Creative B2B Marketing

BACKGROUND | Over the past year, I’ve been checking out Reddit groups, LinkedIn articles/comments, substack newsletters, and YouTube vids about what is being discussed around B2B marketing and the “advice” being dished out by various content creators. It soon became strikingly obvious to me that most of these advisors/experts/commentators HAD NO IDEA WHAT THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT.

I could tell by their comments and advice that they have never been a conference room with a CEO, CIO, CFO and various company directors all discussing the pros and cons of going with a selected vendor that was going to impact the company significantly and be a major expense/investment for that company. It was obvious they had never been one of the Buyer Group Influencers, Champions, & Detractors OR on a 12-person, slide-deck-Zoom call pitching a $200K to $1M piece of business. Well, I have. Not just once or twice but countless times over the past 30 years AND ON BOTH SIDES OF IT. I’ve been a Champion for specific solutions I felt confident would speed workflow and improve quality where I was trying to influence our CEO, CFO, CIO — AND I’ve been on the PITCHING side of it where various companies I’ve been with were trying to WIN large deals I am trying to influence the stakeholders in the Buyer Group.

I started offering strategy & tactical advice in Reddit groups — and started a YouTube channel that was well-received. This motivated me to create the Creative B2B Marketing course — 30 videos, 14 hours, 8 modules — includes examples, templates and downloads. I jammed 30+ years of REAL-WORLD, hands-on experience culled from my own experiments & successes from what I learned with other highly-effective team members I’ve had the privilege of being in the trenches with. I’ve achieved EXCEPTIONAL results with what I share in the course — accelerated business growth, brand leadership, taking companies from start-up to NASDAQ… From principles that have proven unshakable through the decades to the latest AI strategies — getting big marketing department impact with small teams — it’s all concentrated in there with step-by-step guides.

Naturally, my upskilling course venture needed branding. You’ll see my brand style is direct, casual, a bit of Gen-X edge, a bit of salty. And hopefully effective for the learners who take the time to benefit from it. The course retailed on an ecommerce website when launched. I now post all the modules on my YouTube channel.

Video Thumbnails Show Brand Graphical Style

Brand Consistent Video Styling

Screenshots from Website

The Intrepid Disruptor Society

BACKGROUND | A streetwear brand for Gen-X? Sure, why not. Just because most of us ended up in cubicles in a soul-sucking corporate machine doesn’t mean we have to wear polo shirts with khakis every day of the week. This solo project is me having some self-indulgent fun and keeping design and marketing skills sharp while I revisit consumer brand marketing.

OBJECTIVE | Launch an apparel brand aimed at alterna-brat Gen-Xers with a tongue-in-cheek, rebellious streak — harkening back to our punk-rock, FAFO roots. The I.D.S. brand is also an elixir of my fascination with esoteric symbology, sacred geometry, and a passion for creative discontent.

SOLUTION | I built what I believe to be a Gen-X friendly, eCommerce site featuring an assortment of Print on Demand apparel items plus links to some of my favorite creative idea-catcher tools and books. I do all the graphic design for all apparel items as well as the content for the I.D.S. Instagram and YouTube channels. I hope you’ll stop by the site, check out the brand, and pick-up a T-shirt while you’re at it! ;)

Some Brand-pushing Vid Samples

Some of the Apparel Art