• Frozen-meal marketing is radically different from that of ’60s TV dinners
• The bus bench doesn’t sit here anymore
• Polaris Marketing Research Survey Shows Phones Aren’t Just for Voice Anymore
• Merriam-Webster adds ‘tweet,’ other new words

These articles all have a kind of hand-wringy tone that I find striking.  New is here, and it’s scary.  We just can’t count on traditional frozen-meal marketing, Merriam-Webster, phones, traditional advertising, etc. etc. etc. anymore.

What's new? How is the world treating you?

I’m sure my view is influenced by both my job as a marketing professional and the fact that I started my business at a time when the bottom seemed suddenly to have dropped out of everything traditional, reassuring, and good.  But honestly, new isn’t that bad.  (New isn’t even really that new, when you look at the underlying principles that make stuff work, but that might be another blog post).  In fact, the terror of New can be really invigorating to a company’s business processes, budgets, and attitudes.

We’re working a lot these days with a client who has seen their industry almost die in the past four years.  They have been pushed to the brink by financing issues, public opinion, and internal change…and they’ve pushed through and are dramatically recreating not just their outward-facing brand identity, but their methods of doing business.  The radical approach isn’t that radical on the one hand — they’re listening to their customers and leveraging an extremely conservative marketing budget.  But they’re facing new head-on, and any hand-wringing is soon replaced by acting, adapting, reaching, and growing.  I guess there’s no way of knowing what would have happened if New hadn’t come along to shake things up, but I like the changes I see and I think they do, too.  For now, I must conclude that New is Scary is Good, even when the scary seems huge. — Erin

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If you answered yes, you’re perfectly normal…and you’re unconsciously imitating a business cycle we see all the time.

Here’s how it works:

Steamrolled by the collective pressures of the holiday season, budget crunch, and the emergencies that accompany a new calendar year, companies go into hurry up and wait mode.  Come April or so, they re-emerge, rubbing their eyes and wondering what happened to their grandiose marketing plans.

Of course, we’re of the opinion that a bit of planning should bolster the gaps in your business cycle, but if you’re just awakening to the fact that 2011 is halfway over, you’re not alone.  Not by a longshot.

Not surprisingly, our own business cycles mimic those of our clients’.  And spring always brings plenty of fun projects to fruition.

Please join us in welcoming a new spring crop of VOCO Creative clients.

There’s Matrix Systems, whose attention-grabbing ads are kicking off a new dealer program in high style.  The Denver Green Cube Show Home is a bright-green single-family dwelling that’s taking the up-and-coming LoHi neighborhood (and the local green business community) by storm.  Alpine Remediation is investing in a new look, while White Girl Salsa is paving their best-laid plans with a hearty serving of distinctive tomatillo flavor.

It’s great to be growing!

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Every year around this time, we take a moment to reflect on what the year has brought:

~ Great results for clients, from publicizing a legal victory to providing clarity to a national brand struggling for relevance to successfully launching three additional communities for a builder that’s beating the odds in Boulder County

~Increased revenues and a saving of almost 50% in overhead costs, reflecting our lean ‘n green business strategy

~Productive pro bono partnerships with the Epworth Foundation, There With Care, and ongoing consulting and training for the Boulder Small Business Development Center

~Speaking engagements, partnerships, collaborations, and schemes galore

~Surviving the launch process for Erin’s debut book, The Heroine’s Bookshelf, which was released by Harper in October and has since garnered press in The New York Times, Glamour, Ms. Magazine, Christian Science Monitor, and more (!)

~Continued growth as business partners and friends, in collaboration with the clients who constantly challenge, question, push, and prompt us to expand and explore.

To celebrate, we thought we’d pass on some of our good fortune and much of our goodwill.  This year we gave to The Girl Effect, an impressive charitable effort on behalf of girls supported by the Nike Foundation, the NoVo Foundation, the UN Foundation, the Coalition for Adolescent Girls, CARE, Plan, the Population Council, ICRW and the Center for Global Development, among others.

Our donations were earmarked to help girls in Tanzania and Bangladesh start businesses and gain access to safe spaces.  The Girl Effect isn’t just an incredible charity, it’s an impressive intersection of social media marketing and charitable giving…an apt choice given our personal and professional obsessions.

Many thanks to our clients, friends, followers, and faithful companions on VOCO’s path.  On to 2011, and a happy new year! — Erin and Juli

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