K+W’s Marketing Team Honored with Five SF Topaz Awards
Kier + Wright’s Marketing team took home five awards at the 2023 SF Topaz Awards Night on Thursday, June 29th. The networking event took place at the Oakland Marriott City Center’s Skyline Room overlooking downtown Oakland. The SMPS SF Topaz Awards Program highlights the critical role and immense value marketing professionals bring to the design and building industry. K+W’s five SF Topaz Awards include:
Sandy D’elia Marketer of the Year Award – Marilynn Stratton, Chief Marketing Officer
Marilynn Stratton, Chief Marketing Officer at K+W, was awarded the prestigious Sandy D’elia Marketer of the Year Award for her extraordinary marketing efforts over the last two years. With more than 23 years of experience in the AEC industry, Marilynn specializes in providing holistic strategic approaches that seamlessly blend individual components to achieve businesses’ long-term growth goals. Marilynn transformed K+W’s marketing efforts and helped the firm expand into new regions. Her continuous innovation supports K+W’s brand, culture, and mission throughout everything she touches.
Her crucial business development efforts from the last year included four open house events with more than 500 attendees and dozens of events that touched 1,000+ clients. These events, in conjunction with her multi-faceted marketing efforts, resulted in an 18% increase in revenue, more than doubling revenue projections with only a 0.2% increase to budget.
Award of Excellence - Recruitment/Retention + People’s Choice Award: 2021 Women in Engineering Campaign
K+W’s 2021 Women in Engineering Campaign received the Award of Excellence in the Recruitment/Retention Category. This category includes marketing efforts that are designed to recruit potential hires and retain current employees. Additionally, the campaign was the recipient of the People’s Choice Award, determined by popular vote of the event’s attendees.
K+W felt an obligation to highlight and celebrate our female engineers through a multi-faceted campaign. We honored the diversity of women in our industry, emphasizing the value and contributions they bring with two videos, two employee spotlight articles, and a multi-platform social media campaign throughout the week encompassing International Women in Engineering Day 2021. While this campaign is an impressive feat, K+W didn’t stop there. A strong proponent for women’s equity, Chief Marketing Officer, Marilynn Stratton, was driven to bring awareness to the equity and inclusion challenges women in the AEC industry face by providing a safe and encouraging place for meaningful, solution-focused discussions. With approval and encouragement from leadership, Marilynn assembled a diverse team of fellow female employees to create K+W’s first ever WISE Group (Women in Survey and Engineering), using the WIE campaign as a launching pad. The WISE Group has contributed to further evolution of our culture to be more inclusive and equitable.
Click here to read more about the WIE campaign: https://express.adobe.com/page/sUdJnm8QlChYH/
Award of Excellence – Best Digital Media: Changing the Skyline of Downtown San Jose Campaign
K+W’s team was awarded the Award of Excellence in the Best Digital Media category for their outstanding Changing the Skyline of Downtown San Jose Campaign. This category calls for a comprehensive, multi-tactic campaign that takes place over an extended period to promote a specific company message, event, program, or project. The Changing the Skyline of Downtown San Jose campaign presents the impact of a generational downtown urban revitalization on one of California’s largest cities. The campaign was achieved by varied but complementary visual and written messaging using multiple graphics\video production + web development software applications and the ability to integrate all the ‘elements’ into an engaging and impactful experience. The success of the campaign was brought about through the synergistic efforts of a multi-talented team and their ability to showcase K+W’s role in the transformation of downtown San Jose. It’s a dynamic and fun presentation that continues to inspire and impact our firm as well as our colleagues and clients.
Click here to read more about the campaign: https://express.adobe.com/page/28fQ1sZV8QmDN/
Award of Merit – Special Event: 2021 Year in Review Video
K+W’s inspirational 2021 Year in Review video was the Award of Merit recipient for the Special Event category, which includes either print or digital pieces (such as a video) produced for one-time use to promote a special event. The award-winning video set the trajectory for our firm’s success in 2022. Our team’s mission was to break away from the standard “end of year summary video” to bring our audience an electrifying and cinematic experience that encompassed K+W’s 2021 highlights and achievements while showing the passion and dedication of our employees. The overall message was simple and showcased K+W’s dynamic, collaborative, diverse and fun company culture and to attract potential recruits and clients who are interested in working with our company.
Don’t take our word for it—you can watch the video for yourself:
Or click here to read more about the video and the entire campaign: https://express.adobe.com/page/AHH1SCWLly7Il/
It was an inspiring and gratifying awards night for the Kier + Wright Marketing Team. K+W truly appreciates the efforts and mission that SMPS and its San Francisco chapter take on. As a result, it means even more to us that we were chosen to receive such comprehensive recognition from our peers in the Bay Area AEC marketing community.