How do you address a major need without insulting the profession it’s associated with?

In fact, how do you elevate the profession to attract the next generation of great leaders AND get support without making them feel like a charity case?

This week on GaFB, Alpaca Packs founder, Karen Borchert joins Ben in the studio to talk about how the brand is doing just that: making it easy to support educators while attracting, engaging, and retaining more great educators.

Growing a Fruitful Brand is back for season 2 and brand nerds, Raj Lulla and Ben Lueders are digging into what makes a brand good.

The recent blunder with the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, could result in a loss of over $44 Billion dollars in estimated brand value.

How could something like changing a name, be such a huge deal?

It’s hard to believe it’s been a full year since we introduced Growing a Fruitful Brand to the world! 40 episodes later, we’ve really enjoyed sharing our insights on how to create and grow a brand that makes the world a better place for you, your customers and your employees.

If there is one thing you can do now to un-pitch your sales pitch, it’s to ask more questions. Be relentlessly curious about your client, their problem, and their goals so you can diagnose the problem before you prescribe the solution.

What if you could win more sales without the boilerplate sales presentation? In this week's episode, Ben is joined by Brian Sooy, a Cleveland-based StoryBrand Guide. Join us for part 1 of a 2-part series where we delve into Blair Enns' Win Without Pitching Manifesto.

We sat down with Dave Kerber, founder of Cloud Copilot to chat about it on the Growing a Fruitful Brand podcast. Cloud Copilot is a fast and effective solution for businesses who run AWS (Amazon Web Services) infrastructure for their business needs.

StoryBrand Guide and Chief Strategist, Raj Lulla; and Fruitful Founder, and Principle Designer, Ben Lueders were joined by StoryBrand expert, Dr. J.J. Peterson for a special live podcast recording. In the episode, Dr. J.J. Peterson gives his insight into what the next 10 years of marketing will look like in a world of AI and automation.

Shonna Dorsey is an Omaha native working to grow tech jobs in Nebraska along with other big Omaha names, like Jeff Slobotski, who are moving the needle on Nebraska’s tech scene. Dorsey has leveraged her personal brand of being a connector (and lover of karaoke) to develop her professional brand and career in tech.

In case you missed it, Apple held its annual World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) keynote on Monday. It’s no secret that we are big fans (nerds) of Apple products here in the world of graphic design.

There is a debate going on that you may not even be aware of: Squarespace or Wordpress?

As a design and branding agency that works with small businesses and nonprofits, we recommend Squarespace to 90% of our clients.

Here’s why we prefer Squarespace for small businesses.

This month, Google hosted its annual Google I/O conference in Mountain View California. The major theme of the conference: Google’s “bold and responsible” approach to Artificial Intelligence, especially in the workplace. Google’s I/O update was full of announcements that will affect your business.

Don’t worry, we did the work for you and came up with our top 3 list of what to pay attention to for your business.

This year, Fruitful is celebrating 10 years of creating and launching dreams, ideas, and brands. From Ben’s basement to the hallowed halls of the former headquarters of Omaha’s Flywheel... In this week’s episode of GaFB, Ben Lueders is unpacking some of the lessons he learned during his journey growing Fruitful Design & Strategy.

Have you ever thought about how the design choices you make for your business’ physical space affect your business? Or how it affects your employees; their mood, productivity and overall satisfaction with work? From how your employees feel in their work space, to the impression your clients get when they use your restroom, design matters and design tells a story.

In today's digital age, having an ADA-compliant website is more important than ever before. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was enacted in 1990 to ensure that individuals with disabilities have equal access to all areas of public life, including the Internet. Failure to comply with ADA regulations can result in costly fines and legal action, but there are many other reasons to make your website accessible to all users.

In his business accelerator programs for entrepreneurs, Dan Cumberland, founder of The Meaning Movement, poses a question to business leaders: “What do you have the greatest control over - the past, the present, or the future?”.

Access Period, a nonprofit organization based in Omaha, was founded with the goal of normalizing the conversation around period poverty. This issue, which affects one in four people who menstruate, is often overlooked and ignored despite its impact on education, career, and overall wellbeing.

As a business, it can be tempting to say “yes” to everything and try to appeal to a broad audience. You may not even realize you’re doing it.

However, doing so can lead to confusion among your audience and a lack of clarity about what exactly you offer. At Fruitful, we learned this lesson the hard way.

As Q1 of the year comes to a close, it's a good time to check in on your marketing efforts. Are you taking steps to get personal and genuinely connect with your audience? Are you having conversations and meeting face-to-face? Or are you relying solely on automated emails and impersonal strategies?

Change is the only constant in business. In this episode, Kate Johnson unpacks the implications of external change, and internal change, and how our expectations and preconceived opinions dictate how we respond to and lead through change.

Tim Schurrer’s name is associated with success. With a resume that boasts recognizable brand names like Apple Inc. and TOMS, it’s hard to imagine Schurrer defining success any other way.