PORTFOLIO CREATIVE BLOG

Business Vision 101 – The Top 5 Things We Want You To Know

By Catherine Lang-Cline Why am I talking about startups? Because recently the Women’s Small Business Accelerator asked me to talk to a group of small businesses and startups about goal setting. It reminded me of some of the goals that Kristen Harris and I set before we even opened our doors. That made me think, with all of the startups popping up, maybe we can help. If you prefer listening to reading, here is a link to our podcast, Illumination Bureau, that we did on the topic. All of you

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Is Digital Marketing Creative? The Answer is Yes!

By Catherine Lang-Cline When Kristen Harris and I first started this business, it was entirely placing people in print marketing. Fast forward 16+ years and everything now tips toward digital marketing. What is the difference? Nothing and EVERYTHING! Much like the clients, we work with and the people that we place, we have had to evolve our skills, too. Every day we learn about new software, a new app, and a new way to market and we find the people that can do it. Because it is ALL still creative

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Digital Marketing Helps Small Businesses Survive and Thrive

By Kristen Harris As a small business, can you compete with the giant, even behemoth, sized companies that dominate the headlines? Yes, you can! According to the SBA’s latest report, there are 31.7 million small businesses in the U.S., employing 60.6 million people or nearly half of all employees. Small businesses generate 44% of U.S. economic activity and, of small business employer firms, 17.5% are minority-owned and 20% women-owned. Small businesses can compete with the giants by being faster, more innovative, flexible, and nimble, reacting to change, and quickly pivoting

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Embracing A “Remote-First” Model

By Catherine Lang-Cline Up until now, business people have failed to embrace working from home. But this pandemic has taught everyone that remote working works. 83% of employers now say the shift to remote work has been successful for their company, compared to 73% in June, according to PwC’s survey about remote work. And BusinessWire reports that about 83% of the employees want to return to the office in some capacity; 52% miss socializing, 44% miss having the proper equipment, and 44% just want to get out of the house.

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April 15 is World Art Day

By Catherine Lang-Cline Think about how we feel: At a live concert It’s lyric writing, music writing, costumes, and lighting. In an art museum It’s painting, sculpture, crafts, furniture, and more. At a sporting event It’s band music, choreography, music to make you cheer. At a theater performance It’s lighting, costumes, music, choreography, and song lyrics. Even watching streaming content It’s acting, writing, costumes, cinematography, special effects, and on and on. It’s all art. The art world has taken a beating over the past year with theaters and museums being

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Into the Future: Building Your Creative Tech Skills

By Kristen Harris Marketing has been going more technical and digital for quite some time, and the events of 2020 ramped up that change. We’ve talked about skills and roles that translate to creative tech and where you might find those jobs. Maybe you want to learn more of these skills yourself to build your skillset or bring that knowledge to your company.  Creative tech is a hot and growing area, and there are plenty of learning resources available, from free or low-cost up to in-depth courses with a more

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The Art of the Written Word

By Catherine Lang-Cline “Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary.” —Kahlil Gibran Poetry is a talent that I am always in awe of because it is one that I have no idea how it is assembled to create such emotion, tell amazing stories, and capture a wide range of moods. To begin with a recent example, Amanda Gordon, a young, smart young woman puts together some amazing words to speak at an inauguration. In “The Hill We Climb” I was left

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Remote Work: Keep it Fresh While Working From Home

By Kristen Harris We see companies slowly bring people back to the office, and some employees working for essential businesses never left. However, many creatives are still working remotely and likely will be doing so for quite some time. Maybe forever, at least for a portion of the workweek. Working from home has both upsides and downsides.  On the upside: you can set a more flexible schedule (maybe); no commute saves time and money; eliminating work-related expenses like going out for lunch or a daily coffee shop run saves money;

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The Who, What, Where of Creative Tech Part 3 of a 3-Part Series: Where Are All of the Jobs in Creative Tech?

By Catherine Lang-Cline I need to say first, that if you are looking for a role in creative tech, contact us at Portfolio Creative right away. Second, if you are looking for someone for your company or project that knows creative tech, contact us at Portfolio Creative right away. Creative tech is an evolution of many of the jobs that were once all done in print. Those still exist but because of the pandemic taking over our lives, and that includes how we buy things, everything has changed. So where

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The Who, What, Where of Creative Tech Part 2 of a 3-Part Series: What Are the Roles in Creative Tech?

By Catherine Lang-Cline The question of “what are the roles in creative tech?” comes up all of the time because many of these roles are new and we are all learning how to navigate this together. Just a few decades ago we were trying to explain how illustration and design could be done on a computer. We are doing it again with digital marketing and putting really solid definitions around the job titles.  Here, at Portfolio Creative, we can at least speak to the job descriptions that we get the

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