News
Convergence: What for-profit enterprises can learn from non-profits: a BusinessWeek podcast with Roger Sametz and reporter Karen Klein
Karen talks with Roger about how for-profit companies can evolve deeper relationships with their prospects and customers, develop loyal ambassadors, spend their communication dollars wisely, and add emotional (and differentiating) meaning to their brands by adopting strategies and tactics honed by nonprofits.
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Brand-new day
Boston Business Journal
Mary Moore
For the Journal's "Outside the Box" feature, Reporter Mary Moore spoke with Roger Sametz about his philosophy and work and why it's more important than ever to actively manage the brand of your organization.
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Making the case and beating the odds
The NonProfit Times
by Claudia Zorn
Claudia Zorn sat with Roger Sametz to discuss what it takes to raise major dollars in the current environment.
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Upgrade your Web site into a sales-producing machine
Mastercard.com
by Dennis McCafferty
Dennis McCafferty talks with Roger Sametz about how most Web sites under-perform, and how they can be re-thought of to be more interactive, work harder to differentiate you and your offerings, and generate volume.
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Word-of-mouth marketing comes of age
CURRENTS
by Andrea Jarrell
Andrea Jarrell talks to Sametz Blackstone and other firms about how to set positive word-of-mouth marketing in motion, how to get constituents involved
in your brand story, and how to create effective ambassadors.
Sametz Blackstone provides strategy and integrated communications for capital campaigns totaling $2billion
Collaborations are with leading academic, healthcare, cultural, conservation, and biomedical research organizations—to help each to better connect to prospects and donors—and build volunteer corps of ambassadors.
Learning from non-profits: a BusinessWeek podcast with Roger Sametz and reporter Karen Klein
For-profit enterprises can learn from the way non-profits connect and develop relationships with their clients and constituents. Roger talks about evolving value-based messages, creating ambassadors and advocates, and how businesses can sell from the top down, build trust, and be viewed (and valued) as more than commodities.
San Francisco Symphony collaborates with Sametz Blackstone Associates to develop and roll out a reinvigorated brand program
Comprehensive, integrated program includes dynamic visual and verbal framework, system of brand hierarchies, and new print and electronic communications—to enable the Symphony to better communicate its value and deepen relationships.
Woman to Woman
CURRENTS
Julie Nicklin Rubley
"Six stories" from the Women of MIT Sloan to the prospective women of MIT Sloan underscores the power of peer-to-peer communication. Through a unique and inclusive process, Sametz Blackstone and MIT Sloan collaborated to increase the representation of women in the MBA program and also reinforce the School's position as model for women in management.
At nonprofits, participating in fundraising becomes part of the job
The Boston Globe
by Sacha Pfeiffer
Sacha Pfeiffer interviewed Roger Sametz and a range of Sametz Blackstone clients around how they and Sametz Blackstone are collaborating to increase philanthropic giving in a very competitive environment.
The art of the Craft
Marketing News
by Deborah L. Vence
Sametz Blackstone collaborated to transform an also-ran museum into one quickly earning national and international status in contemporary craft. Attendance, membership, and donations are up significantly.
League of American Orchestras and Sametz Blackstone roll out re-branding initiative to support League's new strategic direction.
Integrated program includes new name, visual identity, message platform, and print and electronic communications—all created to help the League better serve America's orchestras.
Sametz Blackstone Associates launches twelve client Web sites.
Sametz Blackstone Associates launches twelve new client Web sites. Compelling, engaging sites build awareness, comprehension, and brand—increasing connection and nurturing relationships for organizations of all shapes and sizes.
Sametz Blackstone develops new branding and communications program for MIT Sloan School of Management.
Comprehensive, flexible system for branded communications can be "tuned" for different constituencies, builds awareness, addresses misperceptions, and positions the institution for leadership in the 21st century.
Re-positioning and re-naming your enterprise: a BusinessWeek podcast with Roger Sametz and reporter Karen Klein
BusinessWeek
Roger outlines internal and external scenarios that drive re-positioning and re-naming; four key naming strategies; when less invasive surgery is a better route; how taglines can add meaning to your name and offering. Theories made real with project stories.
Direxion Funds and Sametz Blackstone launch new branding / identity program
Complete, integrated, re-branding program positions this Boston firm for success in highly-competitive and rapidly-growing leveraged index fund marketplace.
WCVB's Chronicle features Sametz Blackstone's client- and canine-friendly creative environment
Ted Reinstein, of WCVB television's news magazine Chronicle, spends a day on Blackstone Square going to meetings, talking with staff, and running up and down five flights of stairs with two deer hounds, a tibetan terrier, a corgi-huahua, and a poodle—all part of the 20-person, 6-dog team at Sametz Blackstone. "We've always tried to create an environment where staff and clients will be comfortable, creative, and energized—where working hard is fun. Meetings always start on a positive note when everyone first exchanges pleasantries with the quadrupeds under-foot."—Will Cook, design director and principal.
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Transformation leads to a surge in memberships, soaring attendance, and brand value built for the long-term.
Fuller Craft Museum, while building on its commitment to its home community of Brockton, Massachusetts, has quickly become a museum of national and international note.
Crafting a new role
The Chronicle of Philanthropy
by Peter Panepento
Peter Panepento details how our brand-focused collaboration helped Fuller Craft to "own" a more focused position in the cultural landscape, increase participation and fundraising, and achieve national recognition—in an incredibly short period of time.
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Face lift: Sametz Blackstone Associates "revives" 15-year-old logo for AIDS Action Committee's From All Walks of Life
New campaign designed to resonate with those who walked 10-15 years ago, attract new participants, and raise awareness and understanding around HIV and AIDS today.
AIDS Walk 2005: On your mark
EDGE Boston
by David Foucher, EDGE Publisher
"I can't believe it's been that long," says Will Cook, Design Director of Sametz Blackstone Associates, of the design he created in 1990 for the annual AIDS Walk. "That was an incredible thing to be part of. That logo was used for six consecutive years."
Sametz Blackstone launches Pledge Walk campaign
Adweek
by Lisa van der Pool
Sametz Blackstone has launched an outdoor campaign to generate participation in the 20th annual AIDS Pledge Walk, the agency said.
Tufts Health Plan launches new annual report—online
Cost-saving, web-distributed report maximized for both on-screen access and desktop printing. Learn more.
Boston Globe feature links Sametz Blackstone's internal culture to its success
Boston Sunday Globe
by Alan R. Earls
Nico! gets his fifteen minutes of fame.
Lost in translation
Business 2.0
by Mark Lasswell
Time and again, product names in foreign lands have come back to haunt even the most brilliant of marketers.
The New England Spring Flower Show debuts new appearance.
Initiative uses fresh imagery to build awareness, comprehension, and brand.
City of Boston launches brand for Boston Arts Festival.
A new brand identity and communications program launches the Boston Arts Festival, a showcase of the City's contemporary arts scene kicking off the fall / winter season of visual and performing arts throughout Boston.
Sametz Blackstone Associates launches new brand identity and communications program for Bottom Line.
Sametz Blackstone Associates, a leading Boston communications practice, launched a new brand identity and communications program for Bottom Line, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping at-risk students get into college, graduate, and go far in life.
Annual reports—what a difference a yearly report makes
PRWeek
by Craig McGuire
Companies are now producing their second annual reports in the post-Sarbanes-Oxley era, and can better gauge how much information, and what kind, to use.
Sametz Blackstone launches brand identity system and comprehensive website for McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT.
Rollout of integrated communications program coincides with groundbreaking for new building on MIT campus.
FleetBoston Celebrity Series debuts new branding / identity program
Integrated initiative connects artist presentations, development, press, and community-based programs to build awareness, comprehension, and brand.
Picower Center for Learning and Memory at MIT launches new branding / identity program
New logo and identity will help diverse constituents to 'learn' and 'remember' scope and importance of Center's work, according to Director Nobel Laureate Susumu Tonegawa.
Animal planet
Adweek
by Lisa Van Der Pool
Every August, nearly 100 dogs converge on a parking lot carpeted with sod outside Carmichael Lynch in Minneapolis.
Roger Sametz joins Corporate Design Foundation Board
Group dedicated to expanding the awareness of design disciplines welcomes award-winning communication designer and strategist.
Whitehead Institute debuts Paradigm
The first issue of Paradigm magazine provides real-world context to the advances in science from Whitehead Institute research.
Boston Designs Community to help non-profit organizations
A fundraising initiative for Boston area community organizations in need.
Harvard College Financial Aid Office offers new web resource
Harvard College, continuing its commitment to need-blind admissions and need-based aid, opens a new online resource for prospective, admitted, and returning students and their families.
Boston Ballet launches new Nutcracker campaign
Sametz Blackstone Associates and Boston Ballet launch communications campaign for Boston Ballet's 39th Nutcracker that combines tradition and innovation.
City of Somerville launches Conway Park
Built on the site of a defunct lead smelting operation, new story-telling park chronicles the city's unique and diverse cultural heritage.
City has tales to tell, and park's the place
Boston Sunday Globe
by Benjamin Gedan
Boston Globe correspondent Benjamin Gedan discusses Sametz Blackstone's design and messaging work for Somerville's Conway Park.
Somerville's new story-telling park chronicles city's unique and diverse cultural heritage
Somerville Journal
by Lesley Savage
Andrew Maydoney, Vice President at Sametz Blackstone Associates, discusses the environmental graphics of Conway Park, a story-telling park that celebrates the heritage of Somerville, Massachusetts.
Download PDF of Somerville Journal article
Interview on WBZ Radio: designing a story-telling park
WBZ AM 1030
Will Cook
Will Cook, principal and design director at Sametz Blackstone Associates, discusses the environmental graphics of Conway Park, a story-telling park that celebrates the heritage of Somerville, Massachusetts.
Download MP3 of interview
Read the related press release.
American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) launches new brand communications program
Photographers' trade organization develops communications to navigate a changing industry in new millennia.
WBIX interview: Sametz Blackstone's Approach to Communications
WBIX Business 1060
by Roger Sametz
Roger Sametz, appearing as a guest on BIX Business 1060 discusses how thoughtfully planned and creatively executed communications can make a difference to the organization.
Listen to radio broadcast - (696KB MP3 format)
Visit WBIX radio www.wbix.com
Boston Sunday Globe features Sametz Blackstone's work with cultural institutions
Boston Sunday Globe
by Louise Kennedy
In a two-page feature, "The art of promotion," Boston Globe reporter Louise Kennedy presents an in-depth look at Sametz Blackstone's branding and communications work for cultural institutions—including Boston Symphony Orchestra, Boston Ballet, Boston Public Library, FleetBoston Celebrity Series, Fenway Cultural Alliance, and the [Boston] Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs.
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CNN interview : branding for non-profits
CNN
Roger Sametz
Roger Sametz, appearing as a guest on CNN, talks about branding, marketing, and fundraising for cultural organizations and how the best corporate strategies and tactics can be appropriately "tilted" for non-profits with impressive results.
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Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences offers new web resource
Harvard University continues excellence through online resources that facilitates and coordinates academic programs and student services.
Wild Postings blanket the City of Boston
Boston cultural landscape promoted through public awareness campaign, encouraging people to "Experience Boston NOW".
Identity / branding program launches for Rouge, a new restaurant in Boston's South End
"Our brand identity perfectly reflects the concept of our restaurant—to provide a professional, funky, and fun experience."—Andy Husbands, owner and chef.
ASMP identity program
Communication Arts Design Annual 43, pg 312
A new organizational identity (logo etc.), a new website, and new materials have been developed to help reinforce the American Society for Media Photographer's collective commitment to leadership in publication photography. Read the related press release.
Scudder Retirement website wins Star Award from MFEA
Scudder Investments Retirement Education website earned the Star Award for Excellence in Shareholder Communications from the Mutual Fund Education Alliance (MFEA).
True web accessibility: designing websites for the physically impaired
HOW Interactive Design Annual
by Jenny Sullivan, pg 101
Sametz Blackstone designed and built the Boston Center for the Arts website to be consistent with the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Accessibility Guidelines, assuring that physically impaired people who use the web via alternative browsing technologies can fully access the content of the site with ease. Read the related press release.
Moral courage and personal choice are focus of exhibit, Visas for Life.
Photographs, films, and lectures tell the dramatic stories of diplomats from around the world who rescued 250,000 from the Holocaust.
Sametz Blackstone Associates and Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs Produce First-of-Its-Kind Cultural Guide
Initiative Celebrates Year 2 Linking 19 Boston Neighborhoods.
Scudder Retirement website wins NEDMA Top Honors
Sametz Blackstone shares Gold Medal from New England Direct Marketing Association (NEDMA)
Sametz Blackstone Associates Puts Boston Center for the Arts Urban Cultural Village Online
New www.bcaonline.org portal to vibrant city neighborhood.
Whitehead Institute website and poster win top Council for Advancement and Support of Education awards
Our communication projects for this leader in biomedical research win peer / industry recognition.
The Fenway Alliance unveils fenwayculture.org
This comprehensive Web site is the first initiative of the Fenway Cultural District.
Boston, MA, 30 April, 2001—The Fenway Alliance, an unprecedented collaboration of cultural institutions in Boston's Fenway Cultural District, in association with Sametz Blackstone Associates, a 22-year-old integrated communications practice, today unveils fenwayculture.org, a wide-ranging website serving residents, local businesses, domestic and international tourists, and current and prospective students of Boston's Fenway Cultural District and beyond. Fenwayculture.org serves as the first public presence of the Fenway Cultural District; it will be followed by many other initiatives including signage, banners, maps, way-finding systems, and cultural programming in and around the District.