Tim Shephard
Tech & SaaS
← All Work
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Brand
Built for
Scale.

// CREATIVE DIRECTION FOR TECH & SAAS  —  GTM  —  REPOSITIONING  —  BRAND SYSTEMS
SaaS GTM Strategy
Brand Architecture
North American Market Entry
Enterprise Positioning
Demand Generation
Design Systems
Implementation Science
Module 01

The Ecrion Case

Ecrion Software was a European enterprise SaaS company with a strong product and a positioning problem. The software was built for North American enterprise buyers. The brand was not.

As Marketing Director, I rebuilt the full go-to-market from scratch — brand identity, messaging architecture, digital presence, and demand generation. The challenge wasn’t technical. It was perceptual: making an unfamiliar name feel credible, trustworthy, and native to the North American enterprise software market.

That means understanding how enterprise buyers evaluate vendors before they ever talk to sales. How a brand signals stability, expertise, and category fit in the first eight seconds. How messaging has to work at the awareness level, the consideration level, and the evaluation level — simultaneously.

The result was a complete repositioning: new brand identity, new website, new messaging framework, and a demand generation program built on content that spoke to the buyer’s actual problems — not the product’s features.

Ecrion Software — GTM Rebuild
European SaaS → North American Enterprise

Full rebrand and market repositioning. Brand identity, messaging architecture, digital, and demand generation rebuilt from zero for a new market, new buyer profile, and new competitive context.

Engagement Type
Marketing Director
Full GTM ownership, 2015–2016
Market
North America
Enterprise SaaS entry from European base
Scope
Full Stack
Brand → Messaging → Digital → Demand Gen
Buyer Profile
Enterprise
Long-cycle, multi-stakeholder B2B evaluation
Context
Greenfield
Zero brand equity in target market on day one
Module 02 — Work Samples

Before / After

Day one, the Ecrion brand read as foreign and technically-focused in a market that rewards familiarity and trust. The before/after below shows the transformation across brand presence, content, and marketing collateral — drag the slider to compare.

BEFORE  →  AFTER  —  Website & Brand Presence
After: Ecrion brand content Before: Ecrion old site
BEFORE AFTER
BEFORE  →  AFTER  —  Marketing Collateral & Social Content
After: LinkedIn campaign Before: old collateral
BEFORE AFTER
Post-Rebrand Output

The After Work

Brand creative
Brand Creative
Content marketing character
Content Marketing
Campaign comic strip
Campaign Content
Marketing materials
Marketing Materials
Blog content
Blog & Thought Leadership
Product marketing
Product Marketing
Events
Events & Trade Shows
Workspace
Creative Operations
Webinar program
Webinar Program
Module 03

Creative at Scale

Cross-vertical impact data. What happens when brand discipline meets real budgets and real audiences.

tim_shephard — creative_metrics.dashboard LIVE  ●  ALL VERTICALS
Campaign Reach
745M+
TOTAL IMPRESSIONS
↑ National PSA campaign
Earned Media
$77.5M
MEDIA VALUE
↑ 160K+ TV airings
Behavior Change
11.9M
PARTICIPANTS MOBILIZED
↑ Single program year
Economic Impact
$300M
DOCUMENTED VALUE
KAB national program
15+
Years Experience
Creative direction across Tech, Nonprofit, Gov, Entertainment, Branding
6
Verticals
Deep cross-sector brand and campaign expertise
2
National Awards
NAGC First Place + Blue Pencil Award of Excellence
Module 04

The Process

How a brief becomes a brand system. Every engagement runs this pipeline.

01
Diagnose
Audit brand, audience, competitive context. Find the real problem.
02
Position
Define the brand truth. Build the messaging architecture.
03
Design
Visual identity, design system, and creative direction.
04
Deploy
Campaign, digital, and distribution pipeline execution.
05
Scale
Toolkits and systems that work without the CD in the room.
// INPUT
Brief → Strategy

Every engagement starts with diagnosis, not prescription. Implementation Science applied to brand — understand the adoption gap before designing the solution.

// THROUGHPUT
Creative Direction → System

Not just deliverables — a system that propagates. Brand guidelines, component libraries, messaging frameworks, and campaign toolkits that run at scale.

// OUTPUT
Launch → Measure

Creative that produces documented results. Not just aesthetics — behavior change, media value, market penetration, and pipeline contribution.

Module 05

Capabilities Manifest

capabilities.manifest — Tim Shephard, Creative Director v15.0  ●  CURRENT
brand_strategy
ArchitecturePositioningMessaging FrameworksVoice & ToneIdentity Systems
ACTIVE
campaign_creative
Concept DevelopmentTV / BroadcastDigitalOOHIntegrated Campaigns
ACTIVE
digital_design
Web & UXDesign SystemsComponent LibrariesMotion
ACTIVE
go_to_market
GTM StrategyMarket EntryDemand GenerationContent Strategy
ACTIVE
team_leadership
Creative TeamsAgency ManagementVendor DirectionCross-functional
ACTIVE
impl_science
Behavior ChangeAdoption FrameworksAudience ResearchMeasurement
ACTIVE
Ready to initialize

Let’s
Deploy.

✓ brief received ✓ strategy compiled ✓ creative direction: ready ▶ awaiting: your go-ahead
>_ Start the Conversation
Tim Shephard
Branding Gaming Film & TV Nonprofit Gov Hire
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