"As usual, I thought it would be great to poke a little fun at ourselves, this time within the context of a father/son relationship," said Scott Greggory. He wrote the script and appears on camera. Jacob Stutz served as videographer and editor. 

"My philosophy is to entertain first and inform second. It's an 'audience-first approach' that I recommend often to encourage building relationships with prospective buyers."

The humorous piece was released on the BusinessVoice social channels a few days before Father's Day 2022. It won a 2023 Silver Telly Award in the category of "Social Video - Craft - Use of Humor."

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Once again, Humor On Hold from BusinessVoice made a big impression on the Communicator Awards judges. Work from our Caller Experience Marketing agency earned three trophies at the 2023 competition.

Gold Award
Client: Lakeland Auto and Marine
Writer: Scott Greggory 

Gold Award
Client: Binkelman Corp.
Writer: Scott Greggory 

Silver Award
Client: Downey Plumbing
Writers: Cassandra Evans & Scott Greggory 

The brochure we designed for SensoryMax, our Sensory Marketing agency, won a Silver Award at The 2023 Print Excellence Awards. The event is presented by Graphic Media Alliance, a trade organization that serves printers in Ohio, Michigan and Northern Kentucky.

Design Director Greg Stawicki created the look of the winning piece. Creative Consultant Cassandra Evans wrote the copy.

The printer, H.O.T. Graphic Services, entered the brochure into the competition.

Stawicki worked with H.O.T. Account Executive Greg Reece to determine how the brochure would be printed. "We used a four-color process and overall UV gloss on the first pass," wrote Reece. "On the second pass, we used a spot DULL varnish on all eight pages."

Graphic Media Alliance presents The Print Excellence Awards each year to provide members with an opportunity to showcase their craft and technical skills.

For the second consecutive year, Toledo City Paper readers have voted MadAveGroup as the area’s “Best Advertising Agency.”

According to the paper’s website, readers cast more than 500,000 votes to acknowledge their favorite local businesses in 200+ categories.

“This is a nice honor,” said MadAveGroup CEO Jerry Brown. “Marketing and ad agencies don’t typically enjoy a high profile in most communities, so it’s quite a compliment that we have such a good reputation around town.”

MadAveGroup has now won the “Best” award in Toledo City Paper’s 2021 and 2022 readers’ polls. The paper announced this year’s winners in its March 2023 issue.

Toledo City Paper first went to press in 1997.

In January 2023, we were named a Top Workplace for the fourth year in a row by The Toledo Blade and their partner Energage, a national company that specializes in employee engagement.

Top Workplace winners are selected based on employee feedback. Energage uses its proprietary survey to measure 15 culture drivers essential to an organization’s success. The survey was developed after 16 years of culture research and with the input of 27 million employees from more than 70,000 organizations.

“Our unique culture is absolutely one of the keys to our success,” said MadAveGroup CEO Jerry Brown. “We place a high priority on the individual, ongoing training and authentic communication with our clients.”

“Earning a Top Workplaces award is a badge of honor for companies, especially because it comes authentically from their employees,” said Eric Rubino, Energage CEO. “In today's market, leaders must ensure they’re allowing employees to have a voice and be heard. Top Workplaces do that and it pays dividends.”

See more reasons to join the MadAveGroup team. 

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We asked a few of our staff members to describe their favorite work-related event of 2022. Here are some of their replies.

Van Gogh in America - On October 20th, 21 MadAveGroup team members took a chartered bus to the Detroit Institute of Arts to see this 74-work exhibit.

Daniel DiManna / Creative Consultant: “Standing only inches away from some of the most iconic paintings in history was a powerful experience. There’s a marked difference between looking at art on a postcard or calendar and actually seeing the brushstrokes up close. Seeing so many of Van Gogh’s paintings in person added to my understanding of his work, and changed my perception of my own creative work. I’ll always be thankful to MadAveGroup for giving me the opportunity to be in the presence of that kind of greatness.”

American Advertising Federation Leadership - Along with serving as the Governor of AAF’s Fifth District, our own Michael Seay sits on the organization’s national board.

Michael Seay / Director: “In March, I played host to AAF’s Fifth District National Student Advertising Competition, held right here in Toledo. The event drew about 250 participants from 11 colleges and universities throughout Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia. In June, I attended the AAF National Conference in Nashville. And in November, I was in New York City for AAF’s quarterly meeting, where we review initiatives and analyze the state of the advertising industry.”

Headless Tech Rollout - In February, our TouchStone Digital team launched their first headless WordPress website.

Joe Hochgreve / Senior Web Developer: “We created the new website for our SensoryMax agency using Headless WordPress technology. Headless is an exciting advancement that allows us to increase a website’s speed by more than 100%, improve on-page animation features and increase SEO potential. Since that initial launch, we’ve been able to improve on the technology further. Then, we created Headless websites for VacationLand Federal Credit Union, Gordon Lumber and AudioHelp Hearing.”

Headless Tech Presentation - There was a lot of buzz about Headless WordPress around our shop in 2022. Don and Joe were happy to spread the good news to others, too.

Don Miller / Director, TouchStone Digital Marketing: “In June, we presented our Headless talk to members of the local WP community. Then, in July, we shared it at the Nebraska.Code conference in Lincoln, Nebraska. I gave an overview of the importance of Headless WordPress and Joe discussed the technical side and implementation process.” 

Aaron Draplin Visit - AAF Toledo brought this nationally known designer to town to lead an all-day workshop. Later that night, he presented to a full house in the MadAveGroup Social Club.

Scott Greggory / Chief Creative Officer: “I’ve been following Aaron for many years. I identify with his independent spirit. I love that he does work that matters deeply to him and that he honors his influences with every project. Aaron and I share a love of old things, including ephemera - paper items created for a specific purpose, but not intended to have a long life. For instance, like me, he sees the beauty in the promotional memo books that were distributed to farmers in the first half of the 20th century, and he’s preserving his collection in this amazing online gallery.”