Lorraine and I first met at a friend's wedding. She was not attending as a guest, however; she, along with her husband Greg, was the wedding photographer. Since my husband and I were planning a wedding at the time, I was paying close attention to how they approached their work and I also just thought they looked pretty damn cool. We ended up hiring Lorraine (and Greg) to be our wedding photographers and were so pleasantly surprised to become friendly with them both in the pro

I remember when I was first starting out on my own I would break out into a cold sweat when people asked me what I did for a living. My talents were wide ranging and I had trouble defining everything that I was doing for my clients in a clear and concise way. This also meant that I lacked confidence while trying to explain myself. Certainly not an ideal situation at a networking event. Was I a freelancer? A consultant? A business owner? Did I handle creative marketing? Social

I am a storyteller. I told stories in a visual way when I worked as a television and digital producer up in New York, and after moving to Philadelphia, my medium changed to the written word. Stories are all around us--every brand, every business, every entrepreneur has a story to tell. It's just a matter of finding the right one. Storytelling has ancient roots, with early humans commemorating their stories with paintings on the walls of caves, carvings onto trees, and etching

Throughout my career, I've helped many clients either navigate a rebrand, or build a brand from scratch. But a brand is much bigger than just a logo and a website; behind every great brand is a great message. Through helping my clients navigate their branding challenges, I've learned that many of them do not realize that the first step of the process lies in crafting the right message and tone to present to the outside world. After all, if people don't like what you have to s

Out of sheer curiosity, I decided to Google the 2016 profits of Toyota and Mercedes-Benz recently. And what did I discover? Toyota made roughly $252 billion in 2016 and Mercedes-Benz brought in a mere $97 billion. Does that surprise you? It surprised me a little. As two vastly different car brands, with two vastly different price points and target markets, I had started thinking about how, with the right brand message for the right audience, it could be possible to find immen

When I decided to start my business—nearly five years ago now—my initial thought was that I may have had a great idea, but I couldn’t actual

When you run a small business, the small fires that have to be put out on a daily basis can make it difficult to focus on boosting your marketing efforts. I understand the hesitation to invest in the potentially time-consuming practice of blogging on a regular basis, but the benefits far outweigh any anxiety about time. And as far as money goes, according to HubSpot, 52 percent of companies who blog "indicated that leads from this channel were 'below average cost'" for inboun

There has been alot of buzz in the marketing world over the past few years about a concept called "content marketing." In fact, the Content Marketing Institute found that 55 percent of content marketers have no idea what content marketing success or effectiveness look like. In order to understand where you are going, you have to first have to understand the basics. So, welcome to Content Marketing 101! What is Content Marketing? It sounds complicated. Content Marketing is a