An idea that percolated in the fall of 2009 simmered for a bit and boiled over into a business model and company launch in 2010. This thought brought me to a recent calendar gut check as June marks Cookson Communications’ 15th anniversary. We missed celebrating the 10th anniversary in 2020 as it occurred during that chaotic period also known as the pandemic when the world was distancing and remote for everything. This gut check has allowed me to reflect and look forward on this 15-year mark.
Let me start with an old tagline that still resonates – communications is hard. Now, I’m not referring to a chat with a friend or colleague…this is about core messages with key audiences such as customers, clients, prospects or employees and multiple communications goals like informing or engaging or even encouraging a call to action. While a lot has changed over the past 15 years including marketing strategies and channels, this Cookson tagline holds true as the anthem for all MarCom professionals.
In 2010, Zoom was known as a PBS show. TikTok was the sound a clock made. Online videos regularly froze due to bandwidth constraints, AI was mainly science fiction and most people still received their news from mainstream outlets and even printed newspapers. The physical and behavioral changes in how we receive and evaluate information, communicate and interact has massively changed in only 15 years.
We launched the company with that initial focus on communications and storytelling. My corporate and executive communications roles in New Hampshire over the previous 15 years provided numerous opportunities to partner and network with leaders across the state in many sectors including education, technology, healthcare and nonprofits. Our two degrees of separation across these sectors in this entrepreneurial state made forming partnerships a natural outcome of conversations.
With an original team of four and an initial client base built from that original network, we created a home and sense of place in downtown Manchester. We crafted a vision around ethics and being highly responsible and responsive to our clientele. This was partly based on my journalistic training and on an ethos that our work is a reflection of us. We became involved in local organizations, focused on core communications and marketing work for a dozen or so clients, and tried to give back when we could during those early years.
This work led to steady growth through word of mouth and client recommendations, and we added services and staff to expand offerings based on what our clients wanted and needed, and on shifts in how people were communicating. Core, in-house services expanded to include design, branding, web services, digital marketing, social media and my favorite – consulting services. I call this out because we focus on a partnership model of trust and collaboration with the organizations we work with. This often leads to a higher-level partnership that encompasses strategies and goals that are future focused and can potentially provide longer-term benefits for all.
During the pandemic when everyone went remote, our staff at first embraced it, but slowly came to abhor a fully remote working environment. One by one, they came back to the office in 2020, wanting to be part of an onsite team. This reinforced that our strength was collaboration, and we work better by processing and doing deep dives into challenges. The sudden shift to a Zoom-only world focused on beginning and ending a meeting that often lost the human element of exploration and what we call the “parking lot discussion” after a meeting where key issues or ideas often arise.
As an agency, the pandemic changed us. Suddenly, geographical barriers went away. Frankly, travel largely went away. But the recognition that an agency from New Hampshire with particular expertise could support clients in Seattle or Los Angeles became acceptable and viable.
Over these 15 years, we’ve worked with companies in nearly 20 states and several countries across a myriad of sectors. We’ve taken deep dives into so many subject matters ranging from behavioral health and regenerative medicine to drones and geothermal energy. We doubled in size since 2020 and recently bought a “work house” in Manchester to accommodate growth and create a high-quality work environment.
While communications tools have come and gone over this time, some things have remained steady. Organizations need core messaging that resonates. They highly value storytelling. They need a solid brand that is current and relevant. They need a digital presence that represents who they are. And they need a strategy and plan to connect with those they serve. It’s exciting and invigorating to have an amazing team that has adapted to external factors to support our partnerships with clients over these years.
In summary and looking forward, I see a robust future for entities like ours that focus on teamwork, partnerships and strategy to help organizations move forward. Geographical barriers have been lifted and technology, mobility and user acceptance of a new way of working have become the norm. While tools like AI (which we use judiciously) will be a big factor in the world of tomorrow, I am optimistic that organizations driven by ethics, responsiveness and collaboration will be key to our economic future.
Thank you to our partners and team – past and present – for a great 15 years.
