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Pushing the Envelope, a strategic marketing and branding firm based in Fort Myers, normally counts its clients as long-term partners — measured in years, not months. Samantha Scott, who founded the firm in 2006, says the goal with any client is to help shape that firm’s approach to reaching customers and building a sustainable brand.
The company, with a full-time staff of four and a team of project-based freelancers, has kept up doing some of that work for clients during the pandemic. But Scott, watching the news and talking to other Southwest Florida business owners, saw a gap in the marketing marketplace: uncertainty about how to restart a business. “I saw a lot of business were saying: ‘I want to reopen, but I don’t know how. I’m so overwhelmed,’” says Scott, a past Business Observer 40 under 40 winner. “Marketing [for those businesses] has become secondary. People don’t have the bandwidth to handle it.”
With that in mind, in late May Pushing the Envelope launched “Kickstart 2020,” a program to help other Southwest Florida businesses reopen post-pandemic. The idea is to do more than a free consultation for services, like most marketing firms offer, but not lock a business into a long-term situation, either. Instead, Pushing the Envelope offers thee mini marketing packages focused on what it says are the most helpful, cost-effective strategies in a COVID-19 world: social media, public relations and email marketing.
A Kickstart 2020 client can choose one of those three areas, at varying monthly price points, or get all three at a discounted rate. Plans range from $575 a month for email marketing to $700 for social media. The social media segment includes managing channels (Instagram, Facebook, etc.) writing and publishing posts and managing comments and messages. The press release part monitors and compiles media coverage and writes press releases, among other tasks. Email marketing includes creating a newsletter, with any graphics, links and other information.
Each package requires a six-month commitment, and the firm will provide tools, so the client can continue on with campaigns after it ends. The packages also include monthly consultations with Pushing the Envelope staff, over phone or Zoom. “Use it to get advice on services we’re providing or bigger marketing strategy or plans,” the Kickstart 2020 webpage states.
Scott adds that another key to the program is it provides updated measurements on how the campaigns are doing, so clients can make real-time return on investment decisions. In the first few days after announcing Kickstart 2020, Scott says a handful of potential clients have reached out about it. “Everything we will do for these clients,” Scott says, “will help move the needle forward for them.”
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