Client: Ki Meishon
Sample media brief
I have followed the KM brand since 2019, witnessing its transformation from one service (famous knotless hair braiding) to another (energy healing), and watching it bloom into the flourishing lifestyle brand that it is today. I recently had the opportunity to connect with its founder and chief visionary, Kionna, and listen as she told her brand story, which is literally a reflection of her own life, growth, and healing. That, in addition to observing (through @ki.meishon) the impact that Kionna has on her clients and customers, made it easy to write about the brand that truly cannot be explained, only experienced — Ki Meishon. Designed in Canva, this media brief was written to inspire possibilities for future PR efforts for the KM brand.
Retail branding
The KM brand prides itself in creating handcrafted and intentionally sourced products (and services) that bring balance to the mind, body, and soul. Over time, the KM brand has experimented with a variety of product types, ingredients, and packaging — reorienting itself as many times as necessary to provide a wholistic offering that speaks from the heart of the brand to the soul of its customers. Every product within this line is a hit, but there is something different about the candles. Due to their rich, long-lasting scent, and unique crafting, customers love every candle that has ever dropped on the site. But Ki has settled on a final 9-candle collection that KM will carry throughout its lifetime. Each candle serves as a deeply reverent representation of her brand and life story. Over a series of phone calls and voice recordings, I listened as Ki took me through the stories, thoughts, and emotional processes that inspired each name, scent, and ingredient of KM’s affirmation candle collection. What she wanted was a keepsake for her customers to read and relate to as they affirm themselves in candle lighting ceremony. These cards (designed by Kionna) were written from her heart, through my words.
Employer: vanderlande
Internal communications & employee engagement
My journey at Vanderlande began in 2019. I started as an Executive Assistant, and my goal was to evolve into a communications role. I began “supplementing” my administrative responsibilities by supporting internal communications initiatives within various departments, and eventually became recognized amongst the organization as a communication agent. My first official internal communications project was to spearhead the organization and development of the Vanderlande North America newsletter, which launched in January 2020. By 2021, I was promoted to Marketing & Communication Specialist, and began contributing to the design and implementation of a multilevel internal communication strategy.
My contributions included:
- Gathering content, editing, and distributing newsletter
- Designing employee resource hub in SharePoint
- Planning and executing employee engagement campaigns
- Coordinating and producing Town Halls
- Content creation (videos, video scripts, article writing)
- Conducting employee interviews
- DE&I program planning
- And more…
By 2022, ~60% of employees were engaging with the newsletter; town hall engagement increased by ~50%; and the employee resource hub was a known source for North America specific content and information.
Digital content and communication helped sustain corporate connections during the period of remote work, and when news broke about the new North America headquarters, I led a return to office campaign to help ease employees’ transition from a fully remote to hybrid working model. As a result of the multilevel internal communications plan and employee engagement efforts, interdepartmental communication increased, the successes of North American projects were shared with the global organization, executive leadership became more visible, and the overall sense of corporate community grew stronger. Below are some of my favorite internal communications projects:
We care community fair
Many of Vanderlande’s newer employees were hired during the pandemic and, due to 100% remote work, never got the opportunity to closely connect with their coworkers and truly experience Vanderlande culture. With this understanding, I led the planning and coordination of the We Care Community Fair as part of a return to office campaign (which I also led the development of) to create space to do just that. The idea behind this event was to exemplify one of Vanderlande’s Core Values — “We Care” — by creating space to for employees to make face to face connections with colleagues, learn about the resources available to them, and find opportunities for social engagement within the walls of of Vanderlande’s new North America headquarters.
I gathered representatives from each employee resource group within the NA organization and we collaborated to come up with an event concept that could spearhead a renewed sense of the “people first” culture that Vanderlande had cultivated pre-pandemic. Each group set up in various spaces within the office over a span of three days, similar to a job fair. Employees were instructed to engage with each group to get a stamp on their “passport” to be entered into a raffle to win prizes. The event turned out to be a success!
Video Content development
I created this video to be used to promote a Town Hall focused on Vanderlande’s culture. In the midst of a 100% remote work model, executives had been giving monthly business updates via virtual Town Hall meetings. The purpose of the ‘Culture’ Town Hall was to reiterate Vanderlande’s prioritization of its “people-first” culture, despite the current physical disconnect, as well as give employees an update on the company’s progress on sustainability, DE&I, and other initiatives. Having been connected to various people within various teams and departments within the organization, I identified some of Vanderlande’s most influential people leaders and drivers of culture, and reached out to them to share their experiences. Each person was happy to participate and share stories about how Vanderlande’s culture had impacted them personally as well as their personal involvement and contributions. The group joined a recorded Microsoft Teams call and snips from each person were individually highlighted in a testimonial style video. The end of the video (pictured) captured the full group in unison laughing — a true depiction of the culture at Vanderlande. The video, titled: The Adventures of Vanderlande: as told by employees, was developed in Adobe Premier Rush. The video is not shared to protect the privacy of the employees.
V.O. Scriptwriting
In 2020, the NA MarComm team developed the company’s first internal communication project commemorating International Women’s Day and Women’s History month within the company. I wrote this script, which was inspired by my experience as an employee, observation of women within various teams, and my understanding of Vanderlande’s core values. With limited resources, our team got creative and developed a visual comprising clips of footage from previously published videos. To accompany the visuals, I sourced a voiceover artist through Fiverr to read the script, and music through Audio Jungle to complete the project. In between the voice over, the voices of women serving in various roles at Vanderlande were shown in clips from previous videos. The script was purposely written to not say women until the end— to communicate that it goes without saying (or at least, it should) that women are an equally integral and invaluable part of the organization.
The value of this initiative was noticed and spread across the company. International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month has been included in Vanderlande’s global internal communication content planning ever since. The final version of this project is not available to view.
At Vanderlande, we appreciate our employees for working hard and making a difference. We recognize the value of people and take pride in those who move our business forward.
Our business relies on the minds of those who work together to promote a culture of teamwork, innovation, and success.
Our customer-focused approach to design and problem-solving helps us deliver solutions that exceed our customers’ expectations.
From corporate and support roles, to sales, engineering, and project execution, it is our people who add value to every part of what we do.
They lead with confidence, perform with pride, and offer value not only in the results, but in the personal efforts made to get the job done.
As always, and in honor of women’s month, we thank the women of Vanderlande who drive the efforts of making the impossible, possible for our customers .
Written by Ashley Kimble
Content design, curation, Writing, editing, and publishing
The largest and most impactful contribution I made to internal communications at Vanderlande was the North America Newsletter. I was granted the opportunity to spearhead this initiative in late 2019. Various steps were taken to bring this publication to fruition:
- Outline content by organizational structure
- Develop an execution plan and propose to executive leadership for approval
- Organize a team of contributors
- Create a template in inDesign
- Communicate and request content from various teams, offices, and departments across the country on a regular basis
- Gather, edit, and format content into template
- Distribute monthly/bi-monthly
The newsletter told success stories, shared project updates, and helped maintain visibility of Vanderlande’s culture and community efforts. It was a joint effort between a small team of 2-3, but we are proud to have made it happen!
Leyāzon 