purpose

When our owner, John Bernhoft, started a mailing service company in 2006, he immediately noticed an alarming trend. Many companies sent direct mail to poorly targeted lists, or sent direct mail pieces that were poorly designed. Companies would send mailings when they were panicked and needed customers desperately, instead of planning them in advance with strategic messaging. Thus 360 Direct was born, to help companies be more strategic in their marketing efforts. That’s what we do, but at 360 Direct we focus just as much on why we do it.

If you browse our website, social media channels, or see any of our marketing materials, you may have noticed an unusual phrase on many of these platforms: we grow businesses one dream at a time. That may seem a little lofty for a marketing agency, especially if you know us well, you know that we specialize in the unglamorous. We rarely do big-budget, extravagant campaigns with large media spends. One of our strengths is the industrial and manufacturing fields. Not exactly the stuff of dreams. Except we know that it IS someone’s dream; every business started as someone’s dream, just like our business began as our owner John’s dream. It just so happens that John’s dream is helping companies like yours.

More Than A Vision Statement

“Growing businesses one dream at a time” is more than a vision statement, it’s our Why, and it’s our way of business.

At 360 Direct, we follow Simon Sinek’s philosophy on Why. Essentially, every individual, team, and organization has a “Why.” It’s what makes you excited to get out of bed in the morning, it’s what gets you excited to go to work. As individuals, we are most fulfilled and happiest when we work in a position or at a company that complements our individual Why.

As a company, our Why is growing businesses one dream at a time. Which means that everyone, account managers, content writers, IT department, has a similar individual sense of purpose and fulfillment by making sure your company achieves great things. To us, it’s not fluff. We know that for our clients, who often manufacture widgets, it’s not really about the widgets. So when we say we grow businesses one dream at a time, we mean we get at the core of what makes your company unique. Anyone can make a widget, but YOU are what makes your widget unique.

What does this mean for you? Why are we telling you this?

Sometimes clients are apprehensive when we talk about blogging, or using a marketing agency at all. They’ll talk about how their work “isn’t that interesting.” But time after time, a few months later they are surprised when our team is as excited about a new machine, new engineer, or new product as they are. Our team is excited every morning to go to work, and excited to work with you and make take your dream to new heights.

We don’t hold ourselves to internal sales quota standards. Our clients aren’t a number. Each one represents someone’s dream, and we’re committed to helping you hit your goals. At 360 Direct, each member of the team is evaluated based on how happy they’ve made our clients. We measure our success by our clients’ success, because that’s what matters to us.

If your company has lost its “Why” or gone through leadership change, we highly recommend Simon Sinek’s “Start with Why” and “Find Your Why.”