Showing posts with label marc usa chicago. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marc usa chicago. Show all posts

Thursday, August 20, 2015

MARC USA Chicago and tech hub 1871 ink marketing program partnership

MARC USA Chicago and tech hub 1871 ink marketing program partnership

MARC USA Chicago and tech hub 1871 ink marketing program partnership

Lewis Lazare

Chicago Business Journal 
20 August 2015


MARC USA Chicago has inked an exclusive marketing seminar partnership deal with Chicago tech hub 1871. The deal comes on the heels of MARC's two successful "Marketing Sparks" gatherings that formed the foundation for the extended relationship.

Over the course of the next 15 months, MARC USA and 1871 will jointly host five additional sessions. The Marketing Sparks events are described as evening-long marketing "hacks" in which key leaders from major corporations in the area — mostly chief marketing officers — come together in small groups to work directly with start-up companies. The sessions aim to help start-ups more clearly define their key audiences and their value propositions, as well as develop marketing plans.

Noted 1871 CEO Howard Tullman: "By partnering with industry leaders, 1871 provides a range of expert mentorship and educational resources to help start-ups develop their businesses. Marketing Sparks provides individualized, industry-specific marketing advice to its participants, and we are excited to continue to work with Marc USA."

Added Jean McLaren, president of MARC USA: "We've found that bringing together seasoned marketers with start-up entrepreneurs has tremendous benefits for all involved. The start-ups come away with actionable marketing strategies, and the marketers report it helps them to rethink their approaches to their own businesses and stretch their mental muscles."

The next event, slated for Sept. 15, will focus on businesses participating in WiSTEM, 1871's new program to foster opportunities for female entrepreneurs.

Monday, February 09, 2015

Crain's Help! My company needs a marketing intervention

Help! My company needs a marketing intervention

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As a small-business owner, you face myriad challenges. You know you need to ramp up your marketing to gain more customers, but you don't have the money to outsource. So you find yourself adding *MARKETING!!! as No. 136,873 to your to-do list—even though you haven't the slightest clue how to build a campaign.

Jean McLaren, chief marketing officer at Pittsburgh-based marketing firm Marc USA, feels your pain. She recently led a marketing "hack-a-thon" for four companies at startup incubator 1871 in Chicago. In it, she paired seasoned communications pros with fledgling company CEOs. The results were so enthusiastic—and some of the changes so dramatic—that she plans to hold a second event next month.

"Small companies have the same problem that the big companies have: focus," McLaren says. "Their heads are turned by all the various ways in which they can take their business, and they can forget what it's like to take a step back and look at marketing in its purest form: What is the one idea that I need to present?"

Here, we examine how four Chicago companies are answering that question.

Friday, December 05, 2014

1871 hosts marc usa chicago marketing sparks hackathon with 1871 member companies















MARC USA Chicago Partners with 1871 to Host Marketing Hack Event

Marketing Sparks Event Brings Together Chicago Startups and Marketers to develop communications and business development strategies

CHICAGO (December 4, 2014) – Four promising Chicago startups will be matched with leading Chicago marketing executives in the first local Marketing Sparks event. This three-hour marketing hack on Thursday, December 4th will be led by MARC USA’s Chicago office in partnership with 1871, the entrepreneurial hub for digital startups.

Marketing leaders from McDonalds, United Airlines, Caterpillar, US Cellular, Grainger, Payless ShoeSource, Buddig and CDW, among others, will join MARC USA’s Chicago leadership in developing actionable strategic and tactical marketing communications and business development ideas to help increase each startup company’s chances of success.  

MARC USA has hosted two Marketing Sparks events in Pittsburgh in partnership with local universities and incubators as a way to provide that city’s most innovative startups with critical advice on how to market their ideas.

“Young companies have very distinct needs, and our experience shows that when they can put innovative marketing ideas to work early in the business development process, it maximizes their opportunities for growth,” explained Jean McLaren, President of MARC USA Chicago.  “We recognized how successful our Marketing Sparks program was in Pittsburgh and saw an opportunity to bring it to Chicago’s growing startup community. We’ve invited senior marketers who enjoy getting together with their peers and working with young companies as a way to give back to their communities.” 

The Chicago Startups who are participating include: 

•         ParkNav, creators of an app that finds open parking spaces in cities 
•         Fetchfind, a match.com-like program for pet sitting companies seeking employees
•         Rippleshot, a credit card fraud detection company
•         Double Helix Group, real-time, cloud-based programs to support patient engagement between regular visits to health care providers

MARC USA selected 1871 as its partner in Chicago, recognizing its deep roots and success in developing and supporting innovative local entrepreneurs. The startups participating in the event were selected based on their readiness to act on the advice presented.  

“By providing quality, personalized support throughout our member companies’ development, 1871 ensures that our members have access to every resource they might need to help them succeed,” said 1871 CEO Howard A. Tullman. “We are excited to partner with MARC USA in Chicago to offer this opportunity to our startups.”

The marketers who are joining the session represent a diverse pool of leaders across disciplines (PR, strategy, digital, creative and more) who are passionate and eager to share their knowledge. The Chicago Marketing Sparks will be held at 1871 in Chicago on December 4th from 6 – 9 pm. A website to support the effort has been launched at http://marketingsparks.org.  

About MARC USA

MARC USA is a national full-service integrated marketing communications firm known for uncovering radical insights that incite powerful reactions through a deeper understanding of whole-brain behavior. With offices in Chicago, Miami, Boston and Pittsburgh, 270 employees and more than $370 million in annual billings, it is one of the largest independent agencies in the country. Services include advertising, strategic planning, research, public relations, social marketing, media planning and buying, digital marketing, direct and customer relationship marketing and sales promotion.  

About 1871



1871 is an entrepreneurial incubator for digital startups. Home to over 300 companies, the 75,000-square-foot facility in The Merchandise Mart provides Chicago startups with programming, access to mentors, educational resources, potential investors and a community of like-minded entrepreneurs that help them on their path to building successful businesses. Recently ranked 9th in the world in the 2014 UBI Index list of top university-associated business incubators, 1871 has become a global leader in the entrepreneurial community. 1871 is the flagship project of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center.

Marc USA Chicago brings in marketing mavens to give 1871 startups a leg up

Dec 5, 2014, 2:59pm CST
Howard Tullman is the new CEO of Chicago tech hub 1871.

Reporter-Chicago Business Journal
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Four startups housed at Chicago-based tech incubator 1871 got a very generous helping hand last night from Marc USAChicago. The local ad agency sponsored a "Marketing Sparks" confab to assist the select group of startups in expanding and sharpening their business development and marketing game plans as they begin to move out into the larger marketplace.
The four startups chosen by 1871 to participate in the three-hour session included ParkNav, a company with an app that finds open parking spaces in cities; Fetchfind, a Match.com-like program for petting-sitting companies seeking employees; Rippleshot, a credit card fraud detection company; and Double Helix Group, a company that develops cloud-based programs to support patient engagement between regular visits to health care providers.
At the invitation of Marc USA, marketing executives from a range of high-profile, well-established companies, including McDonald's, United Airlines, Caterpillar, U.S. Cellular, Grainger, Payless ShoeSource, Buddig and CDW, participated in the event and worked one-on-one during the session with staff from each startup.
Noted Jean McLaren, president of Marc USA Chicago: "Young companies have very distinct needs, and our experience shows that when they can put innovative marketing ideas to work early in the business development process, it maximizes their opportunities for growth."
The Chicago "Marketing Sparks" event comes in the wake of two similar successful events Marc USA sponsored earlier this year in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania., where the ad agency is headquartered.
"Marketing Sparks" is one of the newest ways 1871 is helping to boost the chances of its start-ups to actually make it beyond the start-up phase. Added 1871 CEO Howard Tullman: "By providing quality, personalized support throughout our member companies' development, 1871 ensures that our members have access to every resource they might need to help them succeed."

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