It’s that time of year again. Mariah Carey has climbed out of 1994 and back into the Top 40. You can’t get away from the sound of jingling bells, and everything on the menu comes with a side of “Christmas Cheer.” Whether you love it or loathe it, there’s no denying that the holiday season will impact your brand’s end-of-year performance. But after a fraught year—hello pandemic, politics, murder hornets, and more—your holiday marketing strategy is either the last thing on your mind or just one more potential pitfall you’d rather avoid. But we don’t recommend putting your head in […]

“Sometimes reality is too complex. Stories give it form.” — Jean-Luc Godard Back in 2015, the Harvard Business Review, predicted data-driven storytelling would be the next big trend in content marketing. And they weren’t talking about binary code short stories or the Matrix’s digital rain. The reality of data-driven storytelling is much more routine (and much more exciting) than that. It’s a way of looking at the world and translating facts into emotions that inspire brand love.  What is data-driven storytelling?  Which would you prefer to read: endless columns of data or a story about that data’s real-world impact? If […]

Sometimes, running a business can feel like juggling chainsaws. Between sales leads, production, HR, research and development, and keeping the lights on, marketing can feel like an afterthought. But when you drop your marketing best practices, you run the risk of cutting your business off at the knees. That’s where digital marketing agencies (like Savy) can come in handy. So, how do you know if it’s time to bring in the pros? We’ve got a few telltale signs and brand milestones to help you make the decision.  Signs It’s Time to Outsource Your Marketing You’re not sure where to start […]

Brand positioning has become increasingly important—and challenging—since the start of the 21st century. What used to be a slow dance between brands and consumers has evolved into a crowded parade akin to Carnival festival. Now consumers have more choices than ever, and every brand is dressed in their flashiest attire vying for attention.  With social

Developing a new website is like renovating your house. It’s easy to get excited and jump ahead to the fun parts. But for your website to be successful, you need to start with the foundation. In other words, why are you developing this website? What’s the plan? Without a clear goal, your website will end up feeling like the Winchester Mystery House: beautiful on the outside but meandering and dysfunctional on the inside.  So, at what point do you hire a web developer to bring your plans to fruition? For a successful collaboration, there are a few steps to take […]

The new Google Analytics provides customer-centric measurements instead of measurements fragmented by device and/or by platform. It uses identity spaces, including marketer-provided IDs and Google signals from users opted into ads personalization, to give you a wholistic view of how customers interact with your business. You can see if customers discover your business from a digital

Pay-per-click advertising (PPC) has become a versatile workhorse in the marketing world, working behind the scenes to boost search rankings. More than 7 million advertisers invested a total of $10.1 billion in PPC ads in 2017. Sales steadily increased in 2019 as digital ad spending surpassed traditional media. Once negatively judged for an obvious sales style, PPC services and ads are now as commonplace to consumers as emojis.  By 2018, a mere 1 percent of consumers felt negatively about this form of paid advertising. In fact, last year, 65 percent of paid ads were clicked with intent to purchase. So […]

It’s been seven months since COVID-19’s first wave and the ensuing stay-at-home orders, quarantines, and new regulations. During this time, businesses big and small have suffered the crisis’s impacts––declining sales, interest, and overall motivation. We sat down with Savy’s founder, Christina Brown, to discuss how to achieve business growth during a crisis.   Introducing our founder, Christina Brown  As Savy’s Creative Director and Founder, Christina Brown is no stranger to hard work, effective marketing strategies, and creative ingenuity. Her 25-plus years of experience in the field have made her a pioneer of the digital revolution––from the dot com boom to today’s […]

Digital ad spends are up—but human attention spans are down. In 2019, U.S. advertisers spent $57 billion on digital advertising, a $9.8 billion increase from 2018. Meanwhile, the average human attention span dropped from 12 to 8 seconds between 2000 and 2018. Mostly thanks to technology. For marketing and advertising companies, a distracted virtual world,

There are over 200 million active websites on the internet today—and WordPress powers 38 percent of them. This puts WordPress leaps and bounds ahead of Shopify, the runner-up that currently powers just shy of 3 percent of the web. New content management systems (CMS) like Shopify hit the market each year to meet digital age demands. But since its launch in 2003, WordPress continues to overshadow the rest, with no signs of slowing down. So what sets a WordPress site apart?   First things first: What is a WordPress site?  If you’ve ever managed a website, or simply visited one, you’ve […]

Imagine you arrive at a party where you don’t know anyone. As you wander past groups of strangers, you take inventory of what people are wearing, how they’re interacting, and what topics they’re discussing. You read the room before you interject, instead of jumping in with an out of touch conversation starter. The same is true online. Now more than ever, brands and marketers need to listen to their audiences to create compelling brand messaging that resonates on a human level. Or else they risk coming off tone-deaf. Brand messaging: the good, the bad, and the ugly  Remember the infamous […]

We’re gonna ask you to do something a little different. Take a beat to think about the products in your bathroom. No, seriously. Envision your face wash, toothpaste, deodorant, and shampoo. Consider the packaging—how the colors, logos, package shapes, and even typeface all worked together to encourage you to pick that product off the shelves instead of its dozens (or even hundreds) of competitors. Now take that awareness and expand it. Bathroom. Bedroom. Kitchen. Living room. We are surrounded by product branding—from the kibble we feed our pets to the clothes we wear out the door every day.  When done […]