By Leila Ugincius

Kennedi Woods used to joke that her favorite holiday was the Met Gala.

She loved shopping and clothes, and TV programs such as “America’s Next Top Model” and red-carpet coverage of award shows offered a look at the latest trends. The annual Met Gala in New York City is considered “fashion’s biggest night out.”

So as Woods embarked on her college journey in 2019, her mother had advised her to pursue a passion so she could build a career, not just “hold jobs.” The choice was clear, and Woods is now graduating from Virginia Commonwealth University with a fashion degree with a concentration in fashion merchandising, with minors in marketing and art history as well as a certificate in human-centered design from the da Vinci Center for Innovation.

A native of Gainesville in Northern Virginia, Woods was introduced to VCU as a high school sophomore, living in a dorm for three weeks during a summer intensive program at the School of the Arts. She got to work in the studios and with VCUarts professors who uphold the school’s national reputation.

“That experience solidified that VCU and the department here was the right place for me,” said Woods, but “I knew I wanted to go to a bigger university that had more to offer than art programs. When I was comparing cost to value, especially as an in-state resident, VCU was the leader.”

She noted that Rudy Lopez, an assistant professor of fashion design and merchandising who taught the summer intensive program, was later her professor on multiple occasions and made a big impact.

“He is so knowledgeable about the industry and taught the soft skills you need to survive in it. His classes were challenging, but they prepared me for the real world,” Woods said, noting Lopez’s willingness to mentor students outside of class. “He gave me some of the best advice because he has an amazing way of imparting his wisdom in a way that is relatable.”

She also cited the impact of Charles Ajemian, a Richmond-area innovation technologist who taught her Conscious Capitalism course at the da Vinci Center. Woods said she learned how passion can be molded into profit that can then be turned into impact.

“He is one of the kindest, most warm-hearted and brilliant people I’ve ever met,” Woods said. “The course brings everything I’ve learned in undergrad thus far full circle. He is so integrated and invested in the health and well-being of the Richmond community.”

She praised Lopez and Ajemian, both VCU alums, for sharing their passion with new students. “Their commitment and energy both in and out the classroom is something that they can’t ‘teach’ me how to have, but I have been able to learn from through their example.”

Like all of her peers, Woods endured highs and lows related to the pandemic – and in her case, one led to the other.

As part of a fashion class that visited Italy, Woods looked forward to attending Milan Fashion Week, only to have COVID scuttle the plan. So she turned her sights closer to home: New York Fashion Week – and participating in it, not just attending.

She searched LinkedIn for people with ties to NYFW, messaging them for advice to find a production assistant role – it would build on her interest in event or experiential production. Leslie Russo, the president of fashion events and properties for IMG, responded and asked Woods to share her résumé and her availability. Less than two weeks from the start of NYFW, she secured the role.

“During the week, I worked on events such as the Tiffany Brown Foundation brunch and Ella Emhoff Likes to Knit pop-up activation, brand activations for Core Hydration water and Tresemmé, and fashion shows for designers such as Sergio Hudson, Christian Siriano and The Blonds,” Woods said.

New York is beckoning again. After graduating, Woods has an internship there working in production at Anomaly, which was Adweek’s 2022 U.S. Agency of the Year. She hopes it will develop into a full-time position, supporting her long-term plans of becoming an experiential producer.

Even amid her dedicated pursuits, Woods is proud of doing the wide array of things she wanted to do in college while graduating on time.

“I look at the vision boards I’ve created over the years and see the dreams and ideas I had that turned into realities,” she said. “I took classes, like glassblowing, out of pure interest. I was able to use the pandemic as a springboard for exponential growth and perseverance. I met my best friends. I had an article published in the Richmond Times Dispatch. I was able to travel for leisure, school and work. I made connections in New York City — [it was] one of the biggest things I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to do by choosing to go to school in Richmond.

“I learned so much about myself, the fields I’m interested in and life in general while at VCU.”

NEW YORK, May 8, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — Stagwell (NASDAQ: STGW) Marketing Cloud’s PRophet, the first and only generative and predictive AI SaaS platform built by and for modern PR professionals, today announced an alliance with LexisNexis®, one of the world’s leading providers of news and business data, information and insights. This strategic alliance with LexisNexis® will further power PRophet’s industry leading AI platform, which collectively boasts access to upwards of 200,000 global news sources from high authority outlets and journalists, including hyper local media, newsletters, trade publications and blogs. The PRophet platform ingests and analyzes millions of news articles daily, using AI-techniques to predict journalist interest and sentiment. Its latest generative AI writing tool, Taylor, then drafts personalized pitches to journalists demonstrating the highest interest in the pitch.

“The current media landscape is complex, fragmented, contracting and dynamically evolving – and client-side expectations are higher than ever. Outdated PR practices are no longer working, and communications pros and clients alike are tired of low open rates, frustrated journalists, wasted time, mis-managed expectations and poor results,” said Aaron Kwittken, founder and CEO of PRophet and CEO of Stagwell Marketing Cloud’s Comms Tech Unit. “Our alliance with LexisNexis furthers our mission to help PR pros become more performative, predictive, and productive Communications Engineers©.”

PRophet also announced the launch of “Powered by PRophet,” a white-labeling option for PR agencies of all sizes. Customers can now customize the PRophet platform to their own specifications and go to market with a unique and differentiated agency-branded platform that combines their own unique value proposition alongside the powerful capabilities of PRophet’s predictive and generative AI capabilities.

“We’re happy to offer this white-labeling option to agencies,” added Kwittken.” As a former agency leader and owner myself, I understand how important it can be to brand, customize and integrate proprietary technology into an agency’s capabilities and bring a new level of innovation and differentiation to clients.”

About PRophet
PRophet is the first-ever generative and predictive AI SaaS platform designed by and for the PR community. The platform uses AI to help modern PR professionals become more performative, productive and predictive by generating, analyzing and testing content that predicts earned media interest and sentiment. PRophet was founded in 2020 by PR and marketing industry thought leader and entrepreneur Aaron Kwittken and is part of the Stagwell Marketing Cloud, a suite of SaaS solutions that powers research, communications, and media activation for in-house marketers. To learn more, visit prprophet.ai.

About Stagwell Marketing Cloud
Stagwell Marketing Cloud (SMC) is a suite of data-driven SaaS solutions built for the modern in-house marketer. Born out of Stagwell’s network of award-winning marketing agencies, SMC’s technology empowers marketers to drive business impact by giving them intuitive tools equipped with proprietary, actionable data. SMC’s portfolio of solutions powers strategic customer research, communications, and media activation for brands worldwide by leveraging technology such as generative artificial intelligence, shared augmented reality, and more. Get your head in the cloud at www.stagwellmarketingcloud.com.

About Stagwell
Stagwell is the challenger network built to transform marketing. We deliver scaled creative performance for the world’s most ambitious brands, connecting culture-moving creativity with leading-edge technology to harmonize the art and science of marketing.  Led by entrepreneurs, our 13,000+ specialists in 34+ countries are unified under a single purpose: to drive effectiveness and improve business results for their clients. Join us at www.stagwellglobal.com.

About LexisNexis Legal & Professional
LexisNexis Legal & Professional® provides legal, regulatory, and business information and analytics that help customers increase their productivity, improve decision-making, achieve better outcomes, and advance the rule of law around the world. As a digital pioneer, the company was the first to bring legal and business information online with its Lexis® and Nexis® services. LexisNexis Legal & Professional, which serves customers in more than 150 countries with 10,500 employees worldwide, is part of RELX, a global provider of information-based analytics and decision tools for professional and business customers.

Media Contact
Alex Birmingham
KWT Global
[email protected]

SOURCE Stagwell Inc.

By Tina Meketa, University Communications and Marketing

As the construction dust clears from the Judy Genshaft Honors College building, its
immaculate design symbolizes the hundreds of talented individuals who brought the
state-of-the-art facility to life. 

Since its groundbreaking in late 2020, nearly 80 businesses have worked on the five story, 85,000-square-foot
building – about half are diverse-owned with an estimated spend on contracts exceeding
$11 million. 

“Our goal was to have 30 percent utilization of diverse-owned firms on the Judy Genshaft
Honors College building. So, the fact that we far exceeded that goal is a great example
of if we work together of what can be done together,” said Terrie Daniel, assistant
vice president of the USF Office of Supplier Diversity.

Woman-owned Level Line Interiors installed the metal framing and drywall, the ensemble
acoustic lobby ceiling – which optimizes sound absorption – and the fiber-reinforced
concrete panels on the building’s interior walls.

“The Honors College was like no other job we have worked on – beautiful and unique
and filled with challenges, which our company thrives on,” said Stephanie Schoenberg,
who owns Level Line Interiors with her husband, Don. “The building’s design, with
all the curved walls, glass openings and multiple wall finishes brought a new challenge
every day, and that was very fulling to see it all come together.”

Founded in 1994, Level Line Interiors has about 20 employees and has secured contracts
to work on other USF projects, such as the Marshall Student Center and Osprey Suites on the USF St. Petersburg campus. 

Diverse-owned Evolve Mechanical Services also worked on Osprey Suites and its dining
hall and installed the HVAC system in the Judy Genshaft Honors College building. Founder
Reggie Clark employs 14 technicians, including a Vietnam War veteran.

Several USF alums are at the core of construction of the new Judy Genshaft Honors
College building, which is funded in part by a $20 million gift from USF President
Emerita and Professor Judy Genshaft and her husband Steve Greenbaum. 

Woman-owned Ceco Concrete Construction poured the concrete foundation, columns, walls,
beams and slabs. District manager Chad Anast has been with the company for more than
15 years and earned his executive Master of Business Administration degree from USF
in 2021. 

“I was very excited to be back on campus working on an iconic project with some of
my former classmates right next to where we went to class,” Anast said.

Cableytics owner Floyd Freeman is also an alum, graduating in 1996 with a degree in
electrical engineering. His team installed public safety Distributed Antenna Systems
throughout the Judy Genshaft Honors College building, which boosts police and fire
radios. The diverse-owned business landed the contract while participating in the
USF Mentor Protégé Program – developed in partnership with Skanska to support the Tampa Bay region’s diverse-owned
small businesses in the construction industry. 

The USF Office of Supplier Diversity will soon welcome its third cohort for the mentor
program. Participants will be selected based on recommendations from community partners,
such as the Hillsborough County NAACP, Prospera, the Women’s Business Enterprise Council
Florida, Inclusive St. Pete and the Manasota Black Chamber of Commerce. 

Applications will be accepted May 15-June 16 with the next class beginning in August.
You can register here to learn more about how to sign up for the program and receive notifications about
future Office of Supplier Diversity events or USF purchasing opportunities.

The Gist

• Market limitations. Focusing solely on demand generation leaves businesses open to a smaller portion of the market, neglecting the importance of building brand awareness.
• Gumball mentality. The dangerous mindset of expecting immediate leads from marketing campaigns overlooks the value of long-term brand building and awareness efforts.
• Brand revival. To achieve a balance between brand and demand, marketers must invest in comprehensive branding strategies, appeal to buyers’ emotions, and modernize content and measurement approaches.

Recently, most of the marketers I’ve spoken with feel like none of their tactics are working like they used to. There are multiple reasons for this, including the macroeconomy and buyer indifference to traditional tactics, but I believe one of the main reasons is that the demand gen model we’ve collectively built over the last 15 years has been prioritized at the expense of (more traditional) brand building. 

When you look at it from an aerial perspective, it’s clear how this happened. Marketers were told to drive revenue, then held accountable to their performance (or lack thereof). This was a good thing, but as a side effect the industry became hell-bent on leads measurement above all else and, as a result, lost the art of building the larger brand. 

This might not seem like a big deal, but I assure you it is. In fact, every aspect of your go-to-market, from pipeline creation to win rates to retention and more, will either be strengthened or weakened based on the caliber of your brand. So, how do you get back to the right balance of brand and demand? Here’s my take.

Realize That Demand-Only Limits Your Market 

A significant part of the problem with the demand-only approach is that it leaves you open to a very small portion of the market. When you’re not building brand awareness about the problem in your category, you’ll forever be stuck with the small pool of your market that happens to be actively in-market for your solution right now. But guess what? That’s the exact same pool of accounts that your competitors are also fighting over. 

Instead, think about expanding your market. By speaking to accounts that aren’t in-market at the moment, and then educating them about the problems you solve, you open up a much broader pool of prospects. This is especially important given the fact that today is the age of the anonymous self-service buyer. When potential customers aren’t downloading your e-books like they used to or flocking to other highly measurable tactics that were previously popular, you need to rely on more of the softer, less easy-to-measure brand activities to bolster your progress. 

Related Article: 3 Ways to Generate Millions of Free Brand Awareness Impressions

Get Rid of the Gumball Machine Mentality

Over time, executives from CEOs to CFOs and beyond have come to think of marketing like a gumball machine. You put a quarter in, you get a gumball. You put a campaign in, you get pipeline. This is a dangerous mindset to have since it prioritizes marketing that is measurable over marketing that is hard(er) to measure but more effective in the long-run.

If your entire focus is on executing the campaigns that will result in immediate leads, you’re going to miss the ancillary factors that amplify the results of your lead-gen efforts, namely, brand building and awareness. In other words, without good brand support, even the greatest demand gen programs will struggle to hit their goals. For example, a study from Comscore showed US Internet users are 49% more likely to visit an advertiser’s site if they have previously been exposed to display ads, and research at University of California, San Diego by Hoban and Bucklin found that exposure to advertising increased visits to the firm’s website up to 74.7% for previous nonvisitors. Put simply, investing in your brand equals better demand gen ROI. 

Related Article: 3 Ways to Generate Millions of Free Brand Awareness Impressions

Bringing Brand Back

The next logical question is how to get back to building your brand and awareness while not losing ground with your demand activities. But first, what is a brand? There are many definitions but my favorite is the one that says, “brand is what people say about your company when you’re not in the room.” And brands are built by the sum of every interaction a consumer has with your company.

With this in mind, here are the steps I recommend for making brand once again a focal point:

• Recognize the scope of “brand.” It’s more than your logos, messaging and position. It’s also not a “set and forget” activity. It’s an always-on, comprehensive strategy that requires intentional action and investment. 
• Appeal to buyers’ reptilian brains. B2B buyers are people. People are emotional. And the fact that B2B buyers have emotions means that no matter how disciplined a buying process is, they will use emotionally driven heuristics to simplify complex decisions. In fact, whether the buyer realizes it or not, the decision is often made long before the buying process is completed. And when this happens, even subconsciously, much of the buying process ends up being an effort to justify the initial emotional decision. This is where branding comes in because brands inherently operate on an emotional level by stimulating the amygdala portion of the brain (part of the reptilian limbic system). 
• Make the investments. 
  • You and your executive team must commit marketing program dollars to messaging and positioning in the marketplace, even though it’s harder to measure. If you’re struggling to get buy-in, learn about how to set and defend your marketing budget and ROI with this updated mindset. 
  • It’s also essential to invest in your customers and advocates. They’re the ones who can go out into the world (even into “dark,” private communities where users are anonymous) and evangelize on your brand’s behalf. 
• Modernize your content strategy. Yes, you need content marketing but no, you can’t just gate e-books like we used to. Today, compelling thought leadership requires sharing insights that help your buyers perform better in their roles through accessible reports and guidance, not held behind gates. If you want to see masterful execution of this, take a look at Gong Labs. 
• Change how you think about measurement. Branding works by creating patterns of associations that have emotional force and, therefore, influence purchasing behavior, often unconsciously. This means that a large part of the impact is unconscious, making it harder to explain and measure how and why it works. The goal is not about getting a person to click, or download your e-book, or any of the traditional calls to action. Success means dropping traditional B2B demand generation metrics such as cost-per-click and cost-per-lead. The goal is better engagement over time, which can be measured using “test and control” groups (accounts exposed to your ads versus accounts not exposed).

When you realize that brand is just as important as demand, you’re already on your way to improving your initiatives and bolstering your results. Getting this right is crucial to your success. It’s a balancing act, but it’ll be worth the time and effort it will take to get others on board.

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