Brand Makeovers: Michelle and Randy Thames of Thames Media Solutions On The 5 Things You Should Do To Upgrade and Re-Energize Your Brand and Image

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

…Utilize social media and Instagram stories. Many businesses shy away using Instagram stories because they feel it may be too complex. If you have a brick and mortar business showing behind-the-scenes of your business on social media, this can help you build community. When your customers come into the store they will relate to you more seeing behind-the-scenes on social media, and feel like they have been with you all along.

As part of our series about “Brand Makeovers” I had the pleasure to interview Michelle and Randy Thames.

Michelle and Randy Thames are founders of Thames Media Solutions, which is a boutique social media agency and Black-owned business in Chicago that specializes in helping influencers, creatives, and small biz owners build strategies to market their brands on social media. Michelle Thames is also a successful entrepreneur — an influencer, blogger, podcaster and YouTuber. Together, they are social media experts who are passionate about personal branding on social media.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit more. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Hi! We are Randy and Michelle Thames, social media experts and owners of Thames Media Solutions.

Michelle is a healthcare professional-turned-influencer and social media queen, and Randy is a former educator, basketball coach and realtor. Michelle was let go from her job in 2016, which led her to freelance and look more into opportunities working in social media. She got the opportunity to work for a startup beauty brand which turned into a multi-million dollar company during her time there.

Michelle quit her job in 2019 to begin building the agency. Randy recently left in summer 2021 — and now we both are full time at Thames Media Solutions.

We both realized that our careers no longer served us and that we wanted to go all-in building our agency and helping people understand social media better.

Can you share a story about the funniest marketing or branding mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

One of the funniest marketing mistakes we made when we were first starting was sending out the wrong copy in an email. We didn’t double-check the email contents and the email went to over 100,000 people. We learned to double check all emails that go out.

Double check social media posts too! It doesn’t hurt to have one or many people check marketing material before it is sent out.

Are you able to identify a “tipping point” in your career when you started to see success? Did you start doing anything different? Is there a takeaway or lesson that others can learn from that?

The tipping point came when we decided to niche down with our agency and only offer specific services. We believe that when businesses have so many offerings, it can be hard for people to choose and understand what they really need. When you are niche in your offerings, you will begin to target your specific audience and you begin to attract that specific clientele.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Michelle recently did a Black Friday Masterclass to help product- and service-based businesses prepare their social media strategy for Black Friday. It helped business owners learn how to be prepared to utilize social media Black Friday weekend to profit!

Together, we are also focusing on helping young adults learn how to use social media to create a personal brand online. Young people are craving more guidance for how to utilize social media to create a positive image of themselves online, how to learn online etiquette, and the learn about the long term effects of using social media the wrong way. High school and college students are increasingly evaluated for opportunities like internships, jobs, volunteer positions, and more — and there’s potential that their online reputation can be accessed and evaluated, too. We recently developed our “Before You Press Send, Will it Help you Win” workshop, which is aimed toward schools and educators who want to help students and young adults learn more about personal branding via social media — to set them up to showcase their interests and knowledge proactively and positively.

What advice would you give to other marketers to thrive and avoid burnout?

We would say to always take time for yourself. While your clients are important, so are you. Marketers indeed work a lot, but it is important to slow down, take time to do things you love and not focus on work all the time.

Ok, let’s now jump to the core part of our interview. In a nutshell, how would you define the difference between brand marketing (branding) and product marketing (advertising)? Can you explain?

Branding refers to efforts to build and maintain an image or brand identity surrounding a business. Product marketing is when a company delivers marketing messages and campaigns to promote a particular product or service. We feel that branding is a bit broader and has a long-term emphasis. Marketing for a specific product or service often has a shorter-term purpose.

Can you explain to our readers why it is important to invest resources and energy into building a brand, in addition to the general marketing and advertising efforts?

It is important to invest in building a brand as well as marketing because if you don’t have a brand, you have no message. Your message should be clear before you start marketing your product or service. You want to be clear in who your product or service helps. It will be hard to market your product or service without first branding your product. In order to build trust, your brand needs a story. Your story is developed when you are first building your brand.

Let’s now talk about rebranding. What are a few reasons why a company would consider rebranding?

A company may rebrand if they are changing their packaging or adding new products and services. A company may also rebrand if their messaging is changing or they are targeting a new audience.

Are there downsides of rebranding? Are there companies that you would advise against doing a “Brand Makeover”? Why?

If a company is just starting, rebranding may not be a good idea. You don’t want to confuse your potential customers in the beginning.

Ok, here is the main question of our discussion. Can you share 5 strategies that a company can do to upgrade and re-energize their brand and image”? Please tell us a story or an example for each.

1. Utilize social media and Instagram stories. Many businesses shy away using Instagram stories because they feel it may be too complex. If you have a brick and mortar business showing behind-the-scenes of your business on social media, this can help you build community. When your customers come into the store they will relate to you more seeing behind-the-scenes on social media, and feel like they have been with you all along.
2. Create a hashtag. Utilizing hashtags is a great way to generate UGC (user generated content.) This will help your brand to build content on social media while also engaging your audience. When you have a social media campaign or an event, create a hashtag for people that they can use to connect with your brand.
3. Educate and inform through content. Make sure the content you share with your audience is educating them on why they should buy your product or service. Going live doing an informative demonstration on your product or service while answering questions is a great way to educate your audience about your brand. Make sure to do research and look at your analytics. This will also help you come up with ideas and topics to discuss with your audience.
4. Ask questions. Send surveys to your email list and also your social media audience. Ask them questions when it comes to why they like your brand, what makes your brand stand out among the rest? Utilize your audience to your best ability when it comes to learning what they like. This will help you in the long run and you will be able to serve your audience and provide them with what they need. This holiday season, create a survey and poll your audience, tell them it is an end of year survey and you will give them a code for completing it. Analyze the results you get from your survey and make plans to improve your strategy, messaging, visuals, and implement from the results.
5. Implement. The biggest way to re-energize your brand and image is to implement. You can learn all the tips and tricks but if you never implement anything you won’t see growth. We see the greatest growth from clients who understand that growing your brand on social media takes time and that implementation is the secret to success on social media. Take it slow, you don’t have to do everything all at once. Learn different strategies depending on your business goals,,. Implement, and then repeat.

In your opinion, what is an example of a company that has done a fantastic job doing a “Brand Makeover”. What specifically impresses you? What can one do to replicate that?

Wendy’s has done a great job “branding” their company. They look at trends and determine how their brand can fit in with what is hot on social media. They are fearless in their marketing tactics and willing to take risks to connect and create community online. Immerse yourself in pop culture and what is trending if you want to replicate Wendy’s tactics.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

We would empower more people to share their knowledge. We all possess unique skills and talents that could be beneficial for others. Education is important and everyone learns differently. Therefore, it is room for everyone to be a teacher in some capacity.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Progress is a Process.” Realizing that it takes a combination of time, effort and energy to build anything worth having. Appreciating the current moment and being aware of how it fits into the “big picture.” The lessons that you encounter along your journey prepare you for your destination.

How can our readers follow you online?

To learn more from us and follow our daily adventures, visit https://thamesmediasolutions.com/ and follow Michelle on Instagram at @michellelthames.

Thank you so much for these excellent insights! We wish you continued success in your work.