HALO: “We needed some help elevating our tone.” MarketSmiths turned out to be the answer.
HALO, the world's largest full-service solution for custom uniforms, merchandise, and apparel, helps brands deliver unique and transformative experiences. After stumbling on a LinkedIn post by our founder, a marketing leader at HALO became entranced with the notion of an on-demand, high-quality copywriting solution across digital channels and marketing campaigns. He brought us on board to make HALO’s marketing more engaging and story-driven. Now on our fifth initiative in 18 months, HALO relies on MarketSmiths to craft captivating copy and send marketing-qualified leads to their sales teams.
Client
"We needed some help elevating our tone." MarketSmiths turned out to be the answer.
At its core, HALO performs dynamic and exciting work, helping brands make a memorable and lingering impact on employees and customers alike. As the industry’s leading full-service solution, HALO has helped more than 60,000 clients—including at least 112 Fortune 500 companies—tell their story with creativity and confidence. With one-of-a-kind swag-type merchandise, branded uniforms, event kits, and more, brands can immerse customers in a 3D experience vs. a 2D tale.
There was just one glaring issue. Without proper framing, the excitement was getting lost on potential customers. Thus HALO’s central content goal emerged: turn dry, sales-y marketing collateral into thrilling copy that activates interest and inspires action.
Cord Himelstein, VP of Digital Marketing, led the charge. “We can communicate well, but we didn’t like how we sounded,” he states. “We needed some help elevating our tone.” In performing his vendor research, Cord found us—and secured MarketSmiths as the copywriting agency that hits the right spot.
“Response times to my feedback are always really good—MarketSmiths just gets me.”
— Cord Himelstein, VP of Digital Marketing, HALO
Challenge
"I love well-written content, but it was basically just me on that front."
Before tapping MarketSmiths, HALO was struggling to meet its content goals. In the past, the company had in-house copywriters. Over time, this content team shrunk.
“We lacked the internal writing talent we needed,” Cord explains. “We didn’t have a go-to copywriter, mostly because we couldn’t find the right replacements. I didn’t have the bandwidth to find somebody, then teach them about the business and figure out a rhythm. I love well-written content, but it was basically just me on that front.”
The gravity of the initial project only added to the challenge. “We had a siloed vision of the copy,” he continues. “We were trying to productize some of our services and offerings—particularly around our kitting solution—and wanted to do it quickly. That meant we needed to create a lot of content in a short amount of time.”
For Cord, choosing the right B2B copywriting partner was essential. And MarketSmiths was the answer.
Shared Success
"I see our partnership as a collaboration—one that helps me achieve strong content and messaging."
The MarketSmiths website opened the door to new possibilities, Cord explains. In particular, our tone and approach to content creation piqued his interest—as did our specialization in humanized copywriting and creative marketing collateral.
“I wanted to get rolling quickly, and I was confident MarketSmiths could do that,” he says. “I provided a time frame of 8-12 weeks—a pretty aggressive objective, given the scope of the project. But I didn’t feel as if it couldn’t be done—I really felt that MarketSmiths could deliver.”
Other writers often sacrifice quality for speed or efficiency. Cord could see MarketSmiths would not.
“The speed and pace felt right,” Cord says. “You don’t want it to be too fast—if it is, I could probably do it.
“If I give an outline to a freelancer, they may give us something in a day,” he continues. “They serve their purpose. But MarketSmiths puts real thought into it—and understands we want it done sooner rather than later. Response times to my feedback are always really good—MarketSmiths just gets me.”
Beyond delivering stellar and timely copy, MarketSmiths has helped HALO transcend voice-related limits.
“MarketSmiths pushed it further than we were comfortable with on our own,” he explains. “It gave us the opportunity to explore a different approach and try new things, and pull it back where we needed to. We wanted to get out of our ‘B2B talking head,’ but without being too cool for the room. It was a nice stretch for us, and ultimately made us more flexible in our approach to copy.”
Partnering with MarketSmiths proved a worthwhile investment. With a strong copywriting team providing on-demand content support, HALO is optimistic about its potential for upcoming visibility and growth.
“I look to MarketSmiths as a go-to when I need content for anything,” Cord says. “I see our copy partnership as a collaboration—one that helps me achieve strong content and messaging, without a lot of stress or time.”
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