To go along with this new, unique name, uSooth needed a logo that they could proudly identify with — a logo that’s fun, hip and speaks to the millennial generation they wish to assist. Fresh, vibrant logo colors bring attention to uSooth in ways that its original identity had not.

And if there’s one thing we like to bring to our clients, it’s the power to turn heads.

Look out for uSooth’s new website, coming soon from yours truly.

To save me from repeating myself, here’s last year’s blog: The Challenger Gap!

I still have my 1988 Gap jean jacket. It is increasingly becoming buried in the back of my closet. But as a loyalist, I’m still rooting for you, Gap. If this year’s campaign doesn’t work, maybe you’ll think about a brand spanking.

With online banner ads, print ads, Google AdWords, HTML emails and more, W&M aims to attract military candidates to a new website section and help them successfully navigate their way through funding and program options.

The School of Business offers military personnel multiple ways to get a quality education with a Full-time MBA, Flex MBA (part-time), Executive MBA or a Master of Accounting degree (MAcc). W&M also participates in military funding efforts, including the Post-9/11 GI Bill.

Graduate student candidates with military training have the skills any B-School would hope for — strength, passion and advanced leadership capabilities — so W&M is calling out “We Want You!”

BHS’s challenge: How do we communicate to the Butler area that we’re providing first-rate care at a high rate of speed?

Fitting Group’s solution: Flames.

Check out the TV spot we created (along with print ads, outdoor boards, direct mail pieces and more) to spread the word about BHS FastERcare!

Armed with a passion for heart care, a strong focus on prevention and a love of the Butler community, Dr. Azouz returned to BHS after a short stint at an urban hospital. He came back with a mission to educate patients, helping them understand the risks and causes of heart disease and, ultimately, helping them prevent it. Fitting Group’s mission? Let Butler County know about Dr. Azouz’s much-anticipated return.

Using the BHS website, print advertising, outdoor advertising and direct mail pieces, we spread the word that this familiar face is back in town. Only a month later, his patient numbers are as high as his standards for heart care. Welcome back, Dr. Azouz!

I, along with a few of my colleagues and another guy in my building that I’ve actually never met, have been partaking in a little Foursquare action over the last several months, and I have to say my biggest motivation is that I want to accumulate more points than them — oh, and to remain Mayor of Fitting Group! This is actually hard for this new mom to do; I just don’t get out that much anymore.

Since launching a year ago, the blogosphere has been a flutter with discussions on the true value of Foursquare as the next social media outlet and about how creepy it is that people are actually identifying their locations to the world. (Come on, admit it! You have friends on Facebook and followers on Twitter that you don’t know well enough to inform them of where you are, or more importantly where you are not — @home!)

So far I’ve only been “playing Foursquare,” however I can see how it will be of tremendous value for retailers. They’ve made it extremely easy for people to promote the establishments they frequent and provide tips for when others visit. It is a free referral source! All you have to do is encourage your customers to play.

And once they start to play, you can get valuable information about them from Foursquare as they recently introduced tools for small businesses. Small businesses can track who has been checking into their establishments, who their Mayor is and if anyone has provided a tip. If you dig a little deeper, you can segment the data further and use it to benefit your bottom line. And the best part — it’s FREE, at least for now. So if you’re a retailer, especially one that is considered local to your customers, you need to check out Foursquare and register your business. How much would you pay to get a breakdown of when your best customers are visiting and what they like most AND get them to share your business with others? Priceless.

The only downside to Foursquare in my opinion is that people may get bored of the game so their participation may be short-lived. Get them playing, keep them interested and it might be ok if it is just a game. Oh and if you decide to play, it is creepy to register your address as a location. Yes, I’m talking to you at 402 Spruce Street, aka HOMEBASE!

Some say there is a “New Normal” and that business has changed in a profound way from the beginning to the end of the first decade of the 21st century. If so, then what are the implications for the concept of BRAND — is it more or less important than it was? Should more thought go into proactively creating and managing the brand experience? Should more resources be expended in shaping and defending the brand? And if the answer is yes to one or more of these questions, then by what means can we achieve this control and what can we expect as a return on our investment? These are important questions for marketers of all stripes — from agency denizens to company product managers to entrepreneurs launching new brands.

Not only are these questions affected by financial concerns, but also by seismic shifts in technology that have moved the power to shape the perception of the brand from the “owner” to the consumer. Brand owners could take back much of that power, but should they? If Business is and should be primarily concerned with production, sales and profit, where does brand management fit now?

I think brand management still is a means to an end. Simply put, we manage our brand because we want to sell more stuff at the highest possible price. To do that, we need to earn the trust of the consumer. Trust is a critical currency — it is the primary currency of brand-building. Brand logos have become trust-marks in our society and have created affinity groups among and between consumers. They have practically taken on a life of their own — think Nike wearers, Bud drinkers or iPhone users.

I believe that the key to brand owners maintaining a large degree of control in the time of the New Normal is to view every sale as being accompanied by that trust-mark — that promise to the customer that says, “you’ll get your money’s worth and my product will perform as expected.” Otherwise, the consumer might steer your brand in a direction you don’t want it to go.

However, in order to offer all this support, Gwen’s Girls needs support as well — from donors, volunteers and the community. When they asked Fitting Group to help them create a website that would carry their message to these groups, we were up to the challenge.

Using the girls themselves as inspiration, we created a powerful animated video that highlights the change that can be brought about by investing in girls. It leads to the new site, where users can learn about the resources provided by Gwen’s Girls and donate online.

In my opinion, I’ve lived a sheltered life. I grew up in a rural area, two hours from any major city, fifteen minutes from a decent-size town in Maryland and forty-five minutes from my 600-student high school in Pennsylvania. Up until this past December, I had never been further than Orlando, Florida, and I had never been on an airplane (yes, we drove for 15 hours).

But I finally got my chance to break these boundaries. My fiancé’s sister, Ashley, is currently living in Honduras teaching math at a bilingual school. His family invited me to go with them for two weeks to visit her and sightsee. We flew out of Baltimore on December 18th to the capital of Honduras, Tegucigalpa.

Walking around Tegucigalpa and our second destination, Juticalpa, nearly everyone stared at me. I also knew very little Spanish. It was extremely unnerving. I was prepared to stick out like a sore thumb, and I knew I would have trouble communicating, but I was not prepared for the overwhelming feeling of panic.

My sanity would not last two weeks in this state of shock, so I pushed forward. I brushed off the stares and bought a Spanish phrase book. I wasn’t very good at Spanish, but my efforts were rewarded. Just by trying, people were more patient with me. In the end I learned enough to make it through my trip. I had an amazing time full of new experiences.

When entering a new environment unprepared or underprepared, a sense of panic might be our first reaction. How you overcome the panic and face the obstacles in front of you is what sets those who succeed apart from those who fail.

Taking my experiences from Honduras to my new internship with Fitting Group, I learned to face each obstacle one at a time, pooling my resources and overcoming the panic. When I’m faced with new projects, sometimes the panic comes flooding in. Then, I take a deep breath and realize that I have the knowledge I need to complete the task. I have the knowledge within me and around me. I can’t be afraid to ask for help or find the information I need to move forward.

Starting a new job can be as unfamiliar as entering a foreign country. Succeeding is about finding the tools and skills you need to overcome the challenges ahead of you. The more prepared you are in the beginning, the easier the transition. If you find yourself unprepared, push forward and look for all the available resources you need to survive and flourish. Brush off the stares and find your phrase book.

So, Fitting Group and GeoSonics/Vibra-Tech began a mission to build one big honkin’ website. The end result is a complete resource for any and all geophysical monitoring, analysis and reporting needs.

Building something? Blowing something up? Worried about blasting or construction near your home or community? This site has in-depth information about GS/VT’s services, products, software, FAQs and more. The expertise of these two companies creates one big industry resource — and now their website shows it.