Thinking

Winning the Story Wars — Our Upcoming Book

July 10, 2012 is the big day. After a year and a half of development, Winning the Story Wars is going to hit the shelves (hopefully there will still be plenty of physical stores by then). The book, published by Harvard Business Review Press, is a deep exploration of mythmaking, marketing and the shape of the future. I want to share it all right now, but I'm told if I publish all the content online, nobody will buy the book. So, I'm resisting the urge and just sharing a taste of it. I'd really love to know what you think.

The Free Range Rebrand: Designing Our Story

These days everyone is talking about telling stories — which is great, because we’ve been refining our storytelling methodology for the last 13 years. But the sudden popularity has also challenged us to define what that really means, as our once-esoteric field has become more crowded. Nearly a year ago today, we recognized that we needed to rebrand. 

We knew we couldn’t build a coherent brand without a deep understanding of how we do what we do, and why. We needed to unpack the magic and the science behind our work, and we needed a new story to define what it means to be makers of media that creates a more positive future. And each of our new brand expressions, from an updated logo to this website, needed to reinforce that story.

10 Tips for Successful Brainstorming

Ever been in a “brainstorm” that’s more like a braindrizzle? At Free Range, we have pretty stormy brains — always on the lookout for unexpected creative solutions to client challenges. Here are a few techniques we use to get the best ideas from ourselves. Please add your own best practices to our list in the comments! And if you have a particularly horrendous brainstorm experience to share, happy to hear what doesn’t work!

1. Act “as if”

Envision the end result, and imagine experiencing what that feels like. Come at it from an emotional/spiritual place. Ask: “If people need to feel this way in the end, what do I need to create to make it happen?” Don’t worry about the “how” first — the “how” will flow naturally from this process. Try imagining that you are the client, or the user, or the experiencer of the end result — what do you see, feel, experience? Don’t worry about the gaps yet!

Our Toughest Client

Last year, Free Range began to stare down the same challenge many of our clients face: our website was approaching its fourth birthday and starting to look outdated. In addition to the design and technology being several years old (in internet years, that's ancient!) the content and structure didn’t represent our current approach — and our current vision for the future. Though the prospect of becoming our own client was a little scary, we committed to the collaborative task of rethinking, redesigning, and rebuilding our site.

Tech Trends: 2012 the Year of the (Android) Tablet

2012 is going to be the year of the tablet, and more specifically, the Android tablet. Let me explain why this is the case, and why designers and developers who work on web projects should care.

Reflections on Occupy

We had just moved into our new office a few weeks earlier. Downtown Oakland was now our home, and Free Range was nested solidly into the grid of concrete, alive with dozens of restaurants, a BART station, the newly renovated Fox Theater, big bank offices and Frank Ogawa plaza just a few streets south. A small group of us headed out to the first Occupy Oakland protest on a drizzly afternoon, before any tents had even been set up. The crowd was energized, and protest signs still looked fairly fresh, newly penned and lightly handled. The movement was nascent and growing, and Occupy Oakland was about to put itself on the map.

From 19th Street to 19th Street

Last summer I represented Free Range as a judge in The American Institute of Graphic Arts' national design competition “365: Design Effectiveness." When I walked through the glass door of AIGA's storied headquarters on lower Fifth Avenue, in a sense it was like coming home.

Strategic Decision-Making in Marketing

As marketers, we make two types of decisions — tactical decisions and strategic decisions. A simple distinction: tactical decisions seek to maximize results in the immediate term or solve the challenge of the day, while strategic decisions seek to maximize long term gains, engage a whole new audience, or fundamentally change the marketing landscape. What does this mean in practice?