Change agent finds collaboration a key to success

FAST TRACK: TribalVision Marketing Manager Anna Barcelos, left, counts resilience and lack of fear as important factors in keeping her working through challenges. Above, she speaks with colleague Molly Rosenbaum. / PBN PHOTO/DAVID LEVESQUE
FAST TRACK: TribalVision Marketing Manager Anna Barcelos, left, counts resilience and lack of fear as important factors in keeping her working through challenges. Above, she speaks with colleague Molly Rosenbaum. / PBN PHOTO/DAVID LEVESQUE

(Updated, Nov. 5, 10:27 a.m.)

Marketing professionals succeed by getting to know their clients and developing creative and workable plans so the company can generate business and accomplish its mission.
That’s the foundation for marketing, said TribalVision Marketing Manager Anna Barcelos, but her passion for her work motivates her to strive to provide services – and results – way beyond the basics.
“Everyone thinks they can do marketing,” said Barcelos, who’s been in the business 20 years and describes herself as “a purebred marketer” – someone who has been trained in the field and has evolved with the rapid pace of change.
“Change can be hard, but you have to learn new technology and new skills,” said Barcelos. “If I’m not learning every day, I might as well just go home.”
Headquartered in Providence, with offices in Cambridge, Mass., Hilton Head, S.C., and Brussels, Belgium, TribalVision describes itself as a “marketing department for hire,” with a focus on small- to mid-sized businesses.
One of TribalVision’s guiding principles is: “The ad-agency model is in need of an overhaul.”
The company’s focus is on flexibility and cost-effective marketing programs.
TribalVision’s style and practices attracted Barcelos after experience working in sales and finance for larger companies early in her career, then working with smaller technology companies
“I’m a risk-taker. I’ve been attracted to companies that are fast and furious and on a great path,” said Barcelos. “A couple of companies ran out of money.”
She counts resilience and lack of fear as important factors in keeping her working through challenging times.
An early believer in social media, Barcelos began building a network of contacts via LinkedIn and Twitter, blogging and strengthening her expertise in those areas. That led her to working with companies to develop social media campaigns. She worked as director of strategy and analytics for a marketing-services company using data to develop customer acquisition and retention with clients that included AAA and Cox Communications.
More recently, she developed online marketing strategies at the Northboro, Mass.-based Web-development company ten24 Digital Solutions, whose clients include Nike and the medical-specialties company Davol.
Barcelos joined TribalVision a year ago when she found her skills, experience and professional style fit well with the company’s mission to work as part of their clients’ staff.
“Right now, I have three large clients and I’m in their offices every other week. We have constant email and phone contact,” Barcelos said.
That communication is the foundation for a marketing strategy not based on big media buys or commissions, but what the client really needs, in the most cost-effective way, to enhance business, she said.
“The main part of my job is the relationship with the client, to make sure all their goals and objectives are being reached,” said Barcelos. Other members of the TribalVision team work with specific parts of the marketing plan, such as video or websites.
Barcelos has seen some businesses find themselves with portions of previous marketing plans that have evaporated or that have used up what appeared to be unnecessarily large chunks of the marketing budget.
“I’ve seen companies who have invested tens of thousands of dollars, for instance, in a new trade-show booth recommended by a company and they used it once,” said Barcelos. “It would have been more cost-effective to get a smaller one.”
Sometimes a client might be considering a new website, but that may not be the most cost-effective plan or be at the top of the priority list, for instance, if their specific goal is generating new leads, she said. Measurement is critical.
“We measure return on investment and make recommendations based on that,” Barcelos said.
Collaboration is part of the way TribalVision, with 21 employees, keeps flexible and adds to its services.
“We work with external partners. We have a large network of professionals with expertise in design or copywriting, for instance,” said Barcelos. “There’s strength in numbers and that gives us a lot of resources.”
Sometimes collaborators become clients. That happened with John Polumbo of East Providence, the owner and sole employee of Winning Edge Selling, who’s been doing consulting and training for sales organizations for 15 years.
“I saw them operating at a level in the marketing space I haven’t seen other marketing people do,” he said. “They did a comprehensive marketing assessment. They call that their tribal plan. It’s a multiple-phase marketing game plan. They do diagnosis and treatment.”
Polumbo first brought TribalVision onto one of his client accounts in 2011. It was a Boston-based, $50 million audiovisual company. Then he brought TribalVision in to collaborate on rebranding and marketing strategies for $20 million company.
He saw Barcelos get the parties to develop and agree on a plan, follow-up with frequent status reports and keep the plan in motion.
“She’s accountable. She does what she says she’s going to do. And she gets other people to say what they’re going to do and do it,” said Polumbo.
That’s what convinced him to use TribalVision and continue to work with Barcelos on marketing for his own company. “We look at the client’s business and goals and base our marketing plan on that,” said Barcelos.
“We will not sell things to our clients that make no sense to them.” •

No posts to display