What IS Ride the Sail Marketing?

Ride the Sail Marketing (RSM) is used to talking to other people in marketing. No problems there. But when we looked to expand into other spaces, it became apparent that it’s tricky to explain what we do to non-marketing folks. Simply saying, “We’re a marketing strategist company” still leaves people with questions. 

When I first started my internship with RSM in June this summer, Marikaye warned me that they still struggle with putting a solid explanation into layman’s terms … that her mom wouldn’t know how to explain what the company does! 

After a few months, I ran into the same thing. By August, my own family had no idea what I was talking about half the time when I shared stories about my workday. 

It’s not that RSM has just accepted its floundering in this matter. There’s a whole Google Doc devoted to brainstorming various elevator pitches for the company. Eventually, one of them will be perfect. 

Until then, I’d like to expand a bit on what it is we do for everyone looking for clarification. By the end of this blog post, maybe I’ll even have an elevator pitch to contribute, inching us one step closer to the perfect wording for it. 

So, what IS Ride the Sail Marketing? Here are your answers:

Who are we?

• RSM offers a wide variety of marketing services to help companies grow their business in all kinds of industries. 
• We can act as either a supplemental marketing team or extension to a client’s preexisting one. While it’s fun to be the go-to for all of a company’s marketing needs, we love working with clients’ marketing directors, collaborating and bouncing ideas off each other, and taking a load off their plate. 
• RSM is an entirely remote company. Even before COVID-19, we’ve had great success doing everything virtually, with the team scattered across the U.S.
• We care about quality. Any product coming out of RSM, whether it be an idea, outline, or draft, has had at least three pairs of eyes review it before we send it off to a client for approval. 
• Trust is essential to us.
  • Internal: Each team member here does a lot of independent work. We love opportunities to work together on projects, but when that can’t happen, we trust each other to get the job done.
  • External: Of course, we listen to clients’ concerns and adjust according to feedback. But at the end of the day, we need clients to trust that we know what we’re doing. 
• We value health and wellness, social awareness, and passion for what we do. Our team shares a love for words and connecting with people on a very human level. Check out our full blog to learn more.

What do we do?

Research

RSM is OBSESSED with research. As a marketing strategist, it’s the driving force behind pretty much everything. From uncovering the challenges and hot topics for a client’s target audience to digging into recently published research and looking at how it impacts our clients, their decisions, our recommendations … everything! And don’t even get us started on how much we love working with clients to develop their own research campaigns!

When it comes to our research behind-the-scenes, two of the major things we consider are trends and stats: 

• Trends look at what people are talking about in the business world and in a client’s specific industry. By analyzing what is popular on the leading outlets or sites, we can figure out what would be most relevant to include in a client’s marketing strategy. 
• Stats most often come from surveys that other companies have conducted. After confirming the study’s credibility, we can use it to learn where a population stands on certain topics. 

For example:

Both Hubspot and MarketingProfs featured the same research on their blogs in the same week, indicating that it was trending and something worth our attention. 

In Stackla’s 2020 Consumer Content Report, 86% of the consumers surveyed view authenticity as important when considering which brands they’ll like and support. However, the majority (57%) think that less than half of brands successfully create authentic content.

Having done the research, we could bring this information back to our clients with suggestions on how to incorporate more authenticity into their marketing strategy or even use it as inspiration for content.

Strategy

On the surface, it can seem like a lot of our time goes to writing and editing and polishing. Yes, we do work on a lot of content — blogs, social media shares, ebook guides, FAQs, the descriptions on website pages, and any other written things you might see on a company site. Whew! But we are not a content factory just churning out content all the time. There’s a lot more to our marketing strategist company than that. 

If blog development is what fits your needs best as our client, by all means, that is what we’ll do for you. But we can also help with ease of website navigation, branding, social media planning, increasing media exposure through press mentions and guest writing on big outlets’ blogs, creating resources, launching podcasts, producing webinars, and more. 

We pay close attention to a client’s audience and goals to determine the best strategy for retaining and growing the following. And when working with our clients, we value individualized approaches and flexibility:

• • • • • • Depending on a client’s budget and experience with marketing, they might need help sustaining a simple marketing strategy, or maybe they’re ready to try something new and even experimental. The latter tends to be more fun for us … but the client’s needs are always the priority.
          • We might think we have the perfect strategy for a client’s upcoming quarter, but those plans will surely change what can feel like a thousand times before the quarter ends. Between adjusting to the client’s preferences and changes in the market, that’s inevitable. Keeping a flexible mindset is an integral part of the job. 

Content

Nothing beats good writing. I know that sounds a little self-idolizing coming from someone who is writing to you, but it’s true! The longer companies can keep customers engaged in what they have to share, the better. And you can’t get that without knowing what you’re talking about and presenting it well. 

We excel at both for clients. Our team is made up of fantastic marketing strategists and writers, and we also love to become experts on topics entirely outside our normal area of expertise. Our writing will sound like it came straight from the CEO. 

We talk about blogs a lot because they’re a basic-level step in building a company’s credibility as an expert, keeping customers engaged, and reaching more people. But as we mentioned before, content isn’t just blogs. 

RSM can also develop whitepapers, infographics, surveys, scripts for videos or webinars, landing pages, and any other project that might benefit from captivating writing. The possibilities are endless!

Elevator pitch… v4.4949.x890384…

With our team’s specialized skill set in writing, creating content, social media, SEO, marketing, and public relations, we are perfectly positioned to partner with you. Together, we’ll develop and execute the best strategic approach to get your brand in front of more users and create messaging that will resonate with your intended audience.

If it sounds like your company would benefit from the help of our team, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us today!