regional & worldwide
responsive & collaborative
painstakingly results-driven
• B2B • B2C • Causes •
responsive & collaborative
painstakingly results-driven
• B2B • B2C • Causes •
SHARP THINKING
FOR BETTER RESULTS
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Agile thinking & decades of experience yield highly effective ideas and tactics.
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ORIGINAL
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CREATIVE
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Audacious Strategy:
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Resonant Communication:
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Sharp Targeting:
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Client Recognition
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"James completed several multi-national projects for me at HP and Intel. He is smart, clever, insightful and exceptionally strategic. He transformed the way we thought about our business, and helped us break through clutter and differentiate in a meaningful way. His recommendations were actionable and game changing. He is fun to work with and deeply committed to the end result."
Jan McDaniel, Hewlett-Packard & Intel
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"James is quite non-traditional and gifted. He has a profound ability to focus deeply, which takes him to knowledge and meaning where most people never think to look. His quick wit makes it fun to share the ride with him, but the journey isn't always comfortable. He often follows his unpredictable instinct of where to look for connections, opportunities, and wisdom, then his mind leaps from point A to a solid C while many are still scrambling to find B. James is piercingly astute, and he is never satisfied with superficial thinking. I've seen some of the smartest people I know delight in James' unique thinking and style. In the end, his C is usually better than most people's D, E, or F."
Jim Kober, American Express
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"James gets to the heart of complex challenges quickly, then communicates about them in clear, compelling, and accessible ways. He is one of the smartest people I’ve worked with, and is always thinking about how to best maximize results, even if that means challenging “business as usual.” He's also a lot of fun! James supported Saatchi San Francisco in developing many highly successful campaigns for HP, including their first global ad campaign."
Mary Doan, Saatchi
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"When I've worked with James, I've always found his thinking to be creative and challenging, not mundane or shallow. He gets to the heart of the problem, attacks it with relentless curiosity and passionate energy, then brings the highest levels of strategic thinking to the table."
Rob White, Fallon |
Results
107 Ideas in 2 Weeks
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SUMMARY
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SUMMARY
• B-to-B
• Technology
• GLOBAL
• Assignment: Thwart the frequent loss of major corporate sales at the CEO approval stage
• Result: Changes to sales strategy and communication yielded higher approval rates
CLIENT
- Fortune 50 Technology Corporation
- Interview CEOs of Fortune 500s (and similar outside of U.S.) to understand decision process when IT executives make brand recommendations for major purchases.
- Provided deep understanding of CEO priorities and decision process, recommendations for sales strategy and language to streamline the decision pipeline.
- Substantive changes were made to the proposal and communication process, language, and selling strategy. Approval rates increased significantly.
Prevented Unwanted Pregnancy & HIV Transmission
Reproductive Health Non-Profits & NGOs
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SUMMARY
• Volunteer & Pro Bono
• Public Health
• Consumer
• INDIA, KENYA, THE PHILIPPINES, UNITED STATES
• Objective: Educate and inform people about how to avoid unwanted pregnancy & sexually transmitted infections.
• Result: Several large, diverse populations were impacted
CLIENTS/PARTNERS
- Wide Variety of NGOs and Non-Profit Organizations (Large & Small)
- Help educate, inform, and compel adolescents (& adults in some locations) to prevent unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV. Work aimed to deeply understand target audiences and inform/advise them through education programs, published materials, and various forms of public service communications. Specific contributions ranged widely, from focus group research in remote villages to advising Non-Profits/NGOs and their ad agencies in major cities. Audiences ranged from illiterate, isolated villagers to highly educated, multilingual urban dwellers.
- Contributions over several years were well utilized and often praised. As with most prevention-related work, results are challenging to measure accurately. My objective was never to have measured results; I am certain and deeply satisfied that I helped prevent many, many, many unwanted results from sex.
- Several large, diverse populations were effectively advised about prevention of both unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.
Introduced Hybrid Cars to Mass Market
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SUMMARY
• Automotive
• Consumer
• NORTH AMERICA
• Assignment: Develop strategy for growing hybrid car market after early adopters
• Result: Rapid category development and capture of lion's share of market
CLIENT
- Fortune 50 Automobile Manufacturer (Japan HQ-based clients)
- Conduct focus group research to inform and advise Japanese HQ about developing North American strategy for expanding sales of hybrid cars from early majority to various segments of mass market.
- Provided useful targeting insights and engaged in highly productive planning exercises with Japanese clients and North American ad agency to chart out realistic timelines for messaging strategies to incrementally expand to broader audiences.
- Easily observed on the streets.
Doubled # of Customers at No Additional Cost
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SUMMARY
• Retail Financial Services
• Consumer
• CALIFORNIA
• Assignment: Grow customer base for deposit accounts
• Result: Number of high value deposit accounts nearly doubled in less than one year, with no significant changes to service offerings or marketing budget
CLIENT
- Regional Financial Institution
- Identify ways to expand customer base for a retail financial institution with a long legacy and strong reputation as an “old people’s bank.”
- Primary and secondary research, including extensive in-branch observation and focus group research among customers and prospects of various age groups and financial profiles.
- Brainstorming with client and agency teams.
- KEY EFFORT: Independent analysis and ideation.
- Crucial Observation: The institution had unmatched delivery of highly personal service, which was particularly compelling to younger audiences for large balance, longer-term savings accounts (the most lucrative).
- Recommendation: Adjust positioning and messaging to include both legacy (older) audiences and younger targets, with no changes to the brand image or services.
- Remarkable new customer acquisition results, particularly for highly profitable accounts (high balance, low activity). Creative work and media were altered, but no significant changes were made to services, delivery mechanisms, or budgets.
Clients & Partners
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Selected Clients & Partners
