Courtney Smith Kramer – Top Global Marketing Influencer – Episode 232

Today I'm pleased to introduce you to Courtney Smith Kramer, a friend and an extraordinary woman who has influenced my own and many others' marketing  approaches.<br />She is one of the only 3% of female creative directors in the United States and was named a “Top 200 Global Marketing Influencer” and “Top 20 Agency Strategy Global Influencer” by Onalytica, a UK-based Influencer firm.- Top Global Marketing Influencer.<br />In this episode:<br /><br />Courtney shares her journey from marketing entrepreneur to global marketing influencer.<br />We discuss the importance of PLAY in creativity and how we all have innate creativity.<br />We discover Courtney’s favorite way to do business planning and marketing planning to get great results while staying sane (!)<br />Courtney tells us the biggest mistake she sees entrepreneurs make and a simple strategy to avoid it.<br /><br />Courtney Smith Kramer is an accomplished creative strategist, storyteller, writer and designer, she has earned hundreds of creative awards, and her work has been featured in the Print International Design Annual. She has served as a juror for the ADDY Awards, W3 Awards, Davey Awards and the National Student Advertising Competition (NSAC), and is a former board member for the American Advertising Federation (AAF) and World Brand Congress.<br />Courtney has founded two companies with husband Bryan Kramer; Silicon Valley marketing consultancy purematter, and H2H (or Human-to-Human) Companies. Together, they launched the H2H Growth Accelerator, a 12-week hybrid program that helps entrepreneurs recover from burnout in their own businesses.<br />In her career, she has built campaigns for global brands like Plantronics, Cisco, Pitney Bowes, MasterCard, International Culinary Center, IBM and Netflix DVD.com, to name a few. She most recently completed a 4-year tenure as Global Head of Marketing for the Co-Active Training Institute.<br />Her first book, “Be Your Creative Sexy Self: Humorous Stories to Help You Live a Happier Life” launched in July, 2020 at