A message from our president

Hi there. This is Todd, and no, that's not me in the image. That's actually the point of this blog today... IMAGE. At Split Media, we operate in mainly three states; Missouri, Illinois and New York, but have clients in all but three. We also have several foreign companies that we work with in other countries. What that means for us, is that there are a whole lot of people that love us, and a whole lot more that hate us. "Why would anyone hate Split?????" Beats me. We don't attack our competition, we don't talk poorly about past clients or team members and we certainly don't troll the internet looking for "gotcha" moments to embarrass  a company.  But, that's what happened to us yesterday, and while I normally just say "haters gonna hate"; this one pissed me off. 

So what happened? Our post yesterday on our social platforms came out of the NYC office (this doesn't happen very often) and had to do with our summer intern campaign, and how we weren't expecting as many interested students to apply. We used an image (as we almost always do) from one of the many, many stock libraries that we subscribe to instead of using an actual image from the chaos that was our office for the last two days. Because it's social media, and because we're promoting an image, MY policy is to only post "real" pictures if we have permission from the subject(s). And I'm glad we always ask, because almost NONE of the almost 60 daily team members that we work with, actually want to be seen. They just don't. And that's their right. But here's the deal...

Some ASSHAT decided to track down the image we used and post it all over social media and our page trying to make the point that we use stock images? Or that we weren't being honest by not calling it out? I have no idea what her point was, but she's an idiot. We almost NEVER show our real people or team members. We do this for a reason, and while I don't feel like I should have to explain... I will. 

Anyone that's ever worked at an agency understands the massive amount of poaching and turnover that happens. I have worked at several agencies and have seen past employees get hurt, angry, used, made fun of.... you name it; because their images were used on the company's social media pages.

Not at Split. 

I'm not going to let that happen. The NUMBER ONE reason is because of an incident in which a very violent ex-husband tracked down a team member because he saw a promoted post, featuring his ex wife, on the agencies Facebook page. She got hurt. Bad. 

It was at that moment that I made it company policy to never use a real image without permission. But I guess the larger question is "who cares"? We always use images that are about as true to life as possible. Just because we show "A" pizza party, doesn't mean that we didn't have one. 

At Split, our company culture is very important to us. But it's OUR culture. Not yours. Sure, other agencies can show or not show whatever they'd like. I'm not concerned with other agencies. If we have a client or potential client that doesn't like the images we use, or is "misled" by the fact that we use stock images in an office that they're never going to see.... so be it. We are not the typical digital marketing agency. 

Every image we use is real to us, because they DO reflect our culture. They DO reflect our team. They DO reflect our values. But just like any TV show that's based on real life; they never show the real people to protect their identities. Same here. If you don't like it, look at the image above. It's stock. 

Todd