Intro: [00:00:04] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for Atlanta Business Radio. Brought to you by On pay. Atlanta’s new standard in payroll. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:24] Lee Kantor here, another episode of Atlanta Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, Onpay. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Atlanta Business Radio, we have Jason Marlowe with Market House. Welcome, Jason. Hey, Lee, how are you? I am doing well. I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about market House. How you serving folks?

Jason Marlowe: [00:00:51] Well, we are a creative agency. We’re based here in the metro Atlanta area. We are, uh, we’ve been around for ten years, but we are kind of like a new generation of marketing and design agencies. We’re completely remote. I work out of the Grayson and Lawrenceville area. My partner’s up in the Gainesville and coming area, and we have a team that spreads from Monroe and Gainesville up to Chattanooga. So we’re kind of spread out all over the place. But we serve the people of metro Atlanta and Georgia and beyond.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:25] Now, you used the word design agency. Can you explain what that means?

Jason Marlowe: [00:01:29] Yes. Uh, so we serve clients who are in need of branding, whether they’re coming for the first time to develop their company right out of the gate. They’ve got a name and a passion and a plan, and we help them create an actual physical look and feel to the brand. We develop a story around it. And or if you have company that is ready to be rebranded, they’ve been around for a while and something’s changed or they just need a fresh look. We’ll step in to help them redevelop the brand, but we also serve clients who need ongoing support. So you’re talking about, uh, where we outsource design and we do it all in house. So we have a team of designers with, uh, print media and digital media, web design, copywriting, kind of the whole sphere there to help and serve, uh, businesses.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:24] Now, if you’re an existing company, what’s kind of a symptom that maybe your brand does need a refresh? Because I think a lot of times, you know, people have a brand they decide on early on, and then it is what it is, and they kind of stop thinking about it. But are there some signals that you should be paying attention to when it comes to branding that you should say, hey, maybe we do need a refresh?

Jason Marlowe: [00:02:49] Yeah. Uh, you know, I think that for a lot of folks, when people are, um, really not connecting with the brand because let’s, let’s take one step back. Brand. One of the things that people don’t really get is that brand is more than just like a logo. A lot of people are like, oh, well, you know, can you do my brand? And they just expect some basic logo package. But really, brand is a whole voice, right? The whole presence of your business. And, uh, when people just aren’t connecting with your company and your business, maybe it’s time to really reconsider that voice that you’re using when you’re speaking with customers. Maybe your audience and your customer base has changed. Maybe they’ve gotten older, maybe they’ve gotten younger. Maybe they have different interests. Maybe it’s time to reposition yourself, uh, just because you’re not connecting, uh, the way that you used to. Right. Maybe your audience and is dropping off. Maybe your sales are going down, and that’s something symptomatic of something larger. Right? So, uh, those are usually some of the bigger signals that we see people coming in with.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:58] And I think that, uh, branding, along with corporate culture are one of those things that they’re going to happen whether you do something about them or not. So you might as well be proactive when it comes to them.

Jason Marlowe: [00:04:10] Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. Um, you know, being a part of your corporate culture is one of the kind of the key things with your brand. Um, and unfortunately, a lot of folks, especially during a rebrand, it’s you got to sit down and really, like, explain to them what’s going on. Uh, because like I said, it’s more than just creating a new design. Sometimes it’s like, hey, listen, we’re changing our messaging, right? We’re not the company we were when we started 25, 30 years ago. We’ve changed. We’ve got our eyes set on something new. We might offer the same product, but we’re going to go about it a completely different way. And so it’s really important for all the stakeholders in the company to really get behind the messaging. And that’s one of the things that we help with consulting, you know, you know, after the brand has been developed, is really just trying to, you know, make sure that on all levels, not just customer facing, but on internally, uh, internal acceptance of your brand is vital, paramount.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:09] Now, um, are there some things you can do to ensure that, um, you know, everybody’s on message and that it is authentically yours and it is congruent with your values because as. Especially if you have a team and like even in your case, where you have a team that people are all over the place, uh, and not physically together, sometimes each individual will kind of have a different understanding of the brand, and they may not be communicating it. Um, you know, all from the same, uh, song page.

Jason Marlowe: [00:05:42] You know, uh, I think one of the things that you could share that we develop and other agencies develop is to start with is your brand guide, because inside of that, once you’ve been rebranded and once things have been updated, uh, there’s, there’s stuff more than just the visual aspects and the logo and the colors, but there’s voice, right? Like, how should we be talking with customers? What does our brand sound like? Uh, how are we engaging with customers? All of that should be part of your brand guide. And then, uh, you know, beyond that, it’s it’s having open discussions with the company. Um, and it is, uh, you know, making sure that people understand where you’re going. And that comes from the top down, you know. So it might be the design team along with, you know, your C-suite that’s overseeing the brand. But it’s really the the top of the company really explaining what’s up, what’s going on now.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:39] Have you ever had to have maybe kind of a difficult conversation with a client when it comes to this where like, they could think, hey, we’re Nordstrom. But you look at them and you’re like, know your target. Um, you know there’s some incongruity in what you’re saying and what you aspire to be and your behavior.

Jason Marlowe: [00:06:56] Oh yeah. Um, I think one of the biggest things is a lot of companies want to start the branding process by stripping all of the brand, uh, assets and ideas away to some really basic point. So, for example, um, you know, you have a company that comes in and they’re like, you know what? Nike’s got this brand recognition, right? Like you just see that swoosh and people just know it’s it’s sports. It’s running. It’s it’s everything. It’s you know it’s perseverance. It’s you know trying it’s trying your best when it comes to, you know being an athlete. It’s it’s all of these different aspects. But you gotta you gotta get there. So like I had a client who was like, you know, I really like this branding of X, y, z, but I prefer how they leave all of their name. They leave their name off of it. And I was like, well, you probably should leave your name on it because you’re not at that level yet. And I like to preface it with yet because, you know, you have no idea how high a business is going to fly. And, uh, but the big thing is you got to take your steps. And so a brand can be distilled eventually down to something very simple as a swoosh. But before you get there, you need to have it needs to live with Nike first, you know. So you got to you got to have you got to be around for a minute. You got to really push your brand. You got to promote yourself. You got to market. You got a campaign before you have that kind of household recognition, which is what a lot of people really they go in wanting. And it’s kind of like a baby step thing.

Lee Kantor: [00:08:40] And it’s one of those things that, um, it takes time and and it takes time and money, like, you can’t, you know, like you can’t call yourself Google without spending money. Like it costs money to call yourself a made up name without explaining what that means, right?

Jason Marlowe: [00:08:58] Yes. Branding. Branding is expensive. Um, branding is expensive because it’s a process so far beyond just making a logo. Um, if you want a logo and you don’t want to put any kind of thought behind it, you just say, hey, I want a logo, and it looks like the widget that I sell. Okay, great. Go to go to fiber there. Fiber. There are marketplaces for that, right? $0.99. They’re they’re places where you can go and do that. But if you want to think about your target audience, if you want to do competitor research, if you wanted to develop an actual brand around what you’re creating, you got to do the work. And that’s not, you know, unfortunately, that’s not cheap. And, you know, we’re not talking about breaking the bank, but, you know, you have to put some money down to to get to where you’re going. And it’s kind of like, um. My mama said this my entire life. She’s an entrepreneur. Um, and she always has told me the way it starts is the way it goes. And that’s literally a phrase I think about probably once a week, because it’s all about doing it right out of the gate, and then you set yourself up for success in the future. And unfortunately, a lot of people try and skip the steps when they’re starting a business. They’re bootstrapping, and there’s things you can cut corners on. But. Developing the voice and the face of your business is not something that I would cut the corners on, you know what I mean, right?

Lee Kantor: [00:10:21] Because it’s foundational. Everything is going to build on that. So if you screw that up, you’re going to have a problem.

Jason Marlowe: [00:10:27] Exactly.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:28] Now who is the ideal client for you? Are you working with large enterprise organizations? Do you work in certain industries? Is there kind of an ideal customer profile for your firm?

Jason Marlowe: [00:10:39] Uh, yeah. So, you know, we used to go after everybody, right? You know, big companies, little companies, medium sized. But, you know, after a while, we’re kind of settling into the lane that we really enjoy. Um, I love working with, uh, nonprofits and, um, you know, companies that are on a bigger mission, uh, you know, uh, those, uh, companies, like religious organizations, we work with several of those throughout the state. Um, and, um, you know, medium sized businesses, small and medium sized businesses are kind of our, our forte. You know, I’m not going after some huge company. Um, it’s a Nike earlier. That’s not my that’s not my audience. I don’t think I could fly with them, but, uh, I think for small and medium sized businesses who understand the need for solid design and marketing and the power that, uh, it can have to elevate your business and to grow and to create the life that you want. Uh, I think for those companies, that’s where we, uh, that’s where we really fly.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:51] Are you sometimes there first kind of agency that they hire that they’ve kind of tried things on their own, and now they’ve kind of graduated to the level where they need outside eyes on their work.

Jason Marlowe: [00:12:02] Actually. Yes. Um, that’s a that’s a that’s a great question. Um, you seem like you’ve been doing this for more than a minute. Uh, you know, but, uh, yes, that’s that’s actually, that’s actually nail on the head. Um, a lot of folks try and do it themselves, um, because they’re looking to, you know, save money. Oh, they don’t want to have to hire somebody, or they just want to be able to do it themselves. And they realize, you know what? You know what? I can’t do it myself. Um, sometimes it’s more of a case of, um, they have the skill set to do it. And so they just think that they can take on something else, but they know that their time is better spent growing the business, and our time is better spent helping them, you know, have the tools to do that.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:48] Is there a story you can share of maybe a client that you work with? You don’t have to name their name, but maybe share the problem that they had and how you helped them get to a new level.

Jason Marlowe: [00:12:57] Yeah. For sure. Um, we’ve got a great client we work with now. Uh, they were very they have they have ton of child companies and, uh, individual divisions, but they were all incredibly insulated. Right. So this hand didn’t know what this hand was doing and vice versa. And they were creating a lot of marketing materials and content and websites that were very disjointed. Nothing looked like anything else. And it was just a very muddy brand. It was a great brand, but all of their materials and outreach were very muddy, and one of the things that we’ve helped them do over the last I think two years at this point is start to develop cohesion across all of those. So, you know, we’ve been tackling it one website at a time, one booklet at a time. Uh, one social media post at a time is really just going like, what is the brand? How should we communicate, making sure that we’re always using, you know, always referencing the brand guide. Everything is on point and consistent and helping them create consistency is one of the big things that I can hang my hat on, that we’ve worked for them for over the years now.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:16] Is there a piece of advice you can give, uh, kind of a smaller firm when it comes to their brand or their design or even their marketing, something actionable that they can do today that would make a difference tomorrow.

Jason Marlowe: [00:14:29] Uh, a couple things. One thing is make sure that you set a budget. I talk to every, every, every business I work with. I feel like at one point or another, uh, never has a a defined budget, even if it’s just something. And I understand going into it. A lot of people are like, well, I don’t know how much it costs. Um, but it should never be this kind of song and dance between the business and the agency, the agency, like ourselves and others, we’re better suited to do the best by you, to do right by you, to be good custodians of your budget. If we know what we’re working with. Um, and it’s just it wastes time. It’s very frustrating process trying to suss out, you know, what’s your spend like, um, that is a, um, that’s one of the big ones is, uh, you know, actually sitting down and looking at your budget and to see what you can spend. Uh, I would also say that, um, sitting down and looking at your brain guide, if you have one or kind of creating like, okay, this is our logo, these are our colors. This is these are our fonts. Just go super, super basic and say this is what we should be doing. And then looking at the materials that you’re putting out, go over to sales and say, let me see your one sheets write sales. Send me all of your one sheets that you’re sending out. Hey air, what kind of stuff are we posting online? Uh, you know, looking over at maybe your customer service team or your account manager, like, hey, what are you mailing out to customers? And, you know, talk to somebody else, like, hey, send me your email signature. Right? So step back, take a look at what you should be doing, and then have everybody send to you what you’re actually doing and really go is what we’re doing matching what we should be doing. And I will tell you that there will be incongruity there 99 times out of 100.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:24] Now somebody wants to learn more about your agency or have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team. What’s the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Jason Marlowe: [00:16:34] Yeah. Uh, we are online at MKT Dot House. Yes that is.house.com. It’s mkt dot house. Uh and you can find us on there. We have all of our services detailed out. You can live chat with us. You can give us a call. Um, we are available that way you can shoot me an email at Jason at MKT House. Uh, any way that you can get in touch with us, we’ll be happy to connect with you, talk, and give you a free consult and see how we can help you grow.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:03] Well, Jason, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Jason Marlowe: [00:17:08] Yeah. Thank you. Lee, thank you for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:17:10] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Atlanta Business Radio.