Mary Baum

Current

• Chief Branding Officer at Mary Baum Dynamic Targeted Branding
• Owner/Creative Director at Mary Baum Creative Services

Past

• creative-director type at Maritz
• Art Director and sometimes writer, too, at a variety of Midwestern ad agencies

Education

• Washington University in St. Louis
• Brown University

Recommended

4 people have recommended Mary

Connections

71 connections

Industry

Marketing and Advertising

Websites

• My Company
• My business model

Mary Baum’s Summary

Does your brand pass the four-second test?

That's about how long it takes for someone to look at your business card or home page and decide how smart you are. If you can be trusted. Even your probable net worth.

All without knowing a single thing about you or your company.

But there's good news. Because now you have as much control over that first crucial impression of your brand as any billion-dollar corporation. And it doesn't take a billion-dollar production budget.

It does take experience and expertise. And insight into what your audience values. The cues they need to see and hear - and how - to know you're their kind of person, running their kind of comapny.

Want to know if you'll pass the four-second test?

Take a spin around my web site at http://www.marybaum.com and order a custom Branding Audit, now at a very attractive discount. Or sign up for my FREE e-course: Pro Secrets for Better Branding at http://www.marybaum.com/secrets/subscribe.html

Mary Baum’s Specialties:

Best industries: B2B, finance, technology, the allied construction industries (especially home building and remodeling, and electrical products) and food.

Skillset: logo design and corporate/brand identity systems; marketing and message strategy; creative development for the web, print, email, interactive media, direct marketing, advertising, sales promotion, combinations of those and anything new that comes down the pike.

Mary Baum’s Experience

• Chief Branding Officer

  Mary Baum Dynamic Targeted Branding

  (Marketing and Advertising industry)

  2008 — Present (1 year )

  If you've got a company, you've got a brand. So - how is that brand working for your business?
  
  Does it pass the four-second test we all give it when we see your business card, or your home page?
  
  That's when we secretly decide how smart you are . . . if you have any money . . . if you're our kind of person . . . if your company is our kind of company.
  
  All based on no information beyond the words and pictures we see before us. And we all do it - it's practically hard-wired in us to make snap decisions based on strictly visual information.
  
  So the question is - does your brand pass the four-second test? Does it pass that test with the right audience? And, beyond passing the test, how can your brand help your business grow faster and farther than it ever has before?
  
  The answers, of course, begin with a click: http://marybaum.com.

• Owner/Creative Director

  Mary Baum Creative Services

  (Marketing and Advertising industry)

  June 1994 — Present (15 years 7 months)

  I was reading an article about web development a few days ago and came across this description of the home page: "the most important square foot in your business."
  
  I had to agree.
  
  But here's the good news: We all get the same 786,432 pixels to work with (That's the product of 1024x768.)
  
  Big or small. Fortune 500 or mom 'n pop.
  
  So here are a couple of questions:
  
  If your home page is your face to the world, what are your 786,432 pixels saying about you -- and more important -- promising your customers?
  
  And if you sell to big business: if that home page -- and the whole marketing package -- made you look like a bigger company, what would that do for your ability to generate leads and close sales? To make bigger deals, and more of them?

• creative-director type

  Maritz

  (Privately Held; 1001-5000 employees; Marketing and Advertising industry)

  May 1989 — June 1994 (5 years 2 months)

  By training and temperament I'm both a writer and an art director. On campus at Maritz, I was senior management's personal creative machine, developing everything from that business unit's company brochure to flyers for cleanup day around the office.
  
  I was also a proposal queen, developing concepts and writing (and art-directing, a first for the company at the time) proposals for business meetings, videos and direct marketing programs.
  
  To this day, the VP of marketing of a Maritz operating unit is one of my two top clients.

• Art Director and sometimes writer, too,

  a variety of Midwestern ad agencies

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Marketing and Advertising industry)

  1981 — 1989 (8 years )

  Some highlights: Print ads that sold enough product to cover the cost of the magazine space.
  
  Regional sweepstakes that brought in more entries per market, on average, than some of those markets had people.
  
  A host of other marketing, advertising and promotional concepts that attracted attention and still speak to the human heart.
  
  And never, ever talked down to the reader.

Mary Baum’s Education

• Washington University in St. Louis

  BFA , Graphic Communications , 1979 — 1983

• Brown University

  Semiotics, the theory of signs and symbols 1977 — 1979

  I probably spent more time at WBRU than I did on academics, where I learned to write -- quickly and clearly, and above all, to get attention.
  
  As a sophomore, I picked up my first advertising client, a retailer in the Providence area.
  
  That summer, it became clear that as valuable as a liberal-arts degree from Brown might be, I wanted to be an art director in the agency business. For that I needed a design degree from a recognized design school, so I transferred to Washington University.

  Activities and Societies:

  WBRU Radio, news and sports broadcaster

Additional Information

Mary Baum’s Websites:

• My Company
• My business model

Mary Baum’s Interests:

Tennis (playing, not watching), technology -- especially all things Web 2.x -- ancient history and paleontology, politics and economics, psychology and neurology, everything Mac.

Mary Baum’s Groups:

BrainTrust panelist, Retailwire.com; The Lean Advertising Network; AIPIA

•    Inbound Marketers - For Marketing Professionals
•    John Burroughs School
•    Innovative Marketing, PR, Sales, Word-of-Mouth & Buzz Innovators
•    Brand & Communications Management
•    Social Media Today
•    Social Media Marketing
•    Ex-Maritz people
•    Maritz People and Alumni
•    Lean Advertising Network Developers
•    The Typography Network
•    Designers Talk
•    LinkedWorking St. Louis
•    Ivy Referral Network (IRN)
•    Strategic Business Network
•    NetworkMO
•    Direct Marketing Questions & Answers
•    IVY GROUPS - The Professional Network for Ivy League Alumni
•    IVY GROUPS: Advertising, Media & Public Relations
•    IVY GROUPS: Marketing & Sales

Mary Baum’s Honors:

Have won awards in the St. Louis Addys, the St. Louis Arrows and the Tulsa Golden Quills; was a Designing Woman of the Year at DT&G online and had work featured in an InDesign Conference presentation.

Mary Baum’s Contact Settings

Interested In:

• consulting offers
• expertise requests
• business deals
• reference requests
• getting back in touch