Testimonials

Brand Planning

“We brought in Andy to help us with brand planning for an upscale multi-purpose development. He immediately generated a great rapport with our client and got them focused on the end-user and away from themselves. The result was a brand positioning as unique as the development itself.”
- Vanessa Rose, President, The Voyager Group

“Andy has a captivating ability to hone in on the real issues of marketing and cut through the clutter to develop a clear, well-directed campaign strategy. He’s an original thinker and a fun creative partner. His collaborations with us have brought great results for our clients.”
- Betsey Russell, President, WordOne

“Andy Abend is an outstanding strategic thinker. Our boutique PR firm has had the pleasure of working with him on a number of projects. His innovative approaches are always on the mark, generating desired results for clients. That’s because Andy truly understands all aspects of marketing communications and the role that our discipline, public relations, plays within that mix. Extremely sharp, affable and down-to-earth, he’s the kind of person you want on your dream team.”
- Shira Miller, President, Shira Miller Communications

“Andy helped our organization develop the base positioning of the business. As a startup providing human capital services to a variety of stakeholders in the energy industry, we wanted to make sure our messaging would resonate with all target audiences. Andy helped us think through our messaging strategy from the ground up. We have implemented his recommendations and are seeing good early results.”
- Vikram Singha, VP Marketing, Global Energy Talent

“I had the great privilege to work with Andy on several projects over the last two years. His insight into branding is very impressive. He proved an important and trusted resource for me while at Kleber & Associates. He brings a wealth of experience, creativity and expertise to branding, and strategic planning and I look forward to working with him in the future.”
- Nikki Harmon, Former Senior Account Executive, Kleber & Associates

“Andy has a terrific ability to grasp complicated concepts, simplify them and communicate them succinctly. In working with him to develop the new brand for two merging companies, he was able to identify the high-level benefit the combined companies now provided our customers and develop a brand position around it.”
- Jessica Spragia, Former Chief Marketing Officer, Coverdell

“During a time of significant change at BISYS, Andy helped us get a clear understanding of how to best position ourselves. Through internal and customer interviews, he helped us find the commonalities of three distinct, but complementary, business units. By doing so, he helped us find a customer-centric brand position and also helped us overcome some internal turf battles.”
- Eric Anderson, Former President, BISYS Education Services

“Andy Abend and his team were instrumental in helping us capture the spirit of the Emory Center for Lifelong Learning. We were struggling with managing several sub-brands, each with a different audience and focus. Andy helped us coalesce these “stories” into a unified brand identity that continues to serve us well. Through interactive exercises, audience research and his own creative approach, Andy helped us formulate an approach that we use to this day in our communications and marketing efforts.”
- Steve Stoffle, Director, Emory Center for Lifelong Learning

“Andy essentially created our brand. He quickly became an expert on our product, industry and target market. He even learned the lingo associated with our niche business. Honestly, Andy is one of the most thorough researchers I have ever known. He will challenge you, even if it means respectfully disagreeing with your point of view. This is what separates him from those who cater to the norm. I’d recommend him to anyone.”
- Jason Russell, Executive Vice President, Hold ‘em High Inc.

Communications Planning

“We hired Andy to help us develop a marketing communications plan. Before starting, Andy spent the time to get to know who we were and how we worked, down to how we reported results to our customers. The result was a robust plan that took advantage of current customer touch points that we didn’t see as marketing opportunities and maximized our marketing dollars.”
- Mike Levison, CEO, ReMark Americas

“East West engaged M Is For Marketing to determine/refine its Brand Platform and to develop its Marketing Communications Plan. In short, ‘M’ really delivered. Based upon their work, East West now has the solid foundation and direction from which to launch its new marketing efforts, confident that the consideration for ROI built in to the framework will come to fruition in practice.”
- Jeff Sweeney, EVP CMO, East West Manufacturing

“We are so pleased to be using Andy to help with our marketing plan! I am an owner with a 14 year-old business who has never had a marketing plan. I have tried over the years to come up with marketing tasks on my own and have been disappointed in the results. Having a strategy for marketing excited me and we are currently enacting Andy’s ideas over time. We were so excited to find someone who took the time to contact our clients and associates and referrers to understand our company. Andy is also easygoing and excellent to work with. I would recommend him to any business owner who is “marketing challenged” as I am.”
- Cindi Filer, President, Innovative Outsourcing

General Comments

“I highly recommend Andy to any company requiring assistance with their executive leadership as well as sales and marketing. He brings strategic thinking and an insightful customer focus to his work, with a unique ability to solve complex problems and develop practical solutions that drive measurable business impact. Andy analyzes situations from all angles — market trends, customer data, competitive landscape, financials, company capabilities — in order to make sound decisions. From high level marketing strategy development to day-to-day management of a marketing organization, he knows how to leverage internal and external resources to achieve outstanding results. He also has a great personality and is fun to work with, which brings out the best in those around him. Andy has earned his reputation as an accomplished marketer, is highly respected by his peers, and any company would benefit from his expertise!”

- Amy Bernard, Director Interactive Marketing, Ashworth College

“I’ve had the pleasure of working with Andy on more than one occasion. He is professional, creative and one of the most impressive and intelligent people I have had the pleasure of partnering with. In addition, he keeps spirits up, has fun and makes each project a pleasure. Anyone would be lucky to have Andy’s talent as a part of a project.”
- Andrea Galloy Weyand, Sr. Vice President, WordOne

“Andy’s team brought an impressive marketing approach to the screening assignment that solidly won them the Eaton account over the established industry agencies. Using a foundation of market research, they presented a compelling marketing approach which, once they were awarded the account, was incorporated into a comprehensive strategy aimed at leveraging Eaton’s competitive advantages in an arena that included a number of much larger industry suppliers.”
- Gan Avery, Manager of Global Marketing, Eaton Automotive Group

“I have worked with Andy for many years and can recommend him highly. His ability to develop and utilize marketing research in development of strategy has been highly valuable to me. Andy is particularly skilled at seeing a strategy, positioning or creative execution from all sides and providing his honest assessment.”
- Peter Jardine, Senior Director of Marketing & Communications Highwoods Properties

“I always appreciated Andy’s passion to understand our operations and our customers – he used that passion to create ideas that could motivate both stakeholders to act. His focus was on provable results – I’d call it creative accountability. What I really appreciated was that I always got an honest answer to my questions and ideas – not just what I wanted to hear.”
- Steve Danuser, Former Vice President of Marketing, Orkin

“Andy has an energy and dedication to marketing that you don’t find every day. He has led the efforts to help us brand Imagine It, by understanding our audience and helping us determine where to focus our marketing efforts. The results speak for themselves with attendance increasing 25% and our surpassing our membership goals by 60%.”
- Danica Kombol, Director of Marketing, Imagine It – The Children’s Museum of Atlanta

“My partner and I have capable creative marketing minds, but did not have the experience it takes to iron out a fool-proof sales strategy. We knew that Andy had the creative skills that most companies want to utilize when discerning a particular course of marketing, but we were looking to gain a better understanding of the mechanics of sales as it relates to our marketing ideas. We were surprised to find out just how proficiently right-minded, AND left-minded Andy is. This was invaluable to our operation and we will continue to consult him as our operation grows.”
- Benjamin Lichtenwalner, CoFounder, BioTrauma