Authentic Blog - Marketing Insights for Growing Businesses

Professional services marketing tips from experienced fractional CMOs

Professional services organizations face unique challenges with marketing. When your product is your people or expertise, elevating that expertise in your marketing efforts is critical. Firms have to share their thought leadership in a way that captures prospects’ attention and cultivates trusted relationships — all while keeping pace with developments in the industry and strategically allocating resources for maximum marketing impact. We invited three Authentic Fractional CMOs™, Dee Heffernan, Sherry Rothenberg, and Tracy Steeno, to share marketing insights and recommendations for professional services organizations facing growth hurdles today. The panelists dive into the biggest growth challenges these firms face today,…

How Authentic Fractional CMOs™ build maturity in growing organizations

Every Authentic client wants to grow their business At Authentic, our clients span various industries and business types, and the challenges they face often depend on factors unique to each company. But what all of our clients do have in common is that they are looking to grow their businesses. To support our clients in their growth, we developed our Authentic Growth® Methodology. This methodology is our proprietary system that provides each of our Authentic Fractional CMOs™ with a set of tools and processes that they can strategically apply to the unique challenges of our client engagements — ultimately helping clients achieve marketing alignment, accountability, and aptitude. One…

Closing Time podcast featuring Jennifer Zick

Random Acts of Marketing: Move Past it to Make Your B2B Marketing Strategy Work FOR You Our founder and CEO, Jennifer Zick, was recently the featured guest on the Closing Time podcast with host Chip House. (more…)

Empyrean: Client Story

HR technology and benefits administrator Empyrean hires Authentic to develop a channel strategy and amplify its marketing impact. “He [Authentic Fractional CMO™] was absolutely a key ingredient for us to set up a successful channel marketing effort. The team used to call him our marketing yoda.” James B. Stanton, VP of Go to Market, Empyrean Empyrean at a glance Company size: 900 employeesBusiness type: HR TechnologyCategory: B2B. B2B2CHeadquarters: Houston, TXKey initiatives: Strategic advising, channel marketing, co-marketing, communication strategy, marketing technology https://youtu.be/tiUUQ3t3boo The Challenge Empyrean, an HR technology company that helps some of the largest brands build better cultures through benefits,…

The Berg Group: Client Story

Specialty contractor The Berg Group hired Authentic to solidify its marketing foundation and refocus its brand. "Our fractional CMO came in and laid a foundation of priorities that we needed to tackle before we could build on the components of marketing. Just like in construction, if you don’t start with a great foundation, anything you do above and beyond that is going to be weak." The Berg Group at a glance Company size: 70 employees + 400-600 field craftspeopleBusiness type: National specialty contractorCategory: B2BHeadquarters: Chaska, MinnesotaKey initiatives: Marketing fundamentals, brand messaging and design, digital strategy, metrics, employee development The Challenge…

Pillar Bank: Client Story

Regional community bank Pillar Bank hires Authentic™ to reinvigorate its brand and re-establish it as a powerful community presence. "For an organization our size to have access to a mindshare of fractional CMOs and vetted external resources is super powerful. I don’t know where else we’d get that kind of horsepower." Shane Bauer, President & CEO, Pillar Bank Pillar Bank at a glance Company size: 44 employeesBusiness type: Regional community bankCategory: D2C, B2BHeadquarters: Baldwin, WIKey initiatives: Brand strategy, messaging & design, new market launch, digital strategy, metrics & reporting, marketing resourcing, employee development, and agency management https://youtu.be/lsD_4iE8SmU The Challenge Pillar…

Channels: From undefined to omnichannel

Channels connect your business to your buyers A company’s first go-to-market channel usually emerges organically as the business finds its footing and tests its idea with the market. But as a company matures, it must thoughtfully choose new channels for growth and develop strategic integrations between them. Using our Authentic Growth® Marketing Maturity Matrix, we demonstrate the stages a business moves through as its channel strategy matures. Before we dive into the six stages of channel maturity, let’s define what we mean by channels. (more…)

Healthcare marketing tips from experienced fractional CMOs

Healthcare has always been a challenging industry to market within. Competition is fierce with large investments being made into innovative startups, patient choice is largely based on factors you cannot control, margins are often slim, and regulation presents challenges for how you engage with your patients. Marketers must understand these unique challenges, keep up with developments in the industry, and know how to strategically allocate resources for impact. (more…)

Do Good Work podcast featuring Jennifer Zick

Creating Category Dominance Our founder and CEO, Jennifer Zick, was recently the featured guest on the Do Good Work podcast hosted by Raul Hernandez Ochoa. Jennifer discussed how businesses can achieve category dominance when they start by building a solid marketing foundation that includes a strategy to help them overcome random acts of marketing. Listen to the podcast Watch the conversation https://youtu.be/K644jEx8DPI Key Takeaways Jennifer shares how a painful job termination became the catalyst for building Authentic. Entrepreneurship magnified Jennifer's belief in surrender and trusting a bigger plan. She outlines how Authentic became one of the first national firms to…

Talent Talks podcast featuring Jennifer Zick

The Power of Shared Expertise Through Fractional Leadership w/ Jennifer Zick & Jim Hardwick Our founder and CEO, Jennifer Zick, was recently the guest on the Talent Talks podcast hosted by Titus Talent Strategies, CEO & Visionary, Jonathan D. Reynolds. Jennifer was joined by Jim Hardwick, Chief Community Officer of Sales Xceleration®. The team talked about sales and marketing fractional leadership, and why it's a smart approach that brings external expertise to organizations in a flexible and cost-effective manner. Additionally, the three also covered the importance of giving back, living life with no regrets, the tough lessons learned and what’s…

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