san-diego
(100)
Blah Blah Blah bets on the moment before you buy
The San Diego agency traded an all-platform brief for a Pinterest specialty. Its most useful idea: show up while the customer is still deciding what they want.
Serene Health sees the whole problem.
A therapy appointment is one piece of care. Serene Health works on the connections around it, from clinical supervision to housing support for eligible Medi-Cal members.
Cubic makes the complicated disappear
A subway tap. A fighter-pilot debrief. Cubic builds the machinery behind both - and its hardest projects reveal what simplicity really costs.
Tandem Diabetes Care makes room for life
An insulin pump is a tiny machine with a very big job. Tandem’s bet is that better diabetes care begins with making that machine easier to live with.
Realty Income made rent a monthly ritual.
A Taco Bell property started it. Hundreds of monthly dividends made it famous. Inside the landlord that sells companies capital and investors a calendar.
Industry wants to end the hiring waiting game
First came video résumés for bartenders and chefs. Now Industry sells AI interviews with a human check - and a bet that the slowest part of hiring is everything between applying and meeting.
Tealium and the cost of being late
A company can know a great deal about you and still miss the moment you need help. Tealium built a business in that gap - and now wants to close it for AI.
Biolinq puts the answer in a little blue light
Fourteen years after starting with sweat sensors, Biolinq has an over-the-counter glucose wearable. Its most revealing feature is the one that lets you leave your phone alone.
Corelation put the person back in the core
A credit union’s most consequential software rarely appears on a member’s phone. Corelation’s wager is that changing what happens behind the screen can change the relationship in front of it.
TakeLessons and the trouble with selling a maybe
A music teacher needed paying students. TakeLessons learned to sell the whole appointment, won a place inside Microsoft, and still reached its final lesson.
The San Diego PR Firm That Made Boring Things Travel
For half a century, Nuffer, Smith, Tucker has sold an unfashionable advantage: knowing the subject before trying to make it famous. Its best work turns lubricant, citrus pests and downtown office space into stories people actually pass along.
The Pollster That Put Brown Back on the Padres
Competitive Edge has spent nearly four decades asking what people think. Its sharper trick is knowing when the easy way to ask produces the wrong answer.
The Anti-Agency Bet: Put the Whole Shop Under One Roof
Ric Militi left the client side with one account and an irritation: too many agencies make brands pay for the gaps between specialists. Fourteen years later, InnoVision’s answer is a 50-person marketing shop where the handoff is the product.
Katalyst PR Bet on Fewer Brands - Then Made a City Impossible to Scroll Past
The Southern California agency built its business by refusing the usual agency temptation: more clients, more noise, more everything. Its Visit San Diego work shows what happened when local taste, persistent distribution and a disclosed $50,000 media budget met the modern feed.
Maven PR Wants the Press Hit to Ring the Register
Most small brands buy publicity too soon and measure it too vaguely. Jess Windell built Maven around a sharper question: can a story earn trust and help sell the thing?
Geary Interactive saw what happened before the click
A San Diego agency connected search, advertising and website design long before its 2012 merger. Its work offers a useful lesson in how customers arrive - and its successor’s closure puts a limit on the growth story.
Mixte Communications knows when to hand over the microphone
The social justice agency sells a scarce commodity: communications capacity. Its work shows why the person delivering a message can matter as much as the message itself.
Alternative Strategies knows what a salad can do
A San Diego agency turns restaurant relationships into publicity, coordinated campaigns, and checks for good causes. Its most useful trick is getting everyone to work from the same menu.
Visceral and the expensive art of saying no
The creative agency builds brands and websites for organizations trying to change the world. Its own turning point was deciding which work to turn away.
CENTRIC wants your next click to do some good
A San Diego agency turns public-service briefs into campaigns about everyday choices. Its most revealing work starts with a mosquito map, an empty classroom seat, or a very ordinary showerhead.
MarketU wants you to own the editing room.
A $65 short-form edit is the easy part to understand. The more interesting business is helping customers move from buying finished videos to running the operation that makes them.
Chemistry PR knows what makes a place worth talking about
A wave against a restaurant window. A neighborhood ice cream festival. A new reason to visit an old hotel. Chemistry PR builds campaigns around the details people pass along.
Fast Forward has a business plan for your next glass of wine
The company behind San Diego Food + Wine Festival connects the people who make the bottle, buy it for a restaurant, and order the next glass. Its latest move puts their gatherings in the same week.
H2 Public Relations knows who gets the next table
Behind a restaurant’s reputation sits a second kind of service. H2 Public Relations connects chefs, hotels and places with the people who decide which stories travel.
GG Benitez found a better business inside the buzz
Her babywear brand won attention. Its margins told a different story. GG Benitez turned the skill behind the publicity into an agency that gives consumer products a reason to be talked about.
IVC Media makes the complicated worth caring about
A water bill, a campus expansion, a benefits form: IVC Media works where attention is scarce and the explanation matters. Its business connects public affairs with the people who can actually make the campaign.
62ABOVE gives places a personality. Then it counts the visitors.
A casino gets a VP of Party. A city gets a new invitation. Inside the San Diego agency connecting the peculiar art of destination branding to the practical business of getting people through the door.
Mari + Gold knows a good time needs a good invitation
Three beers and a logo. A hotel beside a ballpark. A phone accessory with somewhere to stick. Inside the agency that turns things people can buy into things they can picture doing.
Formula Marketing knows what an empty table costs
Built by a restaurant operator, the San Diego agency connects the photograph, the search result, and the reservation. Its most useful question comes before the campaign: which part of the business needs more customers?
Katz & Associates and the public permission to build
Before a water project can change a city, the city has to understand it. Katz & Associates built a communications business around that problem - with facility tours, neighborhood meetings and, occasionally, beer.