Advising Industries on How to Make Technology Personal: SmartMark Communications

With more than two decades of expertise driving successful innovation strategies for the world’s leading technology companies, SmartMark Communications is no stranger to innovation. “The recipe for true innovation is a good understanding of the core challenges facing an industry matched with cutting edge technology applications. Mix that with a little bit of fearlessness and you have innovation,” said Juliet Shavit, President and CEO of SmartMark Communications.

This appreciation for deep industry knowledge coupled with fearlessness is exactly what has allowed SmartMark Communications to earn a reputation as an important influencer and change agent in the industries it works in. Whether that is helping telecommunications service and solutions providers understand that their technologies solve real-world problems outside their own network-centric market or helping utilities engineers and policy makers understand that customers play a role in technology acceptance and adoption, SmartMark has been on the frontlines of the most important transformations of the past two decades.

SMART CITIES START WITH SMART PEOPLE

Shavit was one of the early voices calling for increased collaboration between the telecom and utilities industries. Having spent more than a decade in both industries, the SmartMark CEO found her passion in the motivating forces behind digital transformation – the customer. She felt strongly that while both industries were undergoing massive investments in networking infrastructure to improve service delivery, it was inevitable that those agendas would converge. Both would only benefit from shared learnings.

“At the end of the day, networks needed to serve a purpose and the ultimate purpose for both industries was to improve the well-being of customers,” said Shavit. That is when SmartMark became vocal about the importance of infrastructure investments with a purpose. “What was the purpose of building smart cities without smart customers? Wasn’t the goal of these large scale investments to improve quality of life? If so, then customers had a role to play,” she argued.

PEOPLE AT THE CENTER OF THE GRID

Similarly, Shavit has been echoing a similar message in the utilities industry. Having worked with large energy companies on the introduction of smart metering technology, SmartMark emerged as a leading voice in the smart grid customer education conversation, ultimately establishing an industry working group for the U.S. Department of Energy on the subject. This passion for getting to the heart of innovation investment has shaped the last decade of SmartMark’s agenda.

A COMPANY’S EVOLUTION

But the company did not start off shaping policy. The company itself has undergone its own transformation. Staring off as a communications and public relations firm for high-tech startups in telecom, the company was exposed to all stages of corporate and solutions maturity. This appreciation for cutting past the marketing to the core value proposition is what has propelled the company into the larger industry dialogue about sustainable investments.

“We solve real world problems,” said Meredith Salefski, an Account Manager with the Company. “We see past the PR and slick marketing to get to the core of what problem the company or technology is trying to solve.”

Shavit agrees. “We come in and ask ‘so what?’ If the latest technology, product, or solution doesn’t impact our lives for the better, then it’s doomed to failure. On the flip side, sometimes companies and organizations need a little helping pulling out that compelling value proposition.”

This litmus test has helped the Company and its CEO serve as advisors to local and Federal government as well as State policy makers in areas related to technology and innovation investment. The Company also conducts annual market research to ensure that its recommendations are derived from real data.

A PASSION TO CHANGE THE WORLD

Then there is the passion that drives the company and has helped put it on this list of most influential companies. “Our culture has its own fearlessness,” said Dylan Randall, Head of Digital Strategies for the Company. “We’ve worked with NASA, the US Government, Disneyworld, and Universal Music. The common denominator is trust, in-depth understanding of industry transformation and the importance of the customer in technology decision making. Of course, we have a great deal of fun along the way.”

Daniel Lange, Lead Designer for the Company echoes this: “Our company is agile, and we do what we need to do. We have the capacity to roll out a technology pilot with a utility or we can build a virtual reality experience for them at a conference. But the difference between our company and other communications and marketing firms is that we are strategists. We build fun tools and demonstrate cool technologies with a purpose — to tell a story.”

“One that is guaranteed to change our world for the better,” Shavit adds.

About SmartMark Communications

SmartMark Communications has redefined the role of traditional marketing communications companies and uses a blend of industry knowledge and business strategy to help organizations—public, private and not for profit—shape industry. This unique blend of policy, communications and creative expertise is a critical component to successful storytelling. SmartMark’s passionate interest and deep domain expertise in the industries it serves has allowed it to emerge as a leader in the conversation around innovation, technology adoption and transformation. To learn more visit www.smartmarkglobal.com

Meet the luminary: Juliet Shavit, President and CEO

Juliet Shavit is the President and CEO of SmartMark Communications, LLC a global leader in strategic communications and customer experience. For more than two decades, she has been at the forefront of conversation around technology innovation and the impact of those decisions on industry transformation. She has been an active force in redefining the role of communications strategy, underscoring the value of education for stakeholders and consumers in large scale infrastructure and technology investments.

Shavit has been widely recognized for her contributions to the energy and communications industries. She was instrumental in founding the DOE Smart Grid Customer Education Working Group and is the founder of the Smart Grid Customer Education Symposium. She has been called “The Smart Grid Queen” by European Communications magazine and has been the keynote speaker in global conferences on energy, consumer electronics, music, IoT and technology.

Juliet is also proud of founding the organization, MusiComms, which brings together the music, energy, and communications industries to collaborate on future distribution and monetization models for music.