Posts tagged McGowan

What a candidate can teach us about brand

Everyone who relies on Facebook and other social media sites to market their brand and news needs to keep things fresh. That’s why I enjoy working with the McGowan for Maine campaign. I did some work with them in December and got some portraits of an active-looking Pat McGowan at his Hallowell home. Back then, the entire campaign could fit around his kitchen table. Things have changed, and he’s worked hard to get to the point he is at now. Trouble is, a portrait showing a foot of snow doesn’t fly when the thermometer is knocking on 90 degrees. So, we got a whole new round of portraits and other images for the campaign that’ll work well for them for a long time to come. It’s been great working with McGowan…but how does he get the energy?

Pat McGowan of McGowan for Maine

The campaign starts here…

December is supposed to be a slow month, but for me it turned out to be the busiest month of the year. Since much of that turned out to be business-related, that’s not such a bad thing. Of course, there were a couple of hitches thrown in….more on my saga to find a new vehicle to replace my dead 4Runner later…but it’s been a great end to a pretty amazing year in our new studio.
One of the coolest things I’ve been doing has been my involvement with the McGowan for Maine campaign. Pat McGowan announced his candidacy for governor earlier this week. He also launched his new website, designed by my friend and talented web designer Kevin Brooks, and staged the Social Media equivalent of the Blitz (what the blog Maine Politics called, “McGowapalooza”) with the launch of Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and Facebook Pages dedicated to his run.
These days, you have to have a consistent look and feel across not only your website and printed materials, but also on social media platforms. This obviously extends to your image, which is where I come in. I was called in to help with Pat’s photos by campaign manager Brandon Maheu. We tossed around a lot of ideas, and timing was a factor–so we decided was that we’d try for a variety of environmental portraits shot in and around his home. To me this was the best choice–it allowed Pat to be comfortable, on his home turf, which translated into a more relaxed, natural and genuine set of images. I think Pat nailed it. Good luck this year!