PO & Co.

How can you sell products and services if you're ignored in the first place?

PO&Co. helps small-to-medium-size companies spring from their sales plateaus and increase revenue through effective marketing free of buzzwords, shiny objects, and black boxes.

Marketing Consultant & Fractional CMO

Common Giant

Common Giant is a growth-minded branding agency that digs deep into marketing strategy to produce stunning creative execution.

Common Giant was founded in 2012 to My role with Common Giant is to help grow the brand strategy framework for the agency and evangelize the company's brand. 

As of 2021, I have moved out of day-to-day operations to focus on brand growth at SFW.

Founder, Board Member, and Partner

Common Giant is a brand growth agency that digs deep into marketing strategy to produce stunning creative execution for companies who want to become legendary.

Common Giant stands tall with expertise in brand strategy, creative execution, and strategic communication. Our ethos is not only about delivering collaborative, successful brands and campaigns for our clients, it is also about building committed partnerships. We’ve worked globally with clients in the software technology, medical technology, consumer packaged goods, food, and retail industries.

At Common Giant, we channel our partners’ visions into projects that are inspired, clear, and concise. We bring our team’s full range of talents to generate a signature agency experience.

Founder and Chief Creative Officer

The YEC is a selective, invite-only group of like-minded peers and entrepreneurs from nearly every industry. YEC has been honored by Nasdaq, The White House and has been recognized in media outlets worldwide.

Member

Sales Factory

Sales Factory is a retail-focused agency compelled to succeed by a data-driven integrated approach for home retail brands eager to learn, grow, and win.

My focus is to develop winning brand strategies that drive business growth for our clients.

Vice President of Brand Strategy

Piedmont Opera

The mission of Piedmont Opera is to create operatic productions of the highest artistic quality to enrich our community and to advance the art form.

Our Vision is to be the finest opera company of our size in the nation and acknowledged as the best at what we do.

Board Member

iCan House

iCan House supports and enhances the lives of those with social challenges by teaching social skills, educational opportunities and provide a source of educational resources and networks. 

In our community, there exists a large population who live their daily lives with autism, Asperger’s Syndrome, PDD-NOS, and other social disorders. As they grow and experience a world created with rules that they may not understand, it is imperative that these unique individuals are provided with positive social models that care to help them grasp the social world in which they must live in.

Together we are stronger. A support system of parents, professionals and advocates will help us succeed and provide our loved ones with the best chance to get the most out of life. Let's chat and see how I can help.

The Variable

Formerly known as PAVE Creative Group, The Variable is a digitally informed marketing think tank that is committed to turning the traditional agency-client relationship on its head. We like MadMen here. But we're more like MathMen (and women, of course). In that spirit, The Variable thinks agencies should stop being cost centers and start being revenue generators.

Specialties –
Business Strategy, Digitally Informed Advertising, Brand Development, Innovation Development

Art Director

PAVE Creative Group

Designer / Art Director

Freelance Graphic Designer / Art Director

Freelance Art Director

Crobar Creative Leverage

Marketing consultant, Fractional CMO, brand strategy, energetic speaker, foodie, soccer player, and proud Dad

I love marketing and building brands. Friends, colleagues, and clients feel that energy from the first moment of interaction. It all begins with curiosity and evolves into a blend of strategic thinking and creative magic to construct brands through effective marketing.

Over the past two decades, I've led marketing initiatives for a diverse range of companies across various industries and sizes, including technology, medtech, consumer goods, and professional services, catering to both B2C and B2B sectors.

In 2012, I founded Common Giant, specializing in crafting branding and marketing for companies that understand that brand is a competitive advantage in a world full of commodities and a marketplace competing on price.

During my career, I’ve worked client-side managing retail stores up to $52MM, served on the agency side as VP of Brand Strategy, successfully launched an agency with global clients, started a marketing consultancy, and served as fractional CMO for multiple businesses. 

Throughout my career, I’ve believed in these four pillars:

1 - Marketing is a business practice. 
Successful businesses use marketing beyond promotion, as a series of business levers to pull for higher profits.

2 - Know the customer as much as you know yourself.
We’re in business to sell products and services. But it’s hard to sell something customers don’t want or why they should buy from you. Get to know what, how, and where they’ll buy.

3 - Grow the orchard while you sell the fruit.
A small percentage of your current target audience is ready to buy. Sell when they’re ready and invest in the brand long-term to sell a lot more.

4 - Boring is expensive.
Boring is forgettable and less effective. Being ignored means being forgotten and spending more for attention. Boring is bad for business.


Now that you’ve read this excruciatingly verbose bio, I’d like to add that, in addition to my professional endeavors, I am an enthusiastic keynote speaker, delivering engaging talks on branding, marketing, creative problem-solving in business, and effective marketing strategies to audiences of all sizes.

Phillip Oakley

As people discuss the business decline of McDonald's and Wendy's, and blame it on brand promise or not making customers "feel" something, we need to keep in mind that prices outpaced inflation, and (for most), quality declined to maximize profits. 

Providing decent food for the value is the bottom rung of the consumer benefit ladder. You need a solid first rung before climbing up to the feels.

Once that bottom rung breaks, just as Domino's faced years ago, you must slide back to the ground to fix it. 

Or customers won't care to ask "Where's the Beef?"

Stand Tall.

Mixing strategy and creativity to build brands through effective marketing. Energetic speaker, foodie, soccer player, and proud Dad.

Did you know 30-year-old sonic branding for Mentos is so powerful, it can burn a Michael McDonald Yacht Rock earworm straight out of your brain?

I have a confession to make: I quite like Yacht Rock. 

My wife and I have been enjoying more than our fair share of The Doobie Brothers, Christopher Cross, and Steely Dan of late. For some reason, Michael McDonald has cameos in loads of them. 

One night last week, I couldn't get to sleep. I was being haunted by Michael McDonald. If you've heard the song "Ride Like the Wind," you know why: 

🎶 I've got such a long way to go 🎶

It had to stop. (Such a long way to go)

So I turned to ... The Freshmaker. And it works every single time. 🎶Doo doo doo doo, doo doo, doo wah! 🎶

Loads of smart people talk about brand codes and distinctive brand assets here on this platform. But I'll fly the Mentos flag any day as being one of the most powerful assets that's still an easy recall. 

Bookmark this post, so next time there's an unwanted song stuck your head you can freshen up with this commercial (one of many, might I add). How many of their TV spots do you remember? 

Nothing gets to you, staying fresh, staying cool, with Mentos, fresh and fuuuuuuull of life!

Stand Tall.

“I hate those things.” After overhearing three different customers share the same opinion in two days, the visiting district manager removed the virtual tellers from my local bank, for good reason. 

First off, good on the area manager for being in the branches to see how customers interact. 

Secondly, good on them to recognize tech was getting in the way of helping the customer, and hurting the brand. 

This was a video teller interface. You would walk into the branch, not speak to a human, visit a kiosk and push a button to summon a remote teller who would assist you via video. And when they finish your transaction, they can move on to someone else in another city.

Sounds a bit dystopian. And while the tellers were trained well, it just felt disconnected.

I’m sure decisions makers tried to level the playing field with larger banks through technology. And I’m willing to bet this idea was presented in a deck along with the words “digital transformation” in the mid-2010s.

But in the end, it actually removed what makes small local branches better: help.

Help from a real human. 

Know your brand by recognizing what customers need from the different touchpoints of your business. Especially the points where they seek real human interaction. 

If it can be outsourced to a screen, it can be outsourced to AI. 

Stand Tall.

No alternative text description for this image

“I went back to the BMX* deck, and I gotta say, I didn’t realize how much you’d nailed it. It had everything I needed to get focused.” — Our client, while making decisions on a campaign. 

Loads of people bash “brand strategy decks” on this platform. It’s easy, of course. 

Tales of 200-page decks of fluff. Performance art named strategy. Platitudes meant for break room walls that promote eye-rolling responses. 

But a good deck, meant to be a reference point not a performance, is distilled thinking that connects brand strategy to the business. 

It’s a point of focus used to make concerted business and marketing decisions, measured on value, not page count 

*The BMX is our Brand Matrix guide. It’s distilled into one page for a valuable, quick reference. We encourage clients to print and post it near their desk, so it’s ready to see and use.  

Stand Tall.

Want to find out how much you know about your customers and category? Prompt ChatGippity to ask YOU questions about the market you’re in.

Most of us who grew up in the 1970s or 1980s can recall that the Fruit of the Loom logo used to feature a cornucopia, a horn-shaped basket spilling out apples and grapes. Except it never did. 

There was never a cornucopia. Not once. Not ever.

Yes, I checked. I scraped the interwebs. Snopes confirmed it.

My childhood memories are lying to me.

If you remember the cornucopia, you’re in the collective hallucination with me, in what’s known as the Mandela Effect. It’s when a large group of people confidently remembers something that never existed.

But here’s what’s fascinating from a brand perspective: Fruit of the Loom built such powerful mental associations that we invented missing details, giving fruit leaves more importance than they called for. 

The logo felt like it should have a cornucopia. The imagery of abundance and nostalgia was so strong that our brains filled in the blanks. That’s brand memory at work.

Distinctive assets so sticky they expanded themselves in the public imagination. And even with several major refreshes over 100 years, the logo stayed consistent enough to be recognized through every iteration.

Or maybe it’s just crazy pills passed out by the bucketload.

Every brand should hope to be remembered so vividly that people recall things that were never even there.

Stand Tall.

📸: Snopes

“It’s a workshop for startup incubators, of course we have to use acronyms.” - Tongue in cheek client comment. I chuckled at this smart, self-aware comment by one of our clients in a brand workshop this Thursday. 

Sometimes, it seems today’s business world makes up comments on the fly. 

What’s your CAGR from your COGS?

Is your POS communicating your TOS to land your SLA?

And if your brand doesn’t know its COGS, how can your sales team understand its BANT?

How about your OAR? ELO? KLF? REM? POD? INXS? NWA? TLC? EMF? RUN-DMC?

LMFAO!

Isn’t the inside speak exhausting? It sounds like my mixtape playlist from 1992.

Speak clearly and lose the jargon if you want to connect with your target audience. They’ll appreciate the lack of need for an FAQ, IMO. 

Because if you overuse acronyms and insider terms, they’ll look at you like ODB. 

Speak the language of your customers. 

Stand Tall.

Nick Day - Independent Brand Strategy & Marketing Consultancy

Supporting hospitality (and other) brands to gain a clearer idea of the ideal path forwards for their business so that they deliver the best services to their ideal target customer and communicate this in a way that drives desire.

Independent Brand and Marketing Consultant

The Möbius Agency

Director of Brand & Content Marketing

Tolani Hotels

Leading the development of the Tolani Hotels brand.

Director of Brand Marketing

Siam@Siam Design Hotels & Resorts

Corporate Marketing Manager

GOCO Hospitality

Strategy – Formulate marketing communications strategies at both the corporate and property levels.
Content Marketing – Develop content marketing strategy and plan, create numerous research and thought-leader-style articles. 
Public Relations – Build relationships with journalists and generate media coverage at both the corporate and property levels.
Digital Marketing – Use CMS system to regularly update website with fresh content. Ensure website is optimised for ranking on search engines (SEO).
Social Media Marketing – Implemente the latest social media tactics to ensure significant growth in reach and follower numbers, achieving targets, on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Email Marketing – Produce content for and send out email newsletters and EDMs to maintain regular communications with existing company contacts.
Events – Research and prepare content for CEO for regular conference speaking engagements.
Business Development – Support proposal creation.
Client Work – Worked on spa and wellness retreat concept documents. Work with pre-opening team on marketing strategies and spa menu development.

Marketing Communications Manager

QUO Global

I built the image of QUO among senior executives and influencers in the hotel and travel sector as the global leader in the field of hospitality and travel branding through a comprehensive, multi-channel communications strategy, including public and media relations, as well as content, event and digital marketing.

Strategy – Created comprehensive, multi-channel international marketing strategy for the whole company.
Content Marketing – Created in-house magazine highlighting company’s thought leadership. Developed in-depth report that achieved top rank in Google search results page.
Public Relations – Doubled size of media contacts list and achieved significant media coverage of company news.
Digital Marketing – Oversaw launch of new website. Used CMS system to regularly update website with fresh content. Ensured website was optimized for ranking on search engines (SEO).
Social Media Marketing – Reactivated company’s dormant social media channels and built social media audience through regular posting of engaging content. Created industry lists to follow and engage in online discussions of key topics.
Email Marketing – Produced content for and sent out email newsletter to maintain regular communications with existing company contacts.
Events – Managed sponsorship of key hospitality industry conferences to gain speaking slots and build thought-leadership for the company among senior executives in the hotel and travel sector.
Internal Communications – Created monthly internal newsletter to keep all staff in five countries up-to-date on latest company activities.
Business Development – Created various sales and marketing collateral and supported the creation of proposal presentations for potential clients.
Client Work – Created social media guidelines for Deutsche Hospitality, Germany’s largest hotel management company. Created a communications plan for STX, one of Singapore’s leading landscape architecture firms.

Senior Communications Manager

dwp | design worldwide partnership

Developed and implemented an integrated marketing strategy communicating the architectural and interior design capabilities of dwp across 10 countries in the Asia Pacific and Middle East regions, as well as numerous target markets, including hospitality, residential, workplace, healthcare and retail. Strategy included public and media relations, email marketing, social media marketing, content creation, website development & SEO. 

Strategy – Drew up integrated marketing plan covering multiple communication channels and business objectives.
Public Relations – Built media contacts list and wrote press releases featuring major business news and projects completions. Obtained regular media coverage.
Digital Marketing – Regularly updated company website with fresh content.
Social Media Marketing – Through publishing of regular social media content, built online followers and communicated key brand messages. Doubled size of LinkedIn followers.
Email Marketing – Sent out email newsletters to ensure regular communications with company contacts.
Internal Communications – Produced monthly internal newsletter to ensure staff in 10 countries were fully aware of the latest company news and activities. Produced weekly email newsletter to provide staff with educational information useful for their daily work.
Business Development – Regularly wrote new case studies for use on company website and in proposals sent to potential new clients.

Group Marketing Manager

Thai European Business Association

Part-time role handling the public relations duties for the Thai European Business Association (TEBA). Coordinated all activities related to the association’s automotive and aerospace committees. Organised meetings, events, business matching, and government policy advocacy. Managed a comprehensive communications plan for the association, including media management, website maintenance, social media management, event management and publications production.

Advocacy – Supported the association with arranging meetings with government officials on behalf of members.
Content Marketing – Produced an in-house magazine featuring the latest information on key industry sectors and economic trends.
Public Relations – Wrote press releases and built relationships with media outlets to obtain media coverage supporting association’s aims.
Events – Supported trade mission to Germany to help Thailand-based automotive manufacturers build business contacts with European buyers. Organised conferences and seminars on issues ranging from the Thai political situation to latest trends in aerospace manufacturing and how to become a supplier to European automotive companies. Coordinated regular working group meetings.
Digital Marketing – Sent out regular email newsletter to contacts base to provide up-to-date information on association activities. Managed social media accounts.

Public Relations Director

EMAG GmbH

Formulated strategies and implemented all marketing communications campaigns for the EMAG Group in the Southeast Asian region in relation to high-precision manufacturing systems. Identified target customers and utilised strategic marketing communications tools to generate qualified leads for the sales team. 

Strategy – Created annual plan for marketing communications for the Southeast Asian region
Content Marketing – Supported the creation of high-value content (Thailand Autobook) in order to build an audience of target customers.
Public Relations – Maintained close relationships with targeted trade media to obtain regular media coverage
Advertising – Purchased and wrote advertorial spots in key media outlets to build the brand image of the company with target customers.
Social Media Marketing – Managed company’s regional social media accounts to build online audience.
Email Marketing – Sent out emails to company’s regional contacts to maintain communications in order to educate them on the benefits of the company’s technology solutions.
Events – Arranged for the company to have prominent representation at important industry events attended by target customers.
Business Development – Built professional network through highly innovative networking strategy.

Marketing Manager - Southeast Asia

Asia Biz Connect Group Co. Ltd.

Managed the editorial department for three magazines: Asia Food Beverage Thailand, Asia Pacific Plant Management and Asia Pacific Metalworking. Developed the overall editorial quality of the magazines, researched and wrote feature articles, as well as motivated my team members to ensure quality, correctness and the meeting of publishing deadlines. Other duties included conference/seminar management, long-term strategic planning and social media management.

Planning – Created annual editorial calendar for the company’s three trade magazines (Asia Pacific Plant Management, Asia Food Beverage Thailand and Asia Pacific Metalworking).
Management – Managed editorial team in order to meet publishing deadlines and create high-quality articles.
Editorial – Sourced, researched, wrote and edited articles on a variety of issues important to the automotive, electronics, electrical appliance, aerospace, food & beverage and general manufacturing sectors. Interviewed senior executives on the latest business and economic trends.
Design – Provided input to design team on design direction.
Social Media Management – Managed a variety of social media accounts on a number of social media channels to build online audience.
Website – Regularly updated website with fresh content.
Events – Supported company’s event attendance in order to build readership and maintain close relationships with important advertisers.

Group Editor

Gain a clear direction on how to bring your brand and marketing to a higher level. 

Experienced in brand and marketing communications strategy development with an always up-to-date knowledge of the latest marketing trends, techniques and best practices

Skilled at: ▪ inbound and content marketing ▪ public & media relations ▪ digital marketing ▪ copy writing & editing ▪ social media management ▪ website optimisation and SEO ▪ lead generation ▪ brand strategy ▪ event management

In-depth knowledge of the branding, hospitality, architecture & interior design, automotive, engineering and media sectors

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Phillip Oakley

Nick Day

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The Battle

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