Who We Are
GKV is a full-service integrated communications agency that has been changing and evolving for 40 years. We’re good, smart people who can do and will do whatever it takes for challenger brands to succeed.
We create thousands of pieces of social and digital content every year in-house. Plus, awarding-winning TV and radio and direct mail.
Working with challenger brands means always challenging ourselves to find new and more effective ways to grow our clients’ businesses and brands.
Services
- Advertising
- Brand Development
- Brand Inside
- Broadcast, Video & Audio Production
- Data Analytics
- Digital Marketing
- Direct Marketing
- Experiential Marketing
- Grassroots Marketing
- Media Planning/Buying
- Public Relations
- Research
- Search Engine Marketing
- Shopper Marketing
- Social Media
- Strategic Planning
- Web Design & Development
Challenger Branding.
Times change. The basics don’t.
As a fully integrated agency, we continue to evolve and upgrade our tools to help our clients succeed. Constant in all this change, however, are the Challenger Brand tenets that inspire and guide us in our departure from the status quo.
Build emotional connections.
Challenger Brands don’t rely strictly on rational benefits or the badge value of category leaders. Their relevance runs deeper. They connect to the real you. You like having them as a friend, because you can rely on them, and because of that, you introduce them to your friends.
Be true.
After making an emotional connection with customers, the key is maintaining that connection. As with people, we have the strongest emotional connections with brands we trust. We trust those who make good on their promises and who act consistently. A brand’s personality and associated values must continue to guide everything… advertising, sponsorships, social, even internal communications.
Clarity brings creativity.
Digital marketing and commerce give us more information about prospects and customers than ever before, but the speed of life today gives brands only brief moments to present themselves as solutions. Our job is to identify opportunities, prioritize the ones with most promise, and unleash the entire comms team to confidently pursue work that compels an audience to act.
Place calculated bets.
There are hundreds of safe things a marketer can do to grow its sales and brand. And we could do them, but so will every other brand. Your brand needs to stand out. Indifference is a bigger risk than rejection. That doesn’t mean throw caution to the wind, but don’t be so expected that no one notices you. Same with exploring new media. A small-scale test is often all that’s needed to turn a new approach from risky to obvious.
Measure up.
Everything is measurable, especially digital advertising and ecommerce. GKV uses a combination of tracking studies, integrated dashboards, and vendor dashboards to monitor campaign performance. What sets us apart is that everyone here embraces this feedback, creatives included. You hired us to get results. We like validation. And most of all, we want you to win.
GKV is a challenger brand agency.
We are from a challenger brand town, Baltimore, and our clients are challenger brands. Our culture is to always challenge each other and the status quo to do things better. We’re independent, we are not part of a big holding company, so we decide our own fate.
That independence attracts some great talented staff from big organizations that are tired of bureaucracy, and the same for our clients. Our clients want nimble. Our clients appreciate that the people they work with everyday have at least as much experience as they do. We “over-service”. We can’t help it. We know our clients.
We care about them as people in addition to their business goals. How can you not, when you spend as much time together as we do. We work REALLY hard to make our clients happy – we LISTEN to them, establish trust and relationships, guide them in the right direction and do what it takes to make them successful.
Many of us have worked together for many years, so we work together as a team to solve problems quickly, stay positive and make it happen. There really are not a lot of challenges we aren’t able to overcome. A lot of agencies out there deliver good work… we do that PLUS our clients LIKE us. We have many repeat clients.
If you like what you see and think we might be a good fit for you and your brand,
call us or send us a note.
We’re easy to talk to.
We’re good listeners.
