Case Study / Certified Commercial Investment Member (CCIM) Institute

Warming Up in the Windy City

When the call came to travel to Chicago and pitch CCIM, we packed our warmest jackets and best creative. We’d been busy for the last two years Branding a technology portal developed as a value added CCIM service. After successfully increasing traffic usage by 400% and sales through the portal, we were invited to present ideas on Advertising and Marketing strategies for the organization. Their membership growth had remained steady but unimpressive over the past five years. The board was pushing for more — something had to change.

RJ Sirois had the task of growing membership. Nancy Textor oversaw the class enrollment. Both drove revenues for CCIM. “How soon will you be ready to come up?” RJ asked. “Give us a month,” we said. We could have gone sooner but it was 10 degrees in Chicago and we wanted time to warm up the creative juices.

We did our research, went through the perceptions studies and talked with key members – who encouragingly did not give us the cold shoulder. From there we drafted a 10 step strategic marketing plan. Number one on the list for RJ was overhauling the Brand positioning. All the clever creative in the world was not going to move this organization forward if we didn’t develop a stronger position message set.