Story Isn't Your Marketing's Finishing Touch. It's the Foundation.

There's a version of marketing that looks completely professional. The colors are right. The copy is clean. The media buy is solid. And it lands like a thud.

I saw this up close in 2009. I was doing all the digital work -- web, social, YouTube, email -- for a nonprofit in the health and human services space. A large agency had the traditional side: print, radio, billboards, buses. They managed something like 60 clients like this one.

For them, this was another account. Another campaign. Another round of assets to produce and ship.