Go Read Your Company's Earliest Marketing

When was the last time you looked at the old or original marketing your company put out? Especially if you're a new CMO, go take a look at the first things the company made.

Here's what you're looking for. It won't be as polished as what you use today, but it should have an energy and a story you probably don't tell anymore. Over time, a company's messaging gets sanded down. A lot of people have input, and it takes on a committee feel. What you end up with is more professional, sure, but more sterile than what you did when you were newer and scrappier, more interested in breaking things down and getting through doors.

In my experience, B2C companies keep a library and go back to earlier work from time to time to rethink it, reimagine it, recycle it. B2B companies never do this, and I don't know why.

Your early stuff is probably more amateurish and less surgically precise. It probably also had a vigor and an attitude you should copy, or get back to.