Art Bloom President

When I was a marketing director for a bank, I couldn't find what I needed in an advertising and marketing agency. I gave good direction, but what came back was just about always off the mark, as clever and beautiful as the creative concepts often were. I was uncomfortable with the mark-ups and commissions that were, and are, standard for agencies. Wouldn't it be in their best interests to recommend the tactics that gave them the biggest pay-off? Wouldn't they have a big incentive to choose the expensive printers?

I started The Bloom Agency in 2000 with the idea of providing what clients really want, a clear focus on the health and growth of their businesses. I'm all in favor of great design and eloquent words, when they are in the service of business strategy. So we spend a lot of time at the beginning, getting to truly understand our clients' business models, their target markets, their internal culture, and their goals. After careful questioning and listening, we develop a comprehensive marketing plan that fits their objectives, their budget, and their capacity to implement new tactics. Essentially we marry their marketing to their business goals and plans.

In most cases, we operate as our clients' marketing department. It just makes sense for certain organizations to outsource the marketing, advertising and public relations functions. Simply put, they get more for their money—a whole team of energetic experts in strategy, interactive communications, design, writing, public relations, event planning, media planning and buying, speech writing and presentations, and more. We take on virtually any tasks that will advance the company's marketing strategy, including support such as internal mystery shopping, sales training, and professional development activities.

And of course we don't take those mark-ups and commissions. That would put the agency's interests in conflict with our clients' best interests.

Creating the kind of agency I had in mind wouldn't have been possible with a group of people who were steeped in the assumptions and practices of the advertising industry. Over the years we've built a team with a range of perspectives and industry experience. We've got former marketing directors, consultants and entrepreneurs, people who majored in psychology and economics and literature, people who have formal training in the fine arts.

The Bloom Agency today is what I envisioned—a creative, committed, problem-solving partner for our clients, and a talented team of people I am proud to work with.

I'd been asked to give a presentation to the assembled faculty and staff of Forsyth Tech. In choosing to outsource marketing, advertising and public relations, President Gary Green had made a bold move for a community college. He wanted the people who worked there to better understand what marketing is and what The Bloom Agency had accomplished in the first six months.

About ten days before the convocation, I mentioned in a staff meeting that I was thinking about what I should say. Randy Jones, one of our writers, said, "I have an idea." He started singing, to the tune of "Maria" from West Side Story, "Forsyth Tech, I just heard an ad for Forsyth Tech, and suddenly that school seems very, very cool to me."

Ten days later, everyone at the agency was on stage at the West Campus. No boring slide presentation, but a 15-minute musical that expanded the audience's idea of what marketing is about, presented the commercials, publications, website and other materials we had developed in a context that made sense, and showed everyone at Forsyth Tech how much we admire what they are creating. In the finale, set to the tune of "Tonight", we projected the words on a screen and had the audience singing with us—a perfect image of the relationship we always seek to have with our client organizations.

Oh, we had done a lot of client work in those ten days. But the people at The Bloom Agency went way beyond the call of duty for Tech Side Story—writing lyrics, choreographing dance numbers, setting up the display of our work, rehearsing lines—and even creating a show poster so that every staff and faculty member at Forsyth Tech would have a souvenir.

One of my goals has been to create a good place to work, where employees are encouraged to express and develop their interests and talents. We don't usually sing and dance for our clients, but the way we worked to produce Tech Side Story is the way we work on a daily basis - jumping on opportunities, generating lots of ideas, drawing on all of our perspectives and talents, insisting on quality and polish, and never forgetting what we are trying to accomplish, what results we intend to effect.

The energy and enthusiasm of our ensemble get the credit for all the work I like.