Engage

I do not know what you need yet.

Neither do most people who land here. The first conversation is how we find out.

Martin Creative

The first step

A conversation, before anything else.

I read your site before we talk. Then we look for the words that could be working harder. You leave with something useful, whether or not we go further.

Free, before any call

See what your homepage tells people in the first five seconds.

People and AI tools both decide off the first few lines. The test reads yours the way they do, then gives you a score and the three things costing you the most.

Joe Martin speaking on stage in Chicago

How the work runs

Six week cycles, and you always know where things are.

  1. One outcome, agreed up front.

    Written down before anything starts.

  2. You see it while it can still change.

    That is when your input shapes it the most.

  3. It ships, then we decide.

    Another cycle, or a clean stop. Both are good outcomes.

See every step, starting with dinner

The method

Uncover the customer you want next.

Most messaging work starts with your current customers. They already bought the old story. The customer worth studying is the one you do not have yet, so that is where this work starts.

AI shortens the research. It does not do the thinking, and the thinking is the part I do with you.

CFO Simplified has run on that thinking for three years. Brunner Accounting for six.

Larry Chester and the CFO Simplified marketing team, on the call where they first saw the new sentence beside the old one. Turn the sound on.

What a cycle might be

Two ways this usually goes.

The first conversation decides which.

Your Words Expert

I find your words.

The sentence everything else hangs off, built for the customer you want next. You keep it, and you can take it to whoever built your site.

Set up a brainstorm call

Your Senior Webmaster

I make you look great.

Hand me the site and stop thinking about it. Written, designed, built and looked after.

Set up a brainstorm call

Before you ask

The questions I get every time.

What does a cycle cost?

You get the number in a written plan, after the brainstorm call shows what is worth fixing. The call is free and carries no obligation.

Do I have to let you build the site?

No. The words are yours and plenty of people take them to whoever built their site. It is only a website project if you want it to be.

What if I already have a marketing team?

Good. This is a short specialist stretch of the work, not a replacement for anyone. Once the message is settled your team picks it back up and everything they were already doing starts working harder.

What happens after six weeks?

Something is live, and we decide together whether to run another cycle. Plenty of people run one and stop, which is a perfectly good outcome.

Do you only work with businesses in Chicago?

No. Chicago clients get dinner to kick things off and you do not, but the work runs the same anywhere.

The right sentence does the selling for you.

The right buyers recognize themselves in the first line. So do the AI tools people now ask for recommendations.

I do the work myself, so I only take on a few companies each six week cycle. New work starts at the next one.