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Now Open: Boggy Creek goes even bigger in VR

Following the success of the attraction’s first foray into VR for B2B sales, Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures has worked with Starmark to expand its footprint in VR. What we’re calling Boggy Creek 2.0 includes an overhauled sales experience for travel planners and made it publicly accessible for the first time.

Improving on a winning formula

The original version of the Boggy Creek VR experience was created as a way to bring Boggy Creek to travel planners around the world during the travel disruptions of the global pandemic. Now on the heels of a Best in Show win at the 2023 Flagler Awards, the new version of Boggy Creek VR launches to the public.

Taking Boggy Creek to the wider world

While this new and improved version is still primarily used as a tool to book more group sales, it will also be persistently available as a meta theme park within the Engage Metaworld. Now visitors from any continent can visit Boggy Creek in VR before deciding to come in person.

Like version 1.0, this new version is still anchored by our two-minute airboat experience, where visitors can sit in a scale recreation of one of the airboats for a VR-enhanced video showing all the park has to offer. As the video plays, VR airboats zoom across the Everglades waters in front of the viewer, gators gather around the boat and butterflies flutter past.

The Starmark team also added VR recreations of signage throughout the grounds, like education about Everglades birds, a history wall about Kissimmee and a gator guide photo op.

More lifelike than ever

Boggy Creek VR 2.0 takes advantage of additional optimizations to create a lifelike experience that runs great on widely available headsets, like the Meta Quest 2. On more powerful VR devices and desktop versions of Engage, the visual fidelity is even higher. Hear birds chirp in 360 degree sound, listen to the wind, watch the sun disappear behind trees and beams. It all adds up to an experience that’s more immersive than before.

Animal trainers and educational experiences

The new Boggy Creek VR 2.0 features completely new interactions for visitors — and some major enhancements to current ones. The previous version included a butterfly garden, but the new version more realistically captures the in-park experience with a screen-enclosed setting full of accurate recreations of the native Florida plants that serve as food sources. Several different species of butterfly are represented, showing the incredible variety of species native to the state.

Similarly, throughout the park, watchful VR visitors will see other native species, like the birds that make the park their home in real life.

And speaking of critters, Starmark also overhauled the Alligator area, creating an enclosure more like the one visitors experience at the Kissimmee attraction — as well as adding lots more immersion to the fossil and gem mining flume. Now visitors can really hear the water rush — and even pick up the gems.

The Starmark team also added real Boggy Creek animal trainers to this version. Visitors can give themselves a self-guided tour of the attraction by launching dimensional avatar recordings that are modeled after the real animal trainers at the park.

This is one of our most immersive VR projects to date. We’ve loved the opportunity to work with such a forward-thinking partner, and we can’t wait to see how we can bring more and more business opportunities to life through VR.
— Brett Circe, Starmark Chief Digital Officer

A real-world reward for VR visitors

To publicize the public launch, Starmark created a new page about this VR experience on the Boggy Creek website, as well as organic social assets the park’s team can add to its feed. It’s all part of our effort to create a stronger connection between the virtual world and the real one. In fact, when you go check out Boggy Creek in VR for yourself, you’ll see we’ve included a way to win a real-life reward for your real-life tour of Boggy Creek hidden within the VR experience — namely a coupon code for a free gem and fossil mining experience. This new addition provides a clear way to track engagement between the VR experience and real visitors at Boggy Creek.

The Boggy Creek VR Experience is available on every major VR headset (including the new Meta Quest 3), Mac, PC and Chromebook computers. You can also access it on phones and tablets running the Engage iOS and Android app. You can always find the entrance to Boggy Creek on the top floor of the Enterprise plaza in the Engage Metaworld.

New CHS website brings home prestigious Aster Award

The recently renovated Catholic Health Services website just won major 2023 accolades — a bronze Aster Award, one of the healthcare industry’s most prestigious marketing awards.

The new site features a thoroughly researched and completely overhauled information architecture, navigation and approach to design, putting user experience at the center of the design process. After all, people who are using a hospital site are usually doing so at very challenging times in their lives. The new site acknowledges this reality, making it far easier for visitors to find what they are looking for.

Says Linda Lamers, Senior Director of Marketing/Communications for CHS, “Winning this award is not just about the recognition but also about the impact our website has made on our users and the broader online community. It demonstrates that our dedication to providing an exceptional user experience, innovative design, and top-notch functionality has not gone unnoticed.”

Content for the new site is also reorganized around Catholic Health Services’ commitment to a lifelong continuum of care. This reorientation brings the site in line with the larger mission of the entire CHS system.

Winning this award is not just about the recognition but also about the impact our website has made on our users and the broader online community. It demonstrates that our dedication to providing an exceptional user experience, innovative design, and top-notch functionality has not gone unnoticed.
— Linda Lamers, Senior Director of Marketing/Communications for CHS

About the Aster Awards

The Aster Awards is one of the largest and most respected national/international competitions of its kind. This elite program has recognized outstanding healthcare professionals for excellence in their advertising & marketing efforts for over 20 years.

All awards were issued for entries that received top marks from judges placing them in the top 16% of the nation for advertising excellence. Judging criteria included creativity, layout and design, functionality, message effectiveness, production quality and overall appeal and execution.

For more about the Aster Awards, visit asterawards.com.

A website relaunch with a healthcare leader

Catholic Health Services (CHS), one of the largest not-for-profit post-acute healthcare systems in the Southeast U.S., cares for 6,500 people of all faiths daily. Four medical campuses housing skilled nursing facilities, acute medical rehabilitation hospitals, home health agencies, assisted living facilities and in-patient hospice units: eighteen affordable senior housing communities for the independent low-income elderly, two Catholic cemeteries and five early education and childcare. In 2023, Starmark partnered with CHS to create a new healthcare web presence that put patient needs at the forefront while highlighting what makes the system’s care so special.

The Diagnosis: Unconnected Dots

The #1 differentiator for Catholic Health Services is its commitment to a lifelong Continuum of Care. While competitors offer the same core services — physical therapy, skilled nursing or home health — few match the depth and breadth of the system across a patient’s entire lifetime. CHS can coordinate and deliver a full range of highly-specialized healthcare services, covering all needs from the beginning of one’s healthcare journey until they regain independence, without the extra time, stress and recordkeeping risks of using multiple providers.

What the CHS and Starmark team found was that most patients didn’t know what Continuum of Care was — or why they should care. Few even realized that CHS offered multiple services. Physical therapy patients thought they had to go elsewhere for home health, and skilled nursing patients had no idea CHS offered stroke rehabilitation. This finding became the driving business imperative for the new website.

Homepage copy and video illustrations emphasize the why and how of the Continuum of Care

The Treatment Plan

People using a hospital site are usually doing so at very challenging times in their lives – whether a future patient, current patient or a family member of someone in need of care. It was critical for the new website to acknowledge this reality. Our mission was to make it far easier for visitors to find what they are looking for, as well as:

Create compelling ways to convey the importance of the CHS Continuum of Care
Instill a consistent, engaging visual identity and voice throughout
Unite all service lines under the Continuum of Care mission — while still prioritizing each service’s unique selling points and expertise

Starmark began with in-depth stakeholder interviews that built a comprehensive understanding of opportunities. Both teams then collaborated closely on an Agile roadmap to update the information architecture, user personas and journeys.

Information Architecture

User Personas

Putting Every Visitor At The Center

Starmark conducted a best-in-class industry website review, research and testing to create the new design system and site experience. Many new features elevated the user experience significantly, ensuring that visitors stay at the center of the design process, just as the CHS Continuum of Care mission centers on every patient’s individual healthcare journey.

Design System & Patterns

Making Answers Simpler to Find

The Starmark team simplified the global and in-page navigational structures for the new CHS site. The goal was to make it dramatically easier to find what a visitor is looking for.

Simplified architecture makes it faster to find the answers a visitor seeks and view all core services.

FAQs

Content was also formatted to match. The voice, tone and length of content were tuned to create greater engagement and a more scannable experience for seniors and families facing challenging health situations.

Simplifying donations

Donations help fund the ongoing care provided by the not-for-profit health system, so making sure donors could easily help support the mission was critical. Starmark simplified donation forms to make giving simple. We also overhauled back-end integrations to streamline financial handling.

Donation Form

One major improvement in the new site is the intuitive, simplified design system. The update replaced dozens of custom content block styles with flexible, repeatable patterns. The new design system was created specifically to make it easier for several CHS content managers to make updates to keep information current. Reducing the proprietary and custom code created a system that’s much easier to maintain without a full-time team of developers on staff at CHS.

Celebrating Healthier Outcomes

The new website now showcases the impressive range of CHS healthcare expertise clearly and convincingly. A consistent thread of caring and cohesion runs through from the homepage to every service line.

”Our goal was to align all healthcare services to the bigger CHS System mission: a commitment to lifelong continuum of care for every patient,” says Linda Lamers, Senior Director of Marketing/Communications for CHS. “The reorganized content, innovative design and top-notch functionality all demonstrate our dedication to providing an exceptional experience for patients, loved ones, healthcare teams and the greater community.”

The reorganized content, innovative design and top-notch functionality all demonstrate our dedication to providing an exceptional experience for patients, loved ones, healthcare teams and the greater community.
— Linda Lamers, Senior Director of Marketing/Communications, Catholic Health Services

The new website didn’t just impress patients and families

The CHS team also took home a coveted bronze Aster Award in 2023. The Aster Awards are among the healthcare industry’s most prestigious national/international marketing competitions, honoring outstanding healthcare professionals for excellence in advertising & marketing efforts for over 20 years.

Two Starmark Clients Take Home Top Flagler Honors

This year’s Flagler Awards during the Florida Governor’s Conference on Tourism proved to be a big night for two Starmark clients — Amelia Island Convention and Visitors Bureau and Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures. Among other wins, Amelia Island took home the Best in Show honor for marketing budgets over $2 million, while Boggy Creek won Best in Show for marketing budgets under $500,000.

This VR experience has transformed how we’re able to share Boggy Creek with our biggest potential customers in Europe and South America. Asking someone to hop into a headset with us for a VR tour is a lot more appealing than sending a video.
— Margie Bryan, Owner of Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures

Best of Show Wins

Entered into the Mobile Marketing category, the It’s an Island thing weather-triggered ads for Amelia Island CVB took home the top honor for its stunning visual perspective on Northeast Florida island experiences and a 34.4% year-over-year increase in room bookings. With a fun, whimsical and completely ownable approach, the campaign has successfully positioned Amelia Island with its loyalist travelers and those visiting for the first time. In particular, the weather-triggered ads played up the idea of escape from the winter blues for travelers in cold-weather areas.

It’s a thrill to be honored by our peers from across the state. But the best part of this is being able to share with the world the things that make Amelia Island so incredibly special.
— Amy Boek, Chief Marketing Officer for Amelia Island CVB

The Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures VR Experience took home its own top honor in its budget category for a completely new way to share Boggy Creek with overseas travel planners. The idea was born during the travel restrictions of the pandemic when familiarity trips from overseas weren’t possible. Shipping headsets to planners for virtual reality tours helped Boggy Creek keep it’s #1 revenue source of group bookings going even during the depths of travel interruptions.

Additional Winning Entries

In addition to these two Best of Show honors, both Amelia Island and Boggy Creek won awards in other categories.

Amelia Island took home a Bronze Award for Print Advertising and a Bronze award for Radio Advertising. Amelia Island also took home two Henry Awards (First Place) for Mobile Marketing and Social Media Marketing. The Boggy Creek VR Experience also won Bronze in the Trade Resource Material category.

About the Flagler Awards

The Flagler Awards is an annual statewide competition recognizing outstanding Florida tourism marketing. The program was created by VISIT FLORIDA to honor the countless individuals and organizations that help position Florida as the No. 1 travel destination in the world. Each year the Flagler Awards pay tribute to the determined efforts of those who use their skill, resourcefulness, creativity and innovative spirit to market Florida to the world.

This year’s awards ceremony was held during the Florida Governor’s Conference on Tourism at Rosen Shingle Creek in Orlando, Florida.

Brett Circe Shares Current-Day Metaverse Business Success Stories with SFIMA

If you weren’t able to make it in person for Brett Circe’s presentation on July 20, you can still get the cliff’s notes version of how businesses today are using virtual reality — with major upsides.

B2B applications

B2B companies have handfuls of ways to benefit from the metaverse. Everything from prototyping to design to planning to training to sales to marketing to simulations and maintenance can be done in the metaverse in ways that improve speed, increase safety and reduce errors.

Brett also debuted Starmark’s VR B2B sales tool created for Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures, which won bronze at this year’s MMA Smartie awards.

Student recruitment in higher education

We already wrote a definitive article on current metaverse applications in higher education, but Brett gave a deep-dive on how Morehouse college is using the metaverse in instruction with great results for student engagement and retention.

Virtual concierge services in travel & hospitality

Qatar Airlines and Emirates Airlines both have VR concierge services, allowing travelers to tour planes and pick seats at real 1:1 scale. Hilton is using Oculus as a way to train their legion of 10,000 team members in a way that creates greater empathy with guests. Brett also shared a proof-of-concept for a virtual trade show, bringing the best of Central Florida to worldwide travel planners.

Governments and municipalities

One of the surprising stories of the Metaverse is the proliferation of municipal and government projects. We wrote all about this in our article on how municipalities are embracing VR.

During his presentation, Brett shared details of how Barbados, Boston, Austin, Orlando and Miami Gardens are each using the Metaverse differently to add new dimensions to their experiences. You can read about each of these in the article linked above.

Training and mental health services in the healthcare industry

Brett also shared current use cases in children’s hospitals for providing a little escapism for young patients during procedures that could otherwise be scary. And, of course, the medical industry has been a strong early adopter of VR for physician and surgeon training.

There’s more happening in the Metaverse every day

We hope you enjoyed this brief recap of what Brett shared. For more information on SFIMA and its upcoming educational events, visit their site. If you’d like your own Metaverse deep-dive or a catch up with Starmark about how VR, AR and MR can benefit your business, contact us.

Can Threads Get Ahead if Twitter Isn’t Dead?

Amidst the evolving landscape of social media, a new player has emerged – Threads. Operated by Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, Threads is described as “Instagram’s text-based conversation app,” aiming to be a “less toxic version of Twitter.”

While Threads had a sensational launch, Twitter still remains a hot topic, and there aren’t any meaningful signs that Threads has significantly cannibalized Twitter market share.

Several Starmarkers were at the 2023 MMA Possible Conference (to accept our SMARTIES award for the Boggy Creek VR experience) in April for Elon Musk’s interview with Linda Yaccarino, former Chairman of MMA and now CEO of X Corp. It’s strange, looking back, to realize we were actually witnessing Yaccarino’s very unconventional job interview for the top job at X Corp.

X’s new direction may not create growth, but it’s keeping the platform afloat

During that POSSIBLE Conference conversation, Elon Musk unveiled his vision to “maximize unregretted user time” on Twitter. He also reiterated the same beliefs we’ve heard from him previously that freedom of speech is crucial for advancing humanity and democracy.

What was new news to us and the room full of thousands of other advertisers were updates to the platform allowing targeted buying against relevant content and new tools to help advertisers avoid toxic and hateful content appearing in conjunction with their advertising.

Despite these positive signs, the overall instability with the platform and confusion among advertisers has resulted in a 59% decline in U.S. ad revenue.

Threads may not be the answer Twitter exiles want

Despite an initial surge of sign-ups, Threads has faced challenges in user retention. The Wall Street Journal reports that daily active users on Threads have dropped by 70%, with the time spent on the app reduced to just 4 minutes, a fraction of the initial 21 minutes during its launch.

Threads lacks several features that users find essential on other platforms, such as a chronological feed and direct messaging capabilities. Additionally, the actual purpose of Threads remains unclear, leading to a lack of compelling content and engagement.

Couple these oversights with the continued functionality of X (neé Twitter), and despite Elon Musk’s controversial changes, the platform remains operational, making it difficult for Threads to establish itself as a meaningful alternative.

The upside for advertisers

While Threads does not currently offer advertising opportunities, there are indications that Meta’s Instagram team is working on introducing branded content tools in the near future, once Threads gains critical mass. Until then, marketers are advised to use hashtags or text to clearly disclose paid partnerships in their content.

It’s essential to point out that Instagram, another one of Meta’s most successful brands, initially launched without ads but now thrives on advertising revenue. This suggests that Threads may follow a similar trajectory, potentially providing marketers with a new avenue for promoting their brands and products.

It stands to reason that Meta’s engineers may be prioritizing rolling out advertising features and a management platform to capitalize on that previously mentioned advertising revenue decline suffered by Twitter.

Stay tuned for updates

We’ll be keeping a close eye on Threads as it strives to carve a niche as a “less toxic” alternative to Twitter, and we’ll be updating this article (plus writing more on this subject) as news emerges.

Starmark Launches New Strategic Support Subscription Service

Starmark is excited to launch its latest offering, the Starmark Subscription. This new subscription service aims to significantly change the way businesses approach strategic marketing initiatives — with access to top marketing minds when they need them most.

Move your business, not just your project

In today’s competitive landscape, strategic thinking is the key to success. However, many businesses can’t spare already-strapped time and resources to fuel this critical marketing function. That’s why the Starmark Subscription allows businesses to leverage ongoing strategic guidance while still enjoying the flexibility of project-based billing.

According to Starmark VP of Client Service, Katy Gewartowski, this need has been emerging with Starmark’s clients over the last several years. Further bolstering the business case, a recent sentiment survey by Starmark showed that lack of time for strategy is the #1 concern keeping marketing leaders up at night.

This is a natural extension for us. We heard from more and more of our project-based clients that their teams were struggling with strategy, so we decided to make strategy support more accessible in a way that’s really unique within our industry.
— Katy Gewartowski, Starmark Vice President, Client Service

Comprehensive strategy service is a standard offering as part of any AOR (Agency of Record) relationship across the industry. But with the seismic shift of the last decade away from exclusive retainer-based AOR relationships to more project-based or roster-based agency relationships, business-wide strategic counsel often gets overlooked. The Starmark Subscription fills that gap without the long-term contractual obligations and large price tags that come along with traditional retainers.

Says Jacqui Hartnett, Starmark’s President, “As an Agile Agency, because of the more integrated way we work and plan work through roadmaps, we often find ourselves serving that de-facto role as a partner’s strategic AOR, but we’re often only doing that at the point when we’re putting together a project roadmap or annual plan roadmap. There’s just so much more we can do to foster holistic business results if we’re having an ongoing strategic discussion with our partners. That’s the single most exciting part of this new offering. We get to help our clients achieve more.”

That’s the single most exciting part of this new offering. We get to help our clients achieve more.
— Jacqui Hartnett, Starmark President

Starmark Subscription — How it Works:

The journey begins with a comprehensive discovery session with a Starmark strategist designed to gain deep insights into your business objectives, pain points and needs.

Building on the initial discovery conversations, Starmark will assemble a specialized team to address blind spots and areas of improvement for your brand or business. Then that team meets with the client monthly to cover updates, industry insights, business pivots and action plans.

A flexible service model

In addition to having a dedicated strategic consultant with industry expertise, a Starmark Subscription also allows a business to tap into any of Starmark’s subject matter experts, depending on the company’s needs and objectives.

“We wanted to make the pricing simple and predictable,” says Starmark Chief Digital Officer, Brett Circe, “But this isn’t designed one-size-fits-all. Every subscription can have different areas of emphasis, depending upon where we can make the biggest business impact.”

Whether you require assistance in reviewing your advertising performance, analyzing data and analytics, optimizing your digital presence or enhancing customer experiences, Starmark has you covered. Additionally, all subscribers receive ongoing strategic consulting, resource planning assistance and creative insights.

This isn’t one-size-fits-all. Every subscription is going to have different areas of emphasis.
— Brett Circe, Starmark Chief Digital Officer

In fact, the agency already has early adopters of its subscription service in the higher education and healthcare industries, and the areas of emphasis for these subscriptions are substantially different, even at these early stages.

To learn more about the Starmark Subscription and how it can benefit your business, visit starmark.com/subscription or get in touch with us.

Brand Storytelling Essentials: Finding Your North Star

Why do some brands have a gravitational pull that attracts customers so effortlessly? You know the ones. Their social content stops you faster than a mom arm across the passenger seat of your childhood Camry.

So what’s driving these brands? Are they better dressed? Do they tell better stories? Are they the most interesting archetypes in the room? Well, the answer could be yes on all counts, but let’s pump the brakes here. Because there’s something even more fundamental that all these brands have in common: an undeniable sense of self.

These beloved brands know exactly who they are. And that clarity allows them to express their authentic voice and identity. On the receiving end, we embrace these brands as our friends, loves, teachers — we just seem to care more for them in ways that go beyond a transactional relationship.

So how do marketers reach brand suave status? Let’s explore where to start.

Tap into your single source of truth.

Instead of trying to be all things to all people, start with understanding your Why. This begins with defining your brand purpose. You’ll want to be crystal clear on why your brand matters – beyond making a profit. It should reflect the values and beliefs of the company and resonate with your customers, employees and stakeholders. With a singular focus, you’ll be able to connect like a lightning rod to all your targets.

Brands like Nike, Apple, Patagonia, Toms and Dove do this extremely well. And although these brands differ greatly, they all have a solid values system that weaves empathy and understanding of their audiences through everything they do.

Using Dove as an example, its brand purpose is “to make beauty a source of confidence, not anxiety.” All of their messaging and campaign executions are built on this single promise, never straying from their mission. It’s no wonder their culture-defining campaigns for the Dove Self-Esteem Project, launched by Ogilvy, resonate with women of all ages, complexions and body types. Regardless of the channel, the message is always simple, consistent and emotionally on point.

Dove Reverse Selfie 1 — Copyright Dove via Campaigns of the World

Your brand may be trying to tell you something

Listen closely. If your brand’s voice feels a little strangled, then open up to some new possibilities.

At Starmark, we have powerful branding tools for marketers, starting with a process for uncovering the tenets of a brand. We call it North Star. Mostly because this exercise shines a light on the company’s values, personality and identity in a way that guides every effort across branding, marketing and the customer experience.

One benefit to developing your North Star is that it is extremely effective at creating consensus across the organization. Imagine your C-suite, Marketing, Sales, Ops, Digital, HR and Finance teams all on the same page. (Insert angelic sound effect here.)

Suddenly, your organization has its own band of brand ambassadors strumming in perfect harmony. The North Star process also does a great job of shaking off the analysis paralysis that is commonplace in boardrooms when companies approach branding on their own.

But one of our favorite outputs from the North Star is the brand triangle, which serves as shorthand for making brand-critical decisions quicker.

Here’s the North Star for The Main Las Olas. When the Stiles Corporation needed a world-class vision for their downtown business hub of Fort Lauderdale, we created this to inform the personality and identity. Once we had the foundation, the North Star phrase was used as a sounding board for the naming, branding, messaging and visioning.

Today, The Main is a thriving destination in the heart of downtown that is living up to its brand promise. For more on this Class A city block, see our case study.

What’s in your toolbox?

Once your North Star is established, other aspects like positioning, mission and vision come into play to help differentiate and establish a unique identity in the mind of your audience (more on those coming soon!).

One thing is for sure, new and even established brands can benefit from a brand reset. With the right building blocks in place, you’ll be primed to create those meaningful narratives that will attract your tribe to your campfire.

Are you looking to boost your brand presence? Get in touch for tools and training.

No time for strategic thinking tops list of marketer worries in 2023

What keeps you up at night? Well, if you were one of the marketers who answered our recent email and social survey, the odds are very good that what keeps you tossing and turning is a lack of strategic planning time.

That’s the takeaway, with 32% of total respondents citing not enough time for strategic thinking as their primary concern. We’ll discuss that more later in this article. But first, here are some of the other topics topping marketers’ lists of woes.

AI and social media also rank high as concerns

In our survey 24% of respondents cited how AI will affect my business as an area of interest. Again, with the rapid proliferation of new generative AI applications, many marketers are clearly watching the direction this technology will take in the future. In our opinion, the best way to combat AI anxiety is to jump right in and try it. Starmark is currently using an AI intern to assist with some of our internal repetitive tasks, and we also published a recent article about how to supercharge your creative process with AI.

Other high-ranking concerns relate to making the most of my social media investment and keeping track of everything we are doing in so many channels, with 10% and 12% of respondents citing these as concerns, respectively. So, if you feel as if your head is spinning with multiple marketing channels or the pace of change in social media marketing, you’re not alone. But maybe checking out our Gen Z guide to TikTok or a rundown of a tight-spiraled multi-channel campaign for football fans will ease your mind.

When doing more with less, strategy suffers

A lack of time for strategy is a complaint we hear increasingly often from CEOs, CMOs and marketing leaders. One likely explanation is the contraction in both budget resources and jobs without a commensurate reduction in ambitious sales and marketing goals. After all, if time is money, the opposite — money is time — is also true. In this case money in the form of marketing personnel, tools and specialized talent within marketing departments.

After the layoffs of the last two years, that resource pinch is driving more focus to short-term performance versus durable, long-term growth creation. In short, it’s a dearth of strategic thinking driven by budget concerns.

Strategy support doesn’t have to break the bank

In response to this growing concern, Starmark recently launched a subscription-based strategic consulting service. It’s light on the budget but heavy on the strategy support that more and more companies need today.

Whether you’re a current Starmark client or a new friend, it’s a turnkey approach to give you greater strategy depth without having to increase your headcount or manufacture more hours in your already overbooked day. If that sounds like music to your ears, definitely get in touch.

About the survey

As our email and social audiences have grown, we deployed these surveys through our social channels and via email to get a handle on the biggest concerns for marketers in 2023. Our goal is to gear our content toward what our audiences care most about.

In the final tally, we had 99 total responses (n=99) after cleaning the data. For ease of reporting, the percentages in the article above are rounded up to reflect an even 100 responses.

Here’s to a universe of possibilities to explore

It all started in Chicago with Peggy Nordeen, Dan Estes and an idea on a cocktail napkin between them. That day, May 1, 1978, Starmark was born – and quickly became a B2B powerhouse in the Chicago agency scene.

Starmark pioneered the first computer customer databases for its clients and brought home slews of awards. That dual spirit of amazing creativity paired with business results still powers us today.

And if you think the last 45 years have been amazing, it’s nothing compared to where we’re headed. From AR and VR to AI, we’re ready to boldly go to brand new places. That’s why we’re celebrating this milestone with hope and wonder, inspired by the incredible images coming back to us from the James Webb Space Telescope.

Explore more Starmark history

In case you missed it, we published a book to celebrate our agency’s 40th anniversary. Take a look back through the first four decades of forward thinking at Starmark.

Four Decades. Forward Thinking. The Starmark 40th Anniversary Book from Starmark

Let’s find your next big thing

Whether it’s a major launch, a complex constellation of campaign efforts – or just a black hole of unknowns you need help navigating, Starmark’s ready to help you defy gravity. Schedule a meeting with us in VR to get started.

TikTok Decoded: Perspectives from a Gen Z’er

Stop us if this sounds too familiar: You’re a brand that’s been pushing ahead in your industry for years. You’re fairly successful with your organic and paid marketing strategies. And despite rolling with the constant changes in the digital marketing landscape, you’re starting to feel like you’re stuck in a rut.

Enter TikTok – the hottest, fastest-growing video platform. The app’s popularity exploded during the pandemic , and it’s been growing astronomically ever since.

The possibilities are intriguing. The audience numbers, too (every day 600 million people log onto TikTok). But wait, those trendy dances, comedy sketches and Gen Zs aren’t exactly your brand’s forte, right?

If you’re used to feeling like you’re out in front of digital marketing, but TikTok has you backing off the throttle, you’re not alone.

But take it from this Gen Z: it’s time to get over the hesitation. With approximately 1 billion users (and that figure will be outdated by the time you finish this article) spending hours scrolling, laughing, dancing, and learning, TikTok offers an unmatched opportunity for marketers to make a lasting impact.

So, read on to unlock our secrets to unleash your creativity, prepare your brand to reach and engage with its target audience – and make some cool TikTok magic.

TikTok Is a Two-Way Conversation:

TikTok isn’t just about who you can reach. It’s also about what you can learn from your audiences.

Through your TikTok presence, you can:

Spark conversations amongst video viewers.
Receive valuable feedback from your audience.
Create a community of loyal followers who are familiar with your brand.

A strong presence offers the opportunity for users to become acquainted with your brand and engage with it on a deeper level beyond seeing and engaging with your ads. This is why having a strong and active organic presence on TikTok is considered a best practice. Simply put, it’s what helps foster stronger connections and build credibility.

Find Your Authenticity on TikTok – Keep it Real

Authenticity is a must for brands on this dynamic platform. If you’re creating content that is hyper scripted and with stiff edits, you will most likely stick out like a sore thumb amongst the brands that are keeping their videos casual and candid, like the other content viewers see on their FYP.

Authenticity begins before you start planning your video. Don’t just dive in. Spend some time exploring the platform, while keeping these questions in mind:

Which other accounts reflect my brand’s values and style?
What inspiration can I draw from their creativity and unique approaches?
How are these people and companies keeping it casual and natural in their videos?
What do I see that sticks out – in a bad way? Who’s not doing a good job?
What is my target audience, and what type of content will best resonate with them?
How can I infuse my brand’s authentic voice to help it stand out?

By actively observing, absorbing, and applying the lessons learned from TikTok, you can start to explore your own brand personality for this medium.

Hot Tip: Plan to utilize Spark Ads for paid advertising to maximize the impact of your campaigns by incorporating organic TikTok posts and features, such as working with other creators. You can use their authorized organic posts as content for your ads.

Being Educational vs. Entertaining

TikTok is more than just a platform for mindless entertainment. A significant portion of users are on the app to expand their knowledge or educate their own followers on a wide range of subjects.

From practical skills, like foraging for food in the wild or installing a sink faucet, to exploring the historical depths of Greek Mythology, TikTok has become a valuable source of informative content, empowering users to learn and share expertise in creative and engaging ways.

The thirst for knowledge from the platform even inspired Tiktok’s most recent advertising campaign, #Tiktoktaughtme, giving a playful nod to the abundance of educational information that is available, and actually useful on the app.

When deciding whether your brand should take an entertaining or educational approach on TikTok, consider your brand’s audience persona and objectives:

If your audience is seeking knowledge, educational and informative content can position your brand as an expert and build credibility.
If your audience craves entertainment and engagement, focusing on creating entertaining content can help capture their attention and foster a stronger connection.

Utilizing the TikTok Creative Center

After you explore the platform on your own, your next step should be to explore and utilize the TikTok Creative Center.

This valuable tool can be used to view and sort high-performing TikTok ads. It’s a simple way to find where your brand’s individual voice fits and your particular creative niche.

Aside from just drawing inspiration from videos, the Creative Center can help you find popular audio, creators hashtags, products and editing tools to stay ahead of this app’s ever-shifting trends.

Just Get Started

There’s a lot of help to be had for any marketer who’s curious about TikTok, and experience is the best teacher. Don’t fear it; embrace the excitement of trying something new on TikTok, and unleash your brand’s magic.

Ready to take your brand to new heights on TikTok? At Starmark, we’ve got you covered with all the tools and strategies you need to succeed. Get in touch with our team for personalized guidance and support.

Boggy Creek and Starmark Score 2022 Smarties Bronze

Starmark is thrilled to announce that our innovation and impact for our clients has again been recognized at this year’s MMA Smarties Awards during this year’s worldwide POSSIBLE Conference in Miami Beach.

As a winner, our work for Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures was selected from among hundreds of submissions across more than 20 countries. Entries were initially evaluated by the SMARTIES Screening Council of over 100 marketing professionals, and then shortlisted entries were reviewed in virtual jury sessions by the MMA’s independent jury, which is comprised of some of the best marketing minds.

Bronze Award | Boggy Creek: Metaverse Category

Starmark created a VR sales experience to take Boggy Creek Airboat Adventures to travel planners around the world. When COVID travel restrictions shut down the attraction’s ability to host travel planners from Europe and other important markets, this new VR sales tool was able to bring the Boggy experience to travel planners anywhere, simply by sending a headset.

A single travel planner can bring busloads of 60+ visitors to Boggy Creek, accounting for thousands and thousands of dollars of revenue. Before the pandemic, it was a reasonable investment to host groups of travel planners at Boggy Creek to make sure the attraction makes it on more itineraries. Not only does this new VR experience broaden Boggy Creek’s reach to travel planners, it also does it more economically than covering airfare and lodging for travel planner “fam” trips.

Starmark Boggy Creek 2023 Smarties Bronze2 web

It’s thrilling to see our work with Boggy Creek honored alongside brands like Dove, Pepsi, Reese’s and Whirlpool on an international awards stage. That’s what we love about the SMARTIES. It’s not about budget, it’s about innovation and impact.
— Brett Circe, Chief Digital Officer at Starmark

About MMA and the SMARTIES Awards

The SMARTIES North America awards celebrate the most imaginative and innovative work that marketing talent and agency teams have created over the past 2 years to drive business impact. The competition honors the most effective modern marketing in the United States and Canada.

What the Effies are for measuring marketing effectiveness and Cannes Lions are for celebrating creativity, the SMARTIES are for recognizing tangible business impact. It’s the only accolade in the industry that honors marketing’s powerful impact on business.
— Greg Stuart, CEO of MMA

A highly competitive and coveted award, SMARTIES only award to three entries (gold, silver and bronze) in each category. Winners are among the best in the modern marketing community.

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