What a week it was...

We knew heading into it, that it was going to be a busy week. The sun, the moon, and the clients had aligned to have our team heading in three very different directions.

On the busiest day, we had our key account managers directing a photo and video shoot in the Valley, another attending a Retail trends conference, and yet another running a major event.

Our videography/photography team captured the live flight path of autonomous drones to show their capabilities.6th Annual National Retail Innovation Awards in Halifax.Launching a new product at the Canadian Progress Club - Halifax Sports Charity Dinner.

Our work has expanded and become more varied in this, our seventh year as a marketing services company. As further proof, our ‘bread & butter’—web design and development—is still a part of our portfolio, but this past week a web project had morphed into brand positioning, identity work, marketing collateral, and a launch plan.

Birthdays/ anniversaries are a great time to reflect on the past, and try to figure out how you got to where you are.

For Charcoal, I take the blame. We first started as a web development firm, and I always felt that I was an interloper. I wasn’t particularly tech savvy, but was a quick study.

Always, I wondered—who’s looking after the website launch? Why didn’t they have a high res logo version? Who manages the brand? How were they going to make money with their new site? How would they generate leads? It was the marketer in me.

Over the years, we’ve contracted out web dev, and brought in more marketers, and it should be no surprise that we’re a lot more marketing centric today. Over the past year, we launched the concept of Fractional Marketing, which is now one of our larger lines of business. We like to think of it as an “all you can eat” marketing buffet!

The business, and prospects for growth are good. The week had started off with a couple of new business wins. One came to us from SEO and our lead generation program; the other from our ongoing work within a sector. Later in the week came a call from a long-time colleague and client, with a referral.

The world of marketing has changed, and will continue to change. It is much more complex than it used to be, but fundamentally the same—finding and attracting customers.

It was fitting that we had such a busy week, heading into our ‘birthday’. It wasn’t just about being busy, but more so a refection on the way that we approach the work. When you are doing web dev, there is a start, middle and end to the work. It’s a project, and success is about getting the project done—on time, and on budget.

When you are doing marketing on behalf of a client, there is no ‘end’. You have to be constantly thinking about finding and attracting customers, at different times of year, in different customer segments. The brain and the activities are ‘always on’.

We did the shoot, attended the conference, planned and ran the event, networked, built relationships, pitched new ideas, submitted proposals and SOWs, researched and developed content calendars, placed ads and issued press releases. We even grabbed a burger or two for Burger Week to celebrate. All in a busy week that was. Which makes the next year something to really look forward to.