What Clients & Partners Say about Blended Thinking & Tom Holownia

"When it comes to marketing, defining how you articulate your value proposition, and how to position your company, it's how quickly a consultant can absorb the input and add value. Blended Thinking is a firm with the strategic smarts, creativity and quickness to solve those difficult marketing challenges. They solved our problem quickly and with successful ideas we would have never thought of ourselves!"
Ed Sanders, President
Performant Solutions

"Your articulation of our positioning is the best I've seen."
Susanne Lyons, CMO
Charles Schwab

"Tom was referred to us as a consulting resource who's a quick study and can engage with clients at all levels, in a number of areas. He surpassed those expectations. Tom has very strong management interview skills, fluency with developing, analyzing and communicating market research, and brings a perpetual grounding in what it all means for the brand.

As a result of Tom's work, we were able to direct the client to look at new areas of the business not previously contemplated. We've already looked to engage Tom in other efforts."
Matt Rosenberg, VP - Business Development
Visage Mobile

"Tom Holownia makes an impact on companies through the way they view themselves and communicate their message with impact. Even with my more than 25 years of marketing and branding experience with Procter & Gamble and other Fortune 500 companies, he taught me something.

Tom is like a brand liaison, helping clients clearly articulate their brands' value propositions and personalities, and translating their 'marketing speak' into powerful language that inspires creative development. He is unusual having successfully moved from the agency side to the client side and mastered both.

He caused me to transform my company positioning from management consulting to the real sweet spot, which is business acceleration for my clients. Thank you Tom."
John Maver, President
Maver Management Group

"Tom led brand positioning and value proposition training sessions for a group of professionals with a lot of industry knowledge, but limited classical marketing training. This led to Tom being asked to put together a series of modules for future use for a corporate 'university' for new brand managers -- based on our business needs -- not a cookie cutter approach to marketing training.

Tom's an excellent presenter -- organized, knowledgeable, entertaining, and a true subject matter expert on all things related to marketing. Most importantly, Tom connects with his audience by engaging them in a dialogue. His 'On Strategy, On Brand' mantra is now in daily use at the firm, as is our new, shared vocabulary".
Elsa Zisook, Marketing Director
Valent USA

"Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Thank you! I received lots of positive feedback from the team who said you listened and were able to think on your feet. You helped me produce just what I wanted with them.
Thank you!"
Kate Hart, Director of Marketing
Central Garden & Pet
Brand Management marketing Summit

"Tom Holownia has a very unique approach to creating effective brand strategies and executions, communicating them in a way that is meaningful to consumers and stakeholders alike, and helping to reinvigorate lusterless brands. Blended Thinking is a solid marketing and branding company that can bring you business results. We know, since we're in the business of evaluating brand strategies and execution!"
David M. Schneer, Co-founder and General Partner
Merrill Research, LLC

"Your approach is more thorough than what I've seen from larger firms."
Art Roth, President,
Hunter Paine Enterprises

"My team doesn't make a move without talking to Tom first."
David Levenson, CEO
iScribe

"I've worked with Tom in a number of different capacities over the years and he always amazes me with his ability to quickly cut to what's most important. He keeps me focused on where I should be taking my brand and my business, as well. I look forward to our meetings and I ensure I have pen and paper at hand because he consistently produces new thinking for me!

He's generous with his insights from other work he's doing and constantly offers new tools to frame challenging situations, so I can grow my business. To use a Tom-ism, he makes staying on strategy and on brand look so easy but I know its the synthesis of who he is and his rich experiences that allows him to help me so much!"
Alexandria Hilton, Founder / Owner
Bellissima Consulting

"Having worked with Tom for more than a decade, I am constantly impressed with how he methodically (yet quickly) gets to the 'heart of the matter' with regards to clients' branding and strategic efforts.

Tom can wrangle a room full of busy executives and quickly engage them in focused, meaningful work sessions like nobody else I've worked with ... all along the way keeping a casual, warm and upbeat personality that I am continually proud to work alongside."
Rick Atwood, President/Creative Director
Atwood+Partners

Telling compelling stories (CC-Tnewsblog entry)
"When you think about your 'brand promise,' consider this: Does it articulate why someone should work with you instead of someone else?

Tom Holownia of Blended Thinking posed that question to the East Bay IT Group Sales & Marketing SIG. Instead of 'branding,' he tells compelling stories. His definition of branding: 'Branding is a process, the way we do things. It is our stories of expectation, fulfillment and satisfaction.'

You can learn how to tell more powerful stories by rehearsing the answers to these questions (common fodder at networking functions):
- So, what do you do?
- How do you do that?
- Who have you done that for?

Your answers should succinctly explain what problems you solve, what opportunities you help seize or what threats you help avoid. They should highlight what's different about the way you work. And don't hesitate to drop the names of your biggest customers. (He name drops Schwab.)

If you tell your story well, you will shift the listeners' perceptions about you. A clear, concise, compelling and credible story will make the benefit of selecting your company undeniable.

I've touched on this topic before (see posts on taglines, 30-second commercials and value propositions). But I especially liked Holownia's 'Game,' where participants tried to answer the three questions, and his pointed questions helped them drill down to the core message. Nice!"
Cathy Chatfield
CC-Tnewsblog

"After starting my own business and doing adequately for the first two years, I spoke with Tom Holownia of Blended Thinking. I was impressed by his experience and helpful attitude and thought he might be someone who could help me turn more of my marketing dollars into more and better leads. He did not let me down!

In the first 10 minutes that we spoke, before we had even explored my marketing materials, he had already zeroed in on an issue I knew instinctively was a problem, but had not yet mentioned to him. He had used calm, conversational, down-to-earth questions to identify my core issue. We agreed that it needed to be fixed before any marketing material could be made more credible and more compelling. Best of all, he immediately offered a suggestion on what I could do to solve it."
Jerry Straks, President
PETRA Consulting and Coaching, Inc.

"Our agency has contracted with Tom Holownia to help the brand marketing efforts for several of our clients. Each time, Tom's unique combination of strategic branding expertise, category knowledge, and innate creativity have enabled our clients to better understand who they are, who they need to be, and what their competitors are doing.

Tom's expertise adds a very important facet to our agency's offering by providing our clients with the 'strategic foundation' they need, but often have a hard time identifying and implementing on their own."
Jeff Spagnola, Partner & Creative Director
Alejandrino Partners

"I received a Brand Brief from Tom that was simply a work of art! Too often, as a Creative, I get briefs that aren't useable because they're written like a marketing textbook. Tom's use of language, diagrams and key visuals serve as critical reference tools for both clients and Creatives such as myself.

I wish all the briefs I receive could be as well thought out and formatted as Tom's. It would certainly make my job easier and enable me to produce better work for the client!"
Phil Davis, Owner
Tungsten Marketing

"Tom's presentation helped me to get my thinking straight. His message on branding yourself clarified my self-concept. It inspired me to look at myself as others do and to evaluate the messages that I send to people. It was as though a kind, trusting friend informed me of a piece of food that was hanging off my chin so that I would not embarrass myself in public. He showed me a view of myself that I did not know."
Cliff Perona, Founder
2nd Opinion Decision Support

"Tom Holownia has a gift for taking the complicated subject of marketing and branding and making it clear, understandable and actionable for small businesses. I recently listened to him speak and walked away knowing that I had found the expert who could truly help my business grow with a dynamic marketing plan and powerful brand identity."
Randall Hlavin
MyLoanGuys.com

"The most common question we hear is, 'This is a start up? It looks like you've been at this for a long time! Your materials are so professional!' Tom takes a strategic look at everything he does, and keeping cash constraints in mind, designs industry appropriate materials that can be cost effectively re-purposed while presenting a unified, brand and corporate identity."
Elsa Zisook, President
Lineguard Systems

"Hunter Paine Enterprises hired Tom Holownia and his team to develop the brand strategy and identity for the company's first product, Lexite. From the beginning of the strategic branding process through the implementation of customer collateral, Tom was intimately involved in identifying, delivering and executing the proprietary brand identity for Lexite.

Lexite is a wood replacement product, manufactured from recycled automobile tires using HPE's proprietary technology. HPE was targeting the fragmented wooden pallet industry to establish Lexite's credentials as a stronger, lighter, cleaner and smarter alternative to traditional wooden pallets, being brought to market by a credible, reliable manufacturer.

Tom and his team worked with the entire management team at Hunter Paine, and spent time in our production facility familiarizing themselves with the product, the process and the people who make and sell Lexite. Tom also prepared materials for the company's Board of Managers, providing a summary of the brand development process, the creation and application of the brand identity, and the guidelines for internal and external implementation of the new Lexite logo and tagline.

The development process Tom and his team used included a review of current industry language and standards as well as the development of a thorough brand strategy brief highlighting Lexite's unique points of difference, and ideal positioning within the market. The range of brand identity options presented was insightful, creative, distinct and captured the product points of difference while establishing a unique fit amongst industry competitors.

The resulting Lexite brand identity has been implemented through stationery systems, plant signage, the company website, sales collateral, holiday greeting cards, shirts, hats, and other sales promotion items, as well as on the product itself. We are exceptionally pleased with the results of the Lexite brand development process and are looking forward to working with Tom Holownia and his team in the future to develop and grow Lexite in the marketplace, and to support the launch of new products."
Danna Glauser, VP Marketing
Hunter Paine Enterprises