We do share unattributed customer quotes on our home page.

We’re happy to share a select branded reference. Most of our customers, especially the new ones in cybersecurity, absolutely, positively do not want their competitors to know about their content strategy. If we find have a mutual opportunity, we will likely quietly introduce you to one of our customer CMOs or CEOs. We may also point quietly, under non-disclosure, to public websites and share the content we created.

We rely on a virtual and distributed pool of talent, mostly through 1099 relationships.

Crush10Media, Inc. is headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona.

We do have customers in Silicon Valley, the northeastern United States, and the Washington, D.C. area. We’re expecting to expand into San Diego, Seattle, and Portland, Oregon in the future.

We’re a boutique consultancy.

Large consultancies cannot scale to the level of experience of our principals. It isn’t their model. They just cannot find the people. If they do, their overhead is huge and their hourly rates are astronomic. Especially with experience in cyber security or enterprise software.

I think that grammar issues are almost always either right or wrong depending on your commitment to a specific style.

We try to use the AP Style guide consistently. Many people use the Chicago guide (CMS). There are others out there like the Modern Language Association (MLA) and now and again we hear about the Turabian.

We run into every style and grammatical issue out there. Technology publications use language which is most in contention between these style guides. Healthcare versus health care. Cyber security versus cybersecurity. British (U.K.) english spelling versus U.S. spelling. Don’t laugh! The list is endless. Once again, we align with the AP Style guide as best we can. Sometimes sentences that appear satisfactory to some might be viewed as a bit long, or cumbersome, to others. Some of the time for video scripts, webinars or other content a conversational style is more appropriate. In the final analysis, if they are grammatically correct, it is a question of style and that will always be a bit subjective.

Our smaller clients (start-ups under $20 million in revenue) have no issue with style most of the time. Our larger clients, with separate well staffed corporate marketing and content teams, will often have substantial issues with style. That’s what they do every day and they understand the content. So we will have style issues to resolve, and perhaps require additional review of customers suggested edits and sentence structure review. We will work with you to accommodate these issues.

B2B technology companies need a well-defined brand (branding guide), a consistent set of messaging (see this article on Messaging du Jour), well thought out positioning and a deep understanding of their value proposition. They also need standard corporate descriptors, product descriptors and the other basic trappings for the marketing team to deliver consistent and well-crafted content. This marketing infrastructure platform is essential to a well-executed go-to-market effort for executive staff, public relations, sales, marketing and business development.

Content marketing programs absolutely depend on having good messaging and branding in place. Most of the time we find that new customers don’t have these programs so we move fast to get it done. The goal is to get the content marketing program underway. The branding and messaging is a pre-requisite to getting this done.

+

We define 6 key steps:

• First, we make sure we know your technology. Quickly and efficiently. We’re strong enough to work on your product marketing team and maybe your product management team. We want to know your competitive space. We want the subtleties that enable us to highlight the best facts that quietly deposition your competitors. B2B technology acquisition cycles are in many ways a content war and we fight (with you) to win.
• Second, we learn about your messaging, positioning and branding platform. If you don’t have one then we work with you to get one developed.
• Third, we use your templates for white papers, product briefs, etc., or we develop new ones for you.
• Fourth, we brainstorm with you over new content pieces to fuel your customer journey. Special reports and analysis, product briefs, data sheets, eBrochures, trendjacks (ask us about this!), submitted PR articles, award submissions, new website pages, refreshed website pages, speaking submissions for upcoming trade show events, surveys and more.
• Fifth, we execute to get the content done. We do research as required. We often do the program management around it.
• Sixth, editing, and necessary quality assurance. Fast does not bring accurate without it. A Principal always reviews content at this stage. It may take us a document or two to align your expectations as to style choice and grammar with ours (AP Style Guide).
• Optionally we integrate with your layout and graphics team. You cannot swap graphics artists without changing the look of your brand, so we can adapt to work with your team in this area. Ditto for your template layout. Whatever works. Whatever you need.

We’re a secret weapon for your corporate marketing team. Some of our customers consider us a proxy for in-house product marketing. That function is outsourced to us by some of our customers.

Get up at 5 am.

Check the google newsfeed based upon the industry you are in and find a piece of hot trending news. In cyber security that might be, “BigCorp was Hacked – 5 Million Accounts Compromised.” We generate a quote on the topic, reference the link, right size it to the various social media, and push it out a pipeline to your exec or manager of record to approve. Your social media team, or ours, can get it posted. This tactic projects thought leadership and creates more engagement.

Seriously, did you really think that the 3rd tweet on your upcoming webinar or trade show booth was that interesting?  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

We do the exact same thing with some of our clients but instead produce the content for their PR firms. We produce the content in an hour or two. The PR firm pitches it and gets it placed. Some weeks we get 2 or 3 articles placed for a single customer. A pretty awesome strategy, IMHO. Ask us about how this works.

Of course. We can produce content completely turnkey or deliver the pieces you want. Many customers want the written content but want to use their own creative people to maintain consistency in their go-to-market look.

Our engagement team is always headed by a Principal. Our Principals always have specific experience in your in your industry. Our Principals are all experienced at the senior executive level, reporting to the CEO, and have done so in both public companies and venture-funded companies.

The Principal is always the first team member to start an engagement. They do everything hands-on. The Principal will do the marketing audit and make recommendations. As the engagement proves successful and you are satisfied, we may introduce additional team members, pursuant to your approval, in support of our task load.

For retainer (hourly billing) based agreements we have a 30-minute status call. We provide a detailed dashboard prior to that call that shows active tasks, and the queue of other additional tasks under consideration for the future.

Most of our customers utilize a fixed amount of hours per month that represents a maximum billing amount per month – this is accounted for on an hourly basis. This fixed amount of hours is apportioned against a pipeline of projects and programs. You would think of these team members as part-time extensions of your core team like any other consultant. This produces the best financial arrangements for you as our workload is manageable and more easily planned by both of us. We can participate in regularly scheduled team calls, quarterly on-sites, and more. Hourly retainer agreements for outsourced interim or contract team members received the highest priority in our work queue.

Many of our customers also work on a firm fixed price basis. For example, a white paper, social media posts, regular blogs, submitted articles, data sheets, and much more.

Certain strategic documents, such as marketing requirement documents (MRDs), business plans, merger planning, messaging (and positioning) platforms, and market opportunity analysis (MOAs) are generally *only* done on an hourly retainer basis.

Our model is to use highly qualified, domain experienced, product marketing personnel with strong written skills. These are product marketing people with qualifications just like anyone else you would have on your marketing team. They can also write

We generally allow cancellation of our contracts with reasonable notice. We’re happy to help you bring on board your permanent team members, and we’re glad to manage the transition with you.

Not even close – just about zero percent overlap.

We’re all about the CONTENT and much of the time about the PROJECT MANAGEMENT. We write every word in the website and make strategic decisions with you about the website taxonomy. We brainstorm with you over the documents that must be part of a new website. We understand all the tough issues for the web team such as Marketo integration, SEO, and more. We can take over management of the new website project and break it into small reviewable deliverables that you can review, edit/adjust, and approve.

Perhaps you have a web development firm and they are ready to go. But they have a million questions for you and you don’t have answers just yet. What will the taxonomy of the new website look like? What will the words and concepts on each page be about? What story will you tell and on what pages? Where are the data sheets and white papers? Do you have any infographics designed? How will this interface with your marketing automation system? With your sales force automation system? With your channel programs? With your ad retargeting? What do they do for SEO?

These are the problems we solve. We often manage and deliver the entire website, only because the client has a very small team and is overwhelmed by the massive amount of work to be done. Just as often, we guide the process by leading on the content. Page by page, link by link, we get the site content defined. Every word on every page – that’s the serious work. Perhaps a video or two to go with the website. We work with your web firm and your graphics artists to get it done and take the burden off your shoulders.

We’re ex-CMOs and we know what you need to be successful. We got your back. We do new websites all of the time. The website is just another piece of content – but it is perhaps the most important one in this digital world.

As experienced chief marketing officers, our principals have spent considerable time working with public relations firms. Most of our clients use us quite successfully to provide content for their PR firm. In some cases, they ask us to manage the PR firm as part of a contract CMO engagement.

We support your PR team with a messaging platform, understanding of the value proposition, outlines of the content for pending press releases, quotes, submitted articles, case studies and the content tools they need to be effective. This also reduces the time you have to spend to manage priority interruptions to provide the quotes (and content) the PR team needs on short notice to support your account. We often act as a proxy for your exec team in brainstorming the pipeline of press releases, drafting them, editing and then getting approvals to get it out the door. Once again, our Principals are all highly experienced CMO’s and have considerable experience with the public relations process.

Speed of response. Hands down.

In order for this to work, we’re necessarily on the front line for PR team response. We draft the answers to questions, support active outreach via TrendJack, and get it done in draft for the PR team. We usually respond in four hours or less to any reporter’s request for information, working with you and your PR firm. We draft a response, sms txt the CMO for a quick look and approval, and then the PR firm grabs it, tweaks the grammar to get it final, and out it goes.

We do this often on behalf of the CEO and other officers without their explicit review. We’re a trusted proxy. Only an ex-CMO on the Crush10Media team will produce the quotes and this is someone experienced in the role in both public and private companies.

This process delivers excellent results. We have instances where our content produced fifty (50) plus PR mentions in one month. This just happened with one client this past July, 2018.

This is how it works best. You may double the productivity of your PR team by responding rapidly to them.

We are pleased to partner with PR teams and take on a subcontractor role for delivery of content to support their customer engagements. We will also work with large “big 6” consultancies, marketing services firms, and digital marketing firms as a subcontractor.

Ask us how!

Early in an engagement, we review your company marketing program against the various important components of marketing we have identified. You can see these areas of assessment roughly listed on our skills and experience page. This helps us define the recommended course of action, the priority of tasks, and the skills matrix required to be successful. We present this to your CEO, and/or CMO and other marketing team members and talk through our findings.

The great majority of our customers don’t tell us they need a white paper or a new website. They are uncertain about much broader issues. They ask us instead what marketing components they need to support their current go-to-market execution. Then we propose the mix of content and deliverables to support that stage of growth and the priorities they have identified. Our leadership, experience, and innovation give you the edge you need to be successful in your execution.

Crush10Media, Inc. works in a Google office environment.

In this environment, we utilize Chromebooks for all day to day operations, browser-based applications and communications. We generally utilize 2-factor authentication in the Google environment. We reset these Chromebooks every so often and flush all of the local temporary content at that time. Customer files and working documents are stored in a Google Drive which is 2 factor authenticated. When we need to make deliverables, and the customer does not wish to share a Google sheet or Google doc, we convert to Adobe, MSWord, MSPPT, or MSExcel and then share that with the customer.

Windows PC’s are used work offline when we need to use tools like Microsoft Office applications and the suite of Adobe products. The only online use for our Windows PC’s are for software update, and, in some cases, when not supported by a Chromebook browser, online webinar support. These PC’s absolutely do not access our Google Drive and, in general, are segregated from the Chromebook environment.

Customer files that are maintained locally while in process may be loaded to a USB memory stick. If so, then these memory sticks are labeled and unique to that specific customer. At the end of any particular project, we load the files into the Google Drive, email/zip to the client, or load to your DropBox or project management system (such as Basecamp) and then delete the files from the memory stick. At the end of the customer engagement (end of contract), we physically destroy the memory sticks.

We do not utilize customer email accounts, customer slack accounts or Crush10Media email accounts from mobile phones (android, apple) or pad computing platforms. We do utilize SMS and Skype on mobile platforms for Company business, but not for customer file transfer, only communications.

If you need our help to support website work, then we use WordPress. We utilize one of several templates such as Genesis or Avada on top of WordPress and recommend SHIELD security software that manages access and authentication. This security software notifies us of administrator login attempts, unsuccessful logins, and lock-outs. Your ISP should backup the website daily but we also recommend additional tools for website backup.

We’ll provide a quote for retainer-based services based upon the hourly rates quoted and the monthly time commitments you can budget. These quotes are based upon the availability of specific personnel. For this reason, they will generally extend for about 72 hours. Then we’ll have to requote you when you are closer to a contract signature.

Please recognize that our product is the work product of specific personnel. Content demands are escalating rapidly and qualified personnel with product marketing backgrounds are extremely valuable right now. We’re the only firm that does this in many industries and the demand is high.

Fixed price deliverable sample pricing  (a white paper, data sheet, etc.) is available on a hidden web page which is password protected. Ask us for the URL and password.