But there are companies that can do that for you, and you don’t actually pay until you engage the talent.
Freeman+Leonard has a larger pool of creative and marketing talent than even the largest client or agency in the nation. Our network of professionals covers every area of expertise needed for today’s marketing environment – from strategy, project management, executive leadership and creative teams to digital planning, UX design, programming, and online media planning and buying.
These people can be identified, vetted and trained in your brand standards to be ready to go when you say jump.
Start your wish list now!
2. Upgrade your in-house team.
Here is the hidden opportunity.
You now have the perfect excuse to trim the fat from your team — even those who have been good enough, but maybe not as great as you’d like — and replace them with who you know could be a stronger, more ideal talent solution or team member.
Before this crisis, many marketing departments had become stagnant, perhaps having to rely on outside resources to deliver new skills and solutions.
Now is your chance to meet those needs with new “internal” people, while eliminating often-expensive ongoing relationships with outside professional partners.
Look within your own network, but also consider a partner like Freeman+Leonard to deliver fresh, new résumés from people you’d never meet on your own: talent with all levels of brand-side and agency experience.
Whether as an onsite addition or working in a virtual capacity, our talent solutions could immediately increase the value of your internal team by adding new skills and expertise – while eliminating the bloat and inefficiencies so common with many outsourced solutions.
Not every qualified candidate will be a good fit for your team, though, and social distancing can present even more challenges to the vetting process.
That’s why we provide all clients with a predictive performance assessment to ensure that new hires will succeed in their defined roles. This amazing assessment tool can predict a person’s ability to perform successfully in a job at a 98% level of accuracy! No other job success predictor on the market does this. Use this tool and don’t risk making an unfortunate hire.
3. Break out of your own box.
Corporate marketing and agency staffing are no longer about hiring permanent employees. They’re simply about getting the best talent to deliver the best work.
The more you feel the need to bring people into permanent roles, the less you allow yourself access to amazing talent.
It’s time to rethink that.
On-demand solutions provide access to remarkable talent with a variety of skills – skills and expertise you can tap as needed, and scale down as business needs change.
Think of how much more efficient and effective your own marketing machine could become with that level of flexibility and access.
Freeman+Leonard was created to give clients and agencies access to on-demand talent for variable needs. With our diverse talent pool and variety of ways to access that talent, organizations utilize the right people and skills to solve any size and type of marketing challenge.
The need might be simply for a single project, such as the redesign of a website, or more complex and seasonal, say, for a fully integrated brand advertising campaign or a retail sales promotion. No matter, we have experienced individuals and established teams that can tackle any project, large or small.
4. Go ahead. Reach for the stars.
Perhaps when you hear “staffing” you think primarily of entry- or mid-level talent. Think again.
One result of embracing a more flexible staffing solution is that now you can access more senior-level marketing talent.
Many extraordinary leaders – from Marketing Directors and CMOs to Account Directors and Creative Directors – currently seek opportunities to contribute their talents for companies that could benefit from senior leadership and depth of experience.
Freeman+Leonard has relationships with seasoned marketing experts, leaders and consultants who’ve had tremendous success and experience throughout most every industry.
And many of these invaluable resources are currently pursuing both traditional and non-traditional ways to engage with new organizations that face new challenges.
Regardless of the specifics of the particular need, companies today can access more-senior talent in more ways, so they can not only survive, but thrive in today’s climate.
5. Diversify. Now.
It’s time, more than ever before, for organizations to commit to having their workforce better reflect the diversity of the world around us.
Freeman+Leonard values, seeks out and promotes a diversity of talent to benefit any organization. We hope that our commitment to change within our industry can not only solve specific client problems, but also help solve larger systemic problems that can be eliminated only through action.
We are committed to that. We want to use our talent resources to help you do that, too.
Feel free to reach out to our leadership to discuss certain needs of your organization and how, together, we can make all of our teams stronger.
Do yourself a favor.
Our world has changed significantly, so we are working hard to give clients access to more amazing talent and innovative ways to use that talent.
And on the other side, we want to provide top-performing talent with interesting ways to engage with clients and deliver creative, blow-you-away thinking.
Use the contact form below to reach out and start a conversation. We can show you more ways to find and use the nation’s best marketing and advertising minds.
And it costs you nothing to explore that opportunity.
Get in touch with a Freeman+Leonard consultant today:
End On A High Note: Strategies & Tools To Help Marketers Turn 2020 Into A Success
End On A High Note: Strategies & Tools To Help Marketers Turn 2020 Into A Success
These are challenging times to be a marketing leader. From a public health crisis and ensuing economic challenges to racial justice and civil rights movements, each day seems to bring new changes to how brands engage, interact and connect with their customers.
Ultimately, these upheavals have a real impact to your marketing plans and priorities. Now is the moment to take a beat and consider the strategic pivots you need to make today to drive success for your organization in 2020. What are the right messages to deliver? How is your media plan working for you, given the shifting sands of consumer focus and confidence? In this webinar, you will gain strategic planning tools to use today to refocus your marketing efforts, so that your business can thrive in 2020 and beyond.
These strategic planning tools will guide your messaging in terms of not only what you say, but how to focus your spending based on your audience and business needs. We will also provide a diagnostic tool you can apply to determine how your media spend is working for you today, and what adjustments you might need to make. You will also walk away with a brief checklist of actions to make immediate changes in your marketing efforts to drive success.
Enjoy this webinar from industry expert, Kristine Stebbins, on how to end 2020 on a High Note!
Presentation slides here.
How to survive a COVID-19 related layoff as a recent grad
How to survive a COVID-19 related layoff as a recent grad
Many recent graduates, interns and entry-level workers have suddenly found themselves out of work, laid off or furloughed as a direct result of the coronavirus.
Fighting for an early foothold in your chosen career can be difficult enough without a global pandemic (and resulting economic fallout) thrown into the mix. If you’ve found yourself in this situation, know first of all that you’re not alone, and your disappointment or frustration is understandable.
In fact, this is probably the most difficult time you’ll endure in your career, and maybe your life – so take heart in knowing that if you can make it out of this, you can face anything.
At Freeman+Leonard, though this environment is new and unusual in many ways, this isn’t our first experience with a recession, and we’ve coached many junior creatives and marketers on how to recover from job losses.
Following are four action steps you can take now to regain your professional footing and get back to work:
Treat your search like a full-time job.
You may have heard this one before – but treating your search like it actually is your job doesn’t necessarily mean devoting 40 hours a week to sifting through job listings and submitting endless applications.
What it actually refers to is creating structure and routines, and holding yourself accountable to daily action.
Tap your inner project manager (even if you’re creative, you’ve got one!) and use tools like to-do apps to track daily progress against your goals. Though your ultimate goal is to land a new role, be sure to celebrate mini-milestones like reaching out to a certain number of people in your professional network each day.
“Stay organized, and keep a spreadsheet of the companies you have applied to and the companies recruiters have presented you to,” says Ashley Allen, Sr. Manager, Talent Solutions at Freeman+Leonard. “Take the extra step and follow up directly with the hiring manager or recruiter who posted the opening by sending them a LinkedIn message.”
If you haven’t already, prep your digital and analog workspaces, keeping your computer files organized with various résumé versions for different role types.
Pour your productive energy and focus into finding the right next move and commit wholeheartedly to the job at hand.
Focus on thriving industries and markets.
Some industries are more impacted by COVID-19 than others, like travel and hospitality. Meanwhile, some are thriving.
“Many industries are still in high demand and are hiring, like Mortgage, Banking, Healthcare and Food Manufacturing,” says Allen.
Just like many brick-and-mortar small businesses are pivoting to serve their customers in new ways, it’s just as important that job seekers stay flexible and open to new opportunities – and new markets.
“Many junior candidates we’ve spoken with are accepting internships outside of the industry verticals they were once targeting, and being more open to widening their breadth of skills post-graduation,” says Rachel Runnels, Director of Talent Solutions at Freeman+Leonard.
Pay attention to verticals and even specific companies that seem to be doing well despite (or even because of) the pandemic. Nearly every type of business needs marketing, creative, communications and technology experts. That means rich opportunities for those who are willing to be flexible.
Position and market yourself for the job you want.
As a marketer, how you communicate your talents and the value you bring to a company is your proof of concept. Even if you have little experience, you have qualities and talents to showcase.
Not sure where to start? Use LinkedIn to research the work histories of people currently in roles you find interesting. Where did they start, and what were their own stepping stones? What skills did they strengthen? What professional organizations did they join?
Use this as inspiration for your own LinkedIn profile and résumé refresh. How do they describe themselves? What industry keywords are important to include?
And once you land an interview, “Be prepared to speak confidently about your specialty and what sets you apart from other applicants,” suggests Allen. “Make sure to do your homework on the company and have good questions prepared for the hiring manager.”
Take your career into your own hands instead of waiting for the right opportunity.
Think like an entrepreneur and design the projects you’d like to lead. If your portfolio is slim, build it out by creating your own passion projects or taking on pro bono work.
“We have heard from several design talent that they are helping friends and family outside of the creative realm to craft original résumés and bios while also working on their own branding,” says Runnels.
If you’ve thought about creating a podcast or YouTube channel, or publishing a blog, there’s never been a better time to make it happen. Whatever you create, find a way to weave it into your professional storyline so that it supports your long-term goals. Whether it’s an asset you can include in your portfolio or simply a passion project that allows you to explore a topic you’re curious about, it never hurts to demonstrate initiative and creativity to future employers.
Finally, creatives and marketers know it’s important to never stop learning.
Use your extra time to take courses, especially those that lead to a credential you can add to your LinkedIn profile and résumé, like a HubSpot or Facebook Blueprint certification.
And if you can, seek out and build relationships with people in roles that intrigue you. “Find a mentor in your industry early in your career who you can go to for career advice,” says Allen.
Difficult times can bring out the best in us, if we let them. So don’t be afraid to stretch your skills and shift your focus.
But whatever you do, don’t lower your expectations out of fear. Business is still being done, and companies are still hiring. Though the landscape is changing, all of this change is creating new opportunities for those ready to seize them.
Make the most of this time to build a bridge to the life and career you want.
From contract to full-time roles, Freeman+Leonard has over 25 years of experience placing marketing, digital and creative talent. Click here to submit your résumé and to be considered for future opportunities.
Need for Speed: Assessing and Building Your Brand’s Digital Agility
Need for Speed: Assessing and Building Your Brand’s Digital Agility