Marketing and Design Blog

Developing a Brand for St. Louis Fashion

At Atomicdust, we help companies develop a brand and the messaging to support it. We like to give all of our clients a voice, a story, something that customers can relate to. 

But what if they ask for more than a voice? What if they ask for a face? What if a client wants to develop a brand for a spokesperson?

That’s exactly what CBL & Associates Properties, Inc. asked us to do for their Regional Marketing Director, Sean Phillips.

Read how we developed a brand and blog for St. Louis shopping

A Roadmap for Successful Healthcare Marketing

Everyone in healthcare is talking about changes and the uncertainty that lies ahead. Unfortunately, as companies try to connect their products with those pain points, many are saying exactly the same things. Clients in this industry come to us to polish and promote their brands through bold statements – and that’s exactly what we did for Elsevier’s Revenue Cycle eLearning (RCE).

RCE asked us to promote their revenue cycle management training tools that support the ICD-10 changeover, due in 2013. Their educational products are numerous and complicated to describe, in an industry already buzzing with marketers, experts and lawmakers all fighting for attention in the space. Read A 'Roadmap for Successful Healthcare Marketing'

A Shiny New Article About the Disposable Nature of Marketing

Something I like to share with clients is that marketing is ultimately disposable. In 2-3 years, you’re going to want and likely need a new website, regardless of how beautiful and well designed it is now. In 2-3 years, you’re going to want new brochures and printed materials. And eventually you’re going to start questioning if your logo needs updating.

It’s just the nature of things. Regardless of what agency created it, or how many awards it won, or how much business it landed, there is a certain lure to the word new. The need for new is the reason we get new clients, and why clients leave. It’s normal.

So, if marketing is essentially disposable, how do we as marketers provide something that has lasting value? Read More

Preserving Brands: Transitioning Work from an Agency to an Internal Team

We believe there is a great deal of value in an outside perspective during the development of branding and marketing strategy. However, when we have finished our job the onus of brand stewardship ends up in the hands of internal marketing departments or procurement-strained creative vendors. What happens next is the gruesome mangling of the language and visuals that were once so well-crafted and on-point. All in the name of fast and cheap.

Read More

A Call for Content

Often, potential clients will call us to build a new corporate website. They’re typically unhappy with their current site and want us to design something new and effective. The client often asks for a “facelift” for the website. We take a look, click around and find that the visual elements aren’t the main concern, it’s a lack of messaging and content. Read more. 

Knowledge is Power

The term “knowledge is power” is not new, however, it represents a concept that is often forgotten or abused in marketing. I don’t know which is worse: content that is too top-level, giving the audience only fluffy, feel-good words that do nothing to develop a deeper, more actionable understanding, or bulleted lists of details that go on and on for days. 

There is a fine line to be walked between a preachy, marketing message and a specifications list that makes eyes’ cross, but when that balance is found, customers gain an education that is comforting and empowers decision making.  Read more.