Brand Planning + Production

Brand planning + production

HealthcareTruck AftermarketOutdoor BrandsConsumer ElectronicsBrand + Product Positioning

We discover the truth that moves your brand, then create the work that carries it.

Marshall + More Good is a brand planning and production partner for healthcare, truck aftermarket and outdoor brands. We sit down with your patients, physicians, owners, dealers and team, find the truth that matters most, and carry it into positioning, campaigns and video. We work with you to discover, deepen and grow your greatest good.

See the work How we work
A camera operator films a couple overlooking a mountain town at sunset.
On location · Four Corners brand shoot
Brands we've served LG Electronics, Appliance & CommercialPanasonic / LUMIXLogitechRIM / BlackBerrySan Juan Regional HealthCompass OncologyGerber Legendary BladesHusky LinersSmartCapBedslideAir LiftNIC / CerakoteCatholic Healthcare West (now CommonSpirit Health)

Healthcare systems San Juan Health · Compass Oncology · Catholic Healthcare West, now CommonSpirit Health: Sequoia Hospital, St. Joseph's Modesto, St. Joseph's Stockton and Mercy Mt. Shasta

Strategic insight

The best brand strategy starts with a question nobody has asked.

We sit down one-on-one with the people who decide a brand's future: patients and families, physicians and referral sources, customers, dealers and employees. Ranked data tells us what matters. The conversations tell us why. The best insights hide in plain sight, and once you see one, you can't unsee it.

Survivor & family interviewsNorthwest Cancer Specialists
Q1

What was your first reaction when you got your diagnosis?

Q2

What did you want more than anything when you walked out of the office that day?

The insight

Not hope. Direction. They wanted the next steps and a path forward to healing.

Truck aftermarket, outdoor & consumer The same process, in categories where owners and dealers decide.

Automotive accessories · for Yonder

Husky Liners

Husky Liners ad: a soda spills onto a Husky floor liner and stays in its channels, away from the truck's carpet. Husky Liners ad: a husky dog holds a black Husky floor liner in its mouth.
Research
Consumers ranked what actually mattered to them in floor liners.
Insight
The category leader's headline claim ranked eighth. Vehicle protection ranked first, so we rebuilt the message around blunt, no-nonsense protection.
Result
After a decade of flat revenue, the repositioning that came out of this brand and product planning helped management double the company in three years, grow its most profitable direct-to-consumer channel, and sell the business in 2017.
The work
Brand repositioning, website, packaging and advertising, produced by the same designers and film crew Marshall + More Good works with. Case study ↗ Watch the spot ↗ "Creme" :30 ↗
Market entry · South Africa to US · for Yonder

SmartCap

A hand presses the latch on a steel SmartCap truck canopy in falling snow.
Research
One-on-one interviews with truck owners across the US, testing four positions against the category leaders.
Insight
For decades, truck caps were fiberglass because the category leader grew out of American boat-building, and nearly everyone followed. SmartCap was steel, forged in South Africa's rugged land, and owners wanted rugged above all.
Position
"Built like a truck, not like a boat." We presented it to the CEO and C-suite in South Africa. The campaign was produced by the same designers and film crew Marshall + More Good works with.

Positioning and insight studies

Every study ends with an executive summary presented to the C-suite and senior leadership for buy-in. Then we develop the position, write the strategy and headlines, and produce the campaigns that follow. Studies include work Joel led at Steelhead Advertising before founding Marshall + More Good.

25+Brand and product positioning and insight studies across healthcare, consumer electronics, mobile, outdoor and the truck aftermarket.
  • Brand positioning
  • Product positioning
  • Product naming
  • Rebranding
  • Market entry
  • Brand perception: community and patients
  • Expanding-market studies
  • Internal caregiver perception
  • Provider recruitment
  • Referral and patient decision process

Studies for San Juan Regional Health · Compass Oncology · St. Joseph's Stockton · Panasonic / LUMIX · RIM / BlackBerry · Logitech · SmartCap · Husky Liners · Bedslide · Air Lift · Gerber Legendary Blades · NIC / Cerakote

Creative work

Strategy you can see: video, print, outdoor, environmental and digital.

Most of this work is for San Juan Regional Medical Center and San Juan Health Partners. Once we built the position, Celebrating Life in the Four Corners, everything flowed from it, and so much of the health message claims an active, outdoor life in the region for healthcare. Each campaign runs from the strategy brief to the finished pieces.

Video

Concept · Script · Production
Title card from the Life. Better. Here. brand film: Better is our mission, over the Four Corners landscape.
Life. Better. Here.The brand position launch film that introduced the renewed mission, vision and position to every employee: celebrating the pride and joy of life in the Four Corners. Watch on Vimeo ↗
Brand position launch · 2:45
How to Prevent a Heart AttackA four-spot series for the San Juan Regional Heart Center. A heart mascot works through four simple rules, one spot at a time.
Broadcast · 4 × :30
Couch Potato
Fridge
Scale
Smoker

More on Vimeo

OB/GYN launch · :30 Celebrating Women Celebrating the women of the Four Corners who make life better here. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Community health · :30 If You're Thirsty, You Drink Water! Kids take on soda and alcohol in a region that needed a healthier habit. Out of the mouth of babes. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Internal campaign · 2:49 My Why Reminds employees of their highest purpose: working as a family to care for the families in their community. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Diabetes campaign · :60 Ian: Denial The anchor spot for the "Don't Be in Denial" diabetes education campaign. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Urgent care · :30 Family Happens Broadcast spot for San Juan Regional urgent care. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Brand spot · :30 Better You Broadcast spot built on the Life. Better. Here. platform. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Product positioning · 2:43 BlackBerry PlayBook Use-case films that position the PlayBook tablet around what people would actually do with it. Watch on Vimeo ↗ Truck aftermarket · :30 Husky Liners "Creme" Blunt, no-nonsense protection, the message that came out of the Husky Liners brand and product planning. Watch on Vimeo ↗

Campaigns

Filter by type, or select any piece to view it larger.

Human intelligence

Human intelligence + connection.

We bring the human experience to your brand experience. The best organizations don't rely on AI to make decisions. They use it as a tool to inform them.

What AI does

It summarizes the past like never before. It still can't tell the future.

AI is built on what has already been done. It's fast, useful and efficient, and it's designed to give you a false sense of confidence, which can be deadly to a brand's future.

  • Probabilities, not conviction.
  • Patterns, not perspective.
  • Concepts, without human connection.
How we use it

A tool, not a crutch.

Marshall + More Good harnesses AI the same way the best companies do. We focus on the 20% that makes the difference:

  • Human connection and sound judgment.
  • Lived experience.
  • Brand insight that drives the future.
  • Seeing what others, and AI, miss.

Ask your friends what they think of you, and they'll often avoid the one thing you most need to hear. When you're not in the room, they talk freely. So do your customers. We come in as the other friend, ask them what they think, and bring you the unfiltered truth so we can position your brand in truth.

The difference between artificial intelligence built on the past and human intelligence that leads your brand into the future.

The process

The brand process is a truth process.

To understand the mountain of truth about your brand and how it connects to people, you have to take the time to walk around the mountain and see yourself from everyone's unique perspective. It's the only way to discover the most relevant truth everyone shares about you, no matter what side of the mountain they're on. Only then can you take your highest brand truth, the one that matters most to everyone, and place it at the top of the mountain for all to see.

The quality of the process determines the quality of the position. These four steps have been refined over two decades.

  1. Discovery

    Never decide anything before discovering the most relevant truth. Start inside and move outward: before you can change how people outside an organization think, you often have to change how people inside think. Leadership and staff interviews surface blind spots and groupthink. Then one-on-one interviews with customers, patients, providers or dealers, with benefits and values ranked against the organization's own list. Every interview is filmed, so leaders hear the truth in their own customers' voices, and we listen closely to the words people use, because perception is personalized truth. People who already have a relationship with the brand are the best source, because they can tell you why. Why? is the highest question.

  2. Digestion

    About 2 weeks

    The step most people try to skip. Time to digest what we learned and apply the wisdom gained in discovery, synthesized into a Brand Positioning Executive Summary and a creative brief that gives the team one clear direction.

  3. Determination

    Never build before the foundation. The Brand Positioning Expedition brings the data, planners and brand leaders together to determine and affirm the position. The position sits where the brand's highest truth meets the customer's, because that's where resonance is greatest. If there's no mutual benefit, there's no relationship. This is the summit, and leaders leave as owners of the brand.

  4. Development

    Never ends

    Identity, personality, relationships and every campaign that follows, all built on the same foundation so the work stays cohesive for years. A brand's truth stands firm and keeps changing as life happens, so the listening never stops.

Deliverables Brand IdealBrand MantraBrand PositionBrand ValuesVoice + PersonalityDifferentiationPrioritized BenefitsCreative Brief
Services

A brand partner from first interview to final cut.

Brand and product positioning

Brand and product positioning, naming and identity, health-system and service-line brands, and the leadership alignment to make them stick, through the Brand Positioning Expedition.

Insight research

One-on-one studies with patients, physicians and referral sources, and with truck owners, outdoor enthusiasts, dealers and distributors. Brand perception, market-entry, expanding-market and internal culture studies.

Campaigns and creative direction

Campaign concepts, print copy, and scripts for video and radio, carried across outdoor, print, digital, social and environmental.

Video production

Brand films, broadcast spots, patient testimonials, provider recruitment, and training and values videos for caregivers, from planning to final cut.

Agency partner to San Juan Regional Health for 18 years, and contract brand strategist for Yonder on SmartCap, Husky Liners, Bedslide, Air Lift and NIC / Cerakote. Every project is led by a senior strategist.

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About

Joel David Marshall

Joel David Marshall

Joel founded Marshall + More Good in 2012 after nine years at Steelhead Advertising, where he rose from account executive to Executive Vice President and Director of Brand Planning, leading work for LG, Panasonic, Logitech and RIM/BlackBerry. The agency's mantra was "Communicating Relevant Truth," and it still guides everything we do.

Since then he has served as the virtual agency for San Juan Regional Health for 18 years, and as a contract brand planner for agencies and manufacturers across healthcare, consumer electronics and the truck aftermarket. He taught marketing at George Fox University, and in 2022 he presented “Branding Inside and Out” at SHSMD Connections, the national conference of the Society for Healthcare Strategy & Market Development, alongside San Juan Regional's marketing manager.

Before brand strategy, Joel spent 18 years as a pastor. It taught him to listen for what people care about most, and to ask how he can best serve them. Every study we run is built on that habit.

He has a gift for helping people rediscover the joy and passion in their work. He inspires and elevates teams, pressing the work, and the words, to a higher place.

He's also a lifelong mountain explorer, forager and former Mt. Hood Ski Patroller. As a Master Gardener and herb farmer in Central Oregon, growing things is a personal passion. He loves exploring and finding new ways to see familiar things, uncovering the insights that bring a brand's benefits to life. Again and again, he's found that the greatest benefits are right under your feet.

Joel on a chairlift with snowy Cascade peaks behind him. Joel on his Central Oregon herb farm, wearing a Tumalo Tea shirt.

Where we work

  • Health systems, hospitals and specialty practices
  • Service lines, provider recruitment and caregiver culture
  • Truck aftermarket: caps, liners, bed systems and coatings
  • Outdoor and consumer products
  • Consumer electronics and mobile
  • Dealer and distribution channel marketing
Contact

Let's find the truth about your brand.

Tell us about your brand and the question you're trying to answer. Joel replies to every note personally.

Let's connect.