Writings from Force 5 Basecamp

08/06/15

Over the weekend, Deb DeFreeuw and David Morgan installed a Little Free Library in front of the Force 5 Offices.  For those of you that don’t know about the Little Free Library, it is a nonprofit organization that supports the worldwide movement to offer free books housed in small containers to members of the local community. The idea was popularized in Hudson,

05/06/15

With over 50 food vendors, 60 musical acts, Headliner Ben Folds, dozens of art exhibits and booths, things to do for the kids, a Tech park, and even a Zip line, South Bend’s birthday celebration over the Memorial Day weekend in downtown South Bend will be one of the biggest and most exciting community events ever held. How do you

03/03/15

March 3 marks the day that President Herbert Hoover signed a congressional act making “The Star-Spangled Banner” the official national anthem of the United States, but that might not have happened if Francis Scott Key hadn’t practiced certain social media marketing principles that helped increase the song’s popularity. Francis Scott Key’s Social Media Tips… Find a way to be an ongoing

11/19/14

5 Google AdWords Tips That I Learned from Pheasant Hunting Instead of writing my work blog post last weekend, I decided to drive out to South Dakota to go on my annual pheasant hunting trip with some friends.  Luckily, while traipsing through the cornfields of America’s Heartland, I was able to find a number of similarities between search engine marketing

11/11/14

Blog for Tuesday, November 11 – Veteran’s Day – 2014 The 100th anniversary of the ending of WWI is widely celebrated and recognized today. Marketing for various charity organizations’ coffers, the United Kingdom had a giant 900,000-strong ceramic poppy sale and display, for the climactic day of remembrance. NPR (and a few Brit Facebook friends) informed me about this amazing

04/09/14

I listened to an interesting NPR piece about the brain’s preference for repeating music themes earlier this week. ‘Play It Again And Again, Sam’ by Alix Spiegel, mentioned the “mere exposure effect.” Then I saw “mere exposure effect” again in a blog ‘The Popcorn Effect: When Do Brand Ads Fail?’, thanks to my neuroscience marketing friend, blogger Roger Dooley. People

03/28/14

We’re really happy to announce the addition of Beth North as our new director of business development. Beth has been a long time friend and client, and we’re very pleased to have her on our team! Her responsibilities will include developing strategic ways of helping Force 5’s clients maximize their marketing strategy through the company’s service offerings, as well as

11/05/13

If you happen to peruse on by Google today, you will notice that Google’s doodle is celebrating the birth of Raymond Loewy, a french-born industrial designer. Although Loewy is best known for his involvement in designing the Coca-Cola bottle and locomotives for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, Force 5 wanted to recognize Loewy for his relationship with the Studebaker Automobile Company,

10/24/13

As a creative agency we are always investigating new ways of doing things and because we deal regularly with “bleeding edge” technology in those creative endeavors, it is more important than ever to stay one step ahead. One of these new ideas is the use of “style tiles” in the web design process. You start with the most important step

10/15/13

Force 5, South Bend, IN – a next generation brand development and marketing communications firm, has been named the fifteenth best iPad app development company by bestwebdesignagencies.com for October 2013.  South Bend, IN – Force 5, a next generation brand development and marketing communications firm, has been announced as the fifteenth best iPad app development company by bestwebdesignagencies.com for the

09/27/13

Heartland Small Animal Rescue 2012 Force 4 Good Award Winner Project As the winner of the 2012 Force 4 Good contest, Heartland was entitled to 50 hours of marketing effort. But first, we needed to determine where to focus our efforts. Force 5 met with Heartland to discuss current needs and marketing obstacles within the organization. As a result, Force

09/18/13

I was reading Marketing Daily this morning and the first paragraph struck me, “The recommendations people make to their friends and family carry more weight than the messages companies put out on their own behalf.” The article is about the importance of “word of mouth” which always brings me back to the importance of creating Brand Evangelists and paying attention